May summary: the continuing energy and cost of living crisis, and the end of "partygate"?

The war in Ukraine continues to dominate the news, as does its consequences, the ongoing energy crisis, due to embargoes on gas and oil from Russia and a serious shortage of grain, as Ukraine and Russia supplied around a quarter of the world's wheat. This, and other factors, including Brexit, have led to soaring inflation in UK and a severe cost of living crisis. Another worrying consequence of Brexit is that Britain risks being cut out of the  Horizon Research programme, a critical European research collaboration which has brought many institutions together and has seen collaborative work presented at many recent MEI Conferences.

In the middle of the month the Metropolitan Police inquiry into Downing Street parties finally came to an end, resulting in 126 fines. Boris Johnson was fined only once for his birthday party but not for the bigger BYOB drinks party in No. 10 garden, while many junior staff were, causing many to ask why he could have legally been at so many illegal lockdown gatherings. Publication of photos last week showing conclusively that Johnson attended a party in November 2020 put more pressure on him to resign, and a few days later the long-awaited Sue Gray report on 'partygate' was published, which was damning in its findings. But despite stating to MPs in the commons that he took full responsibility for what happened in Downing Street during lockdown, he still believed at the time that the parties were 'work functions' and that he must now be allowed to 'get on with the job'. What will it take to remove from office this disgraceful excuse for a prime minister and his sycophantic ministers, who are wheeled out each day to morning TV to make fools of themselves by trying to defend the indefensible? Hoping to appease the populace, with impeccable timing, a day after the publication of the 'partygate' report Chancellor Rishi Sunak announced a temporary windfall tax on oil and gas companies to ease the burden of massive increases in household energy bills.

The Times, 26 May

Living in UK we could be forgiven for thinking that the pandemic is over, as social distancing has basically been abandoned and very few people are now wearing face coverings. Reports from other countries belie this however, many major Chinese cities for instance being in strict lockdown.

MEI's Physical Separation '22, originally scheduled for Falmouth, was held online in May and Amanda opened an MEI conference for the first time. The conference included a 2-hour panel discussion on the future of physical separation, which was brilliantly chaired by Dr. Erin Bobicki of the University of Alberta. The panel discussion and all the presentations are now available on demand, so it is not too late to register.

We have been nervous about reinstating the Falmouth conferences due to the great uncertainties with Covid, so this month's IntegratedMinPro '22 and next month's Sustainable Minerals '22 are online, but hopefully in next month's update we should have news of Falmouth 2023.

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