Your Party row erupts over hundreds of thousands of pounds in donations
The feud between Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana over the future of the leftwing Your Party has taken another twist with the two camps arguing publicly over hundreds of thousands of pounds in donations,Sultana offered to transfer £600,000 from a company the party’s founders set up earlier this year, only to be rebuffed by allies of Corbyn who accused her of playing “political games” with supporters’ money,The latest row comes after months of acrimony between the two former Labour MPs as they jostle to be the figurehead of what they hope will be a new force on the populist left,The tussle for power is likely to come to a head in the new year when the party holds a formal leadership contest,The latest row centres on hundreds of thousands of pounds’ worth of donations and fees received by MOU Operations Ltd, a company set up earlier this year while the details of Your Party were being thrashed out.
Your Party officials have been seeking a sum of about £800,000 from MOU Operations, even threatening to take legal action against the company over it.Sultana however has recently taken sole control of MOU Operations and on Monday offered to return £600,000, arguing the rest should be retained in case of future legal or administrative expenses.That offer however was promptly rejected by Your Party officials.A spokesperson for Sultana said: “Zarah is working to transfer all funds and data held by MOU Operations Ltd to Your Party.As sole director, she is legally responsible for ensuring the company’s costs, liabilities and expenses are settled, and this process may take some time.
”They added: “The first £200,000 is scheduled to be sent on 12 November.All remaining funds will be transferred once the company’s costs, expenses and liabilities are settled in full.”Your Party declined to comment, but officials are understood to be in the process of rejecting Sultana’s offer.A spokesperson for Corbyn also declined to comment.The party officials argue that Sultana should repay the full £850,000, which they say was collected by MOU Operations in the early weeks of the party’s formation.
But they do not want the party to take over a separate pot of money – believed to be about £500,000 – that was collected after Sultana launched an unauthorised membership portal on 18 September.Some close to Corbyn believe Sultana is trying to keep money to help fight a leadership contest over the next few months.Sultana’s allies however say some money needs to be held back in case those who donated in the movement’s early days demand refunds.Sign up to First EditionOur morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what’s happening and why it mattersafter newsletter promotionThe row comes as Your Party advisers plan their first national conference in Liverpool at the end of the month, where members are due to approve a draft constitution and elect a 21-member executive.Sultana’s allies say she wants to make sure some money is transferred to the party before that event in order to avoid having to scale it back because of a lack of funds.
The dispute between the two has been going on since Sultana announced in July she was resigning from Labour to set up Your Party alongside Corbyn.That announcement was greeted with fury by Corbyn supporters, who said the former Labour leader was the only person with the national profile to be able to lead the new vehicle.Sultana’s supporters however point to her following among young leftwingers and her success at getting her message across to an online audience.Her TikTok following, for example, is now nearly 490,000, in comparison with Corbyn’s 280,000.
Datacenters meet resistance over environmental concerns as AI boom spreads in Latin America
This Q&A originally appeared as part of The Guardian’s TechScape newsletter. Sign up for this weekly newsletter here.The datacenters that power the artificial intelligence boom are beyond enormous. Their financials, their physical scale, and the amount of information contained within are so massive that the idea of stopping their construction can seem like opposing an avalanche in progress.Despite the scale and momentum of the explosion of datacenters, resistance is mounting in the United States, in the United Kingdom, and in Latin America, where datacenters have been built in some of the world’s driest areas
Can OpenAI keep pace with industry’s soaring costs?
It is the $1.4tn (£1.1tn) question. How can a loss-making startup such as OpenAI afford such a staggering spending commitment?Answer that positively and it will go a long way to easing investor concerns over bubble warnings in the artificial intelligence boom, from lofty tech company valuations to a mooted $3tn global spend on datacentres.The company behind ChatGPT needs a vast amount of computing power – or compute, in tech jargon – to train its models, produce their responses and build even more powerful systems in the future
Tech giants vow to defend users in US as spyware companies make inroads with Trump administration
Apple and WhatsApp have vowed to keep warning users if their mobile phones are targeted by governments using hacking software against them, including in the US, as two spyware makers seek to make inroads with the Trump administration.The two technology giants made their statements in response to queries from the Guardian as the two cyberweapons makers – both founded in Israel and now owned by American investors – are aggressively pursuing access to the US market.Paragon Solutions, which makes a spyware called Graphite, already cemented a deal with the Trump administration in September to give US immigration agents access to one of the world’s most sophisticated hacking tools, after the Department of Homeland lifted a freeze on a $2m contract with ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement).Paragon did not respond to requests for comment.Another company, NSO Group, which was accused by the Biden administration in 2021 of engaging in business that was “contrary to the national security or foreign policy interests of the US”, announced this weekend that David Friedman, the US ambassador to Israel during Donald Trump’s first term, had agreed to become executive chairman of the holding company that owns NSO
Elon Musk makes himself far-right fixture after White House departure
The Tesla CEO once hinted he was done with politics – but he’s been leaning further into the international far rightWhen the far-right activist Tommy Robinson emerged from a London courtroom this week after a judge cleared him of a terrorism charge, he gave thanks to the man he said had bankrolled his defense.“Elon Musk, I’m forever grateful. If you didn’t step in and fund my legal fight I’d probably be in jail,” Robinson said. “Thank you, Elon.”In the period immediately after Musk’s messy departure from the White House, the Tesla CEO repeatedly suggested that he was done with politics
ChatGPT accused of acting as ‘suicide coach’ in series of US lawsuits
ChatGPT has been accused of acting as a “suicide coach” in a series of lawsuits filed this week in California alleging that interactions with the chatbot led to severe mental breakdowns and several deaths.The seven lawsuits include allegations of wrongful death, assisted suicide, involuntary manslaughter, negligence and product liability.Each of the seven plaintiffs initially used ChatGPT for “general help with schoolwork, research, writing, recipes, work, or spiritual guidance”, according to a joint statement from the Social Media Victims Law Center and Tech Justice Law Project, which filed the lawsuits in California on Thursday.Over time, however, the chatbot “evolved into a psychologically manipulative presence, positioning itself as a confidant and emotional support”, the groups said.“Rather than guiding people toward professional help when they needed it ChatGPT reinforced harmful delusions, and, in some cases, acted as a ‘suicide coach’
‘Musk is Tesla and Tesla is Musk’ – why investors are happy to pay him $1tn
For all the headlines about an on-off relationship with Donald Trump, baiting liberals and erratic behaviour, Tesla shareholders are loath to part with Elon Musk.Investors in the electric vehicle maker voted on Thursday to put the world’s richest person on the path to become the world’s first trillionaire, despite the controversy that is now seemingly intrinsic to his public profile.Shareholders approved the $1tn compensation plan, which could yield the largest corporate payout in history if he meets a series of tough-looking goals, not least pushing Tesla from its current market value of $1.4tn to $8.5tn (£1
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