In your briefing today:

📣 Andy Burnham will be installed as Labour leader later today, marking the occasion with a speech in which he’s expected to set out his government’s priorities in detail for the first time.

At a specially convened conference in London, Burnham is expected to say that his government will be “unashamedly Labour in our priorities” and will have the “courage to fix the big things that politics has neglected”. (BBC)

📣 Former First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has been accused of “lying” and knowing “full well” of her husband’s crimes by Tory MP David Davis.

Davis also accused her of the “evil act” of “stitching up” her former ally Alex Salmond, in a scandal that “cost Alex Salmond his life”.

He made the claims in the House of Commons, under parliamentary privilege, and demanded a judicial inquiry into the “entire sordid scandal”.

But Sturgeon immediately hit back at his accusations, calling them “lies” and a “conspiracy theory” spread by a member of the “old boys club”. She has repeatedly and firmly denied any knowledge of Peter Murrell’s crimes since his conviction for embezzlement last month. (Daily Record)

📣 The US has expanded its campaign of airstrikes against Iran overnight, hitting more bridges and - Iran claims - other civilian infrastructure, including a train station and an airport. The Geneva Convention prohibits strikes on essential civilian infrastructure. (BBC)

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📣 The wildfire in the Cairngorms has been contained, but a “very high risk” of more fires remains. The blaze was visible from space. (STV)

📣 An Aberdeen University employee has been arrested and charged in connection with social media comments he is alleged to have made over the death of former MP Ann Widdecombe. (Express)

📣 Two women have been taken to hospital after their car plunged off a bridge onto the M8 near Glasgow Airport. (BBC)

📣 A scammer from Glasgow convinced a string of Premier League and Championship footballers to send him naked pictures, a court heard. William Kirkpatrick was sentenced to community service and placed on the sex offenders register for five years. (Times)

📣 Downing Street has waded into the row about the Falkland Islands, ignited when Argentina players waved a banner supporting their country’s claims to the territory. “The World Cup might not be ours, but the Falkland Islands definitely are,” a spokesperson said. (Times)

📣 Amnesty International is facing an investigation by the Charity Commission after it branded JK Rowling’s rape support centre “anti-rights”. (Mail)

📣 A vast swathe of the US, from the Midwest to the East Coast, has been hit by wildfire smoke coming from fires burning primarily in Canada, but also in northern Minnesota. Air quality in Detroit is now among the worst in the world. (AP)

📣 A new, less invasive treatment for prostate cancer can reduce the risk of side effects, a study has found. (BBC)

📣 Claudia Winkleman has walked away from her own chat show after only seven episodes, saying she was “just too nervous to enjoy it”. (Independent)

⚽️ Rangers’ rebuild under Derek McInnes continues apace, although it looks like their pursuit of highly-rated Tromso attacking midfielder Jens Hjerto-Dahl may end in frustration. But they should sign Partizan Belgrade’s midfield anchor-man Vanja Dragojevic, with yet more to follow. (Daily Record has the exclusive)

⚽️ Motherwell’s Elliot Watt has been given a four-game ban by the SFA after he called the notorious penalty decision in his club’s game against Celtic “the worst VAR decision in history”. (Sun)

⚽️ Thomas Tuchel will face an FA inquest into England’s performance at the World Cup, with a particular focus on his side’s negative tactics against Argentina. (Mirror)

🗣️ Everyone is wondering who will be in Andy Burnham’s cabinet, but nobody knows who he’ll pick. Ailbhe Rea’s column in the New Statesman, while shedding no new light on names, paints an entertaining portrait of a parliamentary Labour Party anxiously awaiting news from Prime Minister-in-waiting Andy Burnham.

He’s apparently “cooped up in an old Westminster townhouse” with three people: Antonia Romea, the head of civil service, James Purnell, his chief of staff, and Louise Haigh, “the most powerful woman in Britain” and former transport secretary who helped run his Makerfield campaign.

They’re coming up with plans and deciding who will be best placed to implement them. “Burnham has been giving ‘steers on everything’, as one attendee puts it. ‘He has thoughts on absolutely everything and he knows what he wants.’” This is a departure from the outgoing occupant of Number 10.

All is revealed on Monday, after the “King of the North” has been off to see the actual King, to be made Prime Minister. (New Statesman)

🗣️ Alastair Campbell is no neutral observer of politics, but his take on Nigel Farage is still interesting. Nor is he shy about telling us how right his predictions were, but on Farage he has a point: he predicted at the start of the year that the Reform UK leader would “peak”, tripped up by the scrutiny that popularity brings. So it appears to have been.

“[Donald] Trump showed that you can be unserious, unpleasant, unhinged, scandal-ridden, up to and including conviction for crimes, and still get to the top. But Farage should have learned from the fall of Boris Johnson… we are not the USA,” writes Campbell.

“In the many years when Farage was cheeky chappy commentator getting an easy ride from the media, editors yawned as journalists tried to generate interest in the murky world of Reform financing. The £5m bung changed that. Tipping-point time.” (The New World (£))

🗣️Why’s it “too darn hot”? The Economist notes that climate change is now feeding on itself, with the warming effects of greenhouse gases now driving other processes which, in turn, further heat the planet.

The one causing a great deal of concern is a reduction in the planet’s “albedo” - the fraction of sunlight reflected back from where it came. White roofs or ice-covered seas keep things cool. When they’re not there, the incoming energy is absorbed here in Earth - raising temperatures. And Earth’s albedo is “falling with surprising speed”, measurements show.

One reason is the presence of fewer cooling clouds over the ocean. The other, ironically enough, is less pollution: emissions of sulfur dioxide have been reduced, which is great for air quality, but denies the planet the tiny particles which remain in the atmosphere and reflect back sunlight.

“No form of emissions reduction, though, can quickly bend the current trajectory. Endurance is what remains,” warns the newspaper. And radical solutions might become necessary: before long, we might have to resort to putting stuff, albeit more benign stuff, back in the atmosphere to cool things down. (Economist (£))

🗣️ Sasha Swire, author of those mildly scandalous (and certainly bridge-burning) memoirs Diary of an MP’s Wife that caused such a stir during Covid, writes the Spectator’s diary this week. It’s a gossipy treat.

She describes bumping into Hugh Grant at a party recently, introducing herself to him and then quickly, she claims, being on the receiving end of an unprovoked and foul-mouthed tirade about her “twat” of a husband, being sprayed with Grant’s spit “until his leggy Swedish wife stopped between us” and “quietly apologised and asked me to leave the conversation”.

“Grant was standing by the exit,” as she left, she writes. “I couldn’t resist. ‘Bye-bye,’ I smiled. ‘And thanks for the diary entry.’ His face turned to stone.” (Spectator (£))

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