A SHORTAGE of brie, underage sexting and the vindication of Piers Morgan’s comments about Meghan Markle were the topics raised by columnists and contributors in the newspapers.

The Daily Express

Paul Baldwin said we were staring down the barrel of a full on crisis, post Brexit.

“If the dread warnings are right apparently it may soon become marginally more difficult to buy Roquefort and brie,” he said. “It gets worse. Chorizo, that granite-hard Spanish sausage nobody actually eats, might also be in short supply. The horror!”

He said we now have deepening import/export problems.

“Now every UK lorry taking food to the EU carries 700 pages of new paperwork and is delayed on average 24 hours,” he said. “So now EU exports are going to get the 700 pages treatment too.

“Remember, because of Brexit the UK economy is set to grow by almost eight percent this year - dwarfing the rest of Europe. So I won’t be crying into my Simpson’s Estate Chardonnay (Kent) as the shelves run dry of those nastily insipid French brie, I shall simply cut myself an extra large chunk of Colston Bassett Stilton (Nottinghamshire) and tuck in.”

The Guardian

Ian Hamilton, senior lecturer in addiction at York University, said sexting was one of the dangers of the advances in digital communications brought about by smartphones.

“Global estimates suggest that 14.8 per cent of 12 to 17-year-olds have sent a sext and a staggering 27.4 per cent have received one,” he said.

“Receiving and sending sexts at an early age is associated with a range of other harms and problems.

“At the moment, any educational intervention around sex and staying safe online is only available to secondary school-aged adolescents, if it happens at all. What we need to confront, uncomfortable as it may be, is that the issue must be addressed at a much earlier age, if we are to stand any chance of protecting young children from this type of activity.”

The Daily Mail

Piers Morgan said Ofcom’s vindication of the comments he made about not believing the Duchess of Sussex’s comments in her Oprah Winfrey interview came down to an ‘unequivocal and emphatic endorsement of my right to an opinion.’

“Make no mistake, this is a watershed moment in the battle for free speech.

“If Ofcom had found against me, that would have signalled the end of every UK TV journalist’s right to express any honestly held opinion on air lest it upset the likes of Meghan Markle.

“The whole point of journalism is surely to question and challenge statements from public figures, particularly when no actual evidence is produced to support them?”