On Monday Kevin Maguire tweeted a picture of an empty fruit and veg aisle at Sainsbury’s, writing ”Don’t want to alarm anybody but the panic buying’s started in my local Sainsbury’s.” Which could only have the opposite result to his stated intention.

The Kingston branch of Sainsbury’s near our Kev’s house in leafy Richmond Park does not have any shortages – as can be seen from the picture taken by a co-conspirator the following day on Tuesday. Maybe deliveries were held up, though Britain produces 60% of its own food and most of our vegetables, particularly potatoes. Certainly the potatoes should have been full. They could have sold out or been cleared out for fresh produce.

The narrative some in the media are trying to promote of Brexit Britain suffering shortages is contradicted by many people working in supply chain logistics. Whether Maguire posted the photo in good faith, he appears not have done any basic journalism like asking the staff why it was empty. Guido gets the impression that Maguire was being disingenuous…

Hat-tip: David Atherton

Yesterday the Mirror claimed Boris Johnson had a “death plan” to kill school children by forcing them back to school in June. It goes without saying there is no such plan and all the medical research suggests children are thankfully almost immune from this terrible virus. Last month they claimed that 50,000 people were set to die on Easter Sunday. The actual number who sadly died on Easter Sunday was in the hundreds. Not tens of thousands. There is tabloid sensationalism and there is absolutely disgraceful scaremongering.

There is a lot of hand wringing punditry about fake news being spread on social media by the likes of David Icke. Here’s two examples of fake news being spread by the traditional dead tree press…