The Week Evening Review
A sluggish economy, Trump's frenemies, and Chappell Roan's line in the sand

 
TODAY'S BIG QUESTION

Why is Labour struggling to grow the economy?

The UK economy barely grew at all in the third quarter of this year, in a blow to Labour's plans for growth.

Newly released data from the Office for National Statistics shows the economy expanded by just 0.1% between July and September – Labour's first three months in power – down from 0.5% growth between April and June. Chancellor Rachel Reeves said she was "not satisfied" with the Q3 figures, adding: "Improving economic growth is at the heart of everything I am seeking to achieve." 

What did the commentators say?
If Reeves wanted more credibility for her growth-driving ambitions, "today's weak GDP data is not going to be helpful", said Bloomberg. But  Labour's first economic output report ends before the October Budget, so "next quarter's GDP report will be one to watch" to rate the impact of the party's financial plans.

Reeves still bears some responsibility for the decline, said former Bank of England chief economist Andy Haldane. Her warnings about a £22 billion black hole left in the public finances by the previous government were "unhelpful economically" and created "fear and foreboding" among businesses.

"One month's growth figures do not tell the whole story," said Kate Andrews in The Spectator. But Labour's problem is that it has "couched every decision it has made so far – from inflation-busting pay rises for the public sector, to the tax-hiking Budget, to its promises for mass reform – as growth-boosting decisions". Although the UK's overall growth trajectory isn't set, the government has "little time to spare". Britain is looking "much closer to stagnation than it does to sustainable growth".

What next?
There seems to be a consensus  that the UK is "in a very bad way", said William Davies in the London Review of Books, and that the crisis has been driven in part by the country's poor economic performance since the 2008 financial crisis.

Keir Starmer "can talk all he likes" about needing two terms to "fix the foundations" of Britain's economy, but "that doesn't mean he'll get them". Even if Labour proves to have the expertise needed to turn the country's economic fortunes around, it doesn't mean that come election time, "voters will remember to thank them".  

 
 
THE EXPLAINER

Best of frenemies: the famous faces back-pedalling to win round Donald Trump

In the run-up to the US election, Donald Trump insisted he would not seek retribution for his critics' less-than-flattering comments. "My revenge will be success," he said.

But less than two weeks after his re-election, his inner circle is said to be "irritated" by the "snide" remarks from the UK and Europe about the president-elect and his "thumping" victory, according to the i news site. 
For those who have "run afoul" of Trump in the past, said NBC News, such reports have "sparked fresh worries" that he may return to the White House "looking for retribution".

David Lammy
As a backbench Labour MP in 2018, the now foreign secretary described Trump as a "tyrant", a KKK sympathiser and "a woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath". He also said that Trump, then in his first term, was "deluded, dishonest, xenophobic, narcissistic" and "no friend of Britain". Following Trump's re-election, Lammy has shrugged off his previous comments as "old news". You would "struggle to find any politician" who had not said some "pretty ripe things" about Trump in the past, he said.

Darren Jones
In 2016, Darren Jones, now chief secretary to the Treasury, wrote that Trump was "repugnant" and that his popularity signalled a "much longer problem for the centre-left". Confronted about his remarks on the BBC last week, Jones said it was "no surprise that as a Labour Party politician, I support Labour sister parties such as the Democrats". But the government "totally" respects Trump's mandate, Jones insisted.

Kevin Rudd
The US election outcome is also uncomfortable for Australia's ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd. In 2020, Rudd wrote that Trump was "the most destructive president in history" and "drags America and democracy through the mud". Rudd has now deleted the post, "out of respect for the office of president of the United States", he said.

Donald Tusk
During his term as president of the European Council, Tusk was famously outspoken about Trump. "With friends like that, who needs enemies?" he said in 2018, after Trump withdrew from the Iran nuclear accord. Tusk also derided one of his speeches as "false and dangerous". Tusk, now prime minister of Poland, this week publicly congratulated Trump on his election win, tweeting that he would "look forward to our cooperation for the good of the American and Polish nations".

 
 
QUOTE OF THE DAY

"We need super high-IQ small-government revolutionaries willing to work 80+ hours per week on unglamorous cost-cutting."

Donald Trump's new US Department of Government Efficiency seeks recruits in a job ad posted on X – but candidates shouldn't expect to be paid. In a separate post, Elon Musk, who will head the new commission, said "this will be tedious work, make lots of enemies & compensation is zero", adding: "What a great deal!"

 
 

Poll watch

Almost half (49%) of the UK's women are on a diet, according to research from Asda Online Doctor. The poll of 2,000 adults for the online pharmacy found that almost a quarter (24%) of women had begun dieting by the age of 16, and 20% said they felt pressured by social media to lose weight. More than one in five (22%) female dieters have suffered fatigue or hair loss.

 
 
IN THE SPOTLIGHT

Chappell Roan is pushing boundaries by setting them

Chappell Roan's six nominations at the upcoming Grammy Awards – including in all "Big Four" categories – round off a year that has seen the pop singer-songwriter rocket to mainstream fame.

The US pop star has had viral success with hooky tunes such as "Casual" and "Good Luck, Babe!", and playing to packed venues worldwide. But fame is a double-edged sword. In August, Roan posted a message on Instagram saying she had endured stalking and harassment from "fans". "I don't agree with the notion that I owe a mutual exchange of energy, time or attention to people I do not know, do not trust or who creep me out – just because they're expressing admiration," she wrote.

Her boundary-setting, and the resulting backlash, is part of a wider trend: female celebrities refusing to play nice.

'Not real to them'
Roan joins a growing list of female musicians who have addressed the issue of overfamiliar or entitled fans. "People will kiss me and pick me up, spin me around," Billie Eilish said in a 2021 interview with Vanity Fair. Doja Cat told Harper's Bazaar last year that her theory about fans who behave as though she "belongs" to them was that "if someone has never met me in real life, then, subconsciously, I'm not real to them".

Reposting Roan's Instagram post in August, Hayley Williams of Paramore said that "this happens to every woman I know from this business, myself included", adding: "I'm really thankful Chappell is willing to address it in a real way" 

'Refuses to lower her voice'
The treatment of celebrities by the media and fans has long been invasive, but social media has further pushed back the boundaries. Roan "refuses to lower her voice to a comfortable volume" when it comes to calling out such inappropriate behaviour, said Louis Staples at Harper's Bazaar. In doing so, she offends the "strange sense of ownership" some fans have over their idols.

"I don't care that it's normal," Roan said in a TikTok. "I don't care that this crazy type of behaviour comes along with the job, or the career field I've chosen. That does not make it OK." 

 
 

Good day ❄️

... for cold-weather enthusiasts, as the Met Office forecasts a sharp drop in temperatures from Sunday. Hilly areas in the north could even see some snow, said deputy chief meteorologist Rebekah Hicks, as the recent dreary grey "anticyclonic gloom" is swept away by an Arctic blast bringing the first frost of winter.

 
 

Bad day ✍️

... for William Shakespeare, whose poems can't compete with AI-generated prose, a new study suggests. More than 1,600 people asked to distinguish verses by the Bard, Emily Dickinson and other famous writers from imitations generated by ChatGPT were unable to do so more than half of the time. And according to the University of Pittsburgh researchers, more than 78% preferred the AI versions.

 
 
picture of the day

Holy gathering

Members of the Islamic missionary movement Tablighi Jamaat pray at the side of a road in Dhaka, Bangladesh. The group's mission is to encourage fellow Muslims to adhere more strictly to the tenets of their faith, as well as seeking out converts from other religions.

Abdul Goni / AFP / Getty Images

 
 
Puzzles

Test your general knowledge with The Week's daily crossword, part of our puzzles section, which also includes sudoku and codewords

 
 
THE WEEK RECOMMENDS

Perth and Kinross: Inchmartine Coach House, Inchture
An elegant B-listed coach house built in 1800, with long views over the surrounding countryside. Main suite, 2 further beds, shower, kitchen/dining room, recep, self- contained studio flat, workshop, outbuildings, garden, garage. OIEO £375,000; Galbrait

Argyll and Bute: Rhugarbh Church, Barcaldine
A converted church, built in 1844, close to the shores of Loch Creran. 5 beds, 2 baths, kitchen/dining/ living room, recep, utilities, garden. £425,000; Dawsons

Suffolk: Martello Tower W, Bawdsey
This pretty Grade II thatched house is set in gardens of more than an acre. 5 beds (1 en suite), 2 baths, kitchen/breakfast room, 3 receps, library, study. OIEO £1 million; Nash Partnership

London: Gillespie Road, Highbury
A distinctive property, close to Highbury Fields and the Gillespie Park Nature Reserve, with large windows and a south-facing balcony. 1 suite, open- plan kitchen/ dining/living room with balcony. OIEO £475,000; Hamptons 

 
 

Statistic of the day

99%: The increase in refugee homelessness in the UK over the past year, according to data compiled by 140 frontline organisations and shared with The Guardian. A total of 1,941 refugees are without accommodation, said the No Accommodation Network, which attributed much of the increase to the previous government's attempts to clear the large backlog in asylum claims, and the lack of affordable housing available.

 
 
instant opinion

Today's best commentary

Resignations alone won't fix the Church of England
Isabel Hardman of The Spectator 
Will there be "more resignations" following the departure of Justin Welby as archbishop of Canterbury, wonders Isabel Hardman. Senior figures "seemed to think their God was so small that he relied on them to carry on his work, rather than that he could do just fine without them". They made themselves "bigger than God", so this is also a "theological" issue, and one that will "involve a lot of chastening soul searching in the literal sense for those still working in this world".

'Dry yoghurt' is proof we should all stop playing with our food
Charlotte Lytton for Indy Voices
The social media trend of shaping and colouring strained yoghurt is fresh proof that food "has been mangled beyond all recognition", writes Charlotte Lytton. It's rather "tragic" when food is "not about looking or – heaven forfend – tasting good" but about "appearing odd enough to jack up the algorithm and further populate the echo chamber". These trends "fuel" a "circle-jerk of pointlessness", reducing meal times, "the most enduring form of togetherness" to "tie-dying breakfast".

Give it a rest, ye merry gentlemen – I've got Christmas fatigue already
Harry Wallop for The Times
The "true sign of ageing" is complaining about "how Christmas seems to come earlier every year", says Harry Wallop. "My moan is not about the commercialisation of the season", but that the commercialisation has "crept ever earlier in the calendar". "Are we so drunk on instant gratification we want to ditch autumn" and "skip straight to the figgy pudding"? I "adore Christmas" but for it "to retain any of its magic, it can't be diluted and spread over three months".

 
 
word of the day

Immortels

The 40 men and women of the French Academy, chosen for their contribution to language and literature, who compile the official French dictionary. The so-called immortals have finally completed the ninth edition of the Dictionnaire de l’Académie Française and formally presented it to President Emmanuel Macron yesterday – 40 years after beginning the task. "The effort is praiseworthy, a collective of linguists wrote in Libération newspaper, "but so excessively tardy that it is perfectly useless."

 
 

In the morning

Our Saturday Wrap will be in your inboxes tomorrow morning featuring a look at America's new oligarch and a recap of the Church of England's worst known scandal.

Thanks for reading and have a good weekend,
Harriet

 
 

Evening Review was written and edited by Sorcha Bradley, Jamie Timson, Rebecca Messina, Chas Newkey-Burden, Harriet Marsden, Irenie Forshaw, Anya Jaremko-Greenwold, Helen Brown, Kari Wilkin, and Natalie Holmes.

Image credits, from top: Stephen Kelly / Getty Images; Wiktor Szymanowicz / Shutterstock; Dana Jacobs / WireImage / Getty Images; Abdul Goni / AFP / Getty Images; Clarke & Simpson / Galbrait / Savills / Hamptons