High pressures squeeze and crush, but low pressures damage too. Losing the atom-level buzz that keeps us held safe in the balance of internal and external pressure releases dangerous storms, disorientation and pain, write ROX MIDDLETON, LIAM SHAW and MIRIAM GAUNTLETT
THE 10-year anniversary of the financial crash led to retrospective talk among pundits and politicians about whether the banks got away with it.
But for the banks, it was business as usual, offering money and support to politicians. Labour MP Wes Streeting, an influential backbencher with a seat on the Treasury select committee, listed a £5,000 payment from JP Morgan for speaking on a panel at its London High Yield Conference this September.
Streeting says the work took six hours, so that’s an £833-an-hour rate from the bank. JP Morgan was one of the bigger sinners of the crash: it was fined a record $13 billion in 2013 for misrepresenting the bundles of “toxic” mortgages it sold to investors as good investments.

The new angle from private firms shmoozing their way into public contracts was the much-trumpeted arrival of ‘artificial intelligence’ — and no-one seemed to have heard the numerous criticisms of this unproven miracle cure, reports SOLOMON HUGHES

It is rather strange that Labour continues to give prestigious roles to inappropriate, controversy-mired businessmen who are also major Tory donors. What could Labour possibly be hoping to get out of it, asks SOLOMON HUGHES

Keir Starmer’s hiring Tim Allan from Tory-led Strand Partners is another illustration of Labour’s corporate-influence world where party differences matter less than business connections, writes SOLOMON HUGHES

MBDA’s Alabama factory makes components for Boeing’s GBU-39 bombs used to kill civilians in Gaza. Its profits flow through Stevenage to Paris — and it is one of the British government’s favourite firms, reveals SOLOMON HUGHES