Portrait of the Week – 5 April 2018

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Alison Saunders said she would relinquish her position as the Director of Public Prosecutions when her five-year contract ends in October. Cressida Dick, the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, told the Times that she was ditching the previously embraced principle of believing all complaints of sexual assault. ‘We should have an open mind when a person walks in,’ she said. In February, 15 people were murdered in London and 14 in New York; in March it was 22 and 21. On 2 April two teenagers were shot in London; one died at the scene and the other the day after. Michael Gove, the Environment Secretary, said that the sale of ivory items of whatever age would be made illegal.

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Some Labour MPs joined criticism of Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the party, for not having done enough to counter anti-Semitism in its ranks. Mr Corbyn deleted his personal Facebook page. He had been accused of belonging to Facebook groups which contained anti-Semitic posts, which he denied having seen. Christine Shawcroft, a director of Momentum, which backs Jeremy Corbyn, resigned her seat on Labour’s National Executive Committee after having called for the reinstatement of a council candidate accused of Holocaust denial. She was replaced by Eddie Izzard, the comedian who often wears women’s clothes. Momentum issued a statement: ‘Accusations of anti-Semitism should not and cannot be dismissed simply as right-wing smears.’ Mr Corbyn then attended an event held by Jewdas, a satirically minded Jewish far-left group, which on its Twitter account called Israel ‘a steaming pile of sewage which needs to be properly disposed of’. The government delayed until 17 April the final decision on which company will make UK British passports after Brexit.

More than three quarters of companies employing more than 250 people reported paying men more than women in different jobs.