The government’s asylum housing scheme is in chaos after the High Court ruled that migrants must be removed from the Bell Hotel in Epping, which has become the focus of weeks of protests. Home Office lawyers say the ruling will “substantially impact” the government’s ability to house asylum seekers, as ministers brace for dozens more legal challenges from local authorities. Donald Trump says the US could play a role “by air” in a postwar security guarantee for Ukraine. His top generals will meet European military chiefs in the Pentagon today to thrash out what each country is willing to commit, with Britain expected to pledge support in the skies and seas, but not on the ground. The last batch of £1 coins bearing Queen Elizabeth II’s face is entering circulation. New King Charles III coins, featuring an intricate bee design, are also being released, which the Royal Mint says is a “physical representation of our monarchy’s transition”.

Trivialising street crime only helps criminals

In recent weeks, says Jenni Russell in The Times, several commentators have declared the widespread anxiety about crime in Britain to be “right-wing scaremongering”. The Times’s own Fraser Nelson argues that in fact, with the country’s overall crime rate in a 30-year decline and homicides, violent attacks and burglaries steeply falling, “Britain has never been safer”. This is a mirage. Crime is unevenly distributed around the country, and its victims are mostly women and the poor. Flattering headline figures also miss out the police’s shocking clear-up rate: just 5.7% of reported crimes were solved in 2022, down from 29% in 2010. This is an appalling legacy of the last Tory government which Labour is doing nothing to improve.

Official statistics also miss the visceral side of crime: brazen shoplifting, phone snatching, drug dealing and general public nuisance have a profound effect on people’s sense of security, trust and social cohesion, particularly in our big cities. I left a recent dinner near Oxford Street late on a balmy evening and wanted to take a Lime bike, but every one nearby had been vandalised. Setting off on foot, I watched two balaclava-clad youths e-biking up the pavement, snatching phones. Looking around to see if anyone would stop them, I noted not just indifference and a lack of police, but an eerie lack of other women. On the tube, I made the mistake of glancing at a man shouting into his mobile. What was I looking at, he shouted, I could “fuck off”. Again, total indifference from my fellow passengers. Again, no other women. This deep corrosion of public life can’t be shrugged off. And downplaying it helps no one but the criminals.