There have been penalties for those who looked the other way when Epstein was convicted of child sex offences and decided to maintain relationships with the financier — but not for the British ambassador to Washington, reveals SOLOMON HUGHES

JB PRIESTLEY, socialist writer and broadcaster, turned down a life peerage in 1965 and a Companion of Honour in 1969. Almost as if to underline his point, in 1979 he accepted the title of Pipe Smoker of the Year.
Some acts of rebellion are very small, but that doesn’t mean they don’t count. When they read out the New Year Honours List on the news you might enjoy playing this seasonal game: try and guess who said “No, thanks.”
Labour MP and peace campaigner Philip Noel-Baker must have had a pretty big mantelpiece on which to keep his Nobel prize, his Olympic medal and the decorations for bravery he won from France, Britain and Italy as an ambulance driver in the first world war. Maybe he turned down a Companion of Honour in 1965 because it seemed a trivial trinket alongside his other trophies, though some suggest that he was motivated by opposition to the war against Vietnam.

MAT COWARD presents a peculiar cabbage that will only do its bodybuilding once the summer dies down

A heatwave, a crimewave, and weird bollocks in Aberdeen, Indiana horror, and the end of the American Dream

A corrupted chemist, a Hampstead homosexual and finely observed class-conflict at The Bohemia

Beet likes warmth, who doesn’t, so attention to detail is required if you’re to succeed, writes MAT COWARD