Author: News Desk

Today’s news summary – Paper Talk: Royals named & tributes to Alistair Darling Friday’s newspapers report on the aftermath of a new royal book. Many of the papers’ lead pictures pay tribute to Shawn MacGowan, the Pogues singer, or Alistar Darling, the former Labour chancellor, who died yesterday. Royal scandal continues Several papers have named two senior royals – Charles and Kate – as being the two royals who speculated about Prince Harry’s son’s skin colour. The Daily Mirror reports Buckingham Palace is furious over Omid Scobie’s Endgame. The paper quotes a Palace source: “The entire Royal Family is united…

Your weekly EastEnders picture gallery, previewing episodes airing from Monday, December 4 to Thursday, December 7.

Jeff and Goody had two children together.

Britain was lucky to have Alistair Darling NS says There was a kind of grim symmetry. As the inquiry into the Covid pandemic turned its attention to Matt Hancock and Boris Johnson, the death was announced of a very different figure, who had steered Britain through a very different crisis – though one almost as serious. It is hard to imagine a politician more different from the performative, self-indulgent antics of Johnson’s Downing Street than Alistair Darling. Here was a man who listened intently, respected experts and institutions, but who brought a bracing dose of scepticism to every conversation. In…

Alistair Darling: Westminster stunned by shock death of canny chancellor who steered UK through financial crash Sky News says In life as well as in politics, Alistair Darling was a canny Scot. At a dinner with Sky News journalists when he was chancellor, I told him I’d just bought a new car. “Never buy a new car,” he told me. “They depreciate in value immediately. Buy one that’s a few months old.” Sound advice, no doubt. But it demonstrated how the nation’s finances were in good hands. Like many leading politicians of the Blair-Brown years, Alistair Darling started on the…

A surprising choice.

Former chancellor Alistair Darling dies aged 70 The Guardian says Leaders from across the political spectrum have paid tribute to the former Labour chancellor Alistair Darling, who stewarded the economy through the 2008 crash, after his death at the age of 70. A statement issued in Edinburgh on behalf of Darling’s family said: “Alistair Darling, the much-loved husband of Margaret and beloved father of Calum and Anna, died after a short spell in Western General hospital under the wonderful care of the cancer team.” Darling was an Edinburgh MP from 1987 until he stepped down from parliament in 2015, and…

Gordon Brown: Alistair Darling ‘showed great wisdom in everything he did’ BBC News says Alistair Darling was the “obvious choice” to be his chancellor said former PM Gordon Brown on appointing him. Paying tribute to his friend and colleague, Mr Brown said: “In times of crisis, Alistair was the person you would want in the room.” Mr Darling represented Edinburgh at Westminster and also chaired the Better Together campaign for the 2014 Scottish independence referendum. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-politics-67578940

Endgame: Royal race row naming not publicity stunt, says author Omid Scobie Omid Scobie – the author of the new royal book Endgame – has said the naming of the two royals connected to allegations of racism was not a deliberate publicity stunt. Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle made allegations that there were ‘concerns’ over how dark their son Archie would be. But neither Harry nor Meghan named the royal in question.  King Charles and the Princess of Wales are named in a Dutch translation of Endgame.  Omid says there has never been a version with anyone named.…

Meghan Markle exchanged letters with King Charles after her and Prince Harry’s interview with Oprah Winfrey, but reportedly never intended for them to be made public.