Top story: Macron rejects special post-Brexit deal for City
Morning all. This is Martin Farrer bringing you the Guardian morning briefing with all the day’s top stories.
Boris Johnson has floated the possibility of building a bridge across the English Channel to improve transport links after Brexit. The foreign secretary discussed the idea with the French president, Emmanuel Macron, at yesterday’s Anglo-French summit. He said it was “ridiculous” that two of the world’s largest economies only 22 miles apart were linked by just a single railway line. Macron is understood to have responded positively and agreed that a second link should be built. He tweeted: “Our economic success depends on good infrastructure and good connections. Should the Channel Tunnel be just a first step?”
Macron was not quite so accommodating on other issues as he rejected hopes that the City will get a special deal after Brexit. Speaking after summit talks with Theresa May, Macron said Britain would not be allowed full access to European Union markets, including financial services, unless it paid into the EU budget and accepted all its rules. He said it would be “hypocrisy” to allow UK firms a special deal.
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Cancer hope – Researchers say a new blood test can detect eight common forms of cancer before they spread, potentially saving countless lives. The test, developed at Johns Hopkins University in the US, had a 70% average success rate in detecting tumours in trials on more than 1,000 patients with early-stage cancer. It works by looking for mutated DNA that dying cells shed into the blood, and protein biomarkers associated with bowel, breast, liver, lung, oesophageal, ovarian, pancreatic and stomach cancer. An Australian researcher who has worked on the test, Professor Peter Gibbs, from the Walter and Eliza Institute in Melbourne, said it could save thousands of lives.
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Forensic failure – Miscarriages of justices are the inevitable consequence of falling standards in forensic testing, according to the government’s watchdog. In a damning annual report, Gillian Tully says the decline in the quality of testing since the government allowed outsourcing of the service in 2012 means innocent people could be wrongly convicted and offenders escape justice. She was concerned that criminal forensic work was being carried out by unaccredited laboratories, some of which were not subject to independent oversight. “If you’re not finding indecent images of children on someone’s phone when you should be, that’s a miscarriage of justice as much as if someone was wrongly convicted of a crime,” she tells the Guardian. Tully is investigating whether failure to follow the correct forensic procedures were to blame for the collapse of high-profile rape cases last year. She also called on the government to give her power to ban sub-standard providers.
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UN scandal – Dozens of current and former United Nations staff have described a culture of sexual harassment and assault going unchecked in the orgainsation’s operations around the world, a Guardian investigation has revealed. Complaints have been ignored by management and perpetrators free to act with impunity, according to interviews carried out by the Guardian. Several women said a culture of silence and flawed grievance system meant they had been forced out of their jobs after making complaints. One woman, who alleges she was raped by a senior colleague while working in a remote location, said: “There are no other options to get justice, and I have lost my job too.” Other complaints have failed because the alleged perpetrator had diplomatic immunity or because incidents often take place in countries with weak judicial systems.
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Never again – Colin Firth has become the latest actor to say that he will never work with Woody Allen again. On the same day that the director’s adopted daughter, Dylan Farrow, gave her first televised interview accusing her adopted father of sexually assaulting her when she was seven years old, Firth told the Guardian “I wouldn’t work with him again”. Firth, who starred in Allen’s 2013 film, Magic in the Moonlight, follows Mira Sorvino, Rebecca Hall and Greta Gerwig in making the pledge. Farrow first made her allegations in 2014 and accused Hollywood of turning a “blind eye”. Allen denies the accusations but faces an “existential threat” to his legacy following an unprecedented outpouring of praise and empathy for Farrow, writes our San Francisco reporter, Sam Levin.
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PM pregnant – Jacinda Ardern, the New Zealand prime minister, has announced that she is pregnant with her first child. Ardern, who took up office in October, said she and her partner, Clarke Gayford, are expecting a baby in June and that she will take six weeks maternity leave to care for the child. Asked by a reporter how she was able to organise a new government last year with morning sickness, she replied: “It’s what ladies do.” With this in mind, Ruby Hamad celebrates a very feminist political triumph.
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Lunchtime read: Is work still working for you?
Society has never placed more value on work. It permeates our culture from top to bottom with politicians constantly citing those paragons of virtue – “hard-working families” – and companies expecting employees to be on call at all hours. But in today’s long read, Andy Beckett argues that despite living in a world where workers commute further, strike less and retire later, work is no longer really working for many people. Ours is an increasingly precarious economy of zero-hours and self-employment, all haunted by the onset of mass automation that threatens to make many jobs redundant. Amid this dystopian outlook, an anti-work movement is taking shape and Andy speaks to some leading “post-work” experts to see if it’s really possible that we could one day be free of toil.
Sport
Chelsea have been accused, after an initial Fifa investigation, of breaking the rules on the signing of 25 foreign players under the age of 18. On day five of the Australian Open, there was no hiding place from the unrelenting sun – except beneath shifting slivers of shade – but the fair-skinned Yorkshireman, Kyle Edmund, managed to stagger past Nikoloz Basilashvili into the fourth round of a slam for just the second time. Eddie Jones has claimed England’s injury-hit squad will “hunt down” their Six Nations rivals after claiming the two-time defending champions have been written off before the start of the tournament. And England are looking to take a 2-0 series lead over Australia in the second one-dayer at the Gabba in Brisbane. They’re under way so follow the live blog here.
Business
High street banks have pledged £225m to help firms hit by the collapse of Carillion, while Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has vowed to end the “racket” of outsourcing public services. Asian shares were flat in overnight trading while the pound is buying $1.391 and €1.134.
The papers
The Telegraph splashes on “Boris calls for bridge across the channel” – a physical bridge that is. The Times also has the Boris bridge on the front but leads with an investigation that claims white-collar criminals are “acting with impunity”.
The Guardian leads with our Jeremy Corbyn interview and his pledge to stop the “outsourcing racket” which has been brought into focus by the collapse of Carillion.
The i lead has the headline “New entente cordiale” and focuses on the “diplomatic love-in” between France and the UK.
The Mirror says a flu epidemic is on its way to the UK with 8.3 million people already showing symptoms. The Sun has fun pointing out that Prince William has had a very short haircut – and it cost him £180.
The Mail highlights the case of the British Army’s longest serving Afghan interpreter who has been refused entry to the UK.
Lastly, the FT splashes on its interview with the Zimbawean leader Emmerson Mnangagwa in which he invites UN, EU and Commonwealth observers to monitor the next election. It is being seen as a sign that he wants to improve relations in the post-Mugabe era.
For more news: www.theguardian.com
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