
Independence or more immigration? Why Scotland can't have both
One was Math Campbell-Sturgess, a 42-year-old former army reservist from Cambridgeshire. 'Independence isn't about where you come from,' he said. 'It's about who makes the decisions that matter in your life.'
Campbell-Sturgess is not typical of English folk living in Scotland. Leask unearthed hitherto-unseen polling data that breaks down people's views on independence according to their country of birth. Only 35 per cent of English-born voters in Scotland support independence, and 65 per cent prefer a UK that sticks together.
Immigrants to Scotland from further afield have similar views: only 40 per cent are in favour of breaking up Britain while 60 per cent are opposed.
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Telegraph
30 minutes ago
- Telegraph
Alan Turing Institute scraps diversity drive under pressure from ministers
Britain's leading artificial intelligence (AI) institute has scrapped a key diversity scheme after coming under pressure from ministers. The initiative from The Alan Turing Institute, which last year was handed £100m in taxpayer funding, had aimed to get more women into science and promote 'equity in the data science and AI fields'. However, the programme has now been axed following a review by the organisation's board amid calls for it to focus increasingly on defence. The decision means the institute will no longer have a mandate to investigate 'diversity and inclusion in online and physical workplace cultures', while it will also end inquiries into how 'social bias' risks being built into machine learning systems. It comes just days after Peter Kyle, the Technology Secretary, urged the institute to 'reform'. In a letter to Doug Gurr, the former Amazon executive who is now chairman of the organisation's board of trustees, Mr Kyle said it must 'evolve and adapt' to 'prioritise its defence, national security and sovereign capabilities'. Drift from core mission Originally launched by David Cameron in 2015, the institute has come under growing scrutiny after it was awarded the £100m government funding. This week, a report from British Progress argued the organisation had 'lost its way' and needed 'major reform'. The think tank said the institute had a 'fragmented and thinly spread research portfolio' and that it had been 'susceptible to mission creep'. The report added: 'The most significant example of this has been its drift away from its core technical mission toward work rooted in social and political critique.' British Progress warned that, if it failed to reform, there would be grounds to 'decommission the institute entirely'. While the institute has made moves towards reforming its research, its staff have also criticised its allegedly chaotic management and a lack of diversity in senior roles. Last year, more than 180 staff signed a letter questioning its decision to hire four top male academics, as they criticised a 'trend of limited diversity within the institute's senior scientific leadership'. In December, The Telegraph reported that external consultants had raised concerns from staff about 'tokenism' and 'nepotism' at the institute, warning of 'pervasive issues of low morale'. That month, staff also sent a no-confidence letter to its leadership team and board, warning it had been left 'rudderless'. The scrapping of the gender representation scheme comes amid a wider retreat across the technology sector, with many businesses rowing back on diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies after Donald Trump's return to the White House. The institute was named after the Second World War computer scientist Alan Turing, who was persecuted for his homosexuality. The mathematician, who died in 1954, led Britain's codebreakers at Bletchley Park and helped to design a machine to crack Nazi Germany's Enigma messages. Yet in recent years, the institute has been dogged by concerns that it missed out on the emergence of a new wave of technology. In 2023, a report from the Tony Blair Institute argued it had 'not kept the UK at the cutting edge of international AI developments '. A spokesman for the institute said it was in the process of reviewing 100 projects, two of which had been axed. They added: 'We're shaping a new phase for the institute focused on delivering real-world impact against society's biggest challenges and will respond to the national need to double down on our work in defence, national security and sovereign capabilities.'


BBC News
30 minutes ago
- BBC News
Africa to be hit hard as foreign aid cuts revealed
The government has revealed details of its plans to cut foreign aid, with support for children's education and women's health in Africa facing the biggest government said in February it would slash foreign aid spending by 40% - from 0.5% of gross national income to 0.3% - to increase defence spending to 2.5% after pressure from the US. A Foreign Office report and impact assessment show the biggest cuts this year will come in Africa, with less spent on women's health and water sanitation with increased risks, it says, of disease and death. Bond, a UK network of aid organisations, said women and children in the most marginalised communities would pay the highest price. As well as less support for Africa, including big cuts in children's education, funding for the Occupied Palestinian Territories will fall by 21% despite promises to the the government said spending on multilateral aid bodies - money given to international organisations like the World Bank - would be protected, including the Gavi vaccine alliance, and it said the UK would also continue to play a key humanitarian role in hotspots such as Gaza, Ukraine and Sudan. Baroness Chapman, minister for development, said: "Every pound must work harder for UK taxpayers and the people we help around the world and these figures show how we are starting to do just that through having a clear focus and priorities."The government said the cuts follow "a line-by-line strategic review of aid" by the minister, which focused on "prioritisation, efficiency, protecting planned humanitarian support and live contracts while ensuring responsible exit from programming where necessary".The Foreign Office said bilateral support - aid going directly to the recipient country - for some countries would decrease and multilateral organisations deemed to be underperforming would face future funding cuts. It has not yet announced which countries will be said it was clear the government was "deprioritising" funding "for education, gender and countries experiencing humanitarian crises such as South Sudan, Ethiopia and Somalia, and surprisingly the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Sudan, which the government said would be protected"."It is concerning that bilateral funding for Africa, gender, education and health programmes will drop," Bond policy director Gideon Rabinowitz said."The world's most marginalised communities, particularly those experiencing conflict and women and girls, will pay the highest price for these political choices."At a time when the US has gutted all gender programming, the UK should be stepping up, not stepping back."Foreign aid has come under intense scrutiny in recent years, with the one cabinet minister admitting the public no longer supports spending on it. One organisation that escaped the cuts was the World Bank. The Foreign Office confirmed that the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank's fund for the world's lowest income countries, would receive £1.98bn in funding from the UK over the next three years, helping the organisation benefit 1.9 billion Labour governments under Sir Tony Blair and Gordon Brown committed to increasing the overseas aid budget to 0.7% of national target was reached in 2013 under David Cameron's Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government, before being enshrined in law in aid spending was cut to 0.5% of national income in 2021 under the Conservatives, blaming the economic pressures of Covid.


The Guardian
30 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Ian Hislop calls arrest of man holding Private Eye cartoon at Gaza protest ‘mind-boggling'
The terror arrest of a man for holding up a Private Eye cartoon during a protest at the weekend was 'mind-boggling', the magazine's editor, Ian Hislop, has said, as the retired teacher called for an apology from police. Jon Farley was picked up by police at a silent demonstration in Leeds on Saturday, which he described as a 'pretty terrifying and upsetting experience', for holding a sign that made a joke about the government's proscription of the group Palestine Action from the last issue of the fortnightly satirical magazine. '[Police officers] picked me up, grabbed me, and took me to the side, and I ended up sitting on the pavement,' the 67-year-old said. 'I think that's when they said something about the placard. And I said: 'Well it's a cartoon from Private Eye. I can show you. I've got the magazine in my bag,' by which time, they were putting me in handcuffs.' He was then arrested under section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000, which prohibits support for a proscribed organisation. 'I thought, this is all a bit surreal,' said Farley, who had never been arrested before. 'I clearly wasn't any kind of physical threat. There was no need for them to act in the way they did. 'By this point I was in the van, so I wasn't going anywhere. I said: 'You take the handcuffs off and I'll show you the magazine because what you're doing is just daft.'' In the meantime police found out his name from his senior bus pass and he was taken to a police station. Six hours later, after being questioned by counter-terror police, he was allowed to leave, under bail conditions that he attended no 'Palestine Action' rallies, which, as he pointed out, he had never done and would be illegal under terrorism laws anyway. On Monday morning, a counter-terror officer called to tell him he would face no further action. 'So I said: 'If I go on another demo and I hold up that cartoon again, does that mean I will be arrested or not?' And she said: 'I can't tell you, it's done on a case-by-case basis.'' He said: 'There's been no apology, no explanation. It's this murky lack of clarity.' Farley, who was left with minor bruising and cuts to his arms, said he was 'frustrated and angry' after the experience. 'I was just very shocked at first and then relieved, but now I'm thinking, hang on a minute, what happened here? 'What really concerns me is the whole atmosphere of intimidation.' Farley, who had attended a number of peaceful demonstrations in the past, pointed out on the day he was arrested, 32 Palestinians were shot by the Israel Defense Forces in Gaza while queuing for aid, a subject referenced on his placard. 'I saw it in Private Eye and I thought: 'That's really well thought-out. It's got a bit of nuance about it.' But I don't think the cops do nuance. 'I found out later somebody said to one of the police: 'You know you can buy Private Eye in the newsagent just next to the van you're putting him in, are you going to arrest Ian Hislop?' 'So they're coming out with all this guff about: 'If it's in print, it's fine. But if you carry it on the demo [it's illegal].' That sounds to me like the police making up the law.' Hislop, speaking from Private Eye's London office – having not been arrested – said the cartoon was 'quite blatantly an example of freedom of speech on the subject of a government policy'. The editor of the 63-year-old satirical magazine said: 'I did think it was mind-boggling. I mean, ludicrous. He obviously couldn't believe it and the immediate response in the office was that someone said: 'Well, the jokes have been criminal for ages.'' He said the cartoon was 'actually a very neat and funny little encapsulation about what is and isn't acceptable, and it's a joke about – I mean, it's quite a black joke – but about the hypocrisies of government approach to any sort of action in Gaza. 'So it's not difficult to understand. It's critical, but it is quite clearly a joke. Seems to me absolutely extraordinary that someone could be arrested for holding it up.' He added it was 'disappointing' that the arresting police officers did not appear to have heard of Private Eye. 'That's really depressing, isn't it? That's probably the most appalling thing,' he joked. West Yorkshire police said: 'We are sorry that the man involved is unhappy with the circumstances of this arrest. As this is a new proscribed organisation, West Yorkshire police is considering any individual or organisational learning from this incident.'