Concerns over AI chatbot relationships

Why boys say they are spending more time online

Ed Davey called for emergency 10p fuel duty cut (Alamy)

3 min read16 min

Speaking at a press conference in London on Thursday morning, the Liberal Democrat leader said: “The people of Britain didn’t start this war. They didn’t cheer it on, but they are paying the price for it every single day.”

Davey called for rail fares to be reduced by 10 per cent and the cap on bus fares to be lowered from £3 to £1 in a bid to “keep people moving”.

The ongoing war in Iran is putting major pressure on global energy prices. This is largely down to a sharp fall in traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most important trading routes, as a result of Iranian threats to attack passing ships. This shipping lane is responsible for a large share of the world’s oil and gas.

The European Commission has this week encouraged people to drive and fly less and work from home, while some states in Australia have made public transport free.

Up to now, however, the UK government has not asked people to change their behaviour. 

Davey today called for the Labour government to “look at” what other countries are doing to support the public with rising costs.

“We are looking at other countries; we can’t do exactly what they do. There’s different issues, there’s different situations, but we’re really being bold about encouraging people to use public transport.”

Davey said the reduction in public transport fares urged by his party today would encourage people “if they can, to shift”.

“But of course, in many parts of the country, many people who can’t shift onto public transport, rural areas, for example, they’ve got no alternative. So we’ve got to help those people. They literally have no alternative.”

The Lib Dem leader also called for the Labour government to cut fuel duty by 10p, to help people who are more reliant on cars.

The average price for a litre of unleaded petrol rose by 20p over March, while diesel prices were up 40p.

Davey said: “People who were already struggling with the cost of living already having real problems making ends meet, now they’re having to find even more money, cut back even more, worry about the cost of driving to the shops or the daily commute, or the school run, and all those self employed and small business owners who have to travel to work, whose vans are their offices already hit by higher tax rises and red tape.”

The Lib Dem leader reiterated his party’s strong opposition to the US decision to attack Iran, and criticised the Conservatives and Reform UK over their calls for the UK to join President Donald Trump’s initial strikes on Tehran, referring to the “Trump, Farage, Badenoch tax”.

On Wednesday, several government measures aimed at tackling the cost of living came into force, including increases to the national living wage and the national minimum wage, support for households using heating oil, and money off energy bills.

The government is also expected to announce further support for households most exposed to rising energy prices in the coming weeks.

Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper will today meet with 35 nations, including France, Germany and Canada, to discuss the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.

In a Downing Street press conference on Wednesday, Prime Minister Keir Starmer acknowledged that resuming trade through the vital shipping lane would “not be easy”.

As we reported, freelance journalist Nicole Lampert has been bothering Zack Polanski’s family.

According to her, she’s been doing so as part of her efforts to conduct what she calls ‘journalism’. Defending herself, Lampert claimed that Polanski’s family went to her. Now, it’s claimed that the Green leader’s family have complained to the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO):

Zack Polanski’s mum, dad, brother, and sister have formally complained to IPSO after journalists turned up at their family homes. But I’m confused. I thought the Daily Mail “journalist” said his family approached her.

— Mukhtar (@I_amMukhtar) April 1, 2026

Standards

We first learned that the gutter press were looking into Polanski’s family via this tweet:

This is why Daily Mail journalists are going after my family now.

The right wing propaganda machine will not work on the Green Party.

We’re ready to end Rip Off Britain, end the cost of living crisis and make hope normal again. https://t.co/w9uyGh8mfP

— Zack Polanski (@ZackPolanski) March 28, 2026

We later learned this was being conducted by independent journalist Nicole Lampert on behalf of the Daily Mail. Lampert posted the following online:

I’m a freelance journalist who spoke to your family members who are frightened by the Jew hate in your party. They are frightened by what you have given the green light to.

This is the British media we’re talking about, so the “Jew hate” in question was actually legitimate criticism of the genocidal state of Israel.

The ‘family’ she spoke to ended up being distant relatives. As such, her piece proved nothing besides the fact that everyone has a third cousin or step auntie who’s thick enough to get taken in by the Daily Mail.

Lampert would later say:

I didn’t hound anyone. They came to me.

Since then, the Guido Fawkes blog has reported the following notice which was sent to regulated media organisations:

IPSO has today been contacted by a representative acting on behalf of the immediate family of Zack Polanski.

Mr Polanski’s mother, father, brother, and sister ask that the press do not attend their homes and do not approach them by phone or email, as they do not wish to give comment to the media. For any media enquiries, please contact the Green Party press office at [REDACTED] or on [REDACTED].

We are happy to make editors aware of his request. We note the terms of Clause 2 (Privacy) and 3 (Harassment) of the Editors’ Code.

Notably, this notice doesn’t explicitly confirm that journalists approached members of the Polanski family, nor how.

Polanski has previously claimed they were indeed contacted, though:

Spoke to my family today – all refused to talk to you.

You then started hunting down random “anon” relatives.

People are holding your shit rag accountable.

You’ve not just “touched a nerve.”

You’ve absolutely spurred on a movement ready to take on the Daily Mail. Congrats. https://t.co/95Oq3SUxAf

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— Zack Polanski (@ZackPolanski) March 29, 2026

Form

As people have highlighted, this is far from the only accusation of shoddy journalism that Lampert is currently defending against. The following is Independent reporting from March this year:

Former Daily Mail showbiz editor accused of using private investigators ‘who engaged in unlawful acts’

Nicole Lampert was giving evidence in the trial of claims of unlawful information gathering brought by a group of household names against Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL)

As the BBC reported on 3 March:

A former Daily Mail showbusiness editor has denied listening to voicemails between actors Jude Law and Sadie Frost Law and said stories she wrote about their relationship came from an “amazing source”.

Nicole Lampert said the source was close to Frost and that information had been passed to the newspaper through a “trusted freelance journalist”.

Frost spoke about how the stories led to her mistrusting close friends. Now, however, she is convinced her voicemails were hacked.

Speaking about a specific article, the BBC wrote:

One article in October 2004 referred to discussions about a £10m divorce settlement. Law’s solicitors later complained that it was wrong to suggest he had accepted the settlement, and the Daily Mail published an apology.

Sherborne suggested the newspaper had been unable to challenge the complaint because the information had been obtained through phone hacking and the true source could not be revealed. Lampert rejected the claim.

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Responding to an article in which the Mail reported on Frost’s sleeping pill prescription, Lampert said:

We wouldn’t ever report that sort of information now, but that was par for the course then.

It makes you wonder what villainous acts are simply “par for the course” today.

Featured image Barold

Italy’s exclusion from a third straight World Cup has shifted from a sporting failure to a national plight. Players born after 1990, many now in their prime, have never performed at football’s grandest stage. This absence is undoubtedly reshaping selection, development, and the public’s connection to the Azzurri.

What went wrong on the field

Italy has not participated in the World Cup since 2014. This decade long gap denies emerging skilled performers global exposure and the pressures that define international careers. After the latest elimination, head coach Gennaro Gattuso captured the mood bluntly:

It hurts, it really hurts… More than hurting me, it hurts to see this group which has really given everything in these months.

In another interview, Gattuso added:

Today the boys didn’t deserve a beating like this… It hurts, because we needed it for us, for all of Italy and for our movement.

Those comments aren’t merely the result of post-match emotion. Gattuso’s words reflect the realty of a federation, so far, unable to translate domestic strengths into consistent success on the international stage.

The wider consequences

Missing consecutive World Cups changes more than rosters. The tournament has been Italy’s showcase, the even which transformed Paolo Rossi, Roberto Baggio and Fabio Cannavaro into global football icons. Without that stage, Italian players are less visible to the world, and young fans without the World Cup memories over which past generations bonded.

Former Italy coach Fabio Capello warned of the scale of the problem, calling recent results:

a sporting tragedy, a shame. It’s one of the worst things that has happened to Italian football in its recent history.

Leadership, development, and identity

FIGC president Gabriele Gravina offered measured support while acknowledging the depth of the crisis:

Let me congratulate the lads… they’ve shown incredible growth. I also want to congratulate Rino Gattuso. He’s a great coach.

That tone—encouraging yet defensive—sums up the federation’s position: protect current personnel while promising review.

Veteran Gianluigi Buffon, part of the national delegation, urged patience and careful assessment:

This is a delicate moment, and we need to take the necessary time to make the right evaluations.

Experts point to systemic issues behind the headlines: gaps in youth coaching and scouting, tactical stagnation at senior levels, and Serie A’s declining pull compared with other European leagues. Capello argued for accountability and grassroots rebuild:

No one resigns here, and that’s the most worrying thing […] We have to sit down as experts, analyse what is happening and start a reconstruction from the base.

What comes next

This is not a short-term slump—it’s a multi-year shift that requires structural fixes. If Italy qualifies for the 2030 World Cup, it will be more than a sporting rebound. It will be a reconnection with fans and a chance to rebuild an international identity for a generation starved of World Cup experience.

Until then the Azzurri remain a major footballing nation without its primary stage. The challenge for coaches, clubs and the FIGC is to convert criticism into a clear, long-term plan that rebuilds pathways from youth academies to the national team.

Featured image via the Italian Football Federation

Reform UK’s new housing chief has sparked outrage after claiming housing regulations have gone too far in the wake of Grenfell. He said that while the disaster was a tragedy, ‘fires happen’ and that ‘everyone dies in the end’, so building new houses shouldn’t be slowed by pesky health and safety.

Reforms Housing spokesperson says ‘fires happen’

Simon Dudley, Reform UK’s new Housing and Infrastructure spokesperson, told Inside Housing that regulations put in place following the Grenfell inquiry are ‘stifling’ the housebuilding sector with ‘over-regulation.

Dudley was asked how to balance housebuilding with the regulations. His reponse was typically vile for Reform:

The practical impact of over-regulation is to stop things. Now, people may feel that we’ve done the right thing through introducing this regulation, but on the other side of that, think about all the human suffering of not having a home, not being able to have children and being stuck in your parents’ home in your childhood bedroom. So there is a balance. You know, we can’t, you know, sadly, you know, everyone dies in the end. It’s just how you go, right?

He continued

Extracting Grenfell from the statistics, actually people dying in house fires is rare… many, many more people die on the roads driving cars, but we’re not making cars illegal, so why are we stopping houses being built?

You can’t stop tragic things from happening. You can try to minimise excesses, but bad things do happen. Fires do happen.

Dudley said that the impact of Grenfell on regulation has meant ‘the pendulum has just swung too far the wrong way.’

He continued:

Frankly, for people who are the architects of things, it’s very difficult for them to put them right. And Reform is not the architect of so many of these failures which our country has now. We will put it right, because we’re not emotionally connected with them. They’re not things that we created. We will fix them.

Dudley was appointed Reform UK’s housing spokesperson last month . The party said he would urgently spearhead a review into “Britain’s building crisis”. He’s previously had many board and non-executive roles in development such as with the government’s Homes England. So in a way, he has been an ‘architect in these failures’.

Grenfell wasn’t because ‘fires happen’

72 people died, many of whom were brown or Black and disabled, because of housing companies that wanted to pull up building as quickly as possible to extract rent from vulnerable people. They didn’t care about the safety of the block, despite many warnings and complaints from residents.

What the aftermath of the Grenfell fire showed was how little deaths mattered if they weren’t rich white people.

A Canary editorial responding to the bullshit Grenfell Inquiry report summed it up best:

Ultimately the Grenfell fire was the culmination of years of institutionalised neglect, racism, classism, and discrimination against the predominantly low-income, Black, brown, and disabled residents of the tower.

Racism and classism were the ultimate cause of the Grenfell Tower fire.

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Calls for Dudley to be fired came in quick. Housing Secretary Steve Reed said:

If Nigel Farage has an ounce of decency, he will sack his housing chief immediately.

These disgraceful comments about those who died in the Grenfell Tower fire are beyond the pale and it is completely untenable for Simon Dudley to continue in his position.

But come on, Steve, we all know Farage doesn’t have a single bit of decency in him.

Green MP Sian Berry said:

Reform has sunk to a new low and shown a real disrespect to the victims of Grenfell. Anyone who has any awareness of what Grenfell residents went through, in fact anyone with any empathy or humanity, will find these comments truly abhorrent.

Nigel Farage must sack Simon Dudley for this disgusting outburst.

Reform doesn’t care if poor people die

Of course, instead of apologising, Dudley has doubled down. On LinkedIn, he wrote:

Grenfell was an utter tragedy and quite rightly prompted a wholesale review and tightening of fire regulations. I said it was a tragedy in my interview with Inside Housing and in no shape or form am I belittling that disaster or the huge loss of life. It must never happen again. I reiterate that, and am sorry if it was not sufficiently clear.

Within the last 24 hours, the Berkeley Group, one of Britain’s biggest housebuilders, has paused new land purchases and announced a hiring freeze. They blame ‘an unprecedented surge in costs and regulation.’
These concerns are felt across the industry. The result? The UK’s long running housing crisis is getting worse.

To address the national housing crisis, we must ensure that regulation remains safe, sensible and proportionate. My concern is the introduction of numerous measures that do nothing to protect life and are throttling housebuilding.

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The classic double down is expected from Reform now. It’s the same tactic we saw from Sarah Pochin when she said ‘It drives me mad seeing adverts full of black and Asian people.’ Pochin wasn’t disciplined, but Black MP Dawn Butler was almost kicked out of the House of Commons for calling her a racist.

Dudley’s comments show once again just how little Reform actually cares about poor people. They wouldn’t be saying ‘fires happen’ if it had happened in a more affluent area.

Reform are relying heavily on working class voters who are sick of being ignored by Labour and the other parties. But this should show that Reform will only make life worse for anyone who isn’t rich. And they don’t care how many poor people die.

Featured image via the Canary

3 min read25 min

In the UK, much of the recent ‘gains’ made from cutting the backlog of asylum claims have simply transferred the backlog into the appeal system. In 2024, almost 50 per cent of asylum decisions were overturned on appeal in the UK. This not only undermines efforts to cut the backlog, but it also undermines public trust in the workings of the asylum system.

In the same period in Switzerland, despite much faster average processing times for claims, the successful appeal rate was only around 5 per cent. How was this achieved?

In their allocated accommodation centre, each asylum claimant is provided from the outset with on-site access to state-funded legal representation and advice on their claim, including during interviews with state migration officials and when the draft asylum decision on their claim is prepared. 

This front-loading of legal support improves both the quality and acceptance of first-instance decisions. Not only are there fewer successful appeals, but fewer appeals need to be heard at all. And the appeals process allows only a single appeal, based on written submission only, and with no additional legal funding available.

The UK, conversely, has moved in the opposite direction, combining haphazard access to legal representation for asylum claimants with extensive and multi-layered opportunities to appeal. 

For those whose claims are not accepted, though, Switzerland has a firm, three-pronged returns strategy – promoting voluntary returns, backed up by the threat of enforced returns, supported by return agreements negotiated with other countries. 

With legal advice on their claim, the claimant can receive a clear understanding upfront if their claim has little chance of success, and also get independent information and advice on their return options, all while in the initial accommodation centre. 

What the Swiss have done in reforming their system is important, but how they did it has been crucial. Seeking to bridge the divides between central and local concerns, and between those sympathetic to asylum seekers’ plight and those with concerns that the system is being taken advantage of. This has shaped the changes but also made them more broadly acceptable and practically implementable, rather than bogged down in endless lawfare. 

All interested parties in the reforms understood that there was no magic bullet to the challenge of running an asylum system, that there would always be difficult cases which would take time to resolve, but that material improvements to the system could be made by more swiftly processing the claims of those who clearly need protection, while more swiftly returning those who do not. 

The UK seems so far removed from being able to achieve the same. Most recently, we have seen a complete collapse of trust between the key state and non-state actors in the asylum system, and fundamental changes to the system have been introduced with an almost total absence of meaningful engagement.

It does not have to be this way, though. Until relatively recently, the UK did a much better job in this respect. Both sides of the asylum issue, while undoubtedly still in a tense relationship, at least recognised some of the practical possibilities for working together more cooperatively on seeking to identify common ground and to address difficult challenges within the asylum system. And indeed they did so, on returns in particular, engaging in at least some type of compromise and cooperation, similar to those that supported the Swiss asylum reforms in taking shape and helping to rebuild public trust.

It is hard to see even a glimmer of that in the UK any more. While changing this will not be easy, the Swiss experience both reminds us of our recent past, as well as lighting a possible way to a different future.

Jonathan Thomas is a Senior Fellow at the Social Market Foundation

As we’ve covered, Reform have been having a nightmare trying to sign up suitable candidates for the local elections. The problem is that anyone who’s suited to Reform is probably not well matched to broader public opinion, which is why we keep getting candidates like this:

Quite the quote. https://t.co/nDZelXynf1 pic.twitter.com/PHWHcGo9aE

— Reform Party UK Exposed 🇬🇧 (@reformexposed) April 1, 2026

Reform’s Welsh-Russian axis

John Clark is one of Reform’s candidates for the Welsh Senedd. To be absolutely fair to him, he wasn’t thanking Vladimir Putin for invading Ukraine; he was thanking him for engaging in “dialogue”:

There are still a couple of problems, of course. The first is that Putin wasn’t engaging in peace talks; he was chatting with right-wing US political commentator Tucker Carlson. When Putin has engaged in actual peace talks, he hasn’t engaged very meaningfully – hence the war raging on.

The other problem for Clark is that you can’t be thanking politicians for engaging in discussions in the UK. Remember when the media crucified Jeremy Corbyn for five years because he held talks with Hamas and referred to them as “our friends” in an effort to encourage dialogue? The right certainly played that up, so this is the bed they’ve made for themselves.

It doesn’t help that Reform have previous issues with their Welsh politicians being overly favourable to Russia. This was most notable with Nathan Gill (former leader of Reform Wales), who was sentenced to ten and a half years for taking bribes to talk positively about Russia in the European parliament.

Reform Exposed unearthed some more tweets too, including this one:

Look, we didn’t like Rishi Sunak either, but the above phrasing suggests that Clark just wanted to praise Putin. The same can be said of this:

You can’t form your opinions by taking what your opponents say and just thinking the opposite.

Sides

To be completely fair to Clark, he has talked about the war in terms like the below, which is certainly less head-banging than some of the people on either side of the war:

If Ukraine escalates, then Russia will escalate too, and the cycle of violence will continue. Far too many people have died already. It’s time to look for a diplomatic solution.

— John Clark 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 🇬🇧 (@TJohnClark) March 23, 2024

Digging deeper, he tweeted the following about Trump in 2024, but doesn’t seem to have said anything about Trump’s catastrophic war against Iran:

Trump is the only President in recent history that did not start any wars. Give peace a chance, Trump 2024.

— John Clark 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 🇬🇧 (@TJohnClark) January 16, 2024

Have the neo-cons been reduced to random name-calling? Are you upset that Trump didn’t start any wars?

— John Clark 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 🇬🇧 (@TJohnClark) January 16, 2024

Personally, if we’d been taking in by Trump’s ‘peace candidate’ shtick, we would have corrected the record when he started invading other countries, but that’s just us.

Clark also tweeted the following, suggesting his anti-war feelings are really pretty selective, because Trump conducted all sorts of belligerent acts in his first term:

You’re not fit to polish Trump’s boots @campbellclaret. How is that Iraq war going? Remember David Kelly, warmonger?

— John Clark 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 🇬🇧 (@TJohnClark) August 25, 2023

Differences

It’s obviously the case that Western nations’ relationship with Russia became unduly strained as a result of the US maintaining reflexive Cold War politics. At the same time, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was an absolute travesty. As Joe Glenton wrote for the Canary in 2022:

Less than 48 hours into Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and so much remains unclear. Will Russia occupy? Will NATO respond militarily? What are the risks of nuclear escalation? But one thing should be very apparent. Looking to either NATO or Russia in search of a good guy in all of this is deeply naïve.

On the one side we have the Russian regime. Viciously illiberal and oligarchic, it’s a model of authoritarian capitalism. Determined to reclaim its lost imperial status, it’s as willing to bomb Ukrainian cities as it is to batter its own courageous anti-war protestors off the streets of Moscow.

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In NATO, we have an organisation which today functions as a beard for US imperial ambitions. It comes with a bleak history of supporting fascists in Europe and of the kind of brinkmanship which has brought us to where we are today. It’s also played a direct part in the disastrous wars in – to name just two recent examples – Libya and Afghanistan.

Reform politicians keep giving the impression that they like Russia for the same reason they like Donald Trump; because the imperial powers are the bigger kid, pushing the smaller kid around.

And let’s be real; picking on the little guy is Reform’s policy platform in a nutshell.

Featured image via World Economic Forum (Flickr)