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With M.D.: "The infected blood scandal was hardly new. The Eye wrote about in in 1987, government-funded compensation schemes were put in place in 1988, and extended in 1993 and 2003; and in 2009 an independent, but not public, inquiry by Lord Archer was critical of the speed of response of the NHS and successive governments to the threats of contamination of blood and blood products with HIV and hepatitis C in the 1970s and 1980s…"
With Bio-Waste Spreader: "One of the last events PM Rishi Sunak held before calling a general election was a ‘Farm to Fork' summit in Downing Street where 70 food and farming businesses brought their produce for sampling and learnt the details of the government's new ‘Food Security Index' (FSI). The FSI will apparently be published each year to provide a snapshot of Britain's ability to produce enough food for its population – but will it actually be a reliable guide?…"
With Dr B Ching: "Four private firms have applied to run extra trains on the west-coast mainline to London Euston – supposedly so full that taxpayers are spending squillions on building HS2. Last year the Tory government flipped from opposing ‘open-access' trains (which aren't under government contract and control) to wanting more of them (Eye 1621). Now Labour says it would let open-access operators ‘continue to compete' where they ‘add value and capacity'…"
With Remote Controller: "Genre has always been important in TV, giving the head of comedy or director of drama their fancy title and big salary. But with streamers dividing their sites into ever more niche sections, sub-genres multiply. Netflix's two 30 May drops seek to popularise the category of neurodiversity fairytale. Geek Girl, ten half-hours adapted from Holly Smale's 2013 YA novel, mashes up Perrault's Cinderella and Andersen's The Ugly Duckling in a place of learning…"
With Old Sparky: "Following the collapse of Britishvolt, which had hoped to make batteries big enough to store energy from renewables to back up the grid, its former power station site at Blyth in Northumberland has been sold for a proposed new ‘hyperscale data centre campus'. What that? As one of the largest in Europe, the data centre will serve the burgeoning artificial intelligence (AI) industry, social media and crypto-currency mining. From the energy perspective, this is an ironic 180-degree reversal…"
With Lunchtime O'Boulez: "‘Step inside a place of wonder,' reads Winchester Cathedral's slogan to tourists – though the cause for wonder among those working there is how things are managing to carry on amid a scandal over the enforced departure of their eminent director of music, Andrew Lumsden. As reported by O'Boulez last issue, Lumsden was squeezed out after 22 distinguished years amid what appears to be a campaign against him by the cathedral's precentor, Andy Trenier, who is not loved in the Close but seems to wield power there…"
With Slicker: "The ever more ex-billionaire Barclay family have lost just over £1bn following the end of their 20-year investment in the Yodel parcel delivery business. That loss represents now worthless shares in the collapsed former immediate Yodel parent company. The family pumped money into its shares from 2012 to cover continuing losses. LW Corporation in Jersey, a key Barclay offshore company, effectively funded Yodel. The Barclays are not the only big losers from the collapse of Logistics Group…"
Letter from Berlin
From Our Own Correspondent: "The European football championship beckons, and we look forward to welcoming our British friends and their charming chants about the heady days of the 1940s. We have done our best to make them feel at home: our trains no longer run on time and our autobahns are in a wretched state. And there's more. Our economy is underperforming those of all our peers…"