THE BIG STORIES
“Explosive” tariffs take effect | UK works on “murder prediction” system

📣 The heaviest of Trump’s tariffs came into force at 5am UK time after another turbulent day in global stock markets, with the world now braced for a full-blown trade war. The tariffs now in effect include a 104% levy on imports to the US from China that will have a dramatic impact on trade between the two biggest economies in the world. (FT £) (Bloomberg, free to read) (BBC live coverage)

• Asian markets were down overnight, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 down 4.5%. (Sky News)

• Elon Musk labelled Trump’s trade adviser, Peter Navarro, a “moron” who was “dumber than a sack of bricks” after Navarro made comments about Tesla. (BBC)

• As markets shake, Trump’s top economic advisers are “becoming a team of rivals when it comes to advancing his market-breaking tariffs". (Semafor)

📣 The UK government is developing a “murder prediction” programme using the personal data of thousands of people to try to identify those most likely to become killers.

The Ministry of Justice says the research project will “review offender characteristics that increase the risk of committing homicide”. The pressure group Statewatch says the programme will use the data of victims of crime; officials deny this, saying it’s only looking at people with at least one criminal conviction.

Critics will say it’s a development straight out of the sci-fi book and film Minority Report - which was built around the concept of “precrime” and arresting suspects before they are able to commit an actual crime. (The Guardian has the exclusive)

IDEAS
Columnists turn their ire on Trump’s tariffs, and those who backed him

🗣️ The incredulity over Trump’s tariffs has yet to fade for many observers. “Can it really still be less than a week since a Wall Street Journal poll found 77% of US Republicans thought tariffs would have a positive impact?” asks Marina Hyde in the Guardian.

She turns her withering gaze towards Trump’s backers, including Elon Musk and “Trump’s local beta, Nigel Farage”, and especially Bill Ackman, the billionaire hedge fund manager. Last July he endorsed Trump, assuring onlookers he’d made his decision “carefully, rationally, and by relying on as much empirical data as possible.”

“Well, flash forward to Sunday,” writes Hyde, “and – whaddayaknow? – the same Bill Ackman could be found explaining that Trump was launching ‘economic nuclear war on every country in the world’, […] Can’t believe he’s imposed tariffs. I guess strife comes at you fast,” she writes. (The Guardian)

🗣️ That’s a theme picked up by Alex Massie on his Substack: Trump is “doing what he said he would do and reminding us “that the moral of the fable of The Boy Who Cried Wolf is that, in the end, THERE IS ALWAYS A WOLF.”

He skewers right-winger (and peer!) Daniel Hannan, and Andrew Neil, although he credits the latter with a fine reverse ferret on his views on Trump. His may be a case study in elegantly changing your mind in public for years to come. (The Debatable Land)

🗣️Some commentators are sticking with their man in the White House. Brian Monteith in the Scotsman is one: the former Brexit Party MSP also says we shouldn’t have been surprised by tariffs. And while he says he’s against them, he says other countries - or blocks, especially the EU - started it by having high tariffs against US products, such as cars.

He subscribes to the “great game” theory of what Trump is up to: that this is not, ultimately, about tariffs at all, but about “deciding the dominant economic power between two different views of life and liberty itself,” says Monteith. “In that regard, despite my dislike of tariffs, when it comes to using them as a strategic tool, I stand with Trump.” (The Scotsman)

🗣️Except, except, except… the taxes Trump introduced were not reciprocal tariffs at all: they are just big tariffs, with no relationship to tariffs charged the other way, despite the “reciprocal” phrase being repeated on the BBC again, and again, even now as I write today’s newsletter.

A blog post from the Cato Institute explains why not, calling the taxes Trump has imposed “an unserious (at best) approach to ‘reciprocity’”. They do a very readable job of explaining how the Trump administration arrived at the tariffs being imposed today. The methodology is economically illiterate, they say, “and the results are tragicomic”. (Cato Institute)

AROUND SCOTLAND

📣 Women who are less well-off face greater risks when giving birth, according to figures reported in the Herald today. That’s because the obesity rate in the most deprived areas of Scotland is 12% higher than the least deprived areas. That brings risks for mothers and babies. (The Herald has the exclusive)

The University of Edinburgh is to cut staff, sell buildings and merge schools in its cost-cutting drive, according to a video message sent to staff by principal Sir Peter Mathieson. (The Herald)

📣 NHS Grampian owes £92.2m to the Scottish Government after it had to borrow to pay its bills. It’s £67.5m overspend last year was the worst of any health board in Scotland. (STV)

📣 Scotland’s carbon emissions bounced back from the low levels of the Covid lockdown period, newly-released figures for 2021 show. Greenhouse gas emissions soared to the highest level since 2015 after that low. (The Scotsman)

AROUND THE UK

📣 A vast new theme park is to be built in Bedfordshire by entertainment behemoth Universal. The tourist magnet is expected to bring 8.5 million visitors a year to a former brickworks just off the A421. (The Guardian) (Universal)

📣 The government is considering nationalising British Steel amid fears the company’s blast furnaces in Scunthorpe could run out of raw materials within days. Its owner, Chinese company Jingye, says it’s been losing £700,000 a day. (BBC)

📣 Alan Turing’s notebooks have been saved for the nation after a successful charity campaign. The handwritten notes document Turing’s “Delilah project”, which involved building a portable voice encoder to be used in military operations during the Second World War. (Independent)

AROUND THE WORLD

🌎 The roof collapse at a nightclub in the Dominican Republic has killed at least 98 people, including a former US basketball star and a provincial governor, who called the nation’s President while trapped. (AP)

🌎 The IMF has reached a deal with Argentina on a $20 billion bailout. (AP)

🌎 Detailed 3D scans of the Titanic have revealed new details of the ship’s final hours, showing smashed portholes and the punctures in the hull. (Independent)

BUSINESS & ECONOMICS

💰 Business networking site LinkedIn revealed its top large employers in the UK… and a few have presences in Scotland. (LinkedIn)

• Engineering company Equinor, with a base in Aberdeen, comes in highest in Scotland and at eleventh overall.

• Bank of Scotland owner Lloyds Banking Group is a place below.

• Oil and gas giant Shell - also with a big operation in Aberdeen - comes in 15th overall.

• Honourable mentions, too, for SLB (18th), Zebra Technologies (19th) and Tata Consultancy Services at 22nd.

Overall winner was AstraZeneca - and Cambridge, if you look at the number of top employers based in the English city.

💰 Scottish Labour wants to reform the planning system to speed economic growth. (Daily Business)

SPORT

⚽️ Two of the best free kicks you’ll see in your life - or, at least, since Beckham had a shaved head - helped Arsenal to a commanding 3-0 Champions League quarter-final win over Real Madrid last night.

Declan Rice had never scored from a direct free kick before last night: the brace he popped in from distance will have him remembered as a master of the dead ball for a long time.

“On a red-letter occasion for Arsenal, probably the finest since the Emirates Stadium opened in 2006, their key midfielder brought the house down; Real Madrid to their knees, as well,” writes David Hytner. Merino’s third was not too shabby, either. (Guardian) (🎥 Highlights on YouTube)

⚽️ In the other quarter-final last night, injury-hit Bayern Munich lost 2-1 to Inter Milan. (BBC) (🎥 Highlights on TNT Sports)

⚽️ More Champions League quarter-final fun tonight: Barcelona play Borussia Dortmund (8pm, TNT Sports 2) while PSG play Aston Villa (8pm TNT Sports 1).