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With Bio-Waste Spreader: "A good barometer of farmers’ incomes is how much machinery they buy. So the latest news from the UK’s farm machinery dealerships that sales of ‘kit’ (as farmers call it) have fallen sharply – tractor registrations were down 13 percent last year and those for combine harvesters down 20 percent – is solid evidence farmers are feeling the pinch. But why are farm machinery sales such a reliable indicator of farm incomes?…"
With M.D.: "The Royal College of Emergency Medicine calculated last year that more than 250 Accident & Emergency patients die each week because they wait more than 12 hours to be admitted, based on a January 2022 paper in the Emergency Medical Journal. When waits between 4 and 12 hours were included, around 400 patients a week die who probably would not otherwise have done so. As data scientist Steve Black, who was involved in the research, observed: ‘That’s a lot of people dying because of a problem that was incredibly rare 10 years ago.’…"
With Dr B Ching: "The future Great British Railways mustn’t make its online ticket sales and marketing so good that private-sector rivals are starved, the government has decreed. Labour is legislating to create GBR as the railways’ ‘directing mind’ which will run the trains and tracks and make decisions on fares. On 22 January the government said GBR would ‘retail online by bringing together individual train operators’ ticket websites’ but would have to ensure ‘open and fair’ competition…"
With Remote Controller: "What are now called ‘content hubs’ (previously networks), old or new, like to start the year with big drama. Any fear that the larger budgets of streamers guarantee higher quality is appeased by Prime Target. In the prologue, someone enters their PIN in a cashpoint in a Middle Eastern market square that is immediately ripped apart by a bomb. Cut to rowers on the Cam, one of them Edward (Leo Woodall), a superstar maths undergraduate…"
With Old Sparky: "To the dismay of many, energy secretary Ed Miliband last month quashed parliamentary efforts to make his implausible green targets legally binding and enshrine his ‘clean energy superpower mission’ in law. After just six months in government, realism (if not defeat) on one of Labour’s core policies has effectively been accepted. Greens are further disturbed by chancellor Rachel Reeves’ explicit prioritisation of economic growth over environmental concerns…"
With Lunchtime O’Boulez: "That Wales is known as the land of song is increasingly ironic, as its musical life edges ever closer to collapse. After Welsh Arts Council funding cuts over the past two years, Mid Wales Opera survives, just, with drastically curtailed activity, while Welsh National Opera is in comparably dire straits. The Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama has been forced to close its junior conservatoire…"
With Slicker: "It is not often that billionaires sue former employees, give evidence, are not believed and lose. Especially when a massive fraud has been alleged in a legal action lasting almost ten years, costing well over £10m, concluding in a ten-week high court trial. But that was what happened two weeks ago when John Fredriksen, one of the world’s biggest shipowners and richest men, lost a civil fraud case his companies brought…"
Letter from Tokyo
From Our Own Correspondent: "With heads bowed, two of Japan’s top TV executives resigned on 27 January after a public furore (and escalating advertiser boycott) over the cover-up of a sexual assault scandal. ‘Looking back, I realise there were shortcomings in our response,’ said Koichi Minato, president of Fuji TV, after it emerged that he knew back in 2023 about the accusations of sexual assault at a dinner party against Masahiro Nakai…"