He was an acquired taste whose appeal passed many by, but who found an audience which enjoyed unconventional opinions and flamboyant delivery on matters ranging from drugs legislation, to the overthrow of capitalism, from his support for West Ham to the expansion of state surveillance, and his opposition to vaccine mandates. 

At one stage, his Youtube channel garnered some 14.5m weekly views. 

It is through digital platforms, including X, formerly Twitter, that Brand has attempted to rebut the historic accusations from four women, one of whom says she was 16 and a schoolgirl at the time of the assault. 

Two other incidents are claimed to have taken place in Los Angeles where Brand was developing a Hollywood career, and the fourth is contained in a book by an ex-girlfriend in which she said she was sexually attacked by a man she originally named as “Randall Grand”.

Brand says he was contacted by The Sunday Times and Channel 4 prior to the publication of the story, and said that their reporting contained “a litany” of “astonishing, rather baroque attacks”, and “some very serious allegations that I absolutely refute”.

For TV companies, it is another in a series of controversies with allegations of male coercion or predatory behaviour at their centre. 

Charities have started to distance themselves from Brand, who said at the time of the #MeToo movement that he had nothing to regret about his previous sexual behaviour. Those assertions will be held up to scrutiny in the weeks and months ahead.

Ireland's toothless vaping law

Ireland may have led the way in reducing smoking in public, and has a number of doughty opponents, Tánaiste Micheál Martin among them, to the widespread uptake of vaping, but some mixed evidence has emerged on how best to deal with its increasing popularity.

One body of research has linked vaping to rising stress in teenagers and young adults, while a separate study has confirmed that the vape may be the best tool to help smokers kick the habit. The UK is about to ban the sale of single-use vapes on the back of worries that flavoured models and bright packaging target young people, despite the fact that it is already illegal to sell to this market. There is also a rather less convincing argument by campaigners attempting to wrap themselves in a debate about plastic waste.

Irish legislation drafted before the summer recess prohibits the sale of nicotine-inhaling products to anyone under 18 years and limits the retail sale of tobacco and nicotine products through a licensing system.

International experience tends to show that criminalising something which is traded openly usually results in the creation of a black market. In Australia, which has been as heavy-handed in this area as it was in its approach to covid-19, 92% of vapes are sold illegally, lacking any consumer safeguards or protection for vulnerable citizens.

However, Mr Martin, who introduced the workplace smoking ban in Ireland when he was health minister in 2004, is on record supporting the Australian approach, which decrees that vape products only be sold in pharmacies, with subdued packaging, while nicotine concentrations will also be reduced. All single-use disposable vapes will be banned.

There is little doubt that a ban would attract widespread support from a general public which is always attracted to “something must be done” causes. Whether instituting yet another level of bureaucracy and illegality when we can’t
police and implement our current rules is the point at issue. It is often wiser to ensure existing laws are properly implemented before introducing new tranches of legislation.

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Jones is right — It's not cricket

Eddie Jones may not be everyone’s cup of tea, least of all the nation whose favourite brew it is, but the Australian coach may have a point when he warns that the ever-increasing and over-arching use of television match officials (TMO) is damaging rugby as a spectacle.

Jones is never averse to setting up a straw man to deflect attention from himself, particularly helpful after his team’s setback against Fiji yesterday, but he will find a lot of support for the view that repetitious reviewing of incidents is breaking up the game and sowing confusion among fans. 

It’s not making the game better for players either, he argues. The average ball-in-play session is 30 seconds while the average break in the game is 70 seconds. This places emphasis on the sport being a “power contest” and robs games of continuity.

Rugby and soccer are now in the same boat, losing spontaneity without eradicating the causes of controversy. It was bound to be so once governing bodies made a devil’s pact with TV companies and their technology and established them as the conduit through which decisions are made and communicated. 

What works well in a sport with many natural pause points and an extensive rule book — cricket is a good example — fails on the fields of fast contact.

There is a laconic comment which is often delivered when a fan disagrees with developments in their favourite sport. “The game’s gone”, critics like to say. 

Rugby took video assistance on board in 1999, and soccer started in 2017. Both have introduced a joylessness to our lives. While some people like to defer or delay pleasure, that should not extend to waiting several minutes to celebrate a try or a goal. 

Thank goodness, then, that we didn’t have to wait to enjoy the moment when Johnny Sexton installed himself as Ireland’s greatest ever points scorer, albeit ahead of Ronan O’Gara of Munster and the Irish Examiner. And not without, of course, TMO wiping out an earlier score which would have given him the record. As that was a meat-and-potatoes penalty, perhaps this was one occasion when technology had a heart.