LONDON has a new landmark – a purple line that runs along Oxford Street telling tourists and locals alike to: Mind the Grab.

They are in the nation’s phone-snatching hotspot.

And with a smartphone stolen every eight minutes in London, getting your device nicked by some two-wheeled scumbag is a very real possibility.

“Enough is enough,” says Ed Connolly, of electrical retailer Currys, who are behind the scheme.

“It’s time to draw the line on phone theft.

“That’s why we’ve launched the Mind the Grab campaign — a bold pavement marking we believe can make a real difference by encouraging people to step back from the kerb.”

Good for Currys. But what a tragedy it is not our invisible police, the useless London Mayor or our spineless politicians who had the wit and will to say enough is enough.

And what a crying shame it is the innocent, law-abiding and decent who must adapt their behaviour as thieving little bastards are allowed to run amok.

But this is the country we now live in.

There are voices on the Left who insist statistics prove crime’s going down.

But that is not the way it feels when you see the thin purple line on Oxford Street. And that is certainly not what the rest of the world believes.

Degrade quality of life

My family was in Lapland earlier this year when a fellow traveller was shocked to learn that we live in London.

“Do you feel safe there?” she gasped. And she was from . . . Iran.

But this view of the UK as a lawless land is growing.

The Australian government warns its citizens to “exercise a high degree of caution” when visiting the UK, because “petty crime is common, including pickpocketing and thieves who use scooters and bicycles to snatch belongings”.

It is not just Australia. New Zealand, France, Canada, the UAE and even Mexico — home of the drug cartels! — all warn their citizens to beware.

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The heartbroken family of student Mohammed Algasim, 20, stabbed to death in an “unprovoked” attack in Cambridge, say the UK is “no longer safe” for visitors.

Mr Algasim’s family are from Saudi Arabia. And who would dare to contradict them?

The Broken Windows Theory of crime states that visible signs of criminality — broken windows, graffiti, the stink of weed — create an urban environment that encourages further crime. And that is exactly where we are today.

Last year around 80,000 people had their phones stolen in London.

Yes, phone theft is horrible. But then so is burglary, shoplifting, mugging and knife crime. They all degrade and coarsen our quality of life.

The decline of the social contract means we are becoming a nation fit for thieving, violent little scumbags

They all make us feel our loved ones are not safe on the streets where we live.

Exactly 14 years on from the riots of the summer of 2011, you will hear many smug voices telling you Nigel Farage is wrong to speak of lawless Britain.

I guess these people don’t get out of the house much. Because as they close all of the police stations, the coppers withdraw from sight and the UK becomes the global centre of street crime, the UK sure as hell doesn’t feel safer than it has ever been.

Significantly, the Australian government gives the UK a Level 2 rating, reflecting “a weak law and order system, where violent crime is common”, and a country that “may lack some key public services, such as a responsive police force”.

Yes, that’s us! The police will not save you. The courts will do bugger all.

We are on our own now. Because there has clearly been a fraying of the social contract in this country.

• Meaning — the way we behave.
• Meaning — how we treat each other.
• Meaning — our sense of our rights and our duties.
• Meaning — the immutable standards, values and beliefs we all share.
• Meaning — communal sense of decency.

Now, hurting someone you don’t know is socially acceptable. There is nothing pathetic, nasty and cruel about taking something that doesn’t belong to you.

Shoplifting, phone theft, mugging, assault ­— it is no big deal.

And it ends with a student, a beloved son who was thrilled to be in the UK for ten weeks, bleeding to death.

The decline of the social contract means we are becoming a nation fit for thieving, violent little scumbags.

And I fear it will take more than a thin purple line to stop them.

Name shame

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BACK in the Sixties they asked, would you let your daughter go with a Rolling Stone?

Now the question is, would you name your baby after a Rolling Stone?

Probably not. Keith is no longer in the top 100 names. Neither is Mick.

All those “dad” names – Steve is another one, and Ian and Nigel – are on the way out.

As is Tony. Nobody would call their baby Tony these days.

One of us launches an unnecessary and unprovoked war against Iraq on fabricated evidence and suddenly our name is mud.

Still a trump card

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I HAD my doubts about the Tory scheme to send illegal migrants to Rwanda.

Too legally complicated, I thought. And too prohibitively expensive.

The £700million scheme was promptly ditched when Labour won the election.

But how galling that Rwanda is now taking 250 migrants from the US under Donald Trump’s removal system.

And their pleasant accommodation in Rwanda will be paid for by the British taxpayer.

Perhaps Rwanda will work as a deterrent after all.

And it will certainly be a much greater deterrent to illegal migration than Labour’s “one-in, one-out” deal with France, meaningless sound bites about “smashing the gangs”.

And Home Secretary Yvette Cooper looking very, very cross.

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OZZY OSBOURNE’S death certificate describes the Black Sabbath supremo as a “songwriter, performer and rock legend”.

That sounds like a good job.

What’s the money like?

Home front

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LABOUR’S minister for homelessness, Rushanara Ali, has resigned after turfing four tenants out of her London rental property – and then re-listing the same gaff for £700 a month more!

Hypocritical? Undoubtedly.

But you must admire Ali’s flair for economic growth.

Perhaps she should be Chancellor.

Top Marks for putting Aimee in Christmas ads

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WITH only 137 days to Christmas, thoughts turn inevitably to the big Yuletide commercials.

Marks & Spencer has signed Aimee Lou Wood to front its Christmas campaign – a definite upgrade of last year’s effort (Dawn French as an unfunny fairy).

Aimee was the best thing in the third series of The White Lotus.

The Stockport-born actress, 31, is glamorous yet approachable, charismatic yet relatable. She seems nice. Very British.

The perfect fit to front a Christmas campaign for an institution like M&S.

Aimee definitely has a girl-next-door quality.

If you happen to live next door to one of the hottest names in Hollywood.

Want to keep track of the largest startup funding deals in 2025 with our curated list of $100 million-plus venture deals to U.S.-based companies? Check out The Crunchbase Megadeals Board.

This is a weekly feature that runs down the week’s top 10 announced funding rounds in the U.S. Check out last week’s biggest funding rounds here.

The pace of giant funding rounds slowed a bit this week. However, we still did see some jumbo-sized deals in the mix, topped by a $355 million growth round for First Due, a software provider for emergency responders. Healthcare and AI were also significant sectors for funding, as illustrated below.

1. First Due, $355M, public safety: First Due, a Garden City, New York-based provider of software for emergency first responders, announced that it secured a $355 million strategic minority growth investment led by JMI Equity. Founded in 2016, First Due’s technology currently helps power operations for over 3,000 local, state and federal agencies in the United States and Canada.

2. Strand Therapeutics, $153M, biotechnology: Boston-based Strand Therapeutics, a developer of mRNA-based therapeutics, raised $153 million in a Series B funding led by Kinnevik. The fundraise follows the company’s announcement of promising initial clinical data for its treatment for patients with advanced solid tumors.

3. Apreo Health, $130M, healthcare: Menlo Park, California-based Apreo Health, a clinical-stage medical device company developing a treatment for severe emphysema, landed $130 million in Series B funding. Bain Capital Life Sciences and Norwest Venture Partners led the financing, which will fund its next trials and early commercialization efforts.

4. BeatBread, $124M, financial services: BeatBread, a platform for independent musicians to make money from their work, raised $124 million in debt and equity funding. Citi Sprint led the financing for the 5-year-old company.

5. Decart, $100M, artificial intelligence: San Francisco-headquartered Decart, developer of an AI model focused on interactive experiences, reportedly closed on $100 million in a Series B funding round at a $3.1 billion valuation. Investors in the round included Sequoia Capital, Benchmark, Zeev Ventures and Aleph.

6. (tied) Rillet, $70M, fintech: Fintech startup Rillet picked up $70 million in a Series B funding round co-led by Andreessen Horowitz and Iconiq Capital. The Palo Alto, California-based company describes itself as an AI-native ERP, or Enterprise Resource Planning software, built for CFOs and accounting teams at high-growth companies.

6. (tied) Chai Discovery, $70M, healthcare AI: Chai Discovery, a startup using AI to predict and reprogram the interactions between biochemical molecules for drug research and development, secured $70 million in Series A funding. Menlo Ventures led the financing for the San Francisco-based company.

8. Stavtar Solutions, $55M, enterprise software: New York-based Stavtar Solutions, a provider of business spend management and expense allocation tools, raised $55 million in a Series A investment backed by Elephant.

9. Positive Development, $51.5M, healthcare: Positive Development, a provider of developmental therapy for autistic children and their families, closed on $51.5 million in Series C funding. B Capital, aMoon Fund and Flare Capital Partners led the financing for the McLean, Virginia-based company.

10. Human Interest, $50M, financial services: San Francisco-based Human Interest, a 401k retirement plan provider focused on smaller businesses, announced that Morgan Stanley Tactical Value has agreed to invest up to $50 million. The financing, revealed this week, is part of a previously announced Series E round.

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the Crunchbase database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the seven-day period of Aug. 2-8. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.

Illustration: Dom Guzman