‘Macho man’ lands blows on ‘Ozempic man’ in round two of Tory leadership chats

Published

6 months ago

October 1, 2024

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It was round two of the Tory leadership fireside chats.

After “posh boy” Tom Tugendhat and “working class” Kemi Badenoch, it was the turn of “Ozempic man” and “macho man”.

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Robert Jenrick, who took the weight loss drug for six weeks, changed his diet, exercised and lost four stone, was taking on the barrel-chested strongman James Cleverly, who does press-ups for fun.

And on the evidence of this confident, swaggering performance, Mr Cleverly may be muscling his way into the final two candidates who will contest the leadership in the final ballot of Tory members.

Without mentioning Mr Jenrick by name, “macho man” made several attacks on “Ozempic man” and boastfully told the audience he was a winner and they couldn’t afford to elect any of the other three candidates to replace Rishi Sunak.

It was Mr Jenrick, all slick, measured and media-trained, who went first and began with the disclosure that the middle name of his second daughter, Sophia, is Thatcher, because she was born the year Mrs Thatcher died.

Yes, really. There were gasps of astonishment from the Thatcher-loving audience. Could this really be true? Yes, apparently.

But Mr Jenrick then had a good joke at Sir Keir Starmer’s expense. His daughter had asked if he’d get free Taylor Swift tickets if he becomes leader. “No, that’s only leaders of the Labour Party,” he said.

Challenged by interviewer Christopher Hope if he’d turn down freebies if he became leader, he looked startled. He’d have to say yes, he conceded. He may live to regret that!

Later, asked the same question, Mr Cleverly was having none of that. “Yes, every now and then!” he said. The man has no shame!

Mr Jenrick had a good gag, too, when asked about a deal with Nigel Farage and Reform UK. “I don’t think the party could afford the bar bill if we allowed Nigel Farage back in,” he said.

And then, when asked which of his Tory colleagues he’d like to see in the BBC reality game show The Traitors, he quipped: “Michael Gove has left Parliament!”

Poor Mr Gove is the butt of a lot of Tory jokes in Birmingham this week. He’ll surely have his revenge in the columns of the Spectator magazine now he’s editor.

Mr Jenrick backed a shorter leadership contest so the winner could oppose the Budget in October and also the return of grammar schools. All the candidates love grammar schools.

Then came a story about Mr Jenrick’s own humble origins, the sort of story we’re also used to from political leaders these days. He grew up in a “working class background”, he claimed. Don’t they all? (Well, not Tom Tugendhat, obviously.)

“Money was quite tight in our household,” Mr Jenrick said. “My mum and dad quit their job and set up a small business, and it didn’t prosper initially. I went to a state primary school, and my granddad died.

“And my grandmother, who was not a wealthy person herself, decided instead of going on a cruise or doing anything else you might do with some money to spend that money putting my sister and I through a private school. It wasn’t Eton. It was Wolverhampton Grammar School.”

It was “an innately Conservative story”, he claimed. “And we should never bow to the politics of envy,” he said. “We should respect people who make decisions like that.”

And then it was time for Mr Cleverly, who strode on to the stage like a heavyweight boxer entering the ring. He does, of course, have the physique of a heavyweight boxer, which helps give him his swagger.

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But he told his own humble beginning story, too. He said he went to a private fee-paying school which used to be a grammar school.

And then he claimed: “Because my parents could only afford one set of school fees, that’s why I’m an only child. Genuinely, that’s the sacrifice my parents made to pay for my education.”

Two grammar school boys, then, funded by sacrifices made by their family. We’ll no doubt hear more about this when they make their big speeches on the final day of this conference.

Later Mr Cleverly told, in a very amusing way that made the audience laugh, his own family history. “I’m the child of migrant families, on both sides of my family,” he said.

“My mum came here from Sierra Leone in west Africa in 1966 and my dad’s family came here from northern France in 1066.”

Mr Cleverly, however, doesn’t do modesty. He spoke about “when I’m leader” rather than “if”. Nor is he shy about talking about himself. He must have said “I” up to 100 times during his hour on the stage.

“I am the only one who has run a great office of state,” he began by reminding his audience. “In fact, I’m the only one that has run two great offices of state and delivered in both of them.

“I’m the only one who has been chairman of the Conservative party. I’m the only one who’s been instrumental in winning a general election.”

He was self-deprecating only in answer to two questions, first on his widely reported off-colour jokes about the date rape drug Rohypnol. “I messed up,” he confessed.

And second, when he was asked if he had any skeletons in his cupboard. He referred to a 2015 interview in which he admitted watching online porn and marijuana.

Then came the not-so-subtle attacks on Mr Jenrick. “It’s very now fashionable to be a Brexiteer,” he said. “I was doing it before it was cool.”

On Mr Jenrick resigning from the government over the Rwanda policy, he said: “I didn’t run away from problems, I deal with problems.”

And on Mr Jenrick wearing a “Hamas are terrorists” hoodie, he said: “I think it was Margaret Thatcher who said ‘You don’t need to wear a T-shirt to show what your principles are’.”

Ouch! The heavyweight had landed some effective blows on his opponent. And he ended by declaring: “When I’m in the final two.”

Was this second round of the fireside chats a preview of the final two in the leadership contest? Is Mr Cleverly going to repeat David Cameron’s triumph of the 2005 Tory conference, when his performance saw him transformed from outsider to front runner?

Given the reaction of many in the audience as they left the hall – “Cleverly nailed it”, several activists told Sky News – “macho man” may not have delivered a knock-out blow on “Ozempic man”. But he certainly won on points.

UK

Police searching for missing Cardiff woman launch murder investigation

Published

5 hours ago

March 17, 2025

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Police searching for missing Cardiff woman launch murder investigation

Detectives searching for a Cardiff woman who has been missing since last summer have launched a murder investigation.

Three arrests have previously been made in connection with the disappearance of Charlene Hobbs.

Crimestoppers is now offering a reward of up to £20,000 for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of those responsible.

The last confirmed sighting of the 36-year-old, from Riverside, was a photograph taken on a mobile phone at a house in Broadway in the Adamsdown area of the city on 24 July last year.

Ms Hobbs, who has a distinctive dragon tattoo on her back, had her hair in a bun and was wearing a dark strapless top when the photo was taken.

The day before she was last seen, she was captured on CCTV at a Morrisons Local in Adamsdown.

In a statement released through South Wales Police, Ms Hobbs’ family said: “We still hope that Charlene can be found safe and well.

“We are grateful for the support of Crimestoppers and the reward to help us find her, and hope that this will help people to come forward with information about what has happened to Charlene.”

Detective Chief Inspector Matt Powell said: “We have always been determined to find Charlene alive and return her to her family, but despite a huge number of enquiries we have no proof that Charlene is alive.

“While I have always maintained an open mind, the lack of evidence that Charlene is alive means that we are now treating her disappearance as a murder investigation.

“We have spoken to more than 250 people, either known to Charlene or from areas where she is known to frequent, and no one can tell us where Charlene is or that she is alive, which of course we, her family and friends desperately want to hear.

“Several of those we have spoken to believe that she has died but no one has been able to provide any specific details.”

Detectives and specialist search teams are continuing with extensive efforts to find Ms Hobbs and determine the circumstances around her disappearance.

DCI Powell added: “I still firmly believe that answers lie in the community, and that someone out there holds key information that will help us find Charlene.”

A 45-year-old man arrested in connection with the investigation remains on police bail.

A 43-year-old man and a 38-year-old woman have been released without charge.

UK

Decades on the beach – sex offender Richard Burrows’ life in hiding

Published

5 hours ago

March 17, 2025

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Decades on the beach - sex offender Richard Burrows' life in hiding

In Thailand, Richard Burrows found an escape – a place to hide for nearly 30 years.

After abusing children, he fled the UK to avoid prosecution. But the severity of his crimes didn’t push him to live a low-profile life – far from it.

In the sandy shores of Phuket, he became very well known and liked. Everyone there knew him as Peter Smith, an identity he stole from a passport that wasn’t his.

No one appeared to know where he had gone after he failed to attend the start of his trial over alleged child sex offences at Chester Crown Court in 1997.

His abuse spanned a wide period from the 1960s to the 1990s. Some of the offences occurred at a children’s school in Cheshire and others happened in the Midlands, through his involvement with the scouts.

But it would take 27 years for him to be caught, finally arrested at Heathrow Airport.

He had settled in Thailand with a familiar routine and a wide circle of acquaintances. He would regularly dine at a small roadside restaurant, often ordering fish and chips.

The owner Pakorn Sanwongwan says the man they knew was kind and generous. They had no idea of his past.

“I’m very shocked because from my perspective, he was a good person. For the past 24 years he had recommended our restaurant to lots of people and brought us new customers,” he said.

His wife Supaporn says they were shocked when just a few months ago he announced he was “going to the UK and never coming back”.

It’s easy to see how many people were duped. He kept the reality of what he’d done largely hidden. And his was not a life lived under the radar.

He was involved in the local sailing community. His friends say he’d worked with local schools. And he’d worked in local media.

Burrows lived in a container, a short drive from the coastline. But things started to unravel when money ran thin.

He began opening up to a very small number of close friends, saying he needed to return to the UK to see family and was struggling financially.

“Ben”, not his real name, was among those close confidantes.

He said: “I knew him for 25 years. Only about three to four years ago, he started sort of revealing a few things that he’s not actually who his passport says he is and that he was searched by the UK authorities for some allegations, apparently, he’s done.”

Ben says he had no idea of the severity of the charges against him. The man he thought he knew was a kind soul, giving and supportive of many he met.

There were, he says, signs of his attraction to young people, but it didn’t raise alarm bells.

“Peter” had younger companions who cooked for him at home and he would finance the education of some of them, Ben told us.

“Obviously it was visible that he liked the younger generation. But that he would go for minors I would never have thought,” he said.

All of the offences were committed during Burrows’ time in the United Kingdom, and no charges have been brought against him in Thailand.

If Ben knew the details of Burrows’ sordid past, he may have thought differently. But Burrows was living a lie, enjoying a secret life in the sun.

Remarkably, Burrows went undetected for decades – his visa based on a fake passport, consistently renewed.

It’s unclear what exactly motivated his attempt to move back to the UK, a move that would end in his arrest at Heathrow.

Some we spoke to said he had run out of money and that he wanted to see family. But some suspected he was trying to make peace with his past.

Finally, he has been brought to justice. But his victims were left to deal with the horrific aftermath of his abuse.

Whilst he is now behind bars, they will also have to wrestle with the fact their abuser was able to enjoy a free and full life for so long.

UK

Lucy Letby: What we have learnt from the evidence given to the public inquiry

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5 hours ago

March 17, 2025

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Lucy Letby: What we have learnt from the evidence given to the public inquiry

After Lucy Letby was sentenced to 15 whole-life terms for murdering seven babies and attempting to murder seven others, an inquiry was launched to ensure lessons were learnt.

The Thirlwall Inquiry is examining three broad themes – the experiences of all victims’ parents, how the concerns of clinicians were handled, and to ensure lessons are learnt from the case of the most prolific child serial killer in modern British history.

About 133 witnesses, including parents who lost their children, hospital executives, and Letby’s former colleagues at the Countess of Chester Hospital, have provided live evidence to the inquiry since September, with a further 396 giving written statements.

The closing statements this week come days after a police investigation into corporate manslaughter was widened to include gross negligence manslaughter.

The inquiry also heard that two baby deaths remain the subject of ongoing police investigation, which Letby has been interviewed in prison over.

Inquiry chair Lady Justice Thirlwall is expected to publish her official report in the autumn, outlining the detailed findings and recommendations based on the evidence that has been heard.

This week, the Thirlwall Inquiry is hearing closing submissions from the various interested parties. Here’s what has been said during the key testimonies so far.

Why is it called the Thirwall inquiry and why are there calls for it to be suspended?

Opening the inquiry at Liverpool Town Hall on 10 September last year, Lady Justice Thirlwall said the probe bears her surname so that the parents do not repeatedly see the name of the person convicted of harming their babies.

She said the babies who died or were injured would be at the “heart of the inquiry” and condemned comments at the time that questioned the validity of Letby’s convictions – which the nurse tried and failed to challenge at the Court of Appeal – and some of the evidence used at trial.

The inquiry also remains separate to a 14-member expert panel, led by retired neonatologist Dr Shoo Lee and senior Conservative MP David Davis, which in February said it had analysed medical evidence considered during Letby’s trial and claimed there was no medical evidence that the nurse murdered or attempted to murder 14 premature babies.

Letby’s lawyers have since applied for a review of her case as a “potential miscarriage of justice” by the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) after two failed bids at the Court of Appeal.

On Monday, the judge said she had received a request last month from lawyers representing former executives at the Countess of Chester Hospital asking for the public inquiry to be suspended.

Lady Justice Thirlwall also said she had recently received a written request from solicitors representing Letby for her to pause the inquiry.

In the letter to the judge, which Sky News has seen, Letby’s lawyers warned Lady Justice Thirlwall that her final report would “not only be redundant but likely unreliable” if it was not put on hold until after the conclusion of the former nurse’s CCRC application.

Letby couldn’t ‘wait to get first death out of the way’

One of the nurses who started as a newly qualified nurse at the Countess of Chester Hospital on the same day as Letby told the inquiry that the serial killer had told her she “can’t wait for her first death to get it out the way”.

The nurse said she thought the comment was “strange” at the time, but she put it down to Letby just making conversation.

She also recalled Letby being “animated” when telling her she had been involved with resuscitation attempts of a child on the ward in 2012.

“It was kind of like she was excited to tell me about it,” the nurse said.

‘Likely’ Letby murdered or attacked more children

Neonatal clinical lead at the Countess of Chester Hospital, Dr Stephen Brearey, told the inquiry that he thought it was “likely” Letby murdered or started to harm babies prior to June 2015.

He agreed that “on reflection” several unexpected collapses and deaths before that date now “appear suspicious”.

Dr Brearey added he did not have concerns about those incidents at the time, saying that hospital staff “thought we were going through a busy or particularly difficult patch”.

The inquiry was told that the dislodgement of breathing tubes, which was how Letby tried to kill Child K, generally occurs on less than 1% of shifts.

However, it happened on 40% of shifts that Letby worked when she was a trainee at Liverpool Women’s Hospital.

Newborn given potentially fatal morphine overdose

Two years before Letby carried out the murder of Child A, she and another nurse gave a potentially fatal dose of morphine to a newborn baby.

Neonatal unit ward deputy ward manager, Yvonne Griffiths, told the inquiry that the infant received 10 times the correct amount of the painkiller at the end of a night shift in July 2013.

Describing it as a “very serious error”, she said the infant could have died if colleagues had not spotted the error an hour later.

Letby was told she had to stop administering controlled drugs as a result of the error, a decision that she told management she was not happy about.

Letby offered ‘tips’ on how to get away with murder

In a WhatsApp exchange in 2017, Letby and union rep Hayley Griffiths discussed the US legal drama How To Get Away With Murder.

The discussion took place a year after the neonatal nurse was moved to clerical duties following concerns she may have been deliberately harming babies.

In a message to Letby, Ms Griffiths wrote: “I’m currently watching a programme called How To Get Away With Murder. I’m learning some good tips.”

To which Letby replied: “I could have given you some tips x.”

Ms Griffiths responded saying she needed “someone to practice on to see if [she] could get away with it”, and Letby replied: “I can think of two people you could practice on and will help you cover it up x.”

The union rep said: “I truly and deeply regret having started that conversation… this is completely unprofessional.”

No support or counselling given to parents

The parents of two triplet boys murdered by Letby told the inquiry they were given no support or counselling after the deaths of their children.

The children died on successive days in June 2016. Letby was their designated nurse and their deaths led to her being removed from the Countess of Chester Hospital’s neonatal unit to a non-patient facing role.

The triplets’ father said: “Following the deaths of our children, we didn’t receive any support or counselling from anyone. Had we received some support, we might have been in a better position to try and act on what our instincts were telling us, which was that something had gone badly wrong.”

Senior consultant: ‘I should have been braver’

Letby’s trial in 2023 heard that senior paediatrician Dr Ravi Jayaram caught the serial killer “virtually red-handed” after an incident in a nursery room at the hospital in February 2016.

Addressing that incident while giving evidence at the inquiry, Dr Jayaram said he had walked into the nursery after feeling “significant discomfort” that Letby was alone with Child K.

After walking in, he said he saw “a baby clearly deteriorating” and the child’s endotracheal tube (ET) dislodged. Despite his concern over the incident, the consultant did not tell anyone at the hospital, or the police.

Explaining why he said nothing, Dr Jayaram said: “It’s the fear of not being believed. It’s the fear of ridicule. It’s the fear of accusations of bullying.

“I should have been braver and should have had more courage because it was not just an isolated thing. There was already a lot of other information.”

Hospital boss: ‘I should’ve done better’

Tony Chambers, the former chief executive of the Countess of Chester Hospital, was a key witness to give evidence during the inquiry.

During his evidence, Mr Chambers offered an apology to the families who had fallen victim to Letby and said his language had been “clumsy” in telling the killer nurse the hospital had “her back”.

“I absolutely acknowledged that we hadn’t got that right. We could have done better, we should have done better. I should have done better,” he said.

When pressed on if he tried to “stall and obstruct the police being called or this being made public”, he added: “Had that been what I had done then it would be. But I think it’s an outrageous statement and I do not believe it represents my actions.”

Jeremy Hunt: ‘Terrible tragedy happened on my watch’

Jeremy Hunt appeared at the inquiry in January where he apologised to the victims’ families, saying he was sorry “for anything that didn’t happen that could potentially have prevented such an appalling crime”.

Mr Hunt was health secretary at the time Letby committed her crimes in 2015 and 2016.

The MP told the inquiry the former nurse’s crimes were “a terrible tragedy” which “happened on my watch” and “although he doesn’t bear direct personal responsibility for everything that happens in every ward in the NHS” he does have “ultimate responsibility for the NHS”.

He recommended that medical examiners should be trained to see the signs or patterns of malicious harm in the work of a healthcare professional.