Tt 2014 11 22 by Jurco Smotrych

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saturday november 22 2014 | thetimes.co.uk | no 71361

The hills are alive ... with the sights of Salzburg

Austria’s baroque beauty Page 49

Labour row deepens after MP’s ‘flag sneer’

MARK HARRISON FOR THE TIMES

IN THE NEWS Mandela widow attacks Africa over ebola crisis Graca Machel, the widow of the former South African president Nelson Mandela, has said that African leaders had learnt no lessons from the HIV pandemic and were completely unprepared when ebola struck. Mrs Machel, who is also the widow of the president of Mozambique, asked why Africa relied on help from America and Britain whenever a crisis struck the continent. Page 31

Oil protest succeeds Conservationists have convinced a US oil and gas company to cancel plans to hack through east Africa’s largest coastal forest amid fears that it would make rare wildlife extinct and devastate local people’s livelihoods. Page 36

Poll tweet takes the heat off defeated Tories

Francis Elliott Political Editor Laura Pitel Political Correspondent

The Labour frontbencher who appeared to mock a house draped with England flags before the Rochester & Strood by-election was sacked by Ed Miliband after initially refusing to apologise, The Times understands. Mr Miliband spent yesterday trying to limit the fallout after Emily Thornberry tweeted a picture of the house with a white van parked outside and captioned it “Image from #Rochester”. Despite a storm of protest, the shadow attorney-general told the Labour leader that she had done nothing wrong when he first called to confront her, and had to be instructed to apologise, senior sources said. Although Mr Miliband later dismissed her, the dispute put Labour, not the Tories, under the spotlight after Ukip’s victory in the by-election. Nigel Farage’s party described the incident as Mr Miliband’s “Gillian Duffy” moment — a reference to Gordon Brown’s clash with a voter he later called a “bigoted woman” on the 2010 campaign trail — and said it would speed the collapse of Labour’s support in traditional working-class areas. The row helped David Cameron to make light of the loss of a seat that the Conservatives won in 2010 with almost 50 per cent of the vote and which he had

said he was “absolutely determined” to hold after the defection of Mark Reckless. Mr Reckless held the seat for Ukip with 42 per cent of the vote, seven points ahead of the Tories. Labour came third and the Greens beat the Liberal Democrats into a distant fifth with 349 votes — the party’s lowest showing in a parliamentary election. Labour had hoped that a second successive by-election defeat for Mr Cameron would spark Tory panic, but instead found its own ability to connect with voters under scrutiny. Asked what went through his mind when he saw a white van outside a house with England flags, Mr Miliband said: “What goes through my mind is respect — respect is a basic rule of politics and I’m afraid her tweet conveyed a sense of disrespect. It gave the wrong view about the Labour party, it conveyed a sense of disrespect and that’s why she resigned.” Douglas Alexander, Labour’s chief election strategist, appeared last night to suggest that voters did not recognise themselves in the party’s leadership. He said in a speech that the party would have to use its full “breadth and talent . . . because we need to be seen to look like and reflect the country that we aspire to lead”. Mr Farage delivered a further blow to Continued on page 2, col 5

Czech leader’s defiance Miloš Zeman, the maverick Czech president, has invited President Putin to Prague in defiance of street protests last week in which he was pelted with eggs after he defended Russia’s actions in Ukraine. Page 32

Cosby sex attack claims A total of nine women have made public allegations of sexual assault against Bill Cosby, the American actor and comedian. New details have emerged about inquiries into claims by one woman that she was molested in 2004. Page 33

Inside today

World’s fortune is in the hands of one-childd families Pages 34, 35

Exclusive interview Love, lies and life with Le Président, by Valérie Trierweiler

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News INSIDE TODAY

Hugo Rifkind

Julien Blanc gives pick-up artists like me a bad name Opinion, page 18

Weekend The good grains guide: many carbs have strong health benefits Ian Marber, page 48

Philip Aldrick

If the economy is to strike the right balance, sterling will have to fall Business, page 67

Sport

Lewis Hamilton is all alone in his date with F1 destiny Kevin Eason, pages 80, 81

Opinion 17 Weather 17 Leading articles 20 Letters 21 Cartoon 22 World 30-36 Weekend 37-53 Business 63 Markets 70, 71 Register 72 Sport 76 Crosswords 60, 96 Please note, some sections of The Times are available only in the United Kingdom and Ireland

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

More patients wait on trolleys as crisis looms in A&E units Chris Smyth Health Correspondent

The NHS is heading into an A&E crisis even before winter has begun, patient leaders said after figures showed that thousands more people waited more than four hours to be seen last week. Emergency units are overflowing and thousands of patients are enduring long waits on trolleys because hospitals are too full to admit them, official data showed yesterday. The worsening performance will alarm ministers, who are pouring £700 million into the A&E system in a desperate attempt to prevent a catastrophe months before the general election. More patients are waiting too long than at any time since April last year, when doctors likened hospitals to war zones. Last week 92.9 per cent of A&E patients were seen within four hours, the seventh consecutive week that the NHS has missed the target of seeing 95 per cent patients within this time. The picture is even grimmer in large units, which have not reached this level for more than a year. There has also been a sharp rise in

patients waiting more than four hours waiting to be admitted to a hospital bed, with 6,587 such “trolley waits” last week, twice the level at this time last year. Katherine Murphy, chief executive of the Patients Association, said: “This paints a very bleak picture of an NHS in crisis, when we haven’t even had the winter pressures yet. Patients must not suffer as a result of financial pressures from management. Care cannot and should not be compromised.” Health chiefs blamed a record number of patients needing emergency admission for the figures, which reached 108,301 last week, the highest total since weekly data began in 2010. Sarah Pinto-Duschinsky, director of operations for NHS England, said the health service was “pulling out all the stops to meet rising demand”, and urged patients with minor ailments to visit a pharmacist or call NHS 111 rather than go to A&E. She said: “This past week saw continued increases in the number of patients seeking care — 2,300 more emergency admissions than the week before, and almost 6,000 up on the

same week this time last year. This is the highest number of emergency admissions since publication of weekly data began in November 2010. A&E attendances are also rising, at 429,200 this week up from 418,300 the previous week, and a sharp increase of 22,000 for the same week last year.” Andy Burnham, the shadow health secretary, said: “Hospitals in all parts of England are struggling to cope. This Tory-led government pushed elderly care services to the brink, leaving people turning to A&E. Whole hospitals are being overwhelmed.” Figures this week suggested that “bed blocking” was at record levels, as hospitals struggle to discharge elderly patients because of a lack of social care support at home. Senior doctors are concerned that wards are already filling up, leaving little capacity for winter. Chris Hopson, chief executive of the Foundation Trust Network, said hospitals were so fragile that a “small gust of wind” like the closure of a local nursing home could cause them to miss crucial targets. The Department of Health said: “The NHS is performing well despite unprecedented demand.”

GPs are urged to merge small surgeries Chris Smyth

Doctors’ leaders have called for an end to small, stand-alone GP surgeries as they aim to sweep away the institutions and attitudes of a “bygone era”. Maureen Baker, president of the Royal College of GPs, said it was time to move Dr Finlay into the modern world by encouraging small surgeries to form chains, franchises or other links that would allow them to offer patients more services such as tests, counselling and weekend appointments. Doctors need to listen to their patients properly in order to make more

personal decisions, rather than talking down to them or mechanically following clinical guidance, she said. A reportby the college calls for a “revolution” in the way the family doctor network is organised, saying the present NHS system is ill-suited to a world in which patients have several long-term illnesses, use computers, and expect to make decisions about their own care. Mike Farrar, the veteran NHS manager who led the report, said there needed to be a “seismic shift” both in how services were organised and in how doctors talked to their patients.

“We need a transformation in the way general practice is delivered,” he said. Medicine has yet to adapt to a world where many patients have several longterm conditions and may be taking many drugs, the report says. Dr Baker said GPs needed to take this into account rather than automatically following guidelines for specific diseases. Some surgeries would form chains or “mega-partnerships” to offer patients more, she said, insisting it was vital to keep family doctors “embedded in the community” . . . while also finding ways to share back office functions, equipment and staff.

Sturgeon appoints women Labour fails to to senior roles in reshuffle halt dispute Hamish Macdonell

Nicola Sturgeon announced a new Scottish cabinet yesterday, which is split equally between men and women. On her first full day as first minister, Ms Sturgeon rewarded her supporters with key posts, and replaced some of Alex Salmond’s most trusted allies with a new generation of female ministers. Kenny MacAskill and Michael Russell — both of whom have long been close to Mr Salmond, Ms Sturgeon’s predecessor — were the main casualties. The justice and education secretaries both left government completely and will return to the backbenches. Many observers expected Alex Neil, the health secretary, to be removed from the cabinet, but he was given the social justice, communities and pensioners’ rights portfolio. Instead, Ms Sturgeon brought in Shona Robison, for the health brief, and Roseanna Cunningham to become secretary for fair work, skills and training. Commentators described the new cabinet as a move to the left for Holyrood. Ms Sturgeon said that the new cabinet would tackle poverty and promote social justice. Other women to benefit from Ms Sturgeon’s reshuffle included Angela

Constance, who has been given the education portfolio, and Fiona Hyslop, who will stay on in charge of culture, Europe and foreign affairs. John Swinney was the only senior member of Mr Salmond’s team to remain in his post. He will continue to look after finance and the economy but will also become deputy first minister. Ms Sturgeon, the first woman to hold the post of Scottish first minister, defended her decision to pick a genderbalanced cabinet, insisting that all the ministers had been picked on merit. “I said earlier this week that we will [be] leading by example on equal representation, and encourage others to follow by addressing low pay and improving childcare,” the first minister said. However, Willie Rennie, the Scottish Liberal Democrat leader, said that the cabinet needed a new approach. “Nicola Sturgeon likes to talk liberal, but the real test is whether she’ll walk liberal,” Mr Rennie said. The first minister also denied that she had ousted Mr MacAskill and Mr Russell — both of whom had been widely expected to be axed from Ms Sturgeon’s first ministerial team. Ms Sturgeon claimed that both men had left of their own accord. “They indicated they wanted to step down from ministerial office,” she said.

over flag tweet

Continued from page 1

Labour with the revelation that Mr Reckless’s victory was thanks in part to the support of many of the party’s former voters in the Strood area of the constituency. “We didn’t win in Rochester,” he said. “We won very well in Strood and we did that by picking up a lump of Labour votes.” Party sources said that their vote had been “hammered” in Rochester, which is home to many London commuters and was worked hard by the Conservatives. The Tories also suffered losses, however, with Ukip performing strongly in the rural Hoo Peninsula. The Ukip leader faced his own problems as Mr Reckless broke cover after his victory to accuse him of changing policy over EU migrants. The MP said that he had been sticking to the party line when he told a campaign hustings that Eastern European workers would be able to stay for a transitional period if Britain voted to quit the EU, suggesting that they could later be forced to leave. Ms Thornberry was not available for comment. Labour declined to confirm the account of the conversations with Mr Miliband. By-election special, News, pages 6-9 Leading article, page 20

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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News

Crowds line up behind women to taste success The TV Dragons give more money to men than to women, but that is a big mistake, Jack Malvern writes Who would be a female entrepreneur? Only 3 per cent of projects funded by venture capitalists are led by women, and even on Dragons' Den the investors make more than twice as many offers to men than to women. The received wisdom is that men make better entrepreneurs, but this has been confounded by a study of projects launched on Kickstarter, the crowdfunding website that allows people to pitch ideas to the public and offer rewards for donations. Analysis by The Times of 3,225 projects launched on the site from Britain showed that women exceeded their targets more than a third of the time. The success rate for men was less than one in four. Reaching targets is critical for the site because those who fail receive no money. Women who found success on Kickstarter suggested that the results exposed prejudice among venture capitalists, most of whom are male, but also indicated that women were better at engaging community support. The findings, supported figures

produced by a study of US Kickstarter ventures. Jason Greenberg, of New York University, found that women had a 37 per cent success rate compared with 32 per cent for men. When he and Ethan Mollick, of the University of Pennsylvania, broke down the results they found that women beat men in every category and had the biggest lead in technology projects: a success rate of 65 per cent compared with 30 per cent for men. Amanda Palmer, an American rock star who used Kickstarter to raise $1.2 million (£770,000) for her album Theatre is Evil, said that the beauty of crowdfunding was its ability to circumvent investors with sexist attitudes. “It’s a lot about who will help you and there’s a lot of ingrained sexism about who will vouch for you,” she said. The singer, who set a new record for a Kickstarter project, said her success stemmed from understanding what her community of supporters wanted. Her rewards for donors included an offer to come to a house party anywhere in the world in exchange for $5,000. She ended up going to 33 parties in Australia, Israel, Canada, Britain and Amer-

STUART HOLDSWORTH

Lucy Sparrow raised £10,000 to stock fabric replicas of brands; below, Amanda Palmer raised $1.2 million

Bad for business

t least £250 million of broken British dreams have met their demise on the Kickstarter crowdsourcing website, with over 6,000 projects failing to get funding. One user sought £160,000 to win an auction to play tennis with David Cameron and Boris Johnson, so he could “tell them both what people really

think of them”. He raised only £14. One of the most ambitious failed projects, in financial terms, was launched by Grant Hopkins from Newcastle, who wanted £3 million to make a comedy about students struggling to make a pornographic film. It failed to raise £1, as did a £10,000 project called Carottetes, which wanted to put sticks of carrot into

cigarette-style packs with humorous warning messages. Another was Showerlebrity, which wanted £54,000 to design shower curtains with a television-shaped clear window to make it look like users were on TV while singing in the shower. One punter, named only as John from Brighton, wanted just £20 to experiment with freezing eggs and then frying them to see what shape they would come out. He received nothing.

ica and still has one more to attend, in South Africa. “I think women are fantastic at harnessing their communities, because we have to be. There is a traditional female ability to juggle work, children, family and friends. I don’t know whether it’s in our DNA or we’re just culturally handed that job — because it’s our job to write the Christmas cards. Creating a crowdfunding project is just a higher level way of harnessing a community.” She used her expereince to write The Art of Asking, a handbook for people who need to be braver about asking for help. She found that women often create Kickstarter projects because they have been encouraged to do so by riends., and that men made the mistake of thinking that success lay in the originality of an idea, rather than a wide social circle. Julie Wood, of Kickstarter, said: “It could be that people are judging projects, without caring about creators' identities.”

Love me, Tinder. Middle-aged are turning to youngsters’ dating website Georgie Keate

First they danced at weddings, then they joined Facebook, Now, in a final effort to embarrass the kids, the middle aged are signing up to dating app popular with teenagers. Tinder proved an instant hit with young people keen for casual encounters. Now the app, which is free to download, has seen the number of mid-

dle-age users double since April. Only eight months ago, the 35 to 44 age group made up 6.5 per cent of the app’s users — since then it has surged to 12 per cent. Three per cent of users are aged between 45 and 54. Willard Foxton, 34, a dating blogger and technology writer, said that the 35 to 44 age group was often made up of those who “do not want to take dating too seriously”. The app enables users to

sign up in seconds and does not require long profiles, only a first name, age and several photos. “It’s frictionless, that’s why people like to use it so much,” Mr Foxton said. “It always takes the older generation a bit of time to catch on to new technology, so the increase in users for the 35 to 44 age group is probably because of that. The 35-year-olds are the last digital immigrants, the last age group

who were adults before the internet was properly mainstream. Think about Facebook, it used to be just young people, and now your mum and dad have joined too.” Lena Semaan, 52, a Tinder user who often writes about her dating experiences, said the “older the age group” on the app, “the poorer the quality”. “As a woman using it, most of the middleaged men are of the divorced, entitled

type,” she said. “The ones who have split up from their wife and say they have nothing good to say about the last 20 years except their children. It means they generally want to have sex with as many women as possible, and preferably ones much younger than them.” She added that any middle-aged person who was serious about finding a relationship would pay up to £40 a month to be a member of a dating website. .”

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

News BOB SMALL / MEDIA DRUM WORLD

Death is inevitable, says British hostage The British hostage John Cantlie says he has accepted that his death is “inevitable”. Speaking in the latest in a series of videos released by his captors, Islamic State, he condemns the British government’s refusal to negotiate for his release. The 44-year-old hostage was captured two years ago today, and has become a prominent figure in the Isis propaganda machine. He also spoke yesterday of a failed rescue attempt spearheaded by American forces in June, and condemned Britain and the US for choosing a military response. However, it is impossible to tell how much of his videos are scripted by his captors and how much he has written himself.

Police officer faces jail An undercover police officer was told to expect a prison term when he is sentenced next month for switching the numberplates on his car in an attempt to avoid paying a £60 speeding fine. Cardiff Crown Court was told that Sergeant Anthony Rees-Thompson, 40, of Swansea, had overlooked the fact that his silver Vauxhall Corsa was being filmed every day as he drove it into police headquarters in Bridgend. The jury took less than one hour to find him guilty of perverting the course of justice.

Ex-Ukip MEP in court Mendips mist An extra blanket is just the thing as it turns colder, though perhaps not made of the mist seen this week in the Mendip Hills of Somerset. Forecast, page 17

Muslim schools may be shut over fears for child welfare Nicola Woolcock Education Correspondent

Inspection reports: then and now

Nicky Morgan, the education secretary, has threatened to shut six independent Muslim schools found to be inadequate by Ofsted inspectors who had concerns over children’s welfare. At one school, the designated child protection officer was unaware he held the post. In another pupils told inspectors that women stay at home to clean and cook. At a third, girls had to wait for boys and male teachers to return from the mosque before their lessons began. Sir Michael Wilshaw, the head of Ofsted, said: “I am extremely concerned about the large number of failings in each of the six independent schools inspected.” Mrs Morgan asked Ofsted to carry out the inspections after evidence of the failings of the schools, all in Tower Hamlets, east London, was passed to her department. She said: “While there is no suggestion of a coordinated plot, it is clear that these schools are failing children and this is unacceptable. All schools must prepare children for life in modern Britain. We will now be demanding urgent action plans from the independent schools and expect to see improvements within weeks. If changes are not made then we reserve the right to force the closures.” The inspections came in the wake of the Trojan Horse affair in Birmingham, in which Muslim governors and

Ebrahim Academy, secondary school for boys 2011 Satisfactory and making good progress. There are sound policies, procedures and systems in place to safeguard students. 2014 Procedures to safeguard students are inadequate. Induction of new staff is ineffective and not all members of staff have received appropriate training in child protection. London East Academy, selective boys’ secondary school 2011 Good quality of education and successfully meeting its aims. The school has robust procedures for safeguarding. Students’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is outstanding.

2014 Inadequate. The school’s work to keep students safe is inadequate . . . Parts of the building are open to members of the public, allowing them to have unauthorised access to students and staff. Students’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development is weak. Al Mizan School, selective boys’ primary school 2011 Rated good. The quality of the curriculum is good, broad and balanced. Outstanding provision is made for the memorisation of the Koran. Teaching and assessment are good. Quality of teaching seen during the inspection was consistently good. Teachers have very good subject knowledge. The school is situated in the east London

Mosque and has access to some of its and the London Muslim Centre’s wider learning facilities. The premises provide both good quality accommodation and a safe learning environment. 2014 Inadequate. The curriculum is too narrow. Teaching is inadequate. Classroom resources are poor. Work is not marked adequately. A fifth of pupils do not attend school regularly. Pupils do not get a broad range of experiences to help prepare them for life in modern Britain. Teachers do not have sufficient knowledge to teach different subjects effectively. The school’s work to keep pupils safe and secure is inadequate. Some fire exits are chained shut during the day and no first aid room is available.

parents at several schools attempted to force out head teachers. The reports raise questions about Ofsted’s consistency — of the six schools now rated inadequate, one was previously judged outstanding, three were good and two were satisfactory. Two were inspected last year and three of the earlier inspections were conducted by the same Muslim inspector. Sir Michael, in an advice note to Mrs Morgan, said statutory background checks on staff had not been completed in four of the six schools. In all six, policies relating to welfare, health and safety were missing or out of date. He said: “Three of the schools are sited within mosques. In all three, access to the school was insecure. “In another, the school shared an entrance with a café, giving members of the public open access to the school.” Each of the schools taught a narrow curriculum, focusing intensively on developing Islamic knowledge at the expense of core subjects, he said. An Ofsted report published yesterday said that a previously outstanding Church of England school failed by inspectors had not vetted visiting speakers or taught children about the risks posed by extremism. Sir John Cass School in Stepney, east London, had excellent results, the education regulator reported. It was placed in special measures because of the behaviour and safety of students. The school has more than 90 per cent Muslim pupils.

A former Ukip MEP has appeared in court over an alleged expenses fraud. Ashley Mote, 78, of Binstead, Hampshire, faces nine fraud charges over the alleged abuse of his expenses while he was an MEP for southeast England. He served for five years before resigning in 2009 and it is claimed that the offences stretched throughout his time in office. Mr Mote appeared at Inner London Crown Court, where the prosecution asked Mr Justice Sweeney for more time to finalise their case against him.

Car driven on runway A car thief has been jailed for three years and eight months after driving a stolen car through a fence and on to an airport runway. In August Matthew Dobson, 40, stole a Renault Clio in Grimsby and was chased by police through rush-hour traffic to Humberside airport. He drove through a mesh fence and on to a runway, forcing a passenger aircraft to circle as its fuel ran low. Dobson pleaded guilty at Grimsby crown court to burglary, driving offences and recklessly endangering an aircraft.

“You’re a hardened cybercriminal”

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Two removal men killed in balcony collapse Emily Hall

An MP has called for an investigation after two removal men were killed as they tried to hoist a sofa over a 30ft balcony in one of London’s most expensive streets. The pair were part of an eight-strong team attempting to lift the furniture into a £7 million flat in Cadogan Square, Knightsbridge, where properties can sell for up to £25 million. Both of the men who died are thought to be Polish. It appears that one or both of them fell from the balcony on to sharp railings below. Six other members of the removal team were injured when the balustrade collapsed shortly before 10am. The workers had been using ropes to pull the bulky sofa over the first floor apartment’s Victorian railings, when they gave way and crashed to the ground. Greg Hands, the Conservative MP for Chelsea & Fulham, said that a full investigation was needed to make sure health and safety procedures had been followed. Expressing sympathy for the men’s families, he said: “It is a tragedy, but the emergency services reacted quickly. It is being investigated by police and health and safety. We need

to know if proper procedures were followed and if they were, do we need to have a look at the procedures? I think the question is, was this a freak accident, was it that procedures were not followed or was there a structural problem with the building?” One of the victims is understood to have died in front of his father, who was heard screaming “He’s my son! He’s my son!” as emergency workers fought to save him. A woman who lives in the square said: “There was a man working there with his son. He was young, about 18. The police closed of all the square and they wouldn’t let the man get to his son. He was still alive and the dad was shouting: ‘He’s my son, he’s my son. He’s moving, he’s still alive.’ The father saw the son fall and he was trying to reach him. They were keeping him back.” A property next to the one where the deaths happened was obscured by scaffolding, which initially made some residents believe that someone had fallen while carrying out repairs. Other residents spoke of their shock. A woman who lives in one of the flats below said: “It’s a tragedy. These were young men, they were really nice Polish guys who died in their 20s. They had BEN CAWTHRA / LNP

Police and health and safety inspectors have been examining the balcony

Plebgate chief whip ‘was childish and overbearing’ Sean O’Neill Crime Editor

Andrew Mitchell was “childish and overbearing” when he confronted police officers at the gates of Downing Street on the night before he allegedly called them plebs, the High Court was told yesterday. The Conservative MP was allowed to cycle through the main vehicle gates on September 18, 2012, after telling police on guard that he was “the government chief whip”. The next night he was refused permission to cycle through the gates and is alleged to have responded by calling police “f***ing plebs”. PC Gareth Bonds told the linked libel trial involving Mr Mitchell, The Sun newspaper and PC Toby Rowland that he had been the senior officer at the gates 24 hours before the incident. The officer, who has 30 years of police

service, said that Mr Mitchell was told he should use the pedestrian exit. PC Bonds said: “Mr Mitchell raised his voice and stated that he was the government chief whip and that he wanted to leave via the front vehicle gates. He was politely told to use the gate at the side.” PC Bonds added that he “watched in disbelief at how childish a grown man in his position was being . . . I found Mr Mitchell’s tone overbearing.” Mr Mitchell, 58, who resigned his government post, is suing The Sun which reported the contents of a police log by PC Rowland that claims the MP swore and used the word “plebs”. PC Rowland is suing Mr Mitchell for accusing him of fabricating “toxic phrases”. The trial continues and the judge is expected to rule next Friday on the meaning of the words complained of and if they were substantially true.

One mile

LO N D O N

Hyde Park

Cadogan Square

been working on the property for the past year. I didn’t know them by name, but they would always stop and say hello and we would always smile at each other. We don’t know how the balcony gave way. The property is on

two floors, the first and second. It has been renovated completely. “They have only just started to move the furniture back in in the last week. They have been putting the big pieces in in the same way.” The woman, who refused to say who the owner was, added: “All we know is that no one has lived there for about a year. Loads of work has been done to it.” Sudarma Rajapaksha, a housekeeper, was working a few doors away when she heard screams. She said: “I was working on the top floor of a neighbouring property when a colleague began to panic. “She said ‘someone is falling’. She heard a crash. There has been scaffold-

ing up. We thought it was to do with that. “They had been moving things and fell from the balcony. At first we thought it was just one who died, but now we know it was two.” It is unclear exactly how many men were on the balcony at the time that it collapsed and how many were down below. A spokesman for London Ambulance Service said:“We treated eight people. Every effort was made to resuscitate a patient. Sadly, a man died at the scene. Six patients were treated for minor injuries, but did not go to hospital.”

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

By-election

Labour finds that beer and wine don’t mix in fallout from St George’s flag tweet

Francis Elliott Political Editor

Until 3.12pm on Thursday, Emily Thornberry was a politician with a bright future. The shadow attorneygeneral was due to spend next week in the limelight, debating the legality of the government’s new counter-terror legislation. With one arch tweet sent from a Strood street, however, Ms Thornberry blew her own career to smithereens and threatened to alienate key Labour voters. A week that had started with Ed Miliband having to defend his “mansion tax” to the singer Myleene Klass ended with him asserting the right of people to fly the flag of St George and drive white vans. The precise motives for the now infamous “Image from #Rochester” tweet are disputed. Ms Thornberry claims to have never before seen “anything like” the pictured house bedecked with England flags, outside which was parked a white panel van. Mr Miliband was among those who thought that explanation unlikely. However, Ms Thornberry, a human rights lawyer who moved into the same Islington street as the Blairs in the early 1990s, was apparently slow to realise that she had committed political suicide. “She told Ed she didn’t see any reason to apologise at first,” a senior Labour figure said yesterday. “He had to insist.” As her tweeted apology failed to calm the storm, Mr Miliband, en-

Rich lawyer from council house Profile Emily Thornberry

ady Nugee, 54, is a wealthy barrister who lives in a £2 million townhouse in London’s fashionable Islington and part-owns two other properties (Lucy Fisher writes). She may not appear to be a typical senior Labour party politician, but Emily Thornberry, as she is better known, was a leading member of the shadow cabinet up until Thursday. She does not use her title, conferred on her by her husband, the judge Sir Christopher Nugee, but was nonetheless accused of being “snobbish” by a host of critics this week after she tweeted an image of a modest terraced house covered in England flags. She was herself brought up on a council estate in Guildford, Surrey. She was raised by her mother, Sallie, a teacher who became a councillor and local mayor, after her parents divorced when she

was seven. Her father, Cedric Thornberry, was an academic and human rights lawyer. Although she failed her 11-plus, she gained admission from her secondary modern to study law at the University of Kent. It was there that she met her husband, a fellow law student, and afterwards she went on to become a human rights lawyer, known for her work in trade union and feminist campaigns. She and her husband, now a High Court judge, and their three children, became neighbours of the Blairs in 1993 after the two families moved into the same smart Islington street, Richmond Crescent, in the same week. Having joined the Labour party at 17, she unsuccessfully stood for parliament in Canterbury in 2001. She arrived at Westminster in 2005 after winning a slim majority of fewer than 500 votes in Islington South & Finsbury. A year after becoming an MP, she brought forward the bold Housing Association Bill as a private member’s bill, which aimed to improve housing

association tenants’ rights. Although she lived close to Tony Blair, she was more a loyal acolyte of Gordon Brown. In the penultimate year of the last parliament she was made a ministerial aide at the Department of Energy and Climate Change. An ally of Ed Miliband, and the first MP to back him for the Labour eadership in 2010, she was swiftly promoted at the beginning of this parliament. In 2011 she was made shadow attorney-general. Her decision to send her son to one of the best state schools outside her seat rather than to a state school in Islington was heavily criticised as a damning statement about regular comprehensive education. She later sent her daughter to the same school. She landed in hot water in 2008 after claiming that children in London are robbed “regularly” and that “hardly any” child in Islington had not been mugged at least once, a claim shot down by the police.

couraged by close allies, decided she had to go and in a second call told her she had to resign. On Friday morning, when Ms Thornberry emerged from her wellappointed town house — worth at least £2 million and therefore liable for the mansion tax — she was met by a mob of reporters. “It appears that I got it wrong. I made a mistake. I have resigned. If I have upset anyone or insulted anybody, I apologise,” she said. That expression of regret is at odds with the supportive tweets she “favourited” in the hours after her resignation, including several saying that Mr Miliband had overreacted. Among them were suggestions that the row was “ridiculously overblown” and that she had been the “victim of a febrile and stupid media climate”. Although some in Labour’s high command were sympathetic yesterday, even close friends such as the Labour MP Helen Goodman declined to give her public backing. Other colleagues were brutal. “This is an Emily Thornberry special. She’s known as a classic ‘suck up, kick down’ politician, and found she had no friends to defend her following her bizarre behaviour,” one Labour insider said. Another frontbencher said: “I’m afraid I’m not as surprised as perhaps I should be. She made that classic mistake of believing herself a commentator.” As coverage of the incident continued through the day, dismayed MPs reported to Labour whips the reaction from angry members and constituents over the tweet. “This is not a media invention: this is real,” said one, pointing to a lengthy list of furious messages on his mobile phone. The fury spread beyond the party’s Westminster representatives. The leader of Dudley council, David Sparks, who is the chairman of the Local Government Association and until recently a member of Labour’s national executive committee said that the incident would make it harder for the party to resist the squeeze on it being exerted by Ukip in England and the SNP in Scotland. “The support of people who

Emily Thornberry leaves her home in

have white vans or fly the flag of St George or the Saltire is essential to winning the election,” he said. The Thornberry affair has been characterised as illustrating a clash between Labour’s “beer drinkers” and “wine drinkers”. Coming at the end of a week in which Mr Miliband has heard London Labour MPs complain about the electoral impact of the mansion tax,

Dan the white van man hits the streets of Islington David Sanderson

Jonty Traynor shrugged. “It was a bit reckless,” he said. “It does just show how out of touch they are.” On his Islington housing estate, not far from the tree-lined avenues that typified the days of new Labour, Mr Traynor was scathing about his party. “We don’t see them round here much,” he said, pointing to the blocks of social housing. “Labour used to stand for us. Now we have lost them and they are losing us.” On another of the downtrodden estates of Emily Thornberry’s constituency, Kelly Parker, a single mother, said she was proud of the St George’s flag fluttering from her mother’s balcony. “At the end of the day, everybody has got their own culture,” Ms Parker said. “I don’t mind if I see a Somalian woman walking around with her

country’s colours. Why shouldn’t we show our flag? It’s not racist. The neighbours here don’t mind.” Islington was once deemed the spiritual home of the champagne socialist, where bankers, lawyers, successful writers and the rest of the metropolitan elite had their first home. Yet, it is also a borough that is accessible to poorer families and immigrants; it is a borough in which Labour should be easy electoral victors. Ukip secured 701 votes in Islington South & Finsbury at the last general election, which Ms Thornberry won with a 3,500 majority. Yesterday, outside the property that she shares with her husband — Sir Christopher Nugee, QC, a High Court judge — Ms Thornberry’s nemesis paid a visit. Dan Ware — the “white van man” whose house in Rochester, draped in St George’s flags, attracted Ms Thorn-

Dan Ware, whose house was snapped by Emily Thornberry, outside her home

berry’s attention — turned up on the politician’s doorstep with a flag. Ms Thornberry had, however, already cycled off to work. Mr Ware, 36, a father of four who works in the motor trade, had earlier described Ms Thornberry as a “snob”. As he posed outside her empty house, he refused requests to lighten up. “There’s nothing to smile about,” he replied. It was a sentiment common among Labour supporters in Islington yesterday. Mark Ware — no relation to Dan Ware — said that he understood Ed Miliband’s anger at Ms Thornberry, who is now former shadow attorneygeneral. “White working-class people do take pride in flying the flag, and for it to be the MP for Islington, with all its new Labour connotations, well, it couldn’t be worse could it?”

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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By-election

DAVID MIRZOEFF / NATIONAL PICTURES

Tories claim ‘good result’ and say they will reclaim seat Laura Pitel Political Correspondent

Islington yesterday. Ed Miliband demanded her resignation after she initially saw no reason to apologise for her tweet

it highlights the challenge of keeping together the party’s broad coalition of support. The incident will not change the party’s plans to tackle Ukip, say Labour strategists, but it will increase the urgency of the effort. In northern seats, such as those around Rotherham, Labour’s message is that Ukip is “more Tory than the Tories”. Activists are told to bring up

Nigel Farage’s claim to be the proper heir to Margaret Thatcher on the doorstep to bring around waverers. “It can be done but it is very resource intensive,” said one. “You literally have to deliver that message in person, house to house. It’s a huge effort and she’s just made it a whole lot more difficult.” My week, thetimes.co.uk Thunderer, page 19

The dragon slayer and his flag St George is thought to have been born in Cappadocia, in modern Turkey, in the 3rd century BC. The adoption of his legend by the English began following the Crusades. When King Edward III founded the Order of the Garter in the 14th century, it was under St George’s patronage. Soldiers were required to wear a “sign of St George” and Shakespeare refers to him in Henry V’s address before Agincourt, the year he became the country’s acknowledged patron

of English people said that they considered the flag of St George to be racist; 61 per cent associated it with pride and patriotism, compared with 80 per cent for the Union Jack.

The tweeted image of flags of St George saint. During the Blitz, the king introduced the George Cross for acts of heroism. On one side of the medal St George is depicted slaying the dragon. A survey in 2012 found that 24 per cent

Red Box

Nigel Farage has predicted that there will be no more defections to Ukip before Christmas, despite beating the Tories in Rochester & Strood to secure his second MP. In a tacit acknowledgement of the disciplined Tory response to the byelection defeat, the Ukip leader said he did not expect any MPs to follow immediately in the footsteps of Mark Reckless and Douglas Carswell. “I think they will sit and chew their teeth and have a think about things,” Mr Farage said. He added that he would be very surprised if there were not more defections before the general election, but they would be more likely to come next year. Mr Farage hinted that four northern Conservatives were among those considering making the leap. He singled out an analysis by the academic Matthew Goodwin suggesting that Martin Vickers, Nigel Mills, Chris Kelly and David Nuttall stood a better chance of retaining their seats if they switched sides. All four have previously denied that they are considering jumping ship. Although the win in the north Kent seat was a historic victory for Ukip, the result was closer than several polls had predicted. While a claim by Michael Gove, the Tory chief whip, that the party got “a very good result” was met with raised eyebrows among some of his backbenchers, unhappy MPs appear to have calculated that it was not the day to overshadow an unfortunate story for their Labour opponents. Nonetheless, the party was still nursing its wounds from a campaign that had begun with David Cameron vowing to do everything in his power to stop Ukip. The prime minister visited the seat five times and ordered his ministers to do the same, while MPs were required to make three visits as part of an effort to “love bomb” the Medway towns. The Tory offensive began with a series of

stinging attacks on Mr Reckless, which Ukip claimed had backfired. The party released a voicemail left by the Tory defector hours before he joined Ukip in which he promised to muck in on a campaigning day. Mr Cameron tried to humiliate him by calling him a “fat arse” during private events at his party’s conference, while Mr Gove accused the former Tory of lying to his face at a lunch just weeks before his defection. Later, the focus switched to policy, with a series of attack adverts designed to embarrass Mr Reckless for a U-turn over unpopular plans to build 5,000 homes on a former military site with a population of nightingales. An effort to boost voter enthusiasm for the Tory candidate led to a decision to hold an expensive open primary selection contest. Turnout was disappointing, with just 5,600 people taking part in a vote that handed victory to a local businesswoman, Kelly Tolhurst. Tory sources said they expected Ms Tolhurst to be reselected to fight the seat at the general election. They hope that by keeping Mr Reckless’s lead to 7 points, they stand a good chance of reclaiming the constituency. The MP said yesterday he thought that a last-minute Tory attack leaflet about the NHS had helped the Conservatives to narrow his margin of victory. The red and white flyer, aimed at Labour voters, read: “Revealed: Ukip’s plan to privatise the NHS.” Nowhere did it mention the Conservative name. The party was delighted by new technology that gave it live data from eight polling stations across the constituency. Sources confessed that, at midday, they feared that they were going to win the seat by as little as 1 per cent. They mobilised Mr Farage to an area in need of a boost, and believe boos that decision alone increased turnout by at least 1 per cent. The lessons from the campaign will be deployed at the general election, when Ukip will set its sights on a swathe of seats in Essex, Lincolnshire and Kent.

Clegg goes to ground after worst result Lucy Fisher

Nick Clegg kept his head down yesterday after the Liberal Democrats’ worst by-election result. The party came fifth behind the Greens in Rochester & Strood on Thursday, with fewer than 350 votes — down from 7,800 in the last general election, or less than 1 per cent of the vote, compared with almost 16 per cent in 2010. It meant that the party lost its 11th byelection deposit this parliament, having failed to get the 5 per cent minimum to secure the return of its £500 fee. The Lib Dems’ previous worst score was in Clacton last month, when they polled just 1.4 per cent. Observers were looking for answers yesterday, but Mr Clegg was nowhere to be seen. A spokesman for the deputy prime minister said he was in meetings. Asked what Mr Clegg thought of the

Lib Dems’ performance, the spokesman said: “Obviously it’s a disappointing result, but it was also a disappointing result for Labour and the Tories.” A senior party source said: “There is no hiding the fact that we scored less than 1 per cent. No one can spin that as a good result.” Tim Farron, president of the party, made light of the result, saying: “I spent quite a bit of time on the doorsteps of Rochester. I might flippantly say I met all the Liberal Democrat voters.” He told Radio 4’s World at One programme that the party enjoyed a greater degree of support in the constituency, but Lib Dems had decided to “tactically vote to keep out someone else”, a reference to Ukip. He said that the contest was a twohorse race between the anti-EU party and the Conservatives, adding that he felt “extremely sorry” for Geoff Juby,

the party’s candidate. “We weren’t able to make the case for him that he deserved,” he said. Nigel Farage said that it was partially a collapse in support for Mr Clegg that had led to Ukip’s triumph. The Ukip leader said almost two thirds of votes for Mark Reckless, his party’s candidate, came from former Lib Dem or Labour supporters. For the Green party, it was the best result in a Westminster seat since the 2010 election. Its vote share rose from 1.5 per cent in Rochester & Strood at the last election to 4.2 per cent this week. Lib Dem MPs will be watching closely to see whether Mr Clegg backs David Cameron’s proposed anti-terror measures, as rumours have suggested. Any moves to support the laws, which would allow the relocation of suspects, could risk alienating core voters who back the party for its defence of civil liberties.

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

News By-election

Reckless takes swipe at Farage Francis Elliott, Laura Pitel

Mark Reckless has accused Nigel Farage of changing Ukip policy overnight in response to a row over immigration. Just hours after becoming Ukip’s second elected MP, Mr Reckless used an interview with The Times to shed light on the chaotic nature of party management. Speaking after his victory in Rochester & Strood, he claimed that he had been in “very close contact” with Steven Woolfe, the party’s immigration

spokesman, and Mr Farage before the event at which he made controversial remarks about European migrants. He said that the Ukip leader had altered his stance only after a storm broke when he suggested that EU workers could eventually be forced to leave if Britain cut its ties with Brussels. “Until Nigel changed it on Wednesday, the policy of the party was everyone can stay for the transitional period, no doubt about that, that there would then be a permanent arrangement which would be part of the EU negotia-

tion,” he said. “The policy changed on Wednesday and I’m a bit sore about how I sort of came out of that, because I don’t actually think I said I was only talking about welcoming people of particular circumstances,” he said. “I’ve always thought we should allow people to stay permanently regardless, because that’s the right thing to do by them and it’s also the right thing for our party in terms of how we want to look to the country.” Mr Reckless’s comments highlight the growing pains endured by Ukip,

despite its efforts to professionalise, as well as the grip retained by Mr Farage. They also suggest that the MP may be more willing to criticise the party leader than his fellow defector Douglas Carswell. A serial rebel as a Conservative, Mr Carswell appears determined to be more loyal under his new guise. The two Ukip MPs enjoyed a celebratory lunch after Mr Reckless was sworn into the Commons. The new odd couple of Westminster were somewhat out of kilter with their party’s beer-andfags image, however, ordering only a water and a Diet Coke. Mr Carswell is virtually teetotal, while Mr Reckless no longer drinks after the time he missed a key vote after visiting a Commons bar. Mr Reckless, 43, is seen as less charismatic and self-assured than Mr Carswell. The former barrister suffers badly from nerves. He was so anxious before one hustings that he was told to go away and play with his children to help him to relax. He has shown a taste for risk in his four years as an MP. Two years into the job he led a rebellion on the EU budget. Triggering a by-election in Rochester &

Five questions to answer NHS Ukip has its work cut out explaining why it no longer supports GP charges, an insurance-based health service or more privatisation Deficit and spending It has yet to lay out credible proposals for reducing the deficit or a detailed fiscal programme. It simply claims that leaving the EU would save money and vows to scrap several Whitehall departments Environment and housing The party is against wind turbines and green subsidies, but it needs to flesh out proposals on planning, energy and agriculture. It also needs to come up with a solution to the housing shortage Welfare Aside from scrapping the spare room subsidy and curbing benefits paid to immigrants in the event of Britain’s exit from the EU, the party needs to explain how it would bring down the welfare bill Transport and infrastructure Ukip wants to scrap HS2, but has pledged no other transport policies or offered any ideas on investing in future infrastructure

Strood was also a far bigger gamble than doing so in Clacton. His victory was impressive, but it was not without bumps along the road. He made campaign gaffes, including a claim that Colonel Gaddafi was good for preventing mass migration. Party figures were dismayed by Mr Reckless’s decision to agree to a newspaper interview without telling them. It remains to be seen how the pair of MPs will use their new platform. So far Mr Carswell’s interventions have been modest. Mr Farage said that he would leave it up to them to decide how to use the remaining four months of the parliament. “They are the parliamentary party. It’s up to them to get on with it.” For now, they are the party’s sole representatives in Westminster, giving the duo great freedom. If Ukip makes good on its ambitions to win as many as a dozen MPs next May, expected to include Mr Farage, that dynamic will change dramatically. Leading article, page 20

Mark Reckless, right, and Douglas

Farage lives it large . . . on 42 winks Ann Treneman Political Sketch

o here’s my image from Rochester yesterday. White vans everywhere. On the road! In the car park! Some of them dusty, with visible handprints. These are the kinds of vans that have “I’m dirty” fingered on their backs. But it’s politics, I thought, we know that. “Revenge of the White Van Man,” I noted as we stood outside Ukip headquarters, a Westminster diaspora of journalists, in the grim grey morning, as another giant white box bounced by a little too close. We were waiting for Nigel. The actual winner, Mark Reckless, had

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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By-election News

over immigration policy switch ROB STOTHARD / GETTY IMAGES

UKIP’s targets Constituency and party colour Current MP Majority at last election Ukip proportion of vote (and position)

Conservative

Redcar Ian Swales 5,214 (12.4%) 4.5% (4th)

Labour

Great Grimsby Austen Mitchell (standing down) 714 (2.2%) 6.2% (4th)

Boston and Skegness Mark Simmonds 12,426 (28.8%) 9.5% (4th)

Dudley South Chris Kelly (standing down) 3,856 (10.1%) 8.2% (4th)

Waveney Peter Aldous 769 (1.5%) 5.2% (4th)

Rhondda Chris Bryant 11,553 (37.2%) 1.2% (6th)

Basildon and Billericay John Baron 12,398 (29.8%) 3.8% (5th)

Blaenau Gwent Nick Smith 10,516 (32.5%) 1.5% (N/A)

Rochester & Strood Mark Reckless (UKIP) 42.1%

Forest of Dean Mark Harper 11,064 (22.7%) 5.2% (4th)

fled the constituency at the break of dawn, having won by a comfortable 2,920 votes just a few hours before, bound for the glory that is parliament. At about the same moment that Mr Reckless was in the chamber being sworn in, Nigel was on the radio. We could see him through the Ukip front window, our noses pressed up against the glass like children outside a pet shop, looking past the Ukip merchandise, the coffee mugs that said: “The EU is not my cup of tea” and the sticks of rock that declared: “Let’s Rock Politics”. Before Ukip, this place was a natural healing therapy shop, thus the murals on the wall declaring: “When it rains, look for rainbows, when it’s dark, look for the stars”. There may now be two MPs in Ukip but there is only one star and his name is Nigel. There was a near riot when Nigel slipped out the back door, past the moat of Rochester Castle, festooned with TV satellite vans. “He’s gone to check out of his f***ing hotel!” exclaimed a press person. It was chaos, a curiously Ukip type of mayhem that combines waiting, no information, wild guesses and political chats with passers-by. “Print what I’ve said about individual liberty or we could end up living in a totalitarian state,” said one man to a

“OK. You’ve got what you wished for — I’m off now”

reporter for a Japanese newspaper. Finally Nigel — for it was he — came to the door. He was ready for his close-up. “I slept very well,” he announced, “for all of 42 minutes.” He didn’t look bad, actually. He’d done the count, the victory party, the 42 minutes of shut-eye, the wake-up radio, a string of TV and now this. He hadn’t stopped talking, except I assume when he was napping, for days, but the voice, cigarette throaty

and louder than his ties, was still going strong. What did he think of Labour MP Emily Thornberry’s “image of Rochester” tweet showing White Van Man’s house festooned with flags. “I think Labour are very anti-English. The mask is slipping.” He loved dangling the idea of a Tory defection. “I’d love another one and a by-election before Christmas!” he crowed. What about a Labour defection? “I’d love a Labour defection!” he cock-a-doodle-dooed. Had he spoken to Labour MPs? “Yes we have!” he teased. Who were the Tories he’d spoken to? “I forget,” he tempted. He referred to Labour and the Tories (whose headquarters down the high street had already been stripped bare) as the “legacy parties”. Politics as usual was dead. “They haven’t got the energy. They haven’t got the buzz.” He was asked another question about defectors. “Defectors, defectors,” he said, putting his hands up, “I surrender.” Oh he was loving it, living it wa large or, even, living it Fa Farage. Then he was off to the most important moment of his day. Which was? “Lunch!” he cried. But we should have guessed.

Cleethorpes Martin Vickers 4,298 (9.6%) 7.1% (4th)

Wellingborough Peter Bone 4,298 (9.6%) 7.1% (4th)

Amber Valley Nigel Mills 536 (1.2%) 2% (5th)

Carswell, Ukip’s parliamentary party, hardly fit the pint-and-a-fag stereotype. Carswell rarely drinks and Reckless is teetotal

LibDem

Kingston upon Hull East Karl Turner 8,597 (25.1%) 8% (4th)

Bury North David Nuttall 2,243 (5%) 2.9% (5th)

Eastleigh Mike Thornton 1,771 (4.3%) (by-election 2013) 27.8% (2nd)

Ukip

Kelly Tolhurst (Conservative) 34.81%

Portsmouth South Mike Hancock (standing down) 5,200 (12.6%) 2.1% (4th)

East Worthing Aylesbury and Shoreham David Lidington Tim Loughton 12,618 (23.7%) 11,105 (22.9%) 6.8% (4th) 6.2% (4th)

It may be different come May

Analysis Peter Kellner

ark Reckless will not know until next May whether his gamble with his career has paid off. His majority of 2,920 was less than one quarter that achieved by Douglas Carswell six weeks ago in Clacton. Whereas Mr Carswell will surely be able to withstand a swing back to the Conservatives at the general election, Mr Reckless may not. Between 1987 and 1997, when the Conservatives were last in government, “insurgent” parties gained eight seats from the Tories: seven Liberal Democrat and one SNP. They retained three at the general election — and that was because their margin of victory in the by-election cushioned them against the loss of support when people next chose a government. Those swings ranged from 4.2 per cent (in Eastleigh) to 11.5 per cent (Newbury). This time, the Conservatives need a swing of just 3.7 per cent to regain Rochester & Strood.

If they manage to achieve even the smallest swing they managed in equivalent circumstances last time round, they will defeat Mr Reckless on May 7. To which Nigel Farage can respond: Ukip are not the Lib Dems or the SNP, so the record books are irrelevant. However, a constituency poll commissioned by Lord Ashcroft, which showed Mr Reckless with 44 per cent support in the byelection (two points more than he actually achieved), also found his support down by nine points, to 35 per cent and narrow defeat, when the same people were asked how they would vote in a general election. So past parallels might not be so irrelevant after all. Meanwhile, Geoff Juby, the Lib Dem candidate, won 0.9 per cent of the vote. As far as I can tell, this is the first time that any mainstream party candidate has failed to reach even 1 per cent in a parliamentary election. Peter Kellner is President of YouGov

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

News

Judge condemns ‘spiteful’ banker in £5m divorce battle Frances Gibb Legal Editor

A former banker who painted a picture of his wife as a “psychopath” during their £5 million divorce battle has been described as “spiteful” and “wicked” by the judge who oversaw the case. Anthony Colborne, 53, had the tables turned on him when Judge Simon Oliver said that he was a “man who expects to get what he wants” and would “stop at nothing to ensure that he does”. He had accused the mother of his three children, Lynda, 60, of making “no financial contribution” to their marriage and giving him “no support”. He said that he had “single-handedly brought up” their teenage daughter. The judge rejected the depiction of Mr Colborne’s ex-wife, saying that she had contributed equally to the marriage. Mr Colborne went to the Court of Appeal this week to challenge the ruling of the judge, who said that the former banker’s accusations against his former wife were “spiteful, wicked and done deliberately to upset her”. The judge had valued the former couple’s assets at £5.6 million, including their £1.2 million former home in Wargrave, Berkshire, and a property portfolio in Marrakech, Morocco. He ruled that Mrs Colborne should have the six-bedroom home, with the

whole of her ex-husband’s pension pot. Judge Oliver had also criticised Mr Colborne, who made millions in 2007 from a software company that he founded, for failing fully to disclose his wealth. The judge ordered him to pay his exwife the contents of his bank account — £16,000 — and said that the former banker could live on what remained of £800,000 in “missing assets”. Challenging the ruling at the Court of Appeal as “unfair” Mr Colborne said that his former wife had been awarded everything that the couple owned in the UK, even though the children lived with him. The £800,000 had not been “wantonly “dissipated but spent on school fees, paying off bills and mortgage arrears, among other things Lady Justice Black, sitting with Lord Justice Burnett and Mr Justice Ouseley, ruled that the welfare of the three girls, aged 19 and twins aged 16, had to be taken into account. Mr Colborne and his daughters should be allowed to remain in the Wargrave property to give him time to find a home. The court adjusted the pension-sharing order in Mr Colborne’s favour and let him off paying the £16,000. Nicholas Starks, Mrs Colborne’s barrister, earlier told the court that Mr Colborne had referred to her as a “psychopath” in a sworn statement.

SPLASH

Father charged with rape is given legal aid Frances Gibb Legal Editor

Under wraps Nicole Kidman at Didcot Railway Centre for the filming of Genius, based on a biography of the literary editor Max Perkins, also starring Colin Firth

A man accused of raping the mother of his son has been granted legal aid in his battle for contact with the child. Sir James Munby, president of the High Court Family Division, said in August that if the man could not obtain access to legal advice, his right to a fair trial and to respect for family life might be breached. The man would also have to crossexamine the mother himself, which she had said she could not “countenance”. Yesterday, Sir James said that the man had been granted legal aid on an “exceptional case” basis and so the case could proceed. He did not identify the man, the child or the child’s mother. The man’s son had been born last year. Family court proceedings had started in October, when the man applied to have contact with the boy. The boy’s mother had accused the man of rape. He had pleaded not guilty and was awaiting trial. Sir James recently raised concerns about a separate case in which a couple are fighting to stop their two-year-old son being adopted. He said that he was “profoundly” disturbed by the fact that the couple did not qualify for legal aid but did not have enough money to pay for legal representation. Earlier this year, he said that the problems of lack of funding had been “very considerably exacerbated” by the changes under the 2012 Act dealing with legal aid.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Text neck is new curse of modern age Tom Whipple Science Correspondent

In the 20th century we had housemaid’s knee and miner’s cough — or, if you were from a different social stratum, tennis elbow. Now it seems there is a new work affliction for a new age, and it troubles all classes equally. It is born of a peculiarly modern habit: walking along the street, head down, checking messages. It goes by the name of text neck. Spinal surgeons say they are increasingly concerned that smartphones are causing a crisis in posture, especially in teenagers, the effects of which will be seen long after they have forgotten quite why it was so important to check WhatsApp. “The neck is a wonderful thing, and it can have a full range of motion — but if you keep your head down for four hours a day, it is going to stress it,” said Kenneth Hansraj, chief of spine surgery at New York Spine Surgery & Rehabilitation Medicine. He has published a paper analysing the forces felt by the neck through having continually to support the head held at an angle. His conclusion, in the journal Surgical Technology International, is that, when the head is held at 60 degrees, the spine feels the weight of the head as five times its actual mass. Dr Hansraj said he is already having to treat the consequences of this. “I’m a spinal surgeon, I see 100 patients a week; over time, I must have seen 30,000 patients or more,” he said. “It just incrementally became an issue, especially among young people. They

were coming in with neck and back pain.” One recent case, he said, was particularly extreme. “There was a man, I had operated on him but he still had tremendous back and neck pain. I applied all my strategies but none worked. One day we were chatting and he happened to say: ‘I spend four hours a day playing games on my iPad’. I asked him to show me how he did it. His head was down at 60 degrees.” Dr Hansraj taught him how to play on the iPad while keeping his head vertical — and the pain went. Jonathan Dearing, a consultant orthopaedic surgeon and spokesman for the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, was not surprised by the idea that holding your head in a fixed position for a long time could cause problems. “Any excessive activity in a certain position is bad for you,” he said. “Common sense dictates that if any part of your body is complaining, if something is aching, it’s your body’s way of saying that something is wrong, so you should be sensible and stop Teenagers are most at risk of the condition

How texting could damage your spine Forces on the neck increase the more we tilt our heads, causing spine curvature Force 10-12lb 27lb 40lb 49lb 60lb on neck 30 degrees 45 degrees 60 degrees Neck tilt 0 degrees 15 degrees

doing it.” He added that holding this particular posture for a long period of time was not necessarily a new phenomenon: “You could replace a mobile phone with a book. People have been reading for a long time.” If that does not convince, there is another corollary of text neck that a teenager might find more persuasive: too much texting may well leave we them with a neck like a tortoise. Nichola Joss Nicho

is a skincare artist to the stars, and she says she has seen a very particular trend among her customers. “I am definitely seeing more clients with premature ageing on their necks as a result of using smartphones,” she said. “It’s not necessarily lines and wrinkles, but more sagging skin, which is very ageing.” Luckily, Dr Hansraj says there is an easy solution, to both sore backs and sagging necks. “My goal is not to scare people away from this wonderful technology. I would just say there are better ways to view devices. You don’t have to bend your neck; just hold your smartphone a bit higher and angle your eyes down.” Problem solved? Possibly. Except there is another ailment, cited recently in medical literature. It can be contracted irrespective of posture. It causes pain in the joints. The first reports are already in. Are you ready for iPad shoulder?

News

App that says put the phone down and talk Monique Rivalland

We are all guilty of it sometimes: sitting with friends or family in silence while everyone stares at their phones. Now a group of 20-year-old tech wizards have come up with a simple solution: an app to stop people using their phone. The app, called Apple Tree, is activated when people place their phones together. Once they are connected, a tree appears and apples start growing. The longer they are left together, the more apples appear. The incentive is that the apples can be turned into rewards such as supermarket vouchers, cinema tickets and restaurant discounts. The aim is to bring an end to “phubbing”, or phone-snubbing, when people incessantly interact with their phone while in the company of others. The idea won the three Singaporean students £15,000 in a competition. “We are focusing too much time on our phone,” said Libern Lin Yue Bin. “There should be time when you are just hanging out with your friends and you stop using your phone.” A recent study of smartphone users found that the average person carries out 221 phone tasks a day, taking three hours and 16 minutes of screen time to do so. The idea has been around before: Phone Stack is a game that involves people piling their phones together over dinner with the first to touch theirs picking up the bill. Apple Tree will be available to download free in March.

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News

Hollande caught carrying on with actress lover once again Charles Bremner Paris

France was given a first glimpse of President Hollande’s continuing discreet liaison with Julie Gayet yesterday, when a magazine published pictures of the couple enjoying the autumn sunshine on a terrace at the Elysée Palace. The pictures, which Voici magazine said were unauthorised, appeared to confirm that the 60-year-old president and the 42-year-old actress were together again. Mr Hollande ended his relationship with Valérie Trierweiler, the first lady, after his dalliance with Gayet was exposed in January. Voici said that the new pictures were shot with long lenses from outside the presidential palace. There was speculation, however, that they could have been timed by the administration to counter a media frenzy surrounding this weekend’s release of the English translation of Ms Trierweiler’s kissand-tell book, Merci pour ce moment (Thank you for this moment). Until today’s interview in The Times, Ms Trierweiler had not spoken about the affair. In the vitriolic memoir of her ten-year relationship with Mr Hollande, she likened Gayet to a “snake in the grass”. The new pictures show the couple seated at a table on the terrace facing

the palace garden, which is surrounded by high walls, but partially overlooked by apartments and offices. Voici said that the pair were enjoying one of the “tender moments of complicity that they experience often behind the walls of the Elysée”. Gayet, who has two children from a former marriage, is spending about four nights a week and most weekends at the palace, according to Voici. “The timetable of the amorous pair is becoming more relaxed,” the magazine said. While Gayet used to leave before 8am, “it is not rare to see the actress leaving the Elysée at 10am, as though she is becoming at ease among the glittering surroundings”, it added. Marion Alembert, the editor of Voici, said that Gayet, an aspiring film producer as well as a moderately successful screen actress, had become

France’s “quasi-officiel première dame”. She denied speculation that a remote-controlled aircraft had been used to photograph the couple from the air. “Voici does not use drones,” Ms Alembert said. If they were taken from outside, the pictures, shot a month ago, showed that the pre president was pot potentially vulnerable to attack, some security experts said. Christian Proute teau, a former officer of the National Gendarmerie who led the security surrounding President Mitterrand in the 1980s, said on RTL radio: “If you can get a clear shot with a te telephoto lens, that means you can point anything at the president.” Voici dismissed claims by Mr Hollande’s entourThe French magazine that revealed the affair has published new pictures of Julie Gayet, far right, with President Hollande, who split from Valerie Trierweiler, right, over the betrayal

age of a breach of privacy. The president’s personal life was a legitimate matter of public interest, Ms Alembert said, adding: “We did it because the president has blurred his private life. For nine months, questions have been asked. Are they separated or not? We wanted to reply.” The pictures mark a new episode in the debate over the private life of France’s long-protected rulers. Taboos

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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began falling during the Mitterrand era two decades ago, and it seemed that Nicolas Sarkozy had staged his romance with Carla Bruni as a public spectacle. It was take further, however, when Mr Hollande was exposed as a scooter-riding adulterer in January. His character was then attacked by his betrayed ex-partner when she betra published her memoir in Septempublis ber. Mr Hollande has voiced indignation over what he sees as the violation of the right of public figures to keep their private life secret. However, he has desisted from deploying France’s strict privacy laws against his tormentors. It seems that the French are increasingly as eager to read about their politicians’ bedroom tales as les AngloSaxons, Germans and Italians — although the French reflex of tolerance still operates. Mr Hollande did not suffer any moral condemnation for betraying and dumping Ms Trier-

weiler, as he would have been treated in Britain or the US for such behaviour, opinion polls showed. “Certainly, the Voici pictures are piquing the curiosity of the French, but when it comes down to it, they don’t give a hoot,” said Robert Schneider, author of Premières Dames, a book published this year about Ms Trierweiler and her predecessors at the Elysée. While a prolific sex life may still be no handicap for French leaders, Mr Hollande has suffered mockery over his chaotic love life, in which he has appeared to be under the influence of strong women: Ms Trierweiler, 49; her predecessor Ségolène Royal, 61, a cabinet minister; and Gayet. Otherwise, political damage to the president has instead come from Ms

Online today

Valérie Trierweiler On sex, secrets and the president’s lies thetimes.co.uk/magazine

Trierweiler’s allegations that he secretly despises the working class, whom his Socialist party claims to represent. Chantal Jouanno, a former minister serving in Mr Sarkozy’s administration, suggested that the presidential palace was complicit in the publication of the new photographs: “No one is convinced by the idea that these were stolen pictures. Having been at the Elysée and seen the way it is guarded, under surveillance everywhere, frankly, that makes me laugh.” Leading article, page 28

President used police to track me, says his ex

resident Hollande warned Valérie Trierweiler he would always be able to keep track of her, and may have used France’s police and diplomatic service to prove it, she claims today (writes Giles Whittell). The jilted first lady was surprised to find flowers from the president waiting in her hotel on foreign trips since their split in January, according to her book. Asked how he traced her to Morocco and New York, Ms Trierweiler told The Times: “It’s the police, I think. It’s asking the French embassy . . . In any case he employed certain methods. He told me: ‘I’ll always know where to find you’.” Ten months after their break-up over Mr Hollande’s affair with Julie Gayet, Ms Trierweiler has broken her silence in an exclusive interview in The Times Magazine. She depicts the president as a man unprepared for office and surrounded by courtiers “with no link to reality”. She gives ammunition to voters who consider Mr Hollande out of touch with blue-collar France, revealing that on their first night together he complained about her two-star hotel. She admits that she was nonetheless “completely swept away by feelings, by passion”. Ms Trierweiler’s portrait of the politician she fell in love with as a reporter in 2004 is at odds with his

public persona ten years on — that of a hapless leader juggling girlfriends but failing to juggle the demands of his job. “He’s not just anyone,” she says, looking back. “He became president because he has a power over others. Contrary to what many people think he does have charisma.” That quality made him seductive in private, but “the private man completely disappeared” on his arrival at the Élysée Palace, Ms Trierweiler says. “Truly, I would not have fallen in love with the man I saw in the Élysée.” Mr Hollande has already been damaged by the publication of Ms Trierweiler’s memoir. Thank You for the Moment, which has sold more than 700,000 copies in hardback, portrays the socialist president mocking the working class and clinging to a lifestyle far removed from theirs. Ms Trierweiler says that on the night their affair began, in Limoges in 2004 “he said to me, ‘why such a pathetic hotel?’” Ms Trierweiler claims Mr Hollande bombarded her with texts and emails asking to get back together after their split. The suggestion that he used police and diplomatic resources to track her to Morocco and the US will only add to his political headaches. He is already the least popular president in the history of the Fifth Republic.

Sex, secrets and lies, thetimes.co.uk

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News

Prince knows his onions but a skip is more of a mystery

EAMONN M. MCCORMACK / GETTY IMAGES

Traveller site can stay, judge tells Pickles David Brown

Valentine Low

The Prince of Wales knows a thing or two about the need to protect ancient lineages that are often overlooked by modern tastes. Yesterday it was the turn of rare vegetables and forgotten seeds when he visited the National Heritage Garden in the grounds of Raymond Blanc’s Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons. He showed his enthusiasm for unusual vegetables, spoke passionately about compost and revealed his favourite mushroom variety. He also raised the question: does the heir to the throne know what a skip is? The garden in Great Milton, Oxfordshire, was opened last June to showcase rare varieties and to educate people about organic gardening. It is run in partnership with Garden Organic and their Heritage Seed Library, which conserves vegetable varieties that would otherwise have disappeared. The prince, who has been a patron of Garden Organic for more than 25

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Raymond Blanc with the Prince of Wales yesterday, and a squash named Crown Prince

years, was shown the garden’s compost heap, made out of old pallets. “He was very interested in our compost,” said David Love Cameron, who won a competition to work in the garden for a year. “He loved the fact that we use shipping pallets, and wanted to know where you get them from. I said you could probably find some in a skip if you looked hard enough. But I’m not quite sure if he knew what a skip was.” During his tour of the garden, where forgotten varieties such as the Bloody Worrier lettuce, the Lazy Housewife

French bean and the New England Sugar Pie squash are grown, the prince was given some peas from a Northern Ireland variety which had all but died out before it was saved by the garden. Mr Love Cameron, who comes from Co Antrim, was asked when he started at the garden to profile six vegetable varieties that used to be grown back home. One was the Carruthers purplepodded pea from Co Down. “When we tried to source it we could not find it commercially. We put out an appeal on BBC Radio Ulster’s Gardeners’ Corner, and got a response from an old man called Josh Toombs. He said he

had hung up his gardening tools in the last couple of years — he was getting on a bit — but had some of those peas in a shoe box on top of his wardrobe. “He sent some to us and we grew them this year. They are particularly lovely with mauve magenta flowers. We gave some to the prince so we hope he will grow them at Highgrove.” Prince Charles, who told John Driscoll, an expert on mushrooms, that his favourite mushroom was the birch boletus, was persuaded to taste the leaves of a plant called Stevia, a natural sweetener. “He was completely amazed that a plant could be so sweet,” said Mr Blanc.

A judge has overturned a government order to remove a traveller site that had been set up without planning permission in an area described as being “under siege”. Eric Pickles, the communities secretary, had supported a decision by Epping Forest district council to refuse planning permission for the site, which was set up three years ago in Nazeing, Essex. The site is close to the town of Harlow, which Robert Halfon, the Conservative MP, claims has been under siege after 70 illegal camps were set up in the past year. Mr Halfon has complained that Essex police have refused to remove illegal traveller sites because senior officers fear that it would be a breach of human rights. Two travellers, Miles O’Connor and William Cash, bought the Nazeing site on the Carthagena estate in 2010 and a year later moved into their families’ mobile homes and caravans. Mr Justice Wyn Williams yesterday overturned Mr Pickles’s refusal to allow the planning permission and ordered him to reconsider the matter after a High Court hearing. He ruled that Mr Pickles had been wrong to refuse permission for the site because of possible flooding risk, which conflicted with the view of one of his planning inspectors.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Sonic decanter really does turn plonk into fine wine Rhys Blakely Los Angeles

The inventors of a device that bombards wine with sound waves claim that they have discovered a means of radically improving cheap plonk. The Sonic Decanter is said to improve any vintage in minutes, using high frequency sound waves to soften tannins and release aromas, allegedly recreating effects usually attainable only by laying down a bottle for years. It sounds fantastic, but does it work? The Times took a prototype to the V Wine Room, a highly rated venue in West Hollywood, California. We first tested a white, a 2012 blend of semillon and sauvignon blanc, by Trinitas Cellars, based in California’s Napa Valley. The wine retails for about $30 (£19) in the US. The Sonic Decanter — which stands about 16in high and looks like a hightech wine bucket — is easy to use, but you must follow the instructions carefully. You fill the metal basin at its centre with two cups of chilled water, put in an uncorked bottle, plug the device in, press a button and leave it for 15 to 20 minutes. According to Adam Monte, a sommelier, the effects on our white were pronounced. “I do experience a noticeable difference,” he said. The aroma of the untreated wine held few surprises — “a lot of grapefruit, lemon, lime: all your bright citrus notes”. By contrast, a

sniff of the sonically treated wine merited an “oh wow” from Mr Monte. “That smells more open, more developed. It’s softer, more muted, more elegant. There is a wet stone quality, a mineral quality now. And more melon coming through.” Taste also improved. The treated wine “feels much more integrated, and there’s much more melon. As opposed to drinking something that feels like a blend, I feel like I’m having a single varietal . . . It’s something I’ve never experienced before — it’s kind of nice.” Mr Monte scored the untreated white at 6.25 out of 10, while the sonically treated wine scored an impressive 7.25 out of 10. The trial was off to a good start, but soon ran into a setback. Our second wine was a Californian zinfandel. We put it into the gadget, but when it came out 20 minutes later it was warm. The alcohol content was much more noticeable, eclipsing Inventors claim that the Sonic Decanter can improve any vintage in minutes

the wine’s other qualities. “I don’t want any more of that,” he said after one sip. We tried again, with colder water and a 2008 Vie Syrah, from Las Madres Vineyards in Sonoma County, California. It cost about $40 from the producer. Again, Mr Monte identified a significant effect, though one not as pronounced as with the white. The syrah was “smoother, more supple, better integrated and more expressive”. He scored the untreated wine at 7.75 and the treated wine at 8.25. However, the same effects might have been achieved in an hour by decanting the wine traditionally, Mr Monte felt. He was intrigued. “I didn’t expect so much from this little gadget.” The real test was yet to come: could the Sonic Decanter improve cheap plonk? A bottle of Rabbit Ridge, a 2013 Californian red, costs $6.50. Straight from the bottle, it tastes, well, like cheap red wine. After 20 minutes in the Sonic Decanter, the aroma is fuller, softer, a bit fruitier. When sipped, it’s still pretty tart, with a metallic taste. It’s no patch on a $40 bottle but it is, I think, improved.

News KEITH MORRIS / ALAMY

Feathers fly A dramatic murmuration of starlings over Aberystwyth Pier, Wales. The daily spectacle attracts photographers and birdwatchers from across Britain

of LONDON

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the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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comment pages of the year

Faith schools are prisons of the mind Janice Turner Page 22

Opinion

Nigel Farage is sucking out the Tory toxins The Conservatives need a party to their right to show how moderate they really are. Ukip is just what’s required Matthew Parris

onservatives minus the nasty bits: it’s what the country wants. But it’s not always what the country gets. Despite the defections, despite Thursday’s by-election, despite the slim chance of a couple more, voters by and large do not want to see the Tories dragged to the right. They won’t trust a party that behaves like that. My basis for the claim? They don’t trust Ukip, either. They don’t, to be honest, really trust the right — the real right — in any of its guises. They sense something wrong; they will stay away; and in a moment I’ll show you a poll that proves it. I don’t mean that people won’t, sometimes, vote for the right in significant numbers in the showy circumstances of a by-election when everyone is bored witless by the canvassing, calling and tweeting and the obvious thing to do is put the wind up the frequently unimpressive leadership of all three of what we used to call the main parties: this week’s result shows it can happen, just as Clacton did before. And people like me, who hoped it wouldn’t happen, will just have to take that on the chin. But alongside the immediate sensation, alongside the populism, beer swilling and sustained contradictions in policy that are being found out, there is voter unease about Ukip that’s different from attitudes to other parties. This is about more than political

disagreement: it’s about stigma. The sooner the Conservatives find the guts and definition to open up clear water between the moderate centre party they ought to be and the sourlipped populism they ought to reject, the better. Call me perverse, but I almost don’t mind a by-election loss if it clarifies a difference. Every time an obsessive rightwinger switches to Ukip, the Conservative party becomes potentially easier to sell. The sooner the Tory fifth column find the guts to end their sly shinkicking and stand for election under a banner that honestly describes them, the better: for them, and for the party they’ve rightly parted company with. And here the UK Independence Party can help. Let it be a magnet for everything that is rabid in right-wing politics. Like a poultice applied to an infection, let Ukip draw out the toxins and leave the Tories cleaner, happier, quieter, more united and more determined to do something useful with their time in government. Colourful imagery: but there’s

Ukip will leave the Tories cleaner, happier, quieter, more united analysis beneath my metaphor. I’ve come to believe that the trademark “right-wing” is a liability in this country. “The right” is damaged goods. I don’t know why. Arguably it’s unfair. Arguably what we could call the right in Britain has made an immensely positive contribution in modern history. So why does “he/she is on the right/a rightwinger” induce a slight shudder in so many? Why do you know in your bones that the

media headline “Tories lurch to the right” is not an election winner? True, the British do not like extremists and are nervous of both ends of the political spectrum, but there’s more to it than that. The left and the right do not occupy a mirror-image symmetry. We tend to think of leftwingers as more fools than knaves, often well-meaning but misguided. We are readier to see rightwingers as bad people personally: people whose own motives, as well as political ideologies, are suspect. It has been a persistent but little-detected problem for the Conservative party that ever since the demise (with the Second World War) of Oswald Mosley’s cause, there has been no significant mainstream political party in Britain to the right of the Conservatives. If you were serious about politics and wanted to promote a right-wing agenda, you had nowhere to go but the Tories. Fascists and populists have been seen as people who just took Conservatism a bit too far. This has distorted outsiders’ perceptions of the Conservative party, and sometimes distorted its perceptions of itself. Tories have often thought it helpful in harvesting votes that right-wing voters had nowhere else to go — and in the immediate past that has sometimes been true. But it has helped to brand the party in a way that, in a new century, I think is both limiting and damaging. People suppose that Tory politics inhabits the whole of the huge space between social democracy and fascism. If on an ideological map left is west and right is east, they see no eastern frontier to the right’s domain. Travelling east, you’re still a Tory until you fall off the edge of the world.

signal for the 21st century that there is a domain to its right that it utterly repudiates and will not occupy. On a worrying scale the party has failed to find a footing among the young, among modern women, in urban Britain and among those of immigrant descent. These groups are part of the future. Telling them

Tony Blair did wonders for Labour, defining himself against the left

Oswald Mosley led the last mainstream party to the right of the Conservatives

Tony Blair did wonders for Labour’s image and support by making clear that the corresponding geography did not apply to his party’s side of the divide. He defined himself and new Labour against “the left”. People told him he’d lose votes, lose Labour’s “core support” by doing so. But anything he lost was more than recouped by what he gained from new, modern voters who thought of themselves and their country as moderate and un-ideological. A small if painful amputation opened up to new Labour a whole new market. The Tories have, since John Major’s departure, stood in need of similar surgery. My party needs a

what we aren’t has become as urgent and important as telling them what we are. Well here’s how. According to a YouGov poll for The Times, steering clear of Ukip looks like a very good way indeed of reassuring the voters. In the eyes of many who don’t support it, the phrase “pariah party” doesn’t look too far from the truth. When asked how they would feel if a good friend became a supporter of Ukip, a quarter of all voters said they would find it harder to be friends with them: more than three times the number who thought a friendship could be spoilt by a switch to Labour, the Liberal Democrats, the Conservatives or the Greens. Even Conservative supporters have a special wariness about Ukip. Only one in twenty would find it harder to stay friends with someone who had switched to Labour; but almost three times that number would find a friendship threatened by a switch to Ukip. This is the function that Mr Farage and his gang can fulfil. Let them show the world what the Conservative party is not. And let the Conservative party take pride in that difference.

Today Periods of rain in the west, but mainly dry elsewhere with sunny spells and cold nights. Max 23C (73F), min -8C (18F) Noon today

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Northern Sweden, northern Norway, Finland A very cold day with sunny intervals and areas of cloud giving the odd spell of rain or snow. Maximum 0C (32F), minimum -8C (18F).

Turkey, Crete, Cyprus, the Black Sea, Crimea Mostly cloudy with outbreaks of rain, heavy at times, some snow over the Pontic Mountains. Maximum 17C (63F), minimum 0C (32F).

Southern Norway, southern Sweden, Denmark, northern Germany, Low Countries, northwestern France, Portugal, western Spain Rather cloudy with outbreaks of rain becoming more persistent later. Maximum 5C (41F) in Denmark and up to 22C (72F) in southern Spain, minimum 1C (34F).

Western Russia, the Baltic states, Belarus, Ukraine Largely dry with frost and fog, but some sunny spells and patchy snow in places. Maximum 3C (37F), minimum -7C (19F).

Eastern Spain, the Mediterranean, Italy, the Alps, southeastern France, Germany, Eastern Europe, the Balkans Mainly dry with sunny periods and patchy cloud, but a risk of showers over the Strait of Gibraltar. Maximum 23C (73F), minimum -2C (28F).

British Isles Mostly cloudy with periods of rain, heavy at times, brighter with showers over Ireland. Maximum 14C (57F), minimum 1C (34F). Outlook Continuing unsettled over western Europe, but most central and eastern areas will stay dry, but frosty overnight.

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Opinion

Nothing wrong with being a pick-up artist

Julien Blanc may have given them a bad name but the need for gurus like him shows how downtrodden many men feel Hugo Rifkind

@hugorifkind

any years ago, a short, bald American pick-up artist told me that if I ever wanted to kiss a woman I’d just met in a nightclub, what I should do first was bite her. “Yup,” I remember thinking, quite seriously, “I can totally see how that would work.” I’m not saying you should try it. Really, I am very much not saying that. So please, do not drive me from Britain’s airwaves, in the manner of the ITV2’s ditched, rape-gagging comedian Dapper Laughs (two weeks ago), or get Theresa May to ban me from Britain altogether, in the manner of the American head-humper Julien Blanc (just the other day). Any men out there, who want to bite women? Don’t. This is my firm position. I hope that we are clear. If you did, though, it might work. Which is the thing, really. It strikes me, you see, that while we have all read much about the whole phenomenon of “pick-up artists” (PUA) these past few weeks, there seems to be a widespread presumption that such people are espousing a vision that isn’t just nasty but is also a con. Snake oil for the deluded. Only it isn’t. And I’d know. Because I’ve done it.

Although just for a weekend. This in 2005, when the music writer Neil Strauss (short, bald, aforementioned) wrote The Game, about the PUA scene in Los Angeles. It’s a good book. On one level, it’s a fine example of the “gonzo” journalism pioneered by Hunter S Thompson, with a writer allowing the line between critic and subject to dissolve. On another, though, it’s a fairly thumpingly sexist compendium of techniques for manipulating women into having sex with you. When Strauss came to Britain to promote it, I spent a few days at his elbow, joining a group of other men in acting, speaking and even dressing precisely how he instructed. This wasn’t about chat-up lines. Rather, it was a series of methods for directing social interactions. And it slightly blew my mind.

A pick-up artist offers a simple guide on how to be a man So when you approach a (female) stranger you’d say, “I need to get back to my friends in a second but . . .” thereby removing their fear you’ll be bothering them all night. Then you’d ask them to help you solve some problem, the details of which you’d have memorised. Maybe you’d do this twice. Then your “wingman” would come over to distract everybody who wasn’t your “target” (the “isolation” routine) while you hit her with a learnt routine of codpsychological cold-reading, not unlike a fake psychic might.

Is Julien Blanc filling a void in the lives of young, white males?

Sounds silly. Be halfway fluent with all of this, however, and a decent proportion of people would find you both utterly fascinating and quite unlike anybody else they have ever met. Or at least they would until your friend tried the same routines 20 minutes later. And the next step — which I didn’t take, because I was a professional with a girlfriend — would be to cross the physical boundary. One strategy for this is a wry routine about how mother cats carry their kittens. Which ends with a bite. Note that the sequel to The Game has an approving puff quote by none other than Russell Brand, and all sorts of things click into place. Now, let’s be honest. Parts of this sound a bit . . . dodgy, right? The “isolation” bit, for example, sounds a

lot like how very, very bad things begin to happen in American films about university fraternity houses. The crucial thing about the pick-up artists of 2005, though, was that they weren’t frat boys. They were geeks. And not even Ed Miliband-style geeks. The real ones. The ones you never see. These were the sort of men who saw futures stretching ahead of them full of takeaways, computer games and not having a girlfriend. Men already into their late twenties, perhaps, who had almost given up on losing their virginities before they lost their hair. Yet they got together and learnt to treat social interaction like a maths problem. In conversation, they’d talk with some awe about “the naturals”; handsome lotharios who could engage women with no tricks at all. They knew that this was not what they were. Instead, they had used their brains — and they were rarely stupid — to analyse what the naturals did, and to crowdsource strategies to copy it. We don’t hear much about young male loneliness, despair and selfdisgust. Not properly. Only as the butt of jokes. Yet it’s real, and devastating, too. Sure, I had my reservations about the pick-up artists of 2005. There was a robotic coldness there sometimes; whole personalities too obviously ersatz. Part of me, though, could only rejoice to see people who had always considered themselves to be the scrapings from the very bottom of the male barrel suddenly learn that it was within their power not to be. I cannot pretend to have kept in touch with pick-up artist culture over

the past decade. Not until earlier this year, at any rate, when Elliot Rodgers, a 22-year-old killer of six from California, was found to have been a devotee of various extreme PUA websites, all of which were far more misogynistic than anything I remembered. Looking at the likes of Julien Blanc, I now wonder if the main change was one of personnel. A phenomenon designed to help shy geeks compete with aggressive lads has been co-opted by the lads themselves. Plenty of frat boy pickup artists now, I’d have thought. It’s happened because it fills a void. The pick-up artists culture is one dominated by young, white males, and what other guidelines do they have? People sneer when you ponder the lack of a male equivalent of feminism, but they shouldn’t. Sure, there’s this patriarchy we hear so much about, but how many people are actually in it? To be youngish, white and male today is often to have fewer prospects than your female peers, but simultaneously to be told you can’t complain because somewhere, far away, other white men you’ll never meet dominate the cabinet and the City. Women care about other women but men aren’t supposed to care about men. Nobody does. What a pick-up artist offers is a guide — and at times a surprisingly effective one — for the simple business of how to be a man. So condemn them for their reductive misogyny, by all means. But then ask yourself just who it is that their fans are supposed to be listening to instead.

Melissa Harrison Nature Notebook

Let’s make a B-Line for the capital’s green spaces

e’re getting a B-Line, apparently. It’s not a new Tube line but part of the government’s national pollinator strategy, a ten-year plan to protect and support the UK’s pollinating insects — not just bees but flies, moths and even beetles — in recognition of both their economic and environmental value, and their increasing vulnerability. In London, nine organisations have come together to create a corridor running from Enfield in the north to Croydon in the south, linking existing pollinator hotspots such as

Brockwell Park (or “nectar points”, as they’re doubtless not allowed to call them). Along the B-Line, owners of green space, from parks to humble gardens, will be encouraged to create pollen-rich habitats and manage them for wildlife — initially for five years, during which time insect numbers will be monitored, and hopefully beyond. It can seem as though environmental groups are always coming up with initiatives and plans — as well they might, if they’re alleviate the pressures on wildlife. But there are two things that make the London B-Line plan exciting. The first is the way it brings together several groups. The UK’s conservation sector can often seem fractured, with diverse groups sharing the same aims but not always collaborating in the best way to realise them. So to see the Lo London Wildlife Trust, the RSPB, Buglife, the Greater London Authority,

Bee Collective and others teaming up is a model for the kind of joined-up work the movement needs to do more of in future. B-Line is also a driver of, and further evidence for, the sea-change that’s going on in the public understanding of nature. There’s a long way to go but it’s great to see that we’re all finally learning to think beyond what is either cheap, practical (for people) or merely decorative — and instead understand that our own priorities are just one aspect that needs to be considered for the good of nature. For too long we’ve had a tendency to make decisions as though nothing counts but us humans; now, the cost of that short-sightedness is becoming clear. So next year, when I walk around London’s green spaces, I look forward to seeing far less insecticide being used, and far more unmown grass, native wildflowers and weeds. Let the local letter-writers scribble their complaints to the council; the loss of our pollinators is a far greater concern than a few riotous parks and verges.

Frost bites

e’ve had our first frost — far later, no doubt, than everyone else. It was gone by morning; I wouldn’t have known had I not taken the dog out just before bed and found it silently

foreign climes — like my poor, longsuffering lemon tree.

Dawn roaming

I Robins often sing at night in cities

silvering the car windows on our street. So we brought in the spindly lemon tree that spends all summer soaking up the sun (and the traffic grime) on our porch. This year it produced three actual lemons — compared with none at all on my friends’ far healthier-looking, but wholly outdoor-dwelling specimens in Dorset. Frost is a signal plants respond to in different ways, from damage to dormancy; it can improve some crops, and “blets” fruit like quinces and medlars, making them sweeter. A good frost was once valued for the way it can improve soil texture and kill pests and fungal spores; our fear of it, as modern gardeners, is partly due to our insistence on cultivating species from

t’s the time of year when the robin’s song really starts to stand out. In spring and summer all our songbirds and summer visitors are in voice, but while you’ll still hear contact calls, few birds actually sing during winter simply because, having bred, they’re no longer defending territories. Robins, however, hold on to their territories fiercely all year round — males and females — so as the other birds quieten for winter, their lovely, silver notes sound more conspicuous. Robins, which seem sensitive to artificial lighting, often sing during the night in cities, too; last Sunday a musician friend returned from a gig at five in the morning, and rather than wake his sleeping wife and children he wandered around southwest London for an hour or so as the still-black sky slowly paled. “There were no cars, no trains running,” he said, “nobody about. But everywhere there were robins singing.” As a slim crescent moon finally faded overhead, he walked up the road to his house as the streetlights, one by one, flickered off and the day began.

Melissa Harrison is a nature writer and author of the novel Clay (Bloomsbury)

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Opinion

How a checklist saved a little girl’s life A simple procedure borrowed from the airline industry and a bit of humility has ensured many more patients survive STUART WALLACE/SUNDAY TIMES SCOTLAND

Atul Gawande nde

@atul_gawande

he biggest problem in giving patients the best medical care is the sheer complexity of what we’re trying to do. The case of a three-year-old girl taught me how to take care of somebody who has drowned. She had been out for a walk with her parents one winter day in Austria. It was one of those terrible things: the parents lost sight of her for a moment and the next thing, they saw her on the surface of an icy fishpond. She fell through the ice and was gone. They jumped in but could not find her. It was more than 30 minutes before they felt a limb at the bottom of the pond and pulled her out. But, of course, by then she wasn’t breathing. They called the local emergency services, and the operator told them how to start doing cardiopulmonary resuscitation, or CPR. The rescue team arrived eight minutes later and took the first vital signs. The girl’s temperature was just 66F, more than 30F below normal. She had no pulse and her pupils were fixed wide open. That means the brain is gone. She was flown by helicopter to the nearest hospital. They bypassed A&E and went straight to the operating theatre to begin warming her. Two hours later, they’d raised her temperature by ten degrees — and her heart began to beat. One organ back. They then tried putting her on a ventilator. But it didn’t work. Her lungs were too full of pond water and debris for oxygen to get through. So they tried a different machine. It’s an artificial lung called an extracorporeal membrane oxygenator. For this, they had to open her chest with a saw and plug the machine directly into her heart, but it got oxygen to her bloodstream. For 24 hours, the team worked to clear her lungs, and finally the oxygen got through. Two organs back. After two days, they’d got all her organs back except one: her brain.

Labour aristocrats can’t connect with white van man Ross Clark

ere Emily Thornberry a leading light in the Georgian Group, her tweet from Rochester would have gone down a storm — if indeed members of that organisation

convinced he could save them. He had a plan. It required speed. You needed an array of things at the ready: the pump, the trauma surgeon, cardiac surgeon, anaesthetist. But there was always a problem: the anaesthetist would be at home 30 minutes away, or the pump wasn’t be ready. He tried to fix things in the usual way that surgeons do: by yelling at everyone. That, of course, didn’t work. So he decided to try something new. He made a checklist. Interestingly, he gave it to the person who had the least power in the system: the telephone operator. When the

Doctors need to accept that sometimes they can make mistakes

An operating theatre in Glasgow. A checklist system has helped to save 9,000 lives in Scotland over the past four years

The neurosurgery team drilled a hole in her skull and inserted a probe to gauge the pressure in her brain so they could dial her fluids and drugs up and down until they lowered it. She remained comatose for a week. But then her pupils began to react to light. Then she began to breathe on her own. And then one day, she simply awoke. Her eyes opened and she was there. Two weeks later, she went home. And two years later, they found her physical and neurological capabilities were exactly as they were supposed to be. She was, in other words, after all of that, just like any other fiveyear-old girl that you and I know. Her lucky escape was 15 years ago. The extent of what was required to pull it off seemed almost impossible. There were dozens, probably hundreds, of people involved in her care, and any one of them could have made a small mistake. If one nurse forgot to wash his or her hands, it would have been over. The 20th century has given us a volume of knowledge and skill greater than any individual can hold in their own head or know how to deliver alone. How do we solve that? sully themselves with Twitter. There is something deliciously naff about a small terraced house on a 1970s housing estate aggrandised with mini-columns. Add three England flags and a battered white van and you have the perfect architectural horror. But Emily Thornberry is not an architectural critic. She is — or was — a shadow minister sent to woo Rochester’s voters in a by-election campaign. She should have been listening to the house’s occupant, Dan Ware, to learn why people like him were happy to return a Labour MP in three successive elections between 1997 and 2005 and yet have now relegated the party to third place with a derisory 17 per cent of the vote. If you are a Labour canvasser, the

Simply telling or ordering people to do certain things isn’t very effective. We need to make doing the right thing the norm. We do that through systems. And those systems can be as simple as a checklist. The important thing is to make it easy for everybody to follow. My team was approached by the World Health Organisation several

Surgeons want a preop checklist if they’re going under the knife

years ago with a project designed to reduce deaths in surgery. I thought: how can you possibly do that? But we worked with a safety engineer from the airline industry to design what emerged as a checklist. It had some dumb things — “Do you have the right side of the body you’re operating on?” — but the most powerful components were “Does everybody on the team know each other’s name and role?” and “Has the surgeon briefed the team on the goals of the operation?” Only then do you begin. likes of Dan Ware should not be a joke. He is your meat and drink, the very working-class voter whose interests your party was established to serve. It is impossible to imagine one of Neil Kinnock’s shadow ministers taking a break from a visit to the picket line at the Orgreave coking plant to have a snigger at a miner’s rundown house and the battered Ford Cortina outside. The irony is that while Labour has never been further from the interests of the poor, never has it been so keen on accusing others of patronising them. Wednesday’s prime minister’s questions was typical, with Ed Miliband using the parting shot: “If you’ve got money, you’ve got a friend in this government. If you haven’t, they couldn’t care less.”

After we had tested the checklist in eight cities around the world — including St Mary’s Hospital in west London — the average reduction in deaths was 47 per cent. In Scotland, it has saved the lives of 9,000 people over the past four years. Clearly, it’s not just the checklist. The hardest part is making even the most experienced people feel enough humility to accept that they can make mistakes. We fear these kinds of system. We fear that it’ll lead to a loss of daring, a loss of heroism. When we surveyed surgeons three months after they introduced checklists, we found that 20 per cent or more really disliked them. Then we asked: “If you’re having an operation, would you want the team to use the checklist?” And 94 per cent did. What you discover is that discipline makes daring possible. When I read about the drowned girl, I was puzzled to know how they discovered what to do in such a small hospital — it was Klagenfurt in Austria. Every year, large numbers of people were admitted after being caught in avalanches, which is like being drowned. Markus Thalmann, a cardiac surgeon at the hospital, was There is a good reason why Labour’s senior figures have hit on this strategy. They are preoccupied with the subject of offending the poor because they are acutely aware of the danger of doing as Thornberry

Under Blair, Rochester voted Labour. Now the party’s in third place

has done and falling into the trap themselves. It cannot be easy, going out every morning to appeal for the votes of the disadvantaged when you are leaving from the doorstep of a £3 million home. Labour has always had its middleclass Fabian heart but its leadership has become the preserve of a public

operators got the call, they had the authority to activate the checklist. They could call the doctors at home and tell them, “You need to come in now.” They’d tell the engineer to get the machine ready. And this was the way they had their first survivor — that little girl. Since then, I learnt, they’d had many. He told me about the most recent. A mother driving her daughter on a mountain road lost control of her car, which crashed through a barrier. The mother died instantly. The car fell into a river and the emergency crews arrived just in time to see it disappear under the water. They managed to cut open the car and get the girl out. By then she had gone for more than half an hour without breathing. But, after that, the system at the hospital went like clockwork. The teams were ready. They went straight to the operating theatre. As her body warmed up, her heart came back. In the ICU, a ventilator, fluids and drugs kept her going while the rest of her body recovered. The next day, the doctors removed her lines and tubes. The day after that, she was sitting up in bed, ready to go home. Atul Gawande is presenting this year’s BBC Reith lectures on the future of medicine, which begin on Radio 4 on Tuesday. He is a surgeon, public health researcher and author of Being Mortal: Illness, Medicine and What Matters in the End

sector aristocracy, of lawyers, academics and administrators whose wealth has been built on public funds, and whose manners and tastes are a world away from those of the low-paid. When Emily Thornberry was selected to fight Islington South & Finsbury for Labour in 2005, she was helped on her way by an all-female shortlist. I am not a fan of positive discrimination but if I were a Labour party strategist I would conclude that what the party really needs is a few all-working-class shortlists. One glance at Emily Thornberry’s Islington house — the real Georgian deal, fronted by iron railings rather than a white van — should have identified her as an unsuitable candidate.

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Leading articles Daily Universal Register

Politics as Usual

Ukip’s second by-election victory must not tempt the main parties to continue lurching to the right. They need to get back to talking about the economy The new breed of by-election is one in which nobody really wins. Of course there is a winner in Rochester & Strood: Mark Reckless and Ukip. But even Mr Reckless, who won 42 per cent of the vote, and a majority of 7 percentage points, may feel that his chances of retaining the seat at next year’s general election are slender. By any standards, it was a bad result for Labour, which won just 17 per cent of the vote, a fall of 12 percentage points on 2010. This poor performance does not augur well for Labour’s chances of a breakthrough in the south of England, without which it cannot command an electoral majority. The by-election shows Labour making no progress at all in prosperous areas and with a lack of coherence at the top. The tweet sent by Emily Thornberry, now the former shadow attorneygeneral, in which she showed a picture of a white van and some English flags as evidence that this was inhospitable territory, shows that Labour is struggling with its core vote too. Even so, the most intriguing number of the evening may be the 349 people who voted Liberal Democrat: not so much the hardy, loyal 349 who have struck with the Lib Dems but the thousands who have deserted them. Sixteen per cent of the voters opted for the Lib Dems in 2010. That has

fallen to 1 per cent and a distant fifth place, just beating off a creditable challenge from the Monster Raving Loony Party. This collapse is a direct consequence of Nick Clegg’s choice to take his party into government and there is nothing at all the party can do to counteract it. It was once routine for the Lib Dems to receive the protest vote of those who wished to register their annoyance with the government of the day. Now that the Lib Dems are part of the government of the day, that status as a temporary repository of protest has passed to the Greens and to Ukip — not to Labour, which held the Rochester & Strood seat as recently as 2005. The central point of the by-election, however, will be how the Conservative party reacts to defeat. The narrowness of the Ukip victory probably means that further defections from the Conservative party are less, rather than more, likely. The political momentum Ukip has enjoyed this past year may now begin to wane. A general election campaign will begin in earnest after Christmas and the Conservative party has to hope that this will concentrate the mind of the electorate on which party it trusts most to run the economy and which person it most wants to be prime minister. That is the clue to what the main parties should

now do. They have both tried hardening their rhetoric on immigration, to no avail. The Conservatives have become increasingly hostile to the European Union, jeopardising their good relations with business while persuading back nobody who was bound for Ukip. David Cameron might be wise to enlist the help of John Major when it comes to his renegotiation of Britain’s place in Europe. Whatever he decides, he needs quickly to settle on feasible demands, rather than making promises about the reform of free movement which he will be unable to redeem. There is no viable future for the Conservative party, as either an electoral or a governing force, if it panders to the right like this. It needs to return to talking about the economy — where the latest borrowing figures, which are higher than this time last year, show that there is still a lot of work to be done. Chasing Ukip on immigration is a fool’s errand. That means getting back to the questions on which they can make a difference, namely economic policy. The Rochester & Strood by-election is the last major political event before the general election starts. British politics may never quite return to business as usual but it is the task of the main parties now to turn to the serious questions of government.

News from the Front

Airstrikes are proving effective against the jihadists of Iraq The military campaign against the savage jihadists of Islamic State (Isis) all too often resembles a civilisational war that pits masked executioners operating at will against largely ineffectual western-backed forces. A week that began with grisly public beheadings appeared to be steering yesterday towards another moment of peril; Isis militants began an assault on the city of Ramadi, a vital stepping stone towards the capture of Baghdad. Yet this is by no means the full story of the confrontation in Iraq and Syria. The US-led coalition’s use of air warfare, initially deemed pointless without the deployment of ground troops, is beginning to make an impact. An airstrike killing the Isis governor of Mosul this week demonstrated what could be achieved when raids are based on careful, detailed intelligence. More, it revealed a simple truth about air warfare: that it can be decisive when it is part of a cumulative process of attrition and disruption. There are greater challenges in fighting a highly mobile well-armed guerrilla army such as Isis. An intensified assault from the air should nonetheless be able to break its suffocating hold on Mosul.

That might not end the war but it would be the beginning of the end of the group’s dream of building a caliphate and a cross-border terror franchise. The current airstrikes are making the jihadist army less fleet of foot, less daring and less efficient in ruling captured territory. It is US bombardment that has stalled the Isis advance on the besieged Syrian-Turkish border town of Kobani. The Isis army has lost 700 men in the attempt and is now sending teenage boys into the fray to capture a town that has, for the jihadists, little military significance. Air power has shielded the important Haditha dam from Isis capture. And it has increased the confidence of the Iraqi army. Backed by Shia militias, the Iraqi army has broken the Isis siege of Baiji and its nearby oil refineries. Perhaps the most important contribution to the war so far was the disabling of Isis’s capacity to make the money it needs to support an army on the move and to pay its fighters. Western air raids have destroyed at least 22 mobile refineries; smuggling routes are being targeted. The result: shortages and growing discontent in communities under the control of Isis.

The war is far from over. Certainly US air support will be needed to repel the attack on Ramadi. Above all though the West has to develop a clear idea of what happens if Isis armies are pushed back into Syria. These involve complex political decisions — how far to co-operate with President Assad, how to protect moderate Assad opponents from the al-Qaeda affiliates, and how to bring Turkey closer into the alliance — which have been largely deferred by the US. Air war is proving its value in degrading Isis forces. It should be stepped up. What is missing is a broader concept of what happens when a diminished Isis eventually goes to ground.The only idea appears to be containment, boxing in Isis, perhaps within Raqqa, in the hope that it will wither. Air power can help with that too but it is a poor substitute for policy. The history of terrorism suggests that after the F-16s have returned home, the remnants of Isis will metastasise and emerge as a menace elsewhere. There has to be a concern about good inclusive governance in these troubled countries, a concern that goes beyond dropping bombs on bad people.

An Elysian Life

How does Monsieur le Président do it? It’s a balmy autumn morning just off the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré. The linden trees along the Seine have yet to shed their leaves. The Middle East is aflame but it’s a thousand miles away. Unemployment is at 10.5 per cent and rising but growth is ticking up — to 0.3 per cent! As for the busiest man in France, all work and no play might make him a dull president. Time, then for a “tender moment of complicity” with the third long-term partner in his public life and the second to contend for the title of Première Dame. Even those who follow closely the complex private life of President Hollande had begun, until

yesterday, to suspect that he had opted for a period of monogamous calm after the tumultuous end of his relationship with Valérie Trierweiler amid the disclosure of his affair with the younger and apparently more cheerful Julie Gayet. Then, from a nearby balcony or roof garden there comes a click. A paparazzo strikes. The inadequately guarded privacy of the Elysée Palace garden is quietly invaded and the president is pictured with Ms Gayet for the first time. As Voici magazine publishes the pictures in France, we publish an interview with Ms Gayet’s predecessor in the palace, Valérie Trierweiler, in

which she says she could never fall in love with the man she sees ensconced there. The crushing burden of the presidency changed him, she laments. The man she fell in love with disappeared. Into the arms of now we all know who. We’re told Mr Hollande sees Ms Gayet four nights a week and at weekends. We know he devotes substantial time to monitoring the activities of Ms Trierweiler. He also maintains cordial relations with Ségolène Royal, his cabinet colleague and the mother of his children. The question is, how? Perhaps running the world’s fifth-largest economy on the side helps keep him sane.

Today: Scotland’s new first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, holds a sold-out rally for 12,000 supporters in Glasgow; a women-only march against rape and violence takes place in central London, organised by the London Feminist Network; the Democratic Unionist Party leader Peter Robinson gives a speech at the party’s conference. Tomorrow: The final race of the Formula 1 season takes place in Abu Dhabi, with Lewis Hamilton 17 points ahead of team-mate Nico Rosberg; Band Aid 30’s charity single is expected to top the official UK singles chart; Breast Cancer Care International women’s football friendly, England v Germany, is held at Wembley Stadium.

Birthdays today Sir Peter Hall, pictured, director of plays, films, Orpheus Descending (1991), and opera, 84; Satyajit Bhattacharya, surgeon to the royal household, 52; Boris Becker, Wimbledon tennis champion (1985, 1986, 1989), world No 1 (1991) and Olympic gold medallist (1992), 47; Sally Bercow, parent-patron, Ambitious about Autism, and wife of the speaker of the House of Commons, 45; John Bird, actor, Bremner, Bird and Fortune (1999-2007), 78; Guion Bluford, the first African-American in space (1983), 72; Tom Conti, actor, Shirley Valentine (1989), 73; Jamie Lee Curtis, actress, A Fish Called Wanda (1988), 56; Terry Gilliam, animator, writer and film director, Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life (1983), 74; Stephen Hough, concert pianist, 53; Scarlett Johansson, actress, Lost in Translation (2003), 30; Lord (Robert) Iliffe, chairman, Yattendon Group, 70; Billie Jean King, tennis player, winner of 39 Grand Slam championships and founder, Women’s Tennis Association, 71; Kent Nagano, conductor, 63; Stel Pavlou, novelist, Decipher (2001), Gene (2005), 44; Alistair Wilson, chief executive, The School for Social Entrepreneurs, 46.

Birthdays tomorrow Diana Quick, pictured, actress, Brideshead Revisited (1981), The Missing (2014), 68; Zoë Ball, presenter, Strictly Come Dancing, and first female host on the BBC Radio 1 Breakfast Show (1997-2000), 44; Ross Brawn, motor engineer and Formula 1 team principal, 60; Shane Gould, three-times Olympic gold medal-winning Australian swimmer (1972), 58; Sir Graham Hearne, businessman and non-executive director of NM Rothschild & Sons (1970-2010), 77; Henry Hoare, banker, chairman, C Hoare & Co (1988-2001), 83; Dianne Jeffrey, chairwoman, Age UK, 70; the Most Rev Patrick Kelly, archbishop emeritus of Liverpool (1996-2013), 76; Sir Michael Knight, life vice-president, the Air League aviation society, 82; Sir David Lees, chairman, court of directors, Bank of England (2009-June 2014), 78; Krzysztof Penderecki, composer, 81; Timothy Sheader, artistic director of the Open Air Theatre, Regent’s Park, 43; Peter Stanford, writer, How to Read a Graveyard: journeys in the company of the dead (2013), 53; Professor John Tarn, architect, Working Class Housing in Nineteenth Century Britain (1971), 80; Kirsty Young, presenter, Crimewatch, 46.

The last word “If someone tells you he is going to make a ‘realistic decision’, you immediately understand that he has resolved to do something bad.” Mary McCarthy, American novelist, On the Contrary (1961)

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Letters to the Editor

1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF Email: letters@thetimes.co.uk

Stop weak sex abuse cases coming to court

Climate pledge Sir, We welcome the government’s leadership in announcing that it will pledge £720 million to the Green Climate Fund. This new UN fund will channel finance to help developing countries adapt to the effects of a changing climate and invest in sustainable development. Our organisations see first-hand how urgently this money is needed to help the poorest and most vulnerable people protect themselves from changing climate — which is already disrupting harvests. The need to support at-risk communities and habitats will intensify if emissions are not urgently reduced. The UK joins countries including France, Germany, Japan and the US in making a significant pledge to the fund. This start-up money paves the way for a global climate agreement next year. However, if the Green Climate Fund is to fulfil its vital role, we urge all governments to continue to honour their commitments and further strengthen their ambition. chris bain Director, Cafod loretta minghella Chief executive, Christian Aid mark goldring Chief executive, Oxfam david bull Executive director, Unicef UK david nussbaum Chief executive, WWF-UK

British roast Sir, John Dover (letter, Nov 19) says he was not used to the heated debate to be found in US universities in the Sixties. At my UK university in the Seventies, reading architecture, design projects were ended with the much dreaded “crit” by staff and fellow students. One year we had two American exchange students unfamiliar with the process. The first presented his work, and afterwards described being “chewed up and spat out”. patrick hogan Beaconsfield, Bucks

Sir, I agree with Libby Purves (“There is no justice for those falsely accused of abuse”, Nov 20). Between 2007 and 2010 I was one of a threeperson team of barristers employed by the Crown Prosecution Service in London as Specialist Rape Advocates. Our role was to provide pre-charge advice to the police in cases of sex abuse and rape and to take cases to trial once we had sanctioned charges. The idea was that the police would have one person dealing with their case, which was intended to support and reassure complainants while ensuring that weak cases were not prosecuted. Sadly, we were not deemed to be cost effective and the unit was disbanded. The police and prosecution agencies need to work together to ensure that complainants feel free to speak out but also to ensure that any person accused of such a crime has his or her side of events investigated too. It serves no one to allow weak cases to come to court and in my opinion causes further harm and distress to vulnerable victims. We need a criminal justice system that treats complainants and the accused fairly. We also to debate on how we can fund this so that the police have the training and resources to carry out investigations thoroughly and the CPS has the expertise necessary to ensure that weak cases are not put before a jury in the first place. sarah le foe London SW6 Sir, The report (“‘You wonder if it will ever end’, says head cleared of child

Rates and labour Sir, I am at a loss to understand why, with free movement of labour in the EU, our interest rate policy should be determined by the rate of UK employment (“Delaying a rise in interest rates now could come with a high price later”, Nov 19). Tightness of the labour market will depend also on unemployment in the rest of the EU. When labour is short, immigrants come in instead of wages going up. There will probably be ample labour supply from the EU and elsewhere for the foreseeable future. This applies to professionals as well as more general

Textbook teaching Sir, Greg Hurst (“Textbook case of sloppy work” Nov 20) unfairly represents teachers as “preparing worksheets rather than refining their teaching and planning stimulating lessons”. Most teachers discover very quickly that textbooks should be used alongside a variety of resources and activities. This does include worksheets, but very rarely in productive classrooms is this the only method employed. liam morgan Head of history, Shiplake College

Corrections and clarifications The Times is committed to abiding by the Independent Press Standards Organisation (“IPSO”) rules and regulations and the Editors’ Code of Practice that IPSO enforces. Requests for corrections should be sent to feedback@thetimes.co.uk or to Feedback, The Times, 1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF

on this day november 22, 1914

PARIS FASHIONS IN WARTIME Several of the Paris dressmakers are making attempts to revive trade, and not a few of the leading French women in society are encouraging them by buying dresses they have small use for. The reason for this apparent return to frivolity is that it is becoming more obvious every day that something must be done for the lower ranks of the dressmaking world, or misery and starvation must ensue. There is

rape”, Nov 20) was unsettling in its description of howJames Bird and his family had suffered as a result of an abuse allegation prior to his acquittal. What was more unsettling was the comment by “a CPS spokesman” that “it was important to distinguish between evidence that a person had lied about allegations, and a jury deciding evidence was not strong enough for a conviction”. So what happened to the principle of innocent until proved guilty? Until we have a “not proven” verdict, it would be best that (anonymous) CPS bureaucrats adhered to this principle and even, perhaps, accept that they are capable of mistakes. richard rigby Long Melford, Suffolk Sir, Libby Purves draws readers’ attention to the effect of false allegations of sexual abuse on the lives of the accused and their families. Sadly false accusations of sexual abuse, domestic violence and drug abuse are rife during divorce proceedings in the UK Family Court. They waste court time, cause damage to already vulnerable children and are costly to defend, both emotionally and financially. The perpetrator is rarely penalised by the court and cannot be named. Family Court reform is long overdue. The perpetrator of such serious perjury should be “named and shamed” at the conclusion of the case and costs awarded to the accused. This might dissuade divorcing couples from resorting to serious false allegations and allow the Family workers. Many overseas universities now use English as the language of teaching. My Dutch granddaughter recently had an English-language viva for her master’s degree in maths at a Dutch university, and earlier attended maths courses in English at the University of Stockholm. john jackson Keswick, Cumbria

You say tuxedo . . . Sir, I tremble to question Lord Lexden’s assertion that the DJ was not invented by New York’s Tuxedo Club (letter, Nov 19). However, I have been no more melancholy sight than the great dressmaking rooms, which at this season are usually humming with life, empty and silent with the furniture under dust covers. At the first exhibition of the season about 20 women were present, where in ordinary times at least 100 would have disputed the best seats. The conversations were all of the war and of those who are engaged in it. The manager of the house is fighting at Ypres, and all the male staff is somewhere in or behind the fighting line, from the slim young man who makes the dress designs, to the portly doorkeeper who holds an umbrella as you cross the pavement to a motor-car. The vendeuses all told the same tale: of husbands and brothers and sons at the front. Several were wearing mourning, but the business of selling went on as usual. The same spirit marked the women who went to buy. They were not profoundly interested in the new fashions, but the French woman is not yet born who will consider the cut and hang of her

Court to focus on protecting genuinely “at risk” children. rita kubiak Stratford-upon-Avon, Warks Sir, Although it is appalling that abused children were not always believed in the past, the pendulum is swinging too far in the other direction. I was recently in a dentist’s waiting room, alone, reading a magazine. A mother and her daughter came out of the treatment room. The woman went to pay and the child wandered into the waiting room. I looked up, said hello, and went on reading. The child ran back to her mother and I heard her say “Mummy, that lady asked me if I wanted some sweets but I said no.” The woman then told her she was a very good girl. Had I been an elderly man, and in another setting, the outcome could have been very different. elizabeth clarke Sheffield Sir, Libby Purves draws attention to the consequences of our focus on the predominance of “victims”. It would appear that an allegation of sexual assault amounts to a statement of fact, ie, the facts are as the “victim” states them to be. It is an inconvenient fact that the allegation might be open to interpretation, unsupported by evidence and, experience tells us, could be a lie. It is dangerous to make the “victims” views the sole arbiter of action,which seems to be the current trend. jim howard Newton Abbot, Devon unable to find an exact description of the coat the Prince of Wales wore on his passage to India in 1875. My letter (Nov 14) was based on family gossip which should not perhaps be ignored. My grandfather, Sir Stanley Clarke, served Edward VII for more than 30 years. In the American corner, my aunt Katherine St George was congresswoman for Tuxedo who shared a house there with Emily Post, the doyenne of American manners. What is beyond doubt is that “tuxedo” appeared in print in 1889 (OED), two years before “dinner jacket”. My loyalties are dreadfully torn. antony stanley clarke Mosterton, Dorset skirt a matter of no importance. All the new dresses are good in line. There is no waistline, but a slim, long line from the shoulder to the hem. There is something vaguely Persian in the silhouette, but it is not at all fantastic, and it is extremely comme il faut. Some women will probably exaggerate the tendency to the short full skirt and will display wonderful boots below it: but many women will modify the examples shown, and the result will be satisfactory even to the most conservative of tastes. The suppression of the waistline is to be much commended, for there is no question about the ill effect of tight lacing, and very little doubt that a free waist tends to make a graceful walk, although it must be confessed that the average woman walks very badly; but that is due to her high heels and not to her dress. sign up for a weekly email with extracts from the times history of the war ww1.thetimes.co.uk

Horse exports Sir, With regard to Ross Clark’s Thunderer on horse exports (“Anne is wrong. Animal cruelty knows no borders”, Nov 17), we should be clear about the difference between exports of horses that may be slaughtered abroad and the legal livestock trade. It is legal to export horses for slaughter providing the exporter has the right paperwork, but no such applications have been made in the past few years. The trade to which our president, the Princess Royal, was referring is the export of low-value horses and ponies, allegedly for riding or breeding, but often entered into markets frequented by slaughter buyers. UK port authorities carry out few checks. False, incorrect or absent passports and health certificates mean that these animals should not be exported or enter the food chain. Other European countries struggle to catch this since there is no central system of equine identification, even 18 months after the horse meat scandal. Long journeys can adversely affect horses. They should be slaughtered locally, whether in Britain, France or Poland. roly owers Chief executive, World Horse Welfare

GM and antibiotics Sir, Professor Tony Trewavas (letter, Nov 17) criticised Greenpeace over GM crops. I support the case for some GM crops, such as those with better drought resistance and enhanced nutritional values, but many have been created for increased pestresistance. The next day, six people from the world of science deplored the excessive use of antibiotics in agriculture as this leads to antibiotic resistance (letter, Nov 18). Surely, it is inevitable that any widespread use of pest-resistant GM crops would over time lead to mutations in the pests against which pest resistance is no longer effective. Which scientists are to be preferred when it comes to allowing the widespread use in the UK of pestresistant GM crops? richard burnett-hall Houghton, Hants

Home alone Sir, How times have changed (“Bring in law to protect under-12s home alone”, Nov 15). I was left alone in our house in Byker, Newcastle upon Tyne, just after the war when I was aged 6-8 years. I had my little dog, Rex, with me. Once I played with a lighted newspaper and a towel over the fire caught light. Sometimes I sat in a corner shop doorway with another lad until the pubs closed; we were safe as houses. I think. bill oxley Appleton, Warrington

One’s royal shush Sir, A monarch expressing no opinion publicly represents the nation (“King Charles should keep his shrill, silly opinions to himself”, Thunderer, Nov 21). Those that do otherwise divide us. jm carder Anstruther, Fife

Peeled off Sir, It wasn’t just The Archers (letters, Nov 19 and 21). Peel’s Income Tax Act (1842) was also promoted as temporary. barry morse Usk, Monmouthshire

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Opinion

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No more faith schools, the prisons of the mind Would any child ever choose somewhere that forbids swimming, art, reading a newspaper or playing an instrument? Janice Turner

@victoriapeckham

’ve never met anyone more hungry for knowledge than Laylah Hussain. She devours books and big ideas, relishes argument like someone intellectually starved. Which she was — as she relates in today’s Times Magazine — during her five years at a private Islamic boarding school. Talking with her for many hours, it struck me that there’s one question unasked in our debate on faith schools: what do the children want? We fret about British values, social cohesion or breeding extremism. Yet we seldom wonder how it feels to be taught from the earliest age according to rigid religious rules that will render you a perpetual outsider in your own country. Would any child ever choose a school where it was forbidden to swim, make art, read a newspaper, play a musical instrument, speak to the opposite sex, own a camera or read Harry Potter; where biology textbooks are censored, leaving you in ignorance of

your developing body and most useful modern knowledge, which might one day afford you a job? For these are still the rules at Laylah’s former school, Jamia AlHudaa in Nottingham. And they are echoed in six private Islamic schools in Tower Hamlets, where snap Ofsted inspections found pupils did not know the difference between British law and Sharia. “It’s idiocy,” Laylah texted me as the story broke this week. “Separate kids from mainstream society and what do you expect.” Her anger is not just with such schools, many funded by extreme Saudi clerics who wish to create a community of Arabic-speaking Wahhabi Muslims living in parallel

We allow infants to be indoctrinated with non-scientific beliefs

to western nations, united under their own authoritarian religious law. But also with the British government for allowing it to happen. Private faith schools can teach pretty much anything. The national curriculum does not apply; just tick the boxes of basic literacy and numeracy and you can pump kids with whatever you please. The Ofsted report for Jamia Al-Hudaa noted pupils’ expertise in

“Islamic sciences” but did not question why these subjects, which are not “sciences” at all but ways of studying the Koran and Sharia, fill the majority of the timetable. In practice, private faith schools are almost unaccountable: they are outside the purview of local authorities, and Ofsted inspectors only show up every few years. Any religion can set one up: there is a Scientologist-run boarding school in East Sussex, espousing the views of the science fiction writer L Ron Hubbard. When you pull back and look at it logically, it is baffling that we allow infants to be indoctrinated with beliefs that have no scientific basis, which in some cases allow no room for dissent or doubt. We wouldn’t allow a communist or a Ukip school, yet we sanction any ideology that comes under the catch-all of “faith”. Currently a third of all state schools are religious, most Christian. But new demand from Muslims, Hindus and others has meant that a third of the new free schools are faith-based. In an age when religion is the source of social division, we compound it by separating our children at birth. My own sons went to an inner London state primary where they celebrated Eid, Diwali as well as Christmas. I did wish they sang a few more carols but if I’d

really cared I could have taken them to church. And it has made them more robust modern citizens. Yet religious schools have been championed by both Tony Blair and the coalition government. It is politically unthinkable to oppose Muslim schools if, like David Cameron, you send your kids to a Christian one. When I interviewed the prime minister recently he joked about the shambolic Sunday school

These girls are taught that rape does not exist within marriage

classes he has taught at St Mary Abbots in Kensington and said a faith-based school “helps to build ethos and community”. But faith schools are closed communities. Within cities, in particular, church schools are middle-class ghettos with far lower rates of free school meals than nearby non-faith schools. After all, a place is won by dragging yourself in every Sunday to suck up to the vicar; a famous face or a lavish Christmas fête prize never goes amiss. St Mary Abbots, with just 17 per cent of pupils receiving free school meals, is less ethnically mixed than many posh prep schools.

So it would be invidious for the prime minister to challenge the closed nature of Muslim faith schools. And, as illustrated by the Al-Madinah free school in Derby, many are closed from the secular principles of equality and religious freedom: the school was shut down after it transpired that girls were made to sit at the back and female staff (including non-Muslims) forced to wear the hijab. But, as Laylah Hussain points out, this is normal in many private faith schools. It is assumed that girls of Pakistani origin are happy to have the hijab forced upon them; be taught that the Koran demands obedience; that rape does not exist within marriage and husbands are entitled to beat them. David Cameron would not subject his own daughter to such barbarous ideas: but for Muslim girls it is permitted as part of their culture. What is clear from the Trojan horse affair in Birmingham, the AlMadinah debacle and now the exposé of private faith schools is that we must codify the place of religion in education. There should be a moratorium on new faith schools; religious study should have a tiny space on any curriculum, state or private. Pupils like Laylah Hussain cannot be denied the freedom to learn and think outside the strictures of faith.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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News

Shoppers to splurge £6,000 every second Gabriella Swerling

Christmas shoppers are expected to spend at least £6,000 a second one day next week as retailers whip up demand with the American tradition of Black Friday. The sales bonanza, when stores slash the cost of goods to entice buyers, will take place on November 28. Visa Europe forecasts that £360,000 will be spent per minute on its cards that day. The discount event was introduced to Britain by Amazon in 2010, and retailers are offering sales and discounts in-store as well as online. Some big retailers have already confirmed that they will be offering deals and discounts next week, including Marks & Spencer, John Lewis, Asda, Sainsbury’s, ebay, Dixons and Amazon, which will have 3,000 deals with prices cut by an average of 40 per cent. Last year Amazon hit its biggest sales day in Britain, with four million orders on Black Friday. It expects to surpass that target next week. Ebay predicts that more than seven million shoppers will head to its website on Friday to search through 104,000 deals. Its most popular items are expected to be the Xbox, iPads, the Bose Sound Bar, Lego and Playmobils. According to the latest figures from Mintel, the market research agency, retail sales will rise by 3 per cent this Christmas to £36.5 billion. Mintel also found that 25 per cent of British shop-

pers said that they would do more of their shopping online this year. In an attempt to manage the increasing demand for online shopping, the delivery company DPD added a Sunday service in July. The company, which is ranked as the top delivery company by the consumer group Which?, has been growing in excess of 20 per cent a year. Dwain McDonald, its chief executive, said that peak planning was “about total attention to detail”. “Everything from the labels being printed perfectly every single time, to working with businesses and retailers ensures prompt delivery to the hub every evening,” he said. Andy Hinxman, director of Keybridge IT Solutions, which supports businesses throughout Britain, Europe, Asia and the United States, warned retailers to make sure that their web hosting infrastructure was strong to avoid server meltdowns and unhappy customers. “Retailers around the world will be jumping on the Black Friday bandwagon and should expect sharp spikes in web traffic during the Christmas rush,” he said. However, shoppers have been told that the race to get Christmas bargains can become dangerous. According to the blackfridaydeathcount.com website, there have been seven deaths and 90 injuries as a result of Black Friday shopping in America since 2006.

Feeling fab at fifty but ignored by high street?

tyle-conscious and with money burning a hole in their pockets, women over 50 are most people’s ideal customers. But they have been neglected by some of the high street’s biggest fashion brands (Harriet Walker writes). More than 60 per cent of women over 50 feel that they have “been forgotten”, a YouGov survey found. Two thirds of those questioned felt that there wasn’t enough choice in shops for them. “I’m not surprised at all,” said Caryn Franklin,

55, the fashion commentator. “Go into any store and you’ll see messages communicated on younger models. The clothing has a catwalk bias, which means no sleeves and short skirts.” Now, at the designer end of the market, labels have started paying attention. Marc Jacobs launched his beauty collection this year with a campaign

featuring the actress Jessica Lange, 65, top left, while The Row, the luxury label founded by the Olsen twins, used the silver-haired model Linda Rodin. Some UK brands, including Debenhams and Marks & Spencer, have followed their lead. Yasmin Le Bon, 50, left, is the face of Winser London, while Lo Jaeger teamed supermodels with their mothers for a window display. “Most customers ask for sexier fashion,” said Sheila McKain-Waid, Mc Jaeger’s creative director. “It’s the women in their sixties wo who wh want the neckline moved lower, brighter colours and more bodycon details.” They are trying to woo wo an age group that has four times as much to spend as 18-to-24year-olds. “Our older ye customers have told us they don’t want to look frumpy,” said Belinda Earl, Marks & Spencer’s head of design. “They’re interested in fashion and trends, not in dressing like they’re old before their time.”

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

News

Hunt for

Police inept and guilty of prejudice over the weeks since backpackers died on beach, writes Richard Lloyd Parry Ten minutes from the pubs and beaches of Koh Tao, hidden from the sight of tourists in a clearing, is the shack where Zaw Lin lived. It doesn’t look like a lair of evil — a wretched 10 ft sq hut where eight young Burmese men sleep nose to toe. His former neighbours here speak affectionately of this quiet, rather wide-eyed man of 21 who worked in one of the island’s many tourist bars. Just once a month, on pay day, he would team up with his young friend Wai Phyo to get drunk. And that was where the trouble began. On the night of their last binge, Sunday, September 14, they lingered until the early hours at the popular Sai Ree beach, a few hundred yards from where a group of British backpackers were attending an openair party. Two of them, Hannah Witheridge and David Miller, separated from their friends to enjoy one another’s company at a quieter spot on the sand. It was there, according to the Thai police, that Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo encountered the couple, and where the world of the jungle shack and the tourist beach came into tragic collision. “The two migrants were drunk and uninhibited,” said a Thai detective. “They saw the couple making love and they got in the mood too.” They struck Mr Miller with a hoe that was lying near by; unconscious and face down in the sandy shallows of the sea, he drowned. They hit Ms Witheridge and began to rape her; when she came to and began to resist, they hit her again and again with the sharp edge of the hoe, splitting open her face and skull. The two men confessed to the crime, the police insist — the DNA of both of them, they say, was found on Ms Witheridge’s body. However, what might have been a straightforward murder case has become bogged down in claims of police brutality, incompetence, evidence tampering and racism, drawing in Scotland Yard detectives, a British minister and even Thailand’s military dictator. Since their arrest seven weeks ago, Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo have withdrawn their confessions, claiming that they were tortured. This week they appealed to the British government, and even the families of their alleged victims, for help in defending themselves. “It’s for the court, not for me, to say whether they are guilty or not but

Thai police with the Burmese suspects in a reconstruction of the murders of Hannah Witheridge and David Miller. Right, the resort where they stayed

St Lucia mother Jacqui Goddard St Lucia

On so many occasions over the years, Helen and Theo Gobat watched their son Ollie dive into the waves at Smugglers Cove beach in St Lucia. One last time this week they accompanied him there, wading into the water to scatter his cremated remains. “It was his 39th birthday,” his father said. “Who ever could have imagined we’d spend it scattering his ashes?” In the seven months since Mr Gobat was murdered, his family has struggled to come to terms with not only the horror of his death but the elusiveness

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the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Britons’ killers dogged by racism REUTERS

what we want to see is a fair trial,” said Andy Hall, a British activist who has established a defence fund for the two men. “It isn’t in anyone’s interests if the wrong men are convicted. And from early on, we heard reports of police abuse and suspected that in this case there would be scapegoats.” A visit to Koh Tao confirms one of the claims of those defending Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo: the innate and unselfconscious racism of the police who investigated the murders. Estimates of the number of Burmese workers on the island ranges from 3,000 to 8,000. The barmen who bring the 450,000 tourists who come here every year luridly coloured cocktails are as likely to come from Burma as from Thailand, although they can expect to be paid a good deal less than the Thai minimum wage of 300 baht (£5.85) a day. If they are illegal immigrants, as many on Koh Tao are, they must pay a 500 baht fee every month; if they ride motorbikes, they must pay the same amount again. These “licences” are no more than formalised bribes. “It was obvious from the method of the killing that it was done by Burmese,” the Thai policeman who led the investigation told me. “Because they are very brutal people. Local people are very friendly.” Prejudice, injudicious comment and ineptitude characterised the

investigation from the start. After an initial search, the stretch of beach where the bodies were found was left unguarded and open to rain, tides and curious visitors. Several Burmese men were first detained and then released — at least three have reported being tortured by the police, including being scalded with boiling water. Then the investigators suggested that the killer was not Burmese but a male British friend of Mr Miller, who was said to have carried out the killings in a frenzy of homosexual jealousy. It was obvious that the police were feeling pressure to solve the crime. The head of the Thai junta, General Prayuth Chan-ocha, complained that

suicidal over murder of justice and the realisation that their once carefree lives, split between homes in Esher, Surrey, and the Caribbean, have changed for ever. “Some days I’ve been so down I thought of getting rid of myself. It hurts so much you just want to obliviate, but I realise I can’t cause any more grief for my family,” Mrs Gobat, 66, said. Ollie Gobat was shot dead in April in an apparent contract killing linked to a possible business rivalry. His face stares out from posters taped on walls and doorways around the island. His family’s decision to go public with their concerns about the investigation

was not taken easily. “It’s time to speak up. We’ve been too polite and too British about it,” Mrs Gobat said. Her husband started a hotel development business in St Lucia 42 years ago but today they fear what they might be up against. They arrived on the island last week with an armed bodyguard. “How do we know that the same people aren’t coming for us?” she said. Ollie Gobat’s murder was one of more than 400 on St Lucia in the past ten years. Most remain unsolved. Kenny Anthony, the prime minister, said: “I believe there will be justice for Ollie. It may take some time, but we will find it.”

“it will affect our image in the eyes of foreign countries”. However, DNA tests cleared all of the “suspects” until the beginning of October, when the police announced a positive match with Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo. A bizarre “reconstruction” of the crime, in which they were paraded on the beach in motorcycle helmets, compounded a sense of deep unease, which extended to the British government. Hugo Swire, the Foreign Office minister, expressed “real concern” about the investigation. Detectives from the Metropolitan

police visited Thailand to assess the investigation and are presently working on a report. Seven weeks after the arrests, the prosecutors have still not sent the case to court (under Thai law they have five more weeks to do so). Those who know the accused describe them as shy, unworldly, and — for men accused of perpetrating such a frenziedly violent attack — physically slight. “We don’t believe they did it, but then we’re Burmese,” says an elder of the migrant community. “But the local Thais who live here, they don’t

believe it either.” Social media churns with rumours that the son of a “powerful family” on the island was involved in the murders and that his crime is being covered up. A DNA test has exculpated him, police say. November is low season on Koh Tao, but young tourists continue to arrive. About half of those I spoke to last week did not know about the murders. But if Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo are as innocent as they look, then there is a beast at large in the jungle of Koh Tao, and everyone who stays there has reason for anxiety.

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

News

Google may be broken up in Europe as MEPs vote to curb data collection Charles Bremner Paris

The internet giant Google is to come under increased European pressure next week when the EU parliament is expected to call for its search engine to be detached from the rest of the company’s activities. The dominant centre-left and centre-right blocs in the European Parliament are to vote on a motion that would seek the “unbundling of search

engines from other commercial services” of Google. The vote, likely to pass, will not be binding but it would increase political pressure on the European Commission to take a strong hand with a company it has been investigating for the past four years. If the commission applied the parliament’s motion, Google’s activities in Europe would have to be broken up. “Unbundling cannot be excluded,”

Andreas Schwab, a German MEP, [told the Financial Times. Google declined to comment EU politicians, led by the Germans, have been demanding action to stem what they see as a growing monopoly in which Google endangers privacy, undermines media diversity and evades taxes in Europe. MEPs and European politicians have also been angered by Google’s reluctant implementation of a ruling by the

European Court of Justice’s that European citizens have a right to be forgotten on the internet, which requires the company to cut links to reports on people’s past. Margrethe Vestager, the new EU commissioner for competition, said last week that she would not be rushed into her investigation of the antitrust concerns posed by Google’s control over large amounts of data. She said that she needed to understand how European business was affected by Google’s business practices. The Google problem was “multifaceted and complex,” she said. Ms Verstager has reopened a case, which has been delayed since the previous commission tried and failed to negotiate a solution with the American company to limit its domination over the flow of information in Europe. “The sheer amount of data controlled by Google gives rise to a series of societal challenges,” said the former Danish economy minister. “Not all of these challenges are primarily economic in nature and not all of them are competition-related,” she said. Google is one of the biggest US multinationals to have stirred anger across Europe after reports of its methods for minimising taxes on its profits by funnelling them through Ireland, Luxembourg and other low-tax states.

Tesco to hide newpapers’ front pages Harriet Line

Newspaper front pages will be hidden from view in Tesco stores after a campaign by pressure groups to protect children from sexual images. By the end of this month, branches of the supermarket will have redesigned newsstands that show only the title and logo of newspapers, concealing photographs and headlines. The decision comes after lobbying by Child Eyes and No More Page 3 to reduce children’s exposure to sexual imagery. Child Eye’s co-founder, Kathy McGuiness, said that she started campaigning two years ago when she noticed her four-year-old son staring at explicit images on the front page of a tabloid newspaper in a supermarket. “Children have the right to go into a shop and not be confronted by these images. We have become desensitised to this imagery, but when we see it through the eyes of a child it seems so wrong,” she said. Stephanie Davies-Arai, of No More Page 3, said that she welcomed the changes, adding: “Tabloids often have images that are similar to ‘lads’ magazines’. They have adult content within a non-age-restricted publication.” Tracey Clements, of Tesco, said: “We are first and foremost a family retailer and it’s important we do everything we can to promote the right environment in store. We’ve asked our customers what they think about the issue and we have spoken to campaigners. The change we’re making will strike the right balance for everyone.” Other supermarkets appear less keen to follow suit. Waitrose refused to meet Child Eyes, saying: “We would not be able to run our business if we set a precedent for meeting lobbyists on request.”

Claudia Winkleman to return as Strictly host

Claudia Winkleman will return as presenter of Strictly Come Dancing this weekend, three weeks after her daughter was injured in a Hallowe’en accident. She was replaced by Zoë Ball, after taking leave from the show to care for Matilda, aged eight, who suffered burns when her costume was set alight by a candle. “Matilda is doing well . . . although it will be a long road to recovery,” she wrote on Twitter. “I’m coming back to Strictly this weekend but am out of practice so please bear with me.”

Four held for ‘hacking’ Four people have been arrested in Britain as part of an international operation to combat computer hackers, the National Crime Agency said. The arrests targeted suspected users of remote access trojans, which give hackers control over computers and access to information such as bank details. Three of the men were arrested in Leeds while the fourth was detained in Chatham, Kent. Another 11 suspects were held elsewhere in Europe.

Ramsay denies lying The chef Gordon Ramsay has denied lying in court and “manufacturing” his displeasure about his father-in-law, who he claims used a machine to “forge” his signature. Ramsay claims the machine was used without his knowledge to make him liable for the £640,000 annual rent on a pub near Regent’s Park in London. He wants a high court judge to nullify the guarantee, but Gary Love, the pub’s owner, says Ramsay’s claim is “absurd”.

Beard snoods boom The growth of the hipster beard trend might have hit sales of razor blades, but it has had the opposite effect on snoods — the hygiene nets that cover the whiskers of those working in food industries. Lion Haircare and Disposables, of Nottingham, said annual global sales of its snoods had risen by a third in the past three years to more than three million because of the fashion for beards and stricter standards in food preparation.

“Mother doesn’t respond well to negative comments on TripAdvisor”

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Send us back to Calais for another go, say migrants Richard Ford Home Correspondent

Migrants caught heading from Calais to Britain are demanding to be returned to France so they can try again, according to a top transport official. Many of those congregating in the French port are not seeking asylum but want to get to Britain to find jobs in the black economy, said Tim Reardon, head of taxation, ferry and cruise, at the UK Chamber of Shipping. Another transport boss said that the number of migrants trying to hide on lorries bound for Britain is so great some haulage companies have banned drivers from stopping within 125 miles of Calais. Last month, Natacha Bouchart, the

Immigrants at the French port try to get on to a lorry headed for England

mayor of Calais, insisted that thousands of migrants were coming to the port because of the £36 a week Britain handed out to asylum seekers . However, MPs were told that it is the prospect of working illegally that makes Britain so attractive. “It is our experience that a great number of those migrants that we see around Calais and occasionally on our ferries are not looking to claim asylum either in France or Britain,” Mr Reardon said. “They are looking to come here, be here and work here” Mr Reardon told the home affairs select committee this week that migrants caught on ferries usually ask to be returned to France rather than

face questions in Britain, as that allows them another chance to enter the country illegally. He said: “When these individuals are encountered on board the ships they frequently ask to be taken back to Calais rather than be brought to the UK and put into the asylum processing system. “They would rather remain outside the system altogether, go back to France, and try and have another go at getting into the UK, out of sight of officialdom, so they can enter the labour market, which they cannot do once enter the asylum system.” He added that if the migrants are picked up at Dover port or elsewhere in Britain, they submit an asylum claim to prolong their stay. Mr Reardon said: “That is the way not to be turfed out again as the last thing they want is to be removed to their country of origin.” He said it was not clear how migrants were able to get on board Channel ferries. Some might have avoided checks on lorries, while other might have climbed on to the ship from the water or from the quayside. Mr Reardon and Peter Cullum, head of international affairs at the Road Haulage Association, told MPs they believed Calais was in crisis because of the extent of the migrant problem. Mr Cullum revealed the scale of the problem of migrants hiding or leap aboard moving lorries by confirming that hauliers now tell their drivers not to stop within 200km of the port to ensure they don’t end up with stowaways. “Put it this way, we have some members who will not let their drivers stop within 200km of Calais, we have other members who won’t let them stop within a 100km of Calais, we have others who refuel in Calais,” he said. He was supported by John Keefe, the director of public affairs at Eurotunnel, who confirmed that many hauliers had ordered drivers not to stop within 200km of the port.

Help pay £60m clean-up, chewing gum makers told Jill Sherman Whitehall Editor

Chewing gum companies should help to pay for the removal of tonnes of their discarded produce from city streets, which costs town halls £60 million a year, council chiefs are due to say today. The Local Government Association (LGA), which represents almost 400 councils in England and Wales, says that sticky gum is now “a plague on the country’s pavements”. It says the annual cost of removing gum would enable more than a million potholes to be filled. Calling for a “producer pays” principle so that manufacturers contributed to the cost of proper disposal, it points out that the average piece of gum costs about 3p to buy, but 50 times that (£1.50) to clean up. Most chewing gum never degrades and once trodden into the pavement requires specialist equipment to remove it. The problem is particularly acute in town and city centres. Westminster council in London said that almost three million pieces of gum, amounting

to six tonnes, were dropped on West End streets every year. Authorities had tried several measures to deal with the problem, including recyclable paper sheets to fold around gum and bins with anti-gum littering messages. “Chewing gum is a plague on our pavements,” Peter Box, the LGA environment spokesman, said. “It is a blight that costs councils a fortune to clean up and takes hours of hard work to remove. It’s ugly, it’s unsightly and it’s unacceptable.” He said that councils had no legal obligation to clear up gum, but did it for the benefit of their shoppers, town centre users, businesses and residents to make the pavements more attractive and the environment better. Ministers accused the LGA of backing a gum tax. “This government has no interest in additional gum tax,” Chris Hopkins, the local government minister, said. He urged councils “to promote social responsibility and ensure the decent provision of litter bins”.

News BNPS

Deck the hall National Trust staff at Cotehele House, Cornwall, hang a 60ft Christmas garland made of 36,000 dried flowers

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

News Saturday interview

‘I want to be a Labour leader who The party must embrace patriotism, Jim Murphy tells Alice Thomson and Rachel Sylvester

im Murphy was the unexpected star of the Scottish referendum campaign, touring the cities and glens, street corners and village halls with his Irn-Bru crate. He was heckled,

splattered with egg and had to shout his unionist message above baying Yes campaigners. On his 100-venue tour, he encountered a horse wearing a Yes blanket, raucous hen nights and stand-up comedians with whom he would share a platform. Now he is the frontrunner to become leader of a Scottish Labour party that is on its knees. Announcing his candidacy in the contest — the result of which will be announced on December 13 — he said that he wanted to prevent “self-harm” in his

party. The Glaswegian son of a trade unionist from an Irish Catholic family, he admits he doesn’t own a kilt. “When I was a kid I went to the Scouts and we couldn’t afford a kilt so I had to leave. I wear one on big family occasions but I hire it.” The MP for East Renfrewshire is, though, passionate about Scotland. When he was Scottish secretary he had a painting of Mary, Queen of Scots on his office wall. He prefers Sean Connery to Daniel Craig, Harris tweed to leather and has never been

to Stonehenge — only Arthur’s Seat. “I am a Glaswegian first, Scottish second and British third,” he says. He didn’t mind being harangued on the referendum campaign trail. “I enjoyed some of it, it was good oldfashioned politics . . . Winning made it sweeter but I have never enjoyed a campaign so much.” The mob of Yes vote campaigners didn’t intimidate him. “I just had to stand there looking like a skinny Glaswegian shouting on a crate. They wanted to drown me out but they embarrassed themselves.” During the six weeks on the stump, he never once doubted that the unionists would win. “I said to everyone, ‘Just hold your nerve and it will be fine’. I was meeting too many real people who were saying No. The No campaign wasn’t a shambles but there is an energy about nationalism and we had to match that.” The SNP, he says, still can’t admit defeat. “The horse that came a bad second has spent eight weeks doing a lap of honour. They are trying to turn a big defeat into a moral victory.” He insists the independence question mustn’t dominate the political debate in Scotland for the next 40 years. “The SNP said this was a once in a generation thing and now they seem to be behaving as though it’s once a year. For the next four decades, we should just get on with it.” Labour, he says, now needs to reconnect with all sides. “It’s important to build bridges with Yes voters. I want to be the leader who brings people together, the poor and the prosperous, the new towns and the old cities, who doesn’t ask you how you voted in the referendum.” This applies south as well as north of the border. He was horrified by Emily Thornberry’s tweet of England flags and a white van outside a voter’s house in Rochester and Strood. “The emotional politics of national pride is now mainstream,” Mr Murphy says. “Political parties don’t just have to be comfortable about it, we have to be part of that mood. As Ed Miliband has said, people should be proud and free to fly their national flag. It should be celebrated.” Labour, he insists, must not allow a perception to develop that it is run by a metropolitan elite. “Ed knows and has made clear to his team that everyone has to get out of the Westminster bubble. It’s about spending more time listening to people on their doorstep as well as talking to them from behind TV cameras in London.” But the Scottish Labour party now sees supporters streaming to the SNP. Mr Murphy admits that it took too many of its supporters for granted. “We didn’t listen. We had a degree of arrogance, it was pride before a fall.”

he party in Scotland had indulged in too much infighting, he believes. “Too often Labour looked for opponents and enemies inside its own party. There was no corruption, just nastiness and personal enmity.” This allowed the SNP to become a formidable opponent. “They are now the establishment here. Their trick is to be the incumbent and the insurgent — whatever you want. If you don’t like their principles they can give you some others.” Mr Murphy does not believe the SNP has become a protest group like Ukip in England. “But they do share some characteristics. The Ukip people who are frustrated in England are the SNP in Scotland. I want the Labour party to be the party of government

Jim Murphy took on the heckling mobs as he went around Scotland campaigning for a No vote with

his Irn-Bru crate . “They wanted to drown me out but they embarrassed themselves”

but also the party people come to who are angry and want change.” For that to happen, Labour must first transform itself, he says. “The SNP would love us to retreat to the politics of appealing just to our base. I want to get people who are unaligned, who aren’t ideological. I will respect those feel instinctively Labour, but I want more than just them.” He doesn’t share the analysis that the SNP could take 25 seats from his party at the general election next year. “We mustn’t buy into the myth of nationalist invincibility — the SNP won 32 seats from us in 2011, 28 of those seats voted No in the referendum. The Labour party, while reaching out to those who voted Yes, has to be the natural home for many of those people who voted No. These are middle-of-the-road people who are not tribal in their politics.” Ed Miliband, though, could be a problem: the Scots haven’t warmed to this southerner. Although he was David Miliband’s leadership campaign manager, Mr Murphy will not criticise the younger brother. “The British Labour party is doing better than the

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Saturday interview News

doesn’t ask if you voted Yes or No’ TIMES PHOTOGRAPHER JAMES GLOSSOP

James Francis Murphy Curriculum Vitae Age 47. Born August 23, 1967 Background Born in Glasgow, he moved to South Africa in his teens and returned to Glasgow at 18 Family Married to Claire Cook, a primary school teacher. They have three children Education St Robert Bellarmine School, Glasgow; Milnerton High School, Cape Town; University of Strathclyde Career MP for East Renfrewshire. He has been Europe minister, employment and welfare reform minister, cabinet office secretary, secretary of state for Scotland and shadow secretary of state for defence Notable He is vegetarian and teetotal and captains the parliamentary football team

Scottish one. We don’t even have a leader so I can’t give advice to Ed about what to do.” To win the leadership in Scotland, Mr Murphy must see off the trades unions. Although two thirds of constituency parties and most parliamentarians are backing him, only two unions are. He won’t complain about the electoral college, which gives the unions a share of the vote. “The rules are the rules you can’t contest them.” Len McCluskey, the general secretary of Unite, has said that electing this Blairite former Cabinet minister as Scottish leader would be a “death sentence” for Labour. “The union leadership are entitled to encourage their members to vote in a certain way,” Mr Murphy says, “but I think we’ve got to have a degree of temperance in our language. Len McCluskey doesn’t live in Scotland or have a vote here. This will be decided in Scotland rather than behind a desk in London. I don’t know Len. I’ve never met him. I’ve got better manners than him, I wait to meet someone before I think ill of them.” Some think he may be punished for his support for new Labour but Mr Murphy insists: “We’ve had six leaders since Tony Blair — two UK leaders and four Scottish leaders. It’s not about a guy called Tony Blair who didn’t seem that bad at winning

elections. He was right for that time, but the issues are different now.” Labour, he says, must rediscover “a politics of patriotism” and convey a sense of pride and optimism. “The SNP have been allowed to be the party of sunshine and we’ve been the party that’s looked forward to a rainy day, always carrying an umbrella in the hope that it rained.”

e’s not going to get into personal attacks on his opponents. “Nicola Sturgeon is formidable; she’s intelligent, passionate and she loves Scotland as much as I do,” he says. “The Labour party’s approach in Scotland has been that you’ve got to knock the other person out. We should be saying, ‘Here’s your choice’. It’s not a boxing match where you have to pulverise the other person to win.” To him, the future of Scotland is too important to be the focus of party political games. The “vow” made by all the Westminster party leaders on the eve of the referendum — promising greater devolution including tax-varying powers — must be fulfilled. “I don’t want to be partisan but I am genuinely furious with David Cameron for what he did the morning after the referendum. It was underhand, really shoddy bad faith, bad politics, playing fast and

Quick fire Coke or Irn-Bru? Irn-Bru, below, by miles London Olympics or Glasgow Commonwealth Games? Commonwealth Games Christmas day or New Year’s Eve? Christmas day Holyrood or Windsor Castle? Holyrood Arthur’s Seat or Stonehenge? Arthur’s Seat Lowlands or Highlands? Lowlands Braveheart or Gregory’s Girl? Gregory’s Girl , it’s about my city Sean Connery or Daniel Craig? Sean Connery Elizabeth I or Mary, Queen of Scots? Mary, Queen of Scots Tweed or leather? Harris tweed

loose with the unwritten constitution of the United Kingdom by making a quarter-baked announcement on English votes for English laws.” Now he worries that the prime minister is making another blunder by promising a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU. “I was instinctively attracted to it but my experience of the Scotland referendum has made me less keen on a European referendum. The Scottish vote was a beautiful democratic event with a bit of ugliness around the edges, but the lesson I take from it is that you need a referendum on a particular set of proposals. A European referendum would be a vote in the dark.” Mr Murphy is ready to get out his Irn-Bru crate again — for his party or his country. Having spent his teenage years living in Cape Town after his family emigrated there, and with grandparents who lived in Donegal, he occasionally supports Ireland or South Africa at sport. But there is no doubt where his loyalty lies. “I want Scotland to win at everything against everyone,” he says.

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

World

Iraq begins desperate fight to keep Isis from Baghdad Iraq

Catherine Philp Beirut

Islamic State militants have launched an assault on a key Iraqi city that, if successful, would give the jihadists a clear run into Baghdad. Mosques blared desperate appeals for help yesterday to repel the attempted Isis takeover of Ramadi as militants scaled rooftops in the city centre. Gunfire echoed through Ramadi as Iraqi security forces and local tribesman tried to prevent Isis fighters from overrunning the complex that houses the provincial government. Ramadi’s centre is one of the few enclaves in Anbar province still controlled by the government in Baghdad since Isis began its takeover of the province with the capture of Fallujah in January. Its loss would be a major setback for Iraqi government forces only days after they regained control of the northern town of Baiji and its oil refinery, Iraq’s largest. Baiji is the first urban centre to be retaken from Isis since its fighters crossed the Syrian border in June and seized Iraq’s second city, Mosul, and a swathe of northern Iraq. Baiji’s recapture robs Isis of a key route linking northern and western Iraq, their two centres of control, although both remain accessible from across the Syria border. The capture of Ramadi would give Isis an unbroken road from their Syrian stronghold to the western gates of Baghdad, where the capital’s international airport is also located. Isis fighters have been nearing Ramadi’s outskirts for weeks, prompting warnings from tribal leaders that the province was on the brink of falling. Last month Isis overran the town of Hit, to the west of Ramadi, all but encircling it. There was anger from Anbar

officials, who complained that the battle for the strategically unimportant but highly visible Kurdish town of Kobani, on the Turkish-Syrian border, had distracted the American-led coalition from a more important battle. Yesterday’s assault began in the early hours with co-ordinated attacks from all directions and mortars raining down on Ramadi’s city centre. Gun battles continued last night around the government complex. Tribal leaders instructed mosques to broadcast appeals to residents. “Mosques are asking anyone who can carry weapons to confront the attackers,” Hathal al-Fahdawi, a member of the Anbar provincial council, said. The assault came hours after the

50 miles

IRAN

SYR I A

Mosul Arbil

Mushayrafa

IRAQ

Kirkuk Ramadi Baghdad Fallujah

Dutch jihadist bride faces jail Netherlands Adam Sage

A Dutch teenager who was rescued by her mother after marrying a jihadist in Syria was remanded in custody last night on suspicion of seeking to join a terrorist network. A prosecutor in her home town of Maastricht said that the woman, 19, could face 30 years in jail if she was found to have fought with Islamic State. Judges ordered the detention of the teenager, named only as Aicha, on the ground that she was suspected of “crimes threatening state security”. She was called Sterlina before she adopted an Arab name. Her mother, Monique, said that she had been a happy, outgoing girl until she converted to Islam and began to wear a niqab. She left for Syria after seeing an interview with Omar Yilmaz, right, a Dutch-Turkish jihadist who trains Isis

fighters. Seeing him as a Robin Hood figure, according to her mother, she agreed to marry him. Her mother made a failed attempt to rescue her in October but tried again this month, when she is said to have slipped through checkpoints in Turkey wearing a burqa. Her lawyer said that she had travelled to Raqqa in Syria to bring Aicha home. However, Roger Bos, Maastricht’s chief public prosecutor, said that she had met her daughter at the border between Turkey and Syria. “I think that psychologically [Aicha] needs support and she has that from her mother . . . Is she a victim or a suspect? Maybe she’s both,” he said. “We don't know what she did over there, what her role was.”

death in a coalition airstrike of the Isis governor in Mosul. Radwan Taleb alHamdouni and his driver were killed on Wednesday when their car was hit in an airstrike on Mosul’s western outskirts. His funeral attracted large numbers of Isis fighters and supporters, who carried the black flags of the hardline group. Hamdouni was named governor of Mosul after Isis overran the city in June, aided by disaffected former members of Saddam Hussein’s military. Isis was initially welcomed by Mosul’s Sunni residents, who were unhappy with the repressive rule of the Shia-dominated Iraqi army. Its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, chose a mosque in Mosul to announce the establishment of his self-declared caliphate straddling the Syrian-Iraqi border. However, Isis’s harsh governance has fuelled resentment, as has its failure to maintain basic services in the city, with water and power shortages frequent. Christians and Yazidis have fled the city while many other stay only to prevent Isis from seizing their homes. Sources in Mosul say that opposition to Isis is growing and could help to facilitate the recapture of the city. Thousands of American military advisers have begun deploying to Iraq to help to prepare Iraqi troops for a spring offensive aimed at retaking Mosul. Pentagon officials say that they have not ruled out the use of US ground troops. Mosul’s exiled deputy governor warned that the longer it was delayed, the harder it would become to recapture the city. That may hold even truer for cities such as Fallujah, where distrust of the Baghdad government may run deeper than distaste for the rule of Isis.

Truth march A protester in Aztec dress

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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First the world, then Bondi beach Page 61

Shrinking populations put leading nations at risk Pages 34-35

EDUARDO VERDUGO / AP

Illegal immigrants Seattle

Chicago

Washington Philadelphia

New York

Richmond Raleigh Georgia

Los Angeles Las Vegas Tucson

Denver

Population figures are rounded

Houston

Miami

US total 11,200,000 >750,000 170,000-725,000 75,000-160,000 25,000-70,000 <25,000 Source: Pew Research Centre 2012

Immigrant amnesty may swing the 2016 presidential contest United States

David Taylor US Editor

joins crowds in Mexico City demanding answers over 43 students murdered by gangsters on the orders of a corrupt mayor

Ebola shames Africa, says Mandela widow South Africa

Ruth Maclean Johannesburg

Nelson Mandela’s widow condemned African leaders last night for their failure to stop the spread of ebola, accusing them of always relying on Britain and America to get out of a crisis. Graça Machel, who has made few public remarks since the death of the anti-apartheid hero, said that Africa’s rulers had learnt no lessons from the HIV pandemic and were completely unprepared when ebola struck. The latest outbreak of the virus has killed more than 5,000 people, mainly in west Africa. “Why is it whenever we have a crisis on this continent we have to run to the Americans, we have to run to the British?” she asked at a conference in Johannesburg. African countries have committed to spend 15 per cent of their budgets on health but many break this promise and spend the money on arms instead, she said. “We had hundreds of thousands of Africans dying of HIV/Aids before we’d wake up and take the relevant meas-

ures,” she said. “With the ebola outbreak, it’s as if those lessons didn’t register. Governments were found totally unprepared. Why has it taken us so long to recognise that this is our problem? “What about families? What about the children left behind? It’s time Africans began to give real value to African human life,” she said. “If there is one single American who dies anywhere, they’ll move everything to get him back. How many African leaders would do that?” Mr Mandela, known in South Africa by his clan name, Madiba, died nearly a year ago. Ms Machel said last week that, as the December 5 anniversary approached, “my heart is getting heavier and heavier. It is still too hard to live with

the reality that Madiba is no more.” Yesterday she also accused businesses of taking huge profits out of Africa while failing to help with the ebola crisis. She singled out the chocolate industry, which is worth £60 billion a year. She said Africa was not yet aware of the impact ebola would have on its economies. Safari bookings in South Africa, Botswana, Tanzania and Kenya are down by 70 per cent. These are countries unaffected by ebola, but she said that people associated the disease with the whole continent. Ignorance is also at work within Africa, she said. “Xenophobia is reemerging using the ebola outbreak as the excuse. People are being lynched already just for coming from Sierra Leone.”

President Obama yesterday surrounded himself with celebrating Hispanic schoolchildren as he marked an immigration reform set to give the Democrats a crucial demographic advantage in the 2016 presidential election. The president’s trip to Las Vegas came the day after a speech in which he promised to drive through a law giving amnesty to millions of undocumented migrants who had previously been living in the shadows. The president responded to his midterm election defeat, which saw Republicans take control of the Senate as well as the House of Represenatives, by seeking to bypass Congress and use his executive authority to give almost five million illegal immigrants the right to stay and work for the next three years. None will be able to vote because they are still not citizens, but their families, friends and colleagues who do vote can have a big say in 2016. The remaining six million illegal immigrants will stay in the shadows, in black-economy jobs and unable to get health insurance or drive legally. Most of the migrants are Mexican; in all, 83 per cent come from Mexico, Central or South America. Unauthorised immigrants make up 5 per cent of the US labour force, rising to 10 per cent in states such as Nevada. The number of Hispanic voters has almost doubled in the 12 years since George W Bush was first elected, rising from 5.9 million in 2000 to 11.18 million in 2012. Mr Bush, a former Texas governor, got 40 per cent of their votes, but in 2012, Mitt Romney got just 27 per cent. In crucial swing states such as Florida, the Hispanic vote is decisive. There are 2.1 million eligible Latino voters, many with relatives who are illegal, a figure that has grown 66 per cent since 2000. They now make up almost one in five votes in the state, and are overwhelmingly voting for Democrats. In

2012, Mr Obama beat Mr Romney by 0.9 per cent, or 73,000 votes. The Republicans, who opposed Mr Obama’s plans to use executive powers to bypass Congress, risk being portrayed once again as a party of white America. Mr Obama threw down the gauntlet to Republicans who have blocked new immigration laws, telling those in Congress who question his authority, “I have one answer: pass a bill.” John Boehner, Speaker of the House of Representatives, who leads House Republicans, was visibly angry yesterday as he insisted that Mr Obama was turning a deaf ear to the American people by acting alone, just days after the midterm elections had delivered victory for Republicans.“As I told the president yesterday, he is damaging the presidency itself,” Mr Boehner said. The Speaker conceded that the immigration system was broken, but when asked why he had stood in the way of sweeping new laws for more than a year, he blamed Mr Obama, claiming the president had created an environment where members of the House would not trust him. Mr Boehner would not reveal his next moves, but appeared to hint that the House would start passing some bills dealing with aspects of immigration reform. “In the days ahead, the people’s House will rise to this challenge, we will not stand idle as the president undermines the rule of law in our country . . . We have a broken immigration system and the American people expect us to work together to fix it. And we ought to do it in the democratic process, moving bills through the people’s House, through the Senate, and to the president’s desk.” Apart from passing their own bills, other options for Republicans include forcing a government shutdown by refusing to pass a budget, targeted moves to close parts of the government, taking legal action to challenge the Mr Obama’s reforms, or acting to impeach the president for exceeding his powers.

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

World

Putin’s European ally pelted with eggs Miloš Zeman on holiday this summer and, below, at a meeting in Moscow with Vladimir Putin

Czech Republic

David Charter

The maverick president of the Czech Republic, fond of a drink and fresh from a protest at which he was pelted with eggs, is perhaps not the ideal ally for Vladimir Putin if the Russian president is hoping to rehabilitate his battered reputation in Europe. However, Miloš Zeman, 70, has invited Mr Putin to Prague, in defiance of furious street protests last week after he defended Russia’s actions in Ukraine and criticised the protest group Pussy Riot — even as Czechs were marking the 25th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution, in which they freed themselves from Moscow’s vice-like grip. The former socialist prime minister was confronted by an angry mob in Prague at a memorial for the student demonstration that triggered the revolution, dismissing it as just one of many protests. Mr Zeman followed up with an invitation to President Putin to attend a Holocaust commemoration in January, despite Mr Putin’s growing pariah status in the west. Mr Zeman played down Russian aggression in Ukraine, describing the war as a struggle between two groups

of Ukrainian citizens — appearing to disregard any Russian participation. “I am not afraid of you,” Mr Zeman shouted at the crowd on Monday, as security guards protected him from eggs, one of which hit Joachim Gauck, the visiting German president. One banner in the crowd declared: “We do not want to be a Russian colony.” “Twenty five years ago it was dangerous to go out on the streets. It required courage,” Mr Zeman said. “I was among the demonstrators then. It is cowardly of you to come here and pelt us with eggs.” In spite of all of this, Mr Putin might

be grateful for all the friends he can get. This week it emerged that he had fallen out with one of his last western European allies, Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, after a four-hour meeting at his hotel in Brisbane during the G20 summit. Mr Zeman was a dissident under communist rule who led the Czech Social Democratic Party from 1998 to 2002 and went on to become prime minister. He was named as president last year, but has since been mired in controversy, not least over allegations that he is a heavy drinker. He has been

filmed at official events leaning wearily on the furniture and tripping over stairs. His explanation, on one occasion, that he was suffering from a virus led Czechs to adopt the phrase “heading out for a virus” on Friday nights. Mr Zeman has chosen a sensitive time to show his support for Russia, with feelings running high in Prague on the anniversary of the momentous events of 1989. In an interview last week on Russian TV, speaking in Russian, he said that his country was experiencing “pressure from Washington” to bring in sanctions against Moscow over Ukraine. He has described Pussy Riot, the punk group jailed for denouncing President Putin in a Moscow cathedral, as hooligans who should not have been treated as political prisoners. Mr Zeman has also caused controversy with his remarks on China, which he visited earlier this month. In a break with the policy of speaking up for human rights, Mr Zeman assured Beijing that he accepted China’s position on Tibet and Taiwan. He said that he had gone to China not to teach people human-rights lessons, but “to learn how to stabilise society”. CARLOS ALVAREZ / GETTY IMAGES

Knife attack on Jewish students at seminary Jerusalem Two Jewish students were attacked on Friday night, breaking a short-lived calm in Israel after an attack on a synagogue three days earlier (Gregg Carlstrom writes). The students were attacked outside a religious school on the Mount of Olives, east Jerusalem, with knives, stones and an iron rod. However, it is believed they were not seriously injured. Israeli police said the attackers had not yet been arrested. Eleven people have been killed in a wave of attacks across Jerusalem over the past month. The deadliest attack came on Tuesday, when five people were killed in a synagogue by two Palestinian men.

Stampede at religious service leaves 11 dead Harare Eleven people including a pregnant woman and three children died in a stampede during a religious service at a sports stadium in Zimbabwe’s capital. Four people died at the stadium and seven in hospital, according to police. Those killed were attending a church service held by Walter Magaya, a Pentecostal pastor who draws huge crowds. (AP)

Death toll climbs to 13 after Buffalo blizzards New York The death toll from a

snowstorm in western New York state has hit 13, and is expected to rise further still as rescue workers free vehicles trapped in deep drifts. Blizzards dumped a year’s supply of snow in a matter of days on Buffalo city. Members of the rock band Interpol were among those caught up in the drama, stranded for more than 50 hours on their tour bus. (AFP)

Islamist group murders 50 in machete attack Kinshasa At least 50 people were murdered in a machete and axe attack by a Ugandan Islamist group in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The killings took place about six miles from the town of Beni, home to Congolese military and UN troops. Allied Democratic Forces were blamed for the attack. They have killed 200 people since October in a battle with Congolese forces. (Reuters)

Sri Lanka president faces poll challenge Colombo Mahinda Rajapaksa, the

Grand farewell The six children of the Duchess of Alba, whose funeral was in Seville, each inherit a palace

Followers ate cult leader’s bath pudding India

Robin Pagnamenta Mumbai

An Indian cult leader whose followers bathed him daily in milk, which was then used to make a rice pudding that they all ate, was being questioned by police yesterday. Sant Rampal, a former government engineer who claims to be the reincarnation of a 15th-century mystic poet, was arrested on murder charges after a siege at his ashram. Six people died and more than 200 were injured. He is facing charges of murder and sedition after blockading

himself inside his giant commune at Hisar in Haryana, surrounded by thousands of armed devotees, who exchanged fire with police in pitched battles this week. Followers explained how Mr Rampal had been ritually bathed every day in milk, which was used to make kheer. “The milk falls on him, while he sits and meditates. The fruit of his meditation is present in the kheer,” said Krishan, 29, who was admitted to hospital with a head injury. As well as his daily milk baths, Mr Rampal, 63, also reportedly owned a fleet of BMWs and Mer-

cedes cars. He lived in a “palace” equipped with a private hospital, swimming pool and throne room, where he blessed devotees. Mr Rampal had ignored at least 40 court summons over a murder charge against him from 2006, when he is alleged to have ordered followers to attack villagers. After storming the ashram on Wednesday, police found the bodies of four women and a child, plus a stockpile of arms, ammunition and bags of acid, which were being used by his personal force of “Baba’s Commandos”, who had sworn to protect him.

president of Sri Lanka, is to be challenged by his health minister in elections to be held on January 8. Maithripala Sirisena, number two in the Sri Lanka Freedom Party, the largest party in the ruling coalition, announced that he was standing after quitting his post. It is seen as a serious setback for the president who is seeking his third term. (AP)

Two freed as witness recants after 39 years Cleveland Two men who spent 39 years in jail have been released after a witness said he was coerced by police into testifying against them. Ricky Jackson, now 57, was imprisoned in 1975 for the murder of Harry Franks, along with brothers Wiley and Ronnie Bridgeman. Ronnie Bridgeman, now called Kwame Ajamu, was released in 2003. His brother was freed hours after Mr Jackson.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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World

Latest Cosby rape claims stun America United States

Rhys Blakely Los Angeles

The district attorney leading the investigation felt in his gut that “something untoward” had occurred, but the case was tricky from the start. America was stunned: Bill Cosby, its sitcom superstar, a man beloved by millions as an avuncular father figure, had been accused of drugging and molesting a young woman at his mansion in Philadelphia. The detective who questioned him believed that Cosby was “evasive . . . only telling us things he knew we already knew”. The district attorney believed that the woman, Andrea Constand, then 31, was telling the truth. However, there had been a year between the alleged assault in 2004 Therese Serignese, a nurse, claims she was raped in 1976

and Ms Constand coming forward, which badly damaged her credibility under Philadelphia law. There was no chance of getting a warrant to search Cosby’s home. Bruce L Castor Jr, the district attorney, thought that something was amiss, but now says that he muted his public comments because he didn’t want to prejudice the jury that would hear the civil lawsuit that Ms Constand was planning against Cosby. “I couldn’t say that I thought he was guilty but that I couldn’t prove it,” he told The Times. “I didn’t want to pollute the jury pool for the civil trial.” So a potential criminal case against Cosby melted away. In 2006 Ms Constand’s civil lawsuit against him was settled on undisclosed terms. To this day, the comedian has not been charged with any crime and he

has consistently maintained that he is entirely innocent of any wrongdoing. By last night, however, eight other women had joined Ms Constand in making public allegations of sexual assault against him, scuppering Cosby’s plans to make a television comeback. Their stories date from 1967 to 2005 and most follow a pattern: Cosby offered them friendship and career advice. Then, when they were alone, he allegedly gave them an unknown drug and abused them when they were unable to resist. For Americans, it must seem like a trusted national institution is crumbling. Early in his career, Cosby was likened to Mark Twain for his comedic storytelling, and he was the first black television star to be embraced by mainstream audiences. He wrote bestselling books about fatherhood, and during the 1980s he played the sage patriarch Cliff Huxtable on The Cosby Show, which was the most-watched programme in America for five of its eight series. Over the summer a poll ranked him the second-greatest Pennsylvanian in history, trailing only Benjamin Franklin. This week, however, he has been slowly erased from the TV landscape that he helped to create. On Wednesday NBC cancelled a sitcom in which Cosby was to have played another avuncular father figure; the online video service Netflix postponed Bill Cosby 77, made to celebrate his 77th birthday last July; and the cable channel TV Land

NBC / GETTY IMAGES; SPLASH NEWS

Bill Cosby in The Cosby Show and, below, on stage for charity this week. Left, Janice Dickinson, an alleged victim

pulled its re-runs of The Cosby Show. In part, the biggest television star of the 1980s appears to have been undone by the digital age. Long-standing allegations against Cosby gained new traction last month when Hannibal Buress, a comedian, called him a rapist during a stand-up performance. “He has the smuggest old black man public persona,” Buress said of Cosby. “ ‘Pull your pants up, black people. I can talk down to you, because I had a successful sitcom.’ Yeah, you rape women, Bill Cosby. That brings you down a couple of notches.” Buress had been performing the routine for months, but the clip suddenly went viral on the internet. In its wake, other

alleged victims began to speak out. In The Washington Post Barbara Bowman, a former actress, described an alleged attack. “Cosby won my trust as a 17year-old aspiring actress in 1985, brainwashed me into viewing him as a father figure, and then assaulted me multiple times,” she alleged. On Wednesday the former model Janice Dickinson came forward with a similar story. She alleged that Cosby gave her a glass of red wine and a pill,

which she asked for because she had period pains. “The next morning I woke up, and I wasn’t wearing my pyjamas, and I remember before I passed out that I had been sexually assaulted by this man,” she told the Entertainment Tonight television show. The next day Therese Serignese, a nurse, claimed that Cosby raped her in 1976 after a show in Las Vegas. Last night the ninth woman came forward. Carla Ferrigno is now married to the bodybuilder Lou Ferrigno, who played the title role in The Incredible Hulk on television. She alleges that Cosby kissed her against her will and manhandled her in 1967 when she was working as a Playboy bunny. Cosby has said that allegations are false, saying through his lawyer that Ms Dickinson’s story was an outright lie. He has declined to say anything further. When a reporter from the news agency AP brought up the allegations on camera, Cosby made clear that he wanted the footage to be forgotten. “If you want to consider yourself to be serious, then it will not appear anywhere,” he said. “I would appreciate it if it was scuttled.” That wish now looks fanciful.

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

World

Falling populations in richer countries fuel fears for future Financial pressures and declining birthrates have led to the rise of the one-child family, reports Leo Lewis In every way but one, Zhang Lele is a typical resident of modern Beijing. His financial future is bound tightly to his educational performance, and every spare yuan has been invested in that. Efforts are under way to establish his toehold in the property market. His parents fret and fuss over the boy’s marriage prospects. So far, so normal — but Lele has just turned two. The demographic crisis on the horizon for the world’s most populous nation is a product of its extraordinary economic success, and it looms large for children such as Lele and his parents’ aspirations. For much of the world, after millennia as the norm, the era of the sibling is drawing to a close. With it, the ceaseless population growth of China will come to an end, as it already has in other economic powerhouses such as Germany, Japan and Russia. A little brother or sister would, in the eyes of many Chinese parents, dilute their child’s prospects. China has become a society of intensifying, developedworld pressures. With raw survival now broadly guaranteed,

the question of brood size is calculated in terms of financial burden — and the recent relaxation of the one-child family planning policy won’t change that. Fewer than 700,000 out of 11 million eligible families have applied to be allowed to have a second child. Lele’s parents were not among them. Educated, urbanised, white-collar, Zhang Long, 35, and Wang Qian, 34, already divert all their spare reserves of money, time and mental energy into assuring Lele’s future as an only child. By 2050, according to the United Nations, just nine countries — among them India, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Indonesia and the United States — will account for half of the world’s population increase. Also by 2050, Africa’s population will be growing six times as fast as Latin America’s and 15 times more rapidly than Asia’s. China is expected to lose its place to India as the world’s most populous country as early as 2028. Both countries will, at that point, ha have populations of around 1.45 billion. Even the pace of growth in India, Africa and the Middle East, however, will not offset the overarching global trend of slowdown, and the inexorable disappearance of the sib-

ling. Today, the human population of the planet stands at 7.2 billion, and it is growing at the rate of 82 million a year. By 2050, say UN demographers, that growth rate will have fallen below 50 million. China will lead a club that includes Germany, Japan, Russia and Thailand; a group of nations whose fertility rates are locked well below replacement levels and are on a course of absolute decline. With the Chinese fertility rate logged in 2010 at 1.18 children per woman of childbearing age, the world’s most populous country remains on course to start shrinking some time around 2028. Liang Zhongtang, a retired demography expert at the Shanghai Academy of Social Science, points out that challenges that relate to demography require tectonic social shifts and decades of changing behaviour to reverse. Efforts to engineer those changes are often painful to watch. The calamity of Russia’s population shrinkage has mesmerised demographers in recent decades. Between 1992 and 2009 the population fell by almost seven million people, or nearly 5 per cent of the total. For most of the 23 years since the Soviet Union collapsed, the birth rate has been one of the lowest in the world, and its effects have been accentuated by the unnaturally high death rate among men — a scourge fuelled by alcoholism, high smoking rates, Aids and pollution. In Russia, say demographers, a lower birthrate is not the rational choice of families on a middle-class trajectory of career and wealth accumulation, but the result of a society ravaged by a sense of hopelessness and disillusionment. President Putin has made reversing these demographic trends a cornerstone of his leadership. Last year, ac-

World in numbers

Now

2050

Global projection

9.5bn 7.2bn China 1.4bn

India 1.6bn China 1.4bn

63.4m 73.1m

82.6m 72.5m

UK compared

Germany

142.4m 120.8m Russia

India 1.2bn

446m Now 2050

358m

NORTH AMERICA

505m India to overtake China in 2028

410m

SOUTH AMERICA

US 322m 400m

cording to figures that were allegedly vigorously massaged by regional bureaucrats, the birth rate exceeded the death rate for the first time since 1987. It is a start, say demographers, but a fragile one. Most demographers believe that the drawbacks of a shrinking population will far outweigh any benefits. A shrinking workforce may have shortterm benefits regarding wages, but it does not take long before the economy

Brazil 202m 231m

Nigeria 178m 440m

faces skills shortages, and such high competition for talent that margins are squeezed. As long as life expectancy remains high, shrinking populations mean average ages rise, and the burden on the young becomes intolerable. Economies where young people are primarily working to sustain the old age of their parents and grandparents do not have spare cash to invest in education, innovation or anything else that might raise

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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World Compiled by Michael Bonner

Now

Going down

2050

Five largest nations 127m 100m

1.39bn 1.38bn China

5.16bn

Japan

709m

China

1.4bn

1.6bn

India

1.2bn

1.4bn

China

316m

440m

Nigeria

Indonesia

249m

400m

Brazil

200m

321m

Indonesia

Five lowest birth rates

Tens of thousands of Indian Hindus attend a religious ceremony in Mumbai

(births per 1,000 population)

EUROPE

ASIA

742m

4.34bn

Serbia

8.4

8.1

Japan

Thailand

8.2

7.8

Serbia

Germany

7.9

7.8

Thailand

Portugal

7.9

7.7

Singapore

Japan

7.7

7.5

Portugal

. . . as youthful India set to overtake China

Robin Pagnamenta, Leo Lewis

Five highest crude death rates (deaths per 1,000 population)

AFRICA 1.13bn

39.5m 28.1m

AUSTRALIA/ NEW ZEALAND

2.39bn India 1.26bn 1.62bn

Going up the growth potential. Perhaps the starkest example is Japan, which reached a peak of 128.1 million in 2008, but since then has shed a million people. According to the National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, the country’s population will fall below 100 million by 2048, and to 87 million by 2060. A third of the country, more than 40 million people, will vanish in little more than half a century. The symptoms of rapid ageing are to

Indonesia 252m 321m

Sierra Leone Botswana Dem Rep of Congo Central African Rep Lesotho

17.4

18.4

Ukraine

17.0

17.9

Moldova

15.5

17.8

Bulgaria

15.0

17.2

Belarus

14.9

16.4

Russia

Global religions by most populous Christian

2.2bn

3.3bn

Christian

Muslim

1.5bn

2.5bn

Muslim

Hindu

948m

1.2bn

Hindu

Agnostic

676m

674m

Agnostic

Buddhist

494m

556m

Buddhist

Source: United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2013). World Population Prospects: The 2012 Revision, DVD Edition, Worldbank.org, The World’s Religion in figures

be found all over rural Japan, spreading slowly but steadily towards the centre. Village schools close because they have run out of children, and communities wither without young people. Those in their seventies provide meals-onwheels for people in their nineties. Europe is on course to be one of the biggest demographic losers of the next 35 years as its population ages and shrinks. Economic decline could begin in earnest before 2050 as the ageing

population outstrips the workforce required to pay for them. According to the Brookings Institution, median age on the continent will increase from 40 in 2003 to 52 in 2050, compared with 35 for the US. To reverse the trend, Europe would have to accept a much higher level of immigration than is currently politically acceptable. Additional reporting by Hugh Tomlinson, James Hider, Tom Kington, Charles Bremner and Ruth Maclean

owards the end of the next decade, India will outstrip China as the world’s most populous nation. At the point where the two populations hit the same size, the median age in China will be 40. In India, it will be 30. With 364 million people aged between 10 and 24, India has by far the largest number of young people in the world. More than half the population is under 25 years of age — creating a gigantic opportunity of an expanding labour force, and the challenge of creating 15 million jobs a year. Shagun Bhansari, 24, from Mumbai, said: “We are the future of this country and we can take India to a new level, but everybody needs to work together to make it happen. Young people in India have a new mindset — they want to do what they love and they are being more daring. “A lot of people are starting their own businesses.” Across the Middle East, rapid population growth is another issue on the list of concerns for a region that is in turmoil. With 60 per cent of the Arab world under 25, an employment crisis beckons. In parts of the region, growth rates are three times the global average. Economists say that 100 million jobs will need to be created across

the region over the next 20 years, more than were generated in the whole of the last century. By 2100, Africa’s population will have grown to more than four billion, of whom roughly 25 per cent will be Nigerian. The perception that Africa is a densely populated continent is not true yet — with 65 people per square mile, it is behind Europe, Asia and Latin America, though Rwanda and Burundi are exceptions. Many Africans celebrate the continent’s growth and its youthful population. As well as providing a pension plan for Africa’s elderly, having plenty of young people provides the country with a dynamic workforce and large markets with spending power. Economists warn that high fertility rates can only equal abject poverty, but Chinwuba Iyizoba, a Nigerian engineer, doesn’t see it that way. “We are rejoicing. Africans love people, and they love children,” he said. “People think our problem is that we’re too many, but it’s not true. The problem is corruption. “I come from a family of seven children, and I feel that we’re too small. My parents are retired, and my siblings and I give them money. The government doesn’t pay. “I wouldn’t be able to do it all by myself. This is the case for many people in Africa.”

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World JAKUB POLOMSKI / BARCROFT MEDIA

Oil giant backs down on forest exploration Kenya

Jerome Starkey Arabuko Sokoke

Cold war Scientists cannot agree why Perito Moreno glacier, in Patagonia, which is 170m (550ft) thick, is still growing

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

An American oil and gas company has cancelled plans to hack through east Africa’s largest coastal forest amid fears that it would make rare wildlife extinct and devastate local people’s livelihoods. Camac Energy had hired a Chinese company to carry out a seismic survey through the Arabuko Sokoke forest, home to at least ten endangered species. It would have involved laying hundreds of explosive charges every 60m (200ft) to send shockwaves up to 4km underground. Conservationists warned that the blasts could spell the end of Kenya’s forest elephants, which are already under threat from ivory poachers, The Times revealed earlier this week. More than 100 elephants live inside the 420 sq km reserve and they communicate by sending subsonic vibrations through the ground. The ancient forest is also home to three endangered mammals, including the golden-rumped elephant shrew, and six endangered birds, including the Sokoke scops owl. It was listed by Unesco as a biodiversity hotspot, one of only 25 in the world. “We have

decided to cancel seismic operations within the Arabuko Sokoke forest, given the recent concerns of some stakeholders,” Augustin Nkuba, Camac’s chief executive officer, told Kilifi county’s governor yesterday. Camac’s licence was based on an impact assessment written by the Nairobi-based company Earthview Consultants that referred to two endangered species — Grévy’s zebra and African wild dogs — that do not live in the survey area, known as L16. Large tracts of text appear to have been copied from the internet. Charo Ngumbao, chairman of the Arabuko Sokoke Forest Adjacent Dwellers Association, welcomed Camac’s decision yesterday. However, he remained uneasy about plans to continue with the survey by cutting through local people’s land outside the forest. “There are so many problems with the impact assessment, they may have to start again,” he said. Earthview declined to comment, as did Kenya’s National Environmental Management Agency, which issued Camac’s licence on the strength of the report. Camac and BGP, its Chinese partner, have been ordered to suspend operations for two weeks, pending investigations.

Weekend

Handguns, honky tonk and hellfire

The life of the pistol-wielding, God-fearing Jerry Lee Lewis

Saturday November 22 2014

Travel Starts on page 49

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

photography

Portraits, piety and propaganda — The Royal Photographic Society is putting on show treasures from the dawn of the camera through to the present, says Nancy Durrant

‘It was acceptable to paint naked women but not to photograph them’

n 1857, the writer and art critic Elizabeth Eastlake wrote a treatise on a new art form. “Photography,” she said, “has become a household word and a household want; is used alike by art and science, by love, business and justice; is found in the most sumptuous saloon, and in the dingiest attic . . . in the pocket of the detective, in the cell of the convict, in the folio of the painter and architect, among the papers and patterns of the mill owner and manufacturer, and on the cold brave breast on the battlefield.” Although she was writing a mere 17 years after photography’s invention, she might almost be doing so now, so familiar is its ubiquity. It is proof of how incredibly quickly this seemingly miraculous yet scientific art was embraced by society. At least part of the credit for this must go to the Royal Photographic Society. Founded in 1853, it now holds one of the world’s most important photographic collections. And a selection of its treasures is about to go on display at the Science Museum in London — the same location where, in the 1850s, the society held several of its first open exhibitions. Forty works from these

shows have been identified, including Joseph Cundall’s Highlanders and the Count de Montizón de Borbón’s animal-eye-view image of a hippo at London zoo, and will be presented in a traditional salon hang. “The 19th century was the heyday of the learned society,” says Colin Harding, one of the exhibition’s curators. “The society was there to promote photography through conversation and exchange of information. People would present ideas, discuss, debate and show their work, the idea being that rather than keeping things to yourself with patents, you would share them with the wider community. They also published a journal — The Photographic Journal is the longest surviving photographic publication, it first appeared in 1853 and is still being published today.” Another aim of the society was to present this exciting work to the public in exhibitions. “The Times would run quite lengthy reports on what was seen at the RPS exhibition that year,” says Harding. “In 1853 photography was a newer invention than the web is today.” The possibilities seemed endless. “Dr Hugh Welch Diamond used it to photograph inmates in an asylum. Henry Fox Talbot suggested that

Above, Rudolf Koppitz’s Movement Study (1927); left, Mervyn O’Gorman’s Portrait of Christina (1913); top left, Count de Montizón de Borbón’s London zoo hippo (1855)

if you have a valuable collection you should take a photograph of it and if somebody steals it you can claim back on the insurance.” Anyone with an interest in photography can still join today. One of the main driving forces behind the society was Roger Fenton. He is known as the first war photographer — though Harding insists he was merely one of the first. Trained as a lawyer, Fenton also studied art in Paris under Paul Delaroche. As a gentleman of means, he embraced photography as a very serious hobby. “He was a technical perfectionist,” says Harding. “In terms of the quality of printing, nobody could match Fenton. He was also closely associated with the royal family: he photographed Queen Victoria,

Prince Albert, their children; he went to Balmoral and was friends with Sir Charles Eastlake, then director of the Scottish National Gallery and the husband of Elizabeth Eastlake.” It was Prince Albert who suggested that the photographic society begin collecting examples of the new-fangled art form and the royal patronage was useful in other ways. “When they went to view [the Oscar Rejlander photograph] The Two Ways of Life at the Manchester Art Treasures exhibition in 1857,” says Harding. “The photograph caused an enormous amount of debate and controversy because of the naked women, largely. It was perfectly acceptable to paint naked women but when you photographed them it became too realistic.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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‘A very remarkable exhibition’

Go online for more images, reviews and reports from the earliest days of the Royal Photographic Society from the Times archive

thetimes.co.uk/visualarts

150 years of painting with light NATIONAL MEDIA MUSEUM, BRADFORD / SSPL; NICKOLAS MURAY PHOTO ARCHIVES; STEVE MCCURRY; LIEUTENANT COLONEL MERVYN O’GORMAN

Top left, Lettuce by John Hinde (1942); top right, Edward Weston’s Nude on sand, Oceano (1936); above, A Sea of Steps by Frederick Evans (1903); left, Nickolas Muray’s Soldiers of the Sky (1940)

In 1853 photography was a newer invention than the worldwide web is today Rejlander argued that his tableau was an allegory, showing that you have a choice in life: you can decide to go down the path of thrift and industry and righteousness or you can go down the path of indulgence and debauchery.” The row simmered down after Albert bought a print. The exhibition starts in the earliest days of photography — the heliographic plates of Joseph Nicéphore Niépce from 1826 are some of the earliest known photographic images anywhere in the world; only about 12 are known to survive and three will be on display. It goes up to the contemporary, including a print of Steve McCurry’s famous Afghan Girl from 1984, acquired about a fortnight ago. (Sadly the society no longer has an acquisitions budget, relying

largely on gentle persuasion to entice famous photographers to donate work.) It features images from photographers as varied as Julia Margaret Cameron, Martin Parr, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, aka Lewis Carroll. There are also lesser names whose work deserves to be better known: Nickolas Muray, whose fashion shootstyle Soldiers of the Sky was designed to show the role women could play during the Second World War, or Mervyn O’Gorman, who is represented by an exquisite study of an unknown woman, Christina. “O’Gorman was a Renaissance character,” Harding says. “He was a pioneer aviator, he ran the Royal Aircraft Establishment at Farnborough before the First World War; he was a motoring pioneer. He was one of

the pioneers behind the Highway Code. And he was also a fantastic photographer.” It’s also a chance to see work by photographers that perhaps one wouldn’t naturally associate with them. Frederick Evans, for example, famous for his architectural photography: the show will allow a comparison of his glorious A Sea of Steps, taken at Wells Cathedral in 1903, with his portrait of Aubrey Beardsley (also, to be fair, quite architectural, with his elongated fingers following his sharp cheekbones and that astonishing joyride of a nose). John Hinde’s Fireguard from 1944 comes from a book called Citizens in War — and After by Stephen Spender, of photographs of Britons who contributed to civil defence. The portrait, of a man in late middle age, appar-

Steve McCurry’s Afghan Girl (1984)

ently on alert during the blackout, is actually meticulously posed, shot in a studio but made to look as if lit from the front by a lantern. Hinde later employed this expertise in the work for which he is now mostly known — the garish picture postcards of holidaymakers having a fine old time that he produced for Butlin’s. The show’s curators have avoided taking a chronological approach, instead looking across photographic history at established genres: portraiture, landscape, still life, to reveal the variety with which individual photographers have chosen to interpret them over time. Calum Colvin’s witty 1986 work The Turkish Bath, based loosely on the Ingres painting of the same name, evokes the same obsession with the human form as Rudolf Koppitz’s Movement Study and the orientalism of Fenton’s Nubian water carrier. Afghan Girl will be shown alongside Walter Bird’s 1935 work, Eastern Madonna. Seeing them together, the comparison is striking. “You’ve got the [use of contrasting] colour, you’ve got the direct gaze, you’ve got that notion of what is almost exoticism, but separated by 50 or more years — they are very different, but have something in common,” Harding says. Maxime Du Camp’s 1850 shot of a colossal stone Egyptian head with a man seated on top of its crown sits near an image of the head of the Statue of Liberty by Margaret BourkeWhite, taken from the air in the 1950s, showing people waving from the crown. The preoccupation with scale, with the monumental contrasted with the human, and the high viewpoint, all repeat themselves. A visual dialogue across the centuries, this collection shows how much we have always had in common. Drawn by Light: the Royal Photographic Society Collection, Science Museum, London SW7 (0870 8704868), Dec 2 to Mar 1, then the National Media Museum, Bradford (0870 8704868), Mar 20 to June 21, 2015

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

the conversation

‘It was like breaking up with a girlfriend: what did I do wrong?’ After the success of TV Burp, Harry Hill had a hiccup with a West End flop. Now the comic is back as Professor Branestawm in Charlie Higson’s new drama, he tells Dominic Maxwell

ven now, six months after his £6 million X Factor musical, I Can’t Sing!, closed disastrously early, Harry Hill can’t figure out exactly where it all went wrong. Still riding high from a decade hosting TV Burp, here he was teaming up with Simon Cowell for an outsized satire-cum-celebration of

another bastion of Saturday night ITV. There was a poster, it seemed, on every bus shelter in the southeast. Yet fans stayed away in their droves. “You do this fairly successful TV show and you think that everything else you do after that is going to be a huge success,” says Hill now. “But actually most things are not. You are lucky if you get one.” The first hint he had that his year was

explosively funny Harry Hill’s TV Burp ran for more than a decade on ITV

not going to go to plan was when he received an email from Matt Lucas last Christmas. Hill had just taken his seaside surrealism on to the big screen for the first time in The Harry Hill Movie, in which Lucas had played his evil twin. Hill went to the London premiere, then took himself off on a family holiday the next day. He knew nothing of how the film was going

‘I became quite mad. I left TV for a while. I needed to recharge my batteries’ down. Until he made the mistake of checking his emails. “Lucas’s message went: ‘Oh, you must be really upset about the reviews . . .’ I was thinking, wait a minute! That was the first I heard about it.” The film was a failure with critics — “We aimed to make a family film and I think what we ended up making was a kids’ film” — though not a disaster at the box office. “It wasn’t an Inbetweeners, but it did OK.” The musical, on the other hand, had some technical woes in its previews, got some fond reviews when it opened, yet always struggled to fill the 2,200-seat London Palladium. It closed after six weeks. “So I’ve had a taste of both [kinds of failure]. The really painful one was the musical.” He still loves it. He loved writing the script; loved writing the songs with his regular composer, Steve Brown; became “a luvvie” as he bonded with the cast through the weeks and months of development and rehearsals. And though the show’s producer, Cowell, was spoofed in the show — played, with false gnashers and his own spaceship, by Nigel Harman — he never tried to interfere artistically. “I thought we

would have some big trouble, that at some point it would all go off, but it didn’t. When it closed Simon really took it on the chin.” In his stand-up, Hill can lace his end-ofthe-pier antics with an abrasive edge that takes him halfway between Mr Saturday Night and performance art. I Can’t Sing!, though, for all its enjoyable absurdities, was affectionate rather than biting. Hill insists it was the right approach. “We decided we were better off doing it with a smile. By over-elevating Simon Cowell to this godlike figure, it’s much better to do that than just what people are saying on the street. Because that’s not entertaining, really, it’s bleak and it’s obvious.” We are raking over these coals in a Chelsea restaurant just over the river from Hill’s home in Battersea, south London (he also has a house in Whitstable, Kent). Almost 25 years since a young doctor called Matthew Hall became a knowingly odd light entertainer called Harry Hill, he is dressed in his trademark six-inch collar, but only because he is doing a photo shoot. He is friendly and expansive, and though he doesn’t ply the manic energy of his comic persona he still has a propulsively persuasive way about him, chortling affably as he talks about what he learnt from his “costly flop” and what is coming next. He has just come from a meeting with Brown about their next musical. Next time, he will start it off smaller, both to build up a following and to make changes more easily. Watching I Can’t Sing!, he’d have ideas for adjustments, then find they would involve changing the score, giving out new sheet music to the orchestra, changing the lighting, giving the cast time to relearn their parts and so on. As a comedian, he is used to being able to tweak on the hoof each night. Then there’s marketing. “I think it was

‘When I watch myself as Harry Hill, I enjoy it. You’re not supposed to say that but I learn from it’

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

FGM TIMES PHOTOGRAPHER DAVID BEBBER

difficult to get across to people what it was.” He met a young fan who told him he didn’t come and see the show because “ ‘if I want to see X Factor I watch it on TV, don’t I?’ I think that was a lot of the difficulty we had, because . . .” He pauses, smiles. “I have raked this over with Steve and in the end, you don’t know, you really don’t. We spent a long time getting over it, it was like breaking up with a girlfriend, thinking, what did I do wrong? And you just don’t know. I felt bad for the cast, mainly. “It ran for six weeks and if I’d known it was going to run for only six weeks I still would have done it, but I wouldn’t have had that hope. But that is showbusiness.” If Hill was not, by his own reckoning, “the hardest-working comedian in showbusiness”, he might feel even worse. He gave up TV Burp in 2012 because he had

had enough of a workload that required him to watch tens of hours of television each week to know what to parody. “It’s one thing to enjoy your work, it’s another thing to be pacing up and down thinking, how come I haven’t got my DVD of Club Reps yet? I became quite mad. I left TV for a while because I thought, I’ve had enough of it, I need to recharge my batteries.” Yet TV Burp induced a workaholism that persists. “I’ve always got a million ideas and projects. I really like work.” So he keeps hard at it. Since TV Burp he has done his first live tour in nine years, Sausage Time. He has kept up his voiceover work on You’ve Been Framed. In the new year he will resurrect Stars in their Eyes, in which members of the public get to impersonate their musical heroes. Will it have his usual cake-and-eat-it

mix of mockery and affection? “It will be knowing: for want of a better word, postmodern. It’s about a balance, with this or with the X Factor musical, how far can you go with the knowingness without losing the heart? I’m interested in how you subvert and reinvent the form of things, and I’m also interested in taking low art and turning it into high art. It sounds a bit up-my-arse but that to me is endlessly fascinating.” Hill has also turned actor for the first time to star in Professor Branestawm, the eccentric inventor from Norman Hunter’s books. Charlie Higson’s adaptation, scheduled for Christmas, also features Ben Miller, David Mitchell, Simon Day and Miranda Richardson. Judging by the two clips I’ve seen, featuring an eccentric bearded, uncollared Branestawm, it looks like a well judged mix of Hill as we know him and Hill as we don’t. Those clips are all he has seen himself, he says. “And I felt odd watching them. When I watch myself as Harry Hill, I tend to enjoy it. You’re not supposed to say that, but I enjoy it. I used to enjoy watching TV Burp, I’d learn from it.” Watching himself as the professor, though, he just sees himself trying to remember his lines. He wanted to do it because he liked the books, because it was within his range, and because he didn’t like the idea of someone else doing it. “I thought, what if I turn on the TV at Christmas and it’s Al Murray or Paul Whitehouse or Vic Reeves doing it?” He sent a script to Sir Tom Courtenay — “it sounds like a name-drop but we happen to be friends” — to ask his advice. Sir Tom told him to do it but to steer clear of funny voices: “Just do the words, that’s what acting is all about.” Hill turned 50 in October, which comes as a surprise, since surely he’s been 50ish for the past 20 years? He gurgles. “Well, that’s served me well. I remember when I first shaved my head, I basically did all my ageing in about three minutes and everyone else is catching up with me. I never see Harry Hill as a different person but I think for me it gets funnier the older I get, because what I do is childlike or silly and it’s funnier having an older man doing it.” Does his wife, Magda, or his three daughters (aged 17, 15 and 10) ever wonder why he spends so much time working when he doesn’t have to any more? “It’s funny, back in the summer my oldest daughter said, ‘You’re not even that famous any more, Dad. You haven’t been on the TV for ages.’ And I said, ‘But you used to moan when I was on TV.’ And she said, ‘That was because you were always grumpy.’ ” At which Hill gives a guilty gurn. So where does his hunger come from? After each night of the last tour he would collapse in his dressing room, after spending the previous half hour running around soaking wet, and see himself in the mirror. “You think, how old are you? You know: ex-doctor, 50. But that’s the great thrill, that you can still have that kind of silly fun. “When it works, it’s fantastic. I don’t know if it’s ego or adrenalin or endorphins or what . . . I don’t know why I do it. I think I know why I got into it, though.” When he was a boy of 9 or 10 he did a panto at cubs, playing Widow Twankey. “Everyone was laughing and telling me how great it was, and I found it easy. That seemed a pretty great kind of combination.” It still does. Hard though he works, he doesn’t see what he does as work. “I know what work is. I did that. That was doctoring.” He is in negotiations to do a touring version of I Can’t Sing! on a smaller scale: if it goes well,

flop idol Nigel Harman played Simon Cowell in the doomed X Factor musical I Can’t Sing!

he’d love to see it back in the West End. He’s got ideas for more films, more musicals, has even invented his own sport but has failed, thus far, to convince TV executives that it would work as a show. Do you have to be bloody-minded to be Harry Hill? “Oh yeah, you have to have a kind of arrogance. It’s a kind of arrogance to think that anyone would want to see what you’re doing. I mean, I haven’t had a really rough ride — I wouldn’t want to be Russell Brand at the moment, as far as the press goes. Don’t get me wrong, I wanted that musical to run. But the best thing is to do another one, get back on the horse and remember the feeling you had when you first started doing it, which is that thrill of trying something new. You don’t really have a choice. You either get on with it or get out.” Harry Hill Sausage Time is out on DVD on Monday. The Incredible Adventures of Professor Branestawm will air on BBC One this Christmas

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times MARK ELLIDGE

classical

Paris, the city that gave us modern music

The Philharmonia Orchestra is exploring the creative revolution in the City of Light that changed music for ever, says Neil Fisher

here did modern music really begin? With the Munich premiere of Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde? Or was it in turn of 20th-century Vienna, with Schoenberg slashing up traditional key signatures? From next week onwards the Philharmonia Orchestra will be spending the best part of an entire season exploring Paris from 1900-1950, placing the city’s

Sections of the audiences reacted violently to the dissonance

composers at the heart of the same creative tumult that saw Picasso transform painting and Coco Chanel transform fashion. With help from the Philharmonia’s chief conductor, Esa-Pekka Salonen, here’s a guide to what really shook Paris in the springtime of modern music. The French revolution Even for some opera buffs it is four hours of nothing happening. To Salonen, however, Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande, which launches the Philharmonia’s City of Light: Paris 1900-1950 season on Thursday, changed music for ever after its 1902 premiere. “Suddenly everything is different,” he says. “The words and the music have an equal relationship: all the rhythms, all the tempos, every phrase, is built around the idea of spoken language.” It is Pelléas, argues Salonen, that has inspired French composers up to the present day. “Messiaen, Dutilleux, Boulez: Pelléas marks the beginning of their tradition, their new music, their century.” For the next 50 years Paris was the place to be if you were a composer. World cuisine Paris at the turn of the 20th-century was in the grip of a global feeding frenzy. The city had mounted its Exposition Universelle in 1889 and it was here that Debussy heard the music of the gamelan — which transformed his thinking about harmony and rhythm. Later on, different influences soaked into Paris’s musical life. Ravel’s sultry L’heure espagnole — about a philandering housewife desperate for her next liaison — is the headiest flowering of the Spanish trend. The same composer’s Shéhérazade explored the allure of the “east”, a non-geographically specific location that the next tranche of artistic migrants to Paris would exploit with even greater gusto. I predict a riot Enter a trio of Russians. Diaghilev, Stravinsky, Nijinsky were the producer, composer and choreographer behind the ballet Le sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), a depiction of pagan ritual sacrifice given its notorious curtain up at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in 1913. They were also responsible for ratcheting up the hysteria behind the so-called “riot at the riot” that ensued when sections of the audiences reacted violently against Nijinsky’s choreography and Stravinsky’s score. According

revolt into style Angelika Kirchschlager and Gerald Finley in Debussy’s Pelléas and Mélisande; below, Josephine Baker as “the soul of jazz” in La Joie de Paris

to Salonen, it’s impossible to tell how many of the crowd caused a rumpus. “In Los Angeles once we reconstructed the supposed riot at the premiere, and discovered that you need only about 30 really fearless and loud people to wreck the work.” Stuff and nonsense Long before Dalí was putting lobsters on telephones, the first artwork of any kind to be described as “surréalisme” was Erik Satie’s 1917 Parade, a cabaret-revue set to a scenario by Jean Cocteau with set designs by Picasso. In the same year came the first public performance of any work credited to Francis Poulenc, the Rapsodie nègre. Combining absurdism with the fad for colonial exoticism, the piece featured a baritone intoning lines such as “tota nou nou, nou nou ranga lo lo lulu ma ta ma sou”, apparently in the venerable language of Liberian. In fact the words were made-up rubbish mixed in with Parisian street slang. Knocked for six No clique of artists epitomised the roaring Twenties in Paris as much as Les Six, whose fame as a group has in nearly all cases eclipsed the composers’ individual achievements. They were Francis Poulenc, Georges Auric, Louis Durey, Arthur Honegger, Darius Milhaud and Germaine Tailleferre. At their best, Les Six responded to the world around them, less concerned by their music outlasting them than by it being irrelevant to the pleasureseeking masses. Milhaud channelled Paris’s jazz obsession — this was the heyday of Josephine Baker — with the cabaret suite Le Boeuf sur le Toit. Honegger was one of the few composers to be inspired by

sport, writing a ballet called Skating Rink and a symphonic poem, Rugby, on that most graceful of team sports. Cherchez la femme With a few exceptions and most of them other people’s wives, the history of women in composition is essentially the story of a 750-year gap; between the 12th-century German nun Hildegard of Bingen and emancipated Paris in the Twenties. Two of the most influential were the Boulanger sisters, Lili and Nadia. Salonen describes Lili, a composer who tragically died at 24, as “extraordinarily talented” and her formerly lost Marche gaie will be given its world premiere in London in February. Her sister, Nadia, a conductor and teacher, was virtually a one-woman finishing school for generations of composers and conductors visiting Paris in the 20th century, figures as diverse as Aaron Copland, Philip Glass, Daniel Barenboim and Burt Bacharach. In 1939 an American journalist asked Nadia what it was like to be a woman conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra. “Having been a woman for 50 years,” she replied, “I have recovered from my initial astonishment.” Radical religion When Salonen met the composer Oliver Messiaen shortly before his death, the young conductor took the opportunity to rummage around Messiaen’s study to see what he was reading: “But there were no books — only a leather-bound Bible.” While the Thirties saw an upsurge in spirituality, it was in Messiaen’s ecstatic Turangalîla-Symphonie, first performed in 1949, that the composer really brought God back into the avant-garde: a piece simultaneously breaking apart traditional structures while rhapsodising the Infinite. Yet its chromaticism and Indian rhythmic patterns also take French music full circle. According to Salonen, who will close the Paris season in summer 2015 by conducting Turangalîla, the piece “wouldn’t have been possible without Debussy experiencing the gamelan in 1880. It’s a leap into the unknown — and a totally logical development of what was before.” The Philharmonia’s Paris: City of Light series begins with Pelléas et Mélisande on Thursday at the Royal Festival Hall, London SE1; philharmonia.co.uk/paris

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

books FGM

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Handguns, honky tonk and hellfire CORBIS

Book of the week

He’s the hard-living, pistol-wielding, Godfearing rock’n’roll legend who tried to shoot Elvis Presley. Will Hodgkinson on a life of the notorious Jerry Lee Lewis

Je Lee Lewis: Jerry His Own Story by Rick Bragg Canongate, 479pp £20 * £18; ebook £14.99

hen we think of badly behaved rockers, we think of Keith Richards passing out on heroin or the legend of Keith Moon upending a limousine into a swimming pool. That’s child’s play compared to Jerry Lee Lewis’s efforts. Powering himself out of poverty in Ferriday, Louisiana, on self-regard and amphetamines, the great rebel of the original rock’n’roll era never missed the opportunity to start a fight, cuckold a husband, or lose a fortune. He shot his bass player for an under-par performance and may even have made an attempt on Elvis Presley’s life: in 1976 he rammed his Lincoln Continental into the gates of Presley’s Graceland mansion in Memphis before stumbling out of the car while brandishing a gun, demanding to see the King. (Lewis claims he was drunk and

‘He has never believed the grave is the end of a man, and that has been his torture’ fooling around; Presley was spooked enough to cut all ties with his former friend.) He married his 13-year-old cousin Myra in 1958, provoking a scandal from which his career never quite recovered. And through it all, while giving in to every sin and temptation invented and a few he came up with himself, Jerry Lee Lewis had unswerving faith in the Christian teachings of Heaven and Hell. The paradox of a man defining himself through his faith while leading a far from virtuous life, drives Rick Bragg’s exhaustive biography. After his well-behaved, much-loved elder brother Elmo Jr was killed by a drunk driver at the age of nine, Lewis took on the role of the bad son, forever testing the limits of his indulgent parents, who mortgaged their farm to buy him a piano. Aged ten, he stole his father’s car and went joyriding. At 11 he almost strangled a

teen bride Jerry Lee Lewis with Myra, the 13-year-old cousin he married in 1958, sparking a scandal from which his musical career never truly recovered

teacher to death. At 12 he sneaked into Haney’s Big House, a legendary blues joint in the black part of town where women used to keep razor blades in their underwear. “It’s where I got my juice,” says Lewis of Haney’s. An early chapter finds Lewis attempting to drag his cousin, the future televangelist Jimmy Swaggart, to Haney’s, with Swaggart being too scared of being corrupted by the devil’s music — or of being knifed — to venture in. Lewis’s conflicted approach to life makes sense in the context of rural Louisiana in the 1940s and 1950s, a poor, dangerous place where marrying your 13-year-old cousin was less frowned upon than expected, and breaking someone’s jaw on a Saturday night before atoning for it in church on Sunday morning was routine. Lewis’s inspiration came from singing Pentecostal hymns one moment — and he did try out as a preacher, albeit briefly — and learning hot blues licks the next, while soaking in the heartbroken country of Hank Williams on the radio somewhere in between. As Bragg has it, “all that dark, beautiful, sometimes frightening music swirled around him”. He made his name with the

rock’n’roll rebel Jerry Lee Lewis performs in New York in 1958

rock’n’roll classics Whole Lotta Shaking Going On and Great Balls of Fire, (both hits in 1957) but he feared he might go to Hell for it. “He has never believed the grave is the end of a man, and that has been his torture,” writes Bragg, with Southern gothic solemnity. There have been plenty of biographies on Lewis, Nick Tosches’ Hellfire being the most impressive (and fantastical), but Bragg’s is the first to come with the singer’s full co-operation, if that is the word for a man who kept a pistol to hand during interviews in case the author displeased him. Bragg is also from a poor southern family and writes with sympathy for his subject, seeing no contradiction in Lewis boasting of doing whatever he likes one moment and expressing his deep fear of God the next. There’s vernacular lyricism to the way Bragg paints the key moments in Lewis’s life, too. On the death of his infant son, who fell into an empty swimming pool in 1962: “They buried the boy in the cemetery in Clayton, under the trees just going green, beneath the rising voices of the great intermarried tribe.” A more frustrating product of the 79-year-old Lewis agreeing to co-operate

with Bragg is that the writer, perhaps for fear of Lewis finding a use for that pistol, too often takes the tall tales of a notorious braggart at face value. Lewis never seems to lose a fight, be in a room with a better musician, or come off as anything less than a demon lover. “No matter how many women say to their husbands and other nice men that they want no such part of such a man, the truth is . . . well, the truth,” Bragg writes admiringly of his subject’s legendary magnetism. The result is that he can come across like Lewis’s mythologising mouthpiece rather than his detached observer. Still, Bragg’s fascination for Jerry Lee Lewis wins through, and his shining a light on the eternal dichotomy between sin and salvation makes for a fascinating, distinctly American story. In 1988, Swaggart, by then rich and famous from preaching about his cousin’s sinful ways, confessed to consorting with a prostitute at a Travel Inn near New Orleans. “Was I surprised? Naw, I wasn’t surprised,” said Lewis of Swaggart’s moment of weakness. “It ain’t nothing God can’t forgive you for.” Rick Bragg’s pacey, extensively researched biography draws a portrait of a bullish man doing all the things he believes God will forgive him for, repenting, and doing them all over again.

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

nonfiction

The prisoner who became the president Václav Havel was a national saviour with the cheek of a clown, says Roger Scruton

áclav Havel’s career is without compare among those who came to eminence in the last years of communism: playwright, philosopher, dissident, political prisoner and finally president of his country, he combined the greatness of a national saviour with the cheek of a clown. In his harlequin character, the comic and the tragic, the erotic and the austere were mingled indistinguishably. His mind was like Goethe’s: equally at home in scientific theory and imaginative poetry. He was already the most famous living Czech when in 1989 he entered politics

DAVID W CERNY / REUTERS

Ha l: A Lif Havel: Life by Michael Zantovsky Atlantic, 560pp £25 * £22.50; ebook £15.99

free spirit Václav Havel remembered on a Prague wall; he was dubbed “president of rock’n’roll” for his liking of Frank Zappa

through the back door to Prague Castle, the door of democracy, which the communists had forgotten to close behind them as they drove away from the gates. Havel was followed by a retinue of chain-smoking, hard-drinking bohemians, who brought with them the life of student protest, satirical theatre and beatnik irreverence. Guest lists during Havel’s presidency reflected his high literary culture and also his low musical taste. Mick Jagger and Harold Pinter, Frank Zappa and Tom Stoppard were jumbled together in a kind of carnival against politics and Havel was known for a while as “the president of rock’n’roll”. One of those who entered the castle in Havel’s wake was his lifelong friend and fellow dissident Michael Zantovsky who, after serving as ambassador in Washington and Israel, is now Czech ambassador at the Court of St James. Zantovsky’s talents as a diplomat, not to mention his gifts as an observer and writer, are apparent in this beautifully written biography. To tell the story of the man who made “living in truth” his motto you must tell the truth about him and Zantovsky sets about the task with exquisite politeness and also with genuine love for the person whose faults he describes the better to show the greatness that transcended them. Havel would deserve his high reputation even if he had never been chosen as president. He was at the forefront of Czech literature when, following the Soviet invasion of 1968, he became a non-person — his plays could neither be published nor performed — although one who refused to lie down in the coffin provided. His eventual arrival at the castle resembled the arrival of K in Kafka’s novel: into the empty halls he called out his urgent questions; and the halls answered with an echo. For he was still a dissident and remained so until his death, aged 75, in 2011. Throughout his presidency, which lasted for three terms until 2003, one as president of Czechoslovakia, and then two as president of the Czech Republic, Havel was haunted by the sense that he should not be where he was. Zantovsky recounts the story of Havel’s first visit, at Margaret Thatcher’s invitation, to England, when

the Queen asked him how it felt to change from prisoner to president almost overnight. Havel replied: “Ma’am, if that door over there opened and they came to take me away I would not be at all surprised.” In his speech at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, on receiving an honorary doctorate, Havel recounted that “the reason why I am always creating something, organising something . . . is to defend my permanently questionable right to exist”. Deep in his psyche was a pool of existential guilt, and it is from this source that he

Havel’s addictions included cigarettes, alcohol, pep pills and adultery drew both the philosophy that inspired him and the actions that made him famous. In the 1978 essay The Power of the Powerless Havel describes the way in which, under the pressure of totalitarian government, people forge their own chains and display them obediently to their masters. They live within the lie, since inside the lie things are comfortable and nobody intrudes there save liars, whose motives you share. But you can break free of those chains, too. By taking responsibility for yourself and your world you plant a seed that one day will cover even the most devastated landscape with flowers. This essay arose out of a great spiritual transition in Havel’s life when he attended the trial in 1976 of an underground rock group, the Plastic People of the Universe. Subsequently he spearheaded Charter 77, calling on the authorities to honour the human rights clauses of the Helsinki Accords, and then collaborated in founding

Vons, the committee for the defence of the unjustly prosecuted. Both initiatives were an exercise in the “power of the powerless” — the power of morality, which remains when all other power is taken away, as it was promptly taken from Havel by a lengthy jail sentence. Zantovsky writes: “Rarely has a political movement been born . . . of an individual, internal, psychological need to find a balance in one’s life”. This need arose in part from feelings of shame connected to concessions Havel had once made to the communist authorities. But it arose also — and here Zantovsky is wonderfully illuminating — from the dissipated life into which Havel, like so many of the dissidents, had fallen and which the communist authorities encouraged, since nothing strengthened the grip of the party on society so much as the irresponsible behaviour of its critics. Havel, whose addictions included cigarettes, alcohol, pep pills and adultery, understood that he could redeem his life only by sacrifice. He discovered, within his shell of Czech scepticism, a core of spirituality that assuaged his guilt feelings and pressed him onwards to his fate as a political prisoner. Zantovsky tells the story with a flair for detail, almost as though he had stood at Havel’s shoulder, taking notes. He defends the time as president, when Havel secured the removal of Soviet troops from his homeland and worked tirelessly for the dismantling of the Warsaw pact, the expansion of Nato and entry into the European Union. True, the presidency entered a rocky period towards the end as Václav Klaus, the Czech prime minister, pressed his realistic vision successfully against Havel’s impractical idealism and as Havel’s second marriage turned into a public relations problem. But Zantovsky leaves the reader to make judgments. Havel emerges as a leader whose greatness was inseparable from real humility and grace. Havel’s presidency has become a symbol for young Czechs of an era of lost content, when some attempt was made to honour Plato’s definition of politics as “the care of the soul”. And they remember the soft voice of their much-loved former president expressing his own resolve, in Samuel Beckett’s words, to “fail better”.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

FGM AMY SANCETTA / AP

in short

Crimes of the Amish beard-cutters

Margot at War: Love and Betrayal in Downing Street, 1912-1916 by Anne de Courcy W&N, 384pp £20 * £18 ebook ebo £9.99 Margot Asquith’s sharp Ma humour, modern hu der style, intelligence and wealth fascinated men such as the German diplomat Harry Kessler, who described her in 1913 as keeping “society quiet while Asquith and Lloyd George bleed it”. Herbert Asquith, the prime minister, was her husband. For five years until he was ousted in 1916, Margot was at the centre of London society and the Liberal government in the days before and during the Great War in which the Asquiths lost a son. By then Margot had lost her husband emotionally to his jealous daughter Violet and her best friend Venetia Stanley, with whom he had fallen in love. Anne de Courcy has a firm grasp of politics, an acute eye for social detail, and a keen perception of Margot’s pains and pleasures. Her narrative is concise and compelling.

Damian Whitworth on a story of hate, faith and revenge among the Amish

arty and Barb Miller, a middle-aged Amish couple living on a tiny farm in rural Ohio, were disturbed late one night by three sharp raps on their door. When they opened up, a group of more than a dozen people burst in, including five of their six sons and their daughter, all members of a renegade Amish group from the village of Bergholz. Marty was dragged from his bed and pinned down as his beard was cut off and his head shaved. Then the women pulled Barb’s prayer cap off and cut her waistlength hair to below her ears. Before the intruders left they gathered up the shorn hair as a trophy. Over the next few weeks there were four more beard-cutting attacks by the socalled Bergholz Barbers that left peaceloving Amish communities so terrified that some started keeping loaded shotguns in their houses. It might sound like petty squabbling between members of this buggy-driving, bonnet-wearing sect, but a police investigation led to a landmark trial that revealed a story destined to lodge itself firmly in the voluminous annals of American religious nuttiness. Kraybill is probably the world’s leading expert on Amish culture and he was called as an expert witness by the prosecution to provide insights on the culture of these traditional Christian communities. Fortunately, nobody died at the hands of this small splinter group of lunatics. But while Kraybill, who writes cautiously, stops short of calling the group a cult, this is what was created by a leader who claimed a direct line to God, suppressed all dissent and was accused of sexual exploitation of young women. The Amish originated in the Reformation-era Anabaptist movement in Europe and came to America in the 18th and 19th centuries. By 1937 there were no Amish left in Europe, but they were thriving across the Atlantic. Today almost half are in Pennsylvania and Ohio; the rest are scattered across 29 states and in Ontario in Canada. Their numbers exceed 285,000 and continue to grow because of the seriousness with which they approach procreation. Some 85 per cent of young Amish adults choose to be baptised and stay in their Amish communities or start new ones. There are more than 40 different Amish affiliations and most speak Pennsylvania Dutch, dress plainly and eschew many of the conveniences of the modern world, such as public high schools, television and

Renegade Amish Amish: Beard Cutting, Hate Crimes, and the Trial of the Bergholz Barbers by Donald B Kraybill Johns Hopkins, 224pp £16 * £14.40; ebook £16

xbox-free zone Amish schoolchildren in Bergholz, Ohio

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tangled tale Sam Mullet Jr, a renegade Amish bishop, was jailed for hate crimes

electricity from the grid. The more traditional Amish still milk cows by hand and use gas lamps on their horse-drawn buggies. The dangerous progressives have adopted automatic milkers, have LED lights on buggies and even carry mobile phones. During a week reporting an Amish story a few years ago I was amused when one asked for a lift in my car. Sam Mullet Jr hated the way the modern world was creeping into Amish life and in 1995 bought 800 acres in the mountainous area of Yellow Creek Valley east of Bergholz, close to Ohio’s border with Pennsylvania. Several large families followed him there, almost all of them with blood ties to his own clan, which included 16 children and 80 grandchildren. Mullet became Bergholz’s bishop and gradually asserted total control over the community. Anyone who disagreed with him was excommunicated, a catastrophic position for any Amish man or woman who is then shunned by other Amish. Three hundred outraged ministers from other Amish affiliations took the unprecedented step of issuing a statement that Amish who had been expelled from Bergholz could join other churches. This fuelled the fury that led to Mullet orchestrating the beard cuttings. He was also incensed at losing a custody battle over two grandchildren. Mullet, who claimed God was talking directly to him, created a toxic world where members of the community were banished to sleep in a dog kennel or a chicken coop in freezing temperatures for “having bad thoughts”. Even his wife, Martha, who was in her 60s, suffered this fate. When his son, Eli, had a psychotic episode Mullet decreed that the young man was the Devil, then, with his son being treated in hospital, he insisted that his son’s wife, Nancy, move into his family home where, according to her account, he pressured her until she slept with him. Normally Amish women would never meet with a bishop alone, but Mullet did so

with numerous women, calling it “marriage counselling”. Although he denied having sex with anyone other than his wife, one follower said: “Sam’s wife goes away to take care of children so he is free to have sex with other women.” Such was Mullet’s control that he was able to send others to humiliate those who he claimed had crossed him by cutting their beards and long hair, which are key to Amish identity. The investigation involved the FBI and the trial took place two years ago. With an irony that was not lost on the media, members of the famously non-confrontational and forgiving Amish were the first to be convicted of religiously motivated violence under hate crimes legislation passed in the United States five years ago. The judge sentenced Mullet to 15 years in prison. Another 15 members of the community received sentences ranging from one to seven years. Three of Barb Miller’s sons and her five daughters-in-law were jailed. Since the book was written an appeal court has overturned the hate crimes convictions, but those with time still to serve remain in jail and the case may well end up in the Supreme Court. Kraybill tells this fascinating story clearly, and has the knowledge and contacts to

The case lodges itself in the voluminous annals of American religious nuttiness penetrate a tight-lipped community. It is a slim book and I’d have liked some of the victims and lesser perpetrators to have been fleshed out more. But Mullet emerges as a grotesque figure in the long tradition of religious crazies who set up in the boondocks, claim they will take their followers closer to Heaven and then set about creating their own peculiar hell. We hardly need telling just now that evil men do evil things in the name of religion, but this story shows that they can emerge in the most unlikely places.

Imprudent King: A New Life of Philip II by Geoffrey Parker Ya Yale, 356pp £25 * £20 ebo ebook £25 There are as many Ther Philips as there are historians of his reign as King of Spain and ruler of the first global empire from 1543 until 1598. During that time he was perpetually at war with most of Europe and, from 1571, determined “to kill or capture” Elizabeth Tudor. Drawing on documents unseen for 400 years, Geoffrey Parker reviews Philip’s career and character. Was Philip II driven and distracted by events, or did he create and control them? He was certainly diligent enough, working long hours, tired and hungry, at paperwork. Parker believes that his decisions, however calamitous, were considered and deliberate. He is at pains to know Philip through the testimony of his friends, foes, courtiers and his own words and this authoritative, intelligently revisionist biography must stand now as the primary reference. Yes Please by Amy Poehler Picador, 329pp Pic £1 £16.99 * £14.99 e-b e-book £10.99 Since the death two years ago of the ye screenwriter, essayist, scr anecdotalist and aphorist Nora Ephron, there has been a gap in the market for witty, wacky writing for women. Caitlin Moran has the proprietary rights in the UK but with this collection of lists (reasons we cry in a plane), haikus (on plastic surgery), insider Hollywood stories (Antonio Banderas smells the best), lifestyle advice (on sex: “Ladies, try not to fake it”, and tips on how to make it in showbiz (perform with Tina Fey as two cops called Shortfuse and Powderkeg), Amy Poehler, best known as the star of the comedy series Parks and Recreation, is bidding for performance rights over here. Though sometimes her aspirational advice seems to be channelled through Goldie Hawn, Amy is positive, punchy and powerful in her own right and writing.

Iain Finlayson

FGM

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times GETTY IMAGES

fiction

A history lesson — but not as Michael Gove intended The former education secretary inadvertently inspired this time-travelling romp from Ben Elton, says Helen Rumbelow

what if franz ferdinand lived? Ben Elton’s hero is on a mission to alter history

Time and Time Again by Ben Elton Bantam, 400pp £18.99 * £15.99 ebook £9.49

t is important to note that Ben Elton now lives in a beach town in Western Australia. Ben “glittery suit-wearing, political-swearing, Blackadder-writing” Elton now lists his hobby as paddle boarding. This is hard to imagine, but not as hard if you read his fifteenth novel, Time and Time Again. Elton may have moved 9,000 miles away, but a time-travelling fantasy allows him to transcend jet lag and move right back to where he belongs — in hyper-researched, hyperbolic romps around the traditional history curriculum. Gus Stanton is the hero of this sci-fi/ political history mash-up: an elite British soldier offered a chance to go back in time and prevent “history’s greatest single mistake”. He concludes this is the Great War and the book opens with Stanton, newly catapulted from the 21st century, setting off to Sarajevo to stop the assassination of Franz Ferdinand. Along the way Stanton’s botches lead to success and his successes lead to botches — including a love affair with a suffragette packing the most “luxuriant” pubic hair, a century away from a waxing salon. All this tangles Stanton’s mission, with wilder and cleverer loops in time and twists in plot that return Stanton to the thought he started with: “People made history and people screwed it up.” Elton says that Michael Gove inadvertently inspired his latest novel at the beginning of this year, when the then education secretary attacked Blackadder. Gove said Blackadder “perpetuated left-wing myths”, by questioning the British decision to enter the First World War. Gove’s “clear idiocy”, said Elton (a bit of politics there from Elton’s old Thatcher-bashing days) put some lead in his pencil and the 400-page novel is the result. I see the connection with Blackadder immediately: what is Blackadder other than a

time-traveller, the same swivel-eyed coward moving through the dates of schoolboy exam topics, from Elizabethan times to the trenches? But here Elton is interested only in 1914, and a question newly fashionable among historians: “What if?”. I think, ironically, this makes for a novel Gove would love. In the book Elton has a monstrous Cambridge historian — a female professor with “cheese in her moustache” and greatsplayed buttocks — stand in as an extreme version of the real-life historian Niall Ferguson, the esteemed Scottish academic. Ferguson has said, “It’s perfectly possible for an event as large as the First World War to have had quite proximate, small causes,” and loves to play “What if?”. Other historians deride Ferguson’s “counterfactuals”, key events are the result of larger forces moving inexorably in one direction, they say, to imagine otherwise is just a parlour game. But that doesn’t deny the intellectual fun Elton has playing it, nor the determination with which Elton pushes the game from rollicking comedy into darkness. “What if?” has inspired the other historical time-travel fantasies knocking around, such as this year’s The First Fifteen

A female professor with ‘cheese in her moustache’ stands in for Niall Ferguson Lives of Harry August by Claire North, centring on the Second World War. But I came to this book with Life After Life, Kate Atkinson’s time-travelling bestseller of 2013, deep in my head and heart. Atkinson’s heroine also wants to effect an alternate history — by killing Hitler — but there is no more comparison. Atkinson’s focus is personal, not political. Her writing is beautiful, where Elton’s is effective. That’s not to denigrate Elton; in its own part of the bookshop Time and Time Again triumphs and it’s the best I’ve read of Elton’s many bestsellers. After an overlong set-up the final half’s surprises keep coming and keep satisfying. In historical thrillers Elton has found a new life for himself, and come home.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

FGM KOBAL

in short

The future has crash-landed William Gibson’s novel is a dystopian thriller about the world today, says Andrew McKie

hirty years ago, William Gibson’s debut Neuromancer imagined a future in cyberspace and defined the aesthetic known as cyberpunk. It was a highly prescient, thoroughly speculative book. It still is; though not quite in the way one might have expected in 1984. The digital technology in the book, if anything, understates computing’s capability and centrality in 21st-century life. The atmosphere of the novel, however, has probably done more to shape the aesthetics of the digital age than anything else, bar Ridley Scott’s film Blade Runner. By comparison, his most recent novels, set more or less in the present day, give the impression that Gibson is always at least a couple of months ahead of the rest of us. Pattern Recognition anticipated YouTube, but only just; Spook Country location technology apps and Zero History covert brands and viral marketing. It is almost as if, by some strange quantum electrodynamic effect, Gibson’s observations about the future bring aspects of it into being. Which makes his new novel, The Peripheral, the more terrifying. It is set in two different futures, one perhaps 20 or 30 years away, the other 70 or so years later. As so often in science fiction, Gibson’s themes and concerns are not attempts at prophecy but ruminations on current social, political and technological issues disguised in spectacularly cool setdressing. Nonetheless, The Peripheral is,

Th Periph The Peripheral al by William Gibson Viking, 496pp £18.99 * £15.99

London is deserted but for the billionaire class, the ‘klepts’, and their hangers-on

future shock William Gibson’s cyberpunk influence is second only to Blade Runner

like Neuromancer and unlike the Bigend trilogy, emphatically science fictional. One of the techniques and, for fans the pleasures, of imagined futures is that the world that has been built is revealed by accretion. Gibson is particularly good at building atmosphere and providing exposition by a slow drip of details and oblique references. The initial consequence, however, is that for the first 150 pages or so of the novel, the reader may never be quite sure where he or she is, or what exactly is going on. Happily, the bits fall into place. The future closer to us is a rustbowl southern US state, in which the economy centres on 3D printing, mainly of drugs, while semiprofessional videogame players hang out in trailers and play the benefits system. Flynne, the female protagonist, fills in for her brother, a military veteran in what she thinks is one such game, during which another player is killed. This, it turns out, is a real murder in Flynne’s future, in a London deserted but for the billionaire class — “klepts” — and their hangers-on, in a technologically advanced world which has suffered a series of disasters (climate change, pandemics and financial crises) cumulatively known as the jackpot. These two futures can talk to each other,

Brittle lives shattered

Everything Ev ything I Ne Never Told You by Celeste Ng Blackfriars, 297pp £8.99 * £8.54; ebook £4.49

To order books at discounted prices call 0845 2712134 or visit thetimes.co.uk/ bookshop

he American author Celeste Ng has crash-landed into the literary spotlight after her first novel was named Amazon’s book of the year, pipping Hilary Mantel and Stephen King. The blurb plugs Everything I Never Told You as a literary thriller. An unexplained death of a teenage girl; a troubled family; racial tensions; a bad boy and a murky lake: from the premise, you would think this is a clear-cut genre novel. Ng’s novel (pronounced “Ing”) offers much more than that: this is a poignant exploration of the effect of the death of a child and a sibling, of race and being an outsider and of the struggle to fit in. Set in 1977, in small-town Ohio, this is the story of the Chinese-American Lee family — two parents, two living children — as they live with the unexplained death of the 16-year-old daughter. Lydia simply disappears one night. Days later, her body is dredged up from the nearby lake. The police suspect suicide and James, her father, who is the son of first-generation Chinese immigrants, goes along with them. Her mother Marilyn, an American, believes her daugh-

ter has been murdered. The more Marilyn searches for clues in Lydia’s bags (she is surprised to find her hard-working daughter has a packet of condoms and cigarettes) and old diaries (year after year of blank pages), the more things do not add up. Where is the girl she thought she knew? The narrative shifts between the family members as they consider the events that lead up to Lydia’s death and as we learn about who Lydia really was, the biggest “mystery” of them all. What makes this novel worthwhile are the family’s revelations about themselves, which provide the twists and turns, rather than the “whodunnit” aspect of the teen’s death. Marilyn rebelled against her single mother, who only wanted her to marry well and learn how to cook an egg six ways. She wants to be a doctor, a dream she gives up when she falls for James, a university lecturer. Her mother is appalled that she would marry someone from a different racial background. James

but interact only at second hand, by means of out-of-body avatars called “peripherals”. What’s more, in a nod to quantum smearing, Flynne’s world is, for the London oligarchs, a “stub” — their intervention in it means that her future will not quite be theirs. Fans of Gibson’s first two trilogies, the Sprawl and the Bridge novels, will find themselves at home in the McGuffin-driven thriller the contact between the two sets up. Gibson’s strengths as an SF writer — the atmospheric borrowings from Alfred Bester, the plausibly inventive technologies, the attention to detail (he is outstanding on the look and feel of clothing and kit), the film noir touches and the general sheen of sophistication — are well to the fore. Ultimately, however, this is a book examining some of the central ethical questions of our own time: violence conducted by remote-controlled drones, the increasing distance of the richest from the rest of us, the power of surveillance technology and networked systems, both for individuals and the authorities (Homeland Security, or “Homes”, looms large in Flynne’s world, and the City of London in her future). By the end of the book, it no longer seems extravagantly speculative; instead, there is an alarming suspicion that its main purpose is documentary. new star Celeste Ng has won Amazon’s book of the year

The Petticoat Men by Barbara Ewing Head of Zeus, 474pp He £18.99 * £16.99 £1 ebook £7.99 ebo If you want to take the temperatur temperature of a culture, look at its scandals. lo Ewing’s strange and fascinating Barbara Ewing novel zooms in on one of the greatest scandals of the Victorian age — and manages to shed new light on it. Mattie Stacey has two charming lodgers named Freddie and Ernest, and she admires their extravagant collection of gorgeous gowns and hats. She loves hearing their outrageous stories about attending grand balls in the clothes of their alter egos, “Fanny” and “Stella”. Then the two men are arrested for homosexuality and the press has a field day. So far, this is well-known territory. While researching accounts of the trial, however, Ewing found “forgotten” evidence that took the case into the very heart of the establishment, right up to the edges of the royal family. The tone is warm and compassionate without being too modern. Terrific. Crooked Heart by Lissa Evans Doubleday, 282pp Doub £14.99 £1 £1 12.99 ebook £6.49 ebo So sweet that it’s only just this side of cloying, Crooked Heart tells of Cr love that springs lov ings from nothing, like wildflowers on a bomb site. Ten-yearold orphan Noel, crippled by polio, has been living beside Hampstead Heath with his godmother Mattie, a former suffragette. But the start of the Second World War sends Mattie into dementia and Noel can’t avoid being evacuated to St Albans. There he is billeted with a chancy old bag named Vera Sedge, a woman so lacking in principle that she takes out a life insurance policy on her ancient neighbour. Vera’s trouble is not her dishonesty but her incompetence. Fortunately for her, Noel is as smart as a whip with a formidable streak of independence — and so a winning team is born. The characters are wonderfully vivid and eccentric, and there’s a good dash of sharp comedy to offset the heart-warming stuff.

recalls the otherness of his existence as the only ethnic minority person in class and the feeling of acceptance Marilyn gives him. Both are escaping their past. The couple have three children but blue-eyed Lydia is their favourite. All of their frustrated dreams about careers and popularity are channelled into a daughter who wants to please. “I didn’t want her to be just like everyone else,” Marilyn says. “I wanted her to be exceptional.” That is just the problem: she is the exception. Strangers pull at their eyelids at her, schoolmates leave her out. Lydia is carrying the hopes and expectations of two generations. The family slides into the vacuum she leaves behind. There are no sudden realisations, but the gradual peeling back of the layers is no less compelling as we crawl towards the conclusion in Ng’s portrait of a brittle family and the burden of difference.

Flesh and Blood by Patricia Cornwell HarperCollins, 369pp Ha £20 * £16 ebook ebo £9.99 What has happened to Dr Kay Scarpetta? The opening chapter of her 22nd adventure finds her rather adv disgustingly smug — she’s married to a rich FBI man, with whom she keeps having sex though they’re both ancient. It’s OK, though, because there’s a serial killer on the loose. On Kay’s birthday she finds seven pennies lined up on her garden wall, all dated 1981. And then she’s summoned to examine the corpse of a music teacher who seems to have been shot by someone invisible. There are signs that the killer has Kay in his or her sights — and what is the link with her niece Lucy? It’s enough to send a woman straight back into her “kitchen of commercialgrade stainless steel appliances and antique alabaster chandeliers”. Great gory fun.

Fiona Wilson

Kate Saunders

the times Saturday November 22 2014

48 Body + Soul

RICHARD JUNG / GETTY IMAGES

The good grains guide Carbs often get a bad press but many have powerful health benefits. Nutrition expert Ian Marber chooses the best

arbohydrates have taken a bit of bashing in recent years but not all are created equal, and “good” grains offer far more than just carbs. While excess simple carbohydrates contribute to a variety of conditions, ranging from cardiovascular disease to weight gain, the worthy complex carbohydrates are useful sources of fibre, minerals and antioxidants and belong in a healthy diet alongside lean protein and essential fats. Follow my good grain guide to discover their benefits. Try to vary the grains as much as possible.

rutin levels mean it can reduce the likelihood of stroke, heart attack and thrombosis. It can also lower blood pressure, due to the high angiotensin content; boost the immune system, due to high levels of zinc; reduce the risk of neurological disorders because of its copper content; and is good for digestion, as it is high in fibre. Serve it in place of rice, or in light, savoury pancakes. Don’t rinse it before cooking or it will become mushy.

Bulgur wheat

Packed with fibre, bulgur is great for digestion; the fibre also offers some protection against colon Amaranth cancer and high Freekeh levels of LDL (the Amaranth is unusually unwanted form of rich in: magnesium, which cholesterol), and can reduce is required for muscle high blood pressure. It is wheat, relaxation and helping the body however, so it is not suitable for coeliacs. manage stress; calcium, which maintains Rinse it several times before cooking bone density; iron, which carries oxygen to reduce the starch, then cook it like around the body; and lysine (some rice. It’s great in soups and salads evidence suggests that it counters cold sores but more importantly, helps reduce (especially tabbouleh). calcium loss and therefore is good for bone health). It is in the same family Freekeh as quinoa and beetroot and contains A high-protein Middle Eastern grain, no gluten (in fact, it is not technically freekeh is also high in fibre, making it a grain). good for digestive health and relieving It cooks like rice or can be popped in constipation. It can also help to protect oil to make healthy popcorn. the eyes against macular degeneration because it is rich in lutein, which supports vision and Barley eye health. It’s made from young The high fibre content of green wheat and contains gluten barley means it can help to — so can be used in place of wheat. prevent colon cancer, help Use it in puddings, stuffing, soups, produce energy, reduce appetite or for bread; it makes a less dry (because it helps blood glucose loaf than regular wheat. management), reduce high cholesterol, and aid muscle relaxation, as it Millet is rich in magnesium. Similar to wheat, When combined with except it contains protein it is effective in no gluten and reducing appetite and has a higher maintaining consistent nutritional value. energy levels. It is Millet can help superior to pearl barley to regulate blood because the latter is pressure and more processed, with heartbeat due to a reduced nutrient high potassium content. Cook it with Ian Marber content. Don’t stock and herbs to eat it more than add flavour, or add once or twice a to soups and week, or if you casseroles. have a thyroid problem, because it Buckwheat can hinder iodine Buckwheat has a absorption, number of powerful which the health benefits. High thyroid needs.

Eat a variety of grains to maximise the benefits

different mix of proteins so can be easier to digest for those who have a sensitivity to regular wheat. Spelt can replace wheat in baking, though it does taste slightly sweeter.

It’s ideal for replacing wheat when baking or making bread.

Oats

Oats are a concentrated source of minerals and are good at reducing appetite because they have a favourable balance of protein to carbohydrates. They are also good at reducing cholesterol levels — eating 3g daily can reduce total cholesterol by as much as 10 per cent in three months. Have porridge, use oats in baking, or eat oatcakes.

Quinoa

Technically a seed, quinoa is a rare grain-based complete protein, which means that it can be used as a building block for muscle and tissue, and will also reduce the appetite. It can also reduce inflammation, contains small amounts of the healthy fat oleic acid, which is predominant in extra-virgin olive oil, and has no gluten so is perfect for people with coeliac disease. Use it in place of rice and cereals, and in risotto.

Teff

Buckwheat

Wholewheat

Wheat has a bad reputation but it can be a great addition to the diet. It is a good source of fibre, which can reduce the risk of colon cancer and high cholesterol. Try to eat it in an unprocessed form if possible: unbleached wholewheat has more nutritional benefits than milled, bleached white flour. The problem with wheat is that it’s a simple carbohydrate that creates an insulin response, which can make you hungry and tired very quickly. Having wholewheat avoids this.

Rye

Rye is a wholegrain so it’s more dense and fibrous than wheat, and will keep you full for longer, helping to control appetite. It can also help to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease and breast cancer in post-menopausal women because it is a rich source of lignans. Add it to soups and stews. Look for 100 per cent rye bread because some varieties are made with a mix of rye and wheat flour.

Wild rice

Spelt

Spelt has a high protein content but can also boost the metabolism, improve circulation and reduce cholesterol due to its niacin content. It’s in the same family as wheat and rye, but has a slightly

Teff grains are tiny, yet very concentrated. Teff (from Ethiopia) is high in vitamin C (not normally found in grains) and is good at maintaining bone density because of its high lysine content, which helps the body to absorb calcium. It looks like a brown poppy seed and because it’s so small it’s hard to refine so is generally found in its natural state — although it is possible to buy teff flour. Use it in porridge or to make flatbread or pancakes.

Oats can help to reduce cholesterol

Wild rice has twice as much protein as brown or white rice, which is essential for maintaining muscle tone and reducing appetite. It can also help regulate blood pressure because of the high potassium content. It is very high in antioxidants. Rinse it well and place in cool water for 10 minutes to remove unwanted particles. Drain and rinse again before cooking. ianmarber.com

the times Saturday November 22 2014

Travel 49 RUDY BALASKO / GETTY IMAGES

Hohensalzburg Castle above the city, and below, Hellbrunn Palace

A weekend in ... Salzburg, Austria

n the gardens of Salzburg’s Hellbrunn Palace, two Japanese ladies are hoisting their skirts, preparing to leap from one bench to another in a pretty gazebo. It’s an odd sight perhaps, but then this is a Sound of Music tour and, as fans of the Hollywood blockbuster will know, the pavilion is where young Liesl von Trapp and her beau sang their soppy duet about innocence and roses, rogues and cads. “Please,” our guide Peter begs the ladies. “You’re not 16-year-olds. We had a woman of 80 do that. She broke both legs.” Normally the gazebo is locked because the residents grew tired of listening to discordant renditions of Sixteen Going on Seventeen. Who can blame them? We snuck in because it was opened for decorators. With 2015 marking the 50th anniversary of the film’s first screening, a mass investment in earplugs might be wise. Ah, but who am I to talk? I nurse a guilty affection for the film, and as we progress to the Do-Re-Mi steps at Mirabell Palace gardens and on to Maria’s Nonnberg Convent, I’m happily singing along, even yodelling when Lonely Goatherd starts up on Peter’s soundtrack. Salzburg regards the film’s enduring popularity as a mixed blessing: it generates income but is in bad taste, nonetheless. “It’s not our story, it’s Hollywood’s story,” my guide insists. Instead, it is Salzburg’s links to Mozart that ignite enthusiasm. This really is a tale of two cities. Eine Kleine Nachtmusik versus Edelweiss perhaps. Mozart was born in a modest apartment on the old town’s left bank. I pause to admire his dinky childhood violin, then cross the Salzach river to his adolescent home from where, with his piano-playing sister, Nannerl, and

violinist father, Leopold, the family travelled its way out of impoverishment — tinkling out tunes to countless appreciative audiences. Not so very different from the singing von Trapps, then. But you don’t see Maria’s brood smiling from exquisite chocolate boxes, nor a confectionery specially named in their honour. Following advice, I head to the Fürst café to try out the oldest established Salzburger Mozartkugel — a delicious gobstopper of chocolate, praline and marzipan. Christmas is big business too, with shops dedicated year-round to selling pretty glass baubles, tinsel and fairy lights. Next week sees the start of the sprawling Christmas market in front of the cathedral, complete with brass ensembles and Advent carol singing. We head to Austria’s oldest “Viennese” coffee house — Café Tomaselli, bathed in rare sunshine on airy Alte Markt this fine winter’s day. Pinafored waitresses patrol the coffee drinkers with trays of creamy pastries and newspapers hang from brass hooks beneath marquetrypanelled walls. It was here that Mozart slurped almond milk. More Mozartmania is to come when I visit Stiftskeller St Peter — another oldie — Europe’s first restaurant in fact, dating from 803. Once run by monks, its warren of dining rooms ranges from cosy brick vaulted chambers to frothily stuccoed salons, which is where I later present myself for the Mozart Dinner Concert. Over a rather institutional three-course meal, bewigged and costumed musicians from the Amadeus Consort entertain us with arias from Don Giovanni, Magic Flute and The Marriage of Figaro. But the music is top-notch, as is the

Need to know Louise Rodden was a guest of the Austria National Tourist Office (austria.info). British Airways has return flights from £158. Where to eat Hangar-7 (00 43 662 2197, hangar-7.com), the modern glass bubble owned by the founder of Red Bull is the setting for Restaurant Ikarus. Enjoy innovative guest chefs’ menus while admiring the collection of Formula One cars and vintage aircraft. Three courses cost €49. More information Salzburg.info

playful Don who grabs at wine bottles, admires puddings, confiscates mobiles and even, at one point, claims a pretty girl from the diners. In some ways, the evening perfectly reflects Salzburg: charming, confectionery-obsessed and stuffed to the gills with blowsy architecture. We can thank the 17th-century prince-archbishop Raitenau for Salzburg’s good looks. It was he who transformed this prosperous city-state from medieval mediocrity to glorious Italianate baroque — and as I step into the cathedral to admire creamy marble and powdery stucco, I can’t help thinking of a vast strudel set in stone. Opulent too, are the picture-lined halls and salons of the Dom Residenz — the living quarters of Salzburg’s prince-archbishops. It’s on a par with Venice’s Doge’s Palace — vast echoing chamber after chamber where you can almost hear the rustle of episcopal robes on the shiny marble floors. But I prefer the smaller rooms, prince-archbishop Harrach’s study in particular, where, away from his cronies, he would remove his sweaty wig and nibble on chocolates. Yes, Salzburg has a more modest face, away from bigwig baroque. Turn down any of the left bank’s side streets and you find tiny traditional stores: the delightful Knopferlmayer button house with its sheaves of feathers and lace and cabinets stuffed with handmade buttons, overseen by the charmingly named Veronika Stockinger. Likewise, Getreidegasse with its overhanging wrought-iron shop signs where, at Kirchtag, you find a huge array of handmade umbrellas, parasols and walking canes. All it needs is a remake of Singin’ in the Rain set here, and Salzburg would have another string to its bow. Louise Rodden

The budget hotel

Gasthaus Hinterbrühl (00 43 662 846798, gasthaus-hinterbruehl.at) is a charming B&B in a 14th-century building in the old town. Rooms are cosy, with shared bathrooms. Pick a quieter back room. B&B doubles are from £53.

The luxury hotel

A vast roll call of stars, from Pavarotti to Christopher Plummer, have stayed or eaten at The Goldener Hirsch (00 43 662 80840, goldenerhirsch.com). This lovely 600-year-old inn with a traditional rustic look has antique-filled bedrooms. Have a cocktail in the bar, then dine on schnitzel and noodles next door at s’Herzl, the hotel’s more casual restaurant. B&B doubles are from £168.

the times Saturday November 22 2014

50 Travel Mont Rochelle. Below left: the wine tram. Below: a room at Ulusaba

South Africa

On the wine trail, with a side order of wildlife Richard Branson’s latest hotel, in South Africa’s wine region, is a great place to relax before setting off on safari, says Monique Rivalland

t’s 11am and I’m on my fourth glass of wine. I am, to be fair, on a vineyard tour of the Franschhoek Valley, in the South African winelands, and such behaviour is de rigueur. My current location is the Rickety Bridge winery, where you can sit on the sundeck and taste four wines, including their pinotage — South Africa’s signature pinot noir-hermitage hybrid — for 10 rands. That converts to 58p. It’s the first of eight stops on the “wine tram” — a charming, if a little touristy, open-air locomotive that crawls through the region, hooting at guinea fowl as they cross the tracks. There are other ways of getting around: by mountain bike or, for the intrepid, horseback, but both are peril-

ZIMBABWE

BOTSWANA

Ulusaba Game Reserve

Heading

SOUTH AFRICA

Cape Town Mont Rochelle

200 miles

ous post-drinking. With the tram you can follow the timetable and hop on and off, trying as few or as many vineyards as you fancy. All eight take about six hours. The fourth stop is Mont Rochelle, the vineyard and hotel where we are staying, and the newest addition to Richard Branson’s list of luxury properties. It’s one of two Branson-owned destinations in South Africa; the other is Ulusaba, the private game reserve within Sabi Sands next to the Kruger National Park, which I will also visit for a helping of adventure along with a mellow stay in the vineyards. Back at Mont Rochelle we head to Country Kitchen, one of the hotel’s two restaurants. Trammers and daytrippers are relaxing on the terrace, drinking sau-

vignon blanc and admiring the dramatic vista. Franschhoek — an hour’s drive east of Cape Town and neighbour to the betterknown Stellenbosch — is enveloped by mountains; hazy purple giants with carpets of luscious green at their base. It’s especially beautiful in spring, when the air is warm but still fresh, and the pink and violet bougainvillea are in bloom. If, like us, you don’t feel like sitting down formally for lunch, Country Kitchen offers picnic hampers with local cheeses and charcuterie — and wine, always wine — which you can take anywhere on the farm. We take ours to the lake and sit in the shade of an oak tree. The farm at Mont Rochelle has been producing wine since 1688 but only became a hotel in the mid20th century. Its most recent owners, the German hotelier Erwin Schnitzler and Miko Rwayitare, a Rwandan telecoms tycoon, sold it to Branson in May, who gave it a speedy interior renovation and reopened it in the autumn. There are 22 rooms across three buildings — the Manor House, the Garden House and the Vineyard Wing, where I am staying in a mid-range Cabernet room. It has a private veranda with postcard views of the Klein Dassenberg mountain range, and one of those modern bathroom-inyour-bedroom set-ups, which I rather like. If it’s not for you, though, there’s an electronic screen to conceal it. The style of the room is contemporary and sleek. It’s overly box fresh, but one summer season should remedy that. Just down the hallway are the two topof-the-range Cap Classique suites, which are enormous and, with living rooms and

private plunge pools, well-equipped for families or hosting guests. At the other end of the spectrum are the Shiraz and Merlot rooms, which are still spacious and mostly with valley views, though be sure to ask. In each room is a fresh protea, South Africa’s national flower. It strikes me that the flower and the luxurious Africology products in the bathroom are the only hints of Africa anywhere on the property. In fact, it feels more French than anything else. Which makes sense, since Franschhoek is Afrikaans for “French corner”, the name Dutch settlers gave the area after the French Huguenots fled there from religious persecution in the 17th century. Never without du vin they began cultivating the many vineyards that make it what it is today: a little slice of France in the African cape. Central Franschhoek, ten minutes walk away, is very chic. There’s a main artery packed with boutiques and cafés with Dutch gable façades, and some of the best restaurants in the country. We try Reubens, where we sit in the leafy courtyard. To start I have sugar-cured trout with charred aubergine purée and a ginger-soy dressing, followed by beef fillet with burnt onion purée, pot-au-feu vegetables and a bone marrow jus. It’s excellent and a cut above Miko, the main dinner spot at Mont Rochelle, where the food did not live up to its elaborate de-

Need to know Monique Rivalland was a guest of Virgin Limited Edition, which has a package through Hip Hotels (0844 5732751, vhiphotels.co.uk) of five nights’ all-inclusive at Ulusaba plus four nights’ B&B at Mont Rochelle, with car hire in Cape Town and flights, from £2,999pp.

the times Saturday November 22 2014

Travel 51

JACK BROCKWAY

Five great trips in South Africa Hip Jo’burg If your view of Johannesburg, South Africa’s largest city, comes from 20-year-old news reports, you’re missing out on a revitalised multicultural melting pot that’s on the up, with the best restaurants, galleries, shops and nightlife in Africa. Use a knowledgeable local guide to explore Soweto, the Apartheid Museum, the Maboneng Precinct for arts, and Braamfontein, where the Saturday morning Neighbourgoods Market is a must. Browse eatout.co.za for comprehensive food suggestions. Details Virgin Holidays (0844 5732460, vhiphotels.co.uk) has return flights from Heathrow, private transfers and four nights’ B&B at Melrose Arch, from £1,079pp (two sharing) Family KZN KwaZulu-Natal has some of the best beaches in the country and, outside of local school holidays when half of Gauteng descends on them, you’ll have them all to yourself. But those miles of uninterrupted sand, as well as stunning national parks such as iSimangaliso Wetlands and Hluhluwe–iMfolozi, fascinating colonial battlefields and a culture that blends British, Zulu and Indian influences, make it a great destination for families who can explore the area at a leisurely pace.

scriptions on the menu — although it is true of many hotels that a richer experience is to be had dining in town. On my last morning I pull back the curtains to reveal low clouds pouring over the black mountains, the morning sun rising behind them. I climb into the wicker chair that hangs from the ceiling of my veranda and listen. Silence but for the sound of a distant lawnmower. Mont Rochelle could not be more relaxing: sunshine, fine wine and magnificent scenery. But, with not much else going on, two days here is enough. I’m ready for something exhilarating. It’s not uncommon, once you’ve travelled 11 hours across 6,000 miles, to do two holidays in one in South Africa. And wine and wildlife — why not? With the two distinct Branson properties, you can do them both in style. A warning, though: for those with a fear of flying, this safari part is not for you. Cape Town to Johannesburg by air is the easy bit, but the tiny 14-seater plane that takes me from Johannesburg into the heart of Sabi Sands is, well, terrifying. It dips and sways and shakes all the way there. There are alarm sounds coming from the cockpit. Two young girls at the front are crying; their parents pretending not to notice the almighty drop that just elicited a collective gasp from the back of the plane. Mont Rochelle is already a million miles away. Today (but not always) the plane has to stop at three resorts before Ulusaba. That means landing and taking off four times in half an hour. What awaits me makes the journey worth it. I’m driven from the private

landing strip to the Safari Lodge, right in the bush. For families with young kids there’s the Rock Lodge, which is on a mountainside and away from the animals but with spectacular views of the Sands. I have a River room, a standalone cabin reachable only by crossing a long bamboo bridge hanging high in the trees. I’m told that once the sun goes down it is strictly forbidden to head to my room without a security guard. There are various hazards: a 20m drop, snakes in trees, roving hyenas. It’s very Indiana Jones, and the room is just beautiful — all wooden, with lavish Nguni cowhide rugs and a plunge pool on the deck. In the morning I find an elephant testing the water with his trunk. The next night,

it’s the sound of baboons scrabbling around the outer decking. It doesn’t scare me; when I arrived I was shown how to baboon-proof my room with extra locks. They’d had problems recently with baboons who had learnt to unlock the doors and raid the minibars. And fair play to them. It is a superb minibar, with proper, juicy biltong and posh nougat. Every morning at Ulusaba is a 5 o’clock wake-up. It may sound punishing, but the thrill of climbing into your open-topped Jeep in the misty morning air and heading off into the wild is motivation enough. My game ranger Pierre and his partner Orange, a tracker from the local Shangaan tribe, find four of the Big Five — lion, leopard, elephant and buffalo — on my first drive. We find number five, the elusive rhino, on my final morning. In between drives there’s plenty of eating — I try ostrich, kudu and springbok during my stay — and sunbathing, but what really excites me is the spa. The spas at Ulusaba and Mont Rochelle offer the same treatments but each has something location-specific on the menu. In Ulusaba I have a massage outside, naked in the wild with the odd impala knocking about. At Mont Rochelle, in keeping with the wine theme, I had a grape-extract stem-cell facial. As I lie listening to the cicadas, the smell of aromatherapy oils and barbecue wafting around me, I think of what a brilliant trip I’ve had: from the serenity of the French hills to the drama of the bush, capturing some of the best of what South Africa has to offer. You’ll need walking boots and kitten heels for this one.

Cape Grace Hotel, Cape Town height of the South African summer in about 12 hours. Beaches, vineyards on the slopes of Table Mountain, fantastic local food and a breathtaking location are just a few of the ingredients that see so many UK “snowbirds” return again and again at this time of year. Details British Airways (0844 493 0758, ba.com) has seven nights’ B&B at the Mount Nelson Hotel with flights from Heathrow from £1,779pp if booked by November 24

Golf safari If you’d rather emulate the “big three” — Gary Player, Ernie Els and Retief Goosen — than spot the “big five” wild animals, the Western Cape has some world-class golf courses, such as Fancourt, Arabella and Steenberg. You can easily visit four or five in a week, combining golf with sightseeing in Cape Town, the Winelands and along the Garden Route. Details Great Golf Adventures (01992 579697, greatgolfadventures.net) A beach near Durban has an eight-night tour from £3,195pp, including B&B at hotels such as the Cape Grace in Cape Town and Birkenhead House in Hermanus, some additional meals, five rounds of golf, transport and guiding. International flights are not included

Details A week’s KwaZulu-Natal coastal exploration booked via Umkhumbi Lodge (00 27 76 1641134, umkhumbilodge.co.za), where you’ll spend the first three nights, costs from £749pp based on a family of four travelling, including accommodation, activities, most meals, transport and guiding. Flights are extra and cost from about £680pp to Durban, via Dubai, with Emirates (0344 8002777, emirates.com) Winter trip to Cape Town There’s a lot to love about the Mother City, especially during our winter, when a nonstop, jetlag-free flight delivers you to the

South Africa by rail Yes, you could fly across South Africa for about £100, but if you have the time, going by train is a luxurious way to see the country. The Rovos Rail locomotive takes two days to trundle the 1600km from Pretoria to Cape Town, bisecting the country with stops at towns such as Kimberley and Matjiesfontein, passing through the Highveld and the beautifully barren Karoo en route to the Atlantic Ocean. Details Audley (01993 838550, audleytravel.com) has a ten-night trip with flights, B&B in Cape Town, Franschhoek and Pretoria, and two nights’ full board on the train with transfers from £3,125pp Will Hide

the times Saturday November 22 2014

52 Travel

Martinhal beach and, right, the luxury resort

Portugal

Sun, sea, Santa: Christmas without complications

Novelist Maggie O’Farrell heads to a family-friendly resort on the Algarve for festive cheer with none of the fuss

lasgow airport two days before Christmas is an odd place. Staff loiter beside reindeer dioramas, escalators churn empty steps around and around, our footfalls echo as we cross the near-deserted concourse. I’ve never found mid-winter travel an enticing prospect, possibly because I’m scared of being trapped with inebriated revellers. But the chance of a week in Portugal comes up and I take it, more in a spirit of curiosity than adventure. What would Christmas in an Algarve resort be like? At Glasgow there are only two check-in desks open: one for Krakow, trailing a line of voluble Poles in fur coats, and another for easyJet, populated mainly by retired travellers off to see relatives. We are, astonishingly, the only family with young

children, which gives me slight pause. Are we doing the wrong thing? Are we mad to schlep across Europe at the time of year when most parents are wrapping presents and laying in supplies of chocolate coins? Any misgivings are dispelled immediately on touchdown. We leave a Britain battered by gales and floods; we arrive in Portugal, where the air is balmy, the sun is just slipping down behind the mountains and a nice man is waiting to whisk us away in his capacious people carrier. Our destination is Martinhal, “Europe’s finest luxury family resort” the brochure claims. We head west along a new road through dividing necklaces of lights. Mountains, orange trees and olive groves flash past; we bypass the big Algarve towns of Albufeira and Portimão where, a lifetime ago, I spent a holiday on the beach. Martinhal is far removed from the rest

It’s one of the few places in Europe where you can wear a T-shirt in December

of the Algarve, both geographically and ideologically. Although only an hour or so’s drive from Faro airport, it is light years away from the usual touristic sprawl. You keep on along the coast through a stretch of national park until you find yourself at Europe’s most southwesterly point. Martinhal sits on the easterly bluff of a bay, facing the restless, pounding waves of the Atlantic. A stretch of soft, ochre sand curves away from it; on all remaining sides is environmentally protected land, with low-growing pine trees and wild lavender. The hotel is the brainchild of Roman and Chitra Stern, who met at business school in London (him, Swiss-German; her, Singaporean-Indian). Undeterred by strictures applying to an empty patch of land inside a national park, not to mention a global recession, they set up shop in Portugal and worked on their vision: a five-star resort catering for families, with the central tenets of relaxation for the parents and fun for the kids. Did I mention that, in addition to starting a business and building a village, they also found the time to have four children? It’s instantly apparent that Martinhal has been designed by parents. On arrival, some behind-the-scenes fairy has been at work, assessing the ages of our children: we have been provided with cot, potty and baby gate. The rarity of service like this is apparent in my reaction, which is akin to someone who has stumbled across an unexpected cache of gold. That I don’t have to spend the week worrying that the baby will tumble down the stairs is the best Christmas present I could have asked for. Here are some adjectives about where I spend Christmas: big, new, swish, tasteful. And here are some numbers: four swimming pools (all heated), three restaurants, two kids’ clubs, capacity for 800 guests in 37 hotel rooms and 132 self-catering houses, 55 of which have sea views, 10 of which have their own private pools. The scale of Martinhal is beyond ambitious, the ambience beyond stylish, the service beyond attentive. It’s the kind of place where, micro-seconds before you realise you need something, someone in a white shirt will have materialised at your side proffering the requisite item on a silver platter; be it a spare spoon, a drink of water, a cloth with which to wipe your baby’s face, crayons and paper for your restless four-year-old. This happens so often that I begin to wonder if a module on mind-reading is part of their staff training. The breakfast buffet is a wondrous array of croissants, smoothies, pasties and watermelon. My older child gets to work on demolishing the pastries while the younger ones, once their dining-table patience has expired, escape to the corner play area, which is staffed by an angelically patient woman who will do colouring-in with them while you get to finish your Gwyneth Paltrow energy drink. Buffet time is also prime people-watching time. Clientele here are mostly British

and German, with a smattering of French. There are the first-time parents of babies, looking stunned and sleepless, there are the three-generational holidaymakers who occupy noisy and messy extended tables. There are the parents with teenagers, the former looking sleek and fresh-fromthe-spa, the latter bent wordlessly over their smartphones. There is an intriguing gang of Russians, presided over by an affable giant of a patriarch, with two matching sons who, when they are not engaged on some extreme sport, are to be seen refuelling at the buffet. Christmas day dawns and reception is filled with fairy lights. Santa makes an appearance at breakfast, singing Jingle Bells and looking suspiciously female under the false beard. He/she ascends to a throne in the play area and hands out beautifully wrapped gifts to the children, only some of whom are struck dumb with terror. There is a surreality to spending Christmas day on the beach. The micro-climate of this promontory is astonishingly mild: a bright sun warms our skin to the right degree for a quick dip in the foaming surf. The sea is clear, sharply chill, with a strong undertow. The children splash in the shallows, the first-time parents fiddle with sunblock and UV suits, the Russian beefcakes zip themselves into wetsuits and paddle out on their surfboards. A Dutch family jogs from one end of the beach to the other. I’ve always been sceptical about chasing around the planet in search of winter sun. The distances involved always seemed so arduous as to drain the enterprise of any pleasure. I hadn’t known it was possible to find somewhere in Europe where you can comfortably wear a T-shirt in December or swim outdoors or require a sun hat. The whole place feels invigoratingly healthy. It’s the nexus of sun and sea, giving us all a dose of vitamin D and saline air in the middle of winter. Within days, all our

the times Saturday November 22 2014

persistent coughs and runny noses have vanished. My daughter, who suffers from chronic eczema, arrives with skin that is raw, split and bleeding; by day three, her skin is magically smooth and comfortable. Did I miss Christmas at home? No — rather the opposite. I wouldn’t want to go away every year, but it was lovely to have a year off from big family extravaganzas. On Boxing day it rains, which causes the staff much consternation, as if they have never seen such a thing. Maybe they haven’t. We spend the morning in the games room, playing air hockey and table football, the baby flinging herself around in the ball pit. By afternoon, the sun has broken through and we are back on the beach. My son, running in from the sea, says: “If we were at home, we’d be bored and wishing this day away. But here everything’s good.” I couldn’t have put it better myself.

Need to know A seven-night Christmas package with half-board at Martinhal (00 351 282 240 200, martinhal.com), costs from €113.50 (£91) per night per adult in a hotel room sleeping two adults, one child under 12 years and one baby. It includes Christmas eve dinner and Christmas brunch. The two-night new year package costs from €149 per night per adult in a hotel room sleeping two adults, one child under 12 and one baby. It includes a gala dinner on New Year’s eve and New Year’s day brunch. There’s a complimentary kids’ club until March 26.

Travel 53

Great festive getaways — from a country house stay to Main Street USA At home White stuff in Cornwall The Extreme Academy at the Watergate Bay hotel, north of Newquay, has surf lessons on Christmas eve. There are cliff-top hot tubs, carols, dinner at the hotel’s restaurant Zacry’s or Fifteen Cornwall, and entertainment at the Living Space bar on Boxing Day. Children from 3 to 13 can hang out in the evenings at the Kids’ Zone, while mum and dad enjoy some “we time”. Details Four nights in a family suite starts from £675pp (01637 860543, watergatebay.co.uk) Traditional fun in Herts Luton Hoo, Hertfordshire, a converted stately home with formal gardens designed by Capability Brown, lets its hair down at Christmas. Children can enjoy the cinema with popcorn and ice cream, or make Christmas cards. There are colouring books and a teddy bear, and trips round the estate in a vintage London taxi. Try Christmas lunch in the grand Wernher restaurant, the family quiz and a snooker tournament. Details Christmas house party stays for two nights are from £645pp (0808 250 9673, prideofbritainhotels.com) Candlelit walk in the Cotswolds The Old Swan & Minster Mill offers

a candlelit walk to midnight mass at the local parish church, followed by hot chocolate and mince pies. Christmas day starts with presents and there’s a Boxing day treasure hunt, or a trip to the pantomime. Details Three nights’ full board is from £2,318.75 for a family of four staying in two rooms, with arrivals on Christmas eve (01993 774441, oldswanandminstermill.com) Santa in Scotland The Trump Turnberry resort on the Ayrshire coast has views of the Irish Sea and the mountains of Kintyre. Fun for kids includes the Wee Explorers’ playroom with board games, a cinema showing Christmas classics and a Santa Tracker to follow his journey around the world. Older children have a teen zone with games consoles and mocktails. On Christmas day parents can enjoy a champagne reception, festive lunch and evening buffet. Details The two-night Christmas Experience package is from £1,420 for two adults. There is a charge of £90 per child per night if staying in their parents’ room or £150 per child per night in their own room.

Arrivals are on December 24 (0165 533 1000, turnberryresort.co.uk)

Abroad Caribbean Christmas Whether your kids are sporty or stagestruck they’ll love St Vincent’s Buccament Bay Resort. There’s football coaching from the former Liverpool player Ronnie Whelan and classes in stagecraft from the Les Misérables star Phil Cavill, as well as rugby, tennis and cricket lessons. There’s a visit from Santa, left, a Christmas eve beach barbecue lunch, and a Christmas dinner with carols. Details Seven nights’ allinclusive is from £1,996pp, staying in a deluxe one-bed villa, with flights from Manchester on December 21 (0844 371 4000, caribbeanwarehouse.co.uk) Sledding in Lapland Lapland is great at Christmas whether your children still believe in Santa or not, and Activities Abroad has breaks in Swedish Lapland. Its Tarendo — Christmas Arctic Light Family Adventure suits anybody 14 and over and includes

snow-mobile safaris, dog-sledding, hunts for the aurora borealis and a packed Christmas day programme. Details Five nights is from £1,895 per adult and £1,775 per child, including flights from London on December 21, most meals, activities and warm clothing (01670 789 991; ativitiesabroad.com) Celebration in Orlando Where better to spend Christmas than Walt Disney World? Events include Christmas parades, snow on Main Street USA whatever the weather and complimentary cookies and hot chocolate. Details Virgin Holidays (0844 557 3859, virginholidays.co.uk) has seven nights’ room-only at Disney’s Pop Century Resort from £1,372pp, including flights from Gatwick on December 23 and car hire Sun in Cyprus Tuck into a seven-course Christmas eve menu at the Alexander the Great hotel in Cyprus. Stays at the hotel on Paphos might even allow a Christmas day dip in the sea, since temperatures can touch 20C. Children can enjoy the kids’ club and special dinner parties, while there’s also an adults-only pool. Details Seven nights’ half-board for a family of four is from £2,788, including flights from Stansted on December 19 (020 8492 6868, olympicholidays.com) James Ellis

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

FGM

Games Samurai Sudoku No 430 — Medium

4 7 4 1 2 5

6 9 6

5 2 4

8 5 2 4

4 9

5 5 9

2 8 2

8 6

3 7 8 7

6 3 8 3 2 7

8 5 2 4 3 1

9 8 2

5 6 4

5 1 1

7 3 8

The Listener solution No 4318

Wordplay by Schadenfreude

7 8 5

1 5 2 3 9 6 4

8 9 6 2

3 3 9

2 7 8

35 min

Solution to last week’s Samurai Sudoku

6 8 1 4 7 9

4 8 6 1 3 9 5 7 2

2 9 1 7 5 6 4 3 8

5 3 7 8 2 4 9 6 1

6 4 3 9 8 7 1 2 5

7 1 2 6 4 5 3 8 9

9 5 8 3 1 2 6 4 7

8 5 4 1 9 2 7 3 6

1 9 7 6 3 8 4 5 2

3 6 2 4 5 7 8 9 1

9 2 3 7 6 4 5 1 8

6 4 8 5 1 3 9 2 7

5 7 1 8 2 9 6 4 3

3 2 4 5 9 8 7 1 6 9 3 4 2 8 5 9 7 1 3 6 4

1 6 5 2 7 3 8 9 4 1 5 2 7 3 6 2 4 5 1 8 9

Killler No 4016 - Deadly (56min) 14

2 8 9 7 3 6 8 7 9 9 8 4 7 7 5 2 8 5 3 4 2 1

8 25

Letters omitted by wordplay were in unchecked cells, allowing at least two possible answers. Alternatives were Across: 6 annatto, 11 Siberia, 15 areola, 18 chad, 19 rest/vest, 25 alme, 27 hern/pern, 33 benne, 37 braize; Down: 2 dika, 32 Gaia, 34 Euan/Ewan. The correct letters give ALTERNATIVES, which can be read as “alter natives”; 36ac is thus altered to NATIONS, describing the wordplay-only answers, creating STERNS, which as a verb can mean “rows backward”. More details at listenercrossword.com.

Stuck on Su Doku or Killer Call 0901 322 5005 to receive four clues for any of today’s puzzles. Calls cost 77p from BT landlines.

The winners are Ann Evans of Winchester, Hampshire, Avril & Julian Calder of Kingston upon Thames, Surrey, and Tony Vick of Ponteland, Tyne and Wear.

12 13

1 6 9 5 8 7 3 4 2

3 4 7 2 9 6 8 5 1

5 8 2 4 1 3 9 6 7

1 5 4 3 2 6 9 7 8 3 6 5 1 2 4 6 7 9 3 8 5

3 8 9 4 7 5 6 2 1 8 4 9 5 7 3 2 1 8 4 9 6

6 2 7 8 1 9 4 3 5 7 2 1 6 9 8 3 5 4 7 2 1

8 9 6 7 5 4 3 1 2

5 3 1 6 9 2 8 4 7

4 7 2 1 8 3 5 6 9

9 4 8 2 6 7 1 5 3

7 6 5 9 3 1 2 8 4

2 1 3 5 4 8 7 9 6

7 3 1 4 2 6 8 5 9

2 8 6 5 9 7 1 3 4

4 5 9 8 3 1 6 7 2

9 6 7 1 8 5 2 4 3

8 1 2 9 4 3 5 6 7

3 4 5 7 6 2 9 1 8

Sudoku No 6969

23 28

8 7 9 4 6 1 2 5 3 6 7 8 4 1 9 3 8 6 2 7 5

Yesterday’s solutions

Stuck? Call 0901 322 5005 to receive four clues for any of today’s puzzles. Calls cost 77p from BT landlines.

Time to solve

5 1 6

6 8

Sudoku No 6974 - Fiendish

7 5 2

5 4 7

1 5

3 6

6 3

2 8 3 3

3 4 9

9 5

6 9

7 1 5

Our five-grid Su Doku will test your powers of logic and elimination — against the clock. Fill the grid so that every column, every row and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 to 9. Where the puzzles overlap, the rows and columns do not go beyond their usual length but the interlocking boxes give you more clues — and more complexity! Remember — don’t try to solve each Su Doku grid in turn, the puzzle has to be tackled as a whole.

19 12

Follow standard Su Doku rules, but digits within the cells joined by dotted lines should add up to the printed top left-hand figure. Within each dotted-line “shape”, a digit CANNOT be repeated. For solutions to Su Doku & Killer see Monday’s newspaper

1 5 6 2 7 9 4 3 8

7 4 3 6 8 1 9 5 2

2 8 9 4 3 5 6 1 7

6 9 5 7 2 8 1 4 3

3 7 1 5 4 6 2 8 9

8 2 4 9 1 3 7 6 5

9 3 8 1 6 2 5 7 4

4 1 2 3 5 7 8 9 6

5 6 7 8 9 4 3 2 1

8 9 7 5 3 2 4 6 1

6 5 2 8 1 4 9 7 3

5 8 3 6 2 9 1 4 7

4 2 6 1 8 7 3 9 5

1 7 9 3 4 5 2 8 6

Killer No 4015

2 4 5 7 9 3 6 1 8

9 6 8 2 5 1 7 3 4

7 3 1 4 6 8 5 2 9

3 1 4 9 7 6 8 5 2

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

FGM

Win a Collins Dictionary & Thesaurus For your chance to win, call 0901 292 5274 (ROI 1516 415 029) and leave your answer (the 3 numbers in the pink cells) and details or text the 3 numbers to TIMES followed by a space and then your answer and your contact details to 83080 (ROI 57601) by midnight tonight. You can leave your answer numbers in any order. 6Winners will receive a Collins English Dictionary & Thesaurus Calls cost £1.02 from BT landlines (ROI € 1.50). Other networks and mobiles will cost more. Texts cost £1 (ROI € 1.50) plus your standard network charge. Winners will be picked at random from all correct answers received. One draw per week. Lines close at midnight tonight. If you call or text after this time you will not be entered but will still be charged. Terms and conditions thetimes.co.uk/sudoku-comp. SP: Spoke, W1B 2AG. 0333 202 3390 / 01437 8815 (Mon-Fri 9am-5.30pm).

Fill the grid so that every column, every row and every 3x2 box contains the digits 1 to 6. Developed by Sudoku Syndication H E M L I N E

AW H A I S S T L Y E S I N T N O C O P U R E L S A A N O D F E A U T T A L I E M A T T E S T E

F I N N T H L E M B A I O N

B E T R O T H

K C H P I L E D H D O O A D

O O V R E R U T H O E M B R O E O C O N O M I C E O U N S S U N P B I H E R U A M A T A O N O R

N C H A O P M A B A I L L I A T I Y R B O R I O N W N O

M A S L T A S T Z O Y T R E N S L E E M Y O N V O H P E T T OM N H L I G I D E L S O T I T I N G S E E T H E R O N E S N E T H O R K I N G T O D N R R H E M A T I C S A N A E R L E T N E S T A S N D A K E I W N T S H E N G R G A S S

S A D H I P D O S R E P O U E A F T M L R I M O G O F O L K

L T I M M B C R E E D U I T N C O O N S S O E R T N I U M

F I G O N O A R A O N T T M N E T H A P T H Y E S I C A A L L A Y

S H A K E S P E A R E A N A

I F I N N G E R I N A N I L D B T I L F L C E E S T R E G A B R R E C A H L E

E S T I R G O N S E S I S T O U M R P S E D S I S Y C L O S H E

T A R N T N O U R V E L A U S V S I K P I N N G L O M P E N M

Solution to Friday’s Codeword WA T C H D I I O T UN E R H R T A X I J M F L EMBR YO E U N R E L A Y E A A OWN WO F C N F L EW A

O P A Q U E O D I O U S

Z E S X S K C E L NWO U E S AWH I T E V A X E T HU S E O CR I B

S T U OG ND E L E P D D K Y E E D

Word Watching: Coggle (b) An alternative form of cobble or cobblestone. Grint (c) To gnash or grind one’s teeth. Trogon (c) A bird found in tropical and subtropical regions of America, Africa, and Asia, which has brilliant plumage, a short hooked bill and a long tail. Welkin (a) The sky, heavens or upper air, from Old English wolcen or welcen. Polygon cess, coset, cosset, cost,

R E I V I G L E G D S H A E V E C A B OO N E T N O P T I C S K S O E L V P E N A T N D U S T C C H E L L M D I P S E R A S P E

A T T R A P U E A E R S A R Y I D M A N T I N E N N R A U G H T P R S P R OW A O E E R Y M A N A O L T W I N S N I D G A T E S E E A R F L A P U L L N O I S E D G U L I N E A R A N A E L E T A L N A P P E D K R E L I G E N T T C O R A T I O N P A I O N I S T L T E I M A M V T S R I D E N T E A O R D I S T N U OW C A S E E B U L L A R D L D E B E L L S E I T S I N G E R N H O G G O T T Y

Solution to Cryptic Jumbo 1118 The winner is Colin Lewis of Locking, North Somerset

Scrabble ® Allan Simmons There were further great bonus finds by Durand and the other youngsters. Three that stuck out are with these racks. See how long it takes you to unravel them:

It’s a very exciting few weeks in the Scrabble world at the moment. Last weekend was the UK youth championships (for under 18s) which concluded with some very tense games in the final two rounds for the top ranked players: Jack Durand (14, current world youth champion), Natasha Pratesi (16) and Shrinidhi Prakash (12). In the end, it was Durand that narrowly clinched the title, despite Prakash having beaten him earlier in the event. He won the final game against her and, with Pratesi having a good final game against another opponent, all three ended up on the same number of wins with just spread (cumulative win/loss margin) separating them. Congratulations to all three but especially to Durand who is currently going from strength to strength and the one to watch beyond youth Scrabble. Here’s an example of his bonus-spotting skills in this game against Pratesi. The board position is shown below. There are quite a few bonuses available but Durand finds one that scores the most. How many can you find with his rack of:

BLN

Chess Raymond Keene

AIILORV (played by Durand)

EEFLNSO (played by Pratesi)

LNRTUUY (played by Prakash)

No sooner had this event finished than 100 adult players started travelling from around the globe to the ExCel centre in London for the Mind Sports International (MSI) Scrabble Championships. This is an open event and not based on qualification, as per world championships historically, so there’s scope for some dark horses causing some major upsets. Play got under way on Wednesday leading up to a final knockout stage between the top eight over this weekend. You can follow these final games online at: mindsportstv.com I expect there will be some worthy plays and positions from this event to cover in forthcoming columns. Feedback to Allan Simmons onwordsltd@aol.com

OSU

Collins Scrabble Words is the word authority used. Word positions use the grid reference plus (a)cross or (d)own. 2L

Solution to Quick Jumbo 1118 The winner is Joan Futter of Histon, Cambs

cosy, cymose, cyst, ecosystem, esse, mess, messy, mosey, moss, mossy, most, oyes, scot, sect, seem, seme, setose, some, stem, stye, syce, system, toss. Two Brains 1 Uranus — the Greek god of the heavens. The others are Roman gods. 2 Heath, Thatcher, Major, Blair, Brown, Cameron, the past six prime ministers. Scrabble The complete set of bonus words playable with BLN?OSU were (in order of score and giving the best scoring position if more than one spot for a word): NEBuLOUS E4a (86) played by Durand, NUBiLOUS E4a (86), BLoUSON L7a (78), UNBLOcKS K5a (76), SUNBLOcK K4a (76), UNBOLtS A5d (72). Other bonus racks: RAVIOLI, ONESELF, UNTRULY. Literary quiz 1 The Battle of Waterloo, 1815. 2 The assassination of JF Kennedy, 1963. 3 The great storm of 1987. 4 The anti-Iraq war march of February 15, 2003.

double letter square (dl) 1

G 3W

2L 2L

K 2L

M N

u n 2L ame 2L m reali T y 2L 2L xi 2L 3L 3L c 2W k 2L

3L 2L

3 points:

BCMP 4 points:

AEIOU LNRST DG

Letter values

2 points:

2W 3W

2W 2W

triple word square (tw)

1 point:

2L 3L

10 11 12 13 14 15

double word square (dw)

2W 2L

B D

triple letter square (tl)

FHVWY K=5 JX = 8 QZ = 10

SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark of J. W. Spear & Sons Ltd ©Mattel 2013

Polygon Roger Phillips

Using the given letters no more than once, make as many words as possible of four or more letters, always including the central letter. Capitalised words, plurals, conjugated verbs (past tense etc), adverbs ending in LY, comparatives and superlatives are disallowed. How you rate: 18 words average; 25, good; 30, very good; 35, excellent. Answers to Friday’s Polygon are to the left. Today’s answers are printed in Monday’s newspaper

Puzzles online

For more of your favourite puzzles and crosswords go to thetimes.co.uk/puzzles

Today is a rest day in the Sochi World Championship between Carlsen and Anand. Play resumes tomorrow with game eleven. Games can be followed in real time via the 2seeitlive link on the header of The Times twitter feed @times_chess. For regular updates direct to your twitter account just click on the “follow” button. Meanwhile in the temporary respite I turn my attention to the recently released film The Imitation Game about Alan Turing. Turing, of course, was a computer genius who devised the first effective chessplaying computer program. Starring Benedict Cumberbatch as the persecuted code-breaking and computer wizard, The Imitation Game also features strongly the character of Hugh Alexander, several times British chess champion and head of Turing’s station at Section X in Bletchley Park, the centre that cracked the Nazi codes. Known to his chessplaying friends as CHOD after his initials (Conel Hugh O’Donel), Alexander has the distinction of being one of the few British players to defeat the great Soviet champion Mikhail Botvinnik. He also went on to serve as captain of the English team in chess Olympiads and I had the honour to play under his tutelage in many such team events. In the film Alexander is portrayed by Matthew Goode. White: Hugh Alexander Black: Mikhail Botvinnik ENG-Russia Radio Match 1946 French Defence 1 e4 e6 2 d4 d5 3 Nc3 Bb4 4 e5 c5 5 a3 Bxc3+ 6 bxc3 Ne7 7 Qg4 cxd4 8 Qxg7 Rg8 9 Qxh7 Qa5 Prepared by Botvinnik for this game, but he did not repeat it. 9 ... Qc7 would revert to the modern main lines. 10 Rb1 Qxc3+ 11 Bd2 Qc7 Black avoids 11 ... Qxa3 12 Nf3 when his queen is short of squares. 12 f4 Nbc6 13 Nf3 Bd7

________ árD DkDrD] à0p1bhpDQ] ß DnDpD D] ÞD Dp) D ] Ý D 0 ) D] Ü) D DND ] Û DPG DP)] ÚDRD IBDR] ÁÂÃÄÅÆÇÈ

14 Ng5 Unafraid of complications Alexander challenges his powerful opponent to a hand to hand tactical conflict. 14 ... Rxg5 15 fxg5 0-0-0 16 Qxf7 Qxe5+ 17 Kd1 The exposure of both kings makes this a particularly exciting game. 17 ... Nf5 18 g6 Ne3+ 19 Kc1 Qe4 This looks terrifying but 19 ... Qd6 is stronger although White stands well after 20 Rb3 in reply.

Twitter: @times_chess

20 Bd3 Qxg2 21 Re1 Ne5 21 ... Nc4 is the last chance for a draw. 22 Qf4 Nf3 23 Re2 Qh3

________ á Dk4 D D] à0pDbD D ] ß D DpDPD] ÞD DpD D ] Ý D 0 ! D] Ü) DBhnDq] Û DPGRD )] ÚDRI D D ] ÁÂÃÄÅÆÇÈ

Black’s position appears promising but White could in fact now win outright with 24 Ba5. Eliminating one of Black’s dangerous knights is also fine. 24 Bxe3 e5 25 Qf7 dxe3 26 g7 Qg4 27 h3 Black is now completely lost. 27 ... Qg1+ 28 Kb2 Qg3 29 Bg6 Nd4 30 g8Q Rxg8 31 Qxg8+ Kc7 32 Qh7 Kd6 If 32 ... Nxe2 33 Bf5 wins. 33 Bd3 e4 34 Qh6+ Kc7 35 Rxe3 Qe5 36 Ka2 Nf5 37 Qg5 Be6 38 Be2 d4+ 39 Reb3 b5 40 Qd2 d3 41 Bg4 Black resigns Two years after this game was played Botvinnik became world champion.

Winning move White to play. This position is from Alexander-Yanofsky, Hastings 1946. How can White power through to win?

________ áribD D $] àD D g 1 ] ßpGnDpD D] ÞDpD ) D ] Ý D D DPD] ÜD D ! D ] ÛP)PD D D] ÚDKDRD D ] ÁÂÃÄÅÆÇÈ

The first correct entry drawn on Thursday will win a copy of

The Collins English Dictionary & Thesaurus, also available from The Times Bookshop on

0845 271 2134. The two runners-up will receive a book prize. Answers on a postcard to: Winning Move, The Times, 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF, or email to: winningmove@thetimes.co.uk. The answer will be published next Saturday. Solution to last week’s puzzle: 1 R1xg6! wins, e.g. 1 ... Bxg6 (1 ... fxg6 2 Rh7 mate) 2 Rg8 mate.

The winner is AJ Thurlow of Brayton, North Yorkshire

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

FGM

MindGames

The Times Crossword is in the back of the main paper The Listener Crossword No 4321 Solitaire II by Xanthippe

Codeword No 2249 18

10 12

13 8

13 10

14 6

26 5

12 24

Senders of the first three correct entries drawn will each receive a copy of Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. Write your name and contact details in the space provided and send to: Listener Crossword No 4321, 63 Green Lane, St Albans, Hertfordshire AL3 6HE, to arrive by December 4.

20 21

11 26

6 14

24 8

3 16

9 22

10 23

11 24

12 25

13 26

♠AQ876 ♥ 10 7 5 4 ♦♣AQ97

listenercrossword.com

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z 1

This is undoubtedly the most dramatic deal of the entire 14th quadrennial Red Bull World Bridge Series in Sanya, China. It was Board 13 – unlucky for some – of the Round of 16. There were adventures at every table – here are three. Dealer North Both Vul

Solution to Listener Crossword No 4318 on page 55

12 10

22 8

More information about Chambers books can be found at chambers.co.uk

Stuck on Codeword? To receive 4 random clues call 0901 322 5000 or text TIMESCODE to 85088. Calls cost 77p from BT landlines plus network extras. Texts cost £1 plus your standard network charge. For the full solution call 0907 181 1055. Calls cost 77ppm from BT landlines. Other networks and mobiles may vary. SP: Spoke, W1B 2AG, 0333 202 3390 / 01437 8815 (Mon-Fri 9am-5.30pm).

Quick Crossword No 6565 2

16 17

Across 1 Snooker play leaving opponent unable to score (6,4) 7 Smell (5) 8 Human-looking robot (7) 10 Sink, droop (3) 11 Shrub with red fruit (9) 13 Pungent bulb (6) 14 Short and thick (6) 17 Reckless criminal (9) Solution to Crossword 6564

L A R C H

L ARE D P B A L T I RE I L A A B L E S POT OP S L L E Y L I I N S ARU L E B L S A L ENDS E A

All grid entries are distinct hexadecimal values in the range 100 to FFE, and no entry has all three digits the same (a digit being any of 0-9 or A-F). The third and fifth columns and rows each contain three overlapping entries. Each property clue lists all the entries that conform to that particular property; where the property includes a number, the number is in hexadecimal. Having deduced all entries, solvers must play out a game of Solitaire. Each move consists of jumping one peg (cell entry) over an adjacent peg (horizontally or vertically) into an empty cell, with the jumped peg being removed. The game ends with a single peg in the originally empty central cell. When playing this particular game solvers must make jumps so that: (a) In the first move, the jumping peg and removed peg have the same value. (b) The next 15 removed pegs count down from F to 1 (ie, F, E, ..., 2, 1). The jumper that removes the 2 peg must also be used to remove the 1 peg. (c) The remaining 15 pegs removed in sequence, followed by the final peg left in the central cell, spell out three thematic words. The first word has 9 letters, the first 3 of which can be jumped by the same peg. The lengths of the other two words are 3 and 4, with the order to be deduced. For the purpose of spelling the words, 0 and 1 represent the letters O and I respectively. Solvers must submit the filled grid as it appears before the game is played, and the three thematic words in the order in which they are encountered in the game. While tackling part one of the puzzle (filling the grid) solvers will need to pay attention to the removal instructions in part two (the game of Solitaire). The Chambers Dictionary (2011) is the primary reference. All entries from smallest to largest 1dn, 1ac, 7dn, 7ac, 18ac, 8dn, 8ac, 4ac, 17ac, 12ac, 10dn, 11ac, 2dn, 3dn, 16dn, 9dn, 16ac, 6dn, 5dn, 5ac, 13ac, 15dn, 14dn, 14ac

B A S H F U L

Name ..................................................................................................................................................................................... .................................... Postcode ....................................... Phone number..............................................................

L F RA I L L N A L DEN T N A B L E L L O NE SWE L S L H I NG L N A G I R L

R E B E L G A L L E R Y

19 Jamaican music style (3) 20 Seaport on the Humber estuary (7) 22 Smell (5) 23 Very tall building (10) Down 1 One living off others (7) 2 The right to vote (9) 3 Roman emperor (6) 4 Unhappy (3) 5 Smell (5) 6 Dachshund (7,3) 9 Richard — —, impresario who presented G&S (5,5) 12 Toast when drinking (7,2) 15 One who kneads bodies (7) 16 Hungarian language (6) 18 Smell (5) 21 Secret Intelligence Service (abbreviation) (3)

Need help with today’s puzzle? Call 0906 757 7188 to check the answers. For help with possible words to fit a specific clue text TIMESCROSS followed by a space and the letters that you know, replacing the unknown letters with full stops, to 85088 to receive a list, eg, TIMESCROSS P.P..R to 85088. Calls cost 77ppm from BT landlines. Other networks and mobiles may vary. Texts cost £1 plus your standard network charge. SP: Spoke, W1B 2AG, 0333 202 3390 (Mon-Fri 9am-5.30pm).

6♦(2)

end

N 2♥(1)

E Pass

(1) Weak Two. (2) Looks safer than 6♥ – ♠K is protected with South declaring.

Address ................................................................................................................................................................................

♠4 ♥KJ9862 ♦43 ♣ J 10 8 2 ♠ J 10 9 2 N W E ♥S ♦ 10 8 7 6 ♣ K6543 ♠K53 ♥AQ3 ♦AKQJ952 ♣Table One

Numbers are substituted for letters in the crossword grid. Below the grid is the key with some letters solved. Completing the first word or phrase will give clues to more letters. Enter them in the key and main grid and check the letters on the alphabet list as you complete them. Yesterday’s solution on page 57

Bridge Andrew Robson

Properties Contains only numeric digits (0 to 9): 4ac, 7ac, 1dn Contains only letter digits (A to F): 13ac, 14ac, 5dn, 9dn, 16dn Contains only odd digits: 17ac, 5dn Contains a repeated digit: 1ac, 4ac, 5ac, 11ac, 16ac, 5dn, 9dn Greater than E00: 14ac, 14dn, 15dn Multiple of 6: 4ac, 8ac, 16ac, 1dn, 6dn, 16dn Multiple of 7: 2dn, 10dn Multiple of 10: 4ac, 11ac, 16ac, 10dn Multiple of 64: 10dn Odd: 7ac, 12ac, 13ac, 17ac, 2dn, 3dn, 5dn, 7dn, 15dn

Two Brains Raymond Keene

Word Watching Paul Dunn

Literary Quiz Paul Dunn

Question 1 Which is the odd one out in terms of mythology: Mars, Jupiter, Neptune, Saturn, Uranus, Mercury? Question 2 What links the following: moorland, a roofer, an officer, a Scottish field, a colour, a tartan?

Coggle a. A coat fastening b. A cobblestone c. A pastry topping Grint a. Like a weasel b. Empty c. to gnash one’s teeth. Trogon a. A heraldic beast b. A Balkan warlord c. A tropical bird Welkin a. The heavens b. A small shellfish c. A witch’s familiar Answers on page 57

A moment in time Which real-life historical events feature in the following novels: 1 Vanity Fair by WM Thackeray 2 Couples by John Updike 3 Possession by AS Byatt 4 Saturday by Ian McEwan

Answers on page 53

Thanks to Robert Stone of Skegness for this week’s questions. Please send your puzzles to keenebrain@aol.com. All readers who have contributed to this column receive a special mention.

Answers on page 57

The pre-tournament favourites in the Open Series, USA’s Nickell, lost a big swing to Poland’s Mazurkiewicz. The Polish West Jassem guessed well to cash the ace of spades v 6♦ and saw his partner play a suit preference (when dummy has a singleton) jack of spades (high asking for the higherranking suit). Correctly reading this as a request for a heart, West resisted the temptation to try to cash his other black ace (South would hardly jump to 6♦ if missing both black aces). He duly led a heart which East was pleased to ruff – down one. Mazurkiewicz went on to win the match – and indeed the whole event. Table Two S

6♦ Pass Redbl(2) end

N 2♥ Pass

E Pass Dbl(1)

(1) Lightner – requesting an unusual opening lead, typically dummy’s suit or based on a void...or both. (2) I like it. Generally, if you think you are going no more than one down, and may make, the odds (score-wise) favour redoubling.

East’s Lightner double told West not to try either of his black suit aces, but to lead a heart. East ruffed and now had to decide which black suit to return. However there was another alternative, which would succeed as long as hearts were not running: a trump. And that is what East returned. The grateful Australian declarer Griffiths hurriedly won, drew trumps, ran the hearts and claimed his redoubled slam. Table Three S

6♦ Dbl

6♠! end

N 2♥ Pass

E Pass Pass

There are few players in the world who would wander in, vulnerable at the Six-level, with a barely decent five-card suit. Norwegian Monegasque Geir Helgemo is one – doubtless deducing from the opposing bidding that his partner might have fitting black cards. 6♠ doubled, played with his customary brilliance, went just one down. andrew.robson@thetimes.co.uk

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

FGM

For more crosswords and your favourite puzzles go to thetimes.co.uk/puzzles Jumbo crossword No 1120 Cryptic clues

Across 1 The stage having a strong effect diminished by imp (6) 5 Quick break, touring old facilities for peak coverage (7) 9 Intellectual effect of receding hairline? (8) 13 Here you may see what tomorrow brings (13,4,4) 14 Unaided ability to appreciate nudes? (5,3) 15 Some in June qualify at different levels (7) 16 Change temperament, doubtful when consistently half-hearted? (6) 17 One million fair-skinned people, tons getting stuck (10) 20 Perform a verbal (or oral) retraction (3,4,5) 23 Employed editor to extend plural for me (4) 24 Merge two-dimensional into three-dimensional shape (8) 26 Current doctor breaks non-fast: men finally lose weight (4,4) 29 Reformatted Iliad (9 Mbyte), unaffected by streaming? (5-7) 30 Article preceding retracted death notice expires — they’re supposed to eradicate disease (10) 32 Successful delivery of pages once you don’t hold boxes (5,5) 34 As large as ever and at Oktoberfest, I am at home with one spill (12) 36 Auntie studied food for colonists (3,5) 38 Firewall material representing optimal operating system (8) 39 Gibraltar receives last of oil slick (4) 41 Wise people extended Family Flyer system to project a bright image (5,7) 43 Watchful nymphs for each in male teams (10) 44 War heroine’s demand to seize Victory in Europe (6) 46 Enrolled nurse, a menace ignoring hospital’s request (7) 48 Secretly transported with brio (8) 50 Inventing this needed a brainwave — and it shows (21) 51 Energy wasted on front of ship’s dull quality (8) 52 Thirty per cent of detectives interrupting former boisterous madam (7) 53 Delay report of having received new road surface? (6)

Down 2 Something restrictive bringing down a communist state (5) 3 Exercising control as a Mountie? (2,3,6) 4 Who has a way to stop green running wild? (8) 5 Smooth surface of singular cheat (5) 6 Nothing on overpass excluding a route for egg delivery (7) 7 Conservative fuelled concern about year in alliance (11) 8 Part of ritual I perform over dish (5) 9 Teacher in charge over classroom punishment is star performer (9) 10 Genetically modified field is surrounded by brief light (5) 11 Prevented from seeing window cover in retracted state? (11) 12 Mostly peculiar, with bad fever contained, having had too much on one’s plate? (7) 18 Pole in command worried champ (9) 19 Stirring feeling turned almost malicious, in my opinion (7) 21 Dust settled around macho type in an adversarial situation (4,3,2) 22 Cast (light) encasing front of broken leg? This may be healing inside (4,4) 25 Ethically sourced after aid somehow subsumes resistance (4-5) 27 Old English lay in a type of extra curse (3,6) 28 Do a good job of cooking where tart got its name from (8) 31 Drums supplied by cat with more of his kind (3-4) 33 Perhaps local permit cancelling second one’s a threat to society (6,5) 34 Explanatory wording on city map? It’s apocryphal (5,6) 35 Meaningful omen provided one pious message (11) 37 My group, led by party full of rage, is posing a threat (9) 40 Someone maintaining a hostile investment? (8) 42 An associate extremely unpopular and unskilful (7) 43 One makes short cuts to devise a science fiction blockbuster (7) 45 Elastic set fire to helium (5) 47 Short lecture about working with conventional harmonies (5) 48 Volume in auction provides consolation (5) 49 Here's cycling in Sandown Park's location (5)

28 29

39 40

Name......................................................................................................... Prizes Address..................................................................................................... ...................................................................................................................... ...................................................................................................................... ............................................................ Postcode..................................... Phone number......................................................................................

The prize for each of the first correct solutions to the Cryptic and times2 Jumbo clues to be opened will be a collection of Times reference books — including The Times Universal Atlas of the World, Collins English Dictionary & Thesaurus, and Bradford’s Crossword Solver’s Dictionary published by HarperCollins — worth £110. Entries should be marked “Cryptic” or “times2” and sent to: Jumbo 1120, The Times, 1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF, to arrive by December 4. The winners and the solutions will be published on December 6.

Quick clues Across 1 Bring back to life (6) 5 Fruit; colour (7) 9 Scientific investigation (8) 13 Be involved in many different affairs (4,1,6,2,5,3) 14 A million million (8) 15 Large crustacean (7) 16 Flexible (6) 17 Breeder of birds to be shot (10) 20 System of names (12) 23 Learned (4) 24 Easily evaporated (8) 26 Annual commemoration of Oxford University’s founders (8) 29 Very important or shocking (12) 30 Process of reducing activity (10) 32 Friendly and considerate manner (10) 34 Ceremony; attendant fact (12) 36 Innards (8) 38 Public disgrace or shame (8) 39 Burrowing mammal with velvety fur (4)

41 43 44 46 48 50

One who oversteps a mark (12) Skill, adroitness (10) Valuable possessions (6) Area of the Czech Republic (7) Disapproving; extremely ill (8) Play by Arthur Wing Pinero (3,6,3,9) 51 Able to perceive things (8) 52 Sum paid to author for each copy sold (7) 53 Mislaying; failing to win (6)

Down 2 Anaesthetic liquid; clear sky (5) 3 Participation (in something) (11) 4 One setting a formal test (8) 5 Foreign (5) 6 Customary; done frequently (7) 7 Bird of arable land (4,7) 8 Principle, belief (5) 9 Deep respect (9) 10 Remove all clothes (5) 11 Job, position (11) 12 Char; less dirty (7)

18 19 21 22 25 27 28 31 33 34 35 37 40 42 43 45 47 48 49

Vigour; film technique (9) Secular (7) Powerful whirlpool (9) Scots monster’s home (4,4) In the centre of a vessel (9) (Of triangles) having two sides the same (9) Having ambition to achieve greater things (8) Former (female) pupils (7) Disorder; insanity (11) Long heated debate (11) Mademoiselle from —, WW1 song (11) — Willie, early Mickey Mouse film (9) Remaining (8) Supporter’s ribbon (7) Littoral (7) Rubbed leather (5) Aircraft detection system (5) Shrewd (5) Indo-European language (5)

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

FGM

World

Aggressive lover, likes travel, wltm white female New Zealand

Cairns

Bernard Lagan Sydney

The great white sharks that patrol the cold waters south of New Zealand are among the largest in the world and, until recently, also the least understood, according to new research. They include some monster specimens, with one creature said to measure 11m (36ft). Marine scientists studying the group have found that they undertake one of the most epic sea journeys documented — assuming that they survive a potentially fatal mating ritual. A study using satellite-tracking devices to follow the movements of the sharks has revealed some remarkable information about the seafaring capabilities of one of the ocean’s most feared predators. Surprisingly young sharks are able to conduct gruelling solo voyages across oceans and climate zones before finding their way back home, stopping off along the way at Bondi beach in Sydney, Australia, about 1,200 miles (2,000km) distant. Yesterday another great white — the second in a week — was found entangled in Bondi’s protective shark nets, setting off alarm bells for swimmers and lifeguards. Huge crowds are expected at the beach over the week-

AUSTRALIA Sydney

Great white sharks, long known as efficient predators, are also great wanderers

Greek jails allow conjugal visits

Egypt may free jailed journalist

Athens Conjugal visits for prisoners are to be allowed in Greece amid an upsurge in violence in Europe’s most overcrowded jails. The country’s justice minister said the measure would be put before parliament in the coming weeks. Inmate numbers have reached record levels, with 12,479 prisoners in jails built to house 9,000 convicts. Some Greek prisons house up to 30 inmates in cells of 35 square metres. Although Britain does not allow conjugal visits, the practice has gained worldwide acceptance in recent years, with even religiously strict countries such as Saudi Arabia and Iran allowing it.

Cairo President Sisi of Egypt has hinted that a former BBC correspondent who has spent 11 months in jail could be released before Christmas. Peter Greste, an Australian journalist, was jailed with Al Jazeera colleagues Mohamed Fahmy and Bahar Mohammed for supporting the Muslim Brotherhood. His trial was condemned as a farce by western governments. In an interview with France 24, Mr Sisi said of a possible release: “Let us say this matter is being discussed.” Mr Greste’s family will travel to Cairo next week for his birthday, and hope that he will be free to return home with them.

Red Box

Essential political news brought to you daily with exclusive polling from YouGov. All for free. Insight and analysis from Philip Webster and Tim Shipman. Exclusive polling from YouGov. Commentary from Tim Montgomerie, Danny Finkelstein, Camilla Cavendish, Jenni Russell, David Aaronovitch and more Sign up today at thetimes.co.uk/redboxemail to receive the free email in your inbox by 8.30 each morning

500 miles NEW CALEDONIA Coral Sea Tasman Sea

Shark begins 4700 mile journey NEW ZEALAND

end, when the temperature in the city is forecast to reach 40C (104F). Until now, great whites have been considered rare visitors to Bondi, although they are believed to have been responsible for seven fatal shark attacks off Western Australia in the past four years. One of the sharks studied, thought to be no more than two years old, has astonished scientists by completing a 4,700-mile odyssey from New Zealand’s far south into the tropics of the western Pacific and northern Australia, before making it back home. It is among the longest round-trips ever documented, and is seen as all the more remarkable because the shark is only 2½ metres long. Great whites are known to grow up to 7m. The great white community that is

being studied is concentrated around one of the world’s roughest sea passages, the Foveaux Strait. The 80-mile stretch of water separates the tip of New Zealand’s South Island from the country’s most southern landfall, Stewart Island. The region is said by residents to hold the largest great whites, and Stewart Island’s small fishing community has long exchanged tales of a monster said to be 11m long. Clinton Duffy, a marine scientist with the New Zealand Department of Conservation, and a project leader on the shark tracking study, doubts that the fabled creature exists — but if it is out there, it will almost certainly be a female, he said. They grow much larger than their male counterparts — although that does not appear to spare them from domestic violence. The researchers have noticed that mature female great whites tend to make themselves scarce when there are lots of males about, probably because they fear being bitten by their sexual partners. Not all the females, however, give in without a fight. “Actually, we have evidence that it’s also pretty risky for male sharks to take on the wrong girl,” Mr Duffy said.

FGM

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

World

Cave dwellers go home to star in Ben-Hur remake

Italy

Tom Kington Rome

A remote Italian town where peasants lived in caves with their animals and which was held up as a shocking example of European poverty is fast becoming the film location of choice to shoot swords and sandals epics. Matera, once a national embarrassment, is currently welcoming film stars such as Morgan Freeman for a remake of Ben-Hur. Jack Huston, a young British actor, is in the lead role. The Roman chariot race, which helped the original film to win 11 Oscars in 1959, will be filmed in Rome, but Matera will double as Jerusalem, BenHur’s home town. Timur Bekmambetov plans to film in an area of caves, known as Sassi, hewn out of rock that was settled in prehistoric times and continued to house 20,000 people until the 1960s in conditions not unlike Jerusalem 2,000 years ago. Built on a slope so steep that streets often sit on the rooftops of houses below, the rocks were described as a scene worthy of Dante’s Inferno. Considered a blight by the Italian government, the cave dwellers of Mate-

ra were moved to council houses in the 1960s, even as film makers began to discover it. Pier Paolo Pasolini shot his biblical tale The Gospel According to St. Matthew there in 1964, but it was Mel Gibson The Passion of the Christ in 2004 that put it on the film makers’ maps. “People who were moved out of the Sassi by the government because of the poverty were surprised to come back years later for a visit and stumble over palm trees planted by the Gibson people,” said Luca Galiardi, a town hall official. Raffaele Stifano, 57, who grew up there and slept in a cave alongside five family members, a horse, chickens and a large terracotta pot used as a toilet, was moved out in 1964 when he was seven, but is now back working as a location adviser for the film. “It was a very tough life for women here — my mother was glad to leave,” he said. “But it was a huge playground for children, who could chase hens

ROMAOSLO, SILVER SCREEN COLLECTION / GETTY IMAGES;

Service with a cuddle at little shop of hugs Will Pavia New York

The skyline of Matera and, left, Charlton Heston, the original Ben-Hur

and shoot lizards with their bows and arrows.” Mr Stifano will be joined on set by 800 locals, including former residents, as extras, earning €80 (£63) a day. The film crew will discov-

er the Sassi are no longer stuck in a time warp. The caves began to see life again in the 1980s, as restaurants and guest houses moved in. Today, they have been plumbed, wired for wi-fi and are home to about 1,500 people, as well as luxury hotels and IT businesses. Cars will be banned from Sassi at certain times during filming. “We didn’t want cars appearing in Ben-Hur,” said a town hall spokesman.

A professional cuddler has opened a shop selling hugs to comfort lonely Americans. On a high street, snuggled between a hardware store and an art gallery, Samantha Hess and her staff of three dispense human contact for a dollar a minute. Hugs can last from 15 minutes up to five hours, which costs $300 (£190). “Most people do 60 minutes,” said Ms Hess, a former personal trainer. She had been meeting clients for cuddles in their homes or in cinemas, now she has taken a lease on a shop in the centre of Portland, Oregon. Cuddle enterprises, which organise “cuddle parties” or offer home visits, have existed in America for a decade, but attempts to open shops have proved difficult. A “cuddle house” in Wisconsin was shut down, amid concern that it constituted a brothel. Ms Hess, 30, said she had received hate mail, but police, after inspecting her premises and noting the rules she imposes and the security cameras in each of her four cuddling rooms, had no concerns. “People asked if it was prostitution,” said Peter Simpson, a police spokesman. “But it’s just cuddling.” Jason O’Brien, who is making a documentary about the industry, found many clients were elderly people who had lost a spouse. “Everyone gets this salacious idea in their heads, but this can have therapy benefits,” he said.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

Broker with Dynamic duo money to burn do the splits Michael Spencer’s £75m war chest Page 65

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Aldi’s top team is broken up

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His numbers have come up

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New boss at helm for lottery’s 20th

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BEN HOSKINS / GETTY IMAGES FOR AVIVA

How’s life in the driving seat? business commentary Alistair Osborne

hat about a tax on white van drivers? Especially ones with three England flags on their house. Good politics that, given they’ll all vote Ukip anyway. Astonishingly, Emily Thornberry clean forgot to mention the tax angle on her Rochester stalking trip, content just to snap people’s houses and stick them on the interweb, like some start-up rival to Google Maps. But surely George Osborne’s spotted it? A bit more tax from White Van Dan and his fellow four-wheelers and, who knows, the public finances might not look so clapped out (report, page 60). Sure, the chancellor had a minor result yesterday, what with the £7.7 billion run up last month on the national credit card actually down by £200 million on October 2013’s net borrowings — the first monthly drop this financial year. Yet the running total of £64.1 billion is still 6 per cent up on last year. Worse, as Capital Economics pointed out, to meet Mr Osborne’s budget boast that borrowing will fall 12 per cent this year, it would have to be 40 per cent lower over the remaining five months, a “whopping £15 billion”. He can forget that because tax and national insurance receipts are way below forecast. The Office for Budget Responsibility had pencilled in a 5.3 per cent rise this financial year. The number for the first seven months? Only 0.6 per cent. Lack of real wage growth is the main culprit, even if it’s just outstripped inflation for the first time in five years. And Mr Osborne could have some bumper selfassessment receipts early next year, boosted by high earners deferring bonuses last time to benefit from April 2013’s cut to top-rate tax. Yet, most employment growth has come in low paid jobs or from the self-employed. Van drivers, say. That leaves Mr Osborne boxed in on the pre-election giveaway front come the autumn statement on December 3. At least a man like Dan Ware could give him some tips on manoeuvring in tight spaces — once he’s finished putting his flag on Ms Thornberry’s house.

Question of timing

ry wells are an occupational hazard in the oil exploration game. But hitting two duffers on the same day you announce an all-share bid for a rival? Nowhere at all in the M&A handbook. Still, full marks to Ophir Energy for trying something new — even if its 115.9p-a-share bid for Salamander Energy wasn’t all it seemed (report, page 62). No, it was worth 97p, or £251 million, once you’d adjusted for Ophir’s 6 per cent fall yesterday to 170p and the drift in the shares since the talks emerged four weeks ago. Drill a bit deeper and there are

some puzzlers. Sure, with oil at just $80, there’s logic in a merger. The Africa-focused Ophir, valued at £1 billion and with plenty of cash, gets its hands on Salamander’s southeast Asian portfolio, including a Thai field that’s already producing. Yet if Ophir thinks its shares are so cheap that it’s buying them back, why is it issuing a load more for a deal — even if it likes Salamander’s price? It’s odd, too, that Salamander let slip a 121p-a-share cash approach from Cepsa, the Spanish/Abu Dhabi combine that pulled out on Monday after it was forced to disclose talks. Cepsa had even dangled a possible 24p more. True, it could return. But that’s not the way the market’s betting. Salamander closed at 91¼p.

Place your bets

upert Soames wasn’t kidding. When Serco’s new boss breezily took a third off the shares ten days ago, he spoke of a “bitter pill”. Nasty aftertaste, too. The shares have since crashed another fifth to 170p, thanks to Mr Soames’s invitation to short them. True, he didn’t have a great hand, as a £1.5 billion writedown showed. But he also adopted an odd tactic: preannouncing a £550 million rights issue, underwritten on a standby basis, that won’t happen until after the full-year results next March. That keeps Serco’s banks onside, while it fire-sales some assets. Yet it’s also encouraged bets on where the shares will be by then. Credit Suisse forecasts a theoretical exrights price of 169p, funnily enough pretty much where the shares are now. It also reckons Serco will still be on a multiple of 27 times without any dividend support in 2016. When Mr Soames’s appointment emerged in March, the shares jumped 12 per cent to 460½p. Happy days.

No time to relax

ow did Mark Wilson, the Aviva chief executive, put things three weeks ago? “I don’t want people relaxing in this business, that terrifies me.” Not the shareholders, either, by the looks of things, now he’s produced a £5.6 billion all-share bid for Friends Life. So much for his mantra that there’s still so much to do, fixing the mess of his predecessor Andrew Moss. Still, the mooted deal brings just the sort of cashflow he’s after from cutting costs and combining the insurers’ back books, underpinning the dividend. It also brings five million extra customers and Friends’ assets under management, boosting Aviva Investors. Even so, Mr Wilson could have moved after the budget’s annuity rule changes. Friends was cheaper then and the market was in chaos. Even less relaxing.

alistair.osborne@thetimes.co.uk

Over the line Aviva, sponsor of Premiership rugby, is within touching distance of landing a massive insurance takeover

Aviva stuns insurers with Friends Life bid Miles Costello

Aviva came within striking distance last night of securing the biggest insurance takeover in 15 years. By offering nearly £5 billion to buy Friends Life, it promises to create Britain’s biggest insurance, savings and asset management company. After folding Friends Life into the UK’s No 2 listed insurer, the combined group would dominate the market for the sales of pensions and investment products, with a 16 million-strong customer base. Aviva hinted last night that the combination also would give it considerably more financial firepower and substantially increase future dividend payments for shareholders in the enlarged group. Friends Life, whose chief executive is Andy Briggs, said that it was minded to recommend the terms of a deal to its investors. Aviva also added the caveat that it would have to carry out due diligence on Friends Life and secure the necessary approvals from regulators. Aviva is understood to have been attracted to Friends Life’s £68 billion book of closed life assurance funds, which generate large amounts of cash when life policies mature while the policyholder is still living. Sources close to the deal said last night that Friends Life’s book of closed

business, known as Heritage, “throws off about £2 billion of cash each year”. Aviva also believes that the Friends’ division that writes new policies for customers is attractive and has adapted well to George Osborne’s reforms of the pensions market, which mean that savers no longer have to buy annuities when they retire. Friends Life has a total customer base of about five million policyholders and a market value of £4.9 billion. Aviva, second only to Prudential as the biggest listed insurer in Britain, is offering 0.74 of its ordinary shares for every Friends Life share held. It said that the price valued Friends Life shares at roughly 398.9p each, a premium of 15 per cent to their closing price on Thursday night. Buying Friends Life is the first big deal undertaken by Mark Wilson, who took charge as Aviva’s chief executive at the beginning of last year. Mr Wilson, who was travelling in Asia when news of the deal broke last night, has declared a mantra at the insurer of generating “cashflow plus growth” and analysts said last night that the enlarged combine would deliver on both fronts. Sources close to the process insisted that Friends Life was not in any financial difficulty, although it has had to rethink part of its business strategy in the wake of the chancellor’s pension re-

forms. As part of a drive to decrease its reliance on annuity sales, Friends Life has thrown itself at winning mandates to manage company pension schemes. In August, Friends reported operating profits for the six months to the end of June of £170 million. Friends Life was known as Resolution previously and was part of a huge insurance consolidation by Clive Cowdery, the entrepreneur. However, it was renamed in May this year and Mr Cowdery’s sole remaining interest is through a private listed vehicle. Mr Cowdery is expected to reap a payout of more than £200 million if the deal goes through. The deal is, nevertheless, a risk for Mr Wilson, who previously ran AIA, the Asian insurer, until a $35.5 billion bid approach from Prudential in 2010. The executive, who took over a company that had lost the confidence of its shareholders, has made clear in recent months that his turnaround of the insurer is still a work in progress. The deal also raises the prospect of widespread job losses at the enlarged group, with Aviva hinting last night at the “operating efficiences” that would follow. Shares in Aviva closed up 6½p at 539p, while Friends Life ended 4½p higher at 347¾p.

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

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Business

Need to know Your 5-minute digest

economics UK: The country’s public finances improved slightly last month, but George Osborne remains on track to miss his borrowing targets, limiting any tax giveaways before the general election next May. The Office for National Statistics said that public sector net borrowing, excluding statecontrolled banks, hit £7.7 billion, down 2.4 per cent from a year earlier, and below analysts’ forecasts of £7.9 billion. Despite the small improvement in finances, the chancellor is still on course to miss his target. Page 66 European Union: Sir James Dyson, the head of the Dyson vacuum cleaners and hand dryers group, has launched an explosive anti-German attack and said that Britain should leave the EU. A close confidant of the prime minister, Sir James said that Britain was a member of an EU in which we are “dominated and bullied by the Germans”. Speaking as he announced a £1.5 billion expansion of his family-owned electronic engineering company, Sir James was asked in a BBC radio interview whether, in the light of the Ukip victory in the Rochester and Strood by-election, Britain should stay in the EU. He replied: “Not particularly, no.”

Page 69

China: The country’s central bank cut benchmark interest rates yesterday, answering rising concerns over the health of the world’s second-biggest economy as factory activity slows, house prices fall and growth rates slide to their lowest in nearly a quarter of a century. The People’s Bank of China said that it would lower its one-year lending rate by 40 basis points to 5.6 per cent. The one-year benchmark deposit rate was also trimmed by a quarter of a percentage point. China’s annual growth dipped to 7.3 per cent in the third quarter, its lowest level in more than five years. World economy: The global economy is in a more perilous state than it was a few months ago, George Osborne has warned, citing stagnation in the eurozone, recession in Japan and geopolitical risks such as the conflict in Ukraine. The chancellor’s comments, to an audience of business leaders in London, follow similar observations by David Cameron at the start of the week, when he referred to “red warning lights” on the global economic dashboard.

banking & finance 1.12% Aviva: The UK’s No 2 listed insurer last night came within striking distance of securing the biggest insurance takeover in 15 years after offering nearly £5 billion to buy Friends Life in a move that would create Britain’s biggest insurance, savings and asset management company. Folding Friends Life into Aviva means that the combined group would dominate the market for the

sales of pensions and investment products, with a 16 million-strong customer base. Page 63 Royal Bank of Scotland: The Bank of England could fine the taxpayer-backed lender after officials discovered RBS had “overstated” a key measure of its financial strength during recent tests designed to judge its ability to weather a severe economic downturn. Officials at the Prudential Regulation Authority, the Bank of England’s supervisory division, discovered the error in RBS’s core capital ratio while undertaking an analysis of the results of last month’s stress tests by the European Banking Authority, forcing the lender to admit that it had miscalculated its figures to the tune of £4 billion. Page 65 Icap: Michael Spencer has amassed a war chest of about £75 million to spend on potential acquisitions after rearranging the financing for his personal investment vehicle. The art-loving former treasurer of the Conservative party, who runs Icap, the City broker, has transferred IPGL’s credit lines with HSBC and JP Morgan into a single £120 million borrowing facility with Barclays. The new arrangement gives IPGL about £30 million of extra borrowing power and slightly more flexibility in terms of the amount of assets that Mr Spencer, 59, has to pledge as security. Page 65

consumer goods 0.74% Hornby: The maker of Scalextric cars and model trains can see some light at the end of the tunnel after it cut back losses in the first half of the year. Hornby, which builds Corgi toys, Airfix models and Humbrol paints, halved its losses to £520,000 in the six months to September 30, compared with the same period in 2013, as it sought to get back on track after a bumpy ride of profit warnings. Group sales increased by 8 per cent from £22.4 million last year to £24.2 million, while sales in the UK were up by 5 per cent. Page 71

engineering 2.36% Rolls-Royce: After an autumn of profit warnings, plunging shares and the decision to shed thousands of staff, Britain’s engineering champion was celebrating some good news at last. Rolls-Royce has received $5 billion of contracts for its Trent aircraft engines after a decision by the world’s busiest airline to turn its back on Boeing and try the new Airbus aircraft coming off the production lines of Wales, France and Germany. Page 69

leisure 0.31% Fuller, Smith & Turner: Simon Emeny, the boss of the brewer and pub operator, has

strongly criticised a decision to call time on the beer-tie agreement between pub owners and landlords. Fuller’s said that half-year pre-tax profit had risen from £16.8 million to £18.3 million. Its shares closed up 7.7 per cent at 987½p. Page 68 Camelot UK: As a committed Christian and avid Bible reader, working for one of the world’s biggest gambling companies might not seem the most obvious career choice. Yet Andy Duncan, the newly elevated chief executive of the National Lottery operator, says he feels no conflict running a business that lures punters with the faint hope of winning serious amounts of filthy lucre.

World markets FTSE 100 6,750.76 (+71.86)

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media 0.38% Future: The Bath-based magazine publisher has called time on a lengthy restructuring of the business and returned to profit in the final quarter of its financial year. The stock rocketed by a third after Future said that it expected to record another profit, excluding interest, tax, depreciation and exceptional items, in the first quarter of the new financial year as a result of massive cost cutting and a disposal of dozens of its magazine titles.

natural resources 5.21% Ophir Energy: The UK-listed oil and gas group’s takeover of the rival explorer Salamander has moved a step closer after a £267 million deal was mapped out. The FTSE 250 company, which is looking to expand from its African base deeper into Asia, has proposed an offer of 0.5719 shares for each Salamander share, valuing Salamander at 115.9p a share. In a joint statement to the stock market about three weeks after talks emerged, Salamander said it was set to recommend the offer to shareholders. The offer represents a 44.5 per cent premium to Salamander’s closing share price before a potential deal was made public last month. Page 68 Oil prices: Benchmark Brent crude returned above the $80a-barrel level after slipping below it last week, as China, the top petroleum buyer, cut interest rates and speculation mounted that Opec will cut output. Higher heating oil prices, on concerns over unseasonably cold weather across America, was also a factor, traders said. Page 69 North Sea oil: The Treasury is feeling the impact of the recent slump in oil prices after North Sea tax receipts fell by 62 per cent in the year to the end of October to £413 million, compared with £1.1 billion last year, according to new figures. Malaysia: The government of the southeast Asian country said that it would withdraw fuel subsidies from next month after the fall in global oil prices. Hasan Malek, the domestic

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Quote of the week ‘The will of the House is very clear. The government would be foolish to ignore that’

trade minister, said fuel prices would be set at the end of every month, based on a monthly average price under a “managed float” system from December 1, allowing citizens to enjoy the benefits of the fall in global crude prices. Last year, the government spent 23 billion ringgit (£4.3 billion) on fuel subsidies. The world oil price has plunged by 31 per cent in five months, after a four-year period of prices near or above $100 a barrel. Petrobras: President Rousseff of Brazil expects a bribery scandal at the state-run oil company to worsen in coming months, aides have said, with arrests possible for some political allies and potentially serious damage to a struggling economy. Prosecutors allege that corrupt officials siphoned billions of dollars from Petroleo Brasileiro SA, as the company is formally known, into the coffers of several parties, including President Rousseff’s Workers’ Party. The investigation has resulted in the arrest of two former Petrobras officials as well as executives from eight of Brazil’s 10 biggest construction companies, which prosecutors allege were part of the scheme. More are expected. “The only thing we know is that things will get worse,” a senior official close to President Rousseff told Reuters. The president chaired Petrobras’s board from 2003 to 2010, but she has denied any knowledge of graft.

retailing 0.42%

Greg Mulholland, the Lib Dem MP, warns the pub industry off challenging his amendment that ended the beer tie

Graph of the day

British banks’ core equity Tier 1 ratio under the European Banking Authority’s “adverse scenario” for 2016 shows that RBS’s failure to correctly calculate its capital ratio means it now has the weakest loss buffer of any major UK lender

Results in brief Name

Pre-tax figure Profit (+) loss (-)

Dividend

Dee Valley (utilities FY) Fuller, Smith & Turner (leisure HY) Hornby (consumer goods HY) Parkmead Group (resources FY)

£2.4m (£2m) £18.3m (£16.8m) -£516k (-£1.1m) £1m (-5.3m)

20.5p p Jan 5 6.4p p Jan 2 0p 0p

6 Results in brief are given for all companies valued at more than £30 million. f = final p = payable

The day’s biggest movers Company Outsourcery Further consideration of a contract Central Rand Gold An agreement to sell its asset Lonmin Dearer platinum Anglo American China cuts interest rates Rio Tinto Hopes for demand from China easyJet Profit-taking Imperial Tobacco “Defensive” shares out of favour Serco Credit Suisse is cautious Tullett Prebon A fundraising Ophir Energy An unenthusiastic reception for takeover plans

Change 71.2% 27.0% 7.9% 6.7% 6.2% -0.8% -1.3% -5.0% -5.4% -5.6%

Game Digital: Martyn Gibbs, the chief executive of the high street video games retailer, has been awarded £1.3 million of shares after its flotation in June on top of his £493,000 salary and bonus. Benedict Smith, the chief financial officer, who earned £387,000 in the year to July, was handed £450,000 in shares as a result of the flotation. Aldi: A low-profile duo who masterminded the chain’s price assault on British shoppers are to split up. Matthew Barnes and Roman Heini have been joint UK managing directors of Aldi since 2010. Mr Barnes is to become the sole UK chief executive, while Mr Heini will chair Aldi Süd, the parent company covering much of western Europe. Page 68 Retail sales: Takings at Britain’s supermarkets are likely to fall from £146 billion to £145 billion for the calendar year, the first fall in a decade, according to Nielsen, the market research company.

utilities 0.46% Pelamis Wave Power: The Edinburgh-based marine energy company has gone into administration after it failed to secure funding for the next stage of its development. Last year E.ON pulled out of a research project with Pelamis, which employs 30 people, because of delays developing wave-energy technology.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Business

Stress test error brings threat of new RBS fine Harry Wilson

The Bank of England could fine Royal Bank of Scotland after discovering that the taxpayer-backed lender had “overstated” a key measure of its financial strength during tests designed to judge its ability to weather a severe economic downturn. Officials at the Prudential Regulation Authority, the Bank of England’s supervisory division, uncovered the error in RBS’s core capital ratio while analysing the results of last month’s stress tests by the European Banking Authority. The lender had to admit that it had miscalculated by £4 billion. It said yesterday that it had “recognised an error” in the calculation of the core capital ratio that it disclosed to the EBA 6 Prosecutors in France have begun an investigation into allegations that HSBC helped wealthy French citizens to evade taxes through its Swiss private banking subsidiary. HSBC said that it had been forced to post a €50 million bail bond with the French authorities after prosecutors confirmed that Britain’s largest bank could face criminal charges over tax evasion by customers holding Swiss bank accounts over several years. and was under pressure to reassure British regulators that the calculations submitted for the UK’s forthcoming stress tests were correct. The disclosure came a day after RBS was fined £56 million over the IT debacle in 2012 that left millions of customers unable to access their accounts for days or even weeks. RBS has begun an internal investigation after the discovery of the mistake in the stress test. A spokesman for the bank would not comment on whether staff would face disciplinary action over the matter. Deloitte, RBS’s auditor, is aiding the

investigation and the bank is expected to deliver a full report to the Bank of England. The PRA could decide to take further action if it were to conclude that it had been deliberately misled by RBS. In a shock statement to investors, RBS, which is 84 per cent-owned by the state, said that instead of the 6.7 per cent core capital ratio that it said it would be able to maintain under the EBA’s “adverse scenario”, the actual number was 5.7 per cent, just above the 5.5 per cent threshold that lenders had to pass to avoid having to raise additional capital. The recalculation means that RBS’s theoretical loss-buffer in any new crisis would be the worst of Britain’s big lenders. RBS was one of more than 120 banks to take part in the EBA’s stress tests, which are part of a series of measures being undertaken by regulators seeking a better understanding of the potential risks facing the financial system in the event of a crash. The error was discovered by the Bank of England after it began to compare the stress results of the UK lenders that took part in the EBA tests. While the other banks had fully deducted from their capital the tax relief they would get as a result of the losses they are forecast to make in a future crisis, RBS had taken off only a small proportion of these so-called “deferred tax assets”, leading to the overstatement. Shares in RBS nosedived after the announcement, falling 15p in minutes. They dropped to just under 370p before recovering a little to close at 377¾p, valuing the bank at just over £43 billion. Joseph Dickerson, banks analyst at Jefferies, said that while “embarrassing”, the miscalculation was “not tragic” for the bank. “Frankly, this does not look good at face value. However, in the case of RBS, the EBA stress tests are quite backward-looking, given that the reported CET1 ratio in the third quarter was 10.8 per cent versus the 2013 full-year value of 8.6 per cent,” he said.

DAN KITWOOD / GETTY IMAGES

Michael Spencer, below with Sarah, the Marchioness of Milford Haven, his partner, used Cariatide as part-security for a loan

Spencer paints an acquisitive picture Miles Costello

Michael Spencer has amassed a war chest of about £75 million to spend on potential acquisitions after rearranging the financing for his personal investment vehicle. The art-loving former treasurer of the Conservative Party, who runs the City broker Icap, has transferred IPGL’s credit lines with HSBC and JP Morgan into a single £120 million borrowing facility with Barclays. The new arrangement gives IPGL about £30 million of additional borrowing power and slightly more flexibility in terms of the amount of assets that Mr Spencer has to pledge as security. Mr Spencer, 59, is also waiting to receive $118 million after IPGL’s sale of City Index, the online spread-betting company, to Gain Capital, of the United States. The deal for City Index is expected to complete during the first quarter and add about £45 million in cash to Mr Spencer’s deal-doing pot. Mr Spencer is effectively the sole

shareholder in IPGL, which he uses as an investment vehicle for his personal business interests. These include a holding in Nutmeg, an online investment manager with a high-profile advertising presence on the London Underground network, and a string of other financial services businesses, including Exotics, which invests in rarely traded securities, such as Cuban debt. Mr Spencer also uses IPGL to control his 16.9 per cent stake in Icap, which is worth about £643 million based on yesterday’s closing share price of 405½p. Icap told investors yesterday that Mr Spencer had pledged 105.6 million Icap shares to Bar-

clays as security for the new facility. Mr Spencer founded Icap as Intercapital in 1986 and built it into one of the world’s biggest interdealer brokers through several large acquisitions. A noted collector of fine art who boasts an original LS Lowry and several Jack Vettrianos, Mr Spencer pledged a painting by Amedeo Modigliani, Cariatide , in part-security against his previous facility with HSBC. Mr Spencer is not yet believed to have any firm acquisition targets in his sights, but nearly all of his commercial investments are in the financial services area. This week Mr Spencer bought a further 250,000 shares in Icap at 395.95p each, taking his total stake to nearly 17 per cent.

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Business COURTESY NOUGAT

Who will have a taste for Nougat?

he owner of the Nougat and Havren fashion brands has gone into administration after weak trading. Insolvency specialists from Zolfo Cooper, the accountancy firm, said strong interest was expected in Nougat London, which employs about 40 people.

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Osborne giveaway under threat as borrowing rises Philip Aldrick Economics Editor

George Osborne has suffered another damaging setback to his deficit reduction plans after official figures confirmed that the government was on course to miss its targets this year. With 12 days to go before the Office for Budget Responsibility updates its forecasts alongside the autumn statement, public finance figures showed that the government borrowed £3.7 billion more in the seven months to October than in the same period last year. Although the outcome for October alone was better and borrowing over the previous six months was revised down by £1.7 billion, the improvement was not enough to undo the shortfall to date. Economists warned that the state of the public finances would leave the chancellor no room for giveaways in the autumn statement, despite the rapid pace of the recovery. “It’s no longer a question of whether borrowing overshoots the OBR forecast, but how large that overshoot will be,” Martin Beck, senior economic adviser to the EY Item Club, said. “The OBR forecast that borrowing would fall by £11.6 billion, but in order to achieve this we would need to see borrowing undershoot last year’s figures by almost £3 billion in each of the remaining five months of the fiscal year. This is very unlikely to happen.” The figures from the Office for National Statistics showed that public sector net borrowing was £64.1 billion after seven months of the year, £3.7 billion higher than in the same period of 2013-14. Borrowing in October alone was £200 million lower than in 2013, at £7.7 billion, slightly better than expected. In March, the OBR reckoned that borrowing would fall to £86.6 billion

over the year to April next year, compared with the latest official estimate for 2013-14 of £97.5 billion. While government spending has remained more or less on target, tax revenues have disappointed. Receipts so far this year have increased by only 2.2 per cent, compared with the OBR’s forecast for nearly 5 per cent. Depressed income taxes and national insurance, attributable to low wages, and the cooling housing market have been largely to blame for the shortfall in receipts. The OBR said: “Weaker-thanexpected wage growth, lower-thanexpected residential property transactions and lower oil and gas revenues

make it unlikely that the full-year receipts growth forecast from March will be met.” Revenues from income tax and national insurance so far this year have been only 0.6 per cent higher than in 2013-14, the ONS data showed, compared with the OBR’s full-year forecast for a 5.3 per cent increase. Rob Wood, UK economist at Berenberg Bank, said: “Weak income tax is the culprit.” A Treasury spokesman said: “While today’s public finance figures show borrowing is down this month compared to last year, the impact of the great recession is still being felt in our economy and the public finances.”

How the analysts saw it “Tax receipts continue to rise, but the government will remain concerned that these fall short of expectations. The figures will put pressure on George Osborne to announce measures to combat this shortfall.” Richard Rose, BDO

“We expect public borrowing to overshoot projections made by the Office for Budget Responsibility in March by £5 billion to £10 billion. This gives the chancellor limited room for manoeuvre in the autumn statement.” John Hawksworth, PwC

“We expect the Office for Budget Responsibility to project a deficit of £98 billion in 2014-15, or an £11 billion overshoot relative to plans. There is a good chance extra austerity will be needed.” Rob Wood, Berenberg Bank

Schools rise to rate challenge

The 15th annual Target Two Point Zero Bank of England and The Times Interest Rate Challenge is under way, with 307 teams competing for the Challenge Trophy and £5,000 for their school. In 42 regional heats, teams of four students, aged 16 to 18, will analyse British and global economic data and their possible impact on inflation and the outlook for the UK — as the Bank’s

monetary policy committee does each month. The winning team from each regional heat will advance to one of six area finals in February. The final will be contested in March at the Bank of England. Results from the latest heats were: Belfast: winner: St Patrick’s High School, Keady; runner-up: Ballymena Academy. London: winner: Wilson’s School, Wallington; runner-up: Highgate School. Newcastle upon Tyne: winner: Royal Grammar School, Newcastle Upon Tyne; runner-up: Newcastle High School for Girls. Tonbridge: winner: Sackville School, Hildenborough; runner-up: Benenden School, Cranbrook. York: winner: Fulford School, York; runner-up: Wyke Sixth Form College, Hull.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Business Busin

Philip Aldrick If the economy is to strike the right balance, sterling will have to fall

‘‘

Philip Aldrick is economics editor of The Times

Britain is no stranger to currency crises. In less than a century, we’ve come off the gold standard, had big devaluations in 1949 and 1967, a sterling catastrophe in 1976 that sent James Callaghan to the International Monetary Fund for a £2.3 billion bailout and the ignominy of crashing out of the exchange rate mechanism on Black Wednesday in 1992. Six years ago, the UK suffered another massive devaluation. In the space of 12 months, in the midst of the worst global financial crisis on record, the pound collapsed by 25 per cent against a basket of currencies to a record low — a bigger fall than in 1967, 1976 or that fateful September 22 years ago. This time, though, we barely noticed. With no currency peg or capital controls, the markets quietly dumped the pound and policymakers applauded. Sterling’s lower level, they believed, would give our exporters a competitive boost and rebalance the economy, ensuring that we were no longer reliant on a debt-fuelled consumer binge for growth. Only events did not stick to the script. Today Britain is more imbalanced than ever. The current account deficit, a proxy for the amount that Britain as a whole borrows from overseas, has bounced to its highest level on record, hitting 5.6 per cent of GDP in the third quarter of last year and averaging 5.1 per cent since. Of 36 advanced economies, the IMF expects that New Zealand alone will report a bigger gap this year. If history is any guide, there is only one way that this will play out. Sterling will devalue again, drive up inflation and the “pound in your pocket” — as Harold Wilson put it in 1967 — won’t buy you as much. After six years of falling real wages, nobody needs reminding what that feels like. For the time being, there is no danger. Soggy eurozone and global

growth make Britain’s relative strength attractive to skittish foreign investors. Moreover, UK interest rates may be at a record low of 0.5 per cent, but that looks positively generous compared with 0.25 per cent in the United States, 0.1 per cent in Japan and 0.05 per cent in the eurozone. Once the US starts to raise rates next year, or Europe shows some sign of recovery, Britain won’t look so pretty. As the IMF has pointed out, few countries manage to sustain a

current account deficit of 4 per cent to 5 per cent because, ultimately, these “liabilities to the rest of the world need to be paid back”. So far, the Bank of England has been sanguine about the threat, insisting that the deficit will narrow automatically as the eurozone recovers. To understand the thinking, you need to examine the three components of the current account. First, there is the trade balance: the income from exports minus spending

on imports. Second, there is the income balance: what Britain earns on overseas assets, such as foreign subsidiaries or rental properties in the south of France, minus payments on foreign-owned UK liabilities. And third, there are transfers: government payments to the European Union, aid and remittances by immigrants back to their families in Poland, for example. It is the first two that matter. Exports have improved since the 2008 devaluation but Britons have continued to buy overseas goods in huge quantities, so the trade balance has barely changed, with the quarterly deficit stuck between £5 billion and £10 billion for the past 14 years — in today’s prices. Investment income, on the other hand, has tanked. Between 2000 and 2007, Britain earned, on average, £4 billion more from its assets than it paid on its liabilities every quarter. For the past two and a half years, the income balance has been, on average, £3.5 billion in deficit. Britain’s investment position today is chronically weak. The volume of UK assets overseas has shrunk just as the returns on those investments have crumbled. In the three months to June, foreign investors owned £332 billion more UK assets than British investors had abroad — another record deficit. To balance the income book, then, the UK has to earn a higher rate of return. Historically, we have. No longer. About 44 per cent of UK assets are invested in the EU, earning an average of 1.6 per cent in 2012, the last data available indicate. Against that, the UK paid 2.4 per cent on British liabilities. The problem is that Britain’s investment portfolio must not only pay for itself, but also for the habitual trade deficit, if the current account is to balance. The UK has not managed to export more than it imports since 1997. The Bank assumes that a eurozone recovery will fix the problem by both

boosting demand for UK exports and improving earnings on the EU investment portfolio. Such thinking looks like a triumph of hope over experience. Closing a similarly large current account gap in 1989 took five years and was helped by the 1992 devaluation. There is a new risk, too. Britain’s deficit is financed by overseas money in the form of foreign direct investment, money managers buying government and company debt, and international bank flows. Kristin Forbes, a Bank rate-setter, argued this week that regulation has trimmed the supply of bank funds, leaving Britain dependent on other forms of financing that could make it “more vulnerable to negative shifts in sentiment that could cause a sterling depreciation”, she said. Political uncertainty over next year’s general election and the prospect of higher rates in the US could be the triggers for foreign investors to pull out their funds and push down the pound. If the economy is going to rebalance, sterling will have to fall. The last time that the UK current account deficit was eliminated was in 1997, when pound was nearly 8 per cent weaker than it is today on a trade-weighted basis. Should it happen, there will be casualties. Inflation shot up to 5.2 per cent after the most recent depreciation, despite the downward pressure on prices from the recession and weak recovery. Britain’s modern take on the old currency crisis may not seem as dramatic, but importing inflation is no less painful, as six years of squeezed incomes attest. Perhaps we should be careful what we wish for. A global economic pick-up could expose Britain’s other fault lines and the imminent respite from the cost of living crisis may be disappointingly shortlived.

’’

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Business

The store with two brains has management rethink Andrew Clark Deputy Business Editor

The wealthy, low-profile duo who quietly masterminded Aldi’s assault on Britain’s supermarket industry are to split up after five years of overseeing the chain’s “pile it high, sell it cheap” retailing philosophy. Matthew Barnes, a British-born law graduate from Bath, and Roman Heini, a German from the Black Forest town of Donaueschingen, are being promoted after their success in sparking a price war that has left Sainsbury’s, Morrisons and Tesco in turmoil. Aldi’s joint UK managing directors have worked so closely that they finish

each others’ sentences, socialise together at the weekends and send their children to the same school. They joined the company as graduate trainees directly out of university. Although unusual in business circles, they maintain that operating with two bosses has worked well. Mr Barnes told an interviewer recently that “the ‘two minds are better than one’ theory is absolutely the case here”. Mr Barnes has been elevated to a new role as sole chief executive of Aldi for the UK and Ireland, while Mr Heini is heading to Germany to chair Aldi Süd, the parent company that operates Aldi’s brand across much of western

Europe. A spokesman said that the change “reflects the expansion of the business and the need for more firepower at a management level”. Two new managing directors will be appointed to work under Mr Barnes in Britain. Aldi, along with Lidl, its German compatriot and rival, have shaken up British food retailing in spectacular fashion, snatching a combined 8.5 per cent market share. Checkout takings at Aldi shot up by 36 per cent to £1.39 billion last year. The 530-strong chain has set its sites on having 1,000 stores by 2022. Bryan Roberts, the retail insights

director at Kantar, the market research firm, said: “Between them, they seemed to get the British shopper and get the British landscape. They tweaked Aldi’s business model to make it more palatable for British consumers and the company has seen a phenomenal improvement under their stewardship.” The management duo have amassed healthy returns from the business: Mr Heini borrowed £1.9 million from Aldi to buy a mansion in the Warwickshire countryside in 2012, while Mr Barnes was loaned £900,000 for a house purchase in 2010. At the core of Aldi’s low-cost structure is a narrow range of products. It

has a range of about 1,350 items, compared with 40,000 at Tesco. Many of its products are own-label, rather than household names, and are sold in unglamorous, no-frills stores. Nevertheless, the chain has won strong reviews for the quality of its produce. Aldi’s mince pies beat rivals from Selfridges and Fortnum & Mason in a taste test by Which? last year, while its Christmas pudding topped the Good Housekeeping Institute’s rankings. This year, Aldi is stocking caviar for the first time to appeal to middle-class shoppers. Its Christmas advertising campaign is fronted by Jools Holland, the pianist and television presenter. THOMAS SKOVSENDE

Ties that bind pass taste test

he boss of Fuller, Smith & Turner has strongly criticised a decision to call time on the beer

tie agreement between pub owners and landlords (Deirdre Hipwell writes). Simon Emeny said that the decision by MPs to abolish the rule — which prevents tenanted pub landlords from buying beer on the open

market — was “ill-guided” and would lead to less investment in pubs. Fuller’s said that half-year pre-tax profit had risen from £16.8 million to £18.3 million. Its shares closed up 7.7 per cent at 987½p.

Lower offer is enough to win Salamander’s approval Tim Webb, Alex Ralph

The board of Salamander Energy is set to recommend a takeover of the oil explorer for about £100 million less than it was offered in a rival bid that was withdrawn this week. The heavily indebted FTSE 250 business is backing the £267 million allshare bid tabled by Ophir Energy yesterday after a consortium led by Cepsa, the Spanish oil company, unexpectedly pulled an offer valuing Salamander at up to £375 million on Monday. Ophir proposed an offer of 0.5719 shares for each Salamander share, valuing the business at 115.9p a share. Salamander, which holds oil exploration licenses in Thailand and Indonesia, said that it “would expect to recommend the proposed offer” from the African-focused Ophir, which plans to launch a formal recommended bid within days. Shares in Ophir fell by 10p to 170p yesterday, not helped by drilling another disappointing exploration well, further reducing the value of its offer to shareholders in Salamander,

who will receive shares in the rival explorer. In a joint statement, the companies’ boards defended the offer, noting that it was pitched at a 31.6 per cent premium to the average share price the month before Salamander announced that Ophir had made an initial approach in October. However, during this period Salamander’s share price slumped to a record low and shares were as high as 148p as recently as July. Shares in Salamander edged up by 1¼p to 92p. Salamander has suffered after the sector fell out of favour with investors. The company is struggling with $400 million of debt, putting gearing at an uncomfortably high 52 per cent. Its projects are barely breaking even at $80 a barrel, according to analyst estimates. Sailingstone Capital Partners, a San Francisco-based asset manager, is Salamander’s biggest shareholder, with a 13.3 per cent stake, and is also the second-largest on Ophir’s register. Cepsa declined to detail why it pulled out of the running. It is possible that it could re-enter the fray and table a bid.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Business

Promise of stimulus from Draghi and China lifts markets Philip Aldrick, Leo Lewis

Global stock markets jumped almost for joy yesterday on the promise of more economic stimulus as China cut interest rates and Mario Draghi signalled that the European Central Bank was inching closer to full-blown quantitative easing. Brent crude oil prices climbed back above $80 a barrel in anticipation of a recovery in demand in the world’s second-largest economy, and the euro slumped against both the pound and the dollar on the prospect of the ECB flooding the markets with new money. Beijing’s decision to counter sagging growth and the strengthening of Mr Draghi’s rhetoric came in the wake of mounting concerns about the health of the global economy. George Osborne voiced his fears earlier in the day, saying that the world was in a more perilous state than it had been a few months ago. China’s central bank cut its one-year lending rate by 40 basis points to 5.6 per cent in an attempt to address worries sparked by slowing factory activity, falling house prices and a slide in growth rates to their lowest in nearly 25 years. The one-year benchmark deposit rate was also trimmed by a quarter of a percentage point. In the eurozone, which Mr Osborne described as a “real worry and concern”, Mr Draghi sent a blunt message that drastic measures may be needed as he painted a bleak picture of the single currency bloc. Striking his most pessimistic tone yet, the ECB president said:

“We will do what we must to raise inflation and inflation expectations as fast as possible. If our policy is not effective enough to achieve this, or further risks to the inflation outlook materialise, we would step up the pressure and broaden even more the channels through which we intervene, by altering accordingly the size, pace and composition of our purchases.” Economists said that he was deliberately preparing the markets for more action next month, when the ECB presents its latest forecasts for the 18-member eurozone. Nick Kounis, of ABN Amro, said: “Draghi all but announced that the central bank will step up monetary easing soon. Mr Maybe has become Mr Definitely.” Pier Carlo Padoan, the Italian finance minister, told Sky News: “I’m afraid Mario Draghi is signalling a real problem — that is the disappointing performance of the European economy, especially the euro area. I think there is common agreement about that fact that all instruments, including monetary policy, must be used.” The markets were delighted. The FTSE 100 closed 71.86 points higher at 6,750.76, and the German, French and Spanish bourses rose by 2.5 per cent to 3 per cent. On Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average was up 1 per cent in early trading. Brent crude jumped $2.28 to a session high of $81.61 before settling back to slightly more than $80. The euro fell by more than 1 per cent against both the pound and the dollar.

LUONG THAI LINH / EPA

Sky defies shareholder rebellion over bonuses Sky has suffered a significant vote against pay for the third year running, with 13.8 per cent of investors opposing its remuneration report. ISS, the shareholder advisory group, had urged investors to withhold votes on pay amid unclear terms related to bonus payments. Jeremy Darroch, the chief executive of Sky, said that some of the bonuses were linked to commercially sensitive targets but that it had received “strong support” from investors. Mr Darroch said that Sky, which is battling BT for rights to Premier League football, would enter next year’s auction in “good shape”.

Future predicts a profit Future has completed a lengthy restructuring and returned to profit in the final quarter of its financial year. The share price rose by a third to 8¾p after the Bath-based magazine publisher said that cost-cutting and the disposal of dozens of its titles was expected to lead to a profit. Future recorded a pre-tax loss of £35 million in the year to September, compared with a £2.2 million loss previously, and revenues fell by 20 per cent to £66 million. It said that most of the losses had been made in the first half.

Roll-Royce is all smiles once again

he Duchess of Cambridge’s high spirits are finally being shared by Rolls-Royce after an autumn of profit warnings, plunging shares and the

decision to shed thousands of staff (Robert Lea writes). The engineer said yesterday that it had received $5 billion-worth of contracts for its Trent aircraft engines. Delta Air Lines, the American carrier that handles more passengers per year than any other, has decided to augment

its long-haul fleet not with Boeing 777s but with $14.3 billion of orders for new Airbus models being produced in Wales, France and Germany — 25 extra-wide A350s and 25 of the new generation of the A330neo. Rolls-Royce is Airbus’s chosen partner on both aircraft.

Stobart goes green The group that put Eddie Stobart lorries on the road has teamed up with the Green Investment Bank on a £110 million project to build one of Britain’s largest biomass power plants. Stobart Group, which spun off its haulage business this year, is building a facility in Widnes, Cheshire, that will provide enough renewable electricity to power more than 35,000 homes. The taxpayer-funded Green Investment Bank, which is providing £30 million for the project, will take a 49 per cent stake in the project.

Dyson urges Britain to quit EU as he attacks German ‘bullies’ Robert Lea Industrial Editor

One of Britain’s most high-profile entrepreneurs has launched an explosive anti-German attack and said that Britain should leave the European Union. Sir James Dyson, the head of the Dyson vacuum cleaners and hand dryers group, who is a close confidante

of the prime minister, said that Britain was a member of an EU in which it was “dominated and bullied by the Germans”. Leaders of Britain’s biggest business organisations distanced themselves from Sir James’s comments, but John Redwood, the eurosceptic Conservative MP, said that the inventor spoke for many entrepreneurs. Speaking as he

announced a £1.5 billion expansion of his family owned electronic engineering company, Sir James was asked in a BBC radio interview whether, in the light of Ukip’s victory in the Rochester and Strood by-election, Britain should stay in the EU. He replied: “Not particularly, no. It is an EU dominated by Germany and in our particular field we have very large

German companies who dominate standard-setting and energy reduction committees and so we get the old guard of old technologies supported and not the new technologies.” Sir James, who sits on David Cameron’s Business Advisory Group, added: “I would leave the EU. I want to keep Efta, the European free trade and free movement of peoples, but I don’t

see that we need to be dominated and bullied by the Germans.” The CBI was dismayed at his intervention. Citing research claiming that eight of ten CBI members want to stay in the EU, a spokesman for the business organisation, said: “Most CBI members believe the UK is best placed to create jobs and growth as part of a reformed European Union.”

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

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Money Wall Street 21st Century Fox 3M Abbott Labs AbbVie Accenture ACE Actavis Adobe Sys Aetna Inc Aflac Air Prods & Chm Alcoa Alexion Pharmas Allergan Alliance Data Sys Allstate Altria Amazon Amer Elec Pwr Amer Express Amer Tower American Int Ameriprise AmerisrceBerg Amgen Amphenol Anadarko Petrlm Analog Devices Aon Corp Apache Apple Applied Mats Archer Daniels AT&T Auto Data Proc Autozone Avago Tech Ltd AvalonBay Baker Hughes Bank NY Mellon Bank of America Baxter Intl BB&T Becton Dickinsn Berkshire Hath Biogen Idec Blackrock Boeing Boston Props Boston Sci Bristol-Myrs Sq Broadcom Capital One Fin Cardinal Health Carnival Caterpillar CBS Corp Celgene CenturyTel Cerner Chesapeake Engy Chevron Chipotle Mex Grill Chubb Cigna Corp Cisco Systems Citigroup CME Coca-Cola Cognizant Tech Colgate-Palm Comcast Conagra Foods ConocoPhillips Consd Edison Constellation Brs Corning Costco Whole Covidien Crown Castle CSX Cummins CVS Caremark Danaher Davita Deere&Co Delphi Auto Delta Air Lines Devon Energy DirecTV Grp Discover Financial Dollar General Dominion Res Dow Chemical Du Pont Duke Energy Eaton eBay Ecolab Edison Intl

Major indices

Nov 21 midday

wkly +/-

Nov 21 midday

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Nov 21 midday

wkly +/-

35.30 160.40 43.86 66.76 84.07 112.68 258.78 72.01 86.84 59.70 145.39 17.67 191.26 209.38 285.25 67.59 49.20 334.61 56.95 90.98 101.49 54.65 131.60 88.19 161.97 52.16 93.87 51.42 90.80 75.25 116.28 22.78 52.84 35.22 84.13 569.49 89.84 157.83 65.54 40.06 17.16 72.61 37.64 130.60 146.75 302.96 354.80 133.00 128.05 13.00 58.88 41.86 81.35 79.66 41.58 106.01 53.65 108.42 40.65 63.71 24.02 118.14 662.68 102.65 102.46 26.88 54.02 83.32 44.45 52.39 68.63 54.24 35.50 73.59 61.82 94.51 20.85 139.94 98.27 81.44 37.50 148.54 89.54 83.67 75.05 87.07 72.03 43.82 67.10 86.91 64.57 67.90 72.98 52.98 72.62 79.64 68.82 54.49 114.92 61.90

+0.19 +1.55 +0.05 +2.76 -0.57 +2.06 +15.01 +0.59 +3.03 +0.39 +10.68 +0.73 +2.50 +10.73 -0.21 +1.01 +0.42 +6.79 +0.89 +0.31 +1.96 +0.75 +2.22 -0.64 +4.29 +1.30 +3.68 +0.80 +0.95 +1.90 +2.10 -0.04 +1.49 -0.68 -0.62 +2.38 +0.82 +1.08 +5.65 +0.39 +0.02 +0.86 +0.21 +1.40 +1.23 -2.47 +7.09 +4.14 +1.71 -0.36 +0.93 -0.25 -0.41 -0.69 +0.08 +4.67 +0.24 +4.37 -0.15 -0.60 +0.81 +1.82 -7.12 +1.40 +0.56 +0.56 +0.64 -1.50 +1.72 -0.90 +1.07 +0.14 +0.77 +2.18 -0.21 +1.63 +0.44 +1.46 +4.29 +1.05 +0.71 +3.48 +0.41 +1.44 -0.61 -0.45 +1.35 +0.07 +2.92 -0.64 -0.41 +3.25 +1.41 +1.61 +1.82 +0.53 +1.88 +0.13 +2.51 +0.14

Eli Lilly 67.37 EMC Corp 30.00 Emerson Elec 65.48 Entergy 82.33 EOG Res 102.18 EQT 95.77 Equity Res 70.12 Estee Lauder 73.30 Exelon 36.00 Express Scripts 80.93 Exxon Mobil 96.49 Facebook 73.93 Fedex 174.69 Fifth Third 20.17 FirstEnergy 36.99 FIS 60.13 Fiserv Inc 70.12 Ford Motor 15.49 Franklin Res 56.96 Freeport-Mcm 29.52 Gap 37.90 Gen Dynamics 145.00 Gen Electric 26.94 Gen Growth Props 26.21 General Mills 51.79 General Mtrs 32.15 Genuine Parts 101.11 Gilead Sciences 100.37 Goldman Sachs 189.99 Google Inc 539.52 Google Inc Class A 547.96 Grainger (WW) 248.60 Halliburton 50.62 Harley-Davidson 69.56 Hartford Financial 41.23 HCP 43.62 Health Care REIT 72.21 Hershey 95.85 Hess 85.27 Hewlett Packard 37.03 Home Depot 98.48 Honeywell Intl 98.29 Host Hotels 22.79 Humana 136.98 ICE Group 219.96 Illinois Tool 96.28 Ingersoll-Rand 63.97 Int Business Mach 161.65 Intel 35.91 Intl Paper 54.21 Intuit 92.46 Intuitive Surg 512.94 Invesco 40.44 Johnsn & Johnsn 107.80 Johnson Cont 50.47 JP Morgan Chase 60.77 Kellogg 65.45 Keurig Green 139.98 Kimberly-Clark 113.98 Kinder Morgan 40.09 Kraft Foods 59.30 Kroger 58.43 L Brands 79.38 Lincoln National 57.66 Lockheed Martin 187.84 Loews 42.97 Lorillard 63.53 Lowes Cos 63.39 LyondellBasell 91.77 Macy's 63.25 Marathon Oil 33.77 Marathon Petroleum96.40 Marriott Intl 76.64 Marsh & McLenn 56.12 MasterCard 84.40 McDonald's 96.91 McGraw Hill Fin 91.95 McKesson 204.53 Mead Johnson 102.28 Medtronic 72.49 Merck & Co 59.59 Metlife 55.92 Michael Kors Hdgs 73.91 Micron 34.05 Microsoft 48.25 Mondelez 39.00 Monsanto 120.79 Monster Beverage 109.07 Moodys 101.11 Morgan Stanley 35.58 Mosaic 46.99 Motorola Sols 65.89 M&T Bank Corp 125.28 Mylan 55.99 Natl Oilwell 73.01 Netflix 366.02 NextEra Energy 103.06 Nielsen Holdings 41.37 Nike 97.70 Noble Energy 57.33

+0.04 -0.05 +1.86 +0.88 +4.02 +2.77 +0.86 +1.97 +0.59 +3.06 +1.40 -0.95 +3.13 +0.01 +1.10 +1.01 +0.03 +0.35 +0.58 +1.22 -1.61 +2.34 +0.48 +0.65 +0.97 +0.36 +1.43 -1.69 +0.01 -4.88 -7.23 +2.33 -4.46 +1.16 +1.33 +0.04 +1.04 -0.21 +2.24 +0.11 +0.24 +1.50 +0.12 +1.21 -2.60 +2.50 +1.38 -2.51 +1.96 -0.22 +1.77 +0.73 +0.29 -0.36 +1.06 +0.49 +1.64 -14.29 +1.33 +0.72 +1.88 +0.72 +1.90 +1.42 +1.24 +0.19 +1.94 +4.81 +3.44 +1.20 +1.41 +4.02 -1.32 +0.35 +0.35 +0.70 +0.82 -0.72 +1.60 +3.54 +0.52 +1.39 +1.85 +1.43 -1.33 +0.84 +1.82 +1.15 +0.64 -0.11 +1.84 +0.64 +0.34 +1.94 +1.67 -20.02 +1.21 -0.26 +2.20 +1.22

Nordstrom 75.15 Norfolk Sthn 115.49 Northeast Utilities 49.89 Northern Trust 68.20 Northrop Grum 139.35 Nucor 54.81 Occidental Petr 87.21 Omnicom 74.95 Oracle 41.46 O'Reilly 180.12 Paccar 67.37 Parker-Hannifin 131.94 Paychex 47.36 PepsiCo 98.60 Perrigo Company 153.95 Pfizer 30.36 PG&E 49.87 Philip Morris Intl 86.92 Phillips66 78.50 Pioneer Ntrl Rscs 175.98 PNC Finl 87.35 PPG Inds 216.02 PPL 35.33 Praxair 130.64 Precision Cast 236.17 Price T Rowe 82.82 Priceline.com 1161.00 Principal Fin 53.54 Procter & Gmbl 89.07 Progressive Cp 27.23 Prologis 41.20 Prudential Finl 84.65 Public Serv Ent 40.72 Public Storage 185.18 Qualcomm 70.96 Raytheon 105.70 Regeneron Pharm 407.46 Reynolds Amer 65.46 Rockwell Auto 114.00 Roper Inds 158.83 Ross Stores 88.84 Salesforce.com 58.25 SanDisk 101.03 Schlumberger 97.59 Schwab (Charles) 28.44 Seagate Tech 65.12 Sempra Energy 109.84 Sherwin-Williams 242.41 Sigma Aldrich 135.90 Simon Prop 179.04 Southern Co 47.02 Spectra Engy 39.18 St Jude Medical 66.17 Stan Blk & Dkr 95.50 Starbucks 79.66 State Street 76.63 Sthwest Airlines 38.62 Stryker 90.08 SunTrust Banks 39.60 Symantec 25.35 Sysco 39.77 Target 71.33 TE Connectivity 62.86 Texas Insts 52.45 Thermo Fisher 126.12 Time Warner 79.99 Time Warner Cab 143.66 TJX 63.62 Travelers 104.01 Tyco International 43.19 Union Pacific 122.75 UPS 107.90 US Bancorp 44.05 Utd Health 97.35 Utd Tech 110.50 Valero Energy 50.54 Ventas 69.03 Verizon Comm 50.05 Vertex Pharma 111.57 VF Corp 73.68 Viacom 73.94 Visa 253.28 Vornado Realty 109.98 Walgreen 67.65 Wal-Mart 84.88 Walt Disney 89.16 Waste Mgt 48.44 WellPoint 126.57 Wells Fargo 54.01 Western Digital 101.84 Weyerhaeuser 34.34 Whole Foods Mkt 48.00 Williams Cos 55.72 Wynn Resorts 181.16 Xcel Energy 33.50 Xerox 13.66 Yahoo 51.73 Yum Brands 76.15 Zimmer Hldgs 109.97 Zoetis 43.44

+0.98 -0.54 +1.09 +0.41 +3.28 +0.90 +0.55 +0.88 +0.62 +0.24 +0.74 +3.50 +0.13 +0.88 -0.51 +0.02 +0.22 +0.64 +6.72 +5.35 -0.06 +12.12 -0.11 +4.78 +9.96 +0.70 -11.96 +0.68 +0.96 +0.25 +0.43 +0.67 +1.24 -0.44 +0.11 +1.07 +12.26 +0.97 +3.88 +1.58 +7.46 -5.67 +4.84 +2.27 -0.43 +2.25 +1.17 +2.76 +0.32 +1.01 +0.38 +1.06 +1.18 -0.17 +1.54 +0.56 -0.33 +2.08 +0.04 +0.01 +1.19 +3.20 +1.33 +0.82 +7.37 +0.24 +3.65 +1.30 +1.58 +0.79 +2.04 +1.07 +0.32 +2.24 +3.05 +1.03 +0.37 -1.45 +0.23 +2.68 +0.98 +4.44 +2.40 +0.72 +1.92 -1.64 -0.65 +1.21 +0.66 +3.43 +0.44 +0.89 +1.67 -2.83 +0.46 +0.23 -0.02 +1.37 -0.15 +0.30

London Financial Futures Long Gilt 3-Mth Sterling

3-Mth Euribor

3-Mth Euroswiss

2 Year Swapnote 5 Year Swapnote 10 Year Swapnote FTSE100 FTSEurofirst 80

Period Dec 14 Mar 15 Dec 14 Mar 15 Jun 15 Sep 15 Dec 15 Dec 14 Mar 15 Jun 15 Sep 15 Dec 15 Dec 14 Mar 15 Jun 15 Sep 15 Dec 14 Mar 15 Dec 14 Mar 15 Dec 14 Mar 15 Dec 14 Mar 15 Dec 14 Mar 15

Open 116.70 115.90 99.440 99.390 99.310 99.170 99.040 99.910 99.905 99.920 99.915 99.900 100.04 100.09 100.11 100.12 111.55 127.51 148.02 6706.5 6645.0 3924.5

High 117.23 116.39 99.440 99.390 99.320 99.210 99.070 99.915 99.920 99.935 99.930 99.915 100.05 100.10 100.12 100.13 111.58 111.56 127.63 100.00 148.34 100.00 6776.0 6715.0 3924.5

Low 116.70 115.86 99.430 99.370 99.300 99.170 99.030 99.905 99.905 99.915 99.910 99.895 100.04 100.08 100.11 100.11 111.55 111.55 127.51 100.00 147.98 100.00 6691.0 6644.5 3924.5

Sett 117.14 116.31 99.440 99.390 99.320 99.210 99.070 99.910 99.915 99.930 99.930 99.910 100.05 100.09 100.11 100.12 111.58 111.90 127.61 127.61 148.32 148.32 6755.0 6700.0 4210.0 4211.0

Vol 184687 51699 7946 21854 33409 25329 52488 49884 80482 92501 57616 38018 1332 4408 3270 2458 239 104 328 3 441 3 115434 5073 1

Open Int 430521 10050 383698 418004 478197 328839 351271 473523 401215 346860 335943 311695 68652 83050 57500 26657 21794 11181 5144 576190 19500 76

Eurotop 100

New York Dow Jones (noon) Nasdaq Composite (noon) S&P 500 (noon)

17793.94 (+74.94) 4719.69 (+17.82) 2061.43 (+8.68)

Tokyo Nikkei 225

17357.51 (+56.65)

Hong Kong Hang Seng

23437.12 (+87.48)

Amsterdam AEX Index

423.46 (+6.65)

Sydney AO

5292.10 (-10.40)

Frankfurt DAX

9732.55 (+248.58)

Singapore Straits

3345.32 (+29.72)

Brussels BEL20

3235.23 (+41.99)

Paris CAC-40

4347.23 (+113.02)

Zurich SMI Index DJ EURO Stoxx 50

9080.55 (+90.61) 3194.22 (+92.01)

London FTSE 100 6750.76 (+71.86) FTSE 250 15691.62 (+87.10) FTSE 350 3666.24 (+36.19) FTSE Eurotop 100 2808.47 (+60.24) FTSE All-Shares 3599.11 (+34.97) FTSE Non Financials 4197.31 (+44.30) techMARK 100 3358.15 (+30.84) Bargains 1246184 US$ 1.5649 (-0.0040) Euro 1.2634 (+0.0127) £:SDR 1.07 (+0.00) Exchange Index 86.7 (+0.3) Bank of England official close (4pm) CPI 128.40 Sep (2005 = 100) RPI 257.60 Sep (Jan 1987 = 100) RPIX 257.10 Sep (Jan 1987 = 100) Morningstar Long Commodity 821.63 (+6.47) Morningstar Long/Short Commod 4529.86 (-21.48)

Commodities ICIS pricing (London 6.00pm) Crude Oils ($/barrel FOB) Brent Physical Brent 25 day (Jan) Brent 25 day (Feb) W Texas Intermed (Jan) W Texas Intermed (Feb)

78.60 79.45 79.95 75.85 75.90

+0.70 +0.70 +0.80 +0.65 +0.65

Products ($/MT) Spot CIF NW Europe (prompt delivery) Premium Unld 756.00 758.00 Gasoil EEC 710.25 712.25 3.5 Fuel Oil 406.00 408.00 Naphtha 635.00 639.00

+3.00 +8.50 +10.50 +8.00

ICE Futures Gas Oil Nov Dec Jan

unq 700.75-700.50 698.25-698.00

Brent (6.00pm) Dec unq Jan 79.67-79.66 Feb 80.16-80.14

Feb Mar

710.25-709.75 713.25-712.50 Volume: 196695

Mar Apr

80.75-80.67 81.38-79.02 Volume: 610786

unq unq unq

LIFFE Cocoa Dec Mar May Jul Sep Dec

unq unq unq unq unq unq

Mar May Jul

RobustaCoffee Nov Jan Mar May

unq unq unq unq

Jul Sep

White Sugar (FOB) Reuters Dec Mar May

unq unq unq

Volume: 20062 unq unq Volume: 5522 Aug Oct Dec Mar

unq unq unq unq Volume: 3502

London Grain Futures LIFFE Wheat (close £/t) Nov 125.65 Jan 128.00 May 132.45 Jul 133.30

Mar 130.30 Volume: 217

AHDB meat services Average fatstock prices at representative markets (p/kg lw) Pig Lamb Cattle GB 86.62 177.07 193.74 (+/-) +5.37 +2.70 +1.28 Eng/Wales (+/-) Scotland (+/-)

86.62 +5.37

177.58 +2.70

192.59 +1.28

unq

174.12 +2.06

201.97 +2.82

London Metal Exchange (Official) Cash

3mth

15mth

Copper Gde A ($/tonne) 6789.5-6790.0 6725.0-6725.5

7310.0-7320.0

Lead ($/tonne) 2059.5-2060.0

2063.5-2064.0

1980.0-1985.0

Zinc Spec Hi Gde ($/tonne) 2298.5-2299.0 2306.0-2307.0

1943.0-1948.0

Tin ($/tonne) 20225.0-20250.0

20150.0-20155.0

Alum Hi Gde ($/tonne) 2076.5-2077.5 2062.5-2063.0 Nickel ($/tonne) 16445.0-16450.0 16500.0-16505.0

20160.0-20210.0 2280.0-2285.0 18770.0-18870.0

AP Moller-Maersk A Dn Kr AP Moller-Maersk B Dn Kr ABB Ltd S SF Air Liquide Fr ¤ Allianz G ¤ Anglo American UK p Anheuser-Busch InBev B ¤ ASML Holding Nl ¤ Assicurazioni Generali SpA AstraZeneca UK p Atlas Copco A Sw Kr Atlas Copco B Sw Kr AXA Fr ¤ Banco Santander Es ¤ BBVA Es ¤ Barclays UK p BASF G ¤ Bayer G ¤ BG Group UK p BHP Billiton UK p BMW G ¤ BNP Paribas Fr ¤ BP UK p British Am Tob UK p BT Group UK p Centrica UK p Christian Dior Fr ¤ CS Group S SF Daimler G ¤ Danone Fr ¤ Deutsche Bank G ¤ Deutsche Post AG Deutsche Telekom G ¤ Diageo UK p EON G ¤ EDF Fr ¤ Enel It ¤ ENI It ¤ Ericsson B Sw Kr EADS Fr ¤ GDF Suez Fr ¤ GlaxoSmKline UK p Glencre Xstrata Heineken NV Nl ¤ Henkel KGaA G ¤ Henkel KGaA Pref G ¤ Hennes & Mauritz Sw Kr Hermes Intl SCA Fr ¤ HSBC UK p Iberdrola Es ¤ Imperial Tobacco UK p Inditex Es ¤ ING Nl ¤ Intesa Sanpaolo It ¤ Linde G ¤ Lloyds Bkg Gp UK p L'Oreal Fr ¤ LVMH Fr ¤ Munich Re G ¤ Natl Grid UK p Nestle S SF Nordea Sw Kr Novartis S SF Novo Nordisk B Dn Kr Orange Pernod Ricard NV Fr ¤ Philips Elect Nl ¤ Prudential UK p Reckitt Benckiser UK p Repsol SA Richemont S SF Rio Tinto UK p Roche Hldgs S SF Rolls-Royce UK p Royal Bank Scot UK p Royal Dutch Shell A UK p Royal Dutch Shell B UK p SABMiller UK p Sanofi-Aventis Fr ¤ SAP G ¤ Schneider Electric Fr ¤ Siemens G ¤ Societe Generale SA Standard Chartered UK p StatoilHydro No Kr Swatch Gp BR S SF Swatch Gp Reg S SF Swiss Re AG S SF Syngenta S SF Telefonica Es ¤ Telenor No Kr TeliaSonera Sw Kr Tenaris SA It ¤ Tesco UK p Total Fr ¤ UBS AG S SF UniCredit It ¤ Unilever UK p Unilever NV Nl ¤ Vinci Fr ¤ Vivendi Fr ¤ Vodafone Group UK p Volkswagen G ¤ Volkswagen Prf G ¤ Volvo B Sw Kr Zurich Fin S SF

FTSE volumes Close

+/-

12mthhigh

12mthlow

Yield

P/E

12280.00 12640.00 22.06 100.15 135.85 1294.27 92.74 85.21 17.20 4709.69 219.20 200.90 18.92 6.92 8.38 236.25 73.75 118.00 1069.00 1590.02 88.16 49.67 448.30 3704.00 379.84 292.00 149.65 25.57 64.56 56.00 24.93 25.36 13.16 1920.00 13.53 22.98 3.77 17.19 93.95 48.28 18.82 1476.21 334.23 61.71 76.29 85.46 311.70 261.45 633.22 5.75 2898.00 23.14 11.50 2.36 150.25 78.61 135.45 144.95 161.75 931.50 72.10 93.25 91.95 265.80 13.71 92.83 23.36 1502.50 5157.42 18.44 87.75 3023.88 284.00 850.62 377.70 2283.50 2391.00 3470.00 75.91 56.08 64.56 93.98 38.01 938.70 153.20 478.50 87.25 82.05 321.90 12.47 154.60 51.90 14.95 194.50 48.54 16.90 5.78 2656.00 32.22 43.70 20.22 227.45 176.00 177.95 80.95 298.00

+120.00 +180.00 +0.43 +2.34 +2.40 +0.77 +2.54 +1.15 +0.49 -1.31 +5.70 +5.10 +0.45 +0.24 +0.22 +2.25 +2.65 +3.90 +23.00 +7.52 +3.26 +1.85 +6.95 +4.00 +4.24 -1.90 +3.15 +0.54 +1.65 +1.22 +0.78 +0.80 +0.16 +29.50 +0.49 +0.18 +0.16 +0.77 +2.20 +1.42 +0.33 -0.79 +10.78 +0.24 -0.21 +0.61 +2.50 +2.45 +7.92 +0.18 -26.00 +0.66 +0.22 +0.11 +2.25 +0.49 +2.30 +5.05 +3.50 -4.50 +0.35 +1.65 +0.45 +2.00 +0.66 +1.56 +0.60 -4.00 -32.58 +0.67 +2.75 +158.88 +2.75 +6.62 -2.90 +29.50 +38.00 +20.00 +0.89 +1.20 +2.37 +3.09 +1.56 +29.50 +3.40 +11.60 +2.50 +1.00 +2.60 +0.36 -0.40 +0.75 +0.62 +1.60 +1.88 +0.33 +0.31 +15.00 +0.51

14660.00 15220.00 24.75 106.85 138.45 1648.00 92.74 15220.00 17.43 4823.50 219.20 219.20 20.50 7.89 9.93 296.50 87.36 118.00 1351.50 2096.00 95.51 60.85 523.90 3709.00 418.10 347.70 153.50 30.08 70.44 56.95 39.95 27.93 13.16 2003.50 15.31 29.73 4.46 20.40

11710.00 12140.00 19.16 89.68 117.00 1226.50 69.55 12140.00 14.79 3400.50 186.40 186.40 16.94 6.04 8.17 207.90 65.61 94.73 999.10 1582.50 77.41 45.45 416.70 2881.00 356.20 286.60 127.35 23.77 56.01 48.83 23.34 22.30 10.35 1709.50 12.56 21.56 3.02 15.86

1.75 2.36

16.50 16.98 22.14 20.72 10.06 302.76 21.79 27.88 17.53 94.19 22.69 20.80 9.01 15.35

55.91 21.09 1690.50 377.50 61.71 77.10 86.52 314.90 271.60 693.80 5.75 2924.00 119.90 11.95 2.61 157.30 86.30 135.45 146.25 166.45 960.50 72.10

0.00 16.17 1324.00 297.00 44.96 67.00 67.74 262.10 226.90 589.00 4.43 2182.00 19.89 8.95 1.65 144.60 70.94 115.20 122.50 143.00 746.00 63.10

91.95 284.00 13.71 92.83 28.10 1506.50 5495.00 20.88 94.35 3627.50 290.00 1289.00 388.00 2453.00 2592.00 3740.00 89.56 61.12 71.37 100.25 48.38 1461.00 194.80 107.90 600.50 83.70 363.00 12.85 156.90 52.60

67.80 230.50 8.55 79.36 20.98 1204.00 4537.00 16.33 75.20 2865.00 233.40 779.50 295.50 2013.50 2096.00 2661.00 69.40 50.90 54.73 82.34 34.39 909.20 146.00 75.80 429.50 71.05 283.50 10.87 129.60 45.81

354.55 54.52 19.10 6.85 2729.00 32.59 56.85 21.25 252.30 194.95 197.55 102.50 298.00

168.75 41.56 14.50 5.02 2306.00 27.16 41.41 17.35 184.50 150.70 150.25 72.70 241.50

+0.30 +0.60 +2.40 +3.55 -1.20 +3.70

2.58 3.84 3.58 1.78 0.60 2.06 3.68 2.51 2.74 4.33 7.24 0.74 2.75 3.60 1.75 1.73 4.13 2.90 2.97 3.84 2.61 5.82 1.57 2.68 3.43 2.62 2.08 3.10 2.80 2.55 4.37 5.50 2.79 5.18 3.19 1.53 8.06 5.40 2.87 1.24 1.16 1.04 3.08 1.04 4.75 2.11 4.03 1.37 1.71 2.02

3.20 13.87 27.11 20.37 10.97 10.08 19.34 15.50 22.51 17.59 70.42 9.35 30.73 14.76 26.10 20.73 11.97 10.83 12.06 22.29 23.13 17.30 20.39 25.92 12.20 13.67 26.39 33.14 12.27 17.34 40.32 30.58 12.68

2.23 2.66 4.08 0.10 3.73 2.75 2.58

21.59 238.57 27.53 21.41 7.91 16.31 24.18 12.80 23.87 27.48 23.12 24.03 31.94 18.03 19.93 19.35 23.44 15.63 22.74 7.06

5.14 4.77 1.86 3.63 1.29 3.59 3.23 2.59 5.25 4.71 1.02 1.72 4.97 3.12 4.68 4.63 4.05 1.56 7.59 5.18 1.45

14.53 15.22 25.03 25.01 20.72 19.23 16.22 8.47 9.23 10.48 14.29 13.03 7.44 20.56 13.26 34.48 16.33 14.55 18.42 11.30 18.79

3.28 3.17 4.10 4.87 6.12 1.68 1.66 3.71 6.02

18.45 17.72 9.60

1.87 2.16 4.41 4.51 1.94 4.20 2.81 1.20 5.90 1.82

62.75 7.24 7.32 29.66 11.50

3I Group AB Foods Aberdeen Asset Admiral Aggreko AMEC Anglo Amer Antofagasta ARM Hldgs AstraZeneca Aviva BAE SYS Babcock Barclays BG BHP Billiton BP Brt Am Tob Br Land BSkyB BT Group Bunzl Burberry Group Capita Group Carnival Centrica Coca Cola HBC Compass CRH Diageo EasyJet Experian Fresnillo Friends Life Gp G4S GKN GlaxoSmKline Glencre Xstrata Hammerson Hargreaves Lans HSBC IMI Imperial Tob InterCont Htls Intl Cons Air Intertek ITV Johnson Math Kingfisher Land Secs

1,694 743 7,873 997 684 3,634 11,845 3,424 4,450 2,130 5,975 8,631 2,807 57,801 8,557 17,266 30,718 3,788 4,084 4,426 16,582 609 1,265 1,373 1,206 19,575 655 2,934 2,855 5,405 1,746 1,814 2,109 7,021 6,416 4,627 9,273 83,777 2,793 2,051 25,152 1,007 2,415 636 6,803 555 7,617 781 14,627 3,228

(000s)

Legal & Gen 14,775 Lloyds Bkg Gp 116,578 London Stock Exch 596 Marks Spr 8,144 Meggitt 2,766 Mondi PLC 1,554 Morrison (W) 16,698 Natl Grid 9,525 Next 527 Old Mutual 16,126 Pearson 3,256 Petrofac 2,387 Persimmon 1,204 Prudential 3,611 Randgold Res 930 Reckitt Benck 1,586 Reed Elsevier 3,269 Rio Tinto 11,799 Rolls-Royce 5,271 Royal Mail 4,581 Ryl Bk Scot 23,798 Ryl Dtch Sh A 4,955 Ryl Dtch Sh B 4,189 RSA Ins 3,306 SABMiller 2,645 Sage Gp 2,870 Sainsbury 7,143 Schroders 302 Svrn Trent 656 Shire 1,622 Smith & Neph 4,405 Smiths 3,441 Sports Direct 1,656 SSE 2,149 Std Chartd 14,866 St. James's Place 1,014 Standard Life 3,827 Tate & Lyle 1,788 Tesco 28,962 Travis Perkins 721 TUI Travel 2,752 Tullow Oil 6,733 Unilever 2,701 Utd Utilities 2,341 Vedanta Res 1,139 Vodafone 60,646 Weir 1,054 William Hill 2,165 Whitbread 357 Wolseley 1,250 WPP 4,406

European money deposits % Currency 1mth Dollar 0.10 Sterling 0.51 Euro -0.13

3mth

6mth

12mth

0.15

0.23

0.48

0.56

0.69

0.98

-0.05

0.05

0.21

Gold/precious metals Bullion: Open $1192.78 Close $1196.53-1197.23 High $1207.20 Low $1186.90 AM $1193.25 PM $1203.75 Krugerrand $1184.00-1257.00 (£756.53-803.17) Platinum $1234.00 (£788.48) Silver $16.41 (£10.49) Palladium $797.00 (£509.25)

Dollar rates Australia Canada Denmark Euro Hong Kong Japan Malaysia Norway Singapore Sweden Switzerland

1.1527-1.1531 1.1236-1.1239 6.0066-6.0091 0.8074-0.8075 7.7568-7.7576 117.71-117.74 3.3409-3.3429 6.7964-6.8009 1.2989-1.2994 7.4732-7.4776 0.9702-0.9705

Other Sterling Argentina peso

13.320-13.331

Australia dollar

1.8038-1.8047

Bahrain dinar

0.5862-0.5938

Brazil real

3.9359-3.9515

Euro

1.2634-1.2639

Hong Kong dollar

12.139-12.141

India rupee

96.553-96.755

Indonesia rupiah

18928-19181

Kuwait dinar KD

0.4549-0.4574

Malaysia ringgit

5.1654-5.3676

New Zealand dollar

1.9830-1.9845

Money rates %

Singapore dollar

2.0326-2.0337

S Africa rand

17.124-17.152

Base Rates Clearing Banks 0.5 Finance House 1.0 ECB Refi 0.05 US Fed Fund 0-0.25

U A E dirham

5.7446-5.7509

Halifax Mortgage Rate 3.5

Exchange rates

Treasury Bills (Dis) Buy: 1 mth 0.44; 3 mth 0.42. Sell: 1 mth 0.34; 3 mth 0.35 1 mth

2 mth

3 mth

6 mth

12 mth

0.5054

0.5309

0.5574

0.6862

0.9824

Clearer CDs

0.58-0.43

0.60-0.45

0.65-0.50

0.80-0.65

1.07-0.92

Depo CDs

0.58-0.43

0.60-0.45

0.65-0.50

0.80-0.65

1.07-0.92

Interbank Rates

Eurodollar Deps

0.05-0.25

0.18-0.38

0.23-0.43

0.35-0.55

0.53-0.78

Eurodollar CDs

0.15-0.08

0.18-0.12

0.22-0.15

0.36-0.21

0.52-0.38

Sterling spot and forward rates Mkt Rates for Copenhagen Euro Montreal New York Oslo Stockholm Tokyo Zurich

Range 9.3001-9.4089 1.2648-1.2497 1.7550-1.7755 1.5631-1.5713 10.571-10.656 11.419-11.722 184.00-185.54 1.5020-1.5200

Close 9.4020-9.4030 1.2637-1.2634 1.7585-1.7588 1.5649-1.5650 10.638-10.642 11.696-11.702 184.21-184.27 1.5184-1.5186

1 month 47ds 4pr 9pr 4ds 99pr 40ds 9ds 8ds Premium = pr

3 month 140ds 11pr 27pr 11ds 273pr 107ds 35ds 29ds Discount = ds

Australia $ Canada $ Denmark Kr Egypt Euro ¤ Hong Kong $ Hungary Indonesia Israel Shk Japan Yen New Zealand $ Norway Kr Poland Russia S Africa Rd Sweden Kr Switzerland Fr Turkey Lira USA $

Bank buys Bank sells 1.990 1.730 1.940 1.690 10.010 8.780 12.390 9.860 1.370 1.200 13.100 11.520 419.030 344.750 22018.400 17563.000 6.640 0.000 200.520 173.660 2.240 1.890 11.530 9.960 5.820 4.770 78.660 65.510 19.110 16.190 12.400 11.020 1.650 1.420 3.900 3.120 1.710 1.500

Rates for banknotes and traveller's cheques as traded by Royal Bank of Scotland plc yesterday

Data as shown is for information purposes only. No offer is made by Morningstar or this publication

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

FGM

Markets Business DANNY LAWSON / PA

Martin Waller Tempus Buy, sell or hold: today’s best share tips

Sands and the Greek chorus

both, then few can see how the bank can avoid the much-forecast and highly dilutive rights issue. The problem, as Gary Greenwood, a banking analyst at Shore Capital, says, is that the risks, regulatory and macroeconomic, are all beyond the bank’s control. Mr Sands has said that it does not need to raise cash. This promise is not legally binding — Standard Chartered could hit the market with a massive rights issue on Monday standard chartered morning and it would have broken here is something of the no rules. Greek tragedies in the fall A rights issue, and some look for of Standard Chartered as much as $10 billion against a Bank and Peter Sands, its market capitalisation of the cerebral chief executive. equivalent of $37 billion, could be The bank sailed through the forced on the bank anyway, financial crisis because its historical therefore. If this happens, or there is roots meant that more than 90 per a further unfavourable trading cent of profits came from Africa, statement, such as the third-quarter Asia and the Middle East and it was update at the end of last month in not exposed to tottering western which profits were down by more economies. than 16 per cent, Mr Sands Mr Sands was the probably will be out. guiding force behind the Standard Chartered hit follow me “balti bailout”, whereby back this month with a on twitter leading figures in finance three-day presentation to for updates and politics sat down over investors in Hong Kong, @MartinWaller10 a curry to plan the rescue insisting that it is in good of banks such as Royal Bank shape. On the two ratios that of Scotland and Lloyds. He was count most in banking, the spoken of as a future chairman of leverage ratio and the core tier 1 the Bank of England. ratio, both measures of balance Now Mr Sands is fighting for his sheet strength, the bank says that it job. The shares have tumbled from is well within accepted parameters. approaching £15 a year ago to little Another metric, the gap between more than £9, although they were up 30.2p at 939.4p last night. Two factors beyond its control MY ADVICE Avoid have brought Standard Chartered WHY There are too many low: the dollar and falling uncertainties, most of them commodities prices. Its exposure to commodities is $61 billion, with outside the bank’s control loans to producers in places such as India and Indonesia. In addition, because its clients tend to borrow in the share price and its book value of dollars, the rising value of the £10.50, is less favourable. Banks greenback against their local usually trade at a discount to book currencies inflates the value of value only if there is trouble ahead. those loans and makes them more The City is split. Mr Greenwood expensive to service. The question is at Shore believes that Standard how much of that loan book is Chartered will survive without a going to have to be written off as a rights, although he cautions that consequence. external events could intervene. On Another uncertainty is the that basis, the shares look continuing investigation into the undervalued. bank’s affairs by American A note from Bernstein Research regulatory authorities, which have suggests that the shares are a already fined it nearly $1 billion. The two-way losing bet. A rights issue first fine, in 2012, was over Iran would force the price down. The sanctions-busting. The second, this alternative — shrinking the loan year, was over internal checks on book and selling assets — would possible money laundering. reduce earnings, so the shares will If any further wrongdoing turns fall anyway. Either way, Bernstein up, another fine could follow. It has set a target price of £7 for the shares. not escaped analysts that such fines I reckon that Standard Chartered are getting larger. In the summer, offers one of the clearest binary BNP Paribas, the French bank, was choices available to investors, fined a record $9 billion for breaches because of those external factors. of US sanctions. Buy the shares at this level if you If anything of that kind hits are prepared to gamble on a benign Standard Chartered, or if that loan outcome. If it were my money, I book requires hefty write-offs, or would avoid them.

T T

he maker of Scalextric cars and Hornby model trains can see light at the end of the tunnel after it cut losses in the first half of the year (Danielle Sheridan writes). Hornby, which also

builds Corgi toys, Airfix models and makes Humbrol paints, halved its losses to £520,000 in the six months to September 30 compared with the same period in 2013 as it sought to get back on track after a bumpy ride

of profit warnings. Group profit before tax reached £250,000, on an underlying basis, recovering from the loss of £850,000 for the same period last year, as group sales increased by 8 per cent to £24.2 million.

Market shows its mettle after Chinese whisper Gary Parkinson Market report

and Centrica, the owner of British t was all about natural resources Gas, off 2p at 292p. shares at the end of a fifth week Others, such as easyJet and of improvement by the stock Johnson Matthey, lost out to bouts of market. Miners and oil profit-taking. The no-frills airline companies dominated the gave back 12p to £15.53, while the leaderboard of a FTSE 100 71.9 points maker of catalytic converters to cut higher at 6,750.8, up 96 on the week car emissions eased 14p to £33.27. and nearly 9 per cent since Among the more meaningful mid-October. broker research, Credit Suisse turned China, the biggest consumer of more cautious about Serco. The metal, was the spur after its central troubled outsourcer now run by bank unexpectedly cut its main Randolph Churchill’s great grandson interest rate for the first time in more Rupert Soames, fell another 9p to than two years to rev up its cooling economy. In spite of iron ore enduring 170p. The shares have almost halved since the latest profit warning less its worst week in 18 months — the than a fortnight ago. A £550 million price has nearly halved this year — fundraising is on the way in March. Anglo American added 86½p to Tullett Prebon, the interdealer £13.80 and Rio Tinto advanced 177p to £30.42. Other metals, including copper broker, which facilitates chunky trades between the big banks, was and gold, rallied. Dearer commodity marked 14½p lower to 253½p after prices buoyed the likes of selling new shares at 248p each to Antofagasta, a Chilean copper miner, raise £32 million to pay for the 33½p to 730½p, and Randgold acquisition of PVM Oil Associates, an Resources, a South African oil broker. The shares have almost goldminer, 161p to £44.96. halved in less than a fortnight Share prices across Europe after a profit warning. rallied harder still after Mario Ophir Energy finally Draghi, president of the tabled a £260 million, European Central Bank, follow us all-share offer to buy hinted that full-blown on twitter Salamander Energy. That quantitative easing to tackle for updates anaemic economic growth @timesbusiness was some way shy of the 121p-a-share offer, plus bonus across the eurozone could be if the assets came good, that on the cards sooner rather than had been suggested by Cepsa until later. QE, as proved in Britain and Salamander disclosed that talks were America already, is a great boon to under way and the Spanish company share prices generally. walked off. Analysts were Yesterday, those shares to give underwhelmed. Liberum said that it ground were ones typically targeted “struggles to see the attraction of the for their safer, more “defensive” qualities by nervous investors in times combination”. Westhouse said “sell” Ophir shares, which fell 10p to 170p as of uncertainty. Cigarette companies, sentiment towards them was drugs makers and utilities all tend to dampened further by a couple of duff have relatively resilient earnings. wells in Tanzania. Salamander rose Among those to miss out on the market’s rally were Imperial Tobacco, but a ha’penny to 91¼p. Another to miss out on the wider the maker of JPS and Lambert market rally was Game Digital, off 3p & Butler gaspers, 39p lower at £28.85,

at 342p. An American rival, GameStop, published profits well below Wall Street’s expectations and cut its Christmas sales forecast, blaming the fortnight’s delay in the release of the latest Assassin’s Creed game and weaker software sales, which more than offset hungry demand for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One gaming consoles. On AIM, FairFx, which lets private punters buy currency at the wholesale prices the pros enjoy via a mobile app, added 7.9 per cent to 61½p after unveiling a new chairman. John

Wall Street report China’s unexpected decision to cut interest rates and subsequent hints by the European Central Bank of more moves to bolster economies on the Continent lifted the Dow Jones industrial average by 112.69 points at midday to 17,831.69. Pearson, the co-founder and former chief executive of Virgin Radio and the ex-chairman of Shazam Entertainment, the smartphone music identification app, is replacing Jason Drummond, a former star of the dotcom boom. FairFx shares made their market debut in August at 45p. Finally, DX ran on 5.2 per cent to 91¼p after a push by Zeus Capital. Andy Hanson, its analyst, told clients that the recent dip in the price of the independent delivery company, which works in a series of niche markets such as the heavier or larger parcels that Royal Mail has shunned and in overnight freight, offered a good opportunity to buy. Royal Mail edged a penny higher to 430½p, in spite of caution from Credit Suisse.

A sea of troubles Standard Chartered Bank share price

1,400p

Source: Thomson Reuters

Hornby’s model is back on the right track

Transactional banking

$957m

1,300

Financial markets

$899m

1,200

Corporate finance

$614m

Wealth management

$441m

Retail products

1,100

Q1 2014

Operating income, by product 3 months to end of September

1,000

Other

$1,211m $392m

900

Total

$4,514m

FGM

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Major-General David Houston Army officer who dealt calmly with sectarian tensions in Northern Ireland Rotund, ebullient and scarcely handsome, David Houston was known for forthright expression of his uncompromising and often inconvenient views. A highland Scot in an Irish regiment, he was selected by Field Marshal Sir Gerald Templer to command the Queen’s Lancashire Regiment, formed from an amalgamation of the Lancashire and Loyal regiments. Commissioned in 1949, he served for 20 years in the Royal Irish Fusiliers, known as “The Faughs” (“Fogs”) from their battle cry, “Faugh-a-Ballagh” or “clear the way”. In charge during a small-arms shooting competition in Germany, he noticed a prince of royal blood — an officer in the brigade cavalry regiment — clearing a stoppage on a light machinegun as other competitors ran ahead to the next firing point. Houston’s language made no concession to the culprit’s status. A merger of the three Irish infantry regiments in 1968 ended his chances of an Irish command. Templer, Colonel of both the Faughs and the Loyals, snapped him up to command the Queen’s Lancashires (QLR). Carrying no baggage from either former regiment, Houston was quick to weld the components into a cohesive team ready for active service in Northern Ireland in May 1970. The 1st QLR deployed across the counties of Armagh, Down, Fermanagh and Tyrone, all well known to Houston as the Faughs drew their recruits from the region. On the day of a demonstration outside Armagh prison where Bernadette Devlin, the republican activist, was being held, two mobs confronted each other. The first brick or bottle thrown would cause a riot. He recognised the leader of one vociferous group climbing onto a barricade, shouting to urge on his side. Houston stepped forward and in his booming voice thundered, “Shut up or I’ll lift you”. The man was a former Irish Fusilier. He snapped to attention and stammered, “Major, sorry — Colonel — Houston”. He then introduced his cronies and all disappeared into the Hole in the Wall bar for a drink. There were less tense moments. Returning

to his battalion headquarters in tweeds and carrying his rod, Houston was confronted by a brigade commander sent from England to get a feel of the situation in case his units were required as reinforcements. “Ah,” said Houston, “I’ve just been on a recce incognito.” “I see,” said the brigadier, “I hope you caught some cognitos?” On return to the mainland, Houston was appointed OBE and lionised as someone who knew what to do in Northern Ireland. In December 1970 he took 1st QLR to Osnabruck to join 12 Mechanised Brigade and convert from marching to mechanised infantry. Earlier the Faughs had conducted field trials on the FV432 armoured personnel carriers with which the battalion was equipped, so he knew the vehicles’ foibles and considerable shortcomings.

In Washington he was adept at explaining complex Irish politics While in Osnabruck he faced a delicate situation when a schoolmaster working with the forces’ education service was caught speeding by the German police. As garrison commander, it was Houston’s duty to administer a rebuke, about which the schoolmaster was understandably prickly. As he entered the office, Houston took up his cane saying, “Now you’ve been a naughty boy, bend over.” Laughter defused the tension. There was little surprise in 1974 when, after a staff job in the Ministry of Defence, Houston was accelerated to brigadier to command 8 Infantry Brigade in Londonderry, where the predominantly Catholic population west of the Foyle remained hostile to the British army’s presence in the aftermath of Bloody Sunday two years earlier. Houston dealt delicately but firmly with this challenge and also the problem of Protestant militancy. Early 1975 brought the further burden of reinstating police primacy in the maintenance of law and order, which proved especially difficult in the Catholic districts beyond the Foyle.

On completion of his brigade command he was advanced to CBE and nominated for the 1976 course at the Royal College of Defence Studies. With Northern Ireland at the top of the security agenda as the Provisional IRA bombing campaign spread to the mainland, his experience was in constant demand. This contributed to his next assignment as military attaché in Washington. No matter how carefully diplomats and politicians explained the Northern Ireland emergency, few Americans grasped the distinction between the Republic and the Province. (“Why don’t you give ’em independence for God’s sake?”). Houston understood and could explain. Neither in appearance nor language did he fit the mould for a diplomatic post yet he did a fine job, his attitude bringing trust and popularity on both the diplomatic and social circuits. Then his fortunes changed. Because of the pressure on brigade commanders in the early years of the Northern Ireland emergency, it was judged prudent to curtail their tours of duty to 18 months, rather than two years. This led to a small increase in the number of brigadiers competing for further promotion. On return from Washington, Houston could have reasonably expected promotion to major-general and command of one of six regional districts in England. But someone had decided he was too unpredictable and he faced another couple of years in a brigadier’s staff appointment. This was not to his liking, as he was apt to make clear to those ready to listen. At the end of 1980, with only one further appointment before retirement, he was made president of the Regular Commissions (selection) Board at Westbury. Although well suited by character and experience it was not a particularly prestigious conclusion to an active and useful military career. David Houston was born in 1929, the son of David Houston senior, and educated at Latymer Upper School, London. Commissioned into the Royal Irish Fusiliers in 1949, he served with them in Korea after the ceasefire and in Kenya during the Mau Mau insurgency. In 1959 he married Jancis Burn whose personality matched his own; they were an entertaining and popular couple. The elder of their two sons Simon, known as Sam, is a private client stockbroker, having earned his spurs in the City. The younger son, Angus, is a consultant in the sport and leisure industry, having run Limerick racecourse from 2001 to 2008. His wife and both sons survive him. After leaving the army in 1980, Houston served as LordLieutenant of Sutherland from 1991 to 2004. When serving in Germany he was visited by a senior civilian scientist from the MoD, who asked him, “What on earth makes you join the British Army and spend so much of your life away from home?” Houston replied, “You don’t join the British Army, you join your regiment.” Major-General David Houston, CVO, CBE, soldier and Lord-Lieutenant for Sutherland 1991-2004, was born onFebruary 24, 1929. He died on November 10, 2014 aged 85

Professor Nigel Walker Criminologist who studied mental disorders Professor Nigel Walker was an expert on criminal behaviour — and especially the role of mental disorders. His portrait of the English penal system, published as Crime and Punishment in Britain in 1965, was the first of its kind and quickly earned praise as a clearsighted and reasoned account of an emotional subject. Interested in the theory and practice of punishment, too, he favoured humane rehabilitation. In the course of his research he often met prisoners at institutions around Oxford and was regularly called upon by government

advisory committees. In the early 1970s, for instance, for the Butler Committee, he produced a study that suggested the mentally ill criminal who tends to repeat his crimes could be accurately identified in advance and, with the right sort of treatment, his crimes could be prevented. The committee’s recommendations were later responsible for the setting up of secure psychiatric units all over the country. Walker was a rather unusual example of a civil servant who crossed into academic life at the mid-point of his career — he had worked in the Home Office

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Friends ring bells as married life begins . . . Marriages & Engagements thetimes.co.uk

Lady Wardington Model and author who was turned down for a BBC announcers’ job for being ‘too beautiful’ It is a common accusation that female television presenters are chosen for their looks. But in the early 1950s Audrey White was turned down for an announcing job by the BBC because she was deemed to be too good looking. Viewers would be distracted from what she was trying to say, it was said, and she might alarm “timid men from Wigan and country districts”. Saying that she had no wish to scare timid male viewers, White accepted her fate and resumed a stellar modelling career which made her one of the most familiar faces in Britain. A newspaper described her at the time as a “strikingly good looking girl with auburn hair — curly and cut short — shining brown eyes and dazzlingly white teeth. With them go long slender legs, a 23-inch waist and considerable self-possession.” From modelling she went on to become a fashion editor and after marrying her second husband, Lord Wardington, a lady of the aristocracy. She was back in the headlines when she launched courses for women who knew nothing of financial matters, and she also wrote a series of books in which she invited famous names to offer practical, everyday hints. She first hit on the idea to raise money for a hospice in Banbury and asked the great and the good for their time and money-saving ideas. Superhints appeared in 1991 and her connections ensured it featured some big names. Princess Margaret advised pouring white wine on to any red spilled on the carpet and leave it for five minutes before mopping up, while Princess Michael of Kent suggested putting candles in the deep freeze to prevent them from dripping. Margaret Thatcher came up with a solution to jet lag: “The secret is not to go to sleep when travelling across time lines but to extend your day until it is night where you are now — even if it means doing nearly 36 hours at a stretch without sleep.” The Marchioness of Northampton suggested using toothpaste to clean flies off the windscreen. Max Hastings revealed that he sprayed hair lacquer on the labels of wine bottles to prevent them peeling off in his damp cellar. An only child, Margaret Audrey where he became interested in psychoanalysis and mental health but resigned to take up the newly established readership in criminology at Oxford. Nigel David Walker was born in 1917 at Tientsin, north China, where his father was a consular official. The family lived there for a decade until the Japanese invasion threatened. They returned to Edinburgh, where the young Walker was known to clamber over tiger cages at the zoo. He was educated at Edinburgh Academy and Christ Church, Oxford, graduating in Greats in 1939. A job in the Scottish health department was soon interrupted by the war, in which he served with the Highland Division and the Lovat Scouts. He was wounded in Italy and saw the end of the war as a captain at Allied Force HQ. In 1939 he married Sheila Margaret

At Wardington Manor in 2005; left, as Audrey White modelling in the 1950s

White was born in Bradford in 1927. Her father, a commercial traveller, abandoned the family when she was young and she moved with her mother, Eva, to north London. She attended Henrietta Barnett School in Finchley and remembered taking exams during the doodlebug raids, sheltering under the desk if a hit seemed imminent. After leaving school at 16 her first job was at the Elizabeth Arden cosmetics salon in Bond Street. As a lowly assistant she was landed with the unglamorous chores but had the good luck to be spotted by Phyllis Digby Morton, editor of Woman and Beauty, who invited her to be photographed for the magazine. Her modelling career soon took off and she appeared in countless advertisements, whether ironing, pushing lawn mowers or smiling for toothpaste. In 1950 she was one of dozens of models interviewed for a National Savings campaign. The requirement was for someone “young, charming and unsophisticated” and she got the job. She was seen on hoardings throughout the country as a bride dressed in white with the slogan: “Everyone has someone worth saving for.” She was later the newspaper and magazine face of the washing powder Dreft, claiming that “I

always find time to give my nylons and undies that all-important nightly dip in Dreft.” Despite being “too beautiful for the BBC”, as the press labelled her, she did pick up television work and a few small film parts and worked as an announcer on commercial radio. In 1954 she became fashion editor of Housewife magazine. She stayed for six years before taking the same job at Go magazine. She told a newspaper that her ideal man must be tall — “that is most important as I am 5ft 9in” — intelligent, about ten years older and preferably connected with the arts. After dating the actors Jon Pertwee and Anthony Steel, she was married in 1953 to Jack Dunfee, who made his name driving Bentleys at the Brooklands circuit in the 1930s and was later a farmer and theatrical impresario. He more than ticked the age box: he was 51 and she was 24. They were eventually divorced and in 1964 she married Christopher Henry Beaumont Pease, known from childhood as Bic, the second Lord Wardington. He was a partner at the stockbrokers Hoare Govett and a bibliophile, who took over his father’s collection and enhanced it with rare maps and atlases including the ear-

Johnston, a medical student, who died in 2007, and they had one daughter, Valerie, who is a clinical psychologist. Walker returned to his civil service duties at St Andrew’s house and became private secretary to Lord Home, then minister of state. Promoted to assistant secretary in the Scottish Home Department, he became responsible for crime and juvenile delinquency. He began writing in his spare time — completing a doctoral dissertation on the logic of the Freudian unconscious and publishing A Short History of Psychotherapy, a lucid account of the various therapeutic techniques. He got an honorary fellowship at Nuffield College, Oxford and when the reader in criminology retired he was invited to apply for the post — still then a new one. He concentrated upon good teaching and insisted that his students meet pris-

oners face-to-face in seminars. He introduced a research unit (now the Centre for Criminological Research) to follow up mentally abnormal offenders and produced, within a very short time, a variety of books and reports — all written in a typically lively style. Recalling the challenges of his earlier career, Walker said: “Another of my shortcomings, however, was that I had never dealt face to face with criminals. I could not begin a lecture like Walter Sprott, the psychologist. ‘My friend the burglar says. . .’ always produced a titillated flutter. Acquaintance with criminals had snob value. I was not alone, of course. In those days one could take a university qualification in criminology without actually talking to a criminal, as I was to find at Cambridge.” He later succeeded Sir Leon Radzinowicz as Wolfson professor of criminol-

liest printed edition (1477 in Bologna) of Ptolemy’s atlas. He and his new wife adopted three children: Lucy, now a full-time mother; Helen, a horsebreeder; and Will, a farmer in Argentina. They all survive her. Lady Wardington, as she now was, worked with her husband to develop the garden which provided a fine backdrop to the family home, the Jacobean Wardington Manor in Oxfordshire, and she became well known for her charity work. She admitted that she had married well and never had to worry about money. Not only that, she was totally ignorant about financial matters and after her husband suffered a heart attack she faced the possibility of being widowed and not able to sort out the family affairs. On a business trip with her husband to Canada she heard of an initiative called Investing for Women and was spurred to do something similar. This led her to start a financial planning course called Capital and Savings Handling, or CASH, aimed squarely at women like herself. The course had barely started when it ran into trouble from equal opportunities. She recalled: “Originally it was described as ‘CASH for women’ but I wasn’t allowed to put that. I’d had all these wretched leaflets printed, so I just put a disclaimer at the bottom, ‘Men can come too’.” She admitted that her aristocratic title added glamour: “Well, it sounds better than Mrs Smith’s CASH course, doesn’t it?” After Lord Wardington’s death in 2005, she decided to sell the manor and live in a smaller house in the village. The previous year an electrical fire starting near the roof swept through one of the wings of the manor. The Wardingtons were abroad on holiday but their daughter, Helen, helped by a human chain of villagers, managed to rescue all the valuable books by taking them from the ground floor libraries to the lawn. Lady Wardington remarked, “the really maddening thing is that the kitchen was absolutely untouched. I would have liked a new kitchen.” Lady Wardington, model, fashion editor and charity fundraiser, was born on November 2, 1927. She died on November 8, 2014, aged 87

ogy and director of the Cambridge Institute of Criminology. The book he wrote in retirement, Dangerous People (1996), is still on the reading lists of criminology courses. Walker drove himself hard, working incessantly and leading an abstemious life. However, he loved taking to the hills for his holidays — he particularly enjoyed climbing the Dolomites — and he had a passion for chess. While working for a time at Yale, he took a seminar in which the students included Bill Clinton and Hillary Rodham. He became enraged when the class thought that crime had one single cause, but later apologised. Hillary replied “At least you cared”. Professor Nigel Walker, criminologist, was born on August 6, 1917. He died on September 13, 2014, aged 97

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

thetimes.co.uk/advertise

Military

A German guide to Hitler’s nemesis Giles MacDonogh

There are dozens of biographies of Churchill and there are likely to be more to mark the 50th anniversary of his death on January 24. Thomas Kielinger’s book is rare, however, in that it has been written by a German. Kielinger is the UK correspondent for the German daily Die Welt. His last book was a biography of the Queen. Churchill might seem a bold choice. He was Hitler’s most dogged opponent, the man with whom he fought a solitary duel until Germany had been destroyed. He had seen the evil of Hitler from the very first, but Churchill was not just Hitler’s nemesis, he did many things that still rankle with Germans, such as unleashing the bombers that killed hundreds of thousands of civilians. Superficial resemblances exist between the two: both were former soldiers, both orators and occasional painters with diminished libidos. Both saw themselves as protected by some divine aegis but where the one was a man of the people who abjured meat and alcohol and abhorred smoking, the other

Churchill did many things that rankle with Germans was a grandee, who abandoned himself to the pleasures of the table. Churchill made it clear that he did not approve of the revenge inflicted on the Germans after May 1945, and yet he was powerless to prevent it. Yalta, suggests Kielinger, was Churchill’s Munich. The agreement with Stalin meant handing Poland to the Soviet Union with thousands of Stalin’s enemies who were promptly shot. Kielinger recognises Churchill’s faults, but he is right to see

Churchill was master of U-turns

him as the only feasible successor to Chamberlain in 1940. Like Bismarck, he was summoned to deal with a crisis. Had Halifax taken the job, he would have accepted Hitler’s peace overtures in July. This is a fine, lively account, but there are lacunae. He underrates the great orator who was Churchill’s father and says too little about Churchill’s role in taking Britain to war in 1914, even if he is aware of Churchill’s failings: he won the war, but lost the peace. Britain was bankrupt. The empire that Churchill put before all else was doomed. There were his many voltefaces: the man who said “kill the Bolshie, kiss the Hun”, fought Germany and allied Britain to Stalin, before earnestly considering attacking Soviet Russia in 1945. He weakened the British armed forces as chancellor, then called for rearmament at the rise of Hitler. He promoted the European Union, and then stood aside from it. He wanted to maintain the “special relationship” with the US: Europe was fine, but not for Britain. Kielinger admires Churchill for his bons mots and his ability to paint sunsets in Casablanca while the German army bled to death at Stalingrad. Kielinger may be German, but his portrait is a far from Teutonic.

Court Circular Whitehall, London SW1, and was received by Her Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant of Greater London (Sir David Brewer).

Buckingham Palace 13th November, 2014 The Duke of Edinburgh, Companion Rat, the Grand Order of Water Rats, this evening held a Reception at Buckingham Palace to mark their One Hundred and Twenty Fifth Anniversary. 21st November, 2014 The Prince of Wales, on behalf of The Queen, held an Investiture at Buckingham Palace this morning. Clarence House 21st November, 2014 The Prince of Wales, Patron, Garden Organic — the Henry Doubleday Research Association, this afternoon visited the National Heritage Garden at Belmond le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons, Church Road, Great Milton, and was received by Her Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant of Oxfordshire (Mr Timothy Stevenson). Kensington Palace 21st November, 2014 The Duke of Cambridge this evening presented the Chatham House Prize to Mrs Melinda Gates at the Banqueting House,

Buckingham Palace 21st November, 2014 The Princess Royal, President, Royal Yachting Association, this morning attended the Annual General Meeting and Awards Luncheon at One Great George Street, London SW1. Kensington Palace 21st November, 2014 The Duke of Gloucester this morning opened Tudor Grange Academy Worcester, Bilford Road, Worcester, and was received by Her Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant of Worcestershire (Lieutenant Colonel Patrick Holcroft). His Royal Highness today visited the Sanctuary Group, Chamber Court, Castle Street, Worcester. The Duke of Gloucester, Chancellor, University of Worcester, this afternoon attended the Graduate Awards Ceremony for the Institute of Health and Society, in Worcester Cathedral. Appendix to Court Circular 21st November, 2014 The Queen has been pleased to appoint Group Captain Mark Driver to be one of Her Majesty’s Body Guard of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen at Arms. The appointment to date from 21st November, 2014.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Television & Radio

Today’s television BBC ONE

6.00am Breakfast 10.00 Saturday Kitchen Live 11.30 Football Focus 12.00 BBC News; Weather 12.10pm Live Formula 1: Abu Dhabi Grand Prix — Qualifying. The battle for pole in the ﬁnal round of the season (Start-time 1.00) 2.15 Live International Rugby Union: Scotland v Tonga (Kick-off 2.30) 4.30 Final Score 5.20 Celebrity Mastermind 5.50 BBC News; Regional News and Weather 6.10 Pointless Celebrities 7.00 Strictly Come Dancing 8.15 Atlantis 9.00 Casualty 9.50 The National Lottery Live 10.00 BBC News; Weather 10.20 Match of the Day 11.45 The Football League Show 1.10am-6.00 BBC News

BBC TWO

6.10am Animal Park 6.40 Formula 1: Abu Dhabi Grand Prix — Practice One 8.20 Formula 1: Abu Dhabi Grand Prix — Practice Two 9.55 Live Formula 1: Abu Dhabi Grand Prix — Practice Three 11.05 Bargain Hunt 11.30 James Martin: Home Comforts 1.00pm Rick Stein’s Far Eastern Odyssey 2.00 Escape to the Country 2.45 FILM: The Red Shoes (1948) 4.55 Live International Rugby Union: Wales v New Zealand (Kick-off 5.30) 7.30 Flog It! Trade Secrets 8.00 Perry and Croft: Made in Britain 8.30 Dad’s Army 9.00 QI XL 9.45 Tomorrow’s Worlds: The Unearthly History of Science Fiction 10.45 Intruders 11.30 FILM: Minority Report (2002) 1.50am-3.10 FILM: The Thing from Another World (1951)

ITV London

6.00am CITV 9.25 ITV News 9.30 The Hungry Sailors 10.25 Murder, She Wrote 11.20 ITV News; Weather 11.25 Storage Hoarders 12.25pm Surprise Surprise 1.30 All Star Family Fortunes 2.15 Doc Martin 3.15 Keep It in the Family 4.15 FILM: Scooby-Doo (2002) 6.00 Regional News 6.15 ITV News; Weather 6.30 New You’ve Been Framed! 7.00 The Chase: Celebrity Special 8.00 The X Factor 9.40 I’m a Celebrity. . . Get Me Out of Here! 10.45 The Jonathan Ross Show 11.50 ITV News 12.05am The Chase 1.00 Jackpot247 3.00 The Jeremy Kyle Show USA 3.45-6.00 ITV Nightscreen

Channel 4

6.15am Trans World Sport 7.10 The Grid 7.35 Anglesey Sandman Triathlon 8.00 The Morning Line 9.00 Weekend Kitchen 10.00 Everybody Loves Raymond 10.35 Frasier 11.05 The Big Bang Theory 12.00 The Simpsons 12.30pm Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD 1.30 Live Channel 4 Racing. From Haydock Park and Ascot 4.00 Come Dine with Me 6.30 Channel 4 News

7.00 Speed with Guy Martin 8.00 Walking Through History: King John’s Ruin — Peak District 9.00 It Was Alright in the 1970s 10.00 FILM: Lawless (2012) 12.20am FILM: JFK (1991) 3.40 Hollyoaks 5.55-6.10 SuperScrimpers

Sky1

6.00am Are You Smarter Than a 10-Year-Old? 7.00 Glee 8.00 The Fantasy Football Club 9.00 The F1 Show 10.00 Soccer AM 12.00 Live Formula 1. The Abu Dhabi Grand Prix qualifying session 2.35pm The Hunger Games: Mockingjay — Part One Special 3.00 WWE Superstars 4.00 All Aboard: East Coast Trains 5.00 Portrait Artist of the Year 2014 6.00 The Simpsons 7.00 NCIS: Los Angeles 8.00 Hawaii Five-0 9.00 FILM: Alien — The Director’s Cut (1979) 11.15 A League of Their Own 12.15am Costa Del Street Crime 1.15 Hawaii Five-0 2.05 Starlings 4.00 Nothing to Declare 5.006.00 Crash Test Dummies

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Sport

Bellew aims to keep lid on emotions

ANDREW COULDRIDGE / ACTION IMAGES

Boxing

Ron Lewis Boxing Correspondent

Tony Bellew does crazy well, as Nathan Cleverly knows after finding himself the object of just about everything Bellew dislikes in the build-up to their cruiserweight bout at the Echo Arena, Liverpool, tonight. Revenge has been the motivating factor, but Bellew will have to keep his emotions in check if he is to achieve the victory that he has craved for three years. They previously met at the same arena in 2011 as two unbeaten lightheavyweights, Cleverly retaining his WBO title with a narrow points victory. The build-up to that had been soaked in antipathy, which Bellew admitted was largely put on. But the Welshman’s refusal to give Bellew the respect he felt that he deserved after that bout has stoked a fire that has burnt in Bellew ever since. His bad intentions towards Cleverly now are all too real. Both have plenty to prove, though, having ended their light-heavyweight careers on a low point, Bellew against Adonis Stevenson for the WBC title in Canada, Cleverly in four painful rounds against Sergey Kovalev in Cardiff. Cleverly took the defeat badly. Not only was his world title gone, but there was little to take from the manner of his defeat. There were even rumours that he would retire, but after several months he re-emerged with a new trainer, Darren Wilson, who replaced Cleverly’s father, Vince, and at a new weight — cruiserweight. “The change was something I needed, mentally and physically, to freshen things up,” Cleverly said. “It had gone a bit stale. I am enjoying my training again, which is very important for me. It brings out the best in me.” Having boxed as low as lightmiddleweight when he turned professional, Cleverly has yet to prove that the heavier division really suits him. Certainly he never looked huge as a lightheavyweight and admits that his dieting was often haphazard. Bellew certainly looks better for the move up in weight. He boxed as an 6 Lisa Whiteside and Sandy Ryan have ensured that Great Britain will win two medals at the Women’s World Championships in Jeju Island, South Korea, after reaching the semi-finals. Whiteside, 29, who is in the team at flyweight because Nicola Adams, the Olympic champion, is injured, won a majority points decision over Mandy Bujold to guarantee at least a bronze medal, while Ryan, 21, was impressive in winning a unanimous points decision over Simona Sitar, of Romania. The semi-finals take place tomorrow.

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Pacquiao gets reminder of familiar foe as Algieri awaits Ron Lewis

Manny Pacquiao has spent the past five years answering questions about when he will box Floyd Mayweather, so you can forgive him a bit of scepticism when the subject has been raised this week, in the run-up to his bout against Chris Algieri. The Filipino has been happy to face Mayweather for years. It is his promoter, Bob Arum, and Mayweather who have found business so hard to do, and boxing has suffered for it. Now, it really could happen, or so says Arum, who could just be trying to ramp up interest in this weekend’s bout. Compared with PacquiaoMayweather, Pacquiao-Algieri, for the Filipino’s WBO welterweight title, is a tough sell. It takes place in the Chinese gambling hub of Macau tomorrow morning, ensuring that it is prime-time Saturday night in the United States. Algieri, an unbeaten New Yorker, scored an upset win over Ruslan Provodnikov to win the WBO lightPacquiao has been questioned despite his recent success

Best of enemies: Cleverly, left, and Bellew attempt to goad each other during the weigh-in for their cruiserweight title bout

amateur in the bigger division, where he had to stay at fight weight throughout a tournament, rather than just one weigh-in, but making 12st 7lb began to become unhealthy for him and his family. “I was a bore, I was full of anger and frustration and I wasn’t a nice person to be around when I was making weight,” he said. “I had a temper, I’d snap. Many times I had to move out of home and stay in a hotel. Plus my immune system was low and I’d constantly get sick.” With no huge stars in the cruiserweight division, the winner tonight is likely to step straight into a world-title shot . There might be nowhere to go for the loser. Bellew must keep his emotions in check if he is to win. Boxing is tough enough when under pressure without excess aggression clouding judgment

and Cleverly is not the type to be intimidated. Cruiserweight could be the making of Bellew, though, and the Liverpudlian has the one-punch power to take anyone out. It is Cleverly who has most to prove, most notably about whether he can retain his speed, his best asset, at the higher weight. If not, Bellew looks likely to turn the tables on his hated rival. On a crowded undercard in Liverpool, both James DeGale and George Groves have what are likely to be their final bouts before challenging for different versions of the world supermiddleweight title, while Anthony Joshua’s progress as an unbeaten heavyweight is unlikely to be stopped by Michael Sprott, the former European champion, whose best days look long behind him. Almost hidden away on the bill, Scott

Quigg and Jamie McDonnell make defences of their WBA titles, at superbantamweight and bantamweight respectively. Quigg faces Hidenori Otake, of Japan, hoping for a bout against Carl Frampton, the IBF champion, soon; McDonnell knows a unification bout is waiting for him. Beat Javier Nicolas Chacon, of Argentina, tonight and McDonnell will be meeting Tomoki Kameda, the impressive WBO champion from Japan, early next year and that bout is inspiring him on his morning runs. “I’ve planned it out,” he said. “I’m going to go to Las Vegas and beat Kameda, pick his title up. Then I am going to come home and unify against Randy Caballero. Then I will go to Japan and take on WBC champion Shinsuke Yamanaka with four belts on the line — that’s my little vision.”

welterweight title in June, but few give him a chance against Pacquiao. Hence people ask about Mayweather. “I will fight any fighter and don’t run from anyone,” Pacquiao said. “It’s clear that I have been trying to make this [Mayweather] fight happen for a long time — not for me, because I am comfortable with what I have done in the sport of boxing, but for the fans because they have been calling for this fight for so long. “At the moment, my mind is solely on Algieri, but I hope the fight with Floyd can happen because it would be huge for boxing.” At 35, Pacquiao has a lot of miles on the clock, having won his first world title, at flyweight, in 1998. Despite comfortable wins in his past two bouts, against Brandon Rios and Timothy Bradley, some also question whether he is the same boxer after his knockout defeat by Juan Manuel Márquez in 2012. “I feel very good and I’m in great shape for this fight,” Pacquiao said. “I intend to show the world that I am still the top welterweight around.” 6 Manny Pacquiao versus Chris Algieri is live on BoxNation (Sky 437/490HD, Virgin 546, TalkTalk 525) tonight. Visit boxnation.com to subscribe

Fixtures Today Football Kick-off 3.0 unless stated Barclays Premier League: Arsenal v Manchester United (5.30); Chelsea v West Bromwich Albion; Everton v West Ham; Leicester v Sunderland; Manchester City v Swansea; Newcastle v Queens Park Rangers; Stoke v Burnley. Sky Bet Championship: Blackburn v Leeds; Blackpool v Bolton; Bournemouth v Ipswich; Charlton v Millwall; Huddersfield v Sheffield Wednesday (12.15); Norwich v Brighton; Rotherham v Birmingham; Watford v Derby; Wigan v Middlesbrough; Wolverhampton Wanderers v Nottingham Forest. P W D L F A GD Pts Derby...................17 9 5 3 33 16 17 32 Bournemouth......17 9 4 4 33 16 17 31 Middlesbrough....17 9 4 4 26 12 14 31 Ipswich................17 8 6 3 25 17 8 30 Watford...............17 8 5 4 30 19 11 29 *Brentford..........17 8 4 5 24 23 1 28 Blackburn............17 7 6 4 27 24 3 27 Charlton .............. 17 6 9 2 20 18 2 27

Wolves................17 7 6 4 22 22 0 Norwich...............17 7 5 5 25 19 6 Nottm Forest......17 6 7 4 26 23 3 *Cardiff...............17 6 5 6 21 21 0 Sheffield Wed.....17 4 9 4 12 14 -2 *Reading.............17 6 3 8 22 27 -5 Leeds...................17 5 5 7 20 24 -4 Huddersfield.......17 5 5 7 25 31 -6 *Fulham..............17 5 4 8 27 31 -4 Millwall...............17 4 6 7 19 24 -5 Rotherham..........17 4 6 7 15 24 -9 Brighton..............17 3 8 6 17 20 -3 Bolton..................17 5 2 10 20 27 -7 Wigan..................17 3 7 7 18 22 -4 Birmingham........17 3 7 7 14 29 -15 Blackpool.............17 1 4 12 11 29 -18 * does not include last night’s matches

27 26 25 23 21 21 20 20 19 18 18 17 17 16 16 7

League One: Bradford City v Gillingham; Bristol City v Preston; Chesterfield v Barnsley; Colchester v Coventry; Crawley Town v Scunthorpe; Fleetwood Town v Walsall; Leyton Orient v Crewe; Milton Keynes Dons v Port Vale; Notts County v Yeovil; Peterborough v Swindon; Rochdale v Doncaster; Sheffield United v Oldham. P W D L F A GD Pts Bristol City..........17 10 6 1 33 18 15 36 Swindon..............17 9 5 3 33 19 14 32 Preston................17 9 4 4 29 19 10 31

Notts County ...... 16 Sheffield Utd ...... 16 MK Dons..............14 Peterborough......17 Rochdale..............16 Oldham................17 Fleetwood Town.17 Barnsley..............16 Port Vale.............17 Bradford City ...... 17 Chesterfield........17 Crawley...............17 Walsall................17 Doncaster............15 Colchester...........17 Gillingham...........17 Coventry..............17 Leyton Orient......17 Scunthorpe..........16 Crewe..................17 Yeovil..................17

8 9 8 8 8 6 7 6 6 6 5 5 4 5 4 4 4 3 4 4 3

5 3 23 2 5 23 3 3 29 3 6 25 2 6 29 8 3 24 4 6 19 4 6 26 4 7 23 4 7 22 6 6 23 5 7 16 7 6 14 3 7 14 5 8 24 5 8 17 5 8 20 7 7 19 3 9 19 3 10 13 5 9 12

14 19 16 19 16 19 16 26 24 23 24 26 16 22 27 24 28 25 30 32 27

9 4 13 6 13 5 3 0 -1 -1 -1 -10 -2 -8 -3 -7 -8 -6 -11 -19 -15

29 29 27 27 26 26 25 22 22 22 21 20 19 18 17 17 17 16 15 15 14

League Two: Accrington Stanley v Cambridge United; Burton Albion v Luton; Bury v Newport County; Cheltenham v Wycombe; Dagenham & Redbridge v Carlisle; Exeter v Shrewsbury; Hartlepool v York; Mansfield v Plymouth; Northampton v Stevenage; Oxford United v AFC Wimbledon; Portsmouth v Morecambe; Tranmere v Southend.

P W D L F A GD Pts Luton...................17 10 4 3 20 11 9 34 Shrewsbury.........17 10 3 4 27 12 15 33 Wycombe............17 9 5 3 24 15 9 32 Burton.................17 10 2 5 24 21 3 32 Plymouth.............17 9 3 5 21 9 12 30 Bury.....................17 9 3 5 26 18 8 30 Southend.............17 8 4 5 17 14 3 28 Morecambe.........17 8 2 7 19 17 2 26 Newport County . 17 6 7 4 22 18 4 25 Cambridge...........17 7 3 7 28 21 7 24 Stevenage...........17 7 3 7 26 25 1 24 Exeter..................17 6 6 5 21 21 0 24 Portsmouth.........17 6 5 6 18 19 -1 23 AFC Wimbledon..17 6 5 6 23 25 -2 23 Accrington...........17 7 2 8 24 28 -4 23 Cheltenham.........17 6 4 7 16 23 -7 22 Northampton......17 6 3 8 26 25 1 21 Oxford United.....17 5 4 8 19 23 -4 19 Mansfield............17 5 4 8 14 21 -7 19 Carlisle................17 5 3 9 21 30 -9 18 York.....................17 2 9 6 14 21 -7 15 Dag & Red ........... 17 4 3 10 19 28 -9 15 Tranmere ............ 17 2 6 9 15 23 -8 12 Hartlepool...........17 3 3 11 12 28 -16 12 Vanarama Conference: AFC Telford v Braintree Town; Aldershot v Eastleigh; Chester v Bristol Rovers; Dover v Forest Green; Grimsby v Kidderminster; Lincoln City v Dartford; Macclesfield v Alfreton Town; Nuneaton v Southport; Torquay

v Gateshead; Welling v Halifax; Woking v Barnet; Wrexham v Altrincham. North: AFC Fylde v Stockport County; Brackley v Bradford Park Avenue; Chorley v Hyde; Colwyn Bay v Gloucester; Guiseley v Barrow; Harrogate Town v Worcester; Hednesford v Tamworth; Leamington v Boston United; Lowestoft Town v North Ferriby United; Solihull Moors v Gainsborough; Stalybridge v Oxford City. South: Boreham Wood v Gosport Borough; Bromley v Sutton United; Chelmsford v Bath City; Eastbourne Borough v Ebbsfleet United; Farnborough v Hayes & Yeading; Hemel Hempstead v Basingstoke; St Albans v Havant & Waterlooville; Staines Town v Bishop’s Stortford; Wealdstone v Concord Rangers; Weston-super-Mare v Whitehawk. Scottish Premiership: Celtic v Dundee; Dundee United v Kilmarnock; Hamilton v St Mirren; Inverness Caledonian Thistle v Motherwell; St Johnstone v Ross County. Scottish Championship: Alloa v Falkirk; Cowdenbeath v Livingston; Dumbarton v Hibernian; Heart of Midlothian v Rangers (12.45); Queen of the South v Raith (5.30). League One: Dunfermline v Stirling; Forfar v Ayr; Morton v Stenhousemuir; Peterhead v Brechin; Stranraer v Airdrieonians. League Two: Arbroath v Clyde; Berwick v Annan Athletic; East Fife v Elgin; East Stirling v Montrose; Queen’s Park v Albion.

Rugby union Kick-off 3.0 unless stated International matches: England v Samoa (7.0, at Twickenham); France v Argentina (8.0); Ireland v Australia (4.30, at Aviva Stadium); Italy v South Africa (2.0); Scotland v Tonga (2.30, at Rugby Park); Wales v New Zealand (5.30, at Millennium Stadium). Aviva Premiership: Exeter v Wasps; London Irish v Bath. Greene King IPA Championship: Doncaster v London Scottish (2.30); Moseley v Nottingham. SSE National League One: Cinderford v Wharfedale (2.30); Darlington Mowden Park v Blackheath; Ealing Trailfinders v Fylde; Esher v Loughborough Students; Hartpury College v Rosslyn Park (2.30); Macclesfield v Old Albanian; Richmond v Blaydon (2.30); Tynedale v Coventry (2.0). League Two: North: Ampthill v Caldy (2.15); Birmingham & Solihull v Stourbridge (2.0); Broadstreet v Otley (2.15); Chester v Leicester Lions; Hull Ionians v Harrogate (2.0); Preston Grasshoppers v Luctonian (2.30); Sedgley Park v Huddersfield (2.30); Stockport v Hull (2.15). South: Cambridge v Worthing (2.0); Chinnor v Taunton; Dings Crusaders v Shelford

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Sport

Baxter reaps the rewards of farm life and building Exeter’s new crop Rugby union

TONY MARSHALL / GETTY IMAGES

how they stand

Chris Hamilton

No one seems quite sure how good Exeter Chiefs can be this season, least of all themselves. Promoted to the top flight for the first time in 2010, the Devon club lie second in the Aviva Premiership heading into today’s visit of London Wasps. That is testament to their remarkable progress under Rob Baxter, the club’s thoughtful and grounded director of rugby. When Baxter took the reins in 2009, few could have predicted what would follow: an immediate promotion and Premiership finishes of eighth, fifth, sixth and eighth. The club’s long-serving former captain, who still lives on the family farm just outside Exeter, has attracted admiring glances, but remains focused on continuing the Chiefs’ ascent. “There has been some tentative interest from elsewhere but never anything I have reciprocated,” Baxter told The Times. “I enjoy being at Exeter and I like spending time on the farm. As a family, we are settled here. “My father, John, played several hundred games for the club and when I grew up I decided I wanted to be a rugby player, too. It was a big target of mine, so to captain the team for ten years and then become coach, it has a lot of emotional importance to me. “Exeter are an ambitious club and the most fantastic thing is that, as a story, it’s far from finished. I’m right in the middle of it and I don’t want to let that go because it’s relatively rare that you find something as good as this.” The financial input of Tony Rowe, the owner, who is a telecoms magnate, in Exeter’s rise has been well documented. On the field, Baxter has signed players with a point to prove, stirred in plenty of home-grown spice and blended the Chiefs into a wellbalanced, well-motivated force punching above their weight. In terms of recruitment budget, the contrast with the aristocrats of the Premiership is stark. “We don’t spend up to the salary cap and we’re still not a full shareholder in the Premiership,” Baxter said. “We don’t receive the maximum income stream from being a top-flight club, but that will come. “As our income increases, we can

P W D L F A B Pts Northampton 7 5 0 2 215 106 6 26 Exeter 7 5 0 2 225 130 4 24 Bath 7 5 0 2 217 131 4 24 Saracens 7 5 1 1 209 142 2 24 Wasps 7 4 0 3 220 148 4 20 *Harlequins 7 4 0 3 149 150 2 18 *Sale 7 3 0 4 183 176 4 16 *Gloucester 7 3 0 4 177 181 4 16 Leicester 7 3 1 3 138 174 2 16 London Irish 7 2 0 5 133 192 4 12 *Newcastle 7 2 0 5 129 176 1 9 London Welsh 7 0 0 7 54 343 1 1 * does not include last night’s matches Fixtures: Today (3pm): Exeter Chiefs v Wasps; London Irish v Bath. Tomorrow: London Welsh v Leicester Tigers (3.15pm); Saracens v Northampton Saints (1pm).

Tries! Tries! Tries!

Times Sport

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Making progress: Ben White, of Exeter Chiefs, bursts forward during their morale-boosting win away to Northampton

reinvest it in the team and try and push forward even farther. We’re trying to become a little bit better every year, and I think that’s what we do quite well. We’ve won at every ground in the Premiership, so we know we can compete with anyone.” The capacity of Sandy Park will be increased to 12,500 for next year’s three World Cup matches, and the club’s academy is flourishing. Take the emergence of Jack Nowell, Henry

Slade, Sam Hill and Luke CowanDickie as proof. “When I was playing for Exeter, we were losing players to Bath or Gloucester and beyond,” Baxter said. “Stemming that flow was important, and we have invested time in a lot of young players, because you would hope they want to play for Exeter. “We are seeing that now and will continue to see it, because we’ve got a strong academy, which is only going to

get better.” There is trust and there is undeniable progress at all levels, but the next chapter for Baxter would be to secure a coveted play-off berth. Victory away to Northampton Saints, the champions, last weekend encourages hopes of doing that. Could Exeter defy the odds and finish in the top four? “In sport, it’s always possible to have a good year,” the 43-year-old said, with typical pragmatism. “I’m not going to

say it’s impossible because it’s something we strive to do. “You look at Northampton and they have a large group of players who have stayed together for quite a long time. “We’ve brought in guys like Thomas Waldrom, who has been a big signing for us this year [from Leicester], but we also spend a lot of time on retaining players and working on our academy products. We’re now reaping the rewards.”

Results (2.30); Dorking v Bishops Stortford (2.30); Henley v Redruth; Launceston v Clifton (2.30); Lydney v Canterbury; Southend v Old Elthamians (2.30). Principality Building Society Welsh Premiership: Newport v Neath (1.30). Ulster Bank Irish League: First division: Section A: Clontarf v Ballynahinch (2.0); Dolphin v St Mary’s College (2.30). Section B: Ballymena v Shannon (2.30); Dublin University v Corinthians (2.0); Galwegians v Belfast Harlequins (2.30); Malone v Garryowen (2.30); UL Bohemian v Buccaneers (2.30).

Other sport Basketball: BBL Championship: Plymouth v Newcastle (7.30). Ice hockey: Rapid Solicitors Elite League: Braehead v Sheffield (7.0); Coventry v Cardiff (7.0); Fife v Nottingham (7.15); Hull v Dundee (6.30).

Tomorrow Football Barclays Premier League: Crystal Palace v Liverpool (1.30); Hull v Tottenham (4.0).

Scottish Premiership: Partick v Aberdeen (12.45). Women’s international match: England v Germany (3.0, at Wembley Stadium).

Rugby union Aviva Premiership: London Welsh v Leicester (3.15); Saracens v Northampton (1.0). Guinness PRO12: Benetton Treviso v Leinster (2.30); Edinburgh v Cardiff Blues (4.0). Greene King IPA Championship (3.0): Bristol v Rotherham Titans; Cornish Pirates v Bedford. Ulster Bank Irish League: First division: Section A (2.30): Lansdowne v Young Munster; Terenure College v Old Belvedere; UCD v Cork Constitution.

Other sport Basketball: BBL Championship: Durham v London (4.0); Manchester v Cheshire (6.0). Ice hockey: Rapid Solicitors Elite League: Cardiff v Edinburgh (6.0); Nottingham v Dundee (4.0); Sheffield v Coventry (5.0).

Cricket Second Test match Pakistan v New Zealand

Dubai (final day of five): Pakistan drew with New Zealand New Zealand: First Innings 403 (T W M Latham 137; Zulfiqar Babar 4 for 137.) Second Innings (overnight 167-6) LRPL Taylor st Ahmed b Shah 104 MD Craig c Rahat Ali b Shah 34 TG Southee c Azhar Ali b Babar 20 IS Sodhi not out 2 Extras (lb 3) 3 Total (9 wkts dec, 64.5 overs) 250 Fall of wickets: 1-42, 2-63, 3-78, 4-79, 5-125, 6-166, 7-226, 8-228, 9-250. Bowling: Ali 8-0-39-0; Adil 8-1-33-0; Babar 27.5-5-96-4; Shah 21-1-79-5. Pakistan: First Innings 393 (Shafiq Ahmed 112, Azhar Ali 75, Younus Khan 72) Second Innings Shan Masood lbw b Boult 40 Taufeeq Umar c Watling b Southee 4 Azhar Ali c Neesham b Craig 24 Younus Khan c Taylor b Craig 44 *Misbah-ul-Haq c Watling b Boult 0

Asad Shafiq not out 41 †Sarfaz Ahmed not out 24 Extras (b 15, lb 2, w 1, nb 1) 19 Total (5 wkts, 67 overs) 196 Fall of wickets: 1-8, 2-70, 3-73, 4-75, 5-149. Bowling: Boult 10-6-12-2; Southee 11-3-21-1; Craig 17-3-66-2; Sodhi 21-5-63-0; Anderson 3-1-4-0; Neesham 2-1-1-0; McCullum 3-0-12-0. Umpires: R E J Martinesz (Sri Lanka) and P R Reiffel (Australia). 6 Pakistan lead three-match series 1-0.

Fourth one-day international Australia v South Africa

MCG (South Africa won toss): Australia beat South Africa by three wickets South Africa (balls) †Q de Kock c and b Maxwell 17 (38) HM Amla c Cummins b Coulter-Nile 18 (20) F du Plessis c Wade b Cummins 28 (37) *AB de Villiers c Smith b Cummins 91 (88) DA Miller c Smith b Faulkner 45 (61) F Behardien run out 22 (23) R McLaren c Wade b Starc 13 (14) RJ Peterson b Faulkner 11 (12) WD Parnell not out 3 (3) DW Steyn not out 0 (4) Extras (b 5, lb 5, w 9) 19 Total (8 wkts, 50 overs) 267

KJ Abbott did not bat. Fall of wickets: 1-28, 2-70, 3-77, 4-199, 5-230, 6-246, 7-261, 8-262. Bowling: Starc 10-0-40-1; Coulter-Nile 3-016-1; Cummins 10-0-61-2; Maxwell 9-0-43-1; Watson 5-0-25-0; Faulkner 10-0-45-2; Smith 3-0-27-0. Australia (balls) AJ Finch c du Plessis b Parnell 22 (37) DA Warner lbw b Abbott 4 (8) SR Watson c de Kock b McLaren 19 (25) SPD Smith b Peterson 104 (112) *GJ Bailey c de Kock b Steyn 16 (29) G Maxwell c Amla b Steyn 2 (5) †MS Wade c McLaren b Parnell 52 (59) JP Faulkner not out 34 (19) PJ Cummins not out 1 (1) Extras (b 5, lb 2, w 6, nb 1) 14 Total (7 wkts, 49 overs) 268 NM Coulter-Nile and MA Starc did not bat. Fall of wickets: 1-8, 2-43, 3-48, 4-86, 5-98, 6-219, 7-267. Bowling: Steyn 9-0-47-2; Abbott 10-0-43-1; McLaren 10-0-62-1; Parnell 9-0-52-2; Peterson 8-0-44-1; Behardien 3-0-13-0. Umpires: B F Bowden (New Zealand) and J D Ward. 6 Australia lead five-match series 3-1

Golf DP World Tour Championship Jumeirah Golf Estates: Leading scores after second round (GB and Ire unless stated): 134: H Stenson (Swe) 68, 66. 136: D Willett 69, 67; R Ramsay 67, 69; R McIlroy 66, 70. 137: R CabreraBello (Sp) 73, 64; J Rose 71, 66; K Broberg (Swe) 70, 67; T Olesen (Den) 67, 70; S Lowry 66,71. 138: D Howell 71, 67; T Hatton 70, 68. 139: B Grace (SA) 72,67; V Dubuisson (Fr) 71, 68; R Karlsson (Swe) 71, 68; H Otto (SA) 71, 68; J Luiten (Neth) 70, 69. 140: D Fichardt (SA) 72, 68; S Gallacher 72, 68; T Bjorn (Den) 71, 69; P Larrazabal (Sp) 71, 69; G Coetzee (SA) 70, 70; L Ooosthuizen (SA) 69, 71. 141: M Kaymer (Ger) 72, 69; R Wattel (Fr) 71, 70; L Westwood 70, 71. Others: 142: L Donald 76, 66; G McDowell 72, 70. 144: I Poulter 75, 69; M A Jiménez (Sp) 71, 73.

Tennis Davis Cup final Lille: First day (best of five): France level with Switzerland 1-1: S Wawrinka (Switz) bt J-W Tsonga (Fr) 6-1, 3-6, 6-3, 6-2; G Monfils (Fr) bt R Federer (Switz) 6-1, 6-4, 6-3.

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Sport

Ali’s cameo keeps heat off Cook GARETH COPLEY / GETTY IMAGES

Sri Lanka A v England XI Colombo (Sri Lanka A won toss): England XI beat Sri Lanka A by 56 runs (D/L method)

Cricket

Richard Hobson Deputy Cricket Correspondent

England will complete their preparation for the one-day series against Sri Lanka tomorrow, having opened their tour with a result and performance yesterday that have given Peter Moores and Alastair Cook some early breathing space. After their first big call of the trip, the head coach and captain can feel thoroughly vindicated. Thrusting Moeen Ali to open alongside Cook was sure to raise questions: not so much, “Why Ali?” as “why not Alex Hales?”, with the heavy implication that Cook’s own position ought to be the one under scrutiny. The debate serves little immediate purpose, given the commitment of the selectors, and the new opening partnership could not have bedded in more effectively. Ali starred against Sri Lanka A either side of rain while Cook, having played out a maiden when England began to chase their initial target of 199, hit 54 from 62 balls, including a slog-swept six against the spin of Ramith Rambukwella. But for the 21-ball fifty of Ali, the captain’s innings would have featured heavily in post-match analysis. The home team looked strong on paper, but less effective in the middle. Only Kusal Perera, whose three oneday innings in the recent whitewash by India yielded four runs, enhanced his claims to feature when the one-day series begins on Wednesday, weather

scoreboard Sri Lanka A (balls) MDKJ Perera c Ali b Finn 56 (74) JK Silva c Buttler b Finn 2 (5) N Dickwella c Tredwell b Ali 17 (31) †LD Chandimal c Cook b Ali 0 (2) *SMA Priyanjan c Buttler b Stokes 31 (43) SHT Kandamby c Morgan b Ali 0 (6) BMAJ Mendis not out 42 (55) RLB Rambukwella not out 30 (45) Extras (lb 3, w 14, nb 3) 20 Total (6 wkts, 43 overs) 198 PLS Gamage, PVD Chameera and MVT Fernando did not bat. Fall of wickets: 1-5, 2-49, 3-49, 4-104, 5-105, 6-122. Bowling: Finn 8-1-43-2; Woakes 8-1-20-0; Tredwell 8-2-33-0; Ali 9-0-29-3; Jordan 5-0-48-0; Stokes 3-0-15-1; Root 2-0-7-0. England XI (balls) *AN Cook c Rambukwella b Gamage 54 (62) MM Ali c Chameera b Gamage 56 (37) IR Bell not out 16 (35) JE Root not out 15 (16) Extras (w 4) 4 Total (2 wkts, 25 overs) 145 EJG Morgan,†JC Buttler, BA Stokes, CR Woakes, CJ Jordan, JC Tredwell and ST Finn did not bat. Fall of wickets: 1-94, 2-116. Bowling: Gamage 7-1-36-2; Fernando 1-0-25-0; Rambukwella 5-0-29-0; Priyanjan 4-0-22-0; Chameera 5-0-18-0; Mendis 3-0-15-0. Umpires: RA Kottahachchi and PN Udawatta.

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Smith leaves top job after season ends in relegation Richard Hobson

Cross purposes: Cook was his usual conservative self with the bat yesterday while Ali, right, scored a 21-ball half-century

permitting. Perera will have another chance tomorrow. His own 56, from 74 balls, was heavily overshadowed as Ali made an immediate impression in his new roles as a sort of Tillekeratne Dilshan, bowling spin and hitting as far as he can. Not that there was much brutal in the way he stroked his first six balls against Vishwa Fernando to the ropes. The bowler was later carried from the field with a twisted ankle, bruised ego and figures of 1-0-25-0, a wide separating those boundaries. “I have faced him for the [England] Lions so I knew how he bowled,” Ali said. “Invitingly” might have been the adverb of choice. At left-arm fastmedium, Fernando offered Ali the opportunity to swing his arms through the off side four times, with the other two boundaries whipped through midwicket and deflected behind square. While he intended to be aggressive, Ali did not expect the runs to

accumulate quite so quickly. “I just reacted to what came down,” he said. “There were a couple of half-volleys, a low full toss, then one that was a little bit wide. It is a role I feel comfortable in and when I play well, that is what I do — just go out and enjoy hitting the new ball. “My mindset was to be positive, to play my shots and not be afraid to get out playing a shot.” The strokeplay continued and Ali hit ten fours in his first 17 balls in all, before driving Rambukwella over the top for a six to raise his fifty. He then lost some of his momentum and succumbed to a top-edged pull. Nevertheless, his early fearlessness rubbed off on Cook. The captain was approaching a scoring rate of a run per ball when he picked out deep mid-on to give Lahiru Gamage, the seam bowler and another who struggled in India, a second wicket. The opening stand yielded 94 runs

from 79 legitimate balls. Joe Root and Ian Bell were cruising before bad light and rain curtailed play. “If everything goes right, I would love to open all the way through to the World Cup,” Ali said. “I would love to open for England for the rest of my life, but I do not look on it as a permanent job, I see is as an opportunity. Alex Hales is a really good player and Alastair played fantastically well. It is good that there are three of us.” Ali was also the most successful of the bowlers, removing a pair of Test players in Niroshan Dickwella and Dinesh Chandimal within three balls. Steven Finn provided early penetration, Chris Woakes economy and James Tredwell reliability in short spells. On the negative side, Chris Jordan was expensive and struggled for rhythm, as he did at the back end of last season. England conceded 14 runs in wides overall, and Harry Gurney may be given an opportunity tomorrow.

David Smith, the former Warwickshire batsman, has left his post as Northamptonshire chief executive after the county lost 12 of their 16 games and were left 75 points adrift at the bottom of the LV=County Championship first division last season. He was appointed in late 2011 and the county won the Friends Life t20 as well as earning promotion in 2013, but they were soon exposed at the higher level when injuries hit. Never afraid to speak his mind, either about the broader game or his team, Smith gave a radio interview in midseason that heavily criticised the players. It had little effect. He pointed to improved facilities for members and spectators and said that the club were more sustainable financially as a result of a conference venue development. “I feel I can look back with real pride on my contribution,” Smith said. The team will feature a different make-up in 2015 under Alex Wakely, the new captain. Steven Smith presented the strongest case to become a regular member of the Australia one-day side by hitting 104 from 112 balls in the three-wicket win against South Africa in Melbourne yesterday. The result established an unassailable 3-1 lead for Australia in the five-match series. Having reached 267 for eight, despite a poor end to their innings, South Africa reduced Australia to 98 for five before Smith and Matthew Wade (52) gradually rebuilt with a stand of 121. James Faulkner sealed victory with some late hits. Cricket Australia is to conduct research into the small size of the crowd at the MCG, which numbered 14,177. In Dubai, Pakistan held out for a draw in the second Test against New Zealand to maintain their 1-0 lead in the three-match series. Ross Taylor’s hundred helped to establish a lead of 260 for New Zealand, who then met resistance from Younus Khan, in the form of his life, and Asad Shafiq, who made 44 and 41 not out respectively. Warwickshire picked up three awards at the ECB Business of Cricket dinner at Edgbaston, but Worcestershire secured the County Recognition Award for the way they have recovered from flood damage at New Road and successfully rebranded their 20-over side as the Rapids.

Another birdie spree from Stenson increases pressure on McIlroy Golf

Ron Lewis Dubai

Henrik Stenson showed Rory McIlroy that he was unlikely to get things all his own way in the season finale as he recorded a round of 66 for a two-shot lead at the halfway stage of the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai. It was an impressive performance from Stenson, who hit seven birdies for the second successive day, although this time there was only one bogey as he built a two-round score of ten under par. McIlroy, who had shared the overnight lead on six under with Shane Lowry, was among a group of three on eight under par along with Richie Ramsay and Danny Willett. The Swede proved last year what a

danger he can be on this course, as he hit a five-wood from 248 yards to the final green that finished two feet from the hole to wrap up the title and the Race to Dubai crown. The Race has long been run this year, but after looking in fine form in the opening round, yesterday was more of a struggle for McIlroy. “I can’t let him get too far ahead tomorrow,” he said. “I have to get off to a fast start and try and put a bit of pressure on him.” McIlroy had birdied four of the opening five holes on Thursday, but after picking up another shot on the 1st, he was not in the same form yesterday, notably with a horribly mis-hit approach to the 7th that he described as “a fat, low, duck hook runner . . .

Fine performance: Stenson repeated his first-round feat of seven birdies

non-intentional”. There were dropped shots on the 12th as well as at the 16th, where he three-putted from 15 feet. But he did hit birdies at the 14th, 15th and 17th, as well as doing well to make par on the final hole after driving into the water. “It could have been worse, but again, it probably could have been a little better,” he said. “I definitely didn’t hit it like I did yesterday. I’m in a good position and there is a lot of golf left. I’ve definitely been in worse positions after two rounds and still won.” Ramsay continued his good form this week with a round of 69, thanks to an eagle on the 14th, while Willett had seven birdies and two bogeys in a round of 67. After a desperate start in which he

went four over par in the first ten holes on Thursday, Justin Rose continued his move up the leaderboard with a sixunder round of 66 to move into a share of fifth at seven under. Joining Rose on that score are Lowry, Thorbjorn Olesen, Kristoffer Broberg and Rafael Cabrera-Bello, of Spain, who hit an eagle, eight birdies and two bogeys in a remarkable round of 64. The shot of the round, though, came from Lowry, who at the 13th hit his first hole-in-one in competition, with a sixiron from 183 yards. “As soon as it left the clubface, it looked like it had a chance of going in,” McIlroy, his playing partner, said. “We both had our struggles out there, but hopefully we can have better days tomorrow.”

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Comment Sport

Federer courting trouble and strife Giles Smith

GLYN KIRK / GETTY IMAGES

irka Federer’s Top Five SuperDevastating Courtside Heckles.

1 “Cry-baby” The belter that outed the formerly placid-seeming, coolly appraising, possibly even slightly bored wife of the world-ranked No 2 as a brutally vocal, unabashedly confrontational sideline agitator, operating, on her husband’s behalf, at the highest levels of psychological destabilisation. Dizzied by the insult, which arrived out of nowhere during the ATP World Tour Finals in London last week, Stanislas Wawrinka blew four match points and crashed out to Roger Federer in the semi-finals. The heckle also triggered, allegedly, a heated, ten-minute post-match argument between the two players behind the scenes, and, by extension, an explosive threat to Switzerland’s Davis Cup challenge, which was averted only by hectic public diplomacy and a series of smiling photo-ops in the ensuing days. But that’s heckling for you, when it’s done properly, at the very highest level, by one of the masters. 2 “Scaredy-cat” No less an observer of the verbal undermining game than John McEnroe has described Mirka’s use of this feline-related character-witherer as “on its day, without question the greatest heckle in our sport”. Those who were there will never forget the spectacle of the Swiss-born 36-year-old reaching for it early and to devastating effect against Robin Soderling in the quarter-finals of the 2010 US Open. Utterly unmanned and with his concentration shot to pieces, the Swede seemed to shrink visibly under the New York sky and Roger swept him aside in three sets. 3 “Cowardy cowardy custard” Perhaps Mirka’s most notorious deployment of the so-called “c-bomb” was during her husband’s epic five-setter against Juan Martín del Potro in the semi-finals of the 2009 French Open. The powerful Argentinian seemed on course to produce an upset before Mirka crucially intervened during a change-over with this classic, heavily top-spun, dessert-based put-down. From that moment, Del Potro had no answers and Federer duly advanced to the final, and thereafter to his first French title. Not pretty, maybe, but it got the job done. The “c-bomb” usually does. 4 “Liar, liar, pants on fire” Many formidable players on the men’s circuit have felt the fierce whip and unpredictably savage kick of this dual integrity — and underwear-querying accusation — almost impossible to return when struck with full force from the back of the players’ box — but perhaps none more shrivellingly than David Nalbandian in Dubai in 2010, after an incorrect line-call challenge. 5 “I know you are, but what am I?” Attacking shots aside, Mirka also has in her locker this enormously irritating, repeat-use dialogue-thwarter, definitively modelled by Pee-Wee Herman in the 1985 Tim Burtondirected movie Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure, and ensuring that when the flak does come back — from, say, an increasingly rattled Kei Nishikori, deep into a deciding set — Mirka is ready to come into the net (metaphorically speaking, or even literally) and seal the deal. With this level of attention to every aspect of the heckling game and her ability to adapt to all developing situations on all surfaces, it’s little wonder that so many analysts have described Federer as possibly the best all-round heckler the game of tennis has seen, or is likely to see.

Cold shoulder: the climate between Federer, left, and Wawrinka in London last week was set by devastating heckles from the former’s wife

6 Strong stuff from Roy Hodgson, who became the first England manager in quite some time to allude, in the run-up to an international friendly, to George Orwell, and certainly the first to allude to him in a discussion about the relative merits of the diamond formation. “It’s very important that we don’t become bedded down,” the manager explained. “It can’t become Animal Farm: diamond good, this other system bad.” That’s what we love about Hodgson: the way he sends you back to the classic texts with a freshened eye. That said, a quick, hopeful flick through Orwell’s allegory tended to suggest that the manager might be misremembering it slightly. In the main, the farm seems to have gone with a fairly rigid 4-4-2, and offered very little space to the playmakers in the midfield area. By way of compensation, though, the book does have a lot of good, forthright stuff to offer on the disadvantages of zonal marking at setpieces. Pick up your pig and stay tight to him, would seem to be the message.

MotD pops up at the death

ven as reports of the programme’s demise were prematurely surfacing, Match of the Day’s theme music was securing a healthy fourth place in Co-operative Funeralcare’s annual league table of music most requested for the final ceremony of them all. Barry Stoller’s timeless, trumpet-led, arpeggio-rich stomper has long ridden high on lists of pun-friendly replacements for the traditional wedding march, but its burgeoning popularity as an appropriate cask accompaniment is less often remarked upon. No doubt people turn to it because no other piece of music says “football” on behalf of the deceased so succinctly or so hearteningly, but also perhaps because the programme famously encourages late-night sofa-snoozing, normally somewhere around the highlights from Sunderland v Hull, or similar, and is thereby smoothly equated with loss of consciousness — though in the nicest possible way. OK, there’s still some work to do before MotD can catch (in ascending order) Abide With Me, Psalm 23 (The Lord is My Shepherd) and that funeral evergreen, Monty Python’s Always Look On The Bright Side of Life. But it has nudged ahead of Frank Sinatra’s tiresomely self-romanticising My Way and has absolutely bombed out Robbie Williams’s Angels (languishing in seventh place). And, in any case, fourth place is none too shabby and, of course, offers the chance to compete in Europe next season. They’ll be happy with that. Could it be true that a programme so

deeply and fondly embedded in the nation’s cultural make-up that people still want to be catching the strains of its theme tune on their way out of the door is endangered by an ITV rights-snatch? (Bidding for the 201617 season and beyond starts soon.) Let’s hope not. We’ve been there before, between 2001-2004, and, with the best will in the world and Desmond Lynam (not to mention U2’s Beautiful Day), it didn’t work out well. If it happens again, it’s all of our funerals.

Teams singing from the same hymn sheet No one can condone chanting like that — in a football ground or anywhere else. It spoilt what was otherwise an exciting evening, left a sour taste and was rightly condemned across the media. But what can you do? If fans of the United States turn up for an international against Ireland in Dublin and reprise “We believe that we can win”, their signature song from Brazil 2014, and clearly the lamest football chant that has ever been devised, there is nothing that the authorities can do to prevent it, apart from breaking out the tear gas, and nobody wants to see that. Maybe those American supporters and the equally spirit-sapping England Band could be somehow merged and obliged to work their mutual problems through together. Somewhere remote.

Sport

Federer wants doubles test after taming Tennis

Rick Broadbent

Roger Federer said that he is ready to play doubles in the Davis Cup final fewer than 24 hours after suffering one of the worst defeats of his career in front of 27,000 voyeurs. Gaël Monfils destroyed Federer, below, 6-1, 6-4, 6-3 to level the tie between Switzerland and France, and suggested that the world No 2 was still hampered by his back problem. However, Federer said that a lack of practice on the clay in Lille had hampered him more than the spasms that blew up in London on Saturday. He is scheduled to sit out today’s doubles and face Jo-Wilfried Tsonga tomorrow, but said that he was ready to play immediately. “I’ll definitely make myself available if I feel I can play proper tennis, which, at the end, I was able to do today,” he said. “I started to feel better as the match went on.” It may also be kidology. Such was Monfils’ dominance that it made you glad Mirka Federer was not there. Since pulling out of the ATP World Tour Finals on Sunday, her husband has had to flat-bat questions about his back and her “cry-baby” heckling of Stanislas Wawrinka, his Switzerland team-mate. She did not show up in Lille, but his back problem did. Wawrinka defeated Tsonga 6-1, 3-6, 6-3, 6-2 in the opening rubber to give Switzerland hope of a first Davis Cup trophy, but Federer’s health could decide the issue. His loss to Monfils was not quite down there with the 6-1, 6-3, 6-0 humiliation by Rafael Nadal in the 2008 French Open final, but given the romantic narrative driving this Davis Cup final, it was embarrassingly close. That is not to discredit Monfils, who was several steps ahead in every department and did take a two-set lead against Federer at the US Open. He admitted to being “nervous”, but did not show it as he took Federer apart with some big hitting and brilliant serving.

Flower stays on Wigan payroll Rugby league

Christopher Irvine

Ben Flower, the Wigan Warriors prop who was sent off in the First Utility Super League Grand Final last month for attacking Lance Hohaia, the St Helens stand-off, has escaped dismissal after an internal inquiry at his club. Flower, who is serving a six-month ban by the RFL for twice punching Hohaia in the face, was found guilty of gross misconduct because of violent conduct and fined half his wages for six months. He will also undergo a rehabilitation course working with young people in the community. “Three months of the fine will be suspended, subject to return during the next 12 months to his previous good record,” the club said. “This judgment was appropriate rather than summary dismissal, which was possible.”

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Hamilton all alone in date with destiny Kevin Eason Motor Racing Correspondent Abu Dhabi

Lewis Hamilton will be a man alone when he walks on to the grid tomorrow for the start of a grand prix that could define his place in history. There will be no hug from his dad Anthony, no kiss from Nicole Scherzinger, the pop singer girlfriend who is at home in London transforming herself from Pussycat Doll to Grizabella in Cats, Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical. Neither is expected to watch a dramatic shoot-out for the world championship. Neither was invited. “I have a job to do,” Hamilton said in a quiet corner of the Mercedes hospitality centre. “If I don’t make the call deliberately to invite them, then people know I am here to work.” Hamilton has retreated deep into his own psyche for this confrontation with destiny under the glare of a million brilliant bulbs around the Yas Marina circuit. He is trying to insulate himself from the noise that rattles around this world championship decider at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix and the probing, irritating presence of a team-mate who seems determined to shred nerves and prompt self-doubt in his rival. Inevitably, much was revealed on Twitter in the build-up to this race. A moody shot of Hamilton was accompanied by the message: “People limit themselves to what they think they can do. You can go as far as your mind lets you. You can achieve!” It was difficult to fathom whether the words were intended for Hamilton’s 2.4 million followers or a case of thinking out loud. Nico Rosberg has not invited Keke, his father, either. Abu Dhabi is a fatherfree zone, it seems, this weekend. The Rosbergs have been here before, of course, because Keke won the title in 1982. Unlike Hamilton, whose father worked on the railway and held down three jobs so that his son could go karting, Rosberg is from a motor racing

path to the prize Hamilton 334 points 6 Will be champion if he wins (50pts) or is second (36) 6 Is third (30), fourth (24) or fifth (20) and Rosberg does not win 6 Is sixth (16) and Rosberg does not finish in the top two 6 Is seventh (12) or eighth (8) and Rosberg does not finish in the top three 6 Is ninth (4) and Rosberg does not finish in the top four 6 Is tenth (2) or retires and Rosberg does not finish in the top five Rosberg 317 points 6 Will be champion if he wins and Hamilton is no better than third 6 Is second and Hamilton is no better than sixth 6 Is third and Hamilton is no better than seventh 6 Is fourth and Hamilton is no better than ninth 6 Is fifth and Hamilton is no better than tenth In the event of a tie, Hamilton wins on countback of victories

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Silver machine: Hamilton was keeping his counsel as he focused on the task of

dynasty and there is a snap to his walk and a snarl to his talk that suggests he wants his place in Formula One’s history books as the champion son of a champion. This finale is soaked with intrigue and mesmerising detail — the kid from the council house up against the intellectual rich boy — and they could barely be separated in practice yesterday, Hamilton shading the honours with Rosberg a sliver of 00.083sec behind him on the timesheets. Yet this thrilling contest could all be destroyed by F1’s rulers, who seem like hyperactive children who cannot help but meddle with the rules. The consequence and the danger is that millions will witness a travesty of a championship. By awarding double points, Hamilton’s 17-point lead over Rosberg could be wiped out by a random

moment that will turn F1 into a laughing stock, given that the Englishman has won ten grands prix to Rosberg’s five. Rosberg’s mission is clear: he must aim to win here, but life is more complicated for Hamilton. He could drive tactically, try to stay out of trouble and calculate the odds, but that is not only against his natural instincts, it is fraught with danger, particularly if the rest get in the way. Jenson Button predicts that the Williams cars of Felipe Massa and Valtteri Bottas could intervene on this Mickey Mouse circuit. “Lewis wants to win the race. Great,” Button said. “But there is a more important thing and that is the championship. If Lewis finishes second, he wins the championship. He should realise that. Hopefully, both Mercedes drivers are

best last-race deciders 1976 Japanese Grand Prix, Fuji Hunt v Lauda Perhaps the most famous finale of all. Despite almost dying in a fireball at the Nürburgring, Niki Lauda goes into the final race with a three-point lead over James Hunt. The heavens open and Lauda withdraws, saying it is too dangerous. He sets off for the airport while the Briton battles on, plagued by tyre problems. Hunt finishes fourth to claim his only title. 1986 Australian Grand Prix, Adelaide Mansell v Prost v Piquet A three-way fight between the two Williams cars of Nigel Mansell and Nelson Piquet and McLaren’s Alain Prost. Mansell takes pole position and needs to finish second to win the title. With 19 laps to go, his left rear tyre blows and he is out. It is then between Piquet and Prost and the McLaren man needs to finish ahead of his Brazilian rival. But Piquet is

called into the pits for a precautionary tyre check, handing the title to the Frenchman. 1994 Australian Grand Prix, Adelaide Schumacher v Hill Michael Schumacher, of Benetton, holds a one-point advantage over Damon Hill going into the last race of the year. Schumacher takes the lead, with Hill second. The German leads until lap 36, when he goes off at the East Terrace corner and bounces back on to the track, running into the Williams of Hill. Did Schumacher turn into his English rival deliberately? Hill

retires and Schumacher takes the first of his seven world titles. 1997 European Grand Prix, Estoril Schumacher v Villeneuve Schumacher, now with Ferrari, leads by a point from Jacques Villeneuve, who needs to beat his rival to become Canada’s first world champion. On lap 48, Villeneuve tries to overtake Schumacher but the German turns his car into the Williams — and this time it is definitely deliberate. Villeneuve becomes champion in his second season and the FIA throws the book at Schumacher, disqualifying him from the world championship. 2008 Brazilian Grand Prix, Interlagos, Sao Paulo Hamilton v Massa Lewis Hamilton has what seems a comfortable seven-point cushion to Ferrari’s Felipe Massa going into the Brazilian’s home race. Massa is inspired, winning brilliantly as Hamilton slips down the field in his

McLaren. For a few seconds it appears to be Massa’s title, until Hamilton overtakes Timo Glock’s Toyota almost within sight of the chequered flag for fifth place, enough points to become champion for the first time. 2010 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, Yas Marina Vettel v Alonso v Webber v Hamilton A four-way fight, although Hamilton’s chances are only mathematical. Sebastian Vettel has not led the championship all season and is 15 points adrift of Fernando Alonso, the leader. This is billed as a straight fight between Alonso, in his Ferrari, and Red Bull’s Mark Webber — and they think so too. While Vettel storms off to victory, Alonso and Webber watch each other and lose the tactical plot, finishing seventh and eighth respectively. That allows Vettel to become Red Bull’s first world champion and the youngest champion in F1 history. Words by Kevin Eason

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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CLIVE ROSE / GETTY IMAGES

tale of the tape

Lewis Hamilton

Age 29 Home Stevenage, Hertfordshire

Family Mum Carmen divorced from Anthony, his father, now married to Linda. Younger brother Nick. Upbringing Started in a council flat, sleeping on a sofa while Anthony held down three jobs to pay for his son’s karting career. Big break came at 13 when he was taken on by McLaren and Mercedes, who paid for the rest of his career, smoothing his path to F1. Education John Henry Newman Comprehensive School, Stevenage. Significant other Nicole Scherzinger, pop superstar and X Factor judge. Lives Split between Monaco and Scherzinger’s Los Angeles home and her new London apartment. Titles F3 Euroseries champion, GP2 champion, F1 world champion 2008. F1 wins 32 Poles 38 Grand Prix starts 147

Nico Rosberg

Age 29 Home Monte Carlo

securing a second world title with Rosberg getting ready to pounce on any error

ready [for the rest] because, if they are not, they are going to get shot.” The easiest way out would be the most ruthless — Hamilton could simply punt his team-mate off the track and end the argument right there and then at the first corner. Others have tried the same trick. That will not happen, according to Toto Wolff, the Mercedes head of motorsport, who has spent a season veering between corporate executive, nursemaid and referee in attempting a task on the scale of herding tigers when tempers have frayed and nerves have been stretched. “I have been blown away by Lewis’s development in the last 18 months,” Wolff said. “He has a solid private life, he has sorted out his past and he is almost invulnerable — not unbeatable on the track, but as a person. “He has a bad session and, because he

wears his heart on his sleeve, he’s down. But you see him half an hour later and he is back.” Rosberg is out to test that “invulnerability”. Forget the urbane, suave exterior and the “silver spoon” background that should have sated his ambitions. Wolff says that Rosberg is “ruthless”. “That boy knows what he wants,” he said. “Whatever has been said about him, he knows what he wants. Sometimes they say you need a difficult upcoming to be competitive. Nico had it all. Son of a world champion, raised in Monaco, went to the international school, you can’t imagine a better family environment than that, and still he is an extremely competitive person and he wants to win.” So who will win? The kid from the council estate or the boy with the silver spoon? It is all too close to call.

Upbringing Father is Keke, the 1982 F1 world champion. Born in Wiesbaden — Sina, his mother, is German — but brought up in Monaco, while Keke, his millionaire dad, guided his career. Money has never been an issue, with a lifestyle that has included helicopters and private jets. Education Private school, speaks five languages. Offered a place at London’s Imperial College but turned it down to go racing. Significant other Vivian, the childhood sweetheart and interior designer he married in July. Rosberg helps with her design work. Lives Monaco all of his life in an apartment in Monte Carlo around the corner from his parents. Titles 2002 German Formula BMW champion, first-ever GP2 champion in 2005. F1 wins 8 Poles 14 Grand Prix starts 165

Grosjean penalty rewrites rulebook Kevin Eason

The punishment might fit the crime, according to Formula One’s arcane rulebook, but Romain Grosjean was puzzling last night over a penalty that seemed to consign him to another country. His Lotus blew its petrol engine, its turbocharger and one of its battery packs during practice for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. That triggered a punishment for each component — amounting to an astonishing 20-place grid penalty. That is a little tricky to impose, given that there are only 18 cars on the grid. Even if Grosjean scored an unlikely pole position, he would still be two places short of a penalty, as it were. Wags surmised that Grosjean would either have to start outside a shopping mall in Dubai, or the race stewards would need new rules. They did, and Grosjean will serve a series of time penalties during tomorrow’s race. He

will be lucky to finish on the same day as Lewis Hamilton, the championship leader. Grosjean is not the only driver ruing a lost day in the desert. Fernando Alonso’s Ferrari ground to a halt just two laps into the second practice session. This is his final grand prix in the colours of Ferrari, but Abu Dhabi is not

how they stand Drivers 1, L Hamilton (GB, Mercedes) 334pts; 2, N Rosberg (Ger, Mercedes) 317; 3, D Ricciardo (Aus, Red Bull) 214; 4, S Vettel (Ger, Red Bull) 159; 5, F Alonso (Sp, Ferrari) 157; 6, V Bottas (Fin, Williams) 156; 7, J Button (GB, McLaren) 106; 8, F Massa (Br, Williams) 98; 9, N Hülkenberg (Ger, Force India) 80; 10, K Magnussen (Den, McLaren) 55; 11, K Raikkonen (Fin, Ferrari) 53; 12, S Pérez (Mex, Force India) 47; 13, J-E Vergne (Fr, Scuderia Toro Rosso) 22; 14, R Grosjean (Fr, Lotus) 8; 15, D Kvyat (Russ, Scuderia Toro Rosso) 8; 16, P Maldonado (Ven, Lotus) 2; 17, J Bianchi (Fr, Marussia) 2.

Constructors 1, Mercedes 651pts; 2, Red Bull 373; 3, Williams 254; 4, Ferrari 210; 5, McLaren 161; 6, Force India 127; 7, Scuderia Toro Rosso 30; 8, Lotus 10; 9, Marussia 2.

a happy hunting ground for the Spaniard. He led the world championship when this circuit staged the 2010 finale and lost it to Sebastian Vettel. Now his last race for Ferrari could become a damp squib. Jenson Button will want to finish this season on a high, too, if this is to be his last grand prix in the sport. The driver waiting to discover whether he has a job with McLaren next season suffered a troubled day, but finished eighth quickest. His family are here in force — Simone, his mother, with his three sisters; Jessica, his fiancée whom he will marry next month, will arrive tomorrow. Button has shunned the idea of a farewell and is determined to show that he is worth his place in Formula One, but the cards are stacked against him. Kevin Magnussen, his team-mate, was third quickest yesterday and anxious to show Ron Dennis, the McLaren chief executive, that he is the future.

Strictly fan strives to ensure no last dance for Caterham Kevin Eason

It was a first of sorts for Formula One, but then a sport up to its eyes in money troubles might expect an accountant to be sitting on the pitwall. Finbarr O’Connell, administrator and officer of the court, donned his earphones and team shirt to listen in to the travails of a Caterham team trying desperately to put on a show that would grace the shop window of one of the most glittering sports events on the planet. His advice to Kamui Kobayashi and Will Stevens will not be much use. “Overtake and win,” he said. Er, they held up the final two slots on the timesheets in practice yesterday and were so far back that Lewis Hamilton would need binoculars to spot the green cars. No matter. O’Connell says that he is no fan of motor racing – he is more of a Strictly Come Dancing sort, apparently. But he is in Abu Dhabi to sell Caterham to the highest bidder and has no idea whether it will be to the Russian oligarch who got in touch a few days ago or an Arab royal with money to burn and an ego to feed. He is meeting scions of Middle Eastern families this weekend to discover whether they are prepared to feed F1’s hungry meter — about £70 million a year minimum, according to O’Connell. Cash drips from every pore of Yas Marina. Bikini-clad models cavorted yesterday on some of the 200 superyachts moored against the backdrop of £800 million worth of track, hotels and waterfront. You sense the warped values of the sport in a press release from the FIA, the sport’s governing body, that dropped within hours of O’Connell getting his team up and running. The FIA — the organisation charged with protecting F1 but which is yet to issue a word of regret over the decline of Caterham and Marussia and the consequent loss of more than 400 motor-racing jobs — said it was “proud” to announce seven partners for its gala prize-giving in, where else but Qatar. Michelin, Rolex, Volkswagen, Qatar Airways and the Qatar National Bank are on the list. Plenty of sponsor cash for the FIA, then. There is plenty of money in F1 — just

none for Caterham, who had to rely on 6,200 generous souls to stump up more than £2 million to drag the team from the suspended animation of bankruptcy and back on to the grid. Without O’Connell, it would not have happened. It would be easy to poke fun at a rotund, middle-aged accountant playing at being a team principal, but you sense a spine of steel in the man called in to save Caterham and trying to sift the wheat from the financial chaff of chancers and fakes — “tyrekickers”, he calls them. O’Connell, a softly spoken Irishman, seems unfazed by F1, but this is a man who has faced some challenges over a long career as an administrator. “I could be in Africa running a gold mine, which I did in Ghana ten years ago,” he said. “It was fascinating. One day I was sitting in front of a nuclear power plant waiting to run it, but they refinanced and I didn’t have to. “Formula One is up there with gold-

‘It remains un uphill struggle on the track for Formula One’s tiddlers’ mines and growing wheat in Ukraine, but we get parachuted into a business and have to get to grips with it.” Getting to Abu Dhabi, after missing races in the United States and Brazil, was crucial to prove that Caterham remain a functioning race team and it needed a little help from willing friends to get the 40 staff and the equipment that has stood dormant in the factory in Leafield, Oxfordshire, to the Middle East. Bernie Ecclestone, F1’s chief executive, laid on a chartered plane, while Red Bull and Renault flew out their technical staff to help with preparations and running the Caterham cars. It remains an uphill struggle on the track for F1’s tiddlers, though. For all that, O’Connell’s unique crowdfunded expedition — so roundly criticised by some of the paddock big-hitters — may yet succeed. “With the noises people are making, I am 75 per cent confident we will get a solution,” he said. “How quickly, I am not sure. This team, if bought in the next few weeks, will race next year.” MARK THOMPSON / GETTY IMAGES

Rescue act: O’Connell is cutting an unlikely figure in the paddock but can now add Formula One to a CV that includes nuclear power plants and gold mines

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England women hope to turn on the style during Wembley debut Alyson Rudd

There is the potential for embarrassment when England’s women face Germany at Wembley tomorrow. The visiting team’s head coach will offer her hand to Mark Sampson and it might feel as if progress on these shores has been halted. Will the England head coach feel at all self-conscious that he is a man leading women? Sampson says not, that meeting Silvia Neid will be a high point in his career and that he has much to learn from the woman who has twice won the Fifa world coach of the year for the women’s game, although he insists that his team will play “on the front foot”. “It will be a very proud moment for me actually, to come up against such a highly respected and successful coach,” he says. “It will be great to pit our team against Silvia’s and see how we get on. For me it will be great to share a handshake before and after and hopefully have some time as well to ask for advice. I’ll certainly try to pick her brains. Maybe she’ll pick mine.” The imposing Neid will probably only quiz Sampson should England pull off an unlikely victory against the European champions. England’s women have never beaten Germany but an upset is plausible, not least because this

is a match that has fuelled the closest thing to hysteria the women’s game here has witnessed. Even the ticket touts are intrigued. The encounter is a friendly but the public want to be there. It is the first time England’s women have played at the new Wembley and word has spread that Sampson’s team have stepped up a gear. They qualified for next year’s World Cup with a 100 per cent record, scoring 52 goals. They are attackminded and confident, and as a consequence, 55,000 tickets have been sold. Only safety restrictions — there is engineering work on the Underground lines serving Wembley — prevented a still higher attendance. The stage is set, then, for a barrage of support that just might fluster the Germans. “It started getting a bit surreal when people told us that 30,000 tickets had been sold,” Sampson says. “So when we were told 55,000 had gone it was a hugely surreal moment. We had to say ‘what are you taking about’?” It provided a neat pep talk to his players as they prepare to face a team who have twice won the World Cup and are ranked second in the world behind the United States. “Germany’s strength is their structure and team thinking,” the former Bristol Academy head coach said.

the life and times of england’s head coach Mark Sampson, now 32, knew early on that he would not make it as professional footballer. “My dad would say I knew aged about six, but I’d push it to 12. I had very limited ambition to be a professional.” 6 He studied sports coaching and development at University of Wales Institute while playing non-League football and his experience of the women’s game was limited. “Like probably a lot of males in football in the late Nineties, we wouldn’t have been too aware of the women’s game. We’d watch their Cup final on the BBC once a year and

maybe see my now assistant, Marianne Spacey, score a hat-trick, but the game has grown and the exposure has increased.” 6 Sampson worked under Roberto Martínez at Swansea City’s centre of excellence, then spent five years as head coach at the Bristol Academy. 6 He took over from Hope Powell as head coach of England Women in December last year after being described by the FA as an “outstanding” young coach. “That’s very nice of them,” he says, “but I’d prefer that to come from players I’ve worked with.”

NIGEL RODDIS / GETTY IMAGES

Mauricio Pochettino, the Tottenham Hotspur manager, admits that he is bewildered to find himself in the middle of a club-versus-country conflict surrounding Eric Dier. The 20-year-old defender played no part in England Under-21’s matches against Portugal and France this month after telling Gareth Southgate, the head coach, that he wished to spend the international break at his club. Dier wanted to gain specialist coaching in his preferred position, central defence, rather than play as a right back for his country. Pochettino has now revealed that no such coaching took place, that Dier’s decision had been taken without his

knowledge and that concentrating on one position was, in any case, detrimental to a young player’s development. With Kyle Naughton banned and Kyle Walker not fully fit, the likelihood is that Dier will be required to perform at right back away to Hull City tomorrow, a position he has filled on all but two of the 13 times Pochettino has picked him since his arrival from Sporting Lisbon in the summer. “It was his own decision to speak with Gareth,” Pochettino said. “He never consulted us. Before he arrived here, Eric played a lot of games at right back, centre back and midfield. “His future will be better if he improves in different positions. This gives more possibility to play in the starting eleven. He needs to improve.”

Redknapp in defence of Pardew over ‘fickle game’ Alec Shilton

Ultimate test: Sampson says he is happy to pit his wits against Neid, of Germany, the most successful coach in the women’s game, before the World Cup next year

“They have some strong individuals but function far better as a team. The challenge for us is to break the game up and make that German structure as loose as possible and allow our talent to shine and create some space on the field. Not many teams are able to do that to Germany.” The match will be shown live on BBC Two, so there is pressure for what has become such a showcase event to deliver something that keeps viewers interested in the women’s game. “There’s always that sense of responsibility,” Sampson says. “We want to win, but also to play in a way that allows people to get behind the team.” He hopes that “good strong human values of hard work and honesty” will

leave a lasting impression and win the day. “Fundamentally, we want to play on the front foot and control our destiny,” he says. “We want to seize the initiative, be relentless in terms of the positivity of our decision making.” If facing Germany in a friendly can boost interest in the sport on these shores, then England winning the World Cup final in Vancouver next July would catapult it firmly into the mainstream. “We want to win the competition,” Sampson says. “My hunger is to go there and win it. If it came tomorrow would we be in a position to win it? I’m not sure we would. The objective is that by the time we get on the plane, we will feel, if things go our way, we can win it.”

Dier’s decision to snub under-21s bemuses Pochettino Jon West

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Back where he started: Dier is likely to be at right back for Spurs tomorrow

Pochettino’s main concern is to end a run of three defeats from the past four Barclays Premier League outings, the most recent of which, a 2-1 reverse at home to Stoke City, led to the players being booed off by some Tottenham supporters. Dropping to 12th position in the Barclays Premier League was not part of the remit for the man who was lured from Southampton in the summer, but Pochettino remains convinced that he still has the backing of Daniel Levy, his chairman. “I have a chat every day with Daniel on the training ground, that is normal,” Pochettino said. “I understand football but I always feel the support from him and the club and that is what is important to me.”

Harry Redknapp, the Queens Park Rangers manager, has praised Mike Ashley for standing by Alan Pardew and said that the intelligence behind the decision to do so from the Newcastle United owner is allowing his club to reap the rewards. Newcastle host QPR today in the Barclays Premier League with both Redknapp and Pardew, the Newcastle manager, having presided over recent upturns in form that have eased concerns regarding their futures, Ashley having kept faith in Pardew amid a vociferous campaign from fans to end his tenure at St James’s Park, and after a run of games that has yielded four wins in a row for Newcastle. Redknapp believes that the pressure the pair have had to withstand this season is symptomatic of the sport’s capricious nature. “I like him [Pardew], he’s a good man,” Redknapp said. “He has done a great job and he’s turned it around. “That’s how fickle the game is. You lose a few games and you’re useless and then you win a few and you’re a great manager. It’s a hard old game, it’s hard to win games. “The chairman has been fantastic. He gets a lot of stick, Mike Ashley, but he’s always at the games in the crowd. He follows the team, loves it, and has stuck by Alan because he knows he’s got a good manager. It’s easy to make a kneejerk reaction and bomb him out. “One of the differences is probably because he’s a British owner. Lots of the foreign owners would look at bringing a foreign manager in because maybe he’s been a better player than Alan Pardew was and played in Italy or Spain, but Four straight wins have helped ease strain on Pardew

Ashley has stuck by him. No matter what abuse he gets, he doesn’t care, does he? That’s why he’s such a clever man — you don’t become that wealthy if you’re a mug.” The QPR manager also believes that the cost of paying off his Newcastle counterpart’s original eight-year deal, of which four and a half years remain, is unlikely to be the reason that Ashley has allowed Pardew to keep his post over a difficult period. “It means, if he gets the sack, he will probably get about six months’ money, a year maybe,” Redknapp added. “He’s not going to get eight years’ money. “It doesn’t really matter if you’ve got a contract. There will be a clause in it and 99 times out of 100 if they sack you they will probably pay you a year’s money.” Redknapp was offered the Newcastle job in January of 2008 but turned it down to remain at Portsmouth, a decision that he does not regret after having gone on to compete in the Champions League with Tottenham Hotspur. “I was offered the job but I just couldn’t get my Geordie accent right,” Redknapp joked. “I don’t regret anything, I don’t look back. I look forward and move on. I went to Spurs and had four fantastic years and I don’t regret staying at Pompey, where I had a great time, and I don’t regret being here, I have loved it here. I’m very lucky to keep going.”

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

FGM

Sterling deals with growing pains TIMES PHOTOGRAPHER, GRAHAM HUGHES

Tony Barrett

For Raheem Sterling, there have been countless moments over the past two years when the reality of his journey from promising youngster to genuine superstar has dawned. As he sat in the Tom Saunders lecture theatre at Liverpool’s academy this week, another arrived. Looking up at a piece of artwork featuring shirts belonging to the club’s most illustrious graduates, the teenager spotted his own, in between those made famous by Steven Gerrard and Robbie Fowler. “What’s that doing up there?” he asked, unwittingly revealing his surprise at how far he has come in such a short time. That Sterling’s sense of wonder remains even after the most testing period of his career is in itself a testament to his youth. Already, though, the halcyon days of last season, when he helped to inspire Liverpool’s strongest title challenge since before he was born and went on to beome the only England player to return from the World Cup with as much credit as he arrived with, seem a lifetime ago. The trappings of fame, the relentless spotlight it brings and the pressure of carrying the hopes of club and country have taken a heavy toll. At just 19, it seems as if Sterling has already seen it all: the highs, the lows and everything in between. The carefree days have gone, perhaps never to return. If he didn’t know that already, reality of a much harsher kind dawned last month after Roy Hodgson revealed that the winger had not been chosen for England’s Euro 2016 qualifier against Estonia because he had complained of fatigue. What followed was a case study in overreaction as Sterling found himself at the heart of a week-long storm featuring everything from national newspaper front pages to the opprobrium of former England internationals. Not surprisingly, a different person has emerged. “It was pretty difficult,” he admitted. “I tried to not really watch TV much or listen to things. If I saw on TV that a conversation was about me, then I would turn over and not listen

Brendan Rodgers has admitted that the challenge of revitalising Liverpool this season is the biggest test he has faced at Anfield and insisted he is prepared to take full responsibility should last season’s Barclays Premier League runners-up continue to struggle. The combination of Luis Suárez’s departure to Barcelona, injuries to key players, integrating eight new signings and collective poor form has resulted in Liverpool being a shadow of the team who took Manchester City to the wire in last season’s title race. Rodgers readily acknowledges that Liverpool must show significant improvement, starting tomorrow at Crystal Palace, but concedes that the challenge of making them contenders again is even bigger, given their present difficulties, than the one he faced after taking over as manager in May 2012. “Yes, absolutely, there’s no getting away from that,” Rodgers said. “I don’t

Irvine makes light of jibe by Mourinho before reunion Around the Grounds

Sport Staff

Testing times: Sterling scores against Tottenham, but he has endured the most difficult period of his career this season

and try and play it down. It was different. It was the first time I had to deal with anything like that. It was different, as I say, but I felt I dealt with it really well. I didn’t read too much into it. “The main thing I have learnt is to just shut off. I was always on my phone and Instagram — stuff like that — and things would just pop up and you could not go past it without having a look, but now I have learnt to block it all out and not read what is said about you and jus do my best for Liverpool just and England. I just don’t look at it at all. Obviously you see it, but the focus is on club and country.” Probably born of diplomacy rather than an actual need for contrition, Sterling says he is “sorry if anything was taken the wrong way” but sets the record straight by insisting that he Rodgers has been impressed by the maturity of Sterling

“loves playing for club and country”, adding that “it doesn’t matter where it is, I am happy to play football”. An even more telling comment emerges when asked to pinpoint the most significant lesson he has learnt since making the breakthrough. “My slight weakness was that I was not leading the lifestyle I should have been off the pitch – ie, not resting when I should have been, stuff like that,” he says. “That is something I have brought in with maturity, having that rest period I should have.” Sitting alongside his protégé, Brendan Rodgers nods in agreement. “It is incredible to think as he sits there now he is just 19 years of age and carries all those hopes on his shoulders for his country and club,” the Liverpool manager says. “I have seen since I first came in here and he was a 17-year-old boy, he is definitely growing into a young man, how he has handled himself coming through a great education system here, preparing himself. Sometimes you never know fully until you are here and he is gaining experience all

the time. This last period has been difficult for everyone, but he has handled it really well. It is something I now expect from him, because he has matured a lot in these last couple of years.” There is more maturing to come, of course, and with talks over a new contract progressing, Sterling hopes that it takes place at Liverpool. “I am happy to be here for as long as possible, like the big names that are on that wall,” he says. “I am just happy to play football at this football club for many years to come. The club has spoken to my representatives and hopefully something can be done really soon.” Liverpool hope so, too, particularly as Sterling has already become a role model in his own right, one whose exploits the academy’s latest batch of promising youngsters dream of emulating, so that their shirt can one day go up alongside his. 6 Raheem Sterling was speaking at the Liverpool FC academy day, a bid to inspire young players and foster a oneclub mentality

Rodgers faces up to challenge Warnock’s survival mission Tony Barrett

Football Sport

like to whine or complain or make excuses. We’ve had the whole integration of a lot of new players and, obviously, it’s not gone as well as we would have wanted. But we have to embrace that challenge. We are in an adverse moment, but that can make you stronger. “Now we have to refocus and that goes for myself. If there is any spotlight, any blame, then it comes on to me. I pick the team, so if the results are not there then, rightly so, it comes onto the manager.” Rodgers said there is virtually no chance of Divock Origi’s loan spell at Lille being curtailed and the Belgium striker coming to Anfield in January. Origi, 19, signed for Liverpool in the summer from Lille and was immediately loaned back this season. Liverpool were understood to be keen to bring Origi to Merseyside ahead of schedule after Daniel Sturridge’s injury problems and Mario Balotelli’s struggles, but Rodgers has discounted the possibility.

Alec Shilton

Neil Warnock, the Crystal Palace manager, says that he would rank survival in the Barclays Premier League this season as the proudest accomplishment of his football career, his team having picked up only one point in their past five matches to drop to 17th in the table. Tomorrow’s home match against Liverpool comes precisely a year after Palace appointed Tony Pulis, whom Warnock replaced as manager in late August, and Warnock appears to be facing the same predicament now that Pulis was then. Supporters’ hopes had been high over the summer that they could continue on a solid upward trajectory this season, but progress stalled with Pulis’s surprise departure and Warnock knows the scale of the survival task that now faces him. “I think survival would be my biggest achievement with everything that’s

happened,” Warnock said. “You look at pre-season, to lose the manager like they did, it’s one of those things. It was great for me. “I know I wasn’t first choice, but it was an opportunity and while things weren’t rosy and the team got beaten in the first two games without a manager, it’s good to be able to come in and try to steady the ship and give the lads some confidence.” Palace will attempt to take away the same kind of feel-good factor that they generated from the corresponding fixture, in May, when Liverpool surrendered a three-goal lead in the final 11 minutes of the match as their title hopes were dealt a severe and ultimately fatal blow. However, Warnock knows that Palace need to defend better if their luck is to change. “I just think we have shot ourselves in the foot over the last few weeks,” he added. “So we’ve got to put our own house in order really to give ourselves an opportunity to get points.”

Alan Irvine insists that West Bromwich Albion are far from a “Mickey Mouse” club, yet he believes that José Mourinho’s taunt towards them last season illustrates that they can make the Chelsea manager worried. The Midlands club return to Stamford Bridge today for the first time since their tunnel row with the Portuguese, last November. Mourinho aimed the jibe at West Brom players — then still working under Steve Clarke — straight after the 2-2 draw in which his team required a highly controversial stoppage-time penalty, won by Ramires, to salvage a point. “You can’t be a Premier League club and be a Mickey Mouse club,” Irvine said. “He pokes a few people from time to time. When managers of top clubs are having to make little comments about other clubs, there might just be that little bit of worry there.” Paul Lambert, the Aston Villa manager, has revealed that he tried to sign Dusan Tadic before Southampton secured his services. The Serbia midfielder arrived on the south coast in the summer for £11 million from Twente. “We tried to get Tadic here, the January before last,” Lambert said before facing Southampton at Villa Park on Monday. “There were loads of factors which just meant we couldn’t get it done. He was at Twente and they were looking for a right few quid.” Mark Hughes, the Stoke City manager, claims that his club will never be loved by referees, despite meeting them this week. Stoke met Professional Game Match Officials Ltd after Irvine has brushed off comments by Chelsea manager

decisions against them in recent weeks. Peter Coates, the club’s chairman, could also face punishment after accusing referees of bias. “We spoke to the refs earlier in the week and it was really positive,” Hughes said before today’s home game with Burnley. Ashley Barnes is looking forward to Stoke, saying that he would not be playing for Burnley had he not been given a tough grounding as a teenage striker with Paulton Rovers, of the Southern League. “That’s what made me into what I am,” he said. Andrew Robertson, the Scotland defender, says that he is happy to continue his rapid rise to prominence with Hull City, despite being talked about as a target for one of the Barclays Premier League’s top-four clubs. Two years ago, the 20-year-old was playing part-time football in the Scottish third division with Queen’s Park. The full back scored his first goal for his country in Tuesday’s 3-1 defeat by England at Celtic Park and is ready to face Tottenham Hotspur tomorrow. “It’s nice if people are saying that because it shows I’ve done well, but I’m not looking to go anywhere,” Robertson said. Mansfield Town, of Sky Bet League Two, have parted company with Paul Cox, their manager, who was in charge for more than three years. They drew 1-1 in the FA Cup first round against Concord Rangers, of the Vanarama Conference South, on Tuesday.

FGM

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Sport Barclays Premier League Netbusters

The ultimate Premier League guide 2014-15

Club by club top scorers this season

West Brom TV Highlights, BBC One, 10.20pm RADIO BBC 5 Live

Man City Agüero

BY BILL EDGAR

Cesc Fàbregas is a doubt for Chelsea, but Diego Costa and André Schürrle are fit. Jonas Olsson is out for West Brom and Sébastien Pocognoli is a doubt. In Chelsea’s past two home league games Eden Hazard has converted a penalty he earned. Chelsea have won only one of their past five league matches against West Brom

Chelsea Costa

anywhere near to matching that display. They have not won a match and now they can’t even managing a goal. Nigel Pearson needs to get his team back to basics, working hard. The international break will have given them time to take stock. Sunderland have come back well since that 8-0 defeat by Southampton and Pearson will say to his players that they need to show that same kind of character. This game provides Leicester with a good opportunity and we’ll see something positive from them

Touchline Tony TONY CASCARINO

Everton v West Ham

It was surprising that none of the clubs at the top of the Premier League went for Alexandre Song, main picture, when he became available at Barcelona in the summer. West Ham were able to take him and have benefited greatly because he fits into their team perfectly. He is physically strong, and in his defensive midfield position he unsettles the opposition. He does the simple things rather than look for the world-class pass, and his job is made easier because he has two full backs in Carl Jenkinson and Aaron Cresswell who are always available and two mobile forwards, Enner Valencia and Diafra Sakho. Everton are close to their best but hindered by injuries. I can see a score draw in a fast-paced game

Arsenal v Man United

Since Leicester scored five against Manchester United they have not gone

W D

West Ham

West Brom Berahino

QPR Austin Southampton Pellè Tottenham Chadli West Ham Sakho

Leicester Ulloa Sunderland Fletcher

Everton Lukaku, Naismith Hull Diamé, Jelavic Newcastle Cissé Swansea Bony Aston Villa Weimann Crystal Palace Campbell, Jedinak Liverpool Sterling Man Utd Di María, Mata, Rooney, Van Persie Stoke Diouf

Burnley Arfield, Barnes, Boyd, Ings, Kightly, Wallace

Could face former club this weekend

How they stand P

Everton v

Wayne Rooney and Robin van Persie have fantastic quality and are capable of scoring great goals for United, but as a forward pairing I would prefer Alexis Sánchez and Danny Welbeck, of Arsenal. Sánchez is a predator and can get goals, but he carries out the Rooney role better than Rooney. Welbeck doesn’t get as many goals, but he plays his part in an amazingly hard-working partnership. As long as Arsenal don’t repeat their tendency to hand gifts to the opposition, they can win because United’s defence has been ravaged by injury. It’s like a curse on the team – Sir Alex Ferguson never had that number of injuries

Leicester v Sunderland

Arsenal Sánchez

Pts

Chelsea

+17

Southampton

+18

Man City

+10

West Ham

Swansea

Arsenal

Man Utd

Newcastle

−2

Stoke

−1

Everton

Liverpool

−1

Tottenham

−2

West Brom

−2

Sunderland

−7

Hull City

−2

Aston Villa

−11

Crystal Palace

−6

Leicester

−7

QPR

−11

Burnley

−13

Michael Kightly For Burnley Against Stoke

Joey Barton For QPR Against Newcastle

Alexandre Song

Chelsea v

TV Highlights, BBC One, 10.20pm

Leighton Baines and James McCarthy are doubts for Everton, who are without Gareth Barry. Stewart Downing and Diafra Sakho are doubts for West Ham, who are without Guy Demel. Everton, whose past seven wins in all competitions have come by at least a two-goal margin, are unbeaten in 13 matches against West Ham

TODAY 3pm THE GOALS Live goal updates

Chelsea (4-2-3-1)

13 WEST HAM MIDFIELDER

T Courtois – B Ivanovic, G Cahill, J Terry, C Azpilicueta – N Matic, C Fàbregas – Willian, Oscar, E Hazard ard – D Costa

West Brom (4-4-1-1)

B Foster – A Wisdom, C Dawson, J Lescott, J Davidson – G Dorrans, C Gardner, J Morrison, C Brunt – S Sessègnon – S Berahino Ref L Mason (7 games)

20 1

TODAY 3pm THE GOALS Highlights 5.15pm

Everton (4-2-3-1)

Of the 13 players, including Song, to have played under Arsène Wenger at Arsenal and also appeared for West Ham, only one, Yossi Benayoun, was at West Ham first, and even he later returned to Upton Park

T Howard – S Coleman, P Jagielka, S Distin, L Garbutt – J McCarthy, D Gibson – R Barkley, S Eto’o, A McGeady – R Lukaku

West Ham (4-3-1-2) Adrián – C Jenkinson, J Collins, W Reid, A Cresswell – M Noble, A Song, C Kouyaté – K Nolan – A Carroll, E Valencia Ref M Clattenburg (8 games) 38 1

First for West Ham: Benayoun

Leicester v Sunderland TV Highlights, BBC One, 10.20pm

Leicester have Liam Moore and Wes Morgan fit, but Dean Hammond is out. Steven Fletcher and Ricky Álvarez are over injury for Sunderland. The bottom three (Leicester, QPR, Burnley) are the promoted trio; that was previously the case two games from the end of the 2004-05 season (Crystal Palace, West Brom, Norwich)

Song has proved adept at winning the ball and earning free kicks

TODAY 3pm THE GOALS Highlights 5.15pm

For West Ham in league this season*

Leicester (4-3-1-2) K Schmeichel – R De Laet, W Morgan, L Moore, J Schlupp – D Drinkwater, E Cambiasso, M James – A King – L Ulloa, J Vardy

Sunderland (4-3-3)

C Pantilimon – S Vergini, J O’Shea, W Brown, A Réveillère – S Larsson, L Cattermole, J Gómez – A Johnson, S Fletcher, C Wickham Ref R Madley (1 game)

Manchester City v Swansea TV Highlights, BBC One, 10.20pm RADIO Absolute

City have Vincent Kompany fit, but Aleksandar Kolarov, David Silva and Edin Dzeko are injured. Swansea are without Federico Fernández, but Nathan Dyer, Wayne Routledge and Jordi Amat are back. For the first time in four seasons Manchester City have played six games in a row in which neither team has scored more than two goals

TODAY 3pm THE GOALS Highlights 5.15pm

Manchester City (4-4-1-1)

Michael Dawson For Hull Against Tottenham

Steven Davis For Southampton Against Aston Villa

Newcastle have Fabricio Coloccini and Mehdi Abeid injured. Steven Taylor is a serious doubt. Rio Ferdinand is suspended for QPR, who are without the injured Adel Taarabt. Alan Pardew (the Newcastle manager) and Harry Redknapp (QPR) are London-born former midfielders who managed West Ham and Southampton

Valencia

1.5

*Min 200 min played

Blackburn (2008-10)

Swansea (4-2-3-1)

28 1

West Ham (2011-): Diop, Diamé, Chamakh, Maïga, Razak, Kouyaté, Sakho, Song

10 3 4 8

Fresh-faced and fast Young players sprint far more frequently than their older team-mates. While players who are 30 years old or more average 40 sprints per 90 minutes in the Premier League, players aged 18 to 24 record 55 sprints, which is nearly 40 per cent more. It seems likely that at least a partial explanation is that younger players have more energy than their elders, although perhaps the experience of the thirty-somethings means they take up better positions and therefore do not need to sprint quite as often

TODAY 3pm THE GOALS Highlights 5.15pm

Newcastle (4-2-3-1) T Krul – D Janmaat, M Williamson, P Dummett, M Haïdara – R Taylor, J Colback – R Cabella, M Sissoko, S Ameobi – A Pérez

QPR (4-4-2) R Green – M Isla, S Caulker, R Dunne, Yun Suk Young – E Vargas, Sandro, K Henry, L Fer – R Zamora, C Austin

Most times fouled per 90min Song 2.1

Newcastle (2007-08)

L Fabianski – Á Rangel, J Amat, A Williams, N Taylor – Ki Sung Yueng, J Shelvey – N Dyer, G Sigurdsson, J Montero – W Bony

Ref C Foy (7 games)

2.6

Bolton (1999-2007)

QPR TV Highlights, BBC One, 10.20pm

Kouyaté

2.7

Number of African players signed by Allardyce

J Hart – P Zabaleta, V Kompany, E Mangala, G Clichy – J Navas, Fernando, Fernandinho, S Nasri – Y Touré – S Agüero

Ref N Swarbrick (5 games)

Most tackles won per 90min Song

Song is the eighth African signed for West Ham by Sam Allardyce, who appears to favour players from that continent

Newcastle v Danny Welbeck For Arsenal Against Man Utd

First for Arsenal: Aliadière, Boa Morte, Chamakh, Diawara, Hartson, Jenkinson, Ljungberg, Song,, Suker, Upson, Winterburn, Wright

Sprints per 90min i

Players aged 18−24

Players aged 25−29

Players aged 30−36

Sprint data courtesy of EA S Official Player Rating Index

al EXCLUSIVE Watch mobile, t

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

FGM

Barclays Premier League Sport GRAPHIC: JACK KINGHAM FOR THE TIMES

Stat attack

Today

Chelsea v West Brom Cahill games for Chelsea and England this season; he is unbeaten and his teams have scored in each one

Everton v West Ham Season West Ham (now fourth) have finished in top four in their 56 top-flight years (third in 1985-86)

Leicester v Sunderland Leicester league defeats in a row without scoring, first time for 27 seasons (last did so 1987-88, second tier)

216

Man City v Swansea Seconds Dzeko (injured) on pitch in last game for Manchester City, shortest by a substitute in top flight for four years

Newcastle v QPR Home games in past four when Newcastle have scored in 73rd minute (scored in 71st in the other)

Stoke v Burnley Top-flight clubs without a South American in senior squad; these clubs

Arsenal v Man Utd Seasons since these teams both finished outside top four; yet both are outside top five

Sunday

Crystal Palace v Liverpool Top-flight games in row televised live (before this weekend) without a 0-0

er League this season

55.1 49.7 39.9

er Performance Index, er League

goals on your and online

Hull v Tottenham Successive league starts Ahmed Elmohamady has made for Hull

Monday

Aston Villa v Southampton Monday Premier League games between these sides, after this one; only West Ham and Spurs have met more on this day

Stoke v

Predictions

Burnley

Arsenal v Man Utd

TV Highlights, BBC One, 10.20pm

Marc Wilson is a serious doubt for Stoke, but Glenn Whelan should be fit. Burnley have Steven Reid back. Scott Arfield and Nathaniel Chalobah are likely to be fit. Of the four players fouled when clear on goal, leading to a red card, in the top flight this term, two were Stoke players (Victor Moses against Spurs; Whelan against Hull)

TODAY 3pm THE GOALS Highlights 5.30pm

46%

Stoke (4-2-3-1) A Begovic – P Bardsley, R Shawcross, M Muniesa, E Pieters – S Sidwell, S N’Zonzi – J Walters, Bojan, V Moses – M B Diouf

Burnley (4-4-2)

Arsenal v

Arsenal have Olivier Giroud and Mikel Arteta back but test Danny Welbeck’s hamstring. Theo Walcott is a serious doubt. Luke Shaw is a doubt for United, who are without Radamel Falcao, Phil Jones, Marcos Rojo, Rafael Da Silva, Jonny Evans and Daley Blind. United’s past six league wins have come at home; ten of their previous 17 came away

13% D

Arsenal (4-1-4-1) W Szczesny – C Chambers, P Mertesacker, N Monreal, K Gibbs – M Arteta – A Oxlade-Chamberlain, J Wilshere, A Sánchez, S Cazorla – D Welbeck

Manchester United (4-1-4-1) D De Gea – A Valencia, C Smalling, P McNair, L Shaw – M Carrick – A Januzaj, W Rooney, M Fellaini, Á Di María – R van Persie Ref M Dean (8 games)

Leicester v Sunderland

25% 28%

TOMORROW 1.30pm THE GOALS Live goal updates

Crystal Palace (4-4-1-1)

17% 10%

J Speroni – A Mariappa, S Dann, D Delaney, J Ward – J Puncheon, J McArthur, M Jedinak, Y Bolasie – J Ledley – F Campbell

S Mignolet – G Johnson, M Skrtel, D Lovren, A Moreno – J Henderson, S Gerrard, E Can – R Sterling, M Balotelli, P Coutinho Ref J Moss (8 games)

Newcastle v QPR

Liverpool (4-3-3)

63% 22%

15%

Stoke v Burnley 67% TOMORROW 4pm THE GOALS Live goal updates

21%

Hull (3-5-2) A McGregor – J Chester, M Dawson, C Davies – A Elmohamady, J Livermore, T Huddlestone, M Diamé, R Brady – N Jelavic, A Hernández

Crystal Palace v Liverpool 51%

H Lloris – E Dier, Y Kaboul, F Fazio, B Davies – R Mason, E Capoue – A Townsend, C Eriksen, N Chadli – H Kane Ref C Pawson (8 games)

12%

Tottenham (4-2-3-1) 26% 23% 2

Hull v Tottenham

Aston Villa v Southampton Villa have Philippe Senderos, Ron Vlaar, Nathan Baker and Fabian Delph injured. Christian Benteke is suspended. Steven Davis is a Southampton doubt. Paul Lambert, of Villa, is favourite to be the first top-flight manager to depart: in four of the past five seasons the first managerial exit occurred between November 21 and December 6

Man City v Swansea 73%

Tottenham

TV Live, Sky Sports 1 RADIO BBC 5 Live

46%

Hull v

Hull have Allan McGregor, Michael Dawson, Nikica Jelavic and Alex Bruce back. Curtis Davies is a slight doubt. Spurs are without the suspended Kyle Naughton and injured Kyle Walker. Four of Spurs' past five games have finished 1-2: they lost at home to Newcastle and Stoke, and won away to Aston Villa and Asteras Tripolis

21% 16%

TV Live, Sky Sports 1 RADIO talkSPORT

64%

TODAY 5.30pm THE GOALS Live goal updates

Liverpool James McArthur is a slight doubt for Palace, but Mile Jedinak’s suspension is over and Kevin Doyle is fit. Liverpool will be without Daniel Sturridge until 2015 and Mario Balotelli’s hamstring injury will be assessed. Liverpool have not won any of their five games away to Palace since the turn of the century

Everton v West Ham

Crystal Palace v TV Live, Sky Sports 1 RADIO talkSPORT

Manchester United TV Live, Sky Sports 1 RADIO talkSPORT

Chelsea v West Brom 80%

T Heaton – K Trippier, M Duff, J Shackell, S Ward – S Arfield, D Marney, D Jones, G Boyd – A Barnes, D Ings Ref M Atkinson (9 games)

24%

30%

MONDAY 8pm THE GOALS Live goal updates

Aston Villa (4-3-3) B Guzan – A Hutton, J Okore, C Clark, A Cissokho – A Westwood, C Sánchez, T Cleverley – A Weimann, G Agbonlahor, C N’Zogbia

31%

41% 28%

Ref P Dowd (8 games)

39 2

Aston Villa v Southampton

24% 27% D

Worse in Europe because we’re bad at home

here was a time when the domination of the Champions League by teams from the Premier League was almost embarrassing. At least it was if that sort of thing bothers you. No longer. Or at least it seems like that. But I have learnt never to trust my first instincts and always to let the data do the talking. So this week Dr Henry Stott, Dr Mark Latham and Dr Dinesh Vatvani have taken a look at the performance of English clubs in the Champions League. A real decline or a trick of the eye? A real decline or random fluctuation? A real decline, I’m afraid. Looking at the number of stages in the competition passed by clubs from different countries of eight seasons of data and using linear regression, the Fink Tank finds a statistically significant decline in progress by English teams. There has also been a statistically significant decline in the progress of Italian sides and a statistically significant increase in the progress of Spanish and German teams. At first, the culprit looks easy to find and reassuring. If a little puzzling. It’s Manchester City. Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester United have not declined significantly in terms of

Going, going, gone

How far English clubs go in the Champions League

France Germany

49%

DANIEL FINKELSTEIN

England

Southampton (4-3-3) F Forster – N Clyne, J Fonte, T Alderweireld, R Bertrand – S Davis, V Wanyama, M Schneiderlin – D Tadic, G Pellè, S Mané

Fink Tank

the progress they make. Yet City have pulled down the whole Premier League with their poor performances in their first three seasons in the competition (and this season isn’t looking any better). I say at first, because when looking at the Premier League as a whole and taking the teams on average, there has been a fall in the quality of sides over the past five years, suggesting that City may be a symptom rather than a cause. One theory is that the competitiveness of the Premier League might lead teams to play slightly less good sides in the Champions League. In other words, what Liverpool did against Real Madrid is being done more subtly by all sides. It is certainly true that when playing in the Champions League English sides are much more likely to be caught offside (43 per cent more than in the Premier League), shoot less often (23 per cent less) and concede more shots (27 per cent more). Yet, of course, this may just be the result of stronger opponents rather than weaker performances. And there hasn’t been a change over time. So we studied the proportion of first-team players fielded by clubs from different nations over five seasons. There hasn’t been a significant drop. English clubs fielded first-team players for 73 per cent of player minutes in 2008-09 and 71 per cent in 2013-14. So the drop is real and not random fluctuation. And nothing in what we are specifically doing for the Champions League is to blame. The discouraging thought is just that the Premier League has got worse.

Italy Spain

2006-07 2007-08 2008-09 2009-10 2010-11 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Sport Comment

Depth charge: game hits an all-time low Oliver Kay Chief Football Correspondent

he tweet from Darren, or more precisely @daz1992, is assured in its tone: “You guys must be in journalistic heaven tonight with both Wigan and Sheffield United.” The assumption is that stories such as those involving Wigan Athletic (the appointment of Malky Mackay, a manager who allegedly sent racist, sexist and antisemitic text messages, defended by a chairman who says that “Jewish people do chase money more than everybody else” and “there’s nothing bad” about calling a Chinese person a “ch***”) and Sheffield United (whose joint-chairman made clear his anger last night at the bad publicity, including the resignations of club patrons and the threatened withdrawal of sponsorship deals, that stopped the club offering a career lifeline to a convicted rapist) is manna from heaven for the media. It might seem a reasonable assumption, but it underestimates the sense of dismay that grows every time this beautiful game is besmirched. On the pitch, it is players cheating their fellow professionals in the hope of gaining a competitive edge, safe in the knowledge that the authorities do not care enough to do anything about it. In boardrooms, it is chauvinistic attitudes and the belief that moral and ethical codes need only be brought into play, grudgingly, if the brand — the beloved, all-important brand — comes under threat. Taken to an extreme, it is football being run into a perpetual state of disrepute by Fifa, whose attitude to years upon years of corruption has been to ignore it except in the rare cases where it has been beneficial to get rid of an individual whose toxic influence has endangered the regime. It is the mind-boggling decision to stage the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, a tiny emirate whose size, climate, lack of sporting heritage (and potential) and limited grasp of human rights did not remotely trouble Ricardo Teixeira and friends when they cast their vote. It is Fifa’s “independent” “ethics” committee’s unwillingness to address the blindingly obvious. If this is “journalistic heaven” — corruption, racism, rape, match-fixing allegations in France and, on a comparatively trivial note, cheating or biting or play-acting on the pitch — then why does it feel like hell-in-a-handcart territory? Yes, a raging controversy can dig newspapers out of a hole on a slow news day, but no one embarks on a career in sports journalism, or settles into his or her seat in the press box, in the hope of witnessing ugliness. Journalistic heaven? To offer a few examples from the past couple of years alone, that could be reporting on one of the most dramatic matches in World Cup history as Brazil were beaten 7-1 by Germany in Belo Horizonte this summer. It could be the extraordinary moment when Manchester City became champions of England for the first time in 44 years or

ALEX LIVESEY / GETTY IMAGES

Beautiful game: fortunately there are other, more pleasing, aspects of football to discuss than those that have dominated recent headlines

when Bradford City beat Arsenal and Aston Villa en route to the Capital One Cup final. It could be witnessing a masterclass from Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo or Andrés Iniesta. It could be any number of off-pitch stories — transfers, takeovers, serious upheaval — without welcoming the stuff that shames football. It could be Wigan’s FA Cup triumph 18 months ago, a fairytale for a club who, under Dave Whelan, had risen from the depths of the Football League. Whelan, the chairman responsible for those aforementioned comments, has done remarkable things for Wigan as a town and a club. He reasons that, by appointing Malky Mackay, of “textgate” infamy, he has done another. He even spoke of helping Mackay’s rehabilitation. It was only when pushed farther on Thursday that he revealed that, in offering Mackay a road to redemption, he was not showing a broad mind but the type of narrow mind that felt the former Cardiff City manager had done nothing wrong in the first place.

Will Whelan care once the storm has blown over? As long as the results are good enough, probably not. It is a results business, you see. It is why Sheffield United were willing to offer Ched Evans a place to train, leaving open the possibility of a contract, so soon after his release from prison after a conviction for rape. Again, the talk was of doing the right thing by offering him rehabilitation. Again, after a diplomatic initial statement, the cover was blown, in this case when Jim Phipps, the co-chairman, outrageously accused United’s patrons of dragging the club’s name through the mud. Yes, Jim, how dare those you appointed suggest that renewing links with Evans might be at odds with the club’s stated values and sense of community? How dare they not sit silently as you indulge a convicted rapist? Knowing football, there will be other clubs who decide that they have less to lose by taking on Evans. Some will reject him on ethical grounds, others on the less

United’s search for positives hits engine buffers

ore exciting news from Old Trafford. In his latest pitch to the New York Stock Exchange, Ed Woodward, the Manchester United executive vice-chairman, revealed that Daley Blind’s Twitter following increased by 72 per cent on the day he signed from Ajax, while Ángel Di María’s arrival from Real Madrid brought a 12-time increase in the number of Google searches for his name. If you prefer analytics of a different type, of course, you could say that United’s points total in the Barclays Premier

League fell by 28.09 per cent last season and that, even after a £122 million net spend in the transfer market this summer, it is somehow on course to fall again. They should improve — they have to improve — but, injuries notwithstanding, it has been a disconcertingly slow, directionless start under Louis van Gaal. It could also be pointed out that the extraordinarily expensive loan deal for Radamel Falcao — which, like Liverpool’s ill conceived signing of Mario Balotelli, had executives at rival clubs smirking in disbelief — looks even more panic-driven

or statement-driven now than it did on deadline day. Not only is the Colombian’s fitness a growing concern, but Van Gaal suggests, belatedly, that it will be hard to find the right balance in his team with more than one centre forward. In the meantime, Danny Welbeck, sacrificed to accommodate Falcao’s arrival, has begun to look a far more confident centre forward with Arsenal and England. A lifelong United fan he may be, but, when it comes to facing his former club today, he would love nothing better to stick it up their search engine.

wholesome basis that they could do without the adverse publicity. Inevitably, though, there will be at least one club where desperation outweighs principles and where the decision-making process will be not, “This man has done wrong but deserves a second chance,” but “This man guarantees goals in League One, so sod it.” Still, what kind of standards can football expect when it is governed by the wretched Blatter regime? This is an organisation that was muddling along quite happily, knee-deep in corruption on its executive committee, until the media, most notably the Sunday Times, began to expose moral turpitude on a level that even Blatter, after all those hilarious complaints about “attacks on the football family”, could not ignore. He and Fifa are still doing their best to ignore it, though, continuing to view the much-needed reforms and clean-up operation as a threat to the regime — funny, that — rather than an opportunity to be grasped. Only at Fifa could an “independent ethics committee” be so lacking in credibility, undermined by what seems like a flimsy grasp of ethics and an even flimsier grasp of independence. Fifa, hilariously, goes by the motto “For the game, for the world”. What a joke. Everything Blatter does is for the good of his empire — and to hell with the game. If those charged with running football cannot take responsibility, preferring to turn a blind eye, why should anyone else? It is undeniably true that accentuating the negative aspects of football can at times make you feel, wrongly, as if the beautiful game is a thing of our imagination. It is not. Football is a sport that entertains, excites, enrages and enthrals the masses like no other. It just feels at times that it could be so much better.

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Football Sport

‘Dave Whelan a racist chairman hiring a racist coach’ says Tan James Ducker Northern Football Correspondent

Vincent Tan launched a scathing attack on Dave Whelan and Malky Mackay yesterday, the Cardiff City owner accusing the “racist” Wigan Athletic chairman of hiring a “racist” manager. Tan’s condemnation came as the FA confirmed that it was looking into Whelan’s alleged antisemitic and racist remarks about Jewish and Chinese people respectively in conjunction with its existing investigation over Mackay’s role in the “textgate” affair that has marred English football. Whelan caused widespread opprobrium after reportedly claiming that it was “nothing” to call a Chinese person a “ch***” and saying that “Jewish people chase money more than everybody else” as he controversially attempted to defend Mackay and his appointment of the 42-year-old Scot. The Wigan chairman vehemently denied being a racist and apologised if his remarks had caused offence, but that did little to appease Tan, Jewish and Chinese leaders or the club’s sponsors. After Premier Range, a kitchen appliances company that sponsored the back of Wigan’s shirts, terminated its contract with the club on Thursday, a second sponsor, iPro Sport, a sports drink company, announced on the same day that it was also severing ties with the club in the wake of the storm. Mackay, sacked as Cardiff manager by Tan last December, is being investigated over allegations that he exchanged antisemitic, racist, sexist and homophobic messages with Iain Moody, his former head of recruitment, during his time in charge of the south Wales club. “This is a racist chairman hiring a racist manager,” Tan

Allardyce not going to head for route one Rob Maul

Sam Allardyce has vowed not to turn West Ham United into a long-ball team now that Andy Carroll, the club’s striker, has returned to fitness. At the start of this season, the West Ham manager was told, in no uncertain terms, by David Sullivan and David Gold, the club’s co-owners, that his team had to provide “more entertainment” on the pitch. Allardyce, to his credit, responded positively to the request — and thanks to Diafra Sakho and Enner Valencia

RICHARD HEATHCOTE/GETTY IMAGES

Rory Smith

6 Jim Phipps, the Sheffield United co-chairman, believes “mob-like behaviour” forced the retraction of an offer for Ched Evans to train at the club. Protests from sponsors and club patrons led to the offer to Evans, a convicted rapist, being withdrawn. “I’m upset that we are not able to do what we wanted to,” Phipps said. “Mob-like behaviour made it difficult to take the simple step of allowing Ched to train.” told the BBC. “I hope that stops at two racists in Wigan, not snowballing to 2,000 or 20,000 racists in Wigan. “I think he [Whelan] insulted the dignity of all Jewish people. I think he insulted the dignity of [the] Chinese.” Mackay was accused of branding Tan, a Malaysian, a “ch***” in one text message and is reported in another, in reference to Phil Smith, a Jewish football agent, to have said: “Nothing like a Jew that sees money slipping through his fingers.” Whelan reportedly told The Guardian that he saw nothing offensive in any of Mackay’s remarks. “If any Englishman said he has never called a Chinaman a ch***”, he is lying,” Whelan was claimed to have said. “There is nothing bad about doing that. It is like calling the British Brits, or the Irish paddies.” Whlean has said that he may have been misquoted by the newspaper. The FA said that it was “very concerned” to read Whelan’s alleged comments and stressed that it took “all forms of discrimination seriously”. “As with all such cases, this will be dealt with as a priority,” the FA said in a statement. “The investigation is already under way and the FA’s governance division has writWhelan is the subject of a “priority” FA investigation over his alleged remarks

settling in quickly, with nine goals between them in the Barclays Premier League, the east London club have enjoyed a successful start to the season. Sakho is a doubt for the match away to Everton today because of a back problem. Now that Carroll has recovered from an ankle ligament injury, the assumption was that Allardyce would revert to a long-ball tactic, but he has been to quick play down any fears. “With Andy back, we may play slightly different in that we play more into Andy’s feet than we do into Valencia or Sakho,” Allardyce said. “I don’t want them to knock it up to Andy’s head — I want them to be talented enough to knock it into Andy’s feet or chest. “We want it on Andy’s head when it is getting crossed into the box, because that is where he is at his best and where he can score a lot of goals, as Sakho has proved this season.”

Mourinho will accept risk of card for Costa

Tan, the Cardiff owner who parted company with Mackay in December, accused the Wigan chairman of “insulting the dignity” of Jewish and Chinese people

ten to Mr Whelan. He has three working days to respond.” The FA has already denied claims by Whelan, after conversations he said he had with two “influential” figures at the governing body, that “nothing will come” of its investigation into Mackay. Tan believes it is imperative that the FA takes a strong line against Mackay and Whelan. “If that is true and if the FA is taking this matter lightly, I must say I am very disappointed,” Tan said. “The FA must understand that the whole world is watching. Will the FA be a regulator on football matters with teeth or a toothless regulator?” Whelan, whose suitability to run a club has been questioned by Kick It Out, the anti-racism campaign, came under renewed attack from Jewish

groups yesterday. Jonathan Arkush, vice-president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the main representative body of British Jews, described Whelan’s alleged comments as “outrageous” and said that his apology was “halfhearted” and “does not go far enough”. “You cannot insult a whole group of people and then say, ‘I would never insult them’, and hope that’s OK,” Arkush said. “Whelan, in his role as chairman of a football club, has a responsibility to set the tone for both his players and supporters. “Racism and antisemitism will prevail on and off the pitch if it’s acceptable and unchallenged in the boardroom. We will be taking up the matter with the Football Association and Kick It Out.”

José Mourinho will not ask Diego Costa to curb the combative instincts that have led to four bookings for the Spain striker this season, acknowledging that the risk of suspension immediately after his return from injury is one he must run. The Chelsea manager said yesterday that the 26-year-old forward is “totally recovered” from the hamstring problem that has plagued him for at least the past three months and “free of fear” of a recurrence. He is, Mourinho believes, ready to recapture the form that yielded nine goals in his first seven Barclays Premier League games, starting with the visit of West Bromwich Albion to Stamford Bridge this afternoon. “He had a little holiday for two weeks, with a Chelsea physio,” Mourinho said. “Even then he was working many hours per day. We feel he is free of his old injury. The way he trains, he is free of fears.” Given the arduous schedule facing Chelsea in the next month — Mourinho’s side will play 12 games in three competitions between today and New Year’s day — the manager would hope, of course, to have his talismanic forward available for every fixture. He is aware, though, that Costa is walking a tightrope. His booking at Anfield a fortnight ago, where he had a running battle with Martin Skrtel, was his fourth of the campaign. One more and he will miss a game, but Mourinho has no intention of trying to tame Costa’s competitive streak. “Am I going to protect him? No way. He plays,” Mourinho said. “When he is fit, he plays. When he gets the fifth card, so be it. I am not worried. I just want him to get a proper yellow card, one the consequence of a football action. I do not want a stupid yellow card. “The first two cards he got [were a consequence of his reputation]. Not the third or fourth, they were nothing serious but the consequences of the game. I tell them all I do not want yellow cards, but if it arrives in a normal action, something that is important for the team — an intelligent foul to stop a counterattack — then that is fine.” The only way to endure the demands of the coming fixtures, he feels, is for his players to show a little Christmas cheer. “If you are thinking that you should be having Christmas in Portugal, Brazil or France with your family, or that the players in Germany are on beautiful islands, getting the sun, then you can’t do it. [This is] the only country that plays on these days. You have to be proud of it. You have to do it happy.”

Barkley not ready for central casting Tony Barrett

Roberto Martínez will overlook Ross Barkley’s claims for a central midfield role in the likely absence of Gareth Barry through injury and has told the England player that he must bide his time before moving into his favoured position. Before the start of this season, Barkley revealed that one of his main ambitions was to get more experience in a central role and, although Martínez expects him to establish himself there eventually, he does not believe that the time is right to move the 20-year-old. “No. Not yet,” Martínez, whose side face West Ham United at home in the Barclays Premier League today, said. “I think we will look for other options. I

think I want Ross to play that position eventually, but ‘eventually’ is maybe 100 games in the Premier League. That’s the thinking. Ross can play many positions. I just think at the moment you need to let him develop that knowledge about the game which will allow him to make good decisions. “To do that, he’s got a perfect player to learn from in Gareth Barry. He’s just everything you want for a player like Ross to learn from, but without losing what’s

unique to him. Remember Ross is unique for the talent he has. Ross is a joy to have. He is a pristine professional and I don’t think he will ever ask to play in certain position. “To play that role you need to reduce what you do on the ball, put more work in off the ball. I think the outstanding quality of Ross is the way he brings that transition as soon as he wins the ball, the way he attacks players and drives at space. You don’t want to take that away from his play too much. “I think eventually he will get a little bit more settled with the way he plays. But at the moment, it would be a big loss if you restrict Ross of what he gives you naturally as a raw talent.” Barkley is lauded as unique talent

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Sport Football

Van Gaal backs short-term view on Falcao deal James Ducker Northern Football Correspondent

Louis van Gaal believes that Manchester United supporters are discovering now why the club opted against signing Radamel Falcao on a permanent contract in the summer. The Colombia striker has been plagued by injury since joining United on a season-long loan from Monaco on transfer deadline day in September. The 28-year-old will be absent against Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium this evening — and he is unlikely to make his comeback until the visit to Southampton on December 8 — as he works his way back from a calf injury that has forced him to miss the past three matches. Van Gaal has warned Falcao that his reputation will count for nothing unless he gets fit as doubts grow over United’s prospects of turning his loan move into a permanent £43.5 million transfer next summer. The United manager expressed hope that his decision to sign Falcao — and sell Danny Welbeck, the England striker, to Arsenal on the same day — will be vindicated.

“I hope so,” Van Gaal said when asked if he was confident that the decision would be justified. “That is clear, I think. But do you think that we expected he would be so many weeks injured?” When it was put to Van Gaal that United were well aware Falcao had only returned to action in August after seven months out with a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee, the manager replied: “Yes, but because of that maybe we didn’t buy him. “I don’t give any chance to players when they are not fit. Believe me, see my record. You have to be fit. What’s your name? It doesn’t matter, you have to be fit.” Luke Shaw is likely to be declared fit to face Arsenal, which will be a huge boost for Van Gaal, who is looking for his first away win of the season, with so many defenders sidelined. The England left back trained normally yesterday and Rafael Da Silva and Ashley Young also took part in the session, raising the prospect of the right back and/or winger being included among the substitutes this evening. With Marcos Rojo, Phil Jones, Jonny Evans and Daley Blind all injured, Van

TIMES PHOTOGRAPHER, BRADLEY ORMESHER

Proceeding with caution: Falcao has started three league matches since joining United, raising doubts over whether the club will sign him on a permanent deal

Gaal’s resources are so stretched that the manager may have to gamble on the fitness of some players. At present seventh in the Barclays Premier League, one point and one place behind Arsenal, Van Gaal accepts that United must put a winning run together soon as they attempt to avert a second successive season without competing in the Champions League. This is the longest United have gone without an away win in the league since Sir Alex Ferguson replaced Ron Atkinson as manager in 1986. “It’s always vital in sport [to go on a run],” Van Gaal said. “Believe me, Manchester United, the manager and all the players and staff want to win every game and we do everything to win the game, every week. “That [not having won an away game] is remarkable. Normally for me, away games are not any different in how we play, but it is a fact that we couldn’t win until now. Maybe Arsenal will be the first, you never know.” Van Gaal would not be drawn on whether he will move for Kevin Strootman, the Roma and Holland midfielder, in January, but he echoed the sentiments of Ed Woodward, the United executive vice-chairman, that it will be difficult to sign the quality of player they want in the winter window. “I cannot discuss with the media about players that we want to buy,” he said. “I cannot answer this question and not only about Strootman, but all the players in this world. “I don’t think that he [Woodward] has said we should not buy. I think he said that in January it’s very difficult to buy players who are good enough for the quality of Manchester United and because of that we are not buying, and I agree with that.”

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Football Sport

ADRIAN DENNIS / GETTY IMAGES

Pellegrini and City eager to avoid winter of discontent James Ducker

Wide fit: Welbeck has been revitalised by his move from United to Arsenal, but Giroud’s return after injury could lead to him being shunted to the periphery again

Welbeck may exit stage left

The former Manchester United striker could be playing today to keep his Arsenal central role, writes Matt Hughes

anny Welbeck will be centre stage when he faces Manchester United, his former club, for the first time this evening and would be well advised to enjoy the experience while he can. Arsène Wenger gave a strong hint yesterday that the Arsenal forward will be moved wide when Olivier Giroud regains match fitness, which would come as a huge blow to a player who regards himself as an orthodox centre forward. Welbeck has been revitalised by his £16 million move to Arsenal in the summer, thriving on the new experience of being treated as a first-choice striker by club and country and responding with ten goals in 18 appearances. But it could prove to be a temporary reprieve. With Giroud back in Arsenal’s squad today, for the first time since breaking a leg in August, the relocated Highbury clock is not the only thing ticking at the Emirates Stadium. Welbeck is a diffident character, but he has made it clear that he regards playing through the middle as fundamental to his improved form, national status and — most crucially — increased goal output. He has grown tetchy during several interviews this season when asked about his modest strike-rate at United of a goal about every five games and regularly

bemoaned his lack of opportunities at Old Trafford. “Stick the best strikers on the wing in a four-man midfield and see if they score goals,” Welbeck said pointedly after scoring a hat-trick in Arsenal’s 4-1 win over Galatasaray last month. Wenger’s words as he welcomed Giroud back to the fold yesterday will have worried Welbeck, then, and seemed a strange way to motivate him before what he will view as his biggest game of the season to date. The pair could play up front together, but, with Alexis Sánchez in such scintillating form, it is far more likely that Welbeck will be shunted wide, particularly with Mesut Özil out until the new year. “Welbeck can play in different positions up front and there is room for both of them to start in some games,” Wenger said. “One of the main reasons he came here was that he wanted to play. It was not a condition to play as a central striker. “You have players who play on the flanks who score goals. I don’t think that will stop him from scoring. He had chances the other night when he played 6 Arsène Wenger said yesterday that Gareth Southgate’s plan to take his strongest possible squad to next summer’s Under-21 European Championship could jeopardise the chances of England’s senior team at Euro 2016. Southgate has Roy Hodgson’s blessing to select the squad he wants, which could include the Arsenal players, Jack Wilshere, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Calum Chambers, but Wenger insists that the senior internationals should be given a summer off.

on the left for England. Cristiano Ronaldo played all his life on the flanks and scored more goals than games he played. I don’t think that will stop him. What is a problem for him is to play.” Wenger’s frankness came as a surprise, although looking back at the dramatic transfer deadline day on which Welbeck signed for Arsenal in September, perhaps it should not have done. A few days earlier, Welbeck was not on Arsenal’s radar, with the club exploring the possibility of a loan move for Radamel Falcao, which fell through because of the Colombia striker’s wages and a tax issue involving Monaco, his parent club. Only when Falcao moved to United, who began touting Welbeck around, did Arsenal start to show interest, and even then Wenger took some convincing. With Giroud his main man, Wenger was instinctively opposed to a bringing in a stop-gap signing and would have relied on Yaya Sanogo and Joel Campbell until the France striker’s return had Ivan Gazidis, the chief executive, not pushed the deal through. Since then, Welbeck has shown that he is more than just a stand-in and has also helped England to make light of the continued absence of Daniel Sturridge, but Wenger still seems to view him as a squad player. Welbeck, 23, looks destined to remain a player who divides opinion, with his detractors pointing out that he has scored in only three of his 12 games for Arsenal, and not once against top opposition. Certainly Louis Van Gaal has no regrets about selling him, despite Falcao’s fitness problems, dismissing Welbeck as a fringe player yesterday. “He was more a substitute than a lineup player,” the United manager said.

“And he was already with different coaches not a line-up player, so with Mr Van Gaal the world was not changing.” Welbeck’s directness has given Arsenal greater urgency, but it appears that Wenger is still wedded to Giroud’s more cerebral qualities, particularly with the prospect of Sánchez playing behind him. The Chile forward is a cause of some concern himself, however, as he returned to London from international duty only after a 15-hour flight on Thursday, having played all but four minutes of two friendlies against Venezuela and Uruguay. While Welbeck should shrug off a hamstring niggle, Theo Walcott is likely to miss out with a groin problem, presenting Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain with a chance to build on his impressive performance against Scotland for England, while Nacho Monreal will continue at centre back in the absence of Laurent Koscielny. “Sánchez looked a bit jaded just before he went away,” Wenger said. “But I won’t ask him the question because he will say he’s perfect.” Not since September 1998 have Arsenal met United with both clubs outside the Premier League’s top four, and on that occasion they had played fewer games than the unlikely pacesetters, Aston Villa and Derby County. United went on to win the treble and while they are not involved in European competition this season, Wenger expects Van Gaal to lead them back into the Champions League. “It’s early stages and I’ll tell you more tomorrow,” Wenger said. “They are still candidates to finish in the top four.” Welbeck would love to halt United’s revival and may need to if he is to continue his own.

Manuel Pellegrini has set his Manchester City players an ambitious target of winning seven and drawing one of their next eight Barclays Premier League matches as they bid to get their troubled season back on track. The City manager has warned his squad that there will be little margin for error for the rest of the year as he backed the champions to hunt down Chelsea at the top of the table, despite their poor form. City trail Chelsea by eight points after 11 matches and Pellegrini believes that they need to take at least 22 points from the next 24 available, which was precisely the feat they achieved over the eight league matches leading up to the halfway stage last term. They have accumulated 21 points so far, but the Chilean wants to have “more than 42” by the end of the year, he said. “I think December, and this week of November, is a decisive month for the Premier League,” Pellegrini, whose team face Swansea City at the Etihad Stadium this afternoon, said. “We are going to play eight games in the Premier League, we are going to finish the first round [reach the halfway stage] at the end of December. “We have 24 more points to try to win. I think it is important to have a good first round — that is more than 41 or 42 points. It’s very crucial to try to Pellegrini will welcome Kompany back into the team

be as near to the top of the table as we can be.” City have won just one of their past six matches in all competitions, and after Swansea, they face Bayern Munich at the Etihad on Tuesday in a match that is likely to determine their fate in the Champions League. Pellegrini will be without three key midfielders for the visit of the German champions, with Yaya Touré and Fernandinho suspended after their red cards in the 2-1 defeat by CSKA Moscow and David Silva yet to overcome a knee injury. “David still feels some pain in his knee so he’s not able to kick the ball,” Pellegrini said. “We’ll see if next week he can be ready at the end of the week.” There was one welcome boost for Pellegrini, with Vincent Kompany, the City captain, declared fit to face Swansea after a calf injury, but the manager knows that his team have no choice but to raise their game in the coming weeks. “Last season we dropped a lot of points, especially in the first six games we played away, but after that we were a more consistent team and I hope that after this international break we are going to return to our best performance,” Pellegrini said. “We are in a moment when we feel we are conceding goals too easily. The opponents arrive just two or three times at our goal and they score, and we are missing a lot of chances. “Those things happen when you are not in a good moment, but I am sure the players know exactly what they need to do. We are going to be the strong team that we were last season. We are not so bad as everyone says.”

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Sport Rugby union

Warburton intent on proving credentials John Westerby

The debate about who is the best open-side flanker in the world would be unlikely to last long, but open the discussion to a top five and the topic becomes more interesting. For anyone interested in the subject, the game between Wales and New Zealand at the Millennium Stadium should make for instructive viewing this evening, when the performances of Richie McCaw and Sam Warburton, the two captains, can be compared and contrasted. McCaw is the player who would top

the list of anyone not prejudiced by an anti-All Black bias. But where would Warburton, the northern hemisphere’s leading contender, rank in any such competition? This week, the Wales captain was asked about the challenge of playing against McCaw and produced his own top five. “McCaw, [David] Pocock, [Michael] Hooper, Francois Louw and Justin Tipuric are probably the top five open-sides in the world at the moment,” Warburton said. “You relish any opportunity to come up against those guys.” England supporters will note the

McCaw will captain the All Blacks for the hundredth occasion this evening

absence of their own captain, Chris Robshaw, from that list. Tipuric, whose athletic presence continues to drive Warburton, starts among the replacements today as Wales attempt to beat New Zealand for the first time for 61 years. Or at least to produce a performance that shows progress from their defeat by Australia a fortnight ago and their underwhelming victory over Fiji last weekend. McCaw reaches yet another landmark in his remarkable career, becoming the first player to captain his country 100 times, 16 times more than Brian O’Driscoll captained Ireland, 17 more than John Smit led South Africa. Will Carling holds the record for England, on 59 matches, while Martin Johnson was captain on 39 occasions. The first time that McCaw captained the All Blacks was at the Millennium Stadium, aged 23, winning his 25th cap. Warburton was younger still when he first led Wales in an international, against England in August 2011, winning his 16th cap. He will captain Wales for the 29th time today. Is it feasible to imagine Warburton, 26, leading his country another 71 times? It is more likely that McCaw’s achievement is a record that will never be broken. McCaw, of course, cares little for individual baubles, setting his sights on 6 Vern Cotter, the Scotland coach, has claimed that his side could be considered underdogs heading into today’s match against Tonga at Rugby Park, Kilmarnock. Although his side beat Argentina two weekends ago and gave New Zealand a scare last Saturday, Cotter believes that Tonga are a better side than when they beat Scotland 21-15 two years ago. “They almost come into the match as favourites,” Cotter said. “They have won their last two games and beat Scotland two years ago.” The match is the first top-level international to be played on an artificial pitch.

how they line up Wales: L Halfpenny; A Cuthbert, J Davies, J Roberts, G North; D Biggar, R Webb; P James, R Hibbard, S Lee, J Ball, A W Jones, D Lydiate, S Warburton (captain), T Faletau. Replacements: S Baldwin, N Smith, R Jones, L Charteris, J Tipuric, M Phillips, J Hook, L Williams. New Zealand: B Smith; C Piutau, C Smith, S B Williams, J Savea; B Barrett, A Smith; W Crockett, D Coles, O Franks, B Retallick, S Whitelock, K Read, R McCaw (captain), J Kaino. Replacements: K Mealamu, J Moody, C Faumuina, P Tuipulotu, L Messam, TJ Perenara, C Slade, R Crotty. Referee: W Barnes (England). TV: Live on BBC Two from 4.55pm (kick-off 5.30pm).

a season-ending performance that will take them into a World Cup year in good heart. Another victory this evening will leave their 2014 record at played 14, won 12, drawn one, lost one. “The milestones and all that personal stuff comes well second to the team performing,” McCaw said. “The best way to celebrate that will be if we have a good performance and win. Our [recent] performances have been OK, but we’d like to finish off by really putting a performance together.” Warburton will chalk up a rather more minor landmark this evening, when he starts in the back row alongside Dan Lydiate and Toby Faletau for the 19th time, breaking a 41-year-old Wales record held by Dai Morris, John Taylor and Mervyn Davies. Both sides have made several changes after fielding experimental line-ups last week, the All Blacks beating Scotland 24-16. As well as the clash between the captains, there will be intriguing comparisons to be drawn at centre, between Jamie Roberts and Sonny Bill Williams, and at full back, where Leigh Halfpenny returns for Wales and Ben Smith remains for New Zealand, his vibrant form enough to keep Israel Dagg out of the side. Few are expecting Warren Gatland’s side to end their run of 21 defeats against the three leading southern hemisphere nations, but a strong performance might raise hopes of breaking that duck against South Africa next weekend.

Schmidt seeks fresh answers Rob Wildman

Joe Schmidt, whose confident first year in charge brought a Six Nations title, predicts that his Ireland team will discover today if they can manage the increased expectation that success brings. “We’ll find out if the boys can handle the greater expectations,” is how the Ireland head coach describes today’s task against Australia after wins over Georgia and South Africa. If Ireland do maintain the consistency that has lifted them to No 3 in the world rankings, they will be repeating the feat of 2006, when the team most recently beat the Wallabies and Springboks in the same autumn. Schmidt, the New Zealander who led Leinster to European success before taking over the national squad from Declan Kidney, has smoothly given Ireland firm direction despite the retirement of Brian O’Driscoll in May. Who replaces the centre is still a question, because injury has ruled out Jared Payne, the New Zealand-born centre, who was given the initial opportunity only to damage a foot late on against South Africa. Schmidt has moved Robbie Henshaw to No 13 and kept O’Driscoll’s long-time colleague, Gordon D’Arcy, who proved his fitness in last week’s win over Georgia, at inside centre. The only other change from the starting XV

against South Africa is up front where Rory Best, the fit-again first choice, returns at hooker. Stuart Lancaster, the England head coach, will have a keen interest in events as Australia, who have already beaten Wales and tested France this month, finish their autumn programme at Twickenham next Saturday. For Michael Cheika, the new Wallaby coach, a trip to Dublin is a welcome return to where he helped to launch Leinster to European glory, before moving on to Stade Français and Waratahs in Sydney. A measure of his calibre is that he has quickly brought some order to a Wallaby camp torn by the departure of Ewen McKenzie, the head coach, last month amid the text message row involving Kurtley Beale. Beale, who returned to the Wallaby camp this week, is among the replacements.

how they line up Ireland: R Kearney; T Bowe, R Henshaw, G D’Arcy, S Zebo; J Sexton, C Murray; J McGrath, R Best, M Ross, D Toner, P O’Connell (captain), P O’Mahony, R Ruddock, J Heaslip. Replacements: S Cronin, D Kilcoyne, R Ah You, D Foley, T O’Donnell, E Reddan, I Madigan, F Jones. Australia: I Folau; A Ashley-Cooper, T Kuridrani, M Toomua, H Speight; B Foley, N Phipps; J Slipper, S Fainga’a, S Kepu, S Carter, R Simmons, L Jones, M Hooper (captain), B McCalman. Replacements: J Hanson, B Robinson, T Faulkner, W Skelton, J Schatz, W Genia, Q Cooper, K Beale. Referee: G Jackson (New Zealand). TV: Live on Sky Sports 2 from 4pm (kick-off 4.30pm).

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Comment Sport

No more Mr Nice Guy, let’s get nasty Paul Ackford

DAVID ROGERS / GETTY IMAGES

emo to Lanny, or Bomber (Lancaster, geddit?) as one rather witty social media correspondent had it the other day. This is a crisis. Not significant, I grant you. But more than a blip. There are ten games to go before you open your World Cup account. Well, four actually, because today’s and certain others don’t really count. Samoa are troublesome, not heavy duty. You’ve lost the heavy-duty fixtures and, by my reckoning, that leaves only four matches to discover if this World Cup tilt is anything more than wish-fulfilment. Australia next weekend will be a handful and so will France at Twickenham and Ireland and Wales on the road in the Six Nations, but the rest (Scotland, Italy and three friendlies) will tell you nothing. So, forgive me if I add my tuppence worth. It comes with love and best wishes because it has been pretty good so far. But you seem to have stalled somewhat. Stop being so bloody nice We’ve talked about this before, remember? Port Elizabeth in 2012, the day before you went toe-to-toe with the Springboks and got the 14-14 draw, still your best result against them. I said you didn’t have to be nice to everyone: journalists, players, opponents, South African officials. I read the other day that you reckon to spend 40 per cent of your time dealing with the media. Why? There’s no mileage in that. They’re not loyal, or fans. There are no red roses on their laptops. Most of them are Welsh anyway. Telling them your thoughts on selection, conducting briefings on the developmental stages of your team just gives them bullets to shoot at you when it all goes belly-up. Results are your currency, not information exchange. Give them nothing. Snarl a bit more. That goes for the players, too. In his newspaper column on Thursday, Danny Care, who has been left out of the squad today, said: “I have had my two games and obviously they have not gone exactly how I wanted. I do not think I have played badly. I just have not played brilliantly — two all right games, really.” That’s simply nonsense. Care was rubbish against New Zealand and South Africa. Not to acknowledge that is bordering on the

Point to prove: Lancaster gives instructions in training, but England’s progress has stalled

self-delusional. You’ve always been big on honesty and rigour, but the past two games — shots of replaced players smiling on the bench when their team are losing, retaining Owen Farrell, parading a side who seem more interested in cultivating their ludicrous Movember moustaches than winning a game of rugby — has dented that sense of a humble, self-critical group going about their business. Remove those blinkers While we’re on the subject of Farrell, why, when Charlie Hodgson and Jeremy Guscott (on the radio) and Austin Healey and Sir Clive Woodward (in print) argue that playing him outside George Ford is a mistake, do you think it is a good idea? These men aren’t mugs. Well, Woodward,

Guscott and Hodgson aren’t. Yet you see something they don’t. Hodgson, lest you forget, is a team-mate of Farrell at Saracens, knows him and the dynamic between 10 and 12 inside out, and still has reservations. It’s a big call, Stuart. I hope for your sake it works out. It’s not just Farrell either. Dean Ryan, a former international player and coach, devoted a large chunk of his column to explaining why Brad Barritt is not an international centre. Ryan is not some old-timer revved up and wheeled out to cause controversy. He’s on the inside, looking out. Barritt is a banger. He runs at bodies, not space, which limits the attacking potential of your side. You saw things clearly when you took over from Martin Johnson, successfully

blooded players, spotted potential, rewarded form and performance, but these days I think you are seeing what you want to see on the pitch and elsewhere rather than what is actually happening. You’re not alone in this. All coaches go through it after 30-odd games in charge. You invest so much faith, philosophy and credibility in a group that it becomes extremely difficult to change tack. Here is what your fellow coach, Andy Farrell, said on the eve of the game against the All Blacks two weeks ago. “I sense nothing but excitement. We’ve trained superbly for two weeks . . . I don’t get any sense from our boys that there’s an aura that can’t be broken down. Our players are trying to make their own aura. It’s still in the development stages, but we’re definitely going to get there. I definitely get the feeling this team believe they can go out and perform against a world-class side they respect massively.” Oops. Keep it simple Your team are never going to be as sophisticated or as skilled as the All Blacks, or France and Australia when both are hot, come to that, but that doesn’t mean you cannot be successful. You’re at your best when you play with energy and physicality, when you are direct and quick. That’s what you did in the Six Nations, especially against Ireland, against the All Blacks recently in the first quarter, and against them again for certain periods in the summer. On those occasions you were uninhibited, fierce, passionate; not structured or burdened by a playbook. You said this week that Ford was ready to start because he has now had enough time in camp to understand what is going on, to get to know the systems presumably. When did international rugby become so complicated or cumbersome? Martin Johnson, the player, reckoned that if more of his XV (individually) were better than those of the opposition, the result would take care of itself more often than not, and that seems sensible to me. Less intellect, more instinct is the way forward. So, all the best today, and especially next weekend against the Aussies, But don’t worry if the poor run continues. There’s no rush. Remember that nice Mr Ritchie at Twickenham? He gave you and your coaching team six years to get it right.

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Know your rivals Samoa alex lowe

1. zak taulafo (stade français, 30 caps) Comfortable on either side of the scrum, Taulafo played for Wasps for four seasons before moving to Paris.

15. ken pisi (northampton saints, 4 caps) Fleet of foot, he has played mainly as a wing at Franklin’s Gardens.

2. ti’i paulo (clermont auvergne, 21 caps) One of the outstanding hookers in Super Rugby for the Crusaders, he went to France in 2010.

14. alapati leiua (wasps, 9 caps) Joined Wasps from the Hurricanes this season. A direct runner equally comfortable at centre or wing.

3. census johnston (toulouse, 46 caps) At a wafer-thin mint under 22 stone, Johnston is one of the game’s most formidable front-row figures.

13. reynold lee-lo (hurricanes, 1 cap) Has learnt much from playing under Tana Umaga, the former New Zealand centre.

4. filo paulo (cardiff blues, 12 caps) Paulo stands out. At 6ft 7in he is a lineout lighthouse, although his 19st 3lb takes some lifting.

12. johnny leota (sale sharks, 14 caps) A typically robust centre who will get his side across the gainline, he is a shrewd reader of the game.

5. kane thompson (newcastle falcons, 30 caps) A seasoned traveller, who, at 32, joined the Falcons this season from Waikato Chiefs.

11. david lemi (bristol, 41 caps) Only 5ft 8in, but a familiar figure to Premiership audiences, cherished for his speed and finishing ability.

6. maurie fa’asavalu (oyonnax, 23 caps) Now 34, “Mo” has shone in rugby league and in a Harlequins back row with Chris Robshaw and Nick Easter.

10. tusi pisi (suntory sungoliath, 19 caps) The older brother of Ken and George, all of whom attended Massey High School in Auckland.

7. jack lam (bristol, 10 caps) A cousin of Pat Lam, who went to school in Canberra and played centre for Australian Schools before switching roles.

9. kahn fotuali’i (northampton saints, 21 caps) Livewire scrum half who can also play No 10, his playmaking skills are much valued.

8. ofisa treviranus (london irish, 30 caps) Made his name in sevens, then starred in the 2011 World Cup, after which he was signed by London Irish.

Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Samoa’s band of brothers protest in plea for change DAVID ROGERS / GETTY IMAGES

Alex Lowe

The Samoa players will wear blue wristbands during today’s game against England in a small but significant act of protest against the officials who run the sport on the island. Dan Leo, the London Irish lock, claimed that the players have been threatened by officials since taking their grievances over governance and financial transparency to World Rugby (formerly the IRB) in a letter that said they could boycott the match at Twickenham. The squad withdrew their strike threat once World Rugby and the International Rugby Players’ Association (IRPA) agreed to get involved, but the players, emboldened by the support of many leading rugby nations, although not England, remain defiant and determined to force through a revolution. The blue wristbands will represent the players’ demand for change. They had considered more obvious protests but could not risk being fined by World Rugby because they only earn £500 a week while on international duty. “You will remember the ‘Justice for Bakkies’ campaign that the South Africans did (against the Lions in 2009),” Leo said. “They all got personally fined. We are not in a position where we can afford that, so we have to be very careful.” The Samoa squad launched a social media campaign and they have received support from the New Zealand, Australia, France and Italy teams, all of whom have posted pictures in support of #SamoaUnited. The RFU said that the England squad would not be backing the campaign. They want to alert the people back home to their protest and to put pressure on the SRU board, which contains two government officials and is chaired by the country’s prime minister, to stand down. “We are going out and getting international teams to support us and the wider rugby community,” Leo said. “At the end of the day, the Samoa Rugby Union and the IRB are all representations of the greater rugby public and we have got faith that if the rugby public are behind us, then those organisations will have to be as well.” England should

United front: Samoa prepare to face England at Twickenham and say the squad has been galvanised by the protest against rugby administration on the island

be wary, though, of assuming that the Samoa team are in a state of disruption. They have had their distractions but the whole protest campaign has galvanised them as a squad. There would be no better way to reinforce their message than to beat England today. “It has brought us togetherness and thoroughness in our preparation for England,” David Lemi, the Samoa captain, said. “This team is special, it is different from any team I have been involved with. In this team we are family, we are brothers. We are thankful for the messages of support. It is something that makes us stronger before the game. “From our brothers, the All Blacks, we have massive support. We are grateful for all that support, but we are just focused for the game against England.

If we execute our plan well, it gives us a chance.” Lemi believes that Samoa have a “great opportunity” to beat England for the first time, given that Stuart Lancaster’s side head into the game under the cosh after five consecutive defeats. If Samoa can give England a scare, they will be giving Scotland a scare at the same time because the sides meet in the group stages of the World Cup in less than a year. The last time Samoa played at Twickenham was in November 2010, when England had to come from behind in the second half to win 26-13. “We want to take the opportunity against a tier one team,” Stephen Betham, the coach, said. “It’s a good test for us heading into the World Cup, knowing where we stand.”

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Forward momentum can help England dominate

GRAPHIC: WILL MCQUHAE FOR THE TIMES

Ben Kay

England 2001-09

ngland are under massive pressure to perform today and there will be an expectation on the backs to play exciting, attacking rugby against Samoa, to prove everyone wrong. That, in my opinion, is exactly what they should not do. It is putting the cart before the horse.

What England must do to break Samoa line

George Ford and Owen Farrell can work together to identify where the space lies behind the Samoa defensive line

England’s smallest winning margin against Samoa (35-22 at 2003 World Cup; 26-13 in 2010) Exclusive to members Watch the interactive version online and on tablet at:

thetimes.co.uk/rugby

flog their forwards To go out and throw the ball around would play into Samoa’s hands and is high risk. With all the furore around the threat of a strike, they will come out and want to prove what it means to play for Samoa. All it needs is for them to put in some big shots, win a turnover, run the length of the field to score and the pressure is on England. My suggestion would be that they go out to try to dominate the game up

9 Fotuali'i A

‘England will have worked on moves where Ford can open up holes’ front and flog Samoa’s forwards to tire them out. England need to get their driving play going again because it will tie in defenders and you can create opportunities. In the simplified example in the graphic, England have tied defenders into a maul or a ruck inside the Samoa 22 in the hope of turning one of the strengths of Kahn Fotuali’i, the scrum half, into an area they can exploit. Fotuali’i is one of the best in the business; he is a leader and one of the most effective defenders around the breakdown, constantly analysing where the threats are. If someone is not in the defensive line, he will fill it, he will run in and try to steal a ball; he can be like an extra back-row. His primary role after the ball has gone from the breakdown is to be a sweeper in behind a fast-moving defensive line. Tie him up and there is a chance for George Ford to dink a kick over the top. If the Samoa full

England have won all six of their matches against Samoa

10 Ford

Farrell 12

Pass Kick Run Run with ball

back, Ken Pisi, reads the situation and is pulled across to cover, the crossfield kick to Anthony Watson, the England wing, is on. eyes and ears New Zealand have traditionally used twin playmakers with the inside centre acting as an extra pair of eyes for the fly half. It was the role that Mike Catt and Will Greenwood performed so well outside Jonny Wilkinson. The fly half has his focus on the scrum half and on the ball, so he cannot necessarily see the wider

Kahn Fotuali'i

Watson 14

picture. Farrell can scan the options and communicate what is on to Ford, who is able to react quickly and execute the play. I am not saying that this is my ideal 10-12 partnership, but Farrell is a distributor, a big tackler next to Ford, and the two have a good relationship, which is key to the communication. With the change in mindset and a little more time, we could see Farrell playing in a different way to the past couple of weeks. With Farrell and Brad Barritt in midfield, England do not have centres who can create something out of

England need to try to drag the Samoa and Northampton Saints scrum half out of position

nothing, but they have game understanding and intelligence. England will have been working on moves where Ford can open up holes for them or for the strike runners out wide. balance James Haskell has been the form back-row forward in the Aviva Premiership and I think England have a better balance to their back row this weekend. Ben Morgan can have a massive impact on games in terms of his carrying. He is not the hardestworking No 8 that I have seen, but

TACTICS England dominate the ruck/maul situation and drag in as many defenders as possible Force Kahn Fotuali'i to commit to the ruck or to plug a gap in the defensive line rather than cover the space in behind Farrell is watching movement in the back field as the Samoa defence rushes up Ford can chip (A) over the top into that space for the England runners to chase down If Farrell sees the Samoa full back moving infield to cover that space, the cross kick (B) to Anthony Watson is on

Haskell and Chris Robshaw will do that for him. Haskell can make those dominant hits and get straight over the ball, Robshaw is always in the right place, leaving Morgan with the energy to carry. The selection of Richard Wigglesworth on the bench gives England an option to change style. Ben Youngs, the starting scrum half, brings liveliness at the breakdown, whereas Wigglesworth delivers quick service, straight into the hands of the fly half. You can get a team used to defending one way and change it up in the second half.

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Saturday November 22 2014 | the times

Sport Rugby union

Generation game taken to new level by kids from fame John Westerby on the striking similarities between the career paths of Owen Farrell and George Ford, whose illustrious fathers have been behind the players’ every move

f your outlook on life has been forged in the hard-nosed rugby league heartlands of Wigan or Oldham, you don’t tend to lend much credence to something as fluffy as fate. At the very least, though, there is a remarkable uncanniness in the way that the paths followed by George Ford and Owen Farrell have become intertwined over the past decade. From the time they played against each other in junior rugby league, to the career moves made by their famous fathers, to the forging of a new midfield partnership at No 10 and No 12 for England against Samoa this evening, somehow these two have kept bumping into each other. When they were playing together for England Under-16, the first time they appeared in tandem at fly half and inside centre, they also found themselves sharing a room. In retrospect, this looks like a particularly shrewd piece of management. “Not really,” George Squires, the team manager, said yesterday. “I just did the rooms on alphabetical order.”

the first generation Although both fathers spent formative years in the great Wigan sides of the late 1980s and 1990s, their times at the club did not overlap. Mike Ford played there from 1983 to 1987, four years before Andy Farrell made his debut, aged 16. The similarities came later, when both switched to rugby union and watched their sons grow up to become gifted players in the 15-man game. Ford was head coach at Saracens when he persuaded Farrell to make his highprofile cross-code switch in 2005. Mike went on to become the England defence coach and was then succeeded by Farrell. Each now coaches his son, Ford at Bath, Farrell with England. Denis Betts played alongside Farrell Sr at Wigan and Ford Sr for Great Britain. “Mike was a smart cookie as a player, he made other players look better than they were, and that’s not a bad quality for going into coaching,” Betts said. “The thing that stands out about Andrew is his humility. This is a bloke who had all the talent in the world, but would still work harder than everyone else. That’s why he was one of the greats of the game.” the first encounter A trip to Wigan was something that filled other rugby clubs from Lancashire with a certain dread. Not only were the junior teams there good, they were invariably bigger than the rest, as George Ford discovered when his

Waterhead Under-12 team, from Oldham, travelled to play Wigan St Patricks. “That was the first time George played against Owen,” Mike Ford said. “Waterhead weren’t a very big team, but George was playing a year young and I just remember how huge the St Pats lads were. Owen played loose forward and he really stood out. They were just too big and physical for our lads.” Not so long afterwards, though, there was a happier visit to Wigan for George, although Ford Sr was elsewhere watching his older son, Joe, but he remembers the phone call from his wife, Sally Anne. “She said, ‘You’ll never guess what, they’ve won 9 [tries to] 2,’ ” Ford said. “I said, ‘Are you joking? In Wigan?’ And then she told me: ‘And George scored all nine tries.’ I was gobsmacked. That was the first time I thought maybe he’s got something.” the move down south When Mike and Andy made their respective moves to Saracens, it meant uprooting their families, a painful process where teenagers are involved. The pain was eased by the fact that the families ended up living opposite each other on the same street in Harpenden, Hertfordshire. Joe was two years above Owen at St George’s School, George in the year below. “Owen was quite shy, but we soon saw a different side on the rugby field,” Dan Rees, a teacher at St George’s, said. “With George, we put him at fly half for his first game against St Albans boys, our local rivals. With his first touch he kicked a dropped goal from 25 metres. You don’t see many 12-year-olds do that, let alone with their first touch.” Farrell and Ford did not actually play in the same rugby team at school and, when Mike became England defence coach in 2006, the d Fords returned north to Oldham. the combination: england under-16 From kicking a ball around between their houses, Ford and Farrell found themselves reunited playing for England Under-16. Although he was small for his age, Ford’s precocious rugby brain and turn of speed had enabled him to play a year ahead throughout his teenage years. Farrell was in his second year with the under-16s, all the time playing at inside centre, when Ford came into the side and they found themselves roomWho’s the daddy: Andy Farrell parades the Super League trophy with a young Owen

ing together for the Four Nations tournament in France. “They both showed leadership in different ways,” Squires, the team manager, said. “Owen was a bit more prickly, George more understated, but together they could run a game.” the next step: england under-18 When John Fletcher joined the RFU academy in 2008, his first task was to watch a video of that Four Nations tournament to see whether any younger players merited promotion for the England Under-18 tour to Argentina. He picked out the 16-year-old playing at inside centre and the diminutive 15-year-old fly half. They were there for experience, essentially, but when the team was picked for the international against Argentina at the end of the tour, Farrell was crestfallen when he was not included. “I don’t think he spoke to me for two days,” Fletcher said. “But that’s his character, he backs himself every time. That’s what you want from a player.” the world stage: england under-20 The Ford-Farrell midfield partnership came to wider attention in the later stages of the 2011 Junior World Championship in Italy. Ford, 18, was the youngest player in the tournament, but was England’s regular fly half. Farrell, 19, had recently played a starring role in Saracens’ Aviva Premiership final victory over Leicester, so was used sparingly early in the tournament. Then, for the final group game against South Africa, the playmakers were brought together. “George would probe around the rucks, Owen would release players such as Christian Wade and Marland Yarde in the wider channels,” Diccon Edwards, the under-20s’ attack coach, said. “George is more instinctive, he can see a gap and get through it. Owen is strong in defence and delivers a game plan. They get on really well and they complement each other as players.” South Africa were defeated, England were beaten in the final by New Zealand, but Ford was named IRB young pl player of the year. the professionals In 2008, Farrell, 17, had become the youngest player to appear in professional rugby union. A year later, his record was broken by Ford, 16 years and 237 days, who played for Leicester in their LV= Cup game with Leeds Carnegie, starting in opposition to his brother, Joe. But it was May 2012 before Ford and Farrell would have their first high-profile professional duel, in the Premiership semi-final between Leicester and Saracens. Farrell had recently shone in his first few fresh-faced appearances for the full England

Like father, like son: Farrell, left, and Ford will line up alongside one another in

team, but Ford stole the show at Welford Road with several eye-catching breaks. “What Owen’s done this season has been an inspiration to all the young lads,” Ford said afterwards. the future Those boys are now grown. Ford, 21, makes his first international start this afternoon with a reassuringly familiar figure alongside him. Was it written in the stars that they would play for England together? “I can remember having conversations with Stuart Lancaster [the England head coach], even before he was in his current job, saying there was an inevitability of these two playing together at No 10 and No 12 for England one day,” Fletcher said. Under the Twickenham floodlights this evening, that day has finally come.

Tough week leads to some hard truths, says Rowntree Owen Slot

The week just endured by the England team in preparation to play Samoa at Twickenham this evening has been, according to Graham Rowntree, one of the hardest he has been involved with. After successive weeks of close defeats and excessive errors, Rowntree,

the times | Saturday November 22 2014

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Chancing an arm on Ford and Farrell is a shot in the dark Owen Slot Chief Rugby Correspondent

Do you want your national head coach to experiment and take a risk, or do you want him to play it safe? Do you want slow improvement with limited horizons, or the chance to fast-forward the team when taking that chance may just backfire? At this stage, still ten games before the World Cup, I would take the chance any time. Stuart Lancaster is not loath to show his chancer’s arm, a stance that shows a strength of conviction that is commendable. What you need, of course, is a good hit-rate. For the RBS Six Nations Championship, Lancaster fielded a back line full of younger players short on experience and he gave them licence to attack. It was a risk and, by and large, it worked. In New Zealand, he put Manu Tuilagi on the wing and it did not. But at least he found out. Today, against Samoa, he chances his arm on a combination that he has long had in mind. The George Ford-Owen Farrell duet at Nos 10 and 12 has been pencilled in as a strong possibility to be his World Cup starting unit, so of course he wants to see it and, in that respect, at least he is right to try it. However, of all the aforementioned experiments — if that is not too disdainful a term — Ford-Farrell seems to be the longest shot. Especially now. Lancaster happens to be playing it at a time when his team are in the direst need of positivity, of a shot in the arm, a boost in confidence, a victory to set the spirits soaring, so he must be mightily convinced that it is going to work. Of course, England should win at Twickenham this evening. They have the kind of power and cohesion that goes with being a leading rugby nation and that Samoa have always lacked anyway, but they get a Samoa team tonight who are dealing with more than the traditional imbalance. Political unrest has been in the team’s background and foreground these past few weeks and that is likely only to destabilise. It might just produce an almighty performance from the soul, but it is more likely to help England’s passage to victory. It may also complicate a cold-lightof-day assessment of Ford-Farrell. The combination may be massively

England v Samoa England’s midfield against Samoa today on the latest leg of a journey that has taken the pair to the pinnacle of their sport

the forwards coach, said that he was “thoroughly p***ed off” and that this mood had pervaded the early days of the week’s preparation. “We have to iron out those errors,” he said. “We have to. The lads are desperate to fulfil the talent they’ve got. It’s been a tough week, one of the hardest I’ve been involved with, with some frank discussion. We have a really honest group who are really unhappy with our defeats.” The Samoa game, he said, was being treated as seriously as the two previous weekends, against the All Blacks and South Africa. There is no sense that this is a more straightforward fixture. “It’s very similar,” he said. “A huge game.” By the time England start, at 7pm, two other England players will have completed their day’s work. Neither

Rokoduguni will miss England’s match with Samoa tonight with a hip injury, but is fit enough to play for Bath today

Kyle Eastmond nor Semesa Rokoduguni, the Bath backs, were considered for England selection this weekend because of the injuries they were carrying early in the week. Eastmond had suffered concussion against South Africa and Rokoduguni had hurt a hip against the All Blacks. That they were fit for Bath and not England may have raised a few eyebrows, but Rowntree insisted that they were simply not fit enough early in the week to be considered. The Bath threequarter line, therefore, has something of the attacking zeal about it that England fans may look upon enviously. Eastmond and Rokoduguni will clearly be hoping for a performance to take them back into consideration for England’s game against Australia next Saturday.

Referee Jaco Peyper (South Africa) Kick-off 7pm Live Sky Sports 2

SAMOA

ENGLAND 15 Mike Brown 14 Anthony Watson 13 Brad Barritt 12 Owen Farrell 11 Jonny May 10 George Ford 9 Ben Youngs 1 Joe Marler 2 Rob Webber 3 David Wilson 4 Dave Attwood 5 Courtney Lawes 6 James Haskell 7 Chris Robshaw 8 Ben Morgan

influential to England’s long-term future, but it could also come crashing down at Lancaster’s feet. With Farrell struggling for form in the position he favours, it seems an unlikely time to try him in a position he does not. Regardless of that, though, the bigger question is whether he can sufficiently adapt his game, not just as a 12, but as the kind of 12 to make the most of Ford at fly half. Earlier in the week, Farrell was quite clear of what he is and what he is not. “I’m not an out-and-out classic centre,” he said. And: “I’ll obviously be playing one pass out, but I’ll still be playing the same way.” And: “I’m by no means a 12.” Ford’s particular craft, though, is playing in the face of the defence, crafting holes and putting his runners through them. Kyle Eastmond, at Bath, uses his footwork to benefit from Ford’s guile; you could imagine Luther Burrell using his power to the same effect. What is less easy to envisage is Farrell working on Ford’s shoulder to the same effect. That, as he says, is not the game he plays. Farrell was asked about this. “If he pushes and goes to the line and someone’s needed there, I’ve got to make sure that I’m there,” he said confidently. You have to admire his self-belief. You wonder also how brilliant these two have been on the training paddock together and to what extent they have snapped into an understanding born of their long history in the junior game together. By selecting them together, Lancaster is rubber-stamping it. He has seen enough to believe that it will work. Today is very much an occasion when he needs his risk to come right. They will be playing behind a pack that will win them enough ball to test it properly. Ford-Farrell is not the only new combination. The entire 8-9-10-12 is fresh, from Ben Morgan and Ben Youngs through to Ford and then Farrell. Rob Webber is given a start at hooker and James Haskell has been given a real opportunity to stake a long-term claim at blind-side flanker. Expect the England forwards to dominate and Youngs to go well at No 9. Beyond him, though, behold the great uncertainty.

(Harlequins) (Bath) (Saracens) (Saracens) (Gloucester) (Bath) (Leicester) (Harlequins) (Bath) (Bath) (Bath) (Northampton) (Wasps) (Harlequins, capt) (Gloucester)

15 Ken Pisi 14 Alapati Leiua 13 Reynold Lee-Lo 12 Johnny Leota 11 David Lemi 10 Tusi Pisi 9 Kahn Fotuali’i 1 Zak Taulafo 2 Ti’i Paulo 3 Census Johnston 4 Filo Paulo 5 Kane Thompson 6 Maurie Fa’asavalu 7 Jack Lam 8 Ofisa Treviranus

(Northampton) (Wasps) (Hurricanes) (Sale) (Bristol, capt) (North Harbour) (Northampton) (Stade Français) (Clermont Auvergne) (Toulouse) (Cardiff) (Newcastle) (Oyonnax) (Bristol) (London Irish)

Replacements

Dylan Hartley (Northampton), Matt Mullan (Wasps), Kieran Brookes (Newcastle), George Kruis (Saracens), Tom Wood (Northampton), Richard Wigglesworth (Saracens), Billy Twelvetrees (Gloucester), Marland Yarde (Harlequins)

Manu Leiataua (Stade Aurillacois), Viliamu Afatia (Agen),Anthony Perenise (Bristol), Fa'atiga Lemalu (Fukuoaka Sanix Blues), Dan Leo (London Irish), TJ Ioane (Auckland), Pete Cowley (Auckland Suburbs), Mike Stanley (Counties Manukau)

sport

Saturday November 22 2014

Inside

England pin hopes on George Ford as they go in search of elusive win Rugby, pages 90-95

Danny Welbeck is gunning for United as he takes centre stage for Arsenal Football, pages 83-89

Look of a champion

Lewis Hamilton has Formula One world title in his sights in Abu Dhabi, pages 80-81

Times Crossword No 25,951 Times Crossword 25,951 1

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15 16 17

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A £20 W H Smith gift voucher will be awarded to the senders of the first five correct solutions opened on Thursday. Enter by post to: The Times, Saturday Crossword Competition, 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF, or online through the Crossword Club, timesonline.co.uk/crossword. Winners and solutions will appear on Monday week. Name/Address ................................................................................................................................................... ............................................................................................................................................................................... ............................................................................................................................................................................... ............................................................................................................................................................................... Please note, some sections of The Times are available only in the United Kingdom and Ireland

Across 1 Wine container church required to hold a service (6) 4 Mad attempt to park initially in reverse (8) 10 The writer’s bird and mollusc, say, like some bacilli? (11) 11 Business established by end of village green (3) 12 Distribute drink around east of France (7) 14 Article recalled tips for horrific videos? (7) 15 Weight of chap in bar with British engineer (14) 17 Repairman beginning to tackle siren, accepting foreign cash (14) 21 Very low temperature press employee’s Cockney idol reported (7) 22 Cunning individual set out to be entertainer (7) 23 Priest taking books from George or Thomas Stearns? (3) 24 Comic entering school manageYesterday’s solution 25,950 G O D U T C H

AM U I S C A L E O B O B L U I N T I D C H E D E A D I M

E T E A MO E I SM T O B S E P R I D L Y L D A G G N E S

S H O P A H O L I C G A Y S

M I N L L N F I L Y N T H D E F B L A G

A P E I G B CO A E R D S F C L O E R I E N

P E R S A T H T E R A MB A T I U ROOM D B E E F G O A R E R A T D A I E E E S I S

ment’s communications centre (11) 26 Get a lute repaired, giving instruction (8) 27 Attempt to secure half of pitch with it (6)

Down 1 What rock bands may make, some of them occasionally? (8) 2 Verbally trash small pleasure area (3) 3 First of Friesians run round rings: with this disease? (4-3) 5 Survey study written in Dante’s time (14) 6 Instrument with keys the French army used? (7) 7 Polls Liberal held in various bits and pieces (11) 8 Sweetheart standing on youth leader’s foot (6) 9 Go-ahead, like monarchist outside hospital offices? (7-7) 13 Chunky quad bike’s first I invested in last month (6-5) 16 Favourable directions in force, delivered extremely loftily (8) 18 University developed silent kitchen gadget (7) 19 For several weeks, outside court, turned up to show further disapproval? (7) 20 Declare a sure winner in speech (6) 25 Bristle, displaying anger with new leaders (3)

The recycled paper content of UK newspapers in 2013 was 83.5%

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