Red Ed’s on a high – but he’s doomed if he doesn’t win over the striving classes...

Although criticised for his shortage of charisma and geek-like mannerisms, Ed Miliband arrives in Manchester today for Labour’s annual conference with an opinion poll lead of 10-12 points. 
Life could hardly seem better for him. The party is remarkably united — which is quite an achievement when one recalls it only polled 29 per cent of the vote in the last General Election.
It was then plunged into a fratricidal leadership contest, in which the union block vote helped Ed Miliband narrowly beat his brother, David, who was the choice of Labour MPs. Since then, Ed Miliband — to the surprise of many — has won the trust of his party. He has grown in the job, although the polls still say the public see David Cameron as a more credible prime minister.

Lack of vision: Ed Miliband must represent the striving classes if he is to uphold his party's lead in the polls

As part of his strategy to change his image, Mr Miliband is to hold a question-and-answer session at the conference with an audience who are described as ‘the general public’. Party aides are keen to stress that they will be a cross-section of voters and that they won’t have been vetted to remove any potential trouble-makers. Such an exercise is either courageous or reckless. But it certainly suggests a genuine commitment to democracy at a time when political parties seem more cut off than ever from voters.
There is, however, one ominously dark cloud on the horizon. The truth is that Labour is ahead in the polls by default — and its parliamentary and grass-roots members know it. The party is benefiting from a deeply unpopular government, and from the support of many disillusioned Lib Dems who feel betrayed by Nick Clegg’s alliance with the Tories.

 

Labour is certainly not riding high in the polls because of its own policies. Indeed, it seems to have very few of those — though a big review is under way, led by one of the party’s few genuine intellectuals, Jon Cruddas (MP for Dagenham and Rainham).
The eve-of-conference confusion about Labour’s economic policy and the intellectually dishonest position of shadow chancellor Ed Balls exposes this bankruptcy of ideas. This week, Balls contradicted Labour deputy leader Harriet Harman, who said an incoming Labour government would slow down the pace of the Coalition’s cuts to reduce the deficit.
Balls, a constant critic of George Osborne’s austerity strategy, wants to keep his tax and spending options open for as long as possible — perhaps even sticking to the Coalition’s current spending plans for at least a year so. This, he hopes, would reassure voters that Labour won’t return to the profligacy of the party’s past.
Such mixed messages worry many in the party who, astutely, detect a fragility in its support base that could easily shatter before the General Election due in 2015.
Among those who see such dangers is Alan Johnson, one of the more impressive ministers in the last Labour government.
This week, he praised Mr Miliband for the way he had matured as leader. But he then wielded the stiletto by urging his boss to develop a vision and communicate it to the public. He said: ‘There is no use earning the right to be listened to if you have nothing to say.’
Meanwhile, the Labour-supporting New Statesman magazine picked up the theme and said: ‘The party needs to speak to voters.’  
The centre-Left pressure group Compass was much more scathing. It said it had never known a build-up to a Labour conference that felt ‘so lame, so uninspiring, so flat and lacking in energy and vitality’.
Attacking the policy vacuum, it continued: ‘The party has nothing to say on public sector reform, nothing on welfare reform and nothing on climate change . . . why aren’t we pushing harder on a living wage, a German-style environmental bank, real separation of the big retail and investment banks, new rules on takeovers, workers on boards, a national carers scheme, taxes on land and wealth and so much more?’

Worried: Johnson has this week urged Miliband to develop a clear vision and communicate it to the public

Even more damning, Compass compared Mr Miliband’s lack of proper policies with what happened to the Tories who, under John Major, imploded during the New Labour onslaught in the years leading up to his crushing 1997 election defeat.
‘Without a homogenous, organised and disciplined working class base, Labour has become increasingly lost,’ Compass said. ‘It will stay lost until it finds, or better still, creates a new moral politics, new constituencies of interest.’

This is sage advice. If Labour had still been a tribal working-class party in 1997, 2001 and 2005, Tony Blair would not have won three big election victories. Those successes were the result of Labour engaging with middle-class voters who were gulled by the party’s aspirational tone.
However, when these voters discovered that under Gordon Brown, Labour had reverted to its old tax-and-spend bingeing, culminating in the banking crash, they booted it out of office in 2010.
Of course, opposition parties never have fully formed policies on every issue at the mid-term point of a parliament. However, Compass is right that if Labour is going to get back in power, it has to tailor its appeal again to people with aspirations — not just to those who form the huge client state that it created when last in government. 
Senior Labour figures make much of the Tories’ failure to win seats in the North, urban areas and Scotland. However, the political historian Professor Vernon Bogdanor observed this week that this is a hollow boast. He pointed out that south of a line from The Wash to the River Severn, Labour has just ten out of 197 parliamentary seats. Numerous counties, from Cornwall to Essex, are Labour-free zones.
Prof Bogdanor said that Ed Miliband had ‘not yet allied the party firmly enough with the aspirations of voters in the south of England’.
This is not surprising, when you consider that the only big idea Mr Miliband has offered to the aspirational is that he wants to ‘remake capitalism in an age of austerity’. 

Prof Bogdanor said that Ed Miliband had 'not yet allied the party firmly enough with the aspirations of voters in the south of England'

To many people, that vacuous soundbite comes across as a repudiation of the free-market ideals that powered Britain’s prosperity from the time of Mrs Thatcher until the crash of 2008.
Advance reports of Mr Miliband’s party conference speech say he will develop last year’s call for ‘responsible capitalism’. If so, it would be wise if he showed that he understands the importance of wealth creation — which is more than Nick Clegg or Vince Cable do.
Even an economics illiterate knows that unless you encourage wealth creation, tax revenues will decline and we won’t be able to afford the public services that Labour wants.
Yet there are still many in his party who advocate a wealth tax. They regard most wealth as ‘unearned’, even though these days most ‘wealth’ comprises assets or savings that derive from taxed, earned income. Such ideas are anathema to the aspirational classes from whom Labour craves support. 
One of the few sensible things Nick Clegg said in his own party conference speech this week was to remind voters that Labour had brought us the economic crash, whose effects continue to harm us.
We must never forget that. 
Nor must we forget all the other things Labour fouled up between 1997 and 2010.
It increased public spending irresponsibly, bloated the public sector, created a welfare-dependent client state, allowed immigration to run out of control, wasted £20 billion on a failed NHS computer system, lowered standards in our schools, politicised and corrupted the civil service, failed to address the care for the elderly and tricked the public into an illegal war on the basis of lies.
Given that appalling record, it is just as well the party is taking its time before it announces what it would do if entrusted with office again.
For now, Ed Miliband should enjoy his party’s lead in the polls. But unless he can make Labour represent the millions of aspirational people in this country, that lead will soon vanish.

Hubris and a man who thinks he can only be judged by God

So, if you thought you had heard the last of Tony Blair as a major political player, think again. In the past few weeks, speculation has been growing that the man who ran Britain for ten years after 1997, invaded Iraq and departed office in virtual disgrace, is on the comeback trail.

In Brussels, bureaucrats swap rumours about his eagerness to become president of the European Union. In the German press, Mr Blair has been waxing lyrical about his commitment to the EU.

And in interviews for British newspapers, he has pointedly remarked that he wishes that he had been offered the presidency when it came up in 2009.

Comeback king: Blair, seen here at The Olympic Stadium, has, all summer long, been orchestrating a comeback, arranging meetings and organising interviews in sympathetic newspapers

To most sane observers, of course, the most striking thing about all this is the former prime minister’s extraordinary lack of self-knowledge. Perhaps he simply cannot grasp how low his reputation has sunk since he became the first Labour leader to win three successive elections.
The alternative explanation is that he is well aware how far his stock has declined, but is determined to use the European presidency to rebuild his image.

After all, Mr Blair has always been obsessed by his place in the history books; not for nothing did he claim that he felt ‘the hand of history’ on his shoulder.

Given that his period in office included the shameful debacle of the Iraq war, the growth of a gigantic housing bubble and the worst excesses of the City financiers, you might think that Mr Blair would prefer to spend the next few years in quiet retirement.

But one well-informed observer, the former Foreign Secretary and SDP leader Lord Owen, believes that Tony Blair would find that impossible.

Obsessed: Blair has always been consumed by his place in the history books, saying once that he felt the 'hand of history' on his shoulder

In a new edition of his book The Hubris Syndrome, David Owen — who before entering politics was a specialist in neurology and psychiatry at St Thomas’ Hospital in London — argues that the architect of New Labour has fallen victim to a pathological obsession with his own political importance and moral righteousness.

As Lord Owen sees it, Mr Blair’s conduct after he won power in 1997 formed a ‘pattern of hubristic behaviour . . . which could legitimately be deemed to constitute a medically recognised syndrome’.

This ‘hubris syndrome’, as he calls it, is not the same as ordinary arrogance. Most politicians have an arrogant streak; even Lord Owen was never renowned for his modesty.

But pathologically hubristic politicians, according to Lord Owen, have ‘a narcissistic propensity to see the world primarily as an arena in which they can exercise power and seek glory’. They have a ‘disproportionate concern with image and presentation’, and ‘a messianic manner of talking about what they are doing’.

They identify ‘themselves with the State to the extent that they regard the outlook and interests of the two as identical’. They have ‘excessive confidence in their own judgment and contempt for the advice or criticism of others’.

Luck: Blair faced some very feeble Tory opponents in John Major, William Hague which facilitated his election wins

They believe that instead of being accountable to the court of ordinary public opinion, they are accountable only to ‘History or God’, and that ‘in that court they will be vindicated’. And to cap it all, they are so obsessed with their moral vision that they completely lose interest in the ‘nuts and bolts of policy’ — which inevitably means disaster.

Reading through Lord Owen’s list, the parallels with Tony Blair’s political career seem extraordinarily striking.

That he is fundamentally narcissistic, for example, is surely not in doubt.

As a young man, Mr Blair modelled himself on that supreme narcissist, the rock singer Mick Jagger.
At public school and Oxford, he preferred acting and singing to political activism.

As Lord Owen remarks, Mr Blair was probably drawn into politics because it ‘offered him a very large stage on which to perform’. Fundamental conviction had little to do with it.

The Hubris Syndrome: Former Foreign Secretary and SDP leader Lord Owen, believes Blair would find retirement impossible

Indeed, when Blair first stood for Parliament in 1982, he claimed to be on the Left of the Labour Party. He wrote that he had ‘come to socialism through Marxism’; he enthusiastically supported nuclear disarmament and even joined the CND.

In those days, the Left was in the ascendant. But when it fell from fashion, Blair’s principles underwent a miraculous transformation.

And when he became Labour leader in 1994, he deliberately downplayed political ideology, cleverly blurring the question of precisely what he stood for.

Under his leadership, Labour became besotted with image. Spin became the driving theme of his government, and it spoke volumes about Blair’s priorities that he relied so heavily on his bullying communications chief, Alastair Campbell.

The idea of Mr Campbell clambering out of the political grave to harangue the Brussels press corps on behalf of his EU president boss may seem far-fetched. But stranger things have happened.

Indeed, Tony Blair’s prime ministerial career was a peculiar phenomenon in itself.

He was certainly lucky to have some very feeble Tory opponents in John Major, William Hague, Iain Duncan Smith and Michael Howard. And he was astonishingly lucky that he inherited a booming economy — even though, as we have since painfully discovered, it was built on the quicksand of debt.

Rarely, however, can any prime minister have promised so much and delivered so little, from the failure to turn around Britain’s struggling state schools to his ineffective tinkering with the welfare system.With the admirable exception of peace in Northern Ireland, and the rather less admirable one of the catastrophe in Iraq, Tony Blair’s record was one of sensational non-achievement.

Yet his rhetoric was nothing if not messianic. As Lord Owen notes, it is the hallmark of a hubristic politician that he imagines himself to be walking with destiny, convinced that he alone has the answers to the nation’s problems.

Iraq's long shadow: Blair still faces a lot of opposition, and around Europe many people shudder to recall his self-appointed role as George W. Bush's lapdog

So, in his memoir A Journey, a cross between a footballer’s ghost-written autobiography and a Californian self-help book, Blair describes his political strategy as being ‘derived from destiny’.
Again and again, he pats himself on the back for his vision and courage.

‘Sometimes,’ he writes, ‘I marvelled at the way I did indeed step forward, but more often I was aware of the constant struggle to make the choice to do so.’

Even Bill Clinton, who also entertained a remarkably high opinion of himself, was shocked at Blair’s self-admiration. Seeing him suffused with messianic enthusiasm during the Nato intervention in Kosovo, Clinton told him to ‘pull himself together’.

 

   

One White House aide even suggested that Tony Blair was ‘sprinkling too much adrenaline on his cornflakes’.

But the success of the Kosovo adventure convinced the prime minister not just that he could do no wrong, but that he was a uniquely moral crusader, chosen by history to heal a suffering world.

‘The kaleidoscope has been shaken,’ he told his party conference after the terrorist attack on New York in September 2001. ‘Let us re-order this world around us.’ That was pure Blair: messianic, grandiose, breathtakingly arrogant in his conviction that history could be rewritten; yet at the same time promising everything and nothing
Alas, we know what happened next. The occupation in Iraq will be remembered as the most shameful, cynical and degrading episode in British foreign relations of recent times, not just because it turned out so badly, or even because Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction proved to be non-existent, but because it was an adventure built on trickery and lies.

By this stage, however, Blair no longer cared what the public thought. After meeting him shortly before the invasion, Lord Owen thought that he was showing ‘clear signs of hubris syndrome’, from the ‘messianic belief in his purpose’ to his ‘restless, hyperactive manner’.

We know now, of course, that by this stage Blair had developed a peculiar form of religious belief, a heady cocktail of Catholic orthodoxy, television evangelism and New Age therapy-speak.
When he was interviewed a little later on American television, he remarked that the judgment on Iraq would be ‘made by God’ as well as his peers.

Here is a classic symptom of the hubris syndrome: the fallen politician’s stubborn belief that the judgment of his contemporaries is fleeting and irrelevant, and that God (or history) will reward him.
No wonder, then, that he stubbornly resisted handing over the Number 10 keys to Gordon Brown, even though he had promised to do so. For as Tony Blair saw it, he was the only man for the job.
How could Britain possibly survive without him?

More than ever he reminds me of another supremely narcissistic politician, David Lloyd George, who was kicked out of Downing Street exactly 90 years ago, and spent the rest of his life trying to get back.

The Welsh Wizard, as he was known, became prime minister in 1916 and led Britain through World War I until his Liberal-Tory coalition broke up in 1922. But fundamentally, he was a self-centred careerist to whom no principle was sacred.

‘My supreme idea is to get on,’ Lloyd George told his wife. ‘To this idea, I shall sacrifice everything . . . even love itself under the wheels of my juggernaut if it obstructs the way.’ Like Blair, Lloyd George was an extraordinarily presidential prime minister. Like Blair, he was accused of flogging honours to boost his election coffers. And like Blair, he was addicted to adventures abroad, where he could show off his supposed courage, irrespective of the terrible costs to others.

Over ambitious: Even Bill Clinton, who also entertained a remarkably high opinion of himself, was shocked at Blair's self-admiration

But when, in 1922, Lloyd George tried to drag Britain into war with Turkey, his Tory partners decided they had had enough. Out into the wilderness he went — though he spent the next 20 years scheming to get back.

Like Lloyd George, Tony Blair cannot quite accept that the limelight has left him. And now he clearly believes that his moment has come.

All summer his modestly named firm, Tony Blair Associates, has been orchestrating a comeback, arranging meetings and organising interviews in sympathetic newspapers.

Even by politicians’ standards, his self-belief is simply staggering. ‘I’ve still got plenty of ideas and energy,’ he assured one interviewer.

He has, he explained, ‘learned a huge amount, especially about what is happening in Europe’.

Master of spin: Blair came to rely heavily on his bullying communications chief, Alastair Campbell

And here is the nub of the issue: Europe. At the end of his premiership, Blair was touted as the first president of the European Council. Instead, the job went to the obscure Belgian Herman van Rompuy, a man who appears to have been surgically cleansed of any personality or charisma.

Clearly Mr Blair regrets that Europe’s leaders were so short-sighted as to overlook him. ‘I sometimes wish now that when the presidency came up, I would have taken that position,’ he recently told one interviewer.

Little wonder, then, that in recent weeks Brussels has been alive with rumours that Blair wants the presidency, especially after he told the influential German paper Die Zeit that without radical reform, Europe faced a political crisis.

By implication, he was painting himself as the saviour of the continent. (Van Rompuy’s term of office expires in 2014.)

And as we know, Tony Blair likes nothing better than playing the messiah.

Whether he really can wangle another top job remains uncertain. Hubris inevitably involves a heavy dose of self-delusion, and Mr Blair may have underestimated the depth of opposition to him.

Around Europe, many people shudder to recall his self-appointed role as George W. Bush’s lapdog.
And here in Britain, even his old admirers in the Labour Party have long since seen through him.

Like any good American conman, though, he never gives up. There is always another sucker, always another buck to be made.

Last time it was Middle England that fell for his patter. These days, though, a mere country is not enough. For Tony Blair, now, only a continent will do.

Spoiler alert: Karen Gillan leaves Doctor Who in 'flames of blazing glory'

She raised temperatures when she made her debut as the Doctor Who companion

Now Karen Gillan is set to depart in Saturday night’s show in 'flames of blazing glory'.

The actress, who plays Amy Pond, and her on-screen husband Rory, played by Arthur Darvill, are leaving the drama after a two-and-a-half years as the Timelords companions.

Explosive ending: Karen Gillan is leaving the show and she has promised it will be in 'flames of blazing glory'

Gillan said: ‘All I wanted was for her to go out in flames of blazing glory and she definitely does that. I couldn't have wished for a better way to go.’

She confessed was"emotional for about two weeks" during the final filming period.

 

The 24-year-old explained: ‘I was crying at everything. Things that aren’t even sad. I kept thinking this is the last time I will do this.’

Tonight’s episode is set in New York and sees the terrifying Weeping Angels return and take over the city.

Family shock: Gillan's mother wanted her to stay on the hit sci-fi show

As these images show even the iconic Statue of Liberty succumbs to the silent monsters.

The pair once again join forces with the Doctor to try and rid the city of the terror, but this time the challenge may be too great.

A BBC spokesman said: ‘The Weeping Angels are back and play a key part in the companions’ departure.

‘It is a very final ending for the current companions and one that leaves the Doctor devastated.’

Audiences have already seen a glimpse of new companion Jenna-Louise Coleman in the first episode of the series.

She will be back on screens when the show returns next year.

Miss Gillan said she was able to pass on a few tips to her before she left and said her successor 'knocked it out of the park' in the opening episode Asylum of the Daleks.

The actress also said that her time on the show had taken its toll on her private life.

Spooky: The episode sees The Weeping Angels take over New York

She is currently filming horror film Oculus in Alabama, and prior to that made a biopic about Jean Shrimpton for the BBC, and independent romantic comedy Not Another Happy Ending.

Miss Gillan said: ‘I am single. It’s actually really exciting. I feel free. Sustaining a relationship while working this intensely is not possible, right now I am focusing on work.

She added that she was still young and needed to make the most of opportunities being offered to her, but admitted appearing on Doctor Who had matured her.

‘I feel so much more mature. You can’t help but change.  I feel wise and mature which has never happened to me before.

She went with her 'gut instinct' to leave the show, adding that the decision upset her mother.

'My mum was devastated. She was like "No, Karen I don't want you to leave"'.

Miss Gillan vowed to continue watching the show and said there would be a special screening of her final Doctor Who episode in Alabama today [sat] with the cast of her film.

Executive Steven Moffat said the episode's final shot was inspired by Karen Gillan's first appearance two years ago.

Speaking at a Bafta screening he said: ‘After showing Amelia Pond in the garden as a young girl in the Eleventh Hour, Karen's first episode, the final shot in Saturday's The Angels Take Manhattan is a punchline I have been waiting to tell for two-and-a-half years.'

‘This weekend's episode is more devastating for the Doctor, at certain points he becomes useless and emotional. It was torment and hell trying to write the episode, I struggled for ages to work out a fitting ending and changed my mind until I finally got it right.’

The star, who said she pinched the binoculars from the Tardis as momento, makes her final appearance on Saturday night on BBC1 at 7.20pm.

Did you 'Like' your present? Facebook trials letting users buy real birthday gifts for friends

Facebook is taking a small step toward becoming an e-commerce platform by launching a feature for users to buy and send real gifts - some of them worth as much as hundreds of dollars.
As of Thursday, users can purchase and ship products from more than a hundred 'Facebook Gifts' vendors with a few clicks on the company's website.
The products are only available in some U.S. cities and only to people randomly selected by Facebook to be 'beta users', but perhaps gives some indication how Facebook intends to evolve.
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Facebook's new service, 'Gifts', allows users to send chocolate, coffee, socks and other real-life presents to one another

The products include eyeglasses by Warby Parker, Starbucks coffee, and pastries from New York-based Magnolia Bakery.
Coming four months after Facebook's troubled initial public offering, the feature marks the company's attempt to unlock a potentially significant new revenue stream.

 

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Although it has sought to diversify its income sources, Facebook still relies heavily on display advertising. During the second quarter, more than 80 percent of its revenue of $1.18 billion came from ads while roughly 15 percent came from game-maker Zynga Inc.
Facebook, which can store credit card data for users, will make money by taking a cut of each gift transaction.

Fancy a gift while you vhat? Teddy bears are one of the gifts available on Facebook

The amount varies based on the individual deals it has struck with vendor partners, the company said without disclosing specifics.
The world's No. 1 social network, boasting nearly 1 billion user accounts, has long viewed commercial transactions as a massive opportunity for the platform.
But marketing researchers have found that consumers have been slow to make purchases on the website because many treat it as a place to chat and post messages rather than go shopping.
Facebook hopes to change that by getting users used to the idea of giving small gifts as part of their social routine.
"People already use Facebook to communicate with their friends and share all of their life moments," said Lee Linden, a Facebook product manager heading the Gifts feature.
"Gifting is just a natural extension of that behavior. It makes a lot of sense for us not to just say 'Happy Birthday' but to send a gift, not just say 'I love you' but send some flowers."
Current gifts cost $5 up to several hundred dollars for a Jambox stereo by Aliph Inc, said Linden, who joined the company in May. His previous start-up, Karma, was acquired by Facebook in a deal announced on the day of Facebook's high-profile IPO.
Facebook had experimented with a "virtual" gift-exchange feature years ago, but shut it down in 2010. The original gifts were no more than digital trinkets, cartoon images of flower bouquets, teddy bears and even women's underwear.
Linden said Facebook now aims to provide effortless shopping and shipping of real goods. Users are alerted when their packages are shipped and received, and every package comes with a customizable card stamped with a Facebook logo.
Recipients who do not like their gifts can discreetly swap colors or sizes for no charge.
"We think we can make an end-to-end way to buy a product that is very seamless," Linden said. "We take care in the photos, in the packaging, in everything."
The service will be initially available to a random group of U.S. users logging into Facebook through its website and an Android app. An iPhone app is still in development, Linden said.

Pregnant Raffaella Fico jets out of Milan as Mario Balotelli announces the couple's reconciliation

Pregnant model Raffaella Fico looked stern as she arrived at Milan airport on Friday, just hours after former lover Mario Balotellli announced that he was rekindling his relationship with his former girlfriend.
Their bitter break-up was played out in the press this summer, but it seems that Italian footballer Mario Balotelli has changed his mind and taken back the catwalk model.
Dressed casually in grey jogging bottoms, Rafaella paired floral Nike trainers with a floral T-shirt which accentuated her protruding baby bump as she walked to the terminal.

Back together: Raffaella arrives at Milan airport to catch a flight after Mario Balotelli;s announcement that the couple are rekindling their romance

Joined by a group of friends, the model seemed deep in thought as she made her way to her flight.
With large sunglasses covering her made-up face, she seemed in a serious mood.
The Manchester City striker, who dumped his lover in April, following a series of flaming rows, has released a statement saying that he has now reconciled with Raffaella Fico.

Rekindled: The brunette model seems in a serious mood as she chats to friends at the airport

Where's Mario? Despite the footballer's announcement that the pair are back together, Raffaella is yet to comment

After bitter disputes, during which he demanded a paternity test for the model's unborn baby, the partying footballer has announced a change of heart.
Speaking in a statement to press he said:
'I have decided to try again with Raffaella.'

In happier times: Mario Balotelli and Raffaella pictured in September last year, before their bitter break-up

The international sporting star clearly felt bad and embarrassed about his very public demand for a DNA test to be carried out:
'The DNA test has not been performed and has nothing to do with my decision. In any case, I would’ve asked for the test in that situation with anyone, not just Raffaella.'

Look what you're missing: Raffaella Fico flaunted her pregnant figure during Milan Fashion Week a few days ago

Enviable pregnancy figure: Raffaella walks the catwalk during the Pin Up Stars show

'I am sorry for everything that has happened over the last few months and above all for what has been said and written,' he continued.
'I ask once again for you all to respect our private life that in future must remain private, a pledge taken by me and Raffaella.'

The footballer, who has a reputation for being difficult on and off of the pitch, ended his year-long relationship with the 24-year-old model following a doorstep altercation a few months ago, during which Raffaella accused him of cheating.

Soon to be a father: Mario has taken back his pregnant girlfriend after their bitter split in April

Not long after the split, Raffaella revealed that she was four months pregnant and that the baby was Mario's.
After the striker announced that he wanted a paternity test, the brunette model was left stunned and a strongly-worded argument ensued, played out in the Italian press.
Just days before Mario's statement, Raffaella spoke about her former love during an Italian TV interview:
'We were in love. We were going to get married. He proposed to me and we talked about having a baby. It takes two people to make a baby then all this happened. I was left shocked especially when he asked me to take a DNA test,' she said.
The lingerie model, who has also dated Cristiano Ronaldo, admitted that she'd had Mario's name tattooed on the ring finger of her right hand, a clear sign that she still had feelings for the lothario.

Spurned: Raffaella was dumped after she accused Mario of cheating on her with a string of women

Despite her love for the footballer, the reality star admitted that she was tired of his constant phonecalls:
'I want this to be a calm, tranquil pregnancy. I thought he was calling me to find out how I was but he shouted and called me names. He was trying to stress me psychologically. He wants to stalk me. All I ask of him is respect, at least for the sake of our baby,' she said.

I'm ashamed of my cabinet minister son: Father of disgraced David Laws says the Lib Dem deserves to be in jail over expenses

When David Laws resigned as the Coalition’s Chief Secretary to the Treasury after only 17 days, he made history as the shortest-serving Cabinet minister in modern times.
The man charged with reducing the country’s £156  billion deficit sensationally quit after it was revealed he had been guilty of a serious expenses fiddle totalling more than £50,000 and involving his secret gay lover.
This was hugely embarrassing for the Lib Dem MP, one of the cleverest men at Westminster (with a double first in Economics from Cambridge) who was once dubbed ‘Mr Integrity’ by former party leader Paddy Ashdown, his predecessor as MP for Yeovil.
The expenses scandal that ripped through Westminster had already destroyed several reputations. Some MPs ended up in prison, while many lost their seats. 
David Laws, with his trademark white shirts, Hermes ties and polished shoes, was the only Cabinet minister to lose his job.
At the time, some of his closest friends feared he was so ashamed of the scandal and the revelation he was gay that he would quit politics altogether.
However, he bided his time on the backbenches and was forgiven by David Cameron and Nick Clegg. They brought him back as Education Minister in last month’s ministerial reshuffle. As a result, the 46-year-old is now back in the Government, can attend Cabinet meetings and enjoyed a starring role at this week’s Lib Dem conference in Brighton.
Many in Westminster think he was lucky to be given a second chance — particularly so soon — since the Parliamentary Standards and Privileges Committee had criticised his behaviour, having accused him of a ‘series of serious breaches of the rules over a considerable  period of time’.
He was suspended from Parliament for seven days having already repaid £56,500 to the Commons authorities.

Growing up: David Laws (far right) with his adopted brother and sister Peter and Jacquelyn and father Tony who says he was embarrassed for his son

Many respected observers said he should have had the decency to wait until his constituents had re-elected him, and shown that they had confidence in his probity and integrity, before re-entering the Government.
Among those critics are Laws’s father, Tony.
The retired City banker contacted the Mail this week because he said he wanted to dispute several claims made by his son about his family as he attempted to explain the background to his expenses fiddle.

 

Tony Laws says: ‘I was embarrassed my son had been caught taking money he was not entitled to. I think David was damn lucky that further action wasn’t taken against him, as I know some MPs went to prison.’
Referring to the fact that his son had tried to make political capital out of other Labour and Tory MPs’ expenses fiddles before his own were exposed, his father says: ‘And what was he thinking of, moralising about other MPs? He should have counted his lucky stars that he had got away with it and said nothing.’  Asked if he was happy that his son was now back in government, Tony Laws says: ‘I’m pleased for him, but I think he has gone back too soon. He should have waited until after the general election to let his constituents deliver their verdict on what he did.’ He adds: ‘I am sure he would be forgiven.’

Come back: Laws was brought back as Education Minister in last month's ministerial reshuffle and enjoyed a starring role at this week's Lib Dem conference in Brighton, pictured

It is not only Laws’s speedy return to ministerial office that has perturbed his father. He is also upset by the nature of his son’s emotional statement, announcing his resignation two years ago, when the politician said he recognised that he had neglected ‘those I love’ and that he intended to make amends.
It was in May 2010, just weeks after the Coalition was formed, when it was revealed that David Laws had funnelled £40,000 of taxpayers’ money to his secret gay lover, Westminster lobbyist Jamie Lundie.
Over a period of five years, the MP claimed between £700 and £950 a month to rent a room in Kennington, South London, from Mr Lundie. This broke Commons rules, which bar MPs from claiming for payments to a partner.

'I've no difficulty whatsoever with him being gay'

Mr Laws immediately issued an apology and announced he had paid back the money claimed for rent and other housing costs. He said: ‘I regret this situation deeply, accept that I should not have claimed  my expenses in this way and apologise fully.’
He went on to say he and his boyfriend were ‘intensely private people’, adding: ‘We made the decision to keep our relationship private and believed that was our right. 
‘My motivation throughout has not been to maximise profit but simply to protect our privacy and my wish not to reveal my sexuality.’
He added: ‘Our relationship has been unknown to both family and friends throughout that time.’
In truth, the couple had been together for nine years. But the MP’s friends briefed journalists that he had been trying to protect his elderly parents, who are devout Catholics, from the truth about his homosexuality.
However, Laws’s father, to whom David has not spoken in 15 years following a rift that Tony still finds inexplicable, claims this was very misleading. He says the truth is that he has not been to church for decades, although he was christened a Catholic.
‘It is beyond a joke to call me a devout Catholic,’ says Tony. ‘As early as the age of seven, I was crossing my sister’s palm with silver to cover up for the fact I was playing cricket and football instead of going to church.
‘When David said he was going to remedy the neglect of the people he loved, I thought he might be referring to me. But since I have still not heard from him, I was clearly wrong.’

No surprise: Tony said that when Laws resigned, acknowledging publicly his sexuality came as no surprise to him, saying 'I realised it at least 20 years ago. There were signs'

Tony Laws is also angry that friends of David were quoted at the time of the expenses scandal as saying the MP was trying to do the right thing to shield his aged parents. 
‘Well, I suppose at 76 I am “aged”, but I simply don’t accept David lied over his Commons expenses to protect me,’ says Tony. ‘He was trying to protect himself — because I have no difficulty whatsoever with the fact that he is gay.’ 
Then there were the claims by the MP’s friends that he was an only child. His father says these were ‘very hurtful’, because the truth is that the MP has an adopted older brother and adopted younger sister. 
‘We all used to be so close,’ says Tony Laws.
In fact, David Laws’s entry on the online encyclopedia Wikipedia has stated for years that he is the ‘only son of a Conservative-voting father and a Labour-supporting mother’. He has joked that, as a Lib Dem himself, he was the ‘perfect fusion’.
When told about the Wikipedia entry, Tony Laws became angry and emotional: ‘I can’t believe it! My blood is going hot and cold. It is  so hurtful.’
Tony Laws separated from David’s mother, Maureen, when their son was getting ready to go to university and the couple divorced 24 years ago. But they would meet up for important family occasions such as David’s graduation from Cambridge in 1987. 

'He simply lost interest in me as his father'

‘The end of my marriage was a tragedy, but David never talked to me about it,’ says Tony Laws. ‘I spoke to my other children, but David was not open to discussion.’ 
As for David’s sexuality, his father says he realised his son was gay when he was in his 20s.
‘When he resigned from the Cabinet, he publicly acknowledged his sexuality. It came as no surprise to me. I realised it at least 20 years ago. There were signs. Over time you come to recognise what is happening. I was his father. You see things.
‘David never had a relationship with a female, but there were always male friends. 
‘As a father, I want my children to be happy. Their sexuality is of no concern to me.
‘David is a very private person.  As a young boy he was positively secretive. I’m glad he now feels able to be open.’
David Laws’s father recalls his three children’s early years in Surrey’s stockbroker belt.
In interviews, David has described ‘a pretty comfortable upbringing’, saying his parents were ‘reasonably easy-going’. 
His father worked long hours at JP Morgan Chase bank to put his children through private education. David attended the fee-paying St George’s College in Weybridge before going on to Cambridge.
Explaining how he and his wife adopted a child before David was born, Tony Laws says: ‘Nature  didn’t deliver in a timely fashion. So when we didn’t succeed in having a baby, we adopted a boy who we called Peter.

Brought back: Nick Clegg, left, and David Cameron, right, brought Laws back when even some of his closest friends feared he was so ashamed of the scandal that he would quit politics

‘My wife became pregnant with David barely a year later. We wanted to equal it up, so we adopted our daughter, Jacquelyn. They were great children.’
Peter, who studied biochemistry at Oxford, is an accountant in London and is married with two daughters. Jacquelyn, who worked for a merchant bank, is also happily married. They are in regular contact with their father, but have little to do with David, who has never referred to their existence in any interviews. 
Like father, like son: David went into investment banking at JP Morgan and Barclays de Zoete Wedd.
He retired at 28 already a multi-millionaire and went to work for the Lib Dems in 1994. 
Within three years he was head of policy and research and then was selected as the party’s candidate in Yeovil for the 2001 election. By now, there was no contact between father and son.
Tony, who now lives in a modern home in Axminster in Devon with his second wife, Tamara, explains the rift.

'It's too late for a reconciliation with David now'

‘There was no row, no major fallout, I just think David lost interest in me as his dad,’ says Tony. ‘We haven’t spoken for the best part of 15 years — even though he lives only eight miles away.’ 
In fact, he only learned of his son’s parliamentary ambitions when he appeared on a local TV bulletin announcing his Yeovil candidacy. Tony says David later visited his home and left a note. 
‘That is the last contact I have had from my son,’ he explains. ‘When he was campaigning to be an MP in 2001, he must have been in the locality but he never came to see me.’ 
Mr Laws tried to contact his son after he won the seat. ‘I was thrilled for him. What father wouldn’t be? I wrote a letter, drove to his house, and pushed it through his letter box at 5.30am. 
‘I like to think it was the first letter he received addressed to David Laws MP. I never received any acknowledgement of the card.’
There was no contact between the two men — the only way  he saw his son was when he appeared on TV.

Some of those appearances involved the high-profile Lib Dem MP adopting a lofty tone of moral superiority in 2008 when Tory and Labour MPs were caught fiddling their expenses.
For example, Laws issued a press release aimed at trying to reinforce his image as ‘Mr Integrity’. He boasted: ‘The (official) report into MPs’ expenses has been published today and this confirms that David Laws has not been asked to repay any of his expenses, as it found all his claims for London living costs to be in order.’

Like father, like son: Laws went into investment banking at JP Morgan and Barclays de Zoete Wedd, pictured

He also tried to score points at the expense of his political opponents locally. ‘Over half of MPs (390 out of 650) have been ordered to repay expenses, including many from the Somerset and Dorset area,’ he said.
He listed the names of several MPs and how much they had to repay. These included Oliver Letwin, a Tory facing a fierce Lib Dem challenge at the time, who now sits around the same Cabinet table as Mr Laws.
But the £3,000 Mr Letwin had to repay was dwarfed by the £56,500 that ‘Mr Integrity’ had to give back to the taxpayer when his own expenses fiddle was unearthed two years later.
Laws’s subsequent resignation as Chief Secretary to the Treasury was another blow to his father.
Does Tony think there can now be a reconciliation with his son?
‘Not now. I think it’s too late,’  he says.
Only days before his spectacular fall in 2010, David Laws was asked about his marital status. As  ever, the image-conscious MP answered: ‘Single.’
That was slightly disingenuous considering that he had been in a relationship for nine years with his partner Mr Lundie, who used to work for former Lib Dem leader Charles Kennedy.
Whether he was misguided about trying to hide his sexuality is hard to tell. 
But the fact is, as David Laws has discovered, most people don’t care if their MP is gay or straight.
The truth is that it’s hypocrisy and fraudulent behaviour over expenses that they can’t bear.

Drugs are 'going out of fashion' as figures show dramatic fall in usage since 1996

Illegal drug taking could be 'going out of fashion' as new Home Office figures reveal a continuation in comparatively low level usage.
The 2010-11 annual crime survey for England and Wales shows a decline in the use of so-called legal highs such as mephedrone and herion usage has stabilised at 0.1 per cent of the population.

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The graph illustrates that the number of people using any drug remains below ten per cent while those taking class A drugs is still at well below 5 per cent

However the number of people using methadone, which is prescribed by doctors as an alternative to heroin, has gone up from 0.1 per cent to 0.2 per cent over the last two years.
Just under one in five people aged 16 to 24 (19 per cent) say they had used an illicit drug in the past year – the lowest level since the survey began in 1996.

 

Overall an estimated 3million people, one out of every ten people aged 16 to 59, have taken an illicit drug in the past year, signalling that usage has remained at the low it reached in the previous year.

Illicit drug use in England and Wales is on a downward curve, with latest annual Home Office figures confirming the long-term trend that they might simply be 'going out of fashion'

Cannabis, classified as a Class B drug, is still the most popular drug, with about 2.3million people using it in the past year.
Powder cocaine is the second most prevalent illegal drug at 700,000 - there are also half a million ecstasy users and  300,000 people take amophatamines.
Cannabis usage among the 16-24 age bracket has fallen sharply from 26 per cent in 1996 to 15.7 per cent last year. The figures also show that the percentage of young people taking cocaine has also dropped from its peak of 5.5 per cent in 2009-10 to 4.2 per cent.

Figures published on Thursday even record a decline in recently banned so-called 'legal highs' such as mephedrone and Spice (synthetic cannabis)

Cannabis remains the most popular drug, with about 2.3 million people using it in the past year

Even the party drug ecstasy has seen a decline in usage from 4.4 per cent in 2008-09 to 3.3 per cent in the newly published statistics.
Harry Shapiro, editor of Druglink magazine said that for the first time since the 1960s there was clear downward trend in usage.
He said an increase in the availability of drug treatments coupled with a struggling economy had been factors in causing a reduction in drug usage.

In this month's issue, published on Thursday by Drugscope, an independent centre of drugs experts, Mr Shapiro says: 'Drug use having become more normalised in society, might then be just as prey to fashion as any other cultural artefact. Drugs don't appear to be 'cool' these days as they once were,' writes Shapiro.

'To suggest, as some do, that we are currently going to a drug hell in a handcart is just a wilful refusal to acknowledge the facts'.

He also attacked politicians who claimed that drug use is getting out of control for their own political benefits.

The figures also show a stable low-level use of heroin at 0.1% of the population

The figures also reveal that 16 is the most common age at which people start taking cannabis, with first trying cocaine and ecstasy users most likely to be 18.
While most have stopped smoking cannabis by the time the age of 18, and cocaine or ecstasy by 25 a small minority continue to use cannabis throughout their lives, with some reporting they were still using the drug at 59.

Bare-chested Daniel Craig shows off his impressive form as he appears in gritty new stills for James Bond Skyfall movie

Shooting was delayed two years ago because of funding problems so it’s been a long time coming.
But James Bond enthusiasts will be thrilled to see newly-released stills from the latest movie, Skyfall, especially female fans.
Daniel Craig returns as the protagonist and is showing off his buff figure in shots to promote the film.

Scroll down for video...

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Gritty: Daniel Craig reprises his role as James Bond in the new movie Skyfall to be released in November 2012

The 44-year-old star flaunts his muscular form as he stands shirtless in front of a mirror.

 

In the gritty image, Craig can be seen prodding at his impressive pecs as he looms over a row of sinks and stares at his reflection.
It is has been four years since the last film in the saga, Quantum of Solace, was released.

Impressive body: The 44-year-old actor appears bare-chested as he analyses his image in front of a mirror

The motion picture made $586,090,727 at the worldwide box office making it the highest earning Bond movie ever.
Skyfall is one of the most hotly anticipated films of 2012 and opens in cinemas nationwide on October 26 in Britain and November 9 in the United States.
American Beauty director Sam Mendes is at the helm and Oscar-winner Javier Bardem stars as villain Raoul Silva while Dame Judi Dench returns as spy chief M.

Long time coming: It has been four years since the release of the last Bond film, Quantum of Solace

The flick’s synopsis says that Bond’s loyalty to M is tested as her past comes back to haunt her. 
As MI6 comes under attack, 007 must track down and destroy the threat, no matter how personal the cost.
Production was suspended throughout 2010 because of MGM's financial troubles. 
They resumed pre-production following MGM's exit from bankruptcy on 21 December 2010, and in January 2011 the film was officially given a release date.

Lovebirds: Daniel was seen hand in hand with Rachel Weisz for a romantic New York stroll last week

Iranian news agency reports The Onion spoof story that Americans would rather share a pizza with Ahmadinejad than Obama as fact

It seems that awareness of satire at Iran's Fars News Agency is practically zero after they picked up a bogus story run on the spoof website The Onion and reported it as fact.
Proudly boasting that a majority of rural white Americans would rather go to a baseball game with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad than President Barack Obama, the government affiliated agency was left red faced over its faux-pas.
In fact, so gross was the mistake that they became a figure of fun for The Onion editor Will Tracy who said that. 'The Iranian news agency, Fars, is a subsidiary of The Onion...The Onion freely shares content with Fars and commend the journalists at Iran's Finest News Source on their superb reportage.'

 

 

The Iranian Fars NEws Agency was left red-faced after it ran a spoof news report from The Onion on its website and saying that more rural white Americans would prefer to hang out with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad than President Obama

'Gallup Poll: Rural Whites Prefer Ahmadinejad to Obama,' reads the headline to the article published on the Fars News Agency website.


This followed swiftly on from The Onion, who posted the story as one of many satirical articles that day including, 'George W. Bush Returns to America After Spending 4 years in the Himalayas' and 'Glowing Ahmadinejad: 'I Am the Nuclear Weapon We've Been Building.'

 

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gestures as he leaves a news conference on Wednesday during his much maligned visit to New York

 

President Barack Obama receives a beer and a pork chop at an Iowa State Fair in Des Moines, Iowa

Compounding their error was the actual content of the story, which was barely believable in itself.
'According to the results of a Gallup poll released Monday, the overwhelming majority of rural white Americans said they would rather vote for Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad than US President Barack Obama,' it reads.
Adding that 77 percent of rural white voters said they 'would much rather go to a baseball game or have a beer with Ahmadinejad, a man who has repeatedly denied the Holocaust and has had numerous political prisoners executed, than spend time with Obama.'
Totally ignoring the fact that Ahmadinejad is a teetotaler who as a Muslim man would never go for a beer with a rural white American, the Fars News Agency was praised by The Onion for their stupidity.
'The Iranian news agency, Fars, is a subsidiary of The Onion,' said The Onion editor Will Tracy.
'They have acted as our Middle Eastern bureau since the mid 1980s, when the Onion’s publisher, T. Herman Zweibel, founded Fars with the government approval of the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini. 

It seems that awareness of satire at Iran's Fars News Agency is practically zero after they picked up a bogus story run on the spoof website The Onion and reported it as fact.
Proudly boasting that a majority of rural white Americans would rather go to a baseball game with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad than President Barack Obama, the government affiliated agency was left red faced over its faux-pas.
In fact, so gross was the mistake that they became a figure of fun for The Onion editor Will Tracy who said that. 'The Iranian news agency, Fars, is a subsidiary of The Onion...The Onion freely shares content with Fars and commend the journalists at Iran's Finest News Source on their superb reportage.'

 

 

The Iranian Fars NEws Agency was left red-faced after it ran a spoof news report from The Onion on its website and saying that more rural white Americans would prefer to hang out with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad than President Obama

'Gallup Poll: Rural Whites Prefer Ahmadinejad to Obama,' reads the headline to the article published on the Fars News Agency website.

 

This followed swiftly on from The Onion, who posted the story as one of many satirical articles that day including, 'George W. Bush Returns to America After Spending 4 years in the Himalayas' and 'Glowing Ahmadinejad: 'I Am the Nuclear Weapon We've Been Building.'

 

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gestures as he leaves a news conference on Wednesday during his much maligned visit to New York

 

President Barack Obama receives a beer and a pork chop at an Iowa State Fair in Des Moines, Iowa

Compounding their error was the actual content of the story, which was barely believable in itself.
'According to the results of a Gallup poll released Monday, the overwhelming majority of rural white Americans said they would rather vote for Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad than US President Barack Obama,' it reads.
Adding that 77 percent of rural white voters said they 'would much rather go to a baseball game or have a beer with Ahmadinejad, a man who has repeatedly denied the Holocaust and has had numerous political prisoners executed, than spend time with Obama.'
Totally ignoring the fact that Ahmadinejad is a teetotaler who as a Muslim man would never go for a beer with a rural white American, the Fars News Agency was praised by The Onion for their stupidity.
'The Iranian news agency, Fars, is a subsidiary of The Onion,' said The Onion editor Will Tracy.
'They have acted as our Middle Eastern bureau since the mid 1980s, when the Onion’s publisher, T. Herman Zweibel, founded Fars with the government approval of the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini. 

Teenage rape victims failed by PC dogma

It's impossible not to be horrified by yesterday’s report into the serial failings by social workers, police and prosecutors that allowed a gang of Asian men to systematically rape and pimp vulnerable, underage white girls in the north of England.

Overwhelming evidence that the youngsters, many from broken homes, were being abused was ignored by social workers, some of whom reached the staggering conclusion that the victims were ‘making their own lifestyle choices’ – despite sex with a minor being blatantly illegal.

Almost as appalling is the fact the staff involved are still working under the aegis of Rochdale Council, whose pedantic, box-ticking chief executive Jim Taylor yesterday refused to admit the girls had been ‘betrayed’.

 

Unacceptable: The police and councils did nothing to help victims for fear of wrongly being labelled racist

But, however welcome the inquiry by Rochdale’s Safeguarding Children Board may be, it must be said the report barely scratches the surface.

None of the state workers who failed so dismally in their jobs were identified.

 

  

Nor, disturbingly, was any mention made of the insidious political correctness which, for years, was a considerable factor in stopping the authorities from investigating the girls’ complaints because the men responsible for their misery were Muslim.

Sadly, such misguided liberalism was not confined to Rochdale.

For years – while stressing that the overwhelming majority of Muslims abhor such behaviour and that all races are capable of evil – investigations by this newspaper and others uncovered a pattern of abuse of young white girls by men of Pakistani heritage.

The police and councils did nothing for fear of wrongly being labelled racist.

If, as yesterday’s report suggests, the authorities are still not prepared to learn the lessons of this madness, they will be betraying the victims a second time. That would be truly unforgivable.

Let Britain judge

Not for the first time, Lord Judge spoke for the British public yesterday when he described the interminable Abu Hamza extradition saga as ‘unacceptable’ and a source of ‘real fury to me’.

But, as the Lord Chief Justice himself indicated, it is in Strasbourg – not Britain – that ultimate responsibility for this multi-million pound fiasco lies.
The UK courts took barely a year to decide that the case for sending the murderous Hamza to face trial in the US on terrorism charges was ‘unassailable’.

The cardboard judges at the European Court of Human Rights then sat on their hands for four years – only to agree with the conclusion our own infinitely better qualified judiciary had reached way back in July 2008.

How much longer must we wait for ministers to end Strasbourg’s meddling in our affairs and put Britain’s legal system back in the hands of British judges?

Who’s in charge?

David Cameron – who, according to his Old Etonian friend Charlie Brooks, once refused to take a call from President Obama until he had finished a tennis match – spent Wednesday making a twit of himself on an American TV show with three million viewers.

 

Tell him to hold: David Cameron apparently once refused to take a call from President Obama until he had finished a tennis match

Meanwhile, Chancellor George Osborne, Education Secretary Michael Gove and the arts minister Ed Vaizey took several hours off in the middle of the day enjoying free tickets to a prestigious production of Wagner’s Ring cycle at the Royal Opera House in London’s Covent Garden.

Forgive the Mail for asking, but just who is in charge of the rattling train?