TODAY’S WEATHER

🌤️ A bright day across Scotland, with the threat of rain only around lunchtime in Glasgow and first thing in Edinburgh. Aberdeen gets unashemedly sunny into late afternoon. London will be dry too. (Here’s the UK forecast).

THE BIG STORIES
Trump tariffs hit India hard | Starmer “opens door” to higher tax | Universities spend to lure foreign students

📣 Donald Trump hiked up tariffs on Indian goods to 50% over its purchases of Russian oil, which have increased since Russia invaded Ukraine. The move sparked outrage in New Delhi, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government accusing Trump of singling out India unfairly. (🎁Bloomberg - gift link)

• Trump’s “tariff gamble” puts America’s previously strong ties with India at risk. (🎁New York Times - gift link)

• The move on India comes as new US tariffs on countries around the world come into effect. More than 60 countries, and the European Union, face tariff rates of 15% or higher. (AP has live updates)

• Tariffs imposed earlier in the year are starting to hurt the US economy. Last week saw a spate of weaker economic indicators, with job gains and growth slowing and inflation increasing. (AP)

• That won’t be helped by new plans, announced by Trump yesterday, to impose a 100% tariff on foreign computer chips imported to the US. He made that announcement while meeting Apple CEO Tim Cook, who said the company would invest $100 billion in the next four years to increase US manufacturing, thus side-stepping some tariffs. (Guardian)

📣 Keir Starmer has “opened the door” to an increase in income tax this autumn to help plug an expected £50 billion shortfall in public finances. Labour had previously promised not to raise taxes on “working people”, and only last month the Prime Minister promised the three main taxes would not increase. But economists have warned this week that either taxes must go up, or fiscal rules abandoned, to meet the shortfall caused by spending decisions and slow economic growth. (Independent) (City AM) (Sun)

📣 Scottish Universities are spending millions to attract foreign students, with Heriot Watt, Strathclyde and Aberdeen all opening more than £4 million each on agents to help bring in the lucrative business. The total figure across the country will be much higher, reports Catriona Stewart, because only a few of Scotland’s universities agreed to disclose the information under Freedom of Information requests. (The Scotsman (£) has the exclusive)

IDEAS
Make it Happen leaves a lingering fear over the consequences of Fred the Shred’s mistakes

🗣️ It looks like Kenny Farquharson and I went to the same performance of Make It Happen, the National Theatre of Scotland production about the fall of RBS during the financial crisis.

In a column in The Times (£), he notes that at one point during Monday night’s performance, when Gordon Brown is lamenting that seriousness is no longer a prized value in politics, an audience member shouted “hear, hear!”. “There’s no answer to that,” deadpanned Sandy Grierson, playing RBS chief executive Fred Goodwin, to laughter.

It was an unplanned lighter moment in a show that’s got quite a few planned ones: it doesn’t miss a chance to use mockery to puncture the hubris of Goodwin and his colleagues.

The satire has attracted a lot of column inches (including here, I know) because of the starring role of Brian Cox, who plays Adam Smith. Cox is good, and Smith a useful character to offer challenge to Goodwin’s actions and motivations (and bring a few pantomime-style gags too), but the complexity of the story is wrapped up in Grierson’s Goodwin.

Farquharson says his primary emotion afterwards was anger. Goodwin, these days, is living well off a pension estimated at £600,000 a year, playing golf down at Archerfield, while the consequences of his decisions live on for generations in a public realm hollowed out by austerity, and life chances lost for millions. “RBS was the Darien of our age,” writes Farquharson.

I get the anger, I really do. But I also left the theatre with a different sense of unease: that perhaps we were also laughing, just a little, at the ambition of it all: the idea that Scots - in Scotland! - could aspire to become, then run, the world’s biggest bank. That RBS occupied top spot seems crazy now, not even 20 years on, but it’s what it was. Edinburgh - and Scotland - shared in the spoils.

I’d like to think it’s entirely reasonable that we could be world-leading in a significant economic sector again. There are promising areas, especially in tech and life sciences, I know.

But I did head home wondering if the damage caused by Goodwin and his colleagues went far beyond the economic, reawakening some limiting sense of what can - and can’t - be done from our corner of the planet, and encouraging us to see our overwhelmed state as the answer to all our ills. That would be a bleak, and limiting, legacy indeed.

AROUND SCOTLAND

📣 Extra strong nicotine products designed to appeal to children - and when you see the pictures, you’ll think they’re sweets too - are being “openly sold” in Scottish shops, a BBC Scotland investigation has found. One product, which rips off the “Millions” sweet brand, has pouches equivalent in strength to 10 cigarettes. (BBC Scotland)

📣 Forensic experts are working “around the clock” to process evidence linked to crimes committed in Scotland’s ongoing gangland turf war. Details emerged in a report made to the Scottish Police Authority by Police Scotland’s director of forensic services. (The Sun has the exclusive)

📣 The Scottish Government is being urged to consider a boycott of Israel by Scottish Greens co-leadership hopeful Ross Greer (wrongly described as having landed the job already by The National) (The National £)

📣 Nigel Farage is facing a revolt from the Scottish wing of his party after he backed suggestions by Venessa Frake, his justice advisor, that some transgender criminals should be imprisoned in women’s jails. (Times £)

📣 ScotRail has announced extra train services for the nights of Oasis’s gigs in Edinburgh later this week, with additional trains running across Scotland from Haymarket station. (STV)

AROUND THE UK & WORLD

📣 Donald Trump could meet Vladimir Putin as soon as next week to talk about ending the Ukraine war. The talk of a summit comes after “great progress” was made by US special envoy Steve Witkoff during a visit to Moscow. (Guardian)

• It may be followed by a summit with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, according to The New York Times.

📣 UK interest rates are expected to be cut later today to 4%, from 4.25%, taking them to the lowest level since March 2023. (BBC)

📣 China has been asked to explain a “secret basement” being planned for its huge “mega embassy” in London, amid growing unease about its plans for the former Royal Mint Court in London. There are concerns the complex could bring a “nest of espionage” into the heart of London; concerns which have not been eased by official plans being, in part, greyed out. (🎁 Telegraph - gift link)

📣 A UK-based journalist who vanished in Norway during bad weather has been found alive but seriously injured after nearly a week alone in the wilderness. (Mail)

📣 MasterChef aired last night, featuring sacked hosts John Torode and Gregg Wallace, but with an awkward re-edit that attempted to cut down on their roles and remove their usual “banter” with contestants. It was met with criticism. (The Sun)

SPORT

⚽️ Napoli and Scotland star Scott McTominay could make the Ballon d’Or shortlist, putting him in the running for the annual award for the world’s best footballer. The last Scottish nominee was Rangers’ Ally McCoist in 1987, and the last Scottish winner was Denis Law, back in 1964. (Scotsman)

⚽️ Veteran BBC Sportscene stars including Archie Macpherson and Dougie Donnelly will reunite for a 50th anniversary special this Saturday. Donnelly, now 72 (!), will present while Macpherson will be offering commentary from one of the games. It sounds great fun, although there’s a huge risk we’ll be reminded today’s commentating crop aren’t a patch on the great man. (Record)