Tuesday briefing: Notre Dame fire – 'we will rebuild'

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/16/tuesday-briefing-notre-dame-fire-we-will-rebuild

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Top story: Heartbreak as spire of landmark topples

Hello, Warren Murray bringing you the early dispatches.

The walls and towers of Notre Dame still stand after fire brought down the Paris cathedral’s famed Gothic spire, ravaged its roof and damaged the interior – a beloved and fabled place of worship housing treasures of art and Christianity.

The main structure of the 850-year-old Unesco world heritage landmark has been saved, according to the Paris fire chief, after the blaze was brought under control in the early hours of this morning. One firefighter was injured. The French president, Emmanuel Macron, said the worst has been avoided but warned fires could continue to pose a threat for several days: “The battle is not yet totally won.” The heartbreaking scenes have produced many striking photos. Onlooker videos captured the moment the spire came down.

Attention now turns to the forbidding task of restoration. Macron asked the country to commit to rebuilding Notre Dame together, announcing an international fundraising campaign to raise money for the repairs. The French billionaire François-Henri Pinault, chairman and CEO of international luxury group Kering, pledged €100m towards rebuilding Notre Dame, according to a statement. The mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, said many artworks and religious relics were removed in time – they included the Holy Crown of Thorns, a purported relic of Christ’s crufixion, and the Tunic of St Louis, said to have been worn by the crusader French king.

Prosecutors said they believed the fire started accidentally and their preliminary investigation had ruled out arson and terrorism. World leaders expressed sorrow and solidarity – the German chancellor Angela Merkel’s office tweeted: “Fluctuat nec mergitur”, Latin for “she is tossed by the waves but does not sink” – the motto of Paris since the 14th century, when Notre Dame was completed.

Teachers flee ‘culture of fear’ – Around one in five teachers (18%) expect to leave the classroom in less than two years, blaming excessive workload and accountability pressures, according to a poll by the National Education Union. Overall, two-fifths of teachers, school leaders and support staff say they want to quit in the next five years. “My job is no longer about children,” one respondent said. “It’s just a 60-hour week with pressure to push children’s achievement data through.” Said another: “My personal life doesn’t exist any more.” The government has announced plans to ease workload and help more teachers to job share – but the NEU is calling for drastic action to stop staff fleeing a “culture of fear, over-regulation, and a lack of trust”. One teacher’s verdict on what is needed: “Trust being given back to the teachers. Less paper pushing and more focus on the children. Less emphasis on SATs results.”

PM’s dilemma over Labour talks – Theresa May is under pressure to abandon cross-party Brexit talks. Labour appears to have little incentive to do a deal before the increasingly likely European elections in the UK, as well as local elections, that promise to be costly for the Conservatives. Tory officials are privately acknowledging the party will lose around half of its MEPs, with Ukip set for gains. Ministers and their Labour shadows are holding working groups this week seeking a Brexit compromise but no discussions about a customs union or second referendum are planned before Easter. The government’s alternative plan is for MPs to thrash out an acceptable version of May’s deal in the House of Commons, but experts have expressed doubt there is time to do this in the five weeks before the European elections. Jeremy Hunt, the foreign secretary, has conceded that having to fight the elections would be disastrous for the Tories.

Bernie and Beto’s tax facts – There is more heat on Donald Trump to release his tax records after two Democratic presidential hopefuls published a decade of their own. According to returns provided by his campaign, Bernie Sanders and his wife, Jane, made $566,000 in 2018, paid $137,573 in federal taxes and owed $8,267 in tax. They reported paying a 26% effective tax rate while donating $18,950 to charity. Beto O’Rourke disclosed he and his wife paid $81,000 in taxes on $366,000 of income in 2017. His 2018 filing was not yet available. Trump claims he can’t make his tax returns public because he is under IRS audit. At a Fox News town hall meeting, Sanders looked down the cameras of Potus’s favoured channel and said: “Hey President Trump, my wife and I just released 10 years. Please do the same. Let the American people know.”

Lies in their stars – Amazon is being flooded with “fake” five-star reviews, a new investigation claims. The consumer group Which? found tech products in 14 online categories were dominated by products from unfamiliar brands which in many cases had thousands of unverified reviews – meaning there was no evidence the reviewer had even bought or used the item. Natalie Hitchins, head of home products at Which?, said Amazon was losing the battle against fake reviews: “Customers should always take reviews with a pinch of salt and look to independent and trustworthy sources when researching a purchase.”

‘Magical space’ – The Glen, William Pitt the Younger’s lost garden at Walmer Castle in Kent, has been reclaimed from thick bramble, gorse and fallen trees and will be revealed to the public later this month. “Normally a hole in the ground like this anywhere in England is filled with old sofas and cars,” said Mark Brent, head gardener at the castle, of the former chalk quarry. “The surprise was that it was relatively clean.”

Between 1792 and 1806, Pitt lived at Walmer Castle, and conceived the Glen with his niece, Lady Hester Stanhope. Letters from 1805 talk of plans to plant “‘fir trees, broom, creepers and evergreens’ – probably all that will grow there”, said Brent. “It is a magical space … The survivability of some of the trees is amazing, some of the yew trees are ones which Pitt and Stanhope planted.”

Today in Focus podcast: English football’s racism problem

Recent incidents in Premier League stadiums and at non-league level have highlighted football’s enduring problem with racism. The Guardian’s Jacob Steinberg investigates whether the authorities are taking it seriously enough. Plus: we hear from protesters at the Extinction Rebellion climate change demonstration in London.

Lunchtime read: May and the Brexit numbers game

Calling a snap election didn’t work. Nor did cosying up to hard Brexiters with a promise of no customs deal, no single market. Trying to bounce the DUP into accepting a deal was a failure. Telling ministers that if they resigned, they would be expelled from Chequers on foot to find a taxi home, didn’t work either – they simply resigned a few days later.

The confidence vote of December 2018 is one of the few times that the numbers have fallen in Theresa May’s favour. Dan Sabbagh examines how the prime minister who vowed to deliver the “Brexit that Britain voted for” has misjudged the extent of her authority time and again.

Sport

With Tiger Woods’s remarkable Masters win still lingering in the minds of many, Andy Bull asks: was this the greatest comeback in sporting history? And with major win number 15 secured, Ewan Murray poses the question: is Jack Nicklaus’s record haul of 18 under threat?

The race for Champions League spots continues to hot up in the Premier League, after a howler from Ben Foster handed Arsenal a top four spot, following a 1-0 win at Vicarage Road. Meanwhile, the town hall bells in Liverpool have tolled 96 times, commemorating 30 years since the Hillsborough disaster. “Never forgotten” proclaimed one banner, writes David Conn.

And in F1, Lewis Hamilton has urged his Mercedes team to “keep operating at its full potential”, despite starting the season with a third-consecutive one-two finish, lest rivals Ferrari make up ground.

Business

Asian stocks have been hovering below a nine-month high after disappointing bank earnings dented Wall Street, though recent signs that the global economy is likely to avoid a sharper downturn helped limit the losses. The Nikkei 225 index gained slightly but Shanghai, the Hang Seng and South Korea’s Kospi all lost ground. Sterling is trading around $1.309 and €1.158 while the FTSE promises to open higher.

The papers

The fire that broke out at Notre Dame cathedral, destroying the roof and causing the spire to collapse in front of horrified onlookers, is the lead story on the front pages today.

The Times’s splash is “Battle to save Notre Dame”, the Daily Mail reports “Nine centuries lost to the unholy inferno”, the Daily Telegraph has “Paris weeps for its beloved lady”, and the Guardian reports “Inferno devastates Notre-Dame”. The Sun cannot resist a pun: “Notre Doom”, while the i leads with “Tragedy of Notre Dame”.

The FT includes a picture of the cathedral in flames and the headline “Engulfed”, but its main story is “Goldman dashes shake-up hopes”.

The Express also leads with a different story (“Half of statins users risk lives”) but features pictures of the cathedral in flames, saying “a nation weeps as inferno engulfs Notre Dame”. The Mirror has a story about nursing levels in the NHS: “One in four wards unsafe”.

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