The Know Daily - Thursday 14 March 2024

_{Read in 5m 20s ∙ Listening to Bacarra ∙}

It’s the International Day of Action for Rivers - so what better time to highlight a new initiative aimed at cleaning up the Thames? Meet London’s new “super sewer” 👇 - a 16-mile-long tunnel stretching underneath the river, which will carry waste from storm overflow drains away to a treatment works in east London. Testing on the Thames Tideway Tunnel is set to begin this summer.

🗞️ New rules on newspaper ownership

The government is set to ban foreign state ownership of UK newspapers and news magazines.

What's behind the move?
The decision, announced on Wednesday in the House of Lords, comes in the wake of a proposed takeover of the Telegraph Media Group - which owns the Daily Telegraph and Spectator - by RedBird IMI, a United Arab Emirates-backed investment firm.

The planned takeover has been “fiercely opposed” by many Conservative MPs and peers, who had raised concern about the UAE’s record on press freedom, reported The Guardian.

What have ministers said about the move?
The government said it would “deliver additional protections for a free press". Conservative peer Baroness Stowell, the chair of the Communications and Digital Committee, had previously argued that “public trust in news [...] has fallen significantly in recent years” and that ownership by foreign governments would further “damage public confidence”, noted BBC News.

What happens next?
The government is set to publish full details of the legislation next Tuesday, with MPs expected to vote on it soon after. As The Independent reported, the legislation could apply to the Telegraph Media Group takeover if passed into law swiftly.

A spokesperson for the RedBird IMI group said that they were “extremely disappointed” by yesterday’s development, adding: “we have been clear that the acquisition of the Telegraph and the Spectator has been a fully commercial undertaking”.