Janette Ward is filled with hope after living in a wasteland, Helen Beioley felt surprisingly proud while reading the paper, while Robert Dyson would like to see theHouse of Commons become more civilised
Dr Stephen Riley (Letters, 5 July) succinctly outlines the success of the Tories in providing for the elite they represent by redistributing wealth from the poor to the rich. I awoke on 5 July to a new dawn here in north Herefordshire: a Green party MP and a Labour government. After breathing a sigh of relief, I am filled with hope and joy because we’ve been left to live in a wasteland for far too long; disrespected, insulted, robbed, unloved and, many of us, destitute.
Paying taxes is joyful if the NHS is there for us, if everyone has the right to a home, a good education, transport, food and heating. This is what we need, not just for ourselves but for all our neighbours. If our new political leaders prioritise our wellbeing and the sustainability of the planet above profit, and they make a contribution to world peace, then this new beginning is really something to celebrate. Janette Ward Tarrington, Herefordshire
Prof Helen Smith, David Rennie and Prof John Denham on the dire state of university funding
William Davies’ article on the plight of universities struck a chord (How the Tories pushed universities to the brink of disaster, 2 July). But he underplays how culpable the last decade of university managers have been, and how damaging and dated their response is now.
Universities and their staff face the same problems, derived from the same causes, but – as Davies points out – university management embraced tuition fees and the marketisation of higher education while staff protested against them. Now universities have at last recognised that the funding system is beyond repair. Faced with a sector meltdown that should see unions, staff and management collectively embracing a new hymn sheet, universities are falling back on the same old, same old: redundancy schemes accompanied by restructurings and efficiency drives that have a whiff of rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic.
The TV show depicts cosy villages, bedevilled by crime. And yes, seeing someone crushed by a giant wheel of cheese is scary – but isn’t the clue in the title?
New Caledonia has elected a pro-independence Indigenous Kanak candidate to France’s parliament for the first time in decades, in a move seen as a setback to French loyalists in the territory that has been gripped by unrest.
Over the weekend, voters in the French Pacific territory cast their ballots for their representatives in two seats in France’s national parliament. Emmanuel Tjibaou won out over a loyalist candidate in the second round of voting, while rightwing candidate and French loyalist Nicolas Metzdorf won New Caledonia’s second parliamentary seat.
Chinese military personnel are to begin joint “anti-terrorist training” with their counterparts in Belarus on Monday, close to the border with Poland. The “Eagle Assault” exercises by the two Russian allies amid the war in Ukraine will be held over 11 days in the border city of Brest, Belarus, and will involve tasks such as hostage rescue and anti-terrorism operations, China’s Ministry of National Defence said. It comes days after Belarus officially joined the Shanghai Cooperation Organization led by China and Russia, deepening their coordination on military, economic and political matters. The Belarusian leader, Alexander Lukashenko has been a key ally of Vladimir Putin since the invasion of Ukraine, holding tactical nuclear drills with Russia last year and agreeing to store tactical nuclear warheads for Moscow on its soil.
The Netherlands will begin sending F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine “without delay”, after export licences were granted, foreign minister Caspar Veldkamp said during a visit to Kyiv at the weekend. “Now that we’ve got clearance on the first F-16s, they will be delivered without delay,” Veldkamp said Saturday in a press conference in the Ukrainian capital. Details of the trip were kept secret until Sunday for security reasons. Veldkamp is part of a new ruling coalition in which Geert Wilders’ far-right Party for Freedom (PVV) is the largest party. Ukraine hopes the advanced US-made jets will help it gain air superiority over Russia and better protect its troops and cities from daily bombardments by Moscow’s troops. Kyiv has been calling for F-16s since shortly after Russia invaded in February 2022.
The UK’s new defence minister pledged on Sunday to deliver more artillery guns, ammunition and missiles to Ukraine, stressing ongoing support for Kyiv during a visit to the southern city of Odesa. John Healey, appointed defence minister on Friday, was visiting the port city, a frequent target of Russian missile and drone strikes, on his first international trip. “There may have been a change in government, but the UK is united for Ukraine,” Healey said, according to a statement published by Britain’s defence ministry. Healey pledged a new package of assistance including artillery guns, 250,000 rounds of ammunition, de-mining vehicles, small military boats, missiles and other equipment, the defence ministry said.
US House Speaker Mike Johnson will meet with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Wednesday during the Nato summit in Washington, according to Johnson’s schedule. Support for Ukraine is expected to be a focus at the summit in Washington this week, amid concerns about the future of US support for Kyiv should Donald Trump win the presidential election in November. Johnson in April spearheaded a $95bn bipartisan aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan that was opposed by allies of Trump in Congress.
Campaigners are urging Britain’s new Labour government to prevent Ukraine being sued in the UK courts if it defaults on its debts to private creditors. A two-year suspension of Ukraine’s debt payments was scheduled to expire on 1 August, Debt Justice said, and action was needed to protect Kyiv from the possibility of legal action. Ukraine is in negotiations with bondholders and is seeking a debt write down of 60% on the $24bn (£18.7bn) it owes to private creditors. Bondholders – which include big investment groups such as BlackRock, Pimco, Fidelity and AllianceBernstein – have said they are willing to take a 20% loss.
Readers respond to George Monbiot’s article calling for European rearmament to face Russia and a potential Donald Trump presidency
We desperately need a higher level of debate on Russian imperialism than that provided by George Monbiot (I never thought I’d argue for rearmament. But a looming Trump presidency changes everything, 4 July). I accept that there are reasoned arguments for supporting Ukraine’s anti-colonial resistance. But increasing Britain’s conventional arms in order to “support other European nations” and “perhaps to defend ourselves”? The evidence that Russia might attack or invade European countries is feeble.
Russia is in no position to take on Nato. According to the Royal United Services Institute, Russia faces “increasing material challenges” with maintaining its defence industry and military operations just in Ukraine, and is only doing so right now by avoiding large-scale troop offensives and by taking inferior tanks and degraded ammunition out of storage.
Brian Garcia, Heather Wishik and Guy Ottewell respond to the aftermath of the US president’s difficult debate with Donald Trump
Mehdi Hasan’s suggestion (Kamala Harris may be our only hope. Biden should step aside and endorse her, 3 July) addresses the perceived weaknesses of both Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. Let the man take a back seat and advise the Harris presidency. One term as president is what Biden is said to have promised anyway. Harris is young and fierce.
Let’s remember the woman who made Brett Kavanaugh, Bill Barr and Amy Coney Barrett look like fools. We need her to fight the unabashedly partisan and anti-precedent supreme court. Let’s remember the Harris who called John Kelly to demand he stop the Muslim ban at our airports. Let’s bring back the Harris who championed the Daca immigration policy. Let this Harris return and bring back our democracy. Brian Garcia University of California, Los Angeles
Doctors like me rely on these unsung stars of the medical profession
Your article about physician associates underlines the bullying and frankly disgusting attacks on trained health professionals who are working under intolerable pressure to keep our patients safe (“Rise of physician associates risks ‘care inequality’, warn doctors”). The same doctors on strike today are relying on nurses, healthcare assistants and, yes, physician associates to care for their patients while they are in the sun outside hospitals. I have worked with all types of NHS staff, and PAs deserve their status as health professionals delivering excellent care under supervision, as do nurse practitioners and others.
In a world where my 85-year-old mother has to queue at 7.30am to see anyone, never mind a doctor, I thank those who have trained more than five years, as PAs have, to help patients like her. I speak as a doctor ashamed that my profession cannot understand the mental harm it is causing. Dr Shaun Meehan
Formby, Merseyside
Patriots for Europe gets Danish and Flemish nationalists as latest members, amid EU anger over Hungary PM’s latest unauthorised foreign policy foray
Viktor Orbán’s rightwing political movement attracted enough parties on Saturday to achieve recognition from the European Union parliament in a boost for the Hungarian prime minister’s self-styled effort to “change European politics”.
The nationalist and pro-Russia leader announced on 30 June his intention to form an EU parliamentary grouping called “Patriots for Europe”.
Two bodies recovered from rubble of southern house while collision of oil truck and minibus in western Rivne region leaves single survivor. What we know on day 865
Russian shelling killed three civilians in Ukraine’s southern region of Kherson on Saturday, officials said. Two bodies were recovered from the rubble of a house that came under fire in the morning in a village near Beryslav, north of Kherson town, prosecutors said. An artillery strike in the evening killed one person in a village south of the town, said the region’s governor, Oleksander Prokudin.
Russian night-time strikes left more than 100,000 households without power in northern Ukraine and cut off the water supply to a regional capital, Ukrainian authorities said on Saturday. The northern Sumy region, which borders Russia, was plunged into darkness after Russian strikes late on Friday damaged energy infrastructure, the Ukrainian energy ministry said. Hours later, the Ukrainian public broadcaster reported that Russian drones hit the provincial capital, also called Sumy, cutting off water by hitting power lines that feed its system of pumps. Russian state news agency RIA cited a local pro-Kremlin “underground” leader as saying Moscow’s forces hit a plant producing rocket ammunition in the city. The claim could not be independently verified.
Fire broke out at a gas pipeline in Crimea, Russian-installed officials said on Sunday, blaming an accident and stating there were no casualties. Videos online showed a large fire, said to have followed one or more explosions in the Alushta district.
Russian air defence units downed seven Ukrainian drones each in the southern Belgorod and Kursk regions on the Ukrainian border on Saturday, officials and the military said. Russia’s defence ministry said seven drones were intercepted over the Belgorod region, which is subjected to nearly daily Ukrainian attacks. Alexei Smirnov, the governor of Kursk region, farther north and west, also reported seven drones had been downed over his region. He said Ukrainian forces had shelled about 10 villages across the day.
Ukraine’s air force commander said his forces had duped Russian troops into deploying missiles against sophisticated models put in place to look like military targets. Mykola Oleshchuk said on Telegram that the models depicted fighter aircraft and a surface-to-air missile battery. They were put in place at an airfield near the central city of Kriviy Rih and a district of the Black Sea port of Odesa. A video attached to Saturday’s post, described as footage from a Russian reconnaissance drone, showed what Oleshchuk said were Russian Iskander missiles attacking the depictions. “Air force personnel conducted passive defence measures!” he wrote.
In Ukraine’s eastern frontline region of Donetsk, Russian shelling killed 11 civilians and wounded 43 on Friday and overnight to Saturday, said the regional governor, Vadym Filashkin. Five people died in the town of Selydove, south-east of Pokrovsk, the eastern city that has emerged as a frontline hotspot. The Ukrainian general staff said on Saturday morning that Ukrainian and Russian forces clashed 45 times near Pokrovsk over the previous day. Hours later, the Russian ministry of defence said its troops had captured a village about 30km (19 miles) east of the city.
An oil truck collided with a minibus in western Ukraine on Saturday, killing 14 people, including a six-year-old child, and leaving a single survivor, emergency services said. The report on Telegram was accompanied by pictures of an overturned vehicle in a cornfield in the Rivne region. It said the survivor was in serious condition and being treated for her injuries.
Japan has announced a joint project with Cambodia to share knowledge and technology on landmine removal with countries worldwide including Ukraine. Under the Japan Cambodia landmine initiative, “Japan will provide full-scale assistance to humanitarian mine action in Ukraine”, Japan’s foreign minister, Yoko Kamikawa, said in Phnom Penh. “Next week, we will provide Ukraine with a large de-mining machine, and next month, here in Cambodia, we will train Ukrainian personnel on how to operate the machine.”
Temperatures could crest 100F (38C) in many regions after breaking records and sparking dozens of wildfires
A long-running heatwave that has already broken records, sparked dozens of wildfires and left about 130 million people under a high-temperature threat is about to intensify enough that the National Weather Service has deemed it “potentially historic”.
The NWS on Saturday reported some type of extreme heat or advisory for nearly 133 million people across the nation – mostly in western states where the triple-digit heat, with temperatures 15F to 30F higher than average, is expected to last into next week.
Cabaret club’s sails collapsed in April and new ones are up in time for Olympic torch to pass by on 15 July
Paris’s Moulin Rouge cabaret club, whose landmark windmill sails fell down in April, has inaugurated a new set, a week before the Olympic torch was due to pass by the venue.
The home of the can-can was temporarily laid low after the sails of the red-painted windmill tumbled to the ground in the early hours of 25 April.
New health secretary aims to resolve dispute in England and warns health service is ‘not good enough’
The new health secretary, Wes Streeting, has declared the NHS is broken as he announced that talks with junior doctors in England would restart next week.
The Ilford North MP said patients were not receiving the care they deserved and the performance of the NHS was “not good enough”.
Voting on Thursday proved a harrowing experience for Wayne Osborne and his wife. Plus letters on the election outcome from Mike Pender, Dr Stephen Riley, John Bailey, Michael J Walsh, Ruth Pickles, Cyril Duff and Ian Grieve
We often talked politics with our young daughter after the Tory win in 2010. She was five years old but we talked to her about it, just as my great-grandfather talked to me about the Labour party, which he had been part of in 1915 and onwards (Keir Starmer hails ‘sunlight of hope’ as Britain wakes up to Labour landslide, 5 July). His words stayed with me. I hoped our words would stay with our daughter, just as his words shaped my political views and my worldview. Words hold power and meaning.
When my wife and I approached the polling station on Thursday afternoon, she said quietly: “This would have been Abi’s first time to vote in a general election.” Those words hurt her as she spoke. I welled up, but the resolve to vote the correct way was strong; it would be in Abi’s memory. Because she died with leukaemia in September 2020 just after her 15th birthday, in a children’s hospital wing that had been built in the 1940s. It had only recently obtained some decent beds and observation machines, and it was a place desperate for funding, but with fantastic, hardworking, deeply committed staff.
Readers respond to Mary Beard’s defence of Cambridge University’s mandatory retirement age of 67
Mary Beard’s experience as a longtime Cambridge academic with an outstanding post‑retirement career is not the norm (Is Cambridge University right to enforce a retirement age? I think so – who wants to be a ‘job blocker’?, 29 June). Here is the reality: I moved to Cambridge 10 years ago as a mid-career academic. The cost of housing had exploded. I will be mortgaged until retirement. Meanwhile, our pension system has been downgraded, leaving many of us anxious about the state of our finances if we do not have any flexibility about when to take retirement. (I should note that when this downgrade was brought in, the head of Universities UK told us that we should expect to have to work longer. Cambridge does not give us this option.)
In my department, we have a large number of open positions. As a consequence, we are extremely understaffed and begging retired faculty to help with teaching. We recruit internationally, competing with top departments in the US and elsewhere; forced retirement has no effect on the job prospects of junior Cambridge academics.
Readers on the crisis in the criminal justice system that has brought the prison and the probation service to the verge of collapse
Samira Shackle is correct to say that Labour and the Tories have been ignoring the crisis in the criminal justice system (The prison and court systems are on the verge of collapse. Why aren’t Labour or the Tories talking about it?, 30 June). But her point about the need for major investment in it is debatable. Even when expenditure was high, in the pre-cuts era, the system still experienced regular crises. The cuts have not caused the current crisis, they have intensified it. And even though budgets have been cut, prison expenditure was still over £18bn between 2015 and 2020.
Fundamentally transforming the criminal injustice system should be the goal. Building more prisons has failed in the past, so disinvesting from the current building programme and investing in radical alternatives to prison, operating within a broader system based on social welfare for all, democratic accountability and social justice, is the answer to the crisis, not more of the same failed policies. Joe Sim Emeritus professor, Liverpool John Moores University
From churches to a college, readers on how the feminist is kept alive in the public consciousness
As at St Olave’s church in London (Letters, 1 July), Josephine Butler is well-remembered in her native Northumberland. She is buried at Kirknewton, just 5 miles from one of the parishes I serve. I have appealed to her inspiring example more than once, when preaching and when writing to my MP in opposition to the government’s iniquitous scheme to deport to Rwanda those desperate enough to cross the Channel in small boats.
More than 150 years ago, in her opposition to the Contagious Diseases Acts, Butler successfully argued that you don’t solve social problems by punishing the victims. I trust that Butler will be remembered and honoured long after the Rwanda deportation scheme, like the Contagious Diseases Acts, has been consigned to history. Rev Canon Dr Rob Kelsey Vicar of Norham, Northumberland
The fastest birds in the world, peregrine falcons are sought after for racing and can sell for up to £250,000 in the Middle East. Poaching is a constant threat, with eggs and chicks stolen to supply the hidden market. Now, there are nationwide efforts under way to ring and take DNA from wild chicks – but just reaching their nests can be perilous
A day of mourning has been announced for Thursday after a Russian missile and drone strike killed at least five people and wounded 53 in the south-eastern Ukrainian city of Dnipro on Wednesday. Borys Filatov, the city’s mayor, said on Telegram that the attack damaged kindergartens, schools and hospitals and caused fires across the city. Commercial buildings were also damaged, officials said. As part of a plea for more air defences and long-range weapons, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy published footage on Telegram showing a large explosion in the sky followed by a fireball shooting down towards the ground. “This Russian terror can only be stopped by modern air defences and our long-ranged weapons,” Zelenskiy said. “The world can protect lives, and only the decisiveness of leaders is needed.” Olha, the manager of a cafe that was hit, told Reuters: “Inside, everything is damaged, outside everything is also damaged. I’ve got jitters on my body, my hands … it’s all very complicated and scary.”
Three young brothers have been sentenced in Russia to 17 years in prison for trying to cross into Ukraine to join a unit of Russians fighting on Kyiv’s side. Ioann Ashcheulov, 24, was sentenced to 17 and a half years by a Moscow military court while his brothers – Alexei, 20, and 19-year-old Timofey – were handed 17 years, Russian state media reported. “I believe the Russian leadership, in the name of the Russian state, has committed a huge crime, the biggest of the 21st century,” Ioann Ashcheulov said at the sentencing for treason, according to the Mediazona independent news site. “My actions … were an attempt to stop this crime,” he said. He stressed he did not believe himself to be a “traitor to Russia”, saying: “I am not obliged to support everything the government of the country in which I was born [is doing].” The trio are the sons of a Russian Orthodox priest – Igor Ashcheulov – who preaches in the western Lipetsk region. The head of the Russian Orthodox church, Patriarch Kirill, has sanctified Moscow’s war.
The UN general assembly will keep standing up for Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty whatever the outcome of national elections across the globe this year, its president, Dennis Franci, has told the Associated Press during his first visit to Ukraine. “I am convinced that the people of Ukraine will not give up,” he said, whatever the election outcomes. “They will not accept it and they will not allow foreign domination of their homeland.” Speaking in Kyiv at the end of a two-day visit, Francis called on Russia “to withdraw immediately all its military forces from the territory of Ukraine” – a reference to a general assembly resolution that was approved shortly after the outbreak of the war. Francis met Ukrainian officials, including President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and pledged support for Zelenskiy’s peace plan.
Turkish president Tayyip Erdoğan has told Vladimir Putin that Ankara could help end the Ukraine-Russia war, an offer dismissed by Putin’s spokesperson. Erdoğan, speaking to the Russian president on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in Kazakhstan on Wednesday, said he believed a fair peace suiting both sides was possible, the Turkish presidency said. However, Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, ruled out any role as a go-between for the Turkish leader. “No, it’s not possible,” said Peskov, according to the Russian Tass news agency, without giving further details. Turkey is a member of Nato, but unlike other Nato leaders, Erdoğan has tried to maintain good relations with both Russia and Ukraine throughout the conflict.
Readers respond to an article in which Zadie Smith writes that real change is on the horizon after the Tories ruined Britain
Re Zadie Smith’s article (‘Here comes the sun’: Zadie Smith on hope, trepidation and rebirth after 14 years of the Tories, 3 July), I’m hoping against hope (we’ve been here before) that on Friday, the miasma of greed, self-centredness and downright stupidity will have evaporated and we will have a government whose fundamental purpose is to support, serve and improve the whole of the UK and not just to rip the lead off the roof and steal the last lightbulbs. A government that genuinely means to roll up its sleeves and sort out the mess.
I’m from the generation of free orange juice and cod-liver oil, smaller-scale secondary schools that weren’t businesses but educational establishments, and hospitals where you saw physiotherapists as soon as – and for as long as – you needed, where patients lay in wards, not corridors.
Readers respond to the Guardian’s editorial endorsing a vote for Labour in this week’s general election
Much of the electorate will concur with your editorial and look for a reason to hope that better times lie ahead (Sir Keir Starmer must win. Only his government can shape the future we want to see, 28 June). Like many other voters, I have temporarily put aside yearnings for radical change and a redistribution of wealth, and will settle for a government that offers a basic level of competence and decency. I will bemoan Labour’s lack of ambition and the absence of fundamental reform, but hope that, once in government, it will reveal a programme of action that better reflects its roots and values. In the meantime, I will be relieved to see an enthusiastic, united government beginning to clear up the mess left by 14 years of Conservative misrule. Peter Riddle Wirksworth, Derbyshire
• “The Tories must lose,” says your editorial headline in print. I couldn’t agree more. The last 14 years have been a nightmare of corruption and self-delusion. “Only Labour can shape a future we want to see,” it adds. This is wishful thinking. Public services have been degraded to the point where only radical change will save them. Labour’s extreme fiscal caution simply won’t do the job. This is why it is vital that voters in a constituency where a party to the left of Labour (Lib Dem, Green, SNP or Plaid Cymru) has a good chance should vote for it. The ideal result would be Labour as the largest party, but dependent on support from those to its left. Then, we might even get electoral reform that would end the need for tactical voting. Rodney Smith Glasgow
Fire crews in California are battling a wildfire in Butte County that forced about 13,000 people to evacuate in and around Oroville. The Thompson fire broke out before noon on Tuesday and grew to more than 3 sq miles by evening
Writer, who died in his Los Angeles home, also worked without credit on The Godfather and Bonnie and Clyde
Robert Towne, the Oscar-winning screenwriter of Chinatown, considered one of the greatest screenplays of all time, has died at age 89.
Towne, the screenwriter also nominated for his films Shampoo and The Last Detail, died on Monday among family members at his Los Angeles home, said his publicist, who did not disclose a cause of death.
Readers respond to an article by George Monbiot about the firm grip that oligarchs have on democracies
George Monbiot’s article is spot-on (Things are not going to get better as long as oligarchs rule the roost in our democracies, 27 June). We need to return to the relative equality, fairness and functional state that we had between 1945 and 1975. Monbiot draws attention to the historian Walter Scheidel’s assertion that only four forces have ever significantly reduced inequality: “mass-mobilisation warfare (such as the two world wars), total and violent revolution, state collapse and devastating plagues”.
None of these seem to be particularly attractive solutions. A fifth option could be an innovation in participatory democracy, the Citizens’ Mandate for Change, available online. It asks people what changes they want, summarises them monthly and sends them to politicians. The accompanying book, Saving Our World: Plan B, explains how, if this idea spreads widely enough, it has the capacity to effect transformational change. Is this, perhaps, our path of greatest hope? John Seymour Presteigne, Powys
Val McDermid’s backing for the SNP is misplaced, writes John Mason. But George Elder wishes voters in England had a party like the SNP to support
Val McDermid (How could I back anyone but the SNP and the bolshie, buoyant Scotland it stands for?, 26 June) perpetuates the myth that the Scottish National party, Scotland and small European countries are all “progressive”. Free prescriptions are a middle-class subsidy. The poor already received these and the money lost on them is to the cost of other NHS services. The cost of university fees is met by taxpayers, many not well-off, and fees from foreign students. This results in many Scottish students struggling to find places. The SNP balks at taxing the excess profits of energy corporations and retains the tax breaks for private schools.
Scotland is not particularly progressive, but conservative with a small “c”. The SNP currently has a deputy leader whose social views seem to me to be to the right of most of the Conservative party. As for the small progressive nations in the EU, McDermid is obviously oblivious to the growth of the far right in these countries and the opposition to immigration in Ireland.
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