Ethan Edwards

The 5 finalists that have tested for the role of James Bond: • Robert Pattinson • Jack Lowden • Callum Turner • Nicholas Hoult • Josh O'Connor Who would you choose?

Usman Khawaja has admitted to the Sydney Morning Herald that the entire Australian dressing room knew about the sandpaper scandal at Cape Town in 2018 😳

I've met Russell Brand twice (I think): Once when I hosted a Guardian Live event about his book in 2014. Another time I interviewed him for The Big Issue when I was guest editing in 2015. He also gave my publishers an endorsement for my book The Establishment, which I was mortified about at the time mostly because I thought it was so OTT it would obviously invite ridicule (which it did). At the time I saw him as a crude means to reach disillusioned younger people with left-wing politics - the sort of people who wouldn't be reached by conventional left-wing journalists and politicians. As a result I was willing to overlook, or just not look into, his history of problematic behaviour / statements, including sexism. I convinced myself that he was on some sort of journey and that was a good thing. That was an obvious misjudgement. I did think he was a bit of a chancer / had a messianic complex, but overlooked that too as a necessary evil in reaching disengaged people. But that was clearly his main driving force and he clearly ended up concluding that right-wing politics was a better vehicle to satisfy it. It's an important lesson in not stupidly engaging clearly problematic figures, however charismatic or however much mass appeal they have, in the service of a cause. What I would say is that right now we should be centring the survivors of a rapist and sexual predator. I personally don't really think those trying to point score have his survivors' interests at heart. I would also argue that those with the big questions to answer are the right-wing figures who continue to stand by him and spread conspiratorial nonsense in his defence. Finally, let's hope that other possible survivors of Russell Brand feel able to come forward.

Depressing to see media mission to discredit someone who stops playing their game & uses celebrity to help others. Keep going @rustyrockets.

🚨NEW: It has been recently revealed that Plaid Cymru spent £25,000 on beekeeping classes for disabled Ugandans

The reaction of a recent migrant arrival after being photographed upon reaching our shores (illegally). Honestly, if you were genuinely fleeing war or persecution, wouldn't you show just the tiniest gratitude when landing up in a country you were hoping would give you sanctuary?

I want to apologise to Allison Pearson for thinking that this insane post was written by her. And to Alex Phillips for not realising that she was its author. Though regular and honest readers of either of their posts will admit, I think, that it could have been written by either of them

Kemi, congratulations on leading a major British party as a Black Woman. It takes real talent to rise to where you are and deceit is what it takes to rise as a Black leader in a western Conservative Party. It is a pity the climb did not leave room for a history book and since you chose to argue in the language of history, let us do the history. Let’s dissect your verbal diarrhea point by point. Everyone participated." Slavery existed on every continent. So did war, and nobody calls a village feud the World War. The transatlantic trade ran for 366 years (1501 to 1866) and put about 12.5 million Africans on ships, of whom about 1.8 million died before they saw the Americas, according to the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database. It ran through joint-stock companies, chartered monopolies, Lloyd's underwriters and acts of Parliament. It was hereditary, because the law made the child of an enslaved mother property from birth. It was racial, because a whole continent was defined as chattel. No other system in history combined those features at that scale. Dissolving all of it into "people from every continent" is far worse than intellectual dishonesty. Britain was a market leader, not a participant. British ships carried about 3.2 million Africans, second only to Portugal and Brazil. The Treaty of Utrecht (1713) gave Britain the asiento, a thirty-year monopoly to supply 4,800 enslaved Africans a year to Spanish America. The Royal African Company, chartered in 1672 and headed by the Duke of York, later James II, branded its captives "DY". During Edward Colston's years in its leadership it shipped about 84,000 people, and roughly 19,000 died on the way. You say British taxpayers should not answer for what happened before they were born. They did. In 1833 Britain borrowed £20 million to compensate slaveholders, and taxpayers serviced that loan until 2015, including the descendants of the enslaved. So the principle you invoke was not applied when the cheque went to slaveholders. It only appears when the cheque changes direction. "Navel-gazing" is a curious charge from someone whose party spends more energy on the past (Empire nostalgia, culture war crusades) than most of those you accuse. Defend Britain if you must. But do not use your Nigerian name as the permission slip for arguments Nigerians know better than anyone.

The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade was a European criminal enterprise. The nonsense below is a slew of white supremacist propaganda shorthands designed to whitewash the gravest of crimes against humanity and keep racists happy. Absurd to label it "whole history"; it's antihistory.

Ringing in my 33rd birthday with @macklemore and 10,000 comrades 🍉🥳

Slavery was an evil in which people from every continent and region participated. We should be honest about the whole history, not select the parts that are politically convenient today, especially given Britain's leading role in ending the transatlantic slave trade. If Caribbean countries are asking Britain for a formal apology for Britain’s role in the transatlantic slave trade, will they also be asking the same of the descendants of African kingdoms, rulers and merchants who captured, sold and profited from the trade? On demands for reparations, whether through cash or debt relief, we have been down this track before. Twenty-five years ago, Jubilee 2000, Drop the Debt and Make Poverty History argued that cancelling the debts of poorer countries would give them a fresh start. More than $100 billion of debt was eventually written off, but many of those countries have since built up even bigger debts. Labour are already spending too much on Britain's welfare state, now is not the time for Andy Burnham to be providing global welfare. There is no reason British taxpayers today should be held financially responsible for things that happened generations before any of us were born. And I have even less patience for political elites in commonwealth countries who don’t know how to make their own citizens prosperous now looking for another opportunity to blame Britain. As Prime Minister, Andy Burnham should be Britain’s greatest defender. Instead, he is writing articles saying we need to confront our history (as if we haven't done enough of that) and considering another formal historical apology. Tony Blair already expressed Britain’s deep sorrow and regret for our role in the slave trade nearly twenty years ago. There is no need to do so again. This is all another navel-gazing distraction. The Commonwealth should be looking forward, not endlessly backwards. That means economic partnerships to make us all richer and deeper military and security cooperation against common threats. If every Commonwealth summit becomes an exercise in presenting Britain with demands for cash then we need to start asking if it is worth the effort.