Get tough on tobacco and alcohol firms to improve public health | Letters
The “timid” approach by the government when it comes to regulating businesses is a shift from the promises of just a year ago to face down the nanny-state jibes to secure the long-term future of the NHS (Editorial, 9 September).This approach is also at odds with public sentiment.Recent polling showed 74% of people want the government to prioritise people’s health over business growth.With millions of people affected by preventable diseases caused by tobacco, alcohol and unhealthy food, we need stronger action from the government to match the rhetoric – including minimum unit pricing to prevent strong alcohol being sold cheaply, a levy on the profits of the tobacco industry and the implementation of mandatory policies to improve food and drink.This will not just benefit the NHS but support the government’s growth ambition, given the heavy toll of poor health on productivity and the wider economy.
Hazel Cheeseman Chief executive, Action on Smoking and Health; Prof Sir Ian Gilmore Chair, Alcohol Health Alliance; Katharine Jenner Director, Obesity Health Alliance The government’s ambition to shift to prevention is something many have tried but not achieved.There is cross-party consensus, backed by public support, that we should rid our country of the tobacco epidemic and end smoking, a leading cause of preventable death.The tobacco and vapes bill is the chance to do this, but isn’t being prioritised in parliament.As long as tobacco firms can profit, they will attempt to delay and weaken regulations that save lives.A levy on them would weaken this incentive while raising £700m per year, which could fund efforts to improve public health.
Companies built on profits from addiction and disease should be nowhere near policymaking.It is only right that they pay for the damage they cause.Mary Foy Co-chair, all-party parliamentary group on smoking and health Have an opinion on anything you’ve read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.
Google Pixel 10 Pro review: one of the very best smaller phones
The Pixel 10 Pro is Google’s best phone that is still a pocketable, easy-to-handle size, taking the excellent Pixel 10 and beefing it up in the camera department.The Guardian’s journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Learn more.That makes it a contender for the top smaller phone with Apple’s iPhone 17 Pro, offering the best of Google’s hardware without an enormous screen
Musk’s Grok AI bot falsely suggests police misrepresented footage of far-right rally in London
The Metropolitan police has had to counter false suggestions by the artificial intelligence on Elon Musk’s X platform that the force passed off footage from 2020 as being from Saturday’s far-right rally in the city.The claim by the chatbot Grok was in answer to an X user’s query about where and when footage of police clashing with crowds was filmed.Grok, which has had a track record of giving false and misleading answers, replied: “This footage appears to be from an anti-lockdown protest in London’s Trafalgar Square on 26 September 2020, during clashes between demonstrators and police over Covid restrictions.”The answer was quickly picked up and amplified by X users, including the Daily Telegraph columnist Allison Pearson, who tweeted: “This was my suspicion,” before asking: “Did the Met claim footage of clashes in summer 2020 took place yesterday?”The Met responded to her by saying that the footage was filmed on Saturday shortly before 3pm at the junction of Whitehall and Horse Guards Avenue.“It is quite obviously not Trafalgar Square as is suggested in the AI response you have referenced, but for the avoidance of further doubt we have provided a labelled comparison to confirm the location,” the force added
Elon Musk calls for dissolution of parliament at far-right rally in London
Elon Musk has called for a “dissolution of parliament” and a “change of government” in the UK while addressing a crowd attending a “unite the kingdom” rally in London, organised by the far-right activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, known as Tommy Robinson.Musk, the owner of X, who dialled in via a video link and spoke to Robinson while thousands watched and listened, also railed against the “woke mind virus” and told the crowd that “violence is coming” and that “you either fight back or you die”.He said: “I really think that there’s got to be a change of government in Britain. You can’t – we don’t have another four years, or whenever the next election is, it’s too long.“Something’s got to be done
UK workers wary of AI despite Starmer’s push to increase uptake, survey finds
It is the work shortcut that dare not speak its name. A third of people do not tell their bosses about their use of AI tools amid fears their ability will be questioned if they do.Research for the Guardian has revealed that only 13% of UK adults openly discuss their use of AI with senior staff at work and close to half think of it as a tool to help people who are not very good at their jobs to get by.Amid widespread predictions that many workers face a fight for their jobs with AI, polling by Ipsos found that among more than 1,500 British workers aged 16 to 75, 33% said they did not discuss their use of AI to help them at work with bosses or other more senior colleagues. They were less coy with people at the same level, but a quarter of people believe “co-workers will question my ability to perform my role if I share how I use AI”
AI content needs to be labelled to protect us | Letters
Marcus Beard’s article on artificial intelligence slopaganda (No, that wasn’t Angela Rayner dancing and rapping: you’ll need to understand AI slopaganda, 9 September) highlights a growing problem – what happens when we no longer know what is true? What will the erosion of trust do to our society?The rise of deepfakes is increasing at an ever faster rate due to the ease at which anyone can create realistic images, audio and even video. Generative AI models have now become so sophisticated that a recent survey showed that less than 1% of respondents could correctly identify the best deepfake images and videos.This content is being used to manipulate, defraud, abuse and mislead people. Fraud using AI cost the US $12.3bn in 2023 and Deloitte predicts that could reach $40bn by 2027
ChatGPT may start alerting authorities about youngsters considering suicide, says CEO
The company behind ChatGPT could start calling the authorities when young users talk seriously about suicide, its co-founder has said.Sam Altman raised fears that as many as 1,500 people a week could be discussing taking their own lives with the chatbot before doing so.The chief executive of San Francisco-based OpenAI, which operates the chatbot with an estimated 700 million global users, said the decision to train the system so the authorities were alerted in such emergencies was not yet final. But he said it was “very reasonable for us to say in cases of, young people talking about suicide, seriously, where we cannot get in touch with the parents, we do call authorities”.Altman highlighted the possible change in an interview with the podcaster Tucker Carlson on Wednesday, which came after OpenAI and Altman were sued by the family of Adam Raine, a 16-year-old from California who killed himself after what his family’s lawyer called “months of encouragement from ChatGPT”
Danny Kruger takes Reform back to full strength – so who’ll be next to quit? | John Crace
MP Danny Kruger says Tory party ‘is over’ as he defects to Reform
Top Starmer aide resigns over explicit Diane Abbott messages in further blow to PM – UK politics live
Senior Starmer adviser quits over offensive Diane Abbott messages
Keir Starmer: I’d never have appointed Mandelson if I’d known what I know now
Donald Trump’s UK state visit arrives at awkward moment after Mandelson exit