In your briefing today:

📣 The UK’s terror threat level has been lifted from "substantial" to "severe" for the first time in more than four years after the stabbing of two Jewish men in north London on Wednesday. Security minister Dan Jarvis said the increase to the threat level was "not solely as a result of that attack", but had also been "driven by an increase in broader Islamist and extreme right-wing" threats. He said people should be "alert and vigilant" but not "alarmed". (BBC)

📣 It’s the “meh” election: could non-voters, who don’t bother to turn up to cast their ballot, be a decisive constituency in next week’s Scottish elections? Luke Tryl, director of polling firm More in Common, told an audience this week that focus groups he’d conducted in Scotland recently revealed "possibly the most unenthusiastic or 'meh' I've ever experienced people be about their choices in an election".

That, alongside data showing a large number of “undecided” voters, could add up to a very low turnout - or volatility in the results next week. (BBC)

📣 Donald Trump says he will remove all tariffs and other restrictions on whisky imports in honour of King Charles and Queen Camilla's state visit to the US. The move is a huge boost to the Scottish whisky industry, which was hit hard by the imposition of tariffs last year.

A spokesperson for Buckingham Palace said the King sent his "sincere gratitude" to Trump and he "will be raising a dram to the President's thoughtfulness". (BBC) (Scotsman)

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📣 The Scottish Government's hybrid working policy has been mocked internally after figures revealed an average daily attendance of just 12%.

Thousands of “core” civil servants were supposed to return to the office for at least 40% of the working week from October last year. But no disciplinary action is taken against staff who fail to meet the request.

And, on internal message boards, civil servants are reported to make light of the shortfall. “It’s as if colleagues are voting with their feet and saying exactly what they think of this change,” wrote one on the Saltire intranet. (Herald has the exclusive)

📣 Jewish people are experiencing something similar to what they felt just before the Holocaust following recent attacks, a member of the Jewish Council of Scotland has said. (Scotsman)

📣 Chilling video footage has captured a machete-wielding thug attacking a helpless pensioner on Tuesday in Glasgow. (Daily Record)

📣 A series of attacks on Jewish targets across Europe has been claimed by a “shadowy” Islamic group that, officials fear, may be using low-cost techniques to sow fear in Jewish communities across the continent. (New York Times)

📣 “Martha’s Rule”, which gives hospital patients in England the right to a second medical opinion, may have saved more than 500 lives since 2024. (Guardian)

📣 A trainee drove a bus into the River Seine after hitting a parked car and veering off the road. (BBC)

⚽️ A penalty gave Nottingham Forest a narrow lead over Aston Villa in the first leg of the all-English Europa League semi-final. Emiliano Martínez had, earlier, pulled off a brilliant stop to prevent Forest from scoring one from open play. (Report) (🎥 Highlights)

⚽️ Crystal Palace notched up an outstanding 3-1 win away in Krakow against Shakhtar Donetsk: they’re in the driving seat for the return leg in the Europa Conference semi, next week at Selhurst. (Report) (🎥 Highlights)

⛹️‍♂️ Oliver Rioux, at 7ft 9in the world’s tallest basketball player, is on the move: the student is signing for UC Irvine in Southern California. He really doesn’t have to jump far to dunk. (AP)

🗣️ Fancy a little optimism? The Economist provides it, believe it or not, in its review of how the City of London has coped since Brexit.

That it remains, ten years on from that vote, the non-US world’s number one is a testament to its remarkable strength and resilience.

Moreover, it has the chance to grow even further. JPMorgan Chase, America’s biggest bank, is planning a shiny new European HQ in Canary Wharf. Citigroup is spending vast sums to refurbish its tower there, while Jane Street and Citadel - both trading firms - are buying office space.

What’s going right? Well, long-standing and reputation still count for something. Geography - right in the middle of global day, language and lifestyle is helpful, too.

But, believe it or not, good decisions by the UK government have helped too, the newspaper says. “Rather than junking sensible reforms begun by their Tory predecessors, Treasury ministers have forged on with them,” it writes. “So Britain’s stockmarket-listing regime has been simplified and pension funds are being nudged, rightly, to invest more in risky assets.”

There’s much more still to be done, the newspaper says, but the City’s success should be celebrated, it says - and built upon, for the good of the whole country. (Economist (£))

🗣️ Gordon Brown - yes, that Gordon Brown, former PM and Chancellor - is very much on the case of Andrew Mountbatten Windsor.

As allegations about Jeffrey Epstein’s “Lolita Express” flights begin to take on a British dimension - there’s evidence women were transited to and through the UK, and stayed in his properties here - more questions about the former Prince’s role in the trafficking start to pose themselves.

“While serving as trade envoy, the former prince regularly used RAF flights,” writes Brown. “We must now question whether public funds were used in pursuit not just of his public duties, but of his alleged private liaisons and even private business arrangements.”

It’s a complex case, with leaked emails continuing to shed light on the previously hidden-away dealings between the then-Prince and Epstein, and between Epstein and others. Brown suggests that authorities need to do better at grappling with that complexity.

Mountbatten Windsor strenuously denies any wrongdoing. (New Statesman (£))

🗣️ “We are a nation of shoplifters” writes Mary Wakefield. She doesn’t mean it literally, of course. At least I don’t think so. But she does mean that shoplifting - with apparent impunity - is on the rise, that other petty crime (and some less petty) goes unremarked, and that people are getting very frustrated.

She offers a couple of startling examples. One, from the retail director of M&S: “‘In the past week alone we have had gangs forcing open locked cabinets and stripping shelves, two men brazenly emptying the shelves of steak and walking out, a large group of young people ransacking a store before assaulting a security guard, a colleague headbutted trying to defuse a situation and another hospitalised after having ammonia thrown in their face.”

Or one closer to (her) home: “My ten-year-old was in the opticians recently when a man burst in, smashed the glass case beside his face and scooped the designer frames into his bag. The optician’s assistant didn’t flinch. ‘It happens twice a week,’ she said, ‘especially when there’s only one of us here. They’re always watching.’”

The trouble is, it costs less to let people steal than to spend money on policing and security to stop them. But that also leads to a paradox: “The more freeloaders there are, the closer everyone else comes to doing the same,” she notes. We need more (moral) shaming and more (physical) stopping, she suggests. If not, maybe we will all, literally, become a nation of shoplifters, after all? (The Spectator (£))

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