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c1b5eca5de62c23a52da797ee2c249ef | Ex-officer breaks down after Manchester bomb plotter's prison assault
An alleged attack by the Manchester Arena bomb plotter on prison officers at a high-security jail "will stick with" those impacted "for the rest of their lives", a former officer and colleague of the victims has said.
Hashem Abedi is accused of violently assaulting officers at HMP Frankland in Durham last weekend, using hot cooking oil and an improvised, or homemade, weapon.
He was serving his sentence in a separation unit, known as a "jail within a jail", after being found guilty of 22 counts of murder for helping his brother Salman Abedi carry out a suicide bombing at an Ariana Grande concert in 2017.
The attack has raised fresh questions about the safety of prison staff.
Inmates inside separation units had access to cooking facilities, which has now been suspended.
Image: Abedi was moved back to Belmarsh after the alleged attack
'It will stick with them for life'
Matthew, who only wants to be referred to by his first name, worked with the officers who were hospitalised following the attack.
"I've spoken to ex-colleagues who I'm still friends with," he told Sky News.
"They've not discussed the specifics of the incident, but they've said it will stick with them for the rest of their lives."
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Matthew broke down as he described the "obscene" and "ludicrous" levels of violence that staff face inside prison.
He's worked at a number of different jails.
"I've been there when you're mopping your colleagues' blood… when you've seen a serious assault, and you don't know if they're gonna be OK, and then 10 minutes later, you've got to get back on with your day, you've got to carry on running the regime," he said.
"It is difficult, and it is awful."
Image: Matthew worked with the officers who were hospitalised
'No adequate protection'
There were 10,496 assaults against prison staff in England and Wales in the 12 months to September - a 19% rise on the previous year.
"The reality is there's no adequate protections for prison staff, and that's a great frustration," the general secretary of the Prison Officers' Association union, Steve Gillan, told Sky News.
Having visited HMP Frankland earlier in the week, and spoken to many of the officers who were involved, Mr Gillan described the mood among colleagues as one of "anger, frustration, and sadness".
The association, which represents prison officers, is calling for a "reset" - and for staff to be given stab-proof vests and tasers in "certain circumstances".
Read more:
Prisons now 98.9% full
Fewer criminals to be jailed
Image: Steve Gillan
'The entire system needs to change'
Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood said she shared "the country's shock and anger" at the attack.
The government has launched a review that will look at how it was able to happen, and will also consider how separation centres are run.
The Prison Service is also conducting a "snap" review into whether protective body armour should be available to frontline staff.
But ex-officer Matthew said "nobody is ever truly safe" in the prison service, with staff facing "impossible challenges every day".
"The entire system needs to change," he added. "From the ground up." | {
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"title": "Ex-officer breaks down after Manchester bomb plotter's prison assault",
"url": "https://news.sky.com/story/nobody-is-truly-safe-ex-prison-officers-grim-warning-after-bomb-plotters-jail-attack-13351768"
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313fc256668e95394cdea01e1b26f266 | Carlo Acutis: How do you become a saint - and how did the millennial saint do it?
London-born teenager Carlo Acutis is about to become the first millennial saint, almost 20 years after his death.
The teenager, whose Italian family moved to Milan months after his birth in 1991, dedicated his short life to Catholicism, and died of leukaemia in 2006 aged 15.
Having passed all the posthumous trials necessary for sainthood, he will be canonised on 27 April in St Peter's Square in Vatican City.
But what does it take to become a saint and how did Carlo achieve it?
Here's everything you need to know.
What does it mean to be a saint?
All Christians are called to be saints, but only a select few throughout history have been officially recognised as one.
A saint is defined in Catholicism as people in heaven who lived heroically virtuous lives, offered their life for others, or were martyred for the faith, and who are worthy of imitation.
How do you become a saint - and how did Carlo do it?
There are four steps on the path to becoming a saint:
Stage 1 - Servant of God
A postulator - essentially a cheerleader advocating for the candidate - gathers testimony and documentation and presents the case to the Vatican's Congregation for the Causes of Saints.
This process usually begins at least five years after the death of the person in question.
Carlo was dedicated to the church throughout his short life, receiving first communion at the age of seven and regularly attending daily Mass, praying the rosary and participating in eucharistic adoration.
But it was through mixing his faith with technology that Carlo had the most impact, informally becoming known as "God's influencer" as he used his computer skills to spread the Catholic faith.
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He started publishing newsletters for his local churches, taking care of his parish website and later of a Vatican-based academy.
He became particularly interested in something called Eucharistic miracles.
These are events deemed miracles which take place around the Eucharist, which is the traditional name the Christian church gives to the re-enactment of the Last Supper.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player 0:41 Pope Francis thanks doctors
It's the moment when the faithful are given a small piece of bread and a sip of wine, called the Holy Communion. They believe that, through the consumption of the bread and wine, Jesus Christ enters those who take part.
Carlo started logging miracles on a website, which eventually went viral and has since been translated into many of the world's most widely spoken languages.
Stage 2 - Venerable
If worthy, the case is forwarded to the Pope, who signs a decree confirming the candidate's "heroic virtues". The person is now called "venerable".
Carlo was named venerable in 2018 after the church recognised his virtuous life, and his body was taken to a shrine in Assisi's Santuario della Spogliazione, a major site linked to St Francis' life.
Stage 3 - Beatification
Image: Carlo Acutis lies in state ahead of being beatified in 2020. File pic: AP/Gregorio Borgia
You become beatified - the declaration by the Pope that a dead person is in a state of bliss - when a miracle in your name is identified and formally declared a miracle by the Pope.
The Roman Catholic Church teaches that only God performs miracles, but that saints who are believed to be with God in heaven intercede on behalf of people who pray to them.
Typically, miracles are the medically inexplicable healing of a person.
The Pope tends to accept it as such when witnesses "verify" someone was healed after prayer and doctors/clergy conclude that it had no medical explanation, was instant and lasting.
If verified, the candidate is beatified and becomes "blessed".
Carlo's first supposed miracle was the healing of a boy called Mattheus Vianna, who was born in 2009 in Brazil with a serious birth defect that left him unable to keep food in his stomach.
As a young boy, he was forced to live on vitamins and protein shakes but regularly vomited after meals and was unable to put on weight.
Mattheus, according to his priest, touched one of Carlo's relics in church and said "stop vomiting" - an act which is said to have cured him.
In February 2014, his family ordered further tests and he was found to be fully cured, the priest said.
In 2019, the claimed miracle was acknowledged by the Vatican and confirmed by Pope Francis a few months later, paving the way for Carlo to become beatified in 2020.
Stage 4 - Sainthood
A second miracle is required in order to reach sainthood.
If verified, the candidate can be canonised and made a saint. A formal canonisation ceremony at the Vatican follows.
Image: Figures of Carlo on sale at a souvenir store ahead of his canonisation. Pic: Christoph Sator/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images
The second miracle in Carlo's name was the reported healing of a Costa Rican girl studying in Italy who suffered a major head trauma.
Her mother said she prayed at Carlo's tomb after the incident, invoking his spirit and leading to her daughter's full recovery.
Pope Francis attributed the second miracle to Carlo after a meeting with the head of the Vatican's saint-making department, Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, in May 2024.
Sainthood is rare - but not as much as it used to be
It isn't known exactly how many sainthoods have been handed out in the Catholic church's history, though estimates tend to sit at around 10,000.
For hundreds of years, they were selected through public acclaim, until Pope John XV led the first canonisation in the year 993, making Bishop Ulrich of Augsburg a saint.
Canonisation has been more common in recent years, though, with the late Pope John Paul II, who was the Pope from 1978 until his death in 2005, declaring 482 saints during his tenure - more than all of his predecessors.
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That record was overtaken just two months into Pope Francis' tenure, as he canonised more than 800 15th-century martyrs, the so-called "Martyrs of Otranto," who were beheaded for refusing to convert to Islam.
Since then, the Pope has gone on to grant a number of other high-profile sainthoods, including his predecessors Pope John Paul II and John XXIII, married couple Louis and Zelie Martin, who lived in France during the 19th century, and Mother Teresa.
He'll take to St Peter's Square on 27 April at 9.30am UK time - in conjunction with the celebration of the Holy Year's jubilee for teens - and canonise the first ever millennial saint. | {
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0bdade2411bc8922e69bd93472c1a2d4 | Farage accused of peddling 'nonsense and lies' - as he predicts 'the new Brexit'
Ed Miliband has accused Nigel Farage of peddling "nonsense and lies" about the government's commitment to net zero, as the Reform UK leader said the issue could become the "new Brexit".
The energy secretary said both Mr Farage's party and the Conservatives were prepared to "make up any old nonsense and lies to pursue their ideological agenda" ahead of next month's local elections.
The former Labour leader also warned if an anti-net zero agenda was followed, it would not only risk "climate breakdown" but also "forfeit the clean energy jobs of the future" in Britain.
In an article for The Observer referring to price rises that began in 2022, he wrote: "Our exposure to fossil fuels meant that, as those markets went into meltdown and prices rocketed, family, business and public finances were devastated.
"The cost of living impacts caused back then still stalk families today."
Image: Ed Miliband during a visit to the London Power Tunnels. Pic: PA
'Hopelessly out of touch'
After the government's decision to take control of British Steel from its Chinese owners earlier this month, Mr Farage accused Mr Miliband, whom he has repeatedly called "Red Ed", of pursuing "net-zero lunacy".
He said efforts to cut carbon emissions have made it harder to source the coal required to keep blast furnaces at the company's crisis-hit Scunthorpe plant running after supplies were shipped from abroad last week.
In an interview with The Sun, Mr Farage said net zero could become "the new Brexit", "where parliament is so hopelessly out of touch with the country".
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The Reform leader wants the government to ditch its target of achieving net zero by 2050.
Since she became Tory leader, Kemi Badenoch has also cast doubt on the government's commitment to achieving net zero by 2050 - a target made by her own party.
But Sir Keir Starmer is expected to double down on the government's commitment to clean power at an International Energy Agency conference in London this week.
Read more from Sky News:
Upskirted teacher on misogynistic attitudes in classroom
Why families are facing agonising waits to bury their loved ones
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player 0:45 Farage rides on tractor
'We need a British DOGE'
In his interview with The Sun, Mr Farage also vowed to be Britain's equivalent of Elon Musk by cutting excess council spending if his party claims victory in next month's local elections.
Mr Musk's so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has dismantled entire US federal agencies and cut tens of thousands of jobs.
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The Reform leader said he would "send in the auditors" to every council Reform wins, adding: "The whole thing has to change. We need a British DOGE for every county and every local authority in this country."
That's despite the National Audit Office warning councils are facing a major funding crisis, with social care in particular putting huge strain on their budgets.
Votes for 1,641 council seats across 23 authorities in England will take place on 1 May. | {
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4fbef4f6ccfeb293da328ec221bf57f4 | NHS cancer patients denied life-saving drugs due to Brexit costs, report finds
British cancer patients are being denied life-saving drugs and trials of revolutionary treatments are being derailed by the red tape and extra costs brought on by Brexit, a leaked report warns.
Soaring numbers are being diagnosed with the disease amid a growing and ageing population, improved diagnosis initiatives and wider public awareness – making global collaborations to find new medicines essential.
But five years after the UK’s exit from the EU, the most comprehensive analysis of its kind concludes that while patients across Europe are benefiting from a golden age of pioneering research and novel treatments, Britons with cancer have “lost out” thanks to rising prices and red tape.
Brexit has “damaged the practical ability” of doctors to offer NHS patients life-saving new drugs via international clinical trials, according to the 54-page report obtained by the Guardian.
In some cases, the cost of importing new cancer drugs for Britons has nearly quadrupled as a result of post-Brexit red tape. Some trials have had shipping costs alone increase to 10 times since Brexit.
The extra rules and costs have had a “significant negative impact” on UK cancer research, creating “new barriers” that are “holding back life-saving research” for Britons, the report says.
In some cases, the impact has been devastating. Children are among the NHS cancer patients whose tumours have returned or treatment has stopped working, leaving them in limbo and denied drugs that could extend or save their lives, senior doctors told the Guardian.
Sources said officials in the Cabinet Office and the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology were studying the findings of the review.
It cites evidence from a range of leading clinicians, scientists and researchers, and was compiled by experts from organisations including Cancer Research UK, the University of Southampton, and Hatch, a research consultancy.
In a statement, the government said clinical trials were vital to millions of Britons with long-term conditions for whom limited treatments were available in routine care, including cancer patients for whom routine therapies were ineffective.
Ministers were committed to “strengthening” the UK’s relationship with the EU on research, and the government offered “extensive support” for UK researchers to help them secure funding, a spokesperson added.
Three areas of UK cancer research have been hit particularly hard by its departure from the EU, according to the report. They are the regulatory environment for clinical trials, the mobility of the cancer research workforce and access to research funding and collaboration.
Clinical trial groups and universities are struggling to attract “global talent” in cancer research to come to Britain, with UK patients missing out on the expertise of the world’s top cancer scientists.
At the same time, UK researchers are finding it “more difficult” to attract grant funding to explore new ways to save the lives of patients “due to additional bureaucracy since the UK left the EU”.
The report also reveals the UK is needlessly duplicating drug testing in clinical trials involving the UK and EU, with extra checks causing potentially deadly delays.
In one case, the UK had to spend an extra £22,000 for an official to certify batches of aspirin for use in a cancer trial. Aspirin is one of the world’s most familiar drugs and the batches had already been checked in the EU.
Meanwhile, Brexit is having a wider, damaging effect on life-saving research in the EU, the report adds. “The exclusion of UK researchers from European cancer research activities has had, and will continue to have, negative consequences for the overall European cancer research effort,” it says.
Leading experts shown the report by the Guardian said the harm Brexit had inflicted on UK cancer research and NHS patients had been inevitable and predicted to occur.
“Those of us who understood the EU warned repeatedly about precisely these concerns,” said Dr Martin McKee, a professor of European Public Health at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. “These findings are not just predictable, they were predicted.”
He added: “It was always inevitable that Brexit would lead to costly duplication and barriers to collaboration.”
Mark Dayan, the Brexit programme lead at the Nuffield Trust, a health thinktank, said the report highlighted “concrete examples” of “disruptions which many warned were inevitable from the moment that we left the EU with a relatively hard Brexit for health and research”.
The UK and EU are due to renew the trade and cooperation agreement this year, and discuss a wider reset which will shape the future UK-EU relationship.
Keir Starmer should make the case for “a new pact to protect health”, Dayan said, “cutting back pointless post-Brexit red tape on medicines testing and research approvals by being willing to cooperate and offer guarantees”.
The report recommends the creation of a mutual recognition agreement for testing medicines, to cut costs for researchers leading cross-border trials. Without it, patients will experience further delays to trials in future, denying them access to potentially life-saving treatments, it says.
A government spokesperson said: “We are strengthening our relationship with the EU on research and have been providing extensive support for researchers to help them secure funding from the £80bn Horizon Europe programme and get more vital treatments from the lab to patients.”
Last year, the Guardian revealed how hundreds of thousands of people in the UK were being forced to wait months to begin even basic cancer treatment, such as surgery, radiotherapy or chemotherapy, with deadly delays “routine” and even children denied timely care. | {
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d30c576be84de8b206dae0cc3b2908f2 | Israeli military admits ‘professional failures’ over Gaza paramedic killings
Israel’s military has admitted to several “professional failures” and a breach of orders in the killing of 15 rescue workers in Gaza last month, and said that it was dismissing a deputy commander responsible.
The deadly shooting of eight Red Crescent paramedics, six civil defence workers and a UN staffer by Israeli troops, as they carried out a rescue mission in southern Gaza at dawn on 23 March, had prompted international outcry and calls for a war crimes investigation.
Their bodies were uncovered days after the shooting, buried in a sandy mass grave alongside their crushed vehicles. The UN said they had been killed “one by one”. Israel at first claimed that the medics’ vehicles did not have emergency signals on when troops opened fire but later backtracked after phone video recovered from one of the medics contradicted the account.
On Sunday, the military said an investigation had “identified several professional failures, breaches of orders, and a failure to fully report the incident”.
As a result, the deputy commander of the IDF’s Golani Brigade “will be dismissed from his position due to his responsibilities as the field commander … and for providing an incomplete and inaccurate report during the debrief”.
Another commander, whose unit was in operation in the southern city of Rafah, where the killings took place, would be censured for “his overall responsibility for the incident”, the military said.
0:15 Bodies of health workers pulled from the burial site – video
Despite admitting mistakes, the report does not recommend any criminal action to be taken against the military units responsible for the incident and found no violation of the IDF’s code of ethics. The findings of the report will now be passed along to the military advocate general. Israel’s extreme-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, called the army chief’s decision to dismiss the responsible deputy commander “a grave mistake”.
The Palestine Red Crescent rejected the findings.
“The report is full of lies. It is invalid and unacceptable, as it justifies the killing and shifts responsibility to a personal error in the field command when the truth is quite different,” Nebal Farsakh, spokesperson for the Red Crescent, told AFP.
Human rights lawyers also called the inquiry into question, pointing out that it had been done by Israel’s military itself and alleging it lacked independence.
Sawsan Zaher, a Palestinian human rights lawyer based in Israel, said: “There is nothing objective or neutral about this inquiry. The severity of this case should have led to an immediate criminal investigation. Instead we see the Israeli military inquiring into itself and yet again evidence of violations of international law and war crimes are swept under the carpet.”
The report maintains, without providing further evidence, that six of the 15 Palestinians killed were Hamas militants. Previous claims by Israel along the same lines have been denied by the Red Crescent.
The investigation provided the most thorough account from Israel’s forces about what they alleged took place that night. According to the report, it was an “operational misunderstanding” by Israeli forces that led them to fire on the ambulances. They denied that there had been any “indiscriminate fire” and claimed troops were simply alert to “real threats” from Hamas on the ground, accusing the militant group of regularly using ambulances to transport weapons and terrorists.
The investigation claimed that “poor night visibility” was to blame for the deputy battalion commander’s conclusion that the ambulances belonged to Hamas militants and the decision to fire on them. Video footage that emerged from the scene showed that the ambulances were clearly moving with flashing emergency lights.
View image in fullscreen A still from a phone video taken by one of the medics killed, showing Red Crescent emergency vehicles with lights and sirens flashing and their logos clearly visible. Photograph: AP
The investigation also found that the shooting of a UN vehicle, which drove past 15 minutes later, was carried out in violation of orders.
Daniel Machover, a human rights lawyer who co-founded Lawyers for Palestinian Human Rights, said the admission of the circumstances of the killing of the UN worker, who was in a clearly marked UN vehicle, “alone should be grounds for a court martial and a war crimes investigation, not simply a dismissal”.
After uncovering the bodies from a sandy grave in Gaza days after the attack, a UN official said the workers had been killed “one by one”, while the head of the Palestinian Red Crescent Society has said the men were “targeted at close range”.
Some witnesses and relatives have also alleged there was evidence that at least one of the victims had had their hands bound.
The military’s report said there was “no evidence to support claims of execution or that any of the deceased were bound before or after the shooting”. Ahmed Dhair, the forensic pathologist in Gaza who carried out the postmortems on the victims, said last week that he had not seen visible signs of restraint.
The Israeli military also defended the decision by soldiers to “evacuate” the bodies the next morning and claimed that while the decision to crush their vehicles was wrong, “there was no attempt to hide the incident”.
Dhair told the Guardian last week that the postmortems showed the victims were mostly killed by gunshots to the head and torso, as well as injuries caused by explosives. Dhair alleged evidence of “explosive bullets” in the bodies he had examined.
The Israeli statement on the findings concluded by saying that Israel’s military “regrets the harm caused to uninvolved civilians”. Asked if he thought the incident represented a pervasive issue within the Israeli military, Maj Gen Yoav Har-Even, who headed the inquiry, told journalists: “We’re saying it was a mistake, we don’t think it’s a daily mistake.”
Last week, Palestinian Red Crescent said that one of the two Palestinian paramedics who had survived the shooting, Assad al-Nsasrah, remained in Israeli detention.
View image in fullscreen Their bodies were uncovered days after the shooting, buried in a sandy mass grave alongside their crushed vehicles. Photograph: PRCS
Palestinians and international human rights groups have repeatedly accused Israel’s military of failing to properly investigate or whitewashing misconduct by its troops. A recent report by Yesh Din, an Israeli human rights organisation, concluded that Israel “did not take appropriate action to investigate suspected violations of international law that occurred as part of its war in Gaza”.
Ziv Stahl, the executive director of Yesh Din, said: “It’s another example of the almost full impunity given to soldiers for events in Gaza. In this case, I think they were quick to handle it because of the international pressure they are facing. By taking this small disciplinary action against one commander, it undermines any chance of a wider criminal investigation.”
The international criminal court, established by the international community as a court of last resort, has accused the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and the former defence minister Yoav Gallant of war crimes. Israel, which is not a member of the court, has long asserted that its legal system is capable of investigating the army, and Netanyahu has accused the ICC of antisemitism. | {
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3fc2db3509b38d57650080b9acdca72c | Zelenskyy accuses Russia of violating Putin’s Easter ceasefire 2,000 times
Volodymyr Zelenskyy has dismissed Vladimir Putin’s Easter ceasefire as a fake “PR” exercise and said Russian troops had continued their drone and artillery attacks across many parts of the frontline.
Citing a report from Ukraine’s commander-in-chief, Oleksandr Syrskyi, Zelenskyy said Russia was still using heavy weapons and since 10am on Sunday an increase in Russian shelling had been observed.
He said that, as of 6pm UK time, the Russian army had violated the ceasefire “more than two thousand times”, adding that there had been 67 Russian assaults against Ukrainian positions in various directions.
“In practice, across all main frontline directions, Russia has failed to uphold its own promise of ceasefire,” he wrote on social media.
He also said he had received no response from Russia to his proposal for a full ceasefire for 30 days, adding: “If Russia does not agree to such a step, it will be proof that it intends to continue doing only those things which destroy human lives and prolong the war”.
The current 30-hour truce announced by Putin on Friday is scheduled to end at midnight on Sunday (2100 GMT).
The US state department said it would welcome a ceasefire extension, though the Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, told Russian media no such order had been given by Putin.
Earlier Zelenskyy wrote on social media: “We are documenting every Russian violation of its self-declared commitment to a full ceasefire for the Easter period and are prepared to provide the necessary information to our partners.
“In practice, either Putin does not have full control over his army, or the situation proves that in Russia they have no intention of making a genuine move toward ending the war, and are only interested in favourable PR coverage. The Russian army is attempting to create the general impression of a ceasefire, while in some areas still continuing isolated attempts to advance.”
Zelenskyy later said Ukrainian soldiers had been killed in an ambush in Toretsk in Donetsk oblast. Video footage from the battlefield appeared to confirm his claim that the east of the country was under Russian fire. White puffs of smoke could be seen above the village of Uspenivka, in the Pokrovsk area of Donetsk.
The Russians also reportedly attacked an evacuation convoy in the village of Zoria, near the city of Kostiantynivka. At least two civilians and a rescue worker from the Proliska aid agency were hurt when Russian drones targeted their cars.
View image in fullscreen A military chaplain sprays holy water on service personnel during an Easter service near the frontline in Donetsk region. Photograph: Anatolii Stepanov/Reuters
“For us, it’s just another day of war – with shelling from various types of weapons and even one attempt to assault our positions,” Denys Bobkov, the spokesperson for Ukraine’s 37th separate marine brigade, told the Guardian in a message from the front.
Bobkov said that by 2pm on Sunday his brigade had recorded 16 drone attacks and two artillery strikes. It is fighting near the village of Novopavlivka, south-west of Pokrovsk and on the administrative border between Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk oblasts.
The 66th brigade, based in the city of Lyman, also reported infantry attacks and attempts to repair damaged crossings. “The Russians are using the so-called ‘lull’ to improve their tactical position – to regroup in order to deliver another blow,” it said.
In Moscow, Russia’s defence ministry claimed Ukraine had broken the ceasefire more than 1,000 times. It said there had been more than 900 drone strikes, with damage to infrastructure and civilian casualties. It did not give further details.
After a bloody week, during which Russia killed 35 people in a missile attack in the centre of Sumy, Ukrainian cities were relatively calm on Sunday. Worshippers gathered at St Volodymyr’s cathedral in Kyiv, where priests blessed their Easter baskets with Holy water.
“They’ve already broken their promise. Unfortunately, we cannot trust Russia today,” Olga Grachova, 38, who works in marketing, told the news agency Agence France-Presse.
View image in fullscreen A chaplain conducts an Easter service for soldiers to mark Easter on the frontline in the Zaporizhzhia region. Photograph: Andriy Andriyenko/AP
The US has signalled it is losing patience with both sides. On Friday, Donald Trump said he was ready to walk away from his attempt to broker a peace settlement, declaring: “We want to get it done.”
“Now if for some reason one of the two parties makes it very difficult, we’re just going to say: ‘You’re foolish. You’re fools. You’re horrible people’ – and we’re going to just take a pass,” he said. The US president denied claims that Putin was “playing” him.
Late last night, Trump said on his Truth Social platform that he hoped Ukraine and Russia would make a deal this week and that both would “then start to do big business with the United States of America, which is thriving, and make a fortune”.
The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, met European leaders in Paris last week to discuss how to end the war. Leaks suggest the White House is pushing for a Kremlin-friendly deal that would freeze the conflict along the existing 1000km-long frontline.
Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, has suggested that Crimea and four other Ukrainian provinces could be given to Russia. The US is considering recognising Crimea as Russian and offering Moscow other incentives such as sanctions relief, Bloomberg reported.
The Kremlin insists its original war goals must be achieved. They include the removal of Zelenskyy as Ukraine’s president, as well as the country’s “demilitarisation” and a guarantee of its non-Nato “neutral” status.
Since their disastrous meeting in February in the Oval Office, Zelenskyy has been seeking to improve relations with Washington. Last month, Ukraine accepted a 30-day US ceasefire proposal and it is poised to sign an agreement on Thursday giving the US access to its minerals.
There are hints, however, that Zelenskyy is growing frustrated at the White House’s pro-Putin rhetoric. Trump has piled pressure on Ukraine – in effect cutting off military aid and temporarily pausing intelligence sharing – while taking no corresponding measures against Russia.
On Sunday, Zelenskyy appeared to take a swipe at Fox Television Stations after its Live Now network broadcast live coverage of Putin attending an Orthodox Easter service in Moscow with Russia’s patriarch, while incorrectly labelling Kyiv as part of Russia.
“Instead of broadcasting religious service from Moscow, the focus should be on pressuring Moscow to genuinely commit to a full ceasefire and to maintain it for at least 30 days after Easter – to give diplomacy a real chance,” Zelenskyy wrote on X.
Ukraine’s foreign ministry said it had asked for an explanation. “If this was a mistake rather than a deliberate political statement, there should be an apology and an investigation into who made the mistake,” a ministry spokesperson said. | {
"authors": [
"Luke Harding"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/10b1332f6d17501f021086af5c2abe040d7ab703/201_371_5597_3358/master/5597.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=b1b27f7141d77d91e9af6e5e18bdd402",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Zelenskyy accuses Russia of violating Putin’s Easter ceasefire 2,000 times",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/apr/20/zelenskyy-dismisses-putin-ceasefire-as-pr-and-says-russian-attacks-continue"
} |
6fb68144d491109af401370ef0f59132 | Scottish Water staff to strike for two days as pay standoff continues
Scottish Water staff will strike for two days from the early hours of Tuesday as a standoff over pay continues at the state-owned company.
The striking workers’ union warned that emergency repairs and quality checks to water supplied to 5 million people across Scotland would not be carried out during the action on Tuesday and Wednesday.
More than 1,000 workers in the Unison union will go on strike for the second time in a month in the pay dispute, after rejecting a deal that the union said was 2.6% and followed years of real-terms cuts to wages.
The Unison Scottish Water branch secretary, Tricia McArthur, said: “Scottish Water workers are simply asking to be paid fairly for the essential services upon which everyone in Scotland relies.
“Things are meant to be different in a publicly owned service like this. But senior managers are behaving no differently to those running private water companies south of the border.”
Scottish Water said it “did not recognise” the figures cited by Unison and said that the offer of 3.4% with a guaranteed increase of £1,400 would spell a 5.5% rise for the lowest-paid.
It said contingency plans were in place to enable it to maintain normal services during the strikes and advised customers to report any problems with the water as usual.
Peter Farrer, Scottish Water’s chief operating officer, said the offer was “fair and progressive”, adding: “No one benefits from industrial action, and our focus is on continuing to deliver for our millions of customers across Scotland. We urge the unions to get back round the negotiating table as soon as possible.”
Unlike in England, the water boards in Scotland were never privatised, and Scottish Water has said that it reinvests all profits, currently about £800m a year, directly back into its infrastructure, a network of 30,000 miles of pipes and about 2,000 treatment works.
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Although Scotland has not experienced the scandals around financial and environmental mismanagement seen at English privatised water companies such as Thames Water, agencies have still warned that its sewage pollution could be far more widespread than realised.
Environmental Standards Scotland last year said that there had been thousands of sewage overflow incidents in the previous 12 months, with some Scottish storm overflows releasing sewage more than 500 times. The agency said that sites were spilling more frequently than should be expected, with risks to health and the environment, and that only a fraction were fully monitored. | {
"authors": [
"Gwyn Topham"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/6df2304251eda5054c6f5ba6751cce81c59229c5/30_41_3971_2382/master/3971.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=d89739eaedcf692016ccc56abc7d814a",
"publish_date": "2025-04-21 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Scottish Water staff to strike for two days as pay standoff continues",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/apr/21/scottish-water-staff-to-strike-for-two-days-as-pay-standoff-continues"
} |
01fa68f069c2578c39bb4896d8cb698f | UK set to ramp up weapons production to reduce reliance on US and French imports
Britain is set to significantly increase its weapons production in order to no longer rely on importing from the US and France.
This comes as British and European defence companies move away from buying US-made weaponry and equipment due to concerns over president Donald Trump making the country an unreliable military partner.
First reported by The Times, BAE Systems, the UK defence company, has been developing new methods to make sufficient explosives and propellants in the UK to meet the Ministry of Defence and export requirements.
One of the ways the company, the largest defence contractor in Europe, is doing this is by creating sites across the UK to produce RDX explosives, which are used in 155mm rounds in British Army guns and weapons. It will also be seeking to build three new sites to add “resilience and support our ramp-up of critical munitions production”.
According to John Healey, the defence secretary, the defence industry “is the foundation of our ability to fight and win on the battlefield”.
He said: “Strengthening homegrown artillery production is an important step in learning the lessons from Ukraine, boosting our industrial resilience and making defence an engine for growth.”
BAE Systems said it has developed new methods to create the new weapons, describing it as an “innovative” way to keep up with demand while removing the need for nitrocellulose and nitroglycerine, which are high in demand across global supply chains.
Previously, the company imported RDX explosives from two main sources, the US and France. However, it wants to be in a place where its munitions are deemed to be “Itar-free”, meaning it can be bought and sold on without any restrictions from the US.
Steve Cardew, the business development director at BAE Systems’ maritime and land defence solutions, said: “Our leap forward in synthetic energetics and propellant manufacture will strengthen the UK’s supply chain resilience and support our ramp up of critical munitions production to meet growing demand in response to the increasingly uncertain world we’re living in.
“It also supports economic growth through high-skilled jobs and potential export opportunities.” | {
"authors": [
"Aneesa Ahmed"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/abb149e741eb78779747e86476b987b37f2303d4/0_275_8256_4954/master/8256.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=e7f2fb8fb0aaaa3cbf44c5ce77f235ff",
"publish_date": "2025-04-21 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "UK set to ramp up weapons production to reduce reliance on US and French imports",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/apr/21/britain-set-to-increase-weapons-production-to-avoid-relying-on-us-imports"
} |
12a8c0f28d17d71a358bee0e77bdaa7b | Pete Hegseth shared Yemen attack details in second Signal chat – report
Before the US launched military strikes on Yemen in March, Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, sent detailed information about the planned attacks to a private Signal group chat that he created himself, which included his wife, his brother and about a dozen other people, the New York Times reported on Sunday.
The Guardian has independently confirmed the existence of Hegseth’s own private group chat.
According to unnamed sources familiar with the chat who spoke to the Times, Hegseth sent the private group of his personal associates some of the same information, including the flight schedules for the F/A-18 Hornets that would strike Houthi rebel targets in Yemen, that he also shared with another Signal group of top officials that was created by Mike Waltz, the national security adviser.
The existence of the Signal group chat created by Waltz, in which detailed attack plans were divulged by Hegseth to other Trump administration officials on the private messaging app, was made public last month by Jeffrey Goldberg of the Atlantic, who had been accidentally added to the group by Waltz.
The fact that Hegseth also shared the plans in a second Signal group chat, according to “people familiar with the matter” who spoke to the Times, is likely to add to growing criticism of the former Fox weekend anchor’s ability to manage the Pentagon, a massive organization which operates in matters of life and death around the globe.
According to the Times, the private chat also included two senior advisers to Hegseth – Dan Caldwell and Darin Selnick – who were fired last week after being accused of leaking unauthorized information.
Hegseth has previously been criticized for including his wife, Jennifer, a former Fox News producer, in sensitive meetings with foreign leaders, including a discussion of the war in Ukraine with British military leaders. Phil Hegseth, the secretary’s younger brother, was hired as a senior Pentagon adviser and is the defense department’s liaison to the Department of Homeland Security. It is unclear why either would need to know about the details of strikes plans in advance.
According to the Times, Hegseth used his private phone, rather than a government device, to access the Signal chat with his family and friends.
CNN reported later on Sunday that three sources familiar with Hegseth’s private Signal group confirmed to the broadcaster that he had used it to share Yemen attack plans before the strikes were launched. Hegseth’s former press secretary, John Ullyot, said in a statement obtained by the outlet: “It’s been a month of total chaos at the Pentagon. From leaks of sensitive operational plans to mass firings, the dysfunction is now a major distraction for the president – who deserves better from his senior leadership”. | {
"authors": [
"Robert Mackey"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/7b378599e03ec5c7bd694c5a6848a4268b6c747f/0_51_3900_2340/master/3900.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=a9d0ee166d6c69f7b15e4b48c9948eab",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Pete Hegseth shared Yemen attack details in second Signal chat – report",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/20/pete-hegseth-signal-chat-yemen-attack"
} |
e77cc5485c05f99a014096d37173d669 | Tens of thousands waited more than 24 hours for hospital beds in A&E last year
About 49,000 A&E visits last year resulted in patients waiting 24 hours or more for a hospital bed, with people aged 65 or over making up almost 70% of cases.
According to a freedom of information request by the Liberal Democrats, some patients went 10 days before getting a space on a ward.
The analysis, which used data from 54 trusts in England, showed that of the 48,830 “trolley waits” of 24 hours or longer in 2024, 33,413 were experienced by people aged 65 or over.
The term “trolley wait” refers to the time between a patient being transferred to a ward after a decision has been taken to admit them to hospital.
The Lib Dems said East Kent’s NHS trust had the highest number of day or longer trolley waits last year at 8,916, up from 30 in 2019 – pre-pandemic – followed by Liverpool University hospitals trust with 4,315, up from 10 in 2019. However, the party estimated that the real number of 24-hour cases was likely to be far higher because only 54 out of 141 trusts had provided full data.
The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said the figures “only begin to scratch the surface” of a “crisis in corridor care” – after reports of patients being seen in the corridors of hospitals due to a lack of beds. The RCN said the declining recruitment in nursing was adding to the problem.
“The NHS and the UK government must begin to disclose the true scale of the problem if they’re serious about eradicating it,” general secretary and chief executive of the RCN Prof Nicola Ranger said. “A single patient waiting for more than 24 hours is unacceptable, tens of thousands waiting shows why corridor care must be eradicated. It is undignified and unsafe, and now a year-round crisis.
The Lib Dems want the government to make a new team of “super-heads”, composed of experienced NHS bosses who would go into struggling trusts and bring them up to standard.
“The least patients deserve is the dignity to be treated in an appropriate area,” Lib Dem health and social care spokesperson Helen Morgan said. “Not the ramshackle waiting rooms and corridors that far too many have to suffer through for hours.
“That is why the government must ensure that this is the last winter crisis anyone will experience and end corridor care by the end of this parliament.
“The Conservatives’ beyond-shameful neglect brought us to this point, but the Labour government’s approach of sitting on its hands and hoping it all gets better has not survived contact with reality.”
The current Labour government has made cutting NHS waiting lists one of its key missions.
“We have taken action to protect A&E departments, introducing the new RSV vaccine, delivering more than 27m Covid and flu vaccines and ending the strikes so staff were on the frontline not the picket line for the first winter in three years,” a Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said.
“This work continues to ensure patients are treated quickly. We are fundamentally reforming the NHS as part of our Plan for Change, providing more care in the community, so fewer patients have to go to A&E, and those who do are treated faster and with dignity.”
A spokesperson for East Kent hospitals trust said: “We have seen increased attendances across our three main hospitals and we are sorry that patients are waiting longer than we would like in our emergency departments.”
University Hospitals of Liverpool group has been contacted for comment. | {
"authors": [
"Aneesa Ahmed"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/047ef29f00572082802c9835e7a9ccdb6c00d52a/0_0_4721_2832/master/4721.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=63915a682cff7f43fb0eef157c79b66c",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Tens of thousands waited more than 24 hours for hospital beds in A&E last year",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/apr/20/nhs-hospital-bed-24-hours-trolley-wait-england"
} |
4e97ac1f84331ca1ab09625ada9bcd61 | Amy Klobuchar calls on supreme court to hold Trump officials in contempt
Minnesota senator Amy Klobuchar warned on Sunday that the US is “getting closer and closer to a constitutional crisis”, but the courts, growing Republican disquiet at Trump administration policies, and public protest were holding it off.
“I believe as long as these courts hold, and the constituents hold, and the congress starts standing up, our democracy will hold,” Klobuchar told CNN’s State of the Union, adding “but Donald Trump is trying to pull us down into the sewer of a crisis.”
Klobuchar said the US supreme court should hold Trump administration officials in contempt if they continue to ignore a court order to facilitate the return of Kilmar Ábrego García from El Salvador, the Maryland resident the government admitted in court it had deported by mistake.
Klobuchar said the court could appoint a special prosecutor, independent of Trump’s Department of Justice, to uphold the rule of law and charge any officials who are responsible for Ábrego García’s deportation, or have refused to facilitate his return.
The senator’s comments came hours after supreme court released justice Samuel Alito’s dissenting opinion on the court’s decision to block the Trump administration from deporting more Venezuelans held in north Texas’s Bluebonnet detention center .
In his dissent, Alito criticized the decision of the seven-member majority, saying the court had acted “literally in the middle of the night” and without sufficient explanation. The “unprecedented” relief was “hastily and prematurely granted”, Alito added.
Alito, whose dissent was joined by fellow conservative justice Clarence Thomas, said there was “dubious factual support” for granting the request in an emergency appeal from the American Civil Liberties Union to block deportations of accused gang members that the administration contends are legal under the Alien Enemies Act of 1798.
The majority did not provide a detailed explanation for the order released early on Saturday, only that the administration should not to remove Venezuelans held in the “until further order of this court”.
The court has said previously that deportations under the 1798 law can only proceed if those scheduled to be removed are offered a chance to argue their case in court and were given “a reasonable time” to contest their pending removals.
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Alito further wrote that both “the Executive and the Judiciary have an obligation to follow the law”, but it was not clear whether the supreme court had jurisdiction until legal avenues had been pursued through lower courts. He also objected to the fact that and the justices had not had the chance to hear the government’s side.
“The only papers before this Court were those submitted by the applicants,” Alito wrote. “The Court had not ordered or received a response by the Government regarding either the applicants’ factual allegations or any of the legal issues presented by the application. And the Court did not have the benefit of a Government response filed in any of the lower courts either,” Alito said.
In his dissent, Alito said the applicants had not shown they were in “imminent danger of removal”.
“In sum, literally in the middle of the night, the Court issued unprecedented and legally questionable relief without giving the lower courts a chance to rule, without hearing from the opposing party, within eight hours of receiving the application, with dubious factual support for its order, and without providing any explanation for its order,” Alito wrote.
“I refused to join the Court’s order because we had no good reason to think that, under the circumstances, issuing an order at midnight was necessary or appropriate”, Alito added. | {
"authors": [
"Edward Helmore"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/b9aea4b11582df4ec249d6a4b50debc6b8edb4e2/0_267_4000_2400/master/4000.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=890089f0242d8bd8bb74362c178b083d",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Amy Klobuchar calls on supreme court to hold Trump officials in contempt",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/20/amy-klobuchar-samuel-alito-trump-immigration"
} |
78410c81d43209a73c4bec7eabd78354 | Husband ‘watched in horror’ as wife killed on golf course in Sutton Coldfield
A man has described watching “in helpless horror” as his wife was struck by a van at a golf club.
Suzanne Cherry, 62, of Aldridge, died in hospital on 15 April, four days after she was involved in a collision at Aston Wood golf course in Sutton Coldfield near Birmingham at 10.25am on 11 April.
Paying tribute to his “beautiful wife” in a message released by West Midlands police, Cherry’s husband said: “On Friday 11 April, while enjoying what should have been the safest of one of Suzanne’s many activities, I watched in helpless horror as the life of my beautiful wife and our future together was snatched away in an instant.
“Suzanne had an amazing and infectious zest for life which touched everyone who was fortunate enough to know her. She was unselfish, always ready to encourage with love and support those around her to achieve more than they themselves thought possible.”
He added that she left behind “an unfillable void” in the lives of her mother, Maureen, her three adult children, two stepchildren and colleagues and friends, including those from her sporting activities.
“Sue was loved, and will be painfully missed by her entire family and friends, we ask that our privacy at this difficult time be respected,” he said.
Officers from three different forces have made six arrests in total relating to the incident.
West Midlands police arrested three men on 16 April, including a 51-year-old man, from Bloxwich, arrested on suspicion of murder; a 22-year-old man, from Dudley, on suspicion of manslaughter and assisting an offender; and a 41-year-old man, from Worcester, on suspicion of assisting an offender.
Officers from Staffordshire police arrested another man, aged 34, of Wednesbury, on 18 April on suspicion of manslaughter.
Two other men, aged 36 and 26, both of Coseley, were arrested on 18 April by officers in south Wales, each on suspicion of assisting an offender.
The suspects are being questioned by detectives in custody in Staffordshire, except for the suspect from Worcester, who has since been released and placed on conditional police bail.
The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) is continuing to investigate the circumstances prior to the collision, when West Midlands police officers were responding to the vehicle being involved in reports of suspicious activity.
Officers are continuing to appeal for information and are particularly keen to hear via an online portal from anyone who was in the area of Blake Street and Birmingham Road between Sutton Coldfield and Shenstone in the morning of 11 April, and those with dashcam, CCTV and doorbell footage. | {
"authors": [
"Rachel Hall"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/33dbf9ed45a2307b96a484f84183a75a71f9d7ea/0_35_320_192/master/320.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=0373ad395445041ae57f74d88438af44",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Husband ‘watched in horror’ as wife killed on golf course in Sutton Coldfield",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/apr/20/husband-watched-in-horror-as-wife-killed-on-golf-course-in-sutton-coldfield"
} |
fc498933f58e1c377b19f928bf7c42d2 | Views of TikTok posts with electronic music outgrow those using indie
It is another example of the parallel worlds in the music industry. The Gallagher brothers may be taking over the world’s stadiums this summer, but over on TikTok users are moving to a different beat.
Views of posts using electronic music as a soundtrack, including techno and house, outgrew those tagged for indie and alternative for the first time in 2024, according to the social media app.
There were more than 13bn views of videos tagged #ElectronicMusic worldwide last year, an increase of 45% on 2023, representing faster growth than the “indie and alternative” and “rap and hip-hop” genres. Videos created with the electronic music tag grew by more than 100% over the same period.
TikTok said creators were turning to electronic music in particular as a soundtrack for specific types of video clips, such as sport, fitness and fashion. It has also proved popular with travel content and summer holiday recaps.
TikTok’s head of music partnerships for the UK and Ireland, Toyin Mustapha, said the success of British artists such as Disclosure and Joel Corry had underlined electronic music’s entry into the mainstream.
“Dance music has become more accessible and big in the commercial sphere,” he said. “We are seeing the breaking down of boundaries for artists, and TikTok is part of that.”
TikTok, which has more than 1 billion users worldwide, has become a major platform for breaking and supporting music artists. One of the biggest summer anthems of last year, Adam Port’s Move, established its appeal on the app before becoming a streaming hit. It reached the top 10 in the UK and across Europe. Another hit on TikTok and streaming platforms last year was Pawsa’s Dirty Cash (Money Talks), which reached No 17 in the UK charts.
Fred Again’s headlining sets at the Reading and Leeds festivals have underlined the ascent of electronic artists in major markets, but Mustapha also points to mainstream chart success. Jazzy become the first female Irish act to reach No 1 in Ireland in more than a decade in 2023.
“It’s not just reflected in festival bookings, you can see it in the official charts as well,” he said.
Two British DJs have also taken off on TikTok in recent years. Hannah Laing, a former dental nurse from Dundee known as the queen of “doof”, has launched her own festival and label after building a steady music career on the app. Billy Gillies, a Belfast DJ whose hits include DNA (Loving You) has also built a strong following on the platform.
UK views of videos with the #ElectronicMusic hashtag grew 22%, while the number of videos created with the same hashtag rose by more than 50%.
“TikTok users tend to tag the genres of music, especially genres like electronic music. It shows the community they are trying to build and are part of, and electronic music is very much a community-led thing,” Mustapha said.
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Spotify said streams of dance and electronic music had increased by an average of 18% a year since 2000, while streams of drum’n’bass had risen 94% since 2021.
Indie and alternative, as well as rap and hip-hop, remain bigger genres overall among TikTok users, with indie in particular likely to get a boost when Oasis return in the summer despite the electronic music surge. Last year, TikTok flagged a trend called “Britishcore”, which celebrated the more mundane aspects of UK life but also captured excitement over the Gallagher brothers’ reunion. The hashtag #OasisReunion received more than 100m video views in the fortnight after their comeback tour was announced.
As well as a boom in electronic music, British TikTok users also embraced the music industry’s back catalogue last year. TikTokers set a new high for use of old tracks on British posts, with tunes more than five years old accounting for 19 out of the 50 top tracks in 2024. Popular back catalogue tunes included Sade’s Kiss of Life and Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s Murder on the Dancefloor.
As with electronic music, the trend was also global. Twenty of the top 50 tracks worldwide came from back catalogues, led by the 1980s hit Forever Young by the German synth-pop band Alphaville. | {
"authors": [
"Dan Milmo"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/6c202a52a99fa0f65402b10f6b262a49374abdbb/0_37_3970_2383/master/3970.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=8d48ed85b594e5e885b54374a0f54b60",
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"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Views of TikTok posts with electronic music outgrow those using indie",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/apr/20/views-of-tiktok-posts-with-electronic-music-outgrow-those-using-indie"
} |
1ca0f2c13a404b848e3cc0e7d79897e3 | Why the UK’s electricity costs are so high – and what can be done about it
One of Labour’s key election promises was to cut energy bills by £300 a year by 2030 while making Britain a “clean energy superpower”.
The job is already halfway complete: renewable energy made up more than half the UK’s electricity for the first time last year. So why does Britain continue to have one of the most expensive electricity markets in the world? Industrial users complain those costs are driving companies out of business and discouraging investment in the UK.
The reason behind Britain’s sky-high wholesale energy costs is simple, according to experts. It is down to Britain’s reliance on gas – the price of which was sent soaring by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – in power plants and home heating.
“Great Britain’s dependency on gas imports has been the most important factor behind higher gas and power prices in the market,” Kate Mulvany, the principal consultant at the energy advisory company Cornwall Insight, said.
Prof Michael Grubb of the UCL Institute for Sustainable Resources said in a recent research paper that, although fossil fuels used to be cheaper than renewable energy sources, “that has turned on its head as gas prices shot up and the cost to produce renewables such as wind and solar power has plummeted”.
He said: “If we actually paid the average price of what our electricity now costs to produce, our bills would be substantially cheaper.”
However, gas-fired power plants in effect set the market price for electricity – meaning costs are substantially higher than they could be. In simple terms: the price in the electricity market on any given day is dictated by the most expensive source of generation available, which in the UK would be its gas-fired power plants.
Under this “marginal pricing” system, the UK’s electricity market price is set by gas 98% of the time, the highest rate across Europe and well above the EU average of just under 40%.
In some cases, the soaring cost of firing up older gas plants to meet an increase in demand can cause market prices to rocket. Earlier this year, two gas power plants were paid more than £12m to supply only three hours of electricity after freezing weather led to some of the highest market prices since the energy crisis began.
This has contributed to higher bills for homes – the average household annual energy bill rose by £111 to £1,849 from this month. Meanwhile, inflated costs have also piled pressure on struggling businesses, and manufacturers, including Britain’s steelmakers, have said that high energy prices have disadvantaged them compared with neighbouring countries. So what can the UK do about it? | {
"authors": [
"Jillian Ambrose"
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"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
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"title": "Why the UK’s electricity costs are so high – and what can be done about it",
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8e9815cf2780fa2651d9700593ed4e53 | ‘Last chance saloon’: the scramble to save Dorset’s vanishing Purbeck puffins
Reaching the vantage point is a tricky business.
First, there’s a hop across a fence into Scratch Arse quarry – the stone workers used to find it such a cramped space to work in that their backsides would bump into the rock face. Then, a tiptoe through the slopes of early spider orchids and wild cabbage before a dizzying scramble down to the edge of the cliff.
Teams of hardy volunteers will be making the trip this spring, come rain or shine, to try to solve the mystery of the Purbeck puffins.
This stretch of Dorset coast is the last known regular nesting site for puffins on the mainland of southern England. In the 1950s, there were about 80 birds nesting on this coast but the number of pairs has dropped to three and there have been no definitive sightings of fledglings for years. If the trend is not reversed, the colony will probably vanish within 15 years.
“It is very worrying,” said the marine ornithologist Richard Caldow, who has been monitoring the birds since 2023. “In recent years, only three nesting pairs of puffins have been seen, along with a few adolescent birds. Without intervention, they are probably facing extinction here.”
View image in fullscreen Richard Caldow scans the sea at Scratch Arse quarry for incoming puffins. Photograph: Jim Wileman/The Guardian
The problem is that no one is quite sure what intervention is needed because it is unclear what is ailing the puffins. “The mystery is why they declined but didn’t go extinct completely. I’ve spent many hours sat here trying to puzzle it out,” said Caldow.
The craggy characteristics of the spot makes the puffins hard to observe. The entrance to only one nest site is visible from the vantage point, and the crucial spot is deep in a crevice. The other two are tucked around the cliff corner. When they leave the nest, fledglings tend to vanish at night so to work out if there are any there you have to look out for fish deliveries.
The puffins carried fish to their nests for three weeks in 2023 but stopped abruptly, suggesting that the fledglings died suddenly. The birds began building nests in 2024, but were not seen delivering any fish, probably because their eggs failed to hatch.
Caldow said watching out for the Purbeck puffins bringing in fish required patience. “They are good at appearing out of nowhere and disappearing again,” he said.
View image in fullscreen Two puffins at the Scratch Arse quarry site. Photograph: John Allen
The technique is to spot them as they approach with the naked eye then peer through binoculars as they near the cliff. “It’s easy to be distracted by a dolphin fin or peregrine falcon passing by,” he said.
Together with the National Trust and the Dorset Wildlife Trust, Caldow oversaw the placing of motion-sensor cameras in a narrow fissure where the puffins nest.
Volunteers combed through more than 70,000 images in search of clues to the crisis, perhaps raids by rats or crows. But no predator was spotted and there were no other leads.
There are plans to reinstate the cameras next year with better equipment. What the volunteers from the Purbeck Natural History Forum observe this spring will inform the move. Boat operators have also been asked to join in by keeping an eye on nesting areas from the sea.
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The first puffin sighting at Purbeck this year was on 20 March, slightly later than the past two years. When the Guardian visited, one was bobbing 200 metres (200 yards) out to sea.
Caldow went through the possible reasons for the decline. The peregrine falcons and herring gulls are not top of his list of suspects. “They have better, easier food sources elsewhere,” he said.
Humans – boaters, climbers and coasteering groups – are also thought to be in the clear. Most know to avoid the cliff and it used to be an industrial landscape when it was quarried. The puffins were not put off by humans digging and blasting, so they would probably not be disturbed by a few people now.
The climate emergency could be a factor. Perhaps the puffins are struggling to find enough food – but the razorbills that also nest at the site seem to be thriving.
Though they were not caught on camera, Caldow’s prime suspects are carrion crows, jackdaws, rats and mice, which could squeeze into the crevices.
As he sits on the cliff, he dreams up possible solutions – perhaps sealing back and side entrances to the nesting site with concrete? But that wouldn’t go down well on a stretch of world heritage coast. Constructing an artificial cliff face that predators couldn’t access? Very expensive.
It is probable that some of the same puffins return to the Purbeck coast year in and year out. They can live for up to 30 years and one of the regulars has a distinctive greyish back. But when they leave, they travel far afield and a fear is that if one or two got caught in a nasty winter storm, they might not make it back.
“It wouldn’t take too much to push them over the edge,” said Caldow. “This may be the last chance saloon for them.” | {
"authors": [
"Steven Morris"
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"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/apr/20/last-chance-saloon-the-scramble-to-save-dorsets-vanishing-purbeck-puffins"
} |
8960955748f3478f3eb70b563613febb | The America I loved is gone
The first impression America gave me was gentle carelessness. We were driving down from Canada to visit family friends in Texas sometime in the mid- to late 1980s, and a young border patrol agent at a booth, crouched over a newspaper, leaning back in his chair, carelessly waved my family’s station wagon across without looking up. You didn’t even need a passport to enter the United States until I was 33.
You need clear eyes at the border today. Europe and Canada have issued travel advisories after a series of arbitrary detentions, deportations to foreign jails without due process and hundreds of valid visas pulled or voided amid a sense of general impunity. While I have crossed the border a hundred times at least, sometimes once a month when I lived there, I cannot say when I will see America again, and I am quite sure I will never return to the country I once visited.
The America I knew, the America I loved, has closed.
And so I find myself like a man who has been admiring bubbles floating in the air, trying to recall their shape and swerve and shine after they’ve popped.
America was a country of bubbles. I loved it as one loves anything that is both real and fantastical.
Donald Trump has blown himself into a bubble of gilded ceilings, ersatz Roman murals, sycophants on tap and midnight rants of imperial conquest on personally owned social media networks. He is only one story. America was millions of bubbles. For some reason, I find myself remembering Tom Waits in a junkyard making Bone Machine, turning rusted fenders and tossed-out dry cleaners and cracked sheet metal into a scrap marimba of his own invention. Even its dumps could give birth to magic.
Golf course palaces and wrecking-lot percussion: twin American truths.
You felt the meaning of America the moment you entered. In Canada, wilderness is wilderness. The northern forests I come from resist interpretation; that is their power. But when you cross the border from, say, Quebec into Maine, you can feel myth accruing around the bark of the trees. You are in the haunted forests of New England, redolent with burned witches and ghost stories. Further south, the foggy murderous oaks loom gothically. Out west, the deserts beg for cowboys to cross them. Canada is a country that disillusions you. America is one illusion after another, some magnificent, others treacherous or vicious.
That is a big feeling among the most successful people in America: the sense of being ripped off
Every landscape in America is setting, and you have to pose inside them. In my 20s, I drove Highway 1 from San Francisco to Los Angeles. An older and wiser friend told me to rent a convertible, and I laughed the suggestion off, since it felt like something you would do in the movies. Huge mistake. That drive down the California coast – cows by the big-wave Pacific, condors in the clefts of Big Sur – demands an open roof.
I learned then: when you go to America, always pick the option that feels like what you would do in the movies.
In San Francisco, right by the Yahoo offices on Mission Street, was a small homeless encampment. I could just see inside one of the tents through an open flap, where a boy – he would have been about 10 years old – was playing with little treasures on a small tray – a ring, a toy car, a key chain. Even the tents of the homeless were little bubbles.
In Malibu, at a sushi bar, elegant Japanese surf bums lounged between orders, watching Game 7 of the World Series, languidly curling out cucumber spirals the chefs used instead of seaweed. That was their thing – cucumber-based rolls. That restaurant is ash now.
View image in fullscreen Surfriders state beach park in Malibu, California, in 1965. Photograph: Jonathan Blair/Corbis/Getty Images
Sometimes, you can see the bubbles better from the air. Flying into Palm Springs, the desert circumscribed, encroaching, revealed the furious machinery working to push it away. Palm Springs is pure delight on the ground: the misted pools, the cocktails filled with the exactly the right ice shapes, the street names hanging on to the faded glamour of the tacky talkshow guests from half a century ago.
The airport has no roof; that’s how crazy a city it is. A glistening shivering bubble, effortless once inside.
The sheer prosperity of the country could be breathtaking. I had just come back from Senegal when the Guardian sent me on assignment to Rust belt Ohio, during the first stirrings of Trumpism, back in 2015. I was there to report on the growing swell of populism by way of the postindustrial immiseration of middle America.
I was stopping for gas on the way to a rally, and at the station they were selling a hotdog with as much chilli and cheese as you liked for $1.99. The chilli and cheese came out of the wall. You pressed two buttons, one for chilli and one for cheese.
On the streets of Dakar, children hawk packs of peanuts and plastic bags of clean water on the street, and I wondered if you could even explain to them that there existed a place, on the same earth, where chilli and liquid cheese came out of a wall, and you could have as much of it as you liked for the equivalent of 20 minutes’ work at the minimum wage, and that some of the people in that place considered themselves so hard done by that their resentful fury threatened the political order, that they just wanted to burn it all down.
It was more than money and grandeur, though. The openness, the generosity of ordinary people, floated free over the country.
When I was researching my book The Next Civil War, the far-right people I met, the militia folks, in Oklahoma and in Ohio, at gun shows and Trump rallies and prepper conventions, were, without exception, polite in person – no doubt because I’m white, with blond hair and blue eyes, so I can pretend to be a good ol’ boy when required. They lived in dark bubbles, bubbles of serpentine paranoia and weird loathings and strange fantasies of breakdown.
They welcomed me into their bubbles as equably as concierges. Militia pie is delicious; the crusts are richer, flakier. I think they use lard. Anyway, they talked to me about their hopes for the destruction of their government cheerfully and frankly, because they were living the movies playing in their minds and they wanted me to witness the projection.
At one prepper convention I remember, a vendor was selling gluten-free rations for bunker survival. That was America in a bucket to me: even at the end of the world, don’t let a gluten allergy interfere with your active lifestyle.
View image in fullscreen Wrigley Field in Chicago in 1988. Photograph: Paul Natkin/Getty Images
Much later, for another publication, I attended a human-fairy congress in rural Washington state. Both humans and fairies were welcome to attend but only humans could enroll in the courses on fairy gardening and fairy marriages. They were the residue of the hippies, I suppose. The final event was a big dance where the fairies joined them and parlayed a message from the spirit realm. A young man dressed in Tibetan shaman robes ran into the luscious meadow set between ponderosa pines shouting “I! Feel! Better!” He was a definitive American type – a seeker who just went with his seeking.
In America, one bubble was as good as another: the next week, many of the human-fairy enthusiasts were headed to a cosmic Sasquatch festival.
On the other side of the state, in the Olympia forest, I interviewed illegal lumber poachers who cut a cord of firewood a day from the dead trees on public lands for meth and food and gas money, a primitive existence not that far from stone age tribes or medieval peasants. As I approached their compound, a coagulation of wrecked cars and rotten RVs and driftwood lean-tos with hanging tarps, a turkey strutted out to defend their ad hoc architecture of detritus. They had a guard turkey. The guard turkey was the shine of their bubble, like something in a dream.
The American dream. For technocrats, a dying breed in the US, the term was shorthand for each generation doing better than the one before, for generally upward social mobility. There was more to it than that. There was an idea, an assumption really, that if you had enough talent and worked hard and did the smart thing, with a little luck you could live life just as you wanted. The country’s founding promise, after all, is “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”.
That promise is why success in America does not lead to gratitude but to an intense sensation of loss. The elite take any deviation from their fantasy existence as a broken contract. They’ve been ripped off. That is a big feeling among the most successful people in America: the sense of being ripped off.
As the authoritarian impulse strips America of any motivating ideals, the only -ism surviving is careerism
The country clubs are rife with men and women, in incredible luxury, complaining bitterly about the state of the country. The richest and most powerful, the Americans who have won, who have everything, are still not happy, and why? Their answer is that the American dream must be broken. There is no one who feels more betrayed by the American dream than the world’s richest man. Why else do you think he’s out there with a chainsaw?
The American elites of the past 20 years have called their foremost principle freedom, but what they meant was impunity. That’s what the original slave masters built: a world where they could do whatever they wanted to whomever they wanted, without consequences. That’s what the techlords dream of today.
The truly frictionless world they seek eludes them exactly because it is a dream, because it is unreal. The ultimate truth of bubbles is that they pop.
Another bubble: when I was teaching Shakespeare in Harlem, at the City College of New York, I had a homeless student who slept in his car and never missed my seminar on revenge tragedy. You can only live that way if you live in a bubble buoyed by dreams.
I, too, have floated in American bubbles. I have inhabited its intoxication. If it were not for America, I would be working part-time in a coffee shop.
In the early 2010s, I was a writer stuck between Toronto and New York, and I had written my attempt at the great Canadian novel, about Alberta and Quebec and the unspoken fascination between them – between Montreal, with its wild heart, and the wild prairies filled with longing for a distant recognition. Nationalism was completely out of fashion then. No one in Canada would even look at the manuscript. My friends at small presses stopped accepting my invitations for drinks. You can be a loser and you can be a nag, but nobody wants both at the same time – even in Canada.
View image in fullscreen People ride the subway in New York circa 1980. Photograph: Barbara Alper/Getty Images
I had been sitting on the book for a year when David Granger, my editor at Esquire, invited me down to New York, rented out a room at a Midtown Manhattan restaurant, and threw a party for me, just to give a speech to the gathered editors of Hearst about what a great writer I was. I returned to Canada, asked myself what the hell was I thinking trying to tell the stories of people who didn’t care if their stories were told, rewrote the novel so it was set in New York, and sold it in a few weeks for six figures.
People used to say, about New York: “If you can make it here you can make it anywhere.” Nothing could be further from the truth. The whole point of New York was that it was the city that wanted you to make it. David Granger blew a bubble around me, and the David Grangers on this planet are all American; that’s the fact of the matter.
You work hard, you play hard. So many Americans will do whatever it takes to prevent their bubbles from bursting. The second Trump administration has clarified this national trait. As the authoritarian impulse strips America of any motivating ideals, the only -ism surviving is careerism.
The past decade has demonstrated that there is nothing that will cause an American politician to resign. There is no line they won’t cross. To keep the bubble from popping, they will drink their own blood until there’s nothing left but a husk. There are currently people in America who are racist, not because they actually think other races are inferior, but because they think it will advance their careers, just as there were people pretending to be civil rights activists when they thought it looked good on a résumé.
The definitive work of American art ... is the roadrunner cartoons. If Coyote keeps running, he can run over air. It is only when he looks down that he falls
At the same time as there can be a terrible indifference to those outside the bubbles, there is no other group of people, in the world, happier to see others succeed than Americans. In Florida, there was a private poker room I used to go to, under a dog track in Sarasota, where you could meet the full spectrum of the Floridian population – grill-fronted southern bubbas, Jewish grandmothers, tweakers.
They were just so much fun to sit playing cards with, discussing whether life had any purpose or discernible order. I remember, cancer had struck one of the dealers, who was in her mid-20s, and, to help with the medical bills, the house gave all the profits from a night over to her. It wasn’t just the rake, either. They held a silent auction, old customers forked over fistfuls of dollars straight up, and it was magnificent, a sheer festival of generosity.
View image in fullscreen New York in 1962. Photograph: David Attie/Getty Images
But my little Canadian heart reserved an obvious thought: “You don’t have to do all this.” You don’t have to live this way. No other industrialized country in the world has to throw parties to raise money for its sick people. They could not see their own strangeness. Their bubbles reflect themselves back to them as the world.
But it was a hell of a fun night.
Fun. America was fun.
Other countries do pleasure or luxury or celebration. America did fun. The Beatles were fun because they played American music. McDonalds conquered the world because they put a fun-for-five-minutes piece of plastic in with the fries and called it the Happy Meal. “What’s great about this country is that America started the tradition where the richest consumers buy essentially the same things as the poorest,” Andy Warhol once wrote. “A Coke is a Coke and no amount of money can get you a better Coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking.”
Everyone drinks the drink of bubbles, the fun drink.
The bubbles by which they lived were the subject of their greatest works of art. In the great one-hit wonder paintings, like Christina’s World by Andrew Wyeth or Nighthawks by Edward Hopper, you can feel the souls pressed up against their bubbles or sinking back in them. This year is the 100th anniversary of The Great Gatsby, and obviously it is the great American novel, the novel of the careless people who smash up the world and retreat into their money and their supreme indifference, the novel of bubbles.
But the definitive work of American art isn’t Gatsby; it’s the roadrunner cartoons. If Coyote keeps running, he can run over air. It is only when he looks down that he falls.
In Judaism, it is forbidden to throw out sacred books. They keep the shreds of exhausted texts in a storage room called a genizah.
View image in fullscreen A marching band plays during Mardi Gras in New Orleans circa 1970. Photograph: David Redfern/Redferns
The American text is exhausted. I am going to keep my memories of America in a genizah in my mind, the ones I have written here but also: dawn over the Shenandoah seen from the flatbed of an F-150; Broadway Boogie Woogie by Piet Modrian in the MoMA; a New Orleans band that must have played When the Saints Go Marching In 10,000 times playing it as if it were the first time; the smell of tacos al pastor in a Tulsa parking lot; low-limit craps in Vegas; a western oriole strutting in pine needles; the stump of the “Tree of Hope” in Harlem; the Siesta Key Oyster Bar, where the walls were covered with Iraqi money stapled there by returning soldiers; the sausages at the Wrigley Field ballpark in Chicago; the New York hustler who went down the A train selling his romance novels out of a box; that wave at the border I may have half-imagined.
Countries fall out of the free world. They fall back in, too. These memories are not yet dead. They are only closed.
But for now, a great foam is lifting, drifting, blowing through unsettled air, and all I can hear, in the distance, is the sound of bubbles popping.
View image in fullscreen The Canada border in the 1980s. | {
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f16f6339e2036deb1272ee35838447d1 | Pilgrimage: The Road Through the Alps review – so wonderful that my faith in celebrities is restored
I am of the generation that grew up believing that Robert Powell was Jesus. This is because in my day you knew Easter was around the corner not because of the bastardised diffusion lines of Creme Eggs infesting the supermarkets (White chocolate? Caramel? Come on!), but because the TV schedules suddenly filled with truth ’n’ resurrection-based programming, central to which was the annual showing of Franco Zeffirelli’s four-part 1977 series Jesus of Nazareth. Powell played the Messiah and anyone else who was anyone in 1977 (Laurence Olivier, Christopher Plummer, Anthony Quinn, Ernest Borgnine, Rod Steiger, Peter Ustinov, Michael York, you name it) played the rest of the cast of the Bible. It was as much part of the season as making palm crosses at school or egg-hunting in the garden.
It is possibly still available somewhere out there in the fragmentary world of streaming, if you want to unearth it from underneath the secular detritus at a suitable moment. But it’s not the same as when it’s featured in terrestrial TV’s regularly scheduled seasonal programming.
On the face of it, Pilgrimage: The Road Through the Alps looks like a shoddy attempt by the BBC to fulfil some embarrassing clause lingering in its public service remit. Seven celebrities of different faiths and none are sent off to walk and bus the 190 miles of the Austrian Camino, a revived medieval Catholic route that finishes in the foothills of the Swiss Alps. Together, they see what they can learn about themselves, about faith and about medieval Catholic fortitude as they try to imagine crossing the Alps in the days before Gore-Tex and Craghoppers.
But – a miracle! Pilgrimage quickly reveals itself to be not too bad and, before the three episodes are up, you could be moved to call it really quite good and admit that the whole experience has, against all odds and expectations, been rather uplifting.
Mostly, this is down to the fact that all the pilgrims take it seriously – not sombrely, but seriously – and are willing to talk honestly and thoughtfully about what God and religion mean to them. No artificial timeline has been imposed on their trek – this is not an unseemly race from Innsbruck in Austria to Einsiedeln Abbey in Switzerland but a genuine (yes, yes, within the constraints of a programme still needing to be made) chance for the group to get to know each other, reflect on their past and current experiences, be influenced by each other and deepen rather than cheapen their thoughts. And there is no engineered conflict. In fact, no conflict worth the name at all. It is striking and rather wonderful.
The Wanted singer Jay McGuiness was raised Catholic but now describes himself as agnostic. He is, he says, still searching for the catharsis faith once gave him. And he is still grieving for his bandmate Tom Parker, who died three years ago from a brain tumour, brutally young and brutally soon after diagnosis.
Harry Clark (former soldier, second winner of The Traitors and, according to his mum “the smartest dumbest person … I’m just wired backwards”) is a fellow Catholic, who still believes. But he seems almost more entranced to be in the company of people talking about history and ideas as they yomp along than by the possible presence of the divine at the various ancient monasteries and convents they visit.
Comedian Helen Lederer is feeling the pull of her father’s Jewish heritage and the unspoken grief her family carried. “But you don’t want to overclaim it,” she says, as she tries to feel her way along the boundary between the effects of trauma and experiencing the trauma yourself. Again, a rare subtlety in such shows, in which overclaiming is virtually a requirement.
Paralympian Stefanie Reid has a strong Christian faith, born of the accident that nearly killed her and led to her becoming an amputee in her teens. Comedian Daliso Chaponda (further marking the documentary out from the herd by being naturally funny and thoughtful by turns, instead of a relentless joke seeker and teller), who grew up in 14 countries as the son of a refugee, has sampled a number of Christian denominations and is hoping to find one that truly feels like home.
Journalist Nelufar Hedayat’s Muslim family came to the UK as refugees from Afghanistan when she was seven. She is struggling with the anger she feels towards Islam and how to unpick a religion from its cultural expression and enforcement by – for example – the people who are, in her native country, forcibly silencing women.
There is, by the end of three episodes – which are full of the most gorgeous scenery, and I will take a travelogue too, if anyone is listening – actual growth and learning. As a committed atheist, it didn’t bring me any closer to God, but it may just have renewed my faith in celebrity documentaries. | {
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"title": "Pilgrimage: The Road Through the Alps review – so wonderful that my faith in celebrities is restored",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2025/apr/21/pilgrimage-the-road-through-the-alps-review-so-wonderful-that-my-faith-in-celebrities-is-restored"
} |
a0de1bc5a91c31fd44108a0d0799f2a5 | Go-to author on White House reverses take on Biden and slams former president
“Biden was mentally sharp, even if he appeared physically frail,” Chris Whipple wrote in The Fight of His Life, his 2023 book on the 46th president, who was then warming up his re-election bid at the age of 80.
In that book, Whipple quoted Bruce Reed, a senior aide, describing a long-distance flight. When others appeared exhausted, Biden was raring to go, Reed said. Biden showed “unbelievable stamina”.
Speaking to the Guardian in January 2023, Whipple said Biden’s “inner circle” was “bullish about Biden’s mental acuity and his ability to govern. I never heard any of them express any concern and maybe you would expect that from the inner circle. Many of them will tell you that he has extraordinary endurance, energy.”
Put it this way: much has happened since.
Obviously, there was that whole 2024 election thing. You know – the one when Biden dropped out after a disastrous debate exposed his decline for all to see. There was also the day in February, before the campaign kicked off, when the special counsel Robert Hur declined to charge Biden with mishandling classified documents, because he found him too addled and sympathetic a prospective defendant.
Hur wrote: “He did not remember when he was vice-president, forgetting on the first day of the interview when his term ended (‘If it was 2013 – when did I stop being vice-president?’) and forgetting on the second day of the interview when his term began (‘In 2009, am I still vice-president?’) … He did not remember, even within several years, when his son Beau died.”
‘Biden was unaware of what was happening in his own campaign. Halfway through the session, the president excused himself and went off to sit by the pool.’ Photograph: HarperCollins Publishers
Whipple, a former CBS producer, has emerged as a go-to author on the White House and those who work there. In The Gatekeepers, he examined the lives of chiefs of staff. Then came The Fight of His Life. With hindsight, Whipple seems to have missed key evidence of Biden’s decline.
But Whipple is back with a vengeance. Uncharted, his third book, hits Biden and his aides like a bludgeon. Kamala Harris, who became the Democratic nominee after Biden withdrew, fares little better: Whipple depicts a candidate who never should have been there, a sentiment repeatedly expressed by senior Democrats.
Whipple had access. People talked. Ron Klain, Biden’s first chief of staff, is a key source – and demonstrates startling cognitive dissonance about Biden’s mental and physical decline. Klain says Biden should have stayed in the race – but also gives an absolutely withering account of debate prep at Camp David.
At his first meeting with Biden in Aspen Lodge, the president’s cabin, Klain describes Biden as “startled”. Whipple writes: “He’d never seen him so exhausted and out of it. Biden was unaware of what was happening in his own campaign. Halfway through the session, the president excused himself and went off to sit by the pool.” He fell asleep.
“‘We sat around the table,’” says Klain in the book. “‘And I was struck by how out of touch with American politics he was. He was just very, very focused on his interactions with Nato leaders.’” Klain, Whipple writes, “wondered half-seriously if Biden thought he was president of Nato instead of the US”.
Come the debate against Trump, Biden gave perhaps the worst performance of all time. He shuffled, he stared, he made verbal stumbles and gaffes. He handed Trump the win.
Klain also tags Biden for skipping a post-debate meeting with progressives in favor of a family photoshoot with Annie Leibovitz.
“‘You need to cancel that,’” Klain says he told Biden. “‘You need to stay in Washington. You need to have an aggressive plan to fight and to rally the troops.’” Biden rebuffed him and instead held a Zoom call with the progressives. It went badly.
“‘All you guys want to talk about is Gaza … What would you have me do?’” Biden said. “‘I was a progressive before some of you guys were even in Congress.’”
How do you remind people you’re old without saying you’re old?
Whipple also pays attention to Trump. Susie Wiles, now Trump’s chief of staff, and Karl Rove, a veteran of the George W Bush White House, speak on the record. So does Paul Manafort, a campaign manager in 2016, later jailed and pardoned.
“Democrats wanted to know why Harris had lost to Trump and his MAGA movement,” Whipple writes. “Susie Wiles wanted to know why Harris and her team had run such a flawed campaign.”
Wiles did not view a Trump victory as inevitable. Whipple asks Wiles: “‘Did that mean Harris couldn’t have won?’”
Trump’s campaign chair didn’t mince words.
“‘We’ll never know,’” she replies, “‘because it didn’t seem like she even tried.’
“‘Voters want authenticity … and they didn’t get that from her.’”
Leon Panetta, chief of staff to Bill Clinton, echoed Wiles.
“‘I thought they were thinking they could tiptoe into the presidency without getting anybody pissed off at them,’” he tells Whipple. “‘Baloney. You’ve got to make the American people understand that you’re tough enough to be president of the United States.’”
Rove does take a jab at Trump and Chris LaCivita, the ex-Marine who became a senior adviser. Rove introduced LaCivita to Trump, via the late megadonor Sheldon Adelson, but didn’t think LaCivita would take the gig. “‘I’m surprised because I know what he thinks of Trump,’” Rove tells Whipple. “‘He thinks Trump’s an idiot.’”
LaCivita condemned January 6, after which he “liked” a tweet that urged Trump’s cabinet to invoke the 25th amendment and remove him from power. LaCivita deleted the post – but did not join the second Trump administration.
Back in 2023, in The Fight of His Life, Whipple wrote: “Presidents do not give up power lightly.” Andy Card, chief of staff to George W Bush, weighed in: “‘If anybody tells you they’re leaving the White House voluntarily, they’re probably lying. This applies to presidents, of any age, who are driven by vast reserves of ego and ambition.’”
Biden did go – but not voluntarily. In Uncharted, in merciless detail, Whipple shows he should have gone much sooner. | {
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8c316c06bab6d5f464b760806739da94 | Le Touquet: old-world glamour on the French coast
I was sold on Le Touquet even before we reached the beach, a vast sweep of golden sand and grey green sea. There’s something about the way the town was created that appeals, an eccentric idea that was based on nothing more than a desire for pleasure. (A bit like Las Vegas, but classier and French.) It was in 1837 when a wealthy Parisian lawyer decided to plant about 2,000 pines in the area for his hunting parties.
Around 50 years later, a linoleum magnate from Leeds bought the town, attracting the British gentry with a horse track, casinos and golf course.
View image in fullscreen The market at Pas de Calais. Photograph: Hemis/Alamy
At the centre of its hedonistic history is Hotel Barrière Le Westminster, a grand redbrick, art deco building 10 minutes from the beach. The photo gallery just outside the dining room says everything about its iconic status; Edith Piaf, Charles de Gaulle, Marlene Dietrich all stayed, along with Ian Fleming, who wrote Casino Royale here. In 1962, Sean Connery signed his first James Bond film contract – the most luxurious suite is numbered 007 in tribute. The old-world glamour hasn’t dimmed; plush bedrooms twinkle with art deco touches, in the pale wood panelling and modernist paintings on the walls. If you don’t stay, enjoy a drink at the elegant bar where their French 75 is a favourite.
For budget chic nearby, there’s Hotel Castel Victoria, five minutes from the beach, with a cosy library, pool room and sun terrace. Every Thursday there’s the market at Le Marché Couvert du Touquet in the town centre, where you can find anything from vintage gold jewellery, pretty espadrille wedges for a tenner and an old-fashioned kitchen hardware store that you’ll never want to leave. There are seafood brasseries to while away a lunchtime over a moule marinière and a glass of Cremant – Pérard on Rue de Metz is a seafood institution.
View image in fullscreen Go horse riding on the beach. Photograph: Hemis/Alamy
After lunch, amble through the pine forest, a 15-minute walk from the seafront, to the horseriding centre (centreequestre-letouquet.com) and go for a pony ride along the sand. If you still have energy, climb 274 steps to the top of La Canche Lighthouse for spectacular views or stop off at Le Sand, a pretty bar on the beach where you
can kick off your shoes and gaze out at the ocean.
Hotel Barrière Le Westminster has double rooms from £220 per night; hotelsbarriere.com. Hotel Castel Victoria has double rooms from £91; castelvictoria.com | {
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"Emma Cook"
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"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
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"title": "Le Touquet: old-world glamour on the French coast",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2025/apr/20/le-touquet-old-world-glamour-on-the-french-coast"
} |
72d2c91136538c17304918250fdb43bf | ‘It might be gutted’ – Boots braces for dose of private equity’s bitter medicine
‘We’ve had several rounds of cost-cutting and it could happen again,” says a Boots worker. Fears are running high as the Nottinghamshire-based chemist prepares to change hands – perhaps twice in quick succession.
The US private equity firm Sycamore Partners is close to finalising a $10bn (£7.8bn) deal to take over the listed US owner of Boots, Walgreens Boots Alliance.
Experts say Sycamore is then likely to sell off assets, having previously employed this tactic with varying degrees of success at office supplies group Staples and the former owner of the footwear brand Kurt Geiger, Jones Group. It could look at picking off some aspects of Boots – such as stores, property or brands – but is more likely to sell on the entire business.
Boots – which operates more than 1,800 stores and employs about 51,000 people – including about 6,000 at its headquarters in Beeston, three miles south-west of Nottingham – has already been unsuccessfully put on the block by Walgreens at least twice in recent years, with a valuation of as much as £5bn.
The company has changed hands several times in the past 20 years. After a merger with Alliance Unichem in 2006, the combined firm was taken over by private equity firm KKR in 2007, before Walgreens first took a 45% stake in 2012 and then completed a takeover at the end of 2014.
View image in fullscreen Beeston resident Michelle Aduhene worries about the knock-on effect changes at Boots could have on the town. Photograph: Fabio De Paola/The Observer
But there are concerns now that this latest change of ownership could see the chain of stores, many of which already need more investment in equipment, staff and maintenance, take another hit.
Nowhere is that more keenly felt than in Nottingham, where Boots is the city’s biggest private-sector employer and has been a key to its identity since founder John Boot opened a small herbalist store on Goose Gate in 1849. The group has been based at its 112-hectare headquarters site in Beeston since 1927.
One Boots worker says: “There won’t be any regret we are no longer part of Walgreens. We have always been seen as a small part of that group. Before that Boots was Boots.” However, he adds: “The fear is more stores close or there is yet another round of reducing staff in stores.”
Another staff member says: “Private equity are in it to make money as quickly as they can and are not really bothered about the consequences.”
The high street is very uncertain at the moment. Who will be looking to buy into a retailer with such a huge presence? Boots worker, Beeston
On Beeston high street, several locals say they used to work for Boots or have friends and family who still do.
Jessica Stanley, 38, is suspicious of private equity firms “because they are thinking about shareholder profits and not value of the business to the community. I guess I would be concerned there’s a risk the company might be gutted.”
Michelle Aduhene, 50, compares any potential change to the closure of bicycle maker Raleigh’s Nottingham factory two decades ago. “They built the university [on the old factory site] and that brought students, but does it bring money? It’s worrying.” She points to the hit local businesses that also benefit from Boots’ employees’ trade could face.
However, several staff tell the Observer they would be quite relaxed about a new regime as they have already survived a lot of cost-cutting and restructuring under its various owners, including Walgreens. “It all happens so far up the line it won’t affect us,” says one.
The vast Boots campus still hints at a huge empire – but much of it is now rented out to other companies, some buildings lie empty and about 17 hectares have been sold off to builder Keepmoat for redevelopment into housing.
Occupants are continuing to move out. Alliance Healthcare, the owner of Boots’s former wholesale arm, announced plans to close its warehouse in Beeston next year, shortly after Fareva – the French owner of Boots’s former manufacturing arm, which makes products for its No7, Soltan and Liz Earle ranges – exited late last year.
There are rumours that more of the site could be sold for redevelopment, with Boots apparently assessing its vacant properties, although the company does not confirm this. Some locals feared a big swathe of student housing could be built, but local property experts say it would be tough to sell off large expanses of the site because of its complex nature.
It has several stunning listed buildings – including the art-deco former factory, which is now MediCity, a hub for biotechnology, health and beauty startups which has a number of spaces vacant – and modernist glass monolith D10, which until recently housed Fareva.
With Boots’s manufacturing and wholesale businesses already hived off, there are few divisions left that can be easily sold. However, the own-label beauty brands, including Liz Earle and No7, became a separate company about 10 years ago and could potentially be attractive to an international beauty specialist, according to industry experts. The No7 brand is now sold in the US via Walgreens and other retailers, but is also seen as key to Boots’s appeal in Britain.
Boots has been offering services such as obesity clinics and vaccinations, so there are new areas for potential growth
Store closures then would be an obvious way to go – as evidenced by the complete exit of rival chemist chain Lloyds from the high street after it was bought by private equity.
Boots has already closed more than 300 outlets in recent years but it still has a very high number of stores. Any new owner is likely to look closely at the chain’s property footprint, given the rising costs of high street retail, the shift of trade to online, and competition from discounters such as Savers, Lidl and Home Bargains.
Over a quarter (27%) of Boots staff surveyed in a poll by campaign group Organise said they feared their job would be less secure and more than a third (36%) said they felt conditions could get worse in the event of a takeover.
As one worker puts it: “Because the high street is a very uncertain place at the moment, who is going to be looking to buy into a retailer with such a huge high street presence?”
A listing on the stock exchange is seen as unlikely, given the current volatile situation on public markets and scepticism about growth in consumer companies, so a private sale is seen as more likely.
“Boots has improved dramatically in recent years,” says one source who knows the business well, pointing to the chain’s greater focus on beauty counters and use of technology to grab a share of the online market.
“But Boots is very hard to grow as it has got such big market share in most of the markets it is in, and is incessantly under attack from emerging market players. As its market share is so high there is almost only one way to go.
View image in fullscreen Boots headquarters in Beeston, Nottinghamshire. Photograph: Fabio De Paola/The Observer
“Someone could run it for cash and slowly underinvest in stores but it has been through that already.”
In recent years, the brand has ridden a strong beauty market, reporting a 1.6% rise in sales in the three months to the end of February. Underlying sales at its pharmacies and its retail business, excluding the impact of currency and store closures, both rose about 5%, while Boots.com sales soared 20%.
But staff say that government contracts for pharmacy services make it difficult to cover costs, and Boots has already reduced pharmacy trading hours in many stores, so counters can be closed even when the rest of the store is open.
Workers also point to poor maintenance in some stores and fewer staff, meaning tills are unattended or increasingly automated, which they say is not good for older shoppers.
Previously interested parties include India’s Reliance Industries and restructuring expert Apollo Global Management. CVC, Bain Capital and Asda owner TDR Capital also looked at the group but balked at the then mooted price of at least £5bn.
Stefano Pessina, the entrepreneur behind all the deals at Boots since it merged with his Alliance Unichem business in 2006, is likely to be kingmaker. Those who know him suggest he could keep a stake in Boots and may want to be involved in its future – if he sees a way to make money from it.
Not everyone is so sceptical. Another source who knows Boots well argues: “There is as much a case for investment as there is for stopping it. It could go more digital.”
With an ageing UK population and the Labour government’s increased focus on primary healthcare, where Boots has been increasingly offering services such as obesity clinics and vaccinations, there are new areas for potential growth.
“Boots is thriving, not just surviving, and if it was able to use more of its cash, who knows? There is a change in emphasis in the UK and, on a 10-year view, there is a big opportunity,” says the source. | {
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"Sarah Butler"
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8615b7a62bdc70642b8d3b2ddbe7fcc8 | The end of WeightWatchers? How the dieting club lost out to slimming drugs
It began as a support group for overweight New Yorkers in 1963 and ballooned into a multimillion pound global enterprise that has spent decades selling people the dream of long-term weight loss.
The trademark WeightWatchers’ points-based programme has been followed by millions, with accompanying cookbooks, groceries, weekly weigh-ins and “judgment-free” meetings, and a food-tracking app.
But soon members of WeightWatchers – which rebranded as WW in 2018 – may be putting away their scales for the last time. WW International is preparing to file for bankruptcy and hand control to its creditors in the coming months, if its negotiations with lenders and bondholders fail, the Wall Street Journal reported.
The financial troubles of the company, which is reportedly struggling with more than $1.4bn (£1bn) debt, has not come as a surprise to scientists and those who work in the diet industry, who have seen transformative change to businesses since the introduction of Ozempic and other weight loss injections. These developments may have a knock on effect on the UK operation.
“I think it’s had its day,” says Tim Spector, professor of genetics at King’s College London and co-founder of Zoe, the science and nutrition company. He thinks that meetings run by WeightWatchers, which peaked at five million subscribers worldwide in 2020, have in the past been “a little place of refuge” for overweight and obese people who felt stigmatised elsewhere. They were once a mainstay of church and village halls across the UK, and hundreds of groups still offer meetings across the country.
But Spector said: “I think it’s a good thing. Most calorie counting is largely snake oil … it doesn’t work on the vast majority of people, because if you restrict calories, you increase appetite – and if you don’t focus on the quality of the food, you’re still eating foods that make you overeat.”
WW rewards dieters for eating low-calorie but, it says, nutrient-dense foods. Spector’s advice to people who want to lose weight is to eat “foods that fill you up because of their quality and fibre: going back to better quality and less highly processed foods, rather than cheap food that says it is ‘low calorie’, ‘low fat’ or ‘low sugar’ ”.
View image in fullscreen WeightWatchers launched its own brand of ready meals, with calorie counts and serving suggestions. Photograph: Medicimage Education/Alamy
Spector believes advising people to “eat less and exercise more” is “flawed”, because the effectiveness of GLP-1 weight loss drugs like Ozempic, Wegovy and Mounjaro has demonstrated how important appetite is, compared with metabolism.
Last week the US pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly, which makes Mounjaro, announced it could be bringing the first daily weight-loss pill – which uses the same GLP-1 technology – to the UK next year after trial results found it controls type 2 diabetes and helps people lose weight.
“Until you’ve dealt with the problem, which is the appetite signal … that ‘eat less, exercise more’ approach was just doomed to fail. It’s just a reality that GLP-1 drugs are so much better for people who have been suffering for a long time.”
Spector says some people have been paying WeightWatchers for too long to help them restrict their diets, while failing to achieve long-term weight loss. “Now, they’re realising that they don’t have to keep failing. They can take a drug that works.”
After the explosion of weight loss drugs, Oprah Winfrey, WW’s most famous ambassador, revealed she had been using the medication. She announced in February last year that she would step down from the company’s board, causing its shares to drop by almost 20%, to their lowest since 2001.
The company did not respond to a request for comment last week on the reported bankruptcy, but its former chief executive Sima Sistani told the Financial Times last year that adapting for the new Ozempic era was like Netflix shifting from DVDs to streaming.
View image in fullscreen Sarah Ferguson told a WeightWatchers press conference in New York in 1997 about her weight battles. Photograph: Jon Levy/AFP/Getty Images
As well as GLP-1 drugs, WW also has to compete with advances in scientific research. Prof Roy Taylor of Newcastle University pioneered a groundbreaking diet programme 14 years ago which showed, for the first time, that type 2 diabetes could be reversed through rapid weight loss. Now, NHS England offers the Path to Remission programme based on his research. Using slimming shakes, it limits calorie intake to 800 calories a day for three months for recently diagnosed overweight adults with type 2 diabetes. A year into the programme, participants lost just over 10kg on average and in a long-term study, remained more than 6kg lighter after five years.
Taylor thinks WW, which advocates gradual weight loss, was not as an effective an option for many dieters. “I’ve been listening to my patients over four decades explain to me the very real difficulties of losing weight. One of these was the nagging matter of hunger, because if you cut back what you eat a little every day, you’ll feel hungry. But once a person is established on a diet of less than 1,000 calories a day – which takes about a day and a half – the hunger becomes really quiteminimal.”
For this reason, Taylor argues it’s much easier for dieters to aim to lose weight rapidly. “It’s nonsense to say if you lose weight rapidly, you put it on rapidly,” he says. “Provided the return to eating is done in a carefully guided fashion, people tend to keep the weight off.”
He fears people who go to WW have “an unrealistic view” of just how much weight they may need to lose to avoid being at risk of developing type 2 diabetes. “People talk enthusiastically about losing a few pounds, but that’s a drop in the ocean compared with the excess weight that’s causing mischief in the body,” he says. “We need to compare ourselves with our own weight at the age of 21, because unless you become a bodybuilder, any weight gain in adult life is adipose tissue – in other words, fat,” adds Roy.
Weight loss club Slimming World, which is the largest of its kind in the UK and runs thousands of local groups, described the decline of its biggest rival as “extremely sad” last week and reassured its members: “We’re not going anywhere.”
“Weight loss drugs are not the magic bullet for obesity,” the managing director of the club, Lisa Salmon, said in a statement. “Healthcare professionals need a full range of treatment choices for people without medicalising obesity as the first and only option.
“Everyone losing weight – with or without weight loss drugs – needs support to make changes to their diet, activity and mindset. And despite living in an increasingly digital age, people enjoy and benefit from the sense of community that comes with being part of an in-person group to receive that support.”
In-person local meetings are indeed the “lifeblood” of WeightWatchers, agreed former WW coach Ruth, who asked not to be identified. “There are a million diets and healthy eating plans you can do digitally – the difference with WeightWatchers is getting together with people who ‘get it’ – who understand what you’re going through,” she says.
But during the pandemic, WW International attempted to save $100m and laid off an undisclosed number of the coaches who ran these local meetings. “There was this confusing mass redundancy, and nobody knew what was happening,” Ruth says. After lockdown was lifted, WW was “left with too few coaches, and not enough meetings”, she adds. In her opinion, “they didn’t handle the pandemic well”.
Similarly, the recent introduction of a new points programme for people taking GLP-1 drugs did not go down well with the WW group she coached. “Members said to me: ‘Oh, it’s cheating. That’s not fair,’ ” says Ruth. “They felt like they’d learned new ways of thinking and eating, for example about snacks, and any members that were on weight loss drugs weren’t doing that.”
Taylor argues the programme is dated. “WeightWatchers was started when there was really little contact between people who wanted to lose weight and little discussion of the issue. Having a forum to do that was enormously helpful for people. Now, life has moved on. Society has changed with social media and digital apps.” Ruth recently resigned as a WW coach and had mixed feelings when she heard the business may go bust. “It’s hugely sad, because WeightWatchers is a lifeline for so many people, but it’s no surprise to me.” | {
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eea3142ae4dbedae8eeada6ce516f3af | ‘I want to talk about it honestly’: trauma of Weinstein’s unknown British victims is revealed
Harvey Weinstein’s key accusers were famous – from Angelina Jolie and Gwyneth Paltrow to Lupita Nyong’o and Ashley Judd. These Hollywood film stars spoke out against the ex-studio boss’s abusive behaviour in 2017, fuelling the international #MeToo movement.
But Weinstein’s crimes and bullying practices had a direct and lasting impact on many more, including unknown names who worked with him in London.
These assistants and aspiring actors had to cope with the worst excesses of an entertainment industry that did not only countenance exploitation but accepted it as part of the deal.
Lisa Rose, a British actor who worked at Weinstein’s Miramax office on Chelsea’s King’s Road in the 1990s, remains disturbed by memories of that time, and feels guilty about accidentally putting others at risk. Now, as Weinstein prepares to appear in court again in New York this week, facing a retrial of his two 2020 convictions, Rose is taking her message around Britain in a solo stage show.
“I want to talk about it honestly because people have forgotten how widespread the damage was,” she said this weekend. “It was a culture that put young women at risk all the time. There are intimacy coaches now. It may be better now, but it has not gone away.”
View image in fullscreen Lisa Rose says everything in her one-woman show is rooted in fact, highlighting an industry that put ‘young women at risk all the time’. Photograph: Arachne Press
Rose’s candid one-woman show, Too Small to Tell, is designed to remind audiences how the film business allowed Weinstein to operate with impunity. Bosses were to be obeyed and aspiring actors and office juniors were fair game. Rose has changed the names of those involved, but says everything is rooted in fact: “I wanted to tell it from the perspective of an ordinary woman.”
The appeal of the glamour of the smart offices and the A-list contacts file quickly palled for Rose as she became aware of the atmosphere of fear in the building whenever Weinstein was in the country. She soon learned his requests for an assistant to work with him alone in his room over at the Savoy hotel were to be avoided at all costs, but the shouting outbursts were impossible to dodge. Like many others, Rose says she was asked to perform demeaning tasks.
The show, which has its final performance at London’s Gatehouse Theatre on 20 Apriland goes on next month to Brighton, also sets out the perils of auditioning and is frank about how common abuse was.
“As an actress I had bad experiences both in a film and at auditions. Then I went to work as an assistant at Miramax, where it became apparent it was a big problem. I feel awful for getting a 17-year-old friend some office work there when I thought it was safe. She was assaulted. My show is about me realising that although these stories may be small, they are important.”
Weinstein, 73, was the producer of major box office hits such as Pulp Fiction and Shakespeare in Love while he ran Miramax, alongside his younger brother, Bob. More than 80 people have now come forward to attest to his abuse since the initial investigations by the New York Times and the New Yorker led to his exposure. But he is now to be tried again at New York’s court of appeals after it was found last year that legal improprieties and prejudicial testimony may have influenced the original judgement against him, leading to his 23-year prison sentence.
The disgraced producer is due to plead not guilty, denying all counts of rape and sexual assault.
Evidence will be presented once again accusing him of raping aspiring actor Jessica Mann in a Manhattan hotel in 2013 and committing a criminal sex act on TV production assistant Mimi Haleyi in 2006.
He is also to be charged with another criminal sex act in Manhattan, based on a new allegation from an anonymous woman who was not part of the original trial.
Frail and in poor health, Weinstein has been repeatedly hospitalised. But his lawyer, Arthur Aidala, claims that the full evidence now presented will confirm that his relationships were consensual and so persuade the jury he is not guilty.
The three survivors of Weinstein’s alleged crimes are expected to testify over five to six weeks, with the trial likely to conclude at the end of May.
Weinstein will not go free even if he is acquitted because of his 16-year prison sentence for a 2022 rape conviction in Los Angeles.
However, his lawyers are currently arguing that this, too, should be re-examined, claiming the New York verdict would have influenced the judge’s calculation. | {
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23cf6478f12ee4188f222fe2feaa9451 | A ‘Black Snape’ in the new Harry Potter seems designed to cause controversy – but it could work | Jason Okundaye
After months of speculation, HBO has announced part of the cast of the latest round of Harry Potter IP-mining: the new TV adaptation of the original books will feature John Lithgow as Dumbledore, Nick Frost as Hagrid – and Paapa Essiedu as Snape. As the Mail and Telegraph’s headlines were quick to inform their readers, yes, this means a “Black actor” in that iconic role.
There is a real concern that Essiedu is drinking from a poisoned chalice – that he will be associated with an author who is at the forefront of a gender-critical movement that has succeeded in redefining the rights of trans people to their detriment; that he will have to weather the racist storm of Potterheads enraged at the diversion from “book accuracy” (Snape is described as having “sallow skin”); and deal with opportunists looking to illustrate their next rant about how the world has succumbed to “woke orthodoxy”. All of this in a show that is slated to last a decade.
I’m sceptical about colour-blind casting, especially when it’s presented as a magic bullet for diversity concerns in the arts – but I can’t help but enjoy the audacity of Black Snape. If any performances from the original films were going to be rethought considerably – considering that casting so far is relatively aligned in appearance, bar a more handsome Quirrell – Snape is the most obvious choice. Alan Rickman’s depiction was so singular that any actor who hewed closely to it would likely be written off as doing a pastiche. He is also arguably the most complex and tragic figure in the series, inviting the most interpretation. So why not play around with it a bit?
Many detractors are insistent that they would’ve been OK with, say, a Black Dumbledore or a Black Professor McGonagall, but that the details of Snape’s arc within the series are made invariably more touchy and loaded if the character is Black. Harry and his friends’ suspicion of their potions professor is down to sensing a menacing, scheming intent behind his cold disposition. Cue the imagined new Snape going: Is it cause I’m Black? Harry’s dad, James, and his friends bullied Snape at school in the 1970s, making him levitate and then hanging him upside down. If unchanged in the new series (this somewhat depends on the casting of James’s friends) this could now look like an image of racist bullying. Perhaps that would make James Potter irredeemable, particularly considering the real experiences of Black people in boarding schools – or it could simply deepen the series’ depiction of vulnerability and torment.
View image in fullscreen Alan Rickman as Severus Snape with Rupert Grint as Ron Weasley and Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, 2005. Photograph: Warner Bros/Allstar
It is worth pointing out that Snape being portrayed by a Black actor isn’t automatically the same as there being a “Black Snape”. HBO could simply gloss over the racial implications behind such a decision – after all, the bigotries and oppression system of “muggles” do not neatly map on to the magical world.
But, if executed well, this casting represents an opportunity. I am incredibly intrigued by this idea of a Black man who is socially ostracised in his youth and then joins the Death Eaters (akin to an extremist, white supremacist party in the real world); who realises the errors in his ways, and gives his life in service of redeeming this mistake. The story alone doesn’t necessarily need the dynamics of race, but who in our current times may be better placed to represent such internal conflict, yearning for acceptance and a defection from such ideologies than a Black actor?
In Clint Dyer and Roy Williams’ play Death of England, Essiedu masterfully played a Black working-class Brexit-voting bailiff in what was a compelling psychological profile of the alienation experienced in desperately trying to reconcile aspirations for whiteness in a world that hates you. Similarly, Snape’s backstory of joining the Death Eaters is complicated by him being a “half blood” who joins a blood purity cult advocating for a standard he does not meet. Rather than a hasty imposition on the text, dig a little and a Black Snape starts to look like a much richer prospect – and yes, not too complex for a children’s series where all the themes of prejudice, identity and acceptance are already present. Whether the creators will approach the issue with such consideration, sensitivity and context however remains to be seen.
Quiet as it’s been kept, Paapa Essiedu is one of the finest British actors that I’ve ever had the privilege to see perform – he is eminently commanding on the stage, emotionally precise and able to balance humour and solemnity. In his Emmy-nominated turn in Michaela Coel’s I May Destroy You, he expertly captured the sense of being haunted by trauma. So why shouldn’t he cash in on one of the series’ most iconic roles rather than settle for a minor side character so as not to upset those who would only find something else in the series to complain about anyway?
skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to The Long Wave Free weekly newsletter Nesrine Malik and Jason Okundaye deliver your weekly dose of Black life and culture from around the world Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion
Behind the furore, though, is a much larger issue – about the kind of restrictions that are placed on the careers of Black actors and other creatives. Essiedu is a Black actor, where his colleagues are just actors. I am a Black writer, where my peers are just writers. Perhaps Essiedu being “too Black” for the role will mean some people give the TV series a miss. That’s fine, they can just wait for the next IP round. | {
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c81ce6d50717d76cfbf9b13ed2c47a8a | 11 things you should know about using the gym, from ‘Is everyone watching me?’ to ‘How do I use a squat rack?’
The gym is back. In the UK, about 11.5 million people aged 16 and over now belong to one. Even old habits are making a comeback: after a few years of exhorting people to socially distance and wipe down machines, gym chains are removing cleaning stations, while their clientele go back to sharing kit and sweating all over the benches. Nature, as they say, is healing.
But how many people are using their membership, and how much value are they getting out of the gym when they go? As a former editor of Men’s Fitness magazine, I have been going to gyms for more than a decade, and I still see half a dozen things I wish I could mention to people every time I go. So here are the tips I wish were in every gym’s welcome pack, alongside a bunch of the mistakes that it took me years to learn I was making. I am not going to tell you to wipe up your sweat, though. Hopefully, you are doing that already.
Yes, people are looking at you
View image in fullscreen Don’t believe the lie that no one will watch you. Photograph: Hinterhaus Productions/Getty Images
In lists of advice for the gym-shy, you often see something like: “Nobody else is watching what you’re doing, or even cares – they’re all too focused on their own workouts.”
This is a bit like telling children that all bullies are secretly cowards – it is a nice thing to say, but it isn’t true. People watch and judge others everywhere, and the gym is no exception. Unless you are somewhere incredibly quiet and you’re supernaturally focused, you will occasionally see someone checking out what you are doing – glancing at what weights you are lifting, or how fast you have set the treadmill.
The good news? This usually doesn’t much matter, because it is vanishingly unlikely that they are going to interact with you, at least if you are male. “For women, there’s more of a problem with people wanting to comment on your form – either to correct it, or compliment you on it,” says my wife, who has been a personal trainer for more than a decade. She advises: “My general advice is to Wear headphones, look purposeful, and keep your response to a noncommittal: ‘Thanks.’ It’s going to happen sometimes, but it doesn’t have to ruin your workout.”
‘Working in’ is definitely a skill worth learning
For some reason, probably due to the years of social distancing – the noble art of sharing bits of kit has fallen out of fashion over the past few years. But if you train in a crowded gym, there is a chance that you will have to do it occasionally, so it is worth knowing the proper form. Generally speaking wait until the other person has finished their set of exercises (usually marked by them putting the weight down; machines such as the leg press and pec deck are trickier, as people tend to stay seated between sets, but the same principles apply), then catch their eye and politely ask how many sets they have left.
Depending on how many this is, and how long they are resting for between each, it is fine to ask if you can “work in”, or do your exercises while they are resting. They can always refuse, but there is nothing wrong with posing the question. Obviously, the reverse applies if someone asks you to work in – and you might one day graduate to asking the obviously nervous person hovering around your rack if they need to use it. That’s advanced stuff, though – so for now, concentrate on the next bit …
Using the squat rack correctly is easy
Here is what every experienced gym person says to themselves at least once a week when they catch a glimpse of someone squatting with a barbell: “Put the hooks lower.”
In case you are completely unfamiliar with them, a squat rack works like this: a set of adjustable hooks holds the bar, you get underneath it, lift it up, then back out and do your set. The tricky bit? Lots of people put the hooks too high, so they are going up on tiptoe to remove or return the bar, which isn’t ideal at any weight, but gets downright dangerous when you are lifting heavy. Put them lower: you should quarter-squat the bar out of the rack, then, when it’s time to put it back, walk it straight into the upright part of the rack then let it drop into the hooks. Speaking of which …
You are supposed to put your kit back
View image in fullscreen Don’t leave your dumbbells lying around. Photograph: Kilito Chan/Getty Images
This isn’t always obvious – we have all been to gyms that look like a teenager’s bedroom – but it is generally considered bad form to leave dumbbells, plates and handles for the machines on the floor when you finish with them. Think of it like a cooldown from the rest of your workout, or like holding a door for someone: nobody’s going to make you do it, but it is annoying for everyone if you don’t.
Don’t stand in front of the dumbbell rack
Again, the temptation to do this is understandable: dumbbells are heavy, and if you stand right next to the rack, you can watch your form in the mirror. But standing less than an arm’s length from all the other dumbbells means that fellow gym-goers will have to squeeze past (or wait for you to finish your set) because they will need the weights you are standing in front of.
It’s fine to ask for advice
Honestly, almost nobody does this, but when it happens, it is delightful. If you’re not sure about something, whether it’s if you are doing a move correctly or how to lower the seat on a Wattbike (more complicated than you might expect), just ask someone. The worst that can happen is that they tell you they’re a bit busy.
… or a spotter
There aren’t many movements for which you need a “spotter” ready to step in and save you if you are struggling with weights – bench press is by far the most common – but if you really feel you need one to crank out a couple of extra reps, the protocol is simple. Find someone who looks as if they know what they are doing, wait until they are at a break, then ask if they would mind spotting you. Let them know how many repetitions of your exercise you are aiming for and how much help you would like (if the answer to this is “none”, that’s fine).
If you are on the bench, they might offer to help you with a “lift-off” – taking the bar out of the upright supports. If you take this, give them a clear “My bar!” to let them know when you’re happy that the weight’s under control. Once you’re done, “Done!” or “Take it!” lets them know you could use some help with putting the weight back.
Bands aren’t the best way to do pull-ups
Yes, I know they seem to work. Put both your feet in a band and, depending on its strength, you can happily twang yourself through plenty of pull-ups even if you can’t ordinarily do even one, so what’s the issue? Well, bands don’t really give you a uniform amount of help. You are barely putting in any effort at the bottom of the move (where the band’s fully stretched), and getting almost no assistance at the top. A better way to do it is to focus on “eccentric” reps: use a box or a step (or a little jump) to get your head over the bar, then lower yourself as slowly as you can. Do this two or three times, rest and repeat for a couple of sets, and then you are done for the day (overdoing eccentric reps is a very easy way to make yourself sore). You will be doing unassisted pull-ups long before the people still struggling with bands. By the way, in the gym “eccentric” is often pronounced “e-centric”. Go figure.
Not all trainers are created equal
Here’s a secret: it’s possible to get your level 3 personal trainer qualification, the minimum that most gyms demand, in about five weeks. Lots of personal trainers are lifelong students of exercise, who constantly do courses, read studies and experiment on themselves to fine-tune their knowledge – but more than a few don’t bother with any of that.
In general, it is a good sign if a trainer can point to clients who have got the results you’re looking for, with the same limitations you have. If they are touting six-week, six-pack transformations, make sure they weren’t doing them all with responsibility-free twentysomethings. Good trainers will also be able to explain why you are doing the moves and how to do them in a way that makes sense to you. And while it is nice to build up a rapport with your trainer, it is fine to be a bit wary of one who spends more time talking than taking you through your workout.
Burpees really aren’t all that great
View image in fullscreen Love them or hate them … burpees. Photograph: kovaciclea/Getty Images
Burpees are a love/hate thing: coaches love putting them into workouts because they are an easy way to tire people out; everyone else hates them because they are horrible. But it is also worth understanding that they aren’t necessarily that beneficial. Invented by an American physiologist, Royal Huddleston Burpee Sr (yes, really), they were originally intended to be done to a strict four-count, and not for more than 20 seconds at a time. If you are already in shape and injury-free, there is nothing wrong with them, but if you haven’t been to the gym in a while, then all the jumping, bouncing, flopping to the floor and hauling yourself back up is going to be hard on your joints (your wrists in particular).
If you want to push yourself through a high-intensity finisher, consider something zero-impact instead. The rower, exercise bike and Ski-Erg are all excellent options.
We are all rooting for you
I have saved the heartfelt tip for the end, but this is really true. In my gym, I constantly see people who go from making their first stumbling steps into fitness to building a bunch of confidence (and muscle) – and it’s great! Every time! Obviously, I can’t fist-bump everyone who suddenly builds a set of biceps, or congratulate every stranger I see trying really hard on the treadmill, but please understand that most people in the gym want to see you succeed.
There is something great about the camaraderie of a big gym full of clanking weights and thumping treadmills, and every hardworking person brings up the energy. Welcome on board! | {
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cd561fbe2ce720e57a3c9652d02afb85 | Alexander-Arnold critics ‘ridiculous’ says Slot after Liverpool edge closer
Arne Slot said it is “ridiculous” to dispute Trent Alexander-Arnold’s commitment to Liverpool after he scored the only goal at Leicester to push his club closer to a 20th league title. The 26-year-old, who is expected to join Real Madrid on a free this summer, fired in his first left-foot goal for his boyhood club on his return from an ankle injury to secure victory and condemn Leicester to relegation.
Alexander-Arnold, who scored within five minutes of replacing Conor Bradley, is poised to join Real on a long-term contract when his Liverpool contract expires. He celebrated at Leicester by removing his shirt and Kostas Tsimikas placed it on the corner flag nearest to the away fans. Following the match the full-back soaked up their adulation after Virgil van Dijk ushered him towards them. Alexander-Arnold, who joined Liverpool aged six, has won every domestic trophy with the club, plus the Champions League.
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“It is a big moment and big players like to have big moments in their career,” Slot said. “Virgil had one last week [scoring the winning goal against West Ham], a special moment, Mo [Salah] has had them many times this season and players like Trent, they step up when needed. He did that against Newcastle and in his second-half performance against Paris Saint‑Germain when I was just waiting for him to score a goal and then he had to go off with an injury.”
Asked whether Liverpool have given up hope of keeping Alexander-Arnold, Slot said: “The headline should be today the goal he scored and not about his contract but what I can say is it would be ridiculous if someone argues his commitment for this club because the work rate he has put in today to be back and score such an important goal, and all the work he has done for this club in all the years he is here, no one should, in my opinion, argue with his commitment for this club. Let the headlines be his great goal and not his contract situation.”
Ruud van Nistelrooy, who was appointed in November as Leicester manager on a contract until 2027, said he is planning to be in charge next season but his future is thought to be in doubt. Leicester have sounded out potential successors in recent weeks.
“We have to use this time to get better,” Van Nistelrooy said. “The club will continue and it is my job to put the club in the best place possible.” | {
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b851bdf9ef9eadb3499b9dcb5c395dbb | Oscar Piastri storms to Saudi Arabian F1 GP win and now leads title race
Maintaining a focus and equilibrium under pressure has always been one of the hallmarks of Formula One’s greatest proponents and Oscar Piastri is demonstrating it with striking assurance for one so young.
His victory at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, beating the world champion Max Verstappen, was an object lesson in the 24-year-old’s calm and confidence and his potential to take the title in only his third season.
Seven days ago at the Bahrain GP, Piastri had controlled the race from pole to flag with insouciant ease and while in Jeddah he had more to do, starting from second on the grid after Verstappen had taken an unexpected and brilliant pole, the Australian and his McLaren team kept their composure and once he had the lead, gained through the pit stops after Verstappen was given a five-second penalty, Piastri was once more untouchable.
For all that Verstappen and Red Bull had managed to find the right window for their car this weekend, a far cry from Bahrain, the McLaren remains very much the class of the field in race pace and was notably easier on its tyres than its competitors.
Piastri and his team duly executed with perfection in what was something of a procession to secure the victory and one largely decided in the opening moments when Verstappen held his lead from the off but had to go off wide at turn two as Piastri went up the inside.
The McLaren driver believed he had been ahead and that Verstappen should give the place back; the world champion said he had not been given enough room and the incident was investigated by the stewards. Verstappen was adjudged to have been at fault and given a five-second penalty but he maintained his place at the front in clean air.
The Dutchman pushed hard but could not open a wide enough lead to cover the penalty and Piastri held his nerve and his cool to ease ahead through the pit stops, after which his pace and superior tyre wear paid off and he exercised iron control to take the flag by 2.8sec.
Charles Leclerc took Ferrari’s first podium in third, Lando Norris was fourth for McLaren in a strong comeback drive from 10th on the grid, and George Russell was fifth for Mercedes. Lewis Hamilton could not match his Ferrari teammate, taking seventh.
For Piastri then, his third win this year was another strong statement of intent after dominant wins in Bahrain and China. Based on his performance on the high-speed challenge of the Jeddah Corniche Circuit which demands commitment for a quick lap, his confidence and equanimity in how the McLaren handles under him was once more clear and sits in stark contrast with his teammate Norris, who was considered the championship favourite.
Piastri wielded it in Jeddah with the same controlled aplomb as he has all season and it is paying off. He now leads the world championship for the first time in his short career, 10 points ahead of Norris with Verstappen in third, 12 points back.
Verstappen and Red Bull, however, will still consider this a strong result. In Bahrain Verstappen could manage only sixth place, his car a recalcitrant beast, lacking in almost every area and left floundering against the dominant McLaren and indeed Mercedes and Ferrari. He was wrestling with it through waves of frustration and ire, made clear to his team in no uncertain terms.
Yet the Red Bull was quick and handling well in Jeddah, another indication of how on any given weekend it can veer from fearsome to frightful, according to whether it finds an increasingly narrow operating window but this was nonetheless a strong performance from driver and team.
He and Red Bull were aggrieved at the penalty but might consider the better option would have been to have Verstappen hand the place back immediately rather than risk censure, although regardless he did not look to have the pace to deny Piastri across the race.
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Norris had crashed out in qualifying after an unforced error and drove well to comeback. This was better than he expected, having warned that he believed fifth or sixth might be the best he could manage.
On a counterstrategy of opening on the hard tyres Norris once again demonstrated he is far more comfortable with the McLaren in race pace rather in the very edge over a single lap in qualifying.
He chastised himself for his crash on Saturday and is more than well aware that given his issues with the car he can ill afford to make unforced errors. Norris is very self-critical as a driver and lacking confidence in the car will not be helping him so this decent run in Jeddah will help, but the British driver very much needs some clean and preferably victorious races to reassert himself.
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Piastri, however, in Jeddah as he has repeatedly this season, made the task look seamless even while navigating the unforgiving circuit which punishes errors with finality. He barely put a foot wrong as once more he eased to victory.
There is little to no histrionics in his driving, no unnecessary drama but rather a smooth ease on that even keel holding him very much on course in the title fight.
Kimi Antonelli was sixth for Mercedes, Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon eighth and ninth for Williams and Isack Hadjar in 10th for Racing Bulls. | {
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a6e0a2af73fc77ac426e7630fb332575 | Pina inspires Barcelona to emphatic WCL first-leg win against Chelsea
Sonia Bompastor accepted that her Chelsea team had been simply “not good enough” after they were taught a lesson by a technically superior Barcelona side who now hold a commanding position in their Women’s Champions League semi-final.
Chelsea were beaten for only the second time in all competitions since Bompastor took over last summer but in sunny Catalonia they were outclassed by the strongest team they have faced in her tenure so far.
“Barcelona is maybe the best team in Europe,” Bompastor said. “I think when the result was 2-1 we were not in a bad situation, but the last 10 minutes were not good enough. As a team we made too many mistakes tonight to have a better result. The version we showed tonight was not good enough.
“When you play Barcelona, you just need to be brave on the ball, being able to hold the ball under pressure, and being able also in the physical aspects to win your duels, and just sometimes in your football brain to be smarter, to anticipate things. I think we played with too many reactions, instead of being proactive in the game.”
Chelsea are trying to reach the European final for only the second time and could still win a quadruple of major trophies this term in Bompastor’s first season in charge, but they will now need an unlikely looking comeback and the performance of their lives if they are to have any chance of overturning this deficit in London.
The scoreline could have been worse for Chelsea but for Hannah Hampton’s early penalty save, at a time when the tie was level at 0-0, when the former Ballon d’Or winner Alexia Putellas was denied from the spot. That kept the home side at bay but not for long, with Putellas classily slipping a through ball into the path of Ewa Pajor for the Poland striker to open the scoring.
Chelsea improved defensively after the break but were undone by a masterful team goal as Barcelona made it 2-0 with a move that involved 18 passes before Clàudia Pina turned in from inside the six-yard box. Pina herself had played the 13th pass of Barcelona’s flowing move from deep inside her own half before sprinting upfield to turn home the cross.
View image in fullscreen Chelsea’s Keira Walsh and Sjoeke Nüsken show their disappointment after Barcelona’s fourth goal. Photograph: Albert Gea/Reuters
Sandy Baltimore’s crisp strike into the far corner with 16 minutes remaining offered Bompastor’s team a glimmer of hope to bring the scoreline back to 2-1, but a far-post header from an unmarked Irene Paredes restored Barcelona’s two-goal advantage soon after. Pina then struck again from close range in the 90th minute to severely hamper Chelsea’s hopes for the second leg, and make the hosts’ advantage on the scoreboard more accurately reflect their dominance.
Quick Guide WSL roundup: Holmgaards combine to hit City's Champions League hopes Show Manchester City's fading hopes of qualifying for the Women's Champions League were further dented as they dropped points at home in a 1-1 draw with Everton.
Nick Cushing's injury-hit side had taken the lead in scrappy fashion when Kerstin Casparij reacted fastest to a bouncing ball in the box to tuck in from close range, but that early goal was cancelled out when Karen Holmgaard (right of picture) headed in a cross by her twin sister Sara (left of picture) to equalise. The result left fourth-placed Manchester City seven points away from a European place with only three games remaining.
Second-bottom Aston Villa took a giant step towards survival as Kirsty Hanson's 91st-minute winner gave them a 3-2 victory away at Tottenham. It was Villa's second consecutive WSL victory and lifted them seven points clear of Crystal Palace, who have four matches left to try and save themselves. Tom Garry Photograph: Nigel French/PA Was this helpful? Thank you for your feedback.
Caroline Graham Hansen, who had been a doubt for this first leg after missing Barcelona’s training session on Saturday because of illness, was named among the starting side and the Norway winger began the game impressively, giving the Chelsea left-back Baltimore plenty to think about in the early stages. A shot by Graham Hansen was deflected wide, after the hosts’ holding midfielder Patricia Guijarro had seen a low effort deflected into the arms of Hampton, while Chelsea struggled to hold on to the ball long enough to mount many meaningful attacks in the opening exchanges.
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Barcelona’s early pressure eventually led to a penalty when Nathalie Björn handled Paredes’s header and the Hungarian referee Katalin Kulcsár correctly awarded the spot-kick after consulting the screen following a VAR check. Putellas opted to send her strike straight down the middle and the England goalkeeper Hampton, who had dived slightly to Putellas’s right, made the save comfortably with her feet.
That proved to be one of the only moments of celebration for the travelling Chelsea fans and ultimately this was a game which highlighted Barcelona’s superior skill as they appear to be on course to knock Chelsea out at the semi-final stage of this competition for the third successive season.
Bompastor refused to concede the tie, though, trying to hold on to some hope for a return-leg comeback: “It will be difficult but, in football, you need to believe. We want to go into the second leg trying to win the game and, in football, anything can happen.” The defender Lucy Bronze told TNT Sports: “I think we can do it.”
Barcelona are aiming to reach their fifth consecutive final and lift the European title for the fourth time in those five seasons, having started their current run of dominance in this competition with a 4-0 win against Chelsea – who have never won this title – in the 2021 final in Gothenburg, Sweden.
This first-leg meeting was similarly one-sided to that showdown four years ago. But Paredes was urging caution when telling the Catalan television channel TV3: “It’s not done. We are happy with how we played, but we have to go there [Stamford Bridge] and play well as well.” | {
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c68074c0952e52f6f4338cc88727f340 | Leandro Trossard double secures victory for Arsenal at 10-man Ipswich
Mikel Arteta will have spent more arduous Easter Sundays hunting hidden chocolate eggs.
Aside from brief concern for Bukayo Saka’s raked achilles – an incident for which Leif Davis received his very early marching orders – this was as undemanding an afternoon as the Arsenal manager could have envisaged on the path to the more important matter of a Champions League semi‑final with Paris Saint‑Germain.
Arteta will put his players through tougher training sessions ahead of that showdown than the exertions required of them at Portman Road.
The upshot of this 4-0 win was that Liverpool are not Premier League champions; not yet anyway. They will be – of that there is only mathematical but virtually no practical doubt. For now, though, the title remains unclaimed for a little while longer.
Similarly, Ipswich are not yet relegated, but – as acknowledged by Kieran McKenna even before this defeat – their football will be played in the Championship next season. An implausible five wins to see out the season would likely still send them down on goal difference. If this match marked the reading of their last rites in the top flight, they appeared to hear them in a stupor.
By the time Davis was shown a straight red card for a tackle that possessed an abundant capacity to injure but no hope of winning the ball, his side were two goals down and staring at a task that appeared near impossible. His dismissal, with almost an hour remaining, confirmed as much.
Saka continued after receiving treatment, but an ice pack was strapped to his ankle upon his substitution in the second half. Arteta played down any lasting damage: “He was a bit sore, but it’s nothing serious, so it’s good. He cuts him from the back. I don’t think it’s intentional at all, but it’s dangerous because he cannot really react to anything, because you cannot see him coming.”
The match ceased to exist as anything even resembling a contest following Davis’s departure, although Arsenal’s dominance had been abundantly clear from kick-off, jogging and sometimes walking their way into a healthy lead.
Both early goals followed a similar script, emerging from a right side where Ben White, Martin Ødegaard and Saka started together for the first time since November.
Saka, in particular, caused all manner of problems. His first cutback went via Ødegaard’s toe to Leandro Trossard who, loitering near the penalty spot, prodded past Alex Palmer while falling backwards. When Saka repeated the trick soon after, Mikel Merino’s backheel sent the ball towards Gabriel Martinelli who was able to tap into an empty net at the far post.
View image in fullscreen Arsenal’s Gabriel Martinelli scores their second goal after a clever backheel by Mikel Merino. Photograph: David Klein/Reuters
That Saka was credited with neither assist did nothing to deny his role as creator of both. The England forward instantly became the home fans’ primary target following Davis’s sending off, although they would have been hard pressed to challenge the decision with the benefit of replays. They did, at least, gain a modicum of perverse pleasure from his inability to add his name to the scoresheet despite multiple efforts.
“I probably thought at the start it was the highest standard we’d faced this year,” McKenna said of Arsenal’s first-half performance. “The red card makes it an impossible task in terms of getting back into the game.”
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With one eye on the upcoming PSG semi‑final – Thomas Partey is suspended for the first game – Arteta had decided to use this as a practice for his likely setup, deploying Declan Rice in a deeper No 6 role and pulling Merino back into his more familiar midfield position. Aside from a couple of early skirmishes, where he stood up resolutely to the tricky figure of Julio Enciso, Rice may as well have not been there for all that he was troubled.
The absence of any jeopardy allowed Arteta to rotate his troops after the break, with Saka, Merino, Rice and Martinelli all able to put their feet up early.
From the ninth minute to the 56th, Ipswich did not even muster a shot, McKenna forced to revert to a 5-3-1 formation in the second half in a bid to prevent the floodgates from opening. It had some success, although Arsenal – exhibiting their set-piece prowess – added two more from short corners.
First, Trossard strolled unaccompanied to the edge of the six-yard box before swivelling on the ball and drilling low past Palmer. Then, Ethan Nwaneri cut inside and his shot took multiple deflections on its way into the net. It was nothing that their dominance did not deserve, and Arteta’s side is now unbeaten in 11 matches across all competitions.
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“We are really happy; really happy with the performance,” Arteta said. “I think the first 35 minutes is one of the best we played this season.”
Ipswich fans have now endured seven successive home defeats, the club’s longest losing run at Portman Road. The Championship should provide some solace. | {
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d0037e00fc45bf0ce03fa04d132a6eba | Mark Williams outlasts Wu Yize to make World Snooker Championship last 16
Mark Williams was forced to dredge up every inch of his Crucible experience to sink rising Chinese star Wu Yize 10-8 and book his place in the last 16 of the World Snooker Championship for the 22nd time in his career.
Williams, who turned 50 last month, delivered two near-faultless final frames to hold off his opponent, who had missed a golden chance to seize a 9-7 advantage when he missed a frame-ball red with the rest.
The Welshman’s win was all the more remarkable given his struggles with failing eyesight. Williams said his eyes had “completely gone” after defeat by Ding Junhui in the Players’ Championship in March, and he is understood to be considering surgery.
The 21-year-old Wu, one of the audacious stars of China’s latest generation of cueists, had gripped on to Williams’ coattails after resuming 5-4 behind on Sunday, and when the younger man nudged in front in the 15th frame the momentum appeared to have shifted in his favour. Instead a lapse in concentration in the 16th frame cost him dear, Williams using all his guile to pull level before brilliantly crafted breaks of 58 and 75 got him over the line.
“Some of the balls he can pot is incredible and he’s got the ability to win this tournament, no question,” Williams said of Wu afterwards. “But I got stronger towards the end and if I can’t outscore or outpot him, I suppose I can outwit him.”
Chris Wakelin withstood a stirring comeback from Neil Robertson to beat the Australian former champion 10-8 and seal his place in the second round for the first time. The 33-year-old from Rugby, who had not won a match at the famous venue in three previous attempts, resumed with a 7-2 lead but was rooted in his seat as Robertson reeled off five frames on the bounce to haul the match back level.
However, Wakelin recovered his form at the right time, twice poking his nose back in front before riding his luck to clinch a dramatic 18th frame and finally confirm his place in the last 16.
Also in a drama-filled evening session, 11th seed Barry Hawkins surrendered a slender overnight advantage to Iranian qualifier Hossein Vafaei, whose pressure-filled break of 73 in the decider sealed a 10-9 win and a second round meeting with Williams.
View image in fullscreen Xiao Guodong completed a 10-4 victory over qualifier Matthew Selt on Sunday. Photograph: Richard Sellers/PA
Mark Allen dug deep to chisel out a 5-4 overnight advantage against China’s world No 46 Fan Zhengyi. Qualifier Fan – who was beaten 10-5 by the Antrim man in the same round two years ago – made a blazing start, winning the first three frames including breaks of 89 and 103, before the eighth seed belatedly stirred.
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A century of his own followed by two more breaks over 50 pulled Allen level, and after the pair split the two frames, Allen stepped up to nudge through a scrappy ninth and give him a slender advantage for when they return to play to a conclusion on Monday afternoon.
Earlier, the Chinese surge had showed no sign of abating as Xiao Guodong and Zhao Xintong produced impressive displays on the second morning of the tournament. Xiao followed compatriot Lei Peifan – who stunned defending champion Kyren Wilson on Saturday night – into the last 16 after completing a 10-4 victory over qualifier Matthew Selt.
Zhao, having battled through four qualifying rounds as he continues his comeback from a ban related to a betting scandal, built a 7-2 lead after the first session of his clash with last year’s runner-up, Jak Jones. | {
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fc06f4dd3361b5a0041e1ad08c584354 | Barry Hoban, British cycling legend and Tour de France icon, dies aged 85
The pioneering British road sprinter and Classics rider Barry Hoban has died at the age of 85. Hoban was for many years the UK record holder for stage wins in the Tour de France with a tally of eight during his 17-year professional racing career, a total bettered only by the greatest sprinter of them all, Mark Cavendish, in 2009.
Hoban’s first stage victory in the Tour, in 1967, was not one he cared to remember – or that he felt was really a win – as it came the day after the sudden death of his friend and rival Tom Simpson on Mont Ventoux; he was “permitted” to escape and cross the line first by the grieving peloton.
It emerged during research for Put Me Back on My Bike, my account of Simpson’s death, that Hoban was probably not the senior riders’ preferred choice on that emotionally charged day, creating an undercurrent of controversy that persisted for a quarter of a century.
Nonetheless, his close connection with Major Tom could never be in doubt; the pair had frequently crossed swords as amateurs and Hoban was eventually to marry Simpson’s widow Helen, with whom he moved to the Welsh hills near Newtown, Powys after many years spent in the Flemish city of Gent.
Twelve months after Simpson’s death, however, there was no argument about a solo “medium mountain” stage victory in the Alps at Sallanches which Hoban took in magnificently clear-headed style – winning a cow named Estelle – and he added back-to-back stage wins at Bordeaux and Brive in 1969; Cavendish and Geraint Thomas remain the only other Britons to have taken two Tour stages in two days.
Hoban added further stage wins at Argèles-sur-Mer and Versailles in 1973, Montpellier in 1974 and Bordeaux in 1975, by which time he was on the way to completing nine Tours; he would finish two more, a record bettered only by Thomas last July.
View image in fullscreen Barry Hoban in action during the 1968 Tour de France. Photograph: Agence France Presse/AFP/Getty Images
As well as his undoubted sprint skills – which brought him a brace of stage wins in the Vuelta a España in successive days in his first professional season, 1964 – Hoban’s clear head, ability to read a race and his encyclopaedic memory for race routes enabled him to race strongly in one-day Classics.
He won the Grand Prix of Frankfurt in 1966, and Gent-Wevelgem in 1974 ahead of Eddy Merckx and Roger De Vlaeminck, the only British victory in the race’s history; his third place in Paris-Roubaix in 1972 was a British best, matched only by Roger Hammond in 2004, while his third in Liège-Bastogne-Liège in 1969 has yet to be bettered by a Briton.
“The Grey Fox”, as he was known later in his career, began racing in Yorkshire for the Calder Clarion cycling club, before heading to northern France to race as an independent in 1962. He earned a contract with Raymond Poulidor’s Mercier‑Hutchinson team in 1964 after winning 35 races in the lower tier of the sport, and stayed with the squad in its various incarnations until 1979 apart from a brief spell at Sonolor-Lejeune. In 1980, he retired to Newtown to head up the Coventry-Eagle cycle company; later he worked for the cycle importer Yellow.
“He had incredible knowledge of a race,” said a Mercier insider, Guy Caput. “He was far more than a sprinter. His judgment on everything that went on in a race could be relied on absolutely. He was a professional from sunrise to sunset.”
Hoban leaves his widow Helen, their daughter Daniella and his stepdaughters Jane and Joanne. | {
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6f45f2c2eb443d1a5a4700241c61c9a4 | Steward steers Leicester to victory at Bristol to boost title push
In theory it was a day for Bristol to consolidate second place and reaffirm their Premiership title credentials. The sun shone, the pitch was hard and fast and the free-scoring Bears welcomed back the inspirational wing, Gabriel Ibitoye, after a four-month injury absence.
In reality what materialised was a largely dominant Leicester victory that took them past their opponents into second, on points difference, with four games remaining. Michael Cheika’s one-year assignment as Tigers coach will soon be over but the possibility of him departing a champion cannot be discounted.
Looming over the buildup was the memory of the game last December when Pat Lam’s side won 54-24 at Welford Road. The Tigers were hurt by that humiliation, no doubt, but might also have reminded themselves that the Bears were thrashed 38-0 by Sale at home a week later.
“For me personally, and for us as a team, we wanted to play this game for the fans,” Cheika said. “We were poor the day they came, and we really wanted to turn that around. I hope they’ll be happy with that performance.”
True to form, Bristol seamlessly switched from the sublime to ridiculous here. Adam Radwan’s try had put Leicester in front when Kalaveti Ravouvou made a burst into the visitors’ 22. The Bears centre looked isolated after being dragged down, but the covering defenders could not have imagined the vision and accuracy of a frankly ludicrous one‑handed offload fizzed to Ibitoye, lurking near the touchline. The wing applied a simple finish. “Fiji flair,” Lam said of Ravouvou’s outrageous skill. “With those Fijian boys, just expect the pass. For him to pull it out like that and for Gabs to read it was class.”
Quick Guide Women's Six Nations: Ireland roar back in style to leave Wales winless Show Ireland earned their second Women’s Six Nations win with a 40-14 bonus-point victory over Wales at Rodney Parade. Wales took the lead following a mistake from Ireland wing Amee-Leigh Costigan and the loose ball was quickly scooped up by Carys Cox to ground before Keira Bevan added the extras. The visitors responded when Linda Djougang broke through the Welsh defence to score before another brilliant spell of pressure on the home try line saw Aoife Wafer able to reach over and ground, with Dannah O’Brien converting both tries. Although Ireland were reduced to 14 when O’Brien was sent to the sin-bin, Dorothy Wall added their third try just before the break and Enya Breen’s resulting kick was successful. A dominant afternoon for the visitors continued when a driving maul allowed Wall to cross and secure the bonus point before Djougang weaved through to score underneath the posts, with O’Brien converting. Wales pulled one back through replacement Hannah Bluck, who touched down moments after coming on and Bevan converted, but Wafer extended the visitors’ advantage after breaking from a scrum to score, with Breen’s kick squeezing through the posts to ensure a winless Wales stay bottom. PA Media Was this helpful? Thank you for your feedback.
Soon came the ridiculous. Ibitoye’s ambitious pass drifted into the grateful hands of Ollie Hassell-Collins, near halfway, gifting the wing a clear run to the line. Jack van Poortvliet scored a third try for Leicester and when Handré Pollard added a penalty to two conversions it created a 22-5 half‑time lead for the Tigers. The only downside for them was losing Joe Heyes to the sin-bin for a high shot on Fitz Harding.
This being Bristol it felt unlikely that Leicester would serenely close out the win. Ravouvou was duly sent scorching under the posts six minutes after the break and when AJ MacGinty converted the Bears trailed by 10. England’s Ollie Chessum was putting in a huge shift at lock, personifying the old‑fashioned mongrel that Cheika insists on, but Bristol’s attacking potency remained a concern.
View image in fullscreen Cameron Henderson crosses the line for Leicester’s final try of their victory. Photograph: Steven Paston/PA
The basics still had to be done and when the Bears fluffed a lineout on 63 minutes the full-back Freddie Steward applied a classy finish from turnover ball, ghosting easily away from Benjamín Elizalde and securing a Leicester try bonus point. Game over? Not quite. Harry Randall’s sniping effort again made it a 10-point game and Bristol’s offloading excellence continued to ask questions of the tiring Tigers.
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After Solomone Kata received Leicester’s second yellow card, Randall touched down again with six minutes left, after being hauled down near the posts by Leicester’s replacement scrum-half Ben Youngs. But Randall had knocked on. A converted try then would have reduced Bristol’s arrears to three with a couple of minutes remaining. It wasn’t to be: Cameron Henderson smashed over for a fifth Leicester try, converted by Jamie Shillcock with the final kick.
Considering Bristol’s tricky run‑in – Northampton and Sale away, Bath and Harlequins at home – if they don’t improve on this performance their season could go south quickly.
“We were just messy,” said Lam, who pointed to Bristol’s injury issues, particularly in the second row. “We’ve got to dust ourselves off, with a six-day turnaround, and go and get some points at Northampton next Saturday. Everyone’s pretty gutted … but if we can get five [points] next week it makes a big difference.”
Chessum said: “We owed it firstly to people back home, after what happened,” referring to that painful thrashing last December. “But we owed it to ourselves, too.” Does he like the idea of a trip to Australia with the British & Irish Lions this summer? “No comment.” Another tight spot successfully negotiated. | {
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862020f7ab700901d1b6ceeeb7912db9 | County cricket: Pope and Lawrence hit centuries for Surrey against Sussex – as it happened
4h ago 19.59 BST Roundup: Surrey's Pope and Lawrence hit centuries Tanya Aldred The Surrey teammates Ollie Pope and Dan Lawrence gave the Hove faithful an Easter treat with hundreds of a deliciously attacking hue. Pope’s 102 was his first Championship hundred for two years, and his first away from The Oval for eight. Lawrence survived one fluffed catch and flayed six sixes in his 92-ball century. An awful last half‑hour of the day left Lancashire in deep trouble against Leicestershire. Set eight overs to survive, the steady Old Trafford pitch turned toxic track in the hands of Ian Holland and Logan van Beek. Keaton Jennings was bowled off his second delivery. Anderson Phillip was once more walking out as nightwatchman – for the third innings in four. Nine balls later he was walking back. Michael Jones soon found his off stump dancing behind him. In the end, 16 for three felt like a lucky escape. Earlier, Tom Hartley had wheeled through 44 overs as Leicestershire ticked along to 491 for eight declared, a lead of 228. Peter Handscomb’s 142 not out punished the tired bowlers, after Rehan Ahmed skipped to his second first‑class hundred. Ben Compton’s 178 ushered Kent towards safety at Canterbury. Gloucestershire then built a lead of 191 in their second innings before the light dipped. At Lord’s, Glamorgan chances of survival shrank thanks to two wickets in two balls from Middlesex’s Toby Roland‑Jones. Migael Pretorius (five for 64) and Tom Lammonby (three for 26) restricted Hampshire’s first‑innings lead, and Sean Dickson’s undefeated 55 kept Somerset alive. Worcestershire were set 295 to win at Chelmsford, but Essex picked away, with three wickets for Jamie Porter. The tail must find 110 today on a hybrid pitch. Nottinghamshire need four wickets to beat Warwickshire at Edgbaston. Northamptonshire declared on 500 for eight at Derby, with a century from Saif Zaib and 150 from Luke Procter. Yorkshire rattled through Durham, taking the last nine first‑innings wickets for 126 – after Alex Lees had made 172 and Emilio Gary 152. Share Updated at 20.00 BST
4h ago 19.51 BST After that hypnotic last eight overs at OT, time to go home. We’ll be back tomorrow to see how Lancs, Worcestershire, Warwickshire and more get on. A happy Easter Sunday, wherever you are. Share
4h ago 19.49 BST Close of play scores DIVISION ONE Chester le Street: Durham 427 v Yorkshire 307 and 132-4 Chelmsford: Essex 179 and 317 v Worcestershire 202 and 185-6 Worcs need 110 to win Southampton: Hampshire 336 v Somerset 184 and 103-1 Hove: Sussex 435 v Surrey 390-3 Edgbaston: Warwickshire 93 and 163-6 v Nottinghamshire 367 DIVISION TWO The County Ground: Derbyshire 307 and 202-3 v Northamptonshire 500-8dec Canterbury: Kent 393 v Gloucestershire 472 and 112-2 Old Trafford: Lancashire 263 and 16-3 v Leicestershire 491-8 Lord’s: Middlesex 470-9 v Glamorgan 199 and 186-5 Share
5h ago 18.08 BST Leicestershire declare! 491-8, a lead of 228 With six lofted over wide mid-on by Scriven. They will have eight overs at Lancashire tonight. Share
6h ago 17.29 BST Van Beek slams six, up and away,, and time for me to write up for the paper. Do keep the conversation going BTL. Share
6h ago 17.26 BST Stumps at Canterbury They’ve called it a day for bad light. Share
6h ago 17.25 BST D’Oliveira (33) and Waite (17) have a job to do at Chelmsford – Worcestershire need 141 to win. Handscomb slams Mahmood for six – declaration time?. For those interested, Lancashire didn’t win a Championship game at Old Trafford between September 2022 (when they beat just-crowned champions Surrey) and the last game of last season, when they defeated Somerset. Share
6h ago 17.12 BST Raine and Potts have made inroads into Yorkshire’s second innings – Lyth (32) and Malan (3) rebuild. I’m not sure how many CC games Malan is going to be around for – he signed a two-year white ball contract with Yorkshire in December and will play red ball as and when. I think McGrath’s sweet nothings have been persuasive. Meanwhile, Saqib Mahmood has got rid of Cox, for 31. Leicestershire’s lead now 137. Share
6h ago 17.00 BST A handsome hundred for Handscomb! Very nicely done. With enough energy to run a rapid two in the same over. Takes Leicestershire in whispering distance of a fourth batting point. Share
7h ago 16.50 BST Rain and bad light have halted events at Canterbury and Hove. Share
7h ago 16.48 BST At Old Trafford, the shadows are shrinking but the sun is still warm A handful of Leicester players are doing a loop of the boundary with a football. Handscomb moves into the nineties, the lead is 109. Hartley wheels into his 34th over. And a wave to my 11 year old nephew Seamas who was bought his first proper cricket bat yesterday by his grandad. My brother tells me that Seamas now has to knock it in for six hours?! Cricket does like to test its disciples. Share
7h ago 16.29 BST Lots of glum-faced people walking down Talbot Road and driving out of the Old Trafford car park. Probably caused by Peter Handscomb’s 84 not out. Share
7h ago 16.04 BST Tea-time-ish scores DIVISION ONE Chester le Street: Durham 427 v Yorkshire 307 and 32-1 Chelmsford: Essex 179 and 317 v Worcestershire 202 and 1119-4 Southampton: Hampshire 336 v Somerset 184 and 91-1 Hove: Sussex 435 v Surrey 378-3 Edgbaston: Warwickshire 93 and 53-2 v Nottinghamshire 367 DIVISION TWO The County Ground: Derbyshire 307 and 78-1 v Northamptonshire 500-8dec Canterbury: Kent 393 v Gloucestershire 472 and 112-2 Old Trafford: Lancashire 263 v Leicestershire 354-5 Lord’s: Middlesex 470-9dec v Glamorgan 199 and 105-2 Share
8h ago 15.55 BST A hundred for Dan Lawrence! A right royal romp: 93 balls, 8 fours, six sixes. Share
8h ago 15.45 BST Ollie Robinson is staring his third spell, this with a new ball. Dan Lawrence has 95. Both once flavour of the month, both currently superfluous to England requirements. Share
8h ago 15.40 BST Another wicket at OT! A second for Turner, who removes Kimber, with tea tottering on the horizon. Leicestershire 331-5. Share
8h ago 15.36 BST How are Glamorgan doing? They are clinging on: 103-2, both openers back in the hutch, so Northeast and Carlson must dig out the ABC building blocks again. Share
8h ago 15.32 BST Leicestershire have lost Lewis Hill for 64, but Handscomb (66) is moving effortlessly towards bigger things. The lead 66. Share
8h ago 15.25 BST Drop in on the Sussex stream, where someone seems to have painted a sepia wash over the entire ground. Unlike our dreamy blue Manchester skies. Anyway, Lawrence (77) and Foakes (21) are ploughing ahead without putting themselves out too much. Surrey 108 behind Share
8h ago 15.17 BST Worcestershire are faltering: 76-3, needing another 228. Kashif Ali and Adam Hose are reapplying the cement. Lyth and Bean have negotiated the first six overs at Chester le Street – Yorkshire 13-0. Somerset have just lost Archie Vaughan, for 24 to James Fuller.. They really need to bat for most of the rest of the match to avoid another defeat. And a second single-figure score for Al Davies down at Edgbaston. Warwicks 14-1, and a mountain to climb. Share
8h ago 15.07 BST Bravo Ben Charlesworth, who is racing along at Canterbury, 57 not out. (I met his mum Michelle at Gloucestershire’s Greener Games conference last October – she’s amazing. ) I wonder what Gloucestershire will consider a suitable target to set – with the constant worry at the back of their minds that Zak Crawley might come good. Share
9h ago 14.49 BST Northants declare with a lead of 193 Saif Zaib, who looked so good in his hundred last week against Lancashire, flames another, off 90 balls, against Derbyshire. He’s out, for 105, Northants pass 500, and promptly declare. Share Updated at 14.50 BST
9h ago 14.44 BST Durham all out 427 An impressive recovery there by Yorkshire, who looked down and out when Lees and Gay were having fun. The Durham lead: 120. Share
9h ago 14.23 BST Leicestershire move smoothly past Lancashire, with seven wickets in hand. The forecast for tomorrow “cloud, outbreaks of rain” suggests chasing batting points is probably Leicestershire’s best bet. Share
9h ago 14.17 BST Tim Maitland muses on Cam and Cam. “The more mechanically minded would instantly have gone with “Twin Cams”.
”If they’re both really tall, they’d be “Dual Overhead Cams”. Share
9h ago 14.15 BST Nottinghamshire’s Australian landscape gardener has been showing his worth with bat as well as ball. O’Neill just out for 50, from 53 balls. HH still plodding away, 125 not out, the Notts lead 249. Share
9h ago 14.13 BST There must be something in the water today – there goes Ollie Pope, next ball, hooking, but gloving, at Seales, next ball. Surrey 237-3. Share
9h ago 14.11 BST A century for Ollie Pope A first hundred of the year for the ginger prince. Surrey crunching methodically through the gears alongside the seagulls. Alongside him, Dan Lawrence has hit one six and one four in his 13. Share
10h ago 13.51 BST They’ve resumed at Canterbury, and at Lord’s. Having the benefit of the two Camerons – the Can-Can(?) – has proved pretty profitable for Gloucestershire so far against Kent Glamorgan have safely negotiated the first four an a half overs of their second innings, but a deficit of 252 runs looms large. Share
10h ago 13.21 BST Out in the middle at OT, Mr JM Anderson is having a bowl. Share
10h ago 13.17 BST Lunchtime scores DIVISION ONE Chester le Street: Durham 386-6 v Yorkshire 307 Chelmsford: Essex 179 and 317 v Worcestershire 202 and 1-1 Worcs need 294 to win Southampton: Hampshire 336 v Somerset 184 Hove: Sussex 435 v Surrey 216-2 Edgbaston: Warwickshire 93 v Nottinghamshire 307-6 DIVISION TWO The County Ground: Derbyshire 307 v Northamptonshire 375-5 Canterbury: Kent 393 v Gloucestershire 472 Old Trafford: Lancashire 263 v Leicestershire 242-3 Lord’s: Middlesex 470-9 v Glamorgan 199 and 12-0 Share
10h ago 13.05 BST Worcestershire, set 295 to win, just had time to lose Gareth Roderick to the second ball of the innings, before everyone trooped off for lunch. Share Updated at 13.15 BST
10h ago 13.01 BST Hartley gets a rest at last: after a spell of 15 overs one for 54, over last night and this morning. Luke Wells, head gleaming in the sun, rolls his arm over from the Jimmy Anderson end. Ten minutes till lunch here, lunch being taken around the grounds. Share
11h ago 12.58 BST And 150s for Luke Procter and Emilio Gay Procter departs immediately, caught at gully. He’s steered Northants to a 47-run lead. Emilo Gay too, bowled George Hill for 152, as Durham suffer a mini-wobble, losing three for 24. A memorable first century for Durham. Share
11h ago 12.47 BST A century for Haseeb Hameed Congratulations to CCLive!’s favourite son for a 16th f-c century and a tenth for Notts. I don’t know how it happened but he is now 28. View image in fullscreen Captain’s knock: 111 not out Photograph: Steve Poole/ProSports/REX/Shutterstock Share Updated at 12.53 BST
11h ago 12.37 BST In Division One: At Edgbaston, HH is nearing three figures, though Warwickshire have chipped away at the other end, Lyndon James a second wicket for Barnard for 42. Notts 256-6, a lead of 163. Half centuries for run-gobbler Dom Sibley ,and Ollie Pope at Hove, Surrey 158-1. Hampshire have lost three wicket this morning, all of them to the surprising arm of Tom Lammonby. Hants 280-7: Gubbins out for 82, Dawson for 72. Essex are nine down at Chelmsford, the lead over Worcestershire: 280. Two morning wickets for Tom Taylor, Shane Snater still htere on 34. The late middle order doing a good job here for Essex. And finally, to Chester le Street, where Durham have zipped past Yorkshire, just four wickets down. Lees was finally out for 172 and Emilio Gay is undefeated on 149. Share
11h ago 12.17 BST Another! A wicket for John Turner at OT, Holland caught mis-pulling by Mahmood. Lancs have now got rid of both the overnight batters in quick succession. Share
11h ago 12.13 BST A hundred and out for Rehan Ahmed! Rehan Ahmed reaches his second first-class century, with a single from a drive, crisp and pleasureable as a slice of buttered toast. A gorgeous century to watch, 14 fours,measured defence. Huge applause by the Leicestershire balcony as he removes his helmet and raises his bat. Then he’s out, propping forward to Hartley and giving a catch to silly mid off. Ahmed’s only other f-c century came in September 2022, 122 against Derbyshire, batting at No. 5. On the basis of watching him here at OT, there should be many more. View image in fullscreen First f-c hundred for two and a half years: Rehan Ahmed Photograph: John Mallett/ProSports/REX/Shutterstock Share
11h ago 12.05 BST With an hour gone, a trip around the other Division Two grounds: A century for Luke Procter, 128 not out, and a nippy 43 from Rob Keogh has put Northants in a dominant position in at Derby, just 11 runs behind, seven wickets in hand. Ben Compton is continuing to hold Kent together, now 166 not out. Kent 354-8, 118 behind Gloucestershire. And at Lord’s, the Middlesex lead is a hefty 217. Share
12h ago 11.49 BST Division Two table (as of April 14) 1 Leicestershire 39 2 Kent 38 3 Derbyshire 36 4 Lancashire 23 5 Northants 18 6 Gloucestershire 18 7 Glamorgan 15 8 Middlesex 14 Share
12h ago 11.36 BST Three overs for Mahmood this morning at OT, Anderson Philip has replaced him: liquid run-up to the wicket, hands shoved in pockets for the trudge back. Rehan Ahmed has looked in fine fettle, playing with characteristic artistic ease but also patience. He and Holland have put on 46 runs in the first ten overs. Share Updated at 11.42 BST
12h ago 11.27 BST A first missive: and a very happy Easter to you Tim Maitland: “Salutations Tanya!
“I’m struggling to concentrate on the cricket at the moment. It doesn’t help that my beloved Western Bulldogs (Long story short: some disreputable caddies on the LPGA decided I needed an AFL team and I didn’t have the sense to ignore them) are playing St. Kilda right now.
“But it’s not just that.
“I’m finding it hard to get a sense of who is in form, especially with the bat. Maybe it’s because we were distracted by Tom Banton’s 371, which he’s followed with scores of 6, 0 and 5. How long a lead does a triple centurion get before his chain is yanked?
“If Surrey’s Dom Sibley adds significantly to his 40 overnight, does he hold the crown after a 66 at Essex and then 100 not out and 1055 against Hampshire? Incidentally he made 3 in his one game for Khulna Tigers in Chittagong, which is officially called Chattogram, which would be a great name for a social media platform wouldn’t it?
“Or is it Tom Haines? His 174 against Surrey in this round of matches is, weather permitting, potentially match winning and his second innings 141 set up the victory against Somerset last week.
“As for bowlers... have you got anything? [Ed – My immediate thought is Fergus O’Neill?]
“The Bulldogs, incidentally, have living legend Marcus Bontempelli aka The Bont back for the first time this season, but as I speak our 6 ft 10 in young superstar-to-be ruckman Sam Darcy has just hobbled off with an injured knee, which would be a disaster for the Doggies.” Share
12h ago 11.20 BST Division One Table (as of April 14) A most unexpected hue: 1 Warwicks (35) 2 Sussex (35) 3 Notts (35) 4 Hampshire (30) 5 Essex (28) 6 Yorkshire (27) 7 Surrey (23) 8 Somerset (19) 9 Worcestershire (12) 10 Durham (11) Share
12h ago 11.10 BST Weather watch A delay only a Hove. Elsewhere the Met Office is full of spring-time optimism: Rain across western Scotland and Northern Ireland easing, and rain in southeast England fragmenting into scattered showers. Dry elsewhere with variable cloud and sunny spells, most prolonged for parts of Wales and northwest England. Mostly light winds. Share
12h ago 11.02 BST All is now well at OT, the players are out, the sun too. Share
13h ago 10.57 BST Heavy roller problems An Easter delay at Old Trafford, where the heavy roller has broken down and is stuck in the middle. Share
13h ago 10.27 BST Tall Paul on his surprise promotion up the order for Essex: “A few years ago when I wasn’t playing first team I opened a lot for the twos, Then I did a few games with Cooky during Covid time, so it’s not completely unfamiliar for me. It has been a really nice challenge because it something new, something to prepare for. I think I’ve dealt with it well so far, though it is still early in the season. It’s about turning up every day and giving it your best shot.” Share
13h ago 10.06 BST Saturday's round up A fit looking Saqib Mahmood, with a tentative mullet, bowled in his first Championship game for Lancashire since May 2024. In he steamed from the Statham End at Old Trafford, up against Leicestershire’s tyro opening partnership of Sol Budinger and Rehan Ahmed. Budinger was dropped between first and second slip on a duck, and Leicestershire then made hay, fizzing past 100 in 19.4 overs. Ahmed, a pocket rocket with wrists of steel and a high‑fashion post‑shot pose, punched thrillingly through the covers, flashed extra‑cover drives, whipped with elan. Tom Hartley caused trouble in his six overs from the James Anderson End towards the close and, after Budinger fell to Mahmood, Ahmed played out the last 20 minutes with an extravagant, and tight, defence. Earlier Tom Scriven had collected a career-best five for 46, as Lancashire lost their last four wickets for 21 runs. Marcus Harris, once of Grace Road, made his fourth half-century in his fifth innings since arriving in Manchester. A hundred for Ben Compton, scored at quite the lick, kept Kent in the game at Canterbury, after Gloucestershire strode past 450, a 27-ball 51 by Marchant de Lange ensuring a fifth batting point. James Bracey was left unbeaten on 151, Nathan Gilchrist putting in his Easter egg career best figures of seven for 100. Zak Crawley collar up, was then caught for one. A possible rival for his England opening spot, Tom Haines, brightened the twinkle in Rob Key’s eye with a second hundred in consecutive matches, 174 in seven‑and-a-half hours against a Surrey seam attack of Dan Worrell, Jordan Clark, Gus Atkinson and Matt Fisher, who dedicated their day to slowing down the Sussex scoring rate. Ben Foakes conceded just one bye on a pitch with, at times, unreliable bounce. Surrey reached 90-1 at stumps. Seam bowling to stick in the scrap book from Fergus O’Neill (five for 19) and Brett Hutton (five for 38) left Warwickshire in deep trouble at 93 all out. Nottinghamshire, going out to bat just as the sun came out, then stretched to 204 for five, led by a cast-iron 75 not out from captain Haseeb Hameed After three ducks in four innings, Emilio Gay came good at Chester le Street with 105, he and Alex Lees (148) pounding Yorkshire into the north-east dust with an unbeaten second-wicket partnership of 242. It was Gay’s first century for Durham. A second century of the season for Max Holden, tempo dictated by lunch, helped Middlesex into a promising position at Lord’s. There were three wickets for Timm van der Gugten, and Glamorgan’s fielders stayed perky on a trying day. Paul Walter, settling nicely into the opening slot left vacant by Dean Elgar, hauled Essex out of a hole with 104, and, together with a career best 49 not out from Noah Thain, gave Essex a lead of 210. Sri Lanka’s Kasun Rajitha picked up four Worcestershire wickets on debut. At Southampton, fifties from Nick Gubbins and Liam Dawson gave Hampshire a 10-run lead, after Somerset had been bowled out for 184. Migael Pretorius was the one thorn in Hampshire’s side, making 47 from a 48 run last-wicket partnership for Somerset. It was a good day for Northamptonshire in Derby, Ricky Vasconcelos (82) and Luke Procter (97 not out) reducing the deficit to less than a hundred. Share
13h ago 10.05 BST Scores on the doors DIVISION ONE Chester le Street: Durham 264-1 v Yorkshire 307 Chelmsford: Essex 179 and 233-6 v Worcestershire 202 Southampton: Hampshire 194-3 v Somerset 184 Hove: Sussex 435 v Surrey 90-1 Edgbaston: Warwickshire 93 v Nottinghamshire 204-5 DIVISION TWO The County Ground: Derbyshire 307 v Northamptonshire 236-3 Canterbury: Kent 318-7 v Gloucestershire 472 Old Trafford: Lancashire 263 v Leicestershire 120-1 Lord’s: Middlesex 353-4 v Glamorgan 199 Share | {
"authors": [
"Tanya Aldred"
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"title": "County cricket: Pope and Lawrence hit centuries for Surrey against Sussex – as it happened",
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b0be68c8c87f968f4bc19bd11586f8b3 | RFK’s statements prove autistic people and their families everywhere should fear Trump and his allies | John Harris
In the recent past, Robert F Kennedy Jr has said that Donald Trump is “a terrible human being” and “probably a sociopath”. But in the US’s new age of irrationalism and chaos, these two men are now of one voice, pursuing a strand of Trumpist politics that sometimes feels strangely overlooked. With Trump once again in the White House and Kennedy ensconced as his health and human services secretary, what they are jointly leading is becoming clearer by the day: a war on science and knowledge that aims to replace them with the modern superstitions of conspiracy theory.
Nearly 2,000 members of the US’s National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine have warned of “slashing funding for scientific agencies, terminating grants to scientists, defunding their laboratories, and hampering international scientific collaboration”. Even work on cancer is now under threat. But if you want to really understand the Trump regime’s monstrousness, consider where Kennedy and a gang of acolytes are heading on an issue that goes to the heart of millions of lives: autism.
Last Wednesday, Kennedy spoke at a press conference staged in response to a report about apparently rising rates of autism published by the US’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And out it all came: an insistence that autism is an “epidemic” and a “preventable disease”, and – in complete defiance of the science – that the root cause lies with “environmental toxins”. A range of new studies, he said, will begin reporting back in September: with the same banality that defines his boss’s promises on international conflict and global economics, he told his audience that answers would be presented to the public “very, very quickly”.
Most of the people present would have been aware of Kennedy’s past support for the thoroughly discredited idea that autism is somehow linked to the use of vaccines. As he spoke, they were presumably reminded of the occasions when he has talked about autistic people with a mixture of disgust and complete ignorance. Autism, he said, “destroys” families; today’s autistic children “will never pay taxes. They’ll never hold a job. They’ll never play baseball. They’ll never write a poem. They’ll never go out on a date. Many of them will never use a toilet unassisted.” Those comments have rightly triggered a huge backlash. But what has been rather lacking is a broader critique of Kennedy’s ideas, and how they go deep into aspects of the US’s culture and politics.
As I explain in the book I have just written about my autistic son, James, I began my immersion in autism and the arguments that swirl around it 15 years ago, when he received his diagnosis from the NHS. That came amid visits from speech therapists and educational psychologists, and increasingly futile appointments with a paediatrician, who in effect told us to go away and manage as best we could. But straight away, I was also aware of a much more exotic subculture rooted in the US, based around the idea that autism could somehow be cured, and an array of regimens and pseudo-treatments.
1:00 'I asked you a simple question, Bobby': Sanders grills RFK Jr on vaccines and autism – video
The anxieties surrounding Andrew Wakefield’s disgraced work on a link between autism and the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) jab were still easy to pick up. I read about “chelation”: injecting chemicals into the bloodstream, supposedly to remove the toxic preservatives used in vaccines from the body and send autism on its way. It was easy to find stuff about impossibly restrictive diets, and the terrifying notion of forcing people to drink diluted bleach. These ideas, moreover, came with claims of endless government cover-ups: proto-Maga stuff, which had long been snowballing online.
That said, the underlying logic of all this quackery was encouraged by much more mainstream voices. By and large, British campaigning and research tends to focus on what autism actually is, and how to make autistic lives better – whereas in the US, very powerful forces have seen autism as a disease. In 2006, President George W Bush signed a legislative package tellingly called the Combating Autism Act, hailed by one of its supporters as “a federal declaration of war on the epidemic of autism”. At that point, there were initiatives and organisations with names such as Cure Autism Now and Defeat Autism Now! All this had already spawned the autistic self-advocacy movement that continues to loudly contest such ideas, but its appeal obviously still lingers.
If I were in the US, I would now have two big worries. As well as constant attacks on the public sector that have already hacked back help for autistic people, there is a huge question about what Kennedy’s nonsense might mean for other areas of federal government policy, and the kind of MMR-style panics his “answers” on toxins might trigger. But some of those concerns also apply to the UK, thanks to the ease with which ideas travel, and how Trump and his allies influence politics across the world.
Kennedy’s pronouncements are not only about what causes autism; they also reflect an age-old perception of autism as an aberration, and many autistic people as “ineducable” and beyond help. This surely blurs into populists’ loathing of modern ideas about human difference: once you have declared war on diversity, an attack on the idea of neurodiversity will not be far away. It also chimes with one of the new right’s most pernicious elements: its constant insistence that everything is actually much simpler than it looks.
Which brings me to something it feels painful to have to write. Autism denotes a fantastically complicated set of human traits and qualities, but that does not make them any less real. It presents with and without learning disabilities, and can be synonymous with skills and talents. Its causes (if that is even the right word) are largely genetic, although careful research is focused on how those heritable aspects might sometimes – sometimes– intersect with factors during pregnancy, and with parental age. And obviously, those characterisations barely scratch the surface, which is some indication of the absurdity of Kennedy’s position, and how dangerous it is.
On this side of the Atlantic, there are very good reasons why many of us who have families with autistic members feel deep anxiety about the constant shunting of politics to the right. The care, education and official understanding of the people we love and sometimes look after is fragile enough already: what would happen if their fate was in the hands of the Trumpist know-nothings of Reform UK, or Alternative für Deutschland? The American tragedy unfolding in front of our eyes shows the future we now have to avoid, and the kind of people we may have to fight, who will not just be arrogant and inhumane, but set on taking us back to a failed past: terrible human beings, you might call them. | {
"authors": [
"John Harris"
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"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/9f1b85e4ca16f1b5f0e8a5ddd981977ffca37af2/0_104_3118_1871/master/3118.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctb3BpbmlvbnMucG5n&enable=upscale&s=e429813d3d3c984a7d4b62c0cdefb1b7",
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"title": "RFK’s statements prove autistic people and their families everywhere should fear Trump and his allies | John Harris",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/apr/20/autism-vaccines-robert-f-kennedy-jr-usa-donald-trump"
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98f9e4955d6249c2c63c395f61b6a9b0 | Teenagers having sex is news to no one. Thank goodness the government has seen sense on this | Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett
God, remember kissing in corridors? It’s been so long since I was a teenager that I had honestly forgotten how much snogging used to happen at school, until it was mentioned in the House of Commons this week. (I have never been a fan of the word snogging, yet as a term it’s powerfully evocative of late 1990s-early 2000s adolescence, conjuring a heady mix of Impulse body spray and Lynx Africa, the taste of Juicy Fruit chewing gum, and the sound of braces clashing.)
Teenage love is in the headlines, because of the news that there will be a “Romeo and Juliet” exemption to the new crime and policing bill obliging professionals in England, including teachers and healthcare workers, to report suspicions of child sexual abuse. The exemption for teenagers in consensual sexual relationships received cross-party support, recognising that “not all sexual activity involving under-18s is a cause for alarm or state intervention”.
This is all common sense, and similar approaches are already in place in countries such as Australia and France. That teenagers engage in sexual activity should be news to no one – obliging teachers to report every instance as a potential child sexual offence will give them an even higher workload than they face already. Instead, they can use their professional judgment. Safeguards remain in place: if there is any indication of harm or imbalance, the duty to report remains.
It confirms what many of us have long known: that often the most present threat to teenage girls are those older guys who just can’t seem to get a girlfriend their own age. You know the kind. The groomers. Guys who are 19, 20, older, who hang around the school gates in their Saxos and Corsas. In my home town, one actually went on the run with – or arguably abducted – a just turned 13-year-old girl. Others would invite underage girls to their shitty flats and ply them with alcohol. Alongside these men you had the even older ones in positions of power – at my own school, the biggest threat to teen girls was our actual headteacher (Neil Foden was eventually convicted of multiple offences).
It would be utterly absurd to put such criminal abuse and exploitation on a par with teenage fumbling. The use of Romeo and Juliet to describe the clause may at first seem rather grandiose, but isn’t that just how love, or at least lust, feels at that age? Intense, powerful, tragic even. That feeling of “If I can’t kiss him right this very second against the science block stairs, then I might as well drink poison”. I suspect its resonance is the reason it’s on the syllabus for pupils just about coming up to Juliet’s age (13). It also provides a framework for discussing these issues in class (“I know you feel like the main character in your own Shakespearean tragedy right now, but maybe put down the deadly nightshade and listen to some Lana Del Rey instead?”)
I remember how Amy, who sat next to me in English, could recite most of the play by heart. “O brawling love! O loving hate!” – I can still hear her voice now. That Romeo is saying these words about Rosaline, before he abruptly switches his affection to Juliet, was lost on us. It was in vain that our English teacher tried to get us to think about how Shakespeare might have been commenting on the fickleness of young love. There’s no telling you when you’re in the middle of it, is there? Yet there’s an argument that we should take teenagers’ romantic feelings more seriously, because they can go on to shape us.
Today’s teens are lucky, in many ways. They are not experiencing their first love, or lust, against a backdrop of alarming teenage pregnancy rates, as we were. They receive better sex education, at an earlier age, have access to more varied methods of contraception, and are generally more clued up about the biology of reproduction. We certainly weren’t making TikToks about the luteal phase – we didn’t even know what it meant, let alone how it might affect your dating behaviour.
One thing hasn’t changed, though, and that’s how vulnerable teenagers are, and how easily their hearts can be broken. We thought we were so grown up when we were fooling around at 15, going on dates to Pizza Hut, dissecting our relationships on MSN and rolling ridiculous 10-skin joints so we could hotbox caravans. We were just kids, like the teens I see walking to school or on the bus now, so impossibly young and naive, but fizzing with hormones that made you want to jump each other.
While jumping each other on a Tuesday morning outside set two maths isn’t often going to be a reportable offence, anyone who works with young people knows that their vulnerable hearts need some sort of safeguarding, too. Perhaps, alongside all the work that needs to be done in terms of consent and online misogyny and how to recognise abusive relationships, we all need formal lessons in heartbreak – after all, these years can shape our adult relationships to come and who we are. I wonder about the role they play in later infidelities, too. Most of us are happy to leave those Impulse-scented years behind us, but we all know someone who will always chase that Juicy Fruit high. | {
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37245ca0ad68348622a6a1c5881a1c8c | The supreme court has carefully ringfenced protections for women. That’s all we wanted | Sonia Sodha
Middle-aged women are expected to fade into the background, to be apologetic for their existence, to quietly accept their lot. They’re not supposed to stick up for themselves, to enforce their boundaries, to say no. As a woman, these societal expectations have been drummed into me from day one. But still. The swell of anger and disgust that rose in response to the supreme court judgment last week that made clear women’s rights are not for dismantling – rights already won, that were supposed to be ours all along – has taken my breath away.
I was in court last Wednesday to hear Lord Hodge confirm that the Equality Act’s legal protections that were always intended for women are, indeed, reserved for women. He reiterated that trans people continue to have the same robust legal protections against discrimination and harassment as any other protected group, something I’ve always emphasised in my own writing. But men who identify as female – whether or not they have a legal certificate – are not to be treated as though female for the purposes of equalities law.
This is a hugely consequential clarification because for the past 10 years lobby groups such as Stonewall have misrepresented the law, telling public sector organisations, charities and companies that they must treat trans women as women.
Now the supreme court has made it clear: female-only services, spaces and sports cannot admit males, however they identify. Workplaces and schools must offer single-sex facilities; service providers do not always have to, though it may be unlawful sex discrimination for them not to do so.
This means it is never lawful to expect a female nurse to share changing facilities with a male colleague. It’s not lawful to tell a distressed female patient that the obviously male patient next to her in the female-only ward is, in fact, a woman and she is transphobic to question it. It’s not lawful to expect a female rape victim to take or leave a female-only support group that includes men. It’s not lawful to tell a woman required to undergo a strip-search that the male police officer doing it is actually female. It’s not lawful to expect teenage girls to play women’s football on a team with male players, or female boxers to box against men. Lesbians can have their own groups and associations without being bullied into admitting straight male members who – in an act of gross homophobia – self-identify as “lesbian”.
Why does this matter? Because this unlawful activity has all been happening in recent years, to the detriment not just of women’s safety, but our privacy and dignity. The judgment could not be clearer on the above, though that has not stopped a former supreme court justice, Jonathan Sumption, and a former cabinet minister, Harriet Harman, from taking to the airwaves to interpret the law incorrectly.
Can you imagine angry leftwing men railing against any other group that’s managed to secure their rights? Me neither
In his remarks, Hodge cautioned against reading the judgment as a triumph of one group over another. That is entirely correct: the Equality Act balances conflicting rights, and the supreme court has simply restored the balance to where the law said it was supposed to be. Trans people have their protections, but now women’s protections, too, have been clearly ringfenced on the same basis – all that leftwing feminists ever asked for.
But many pundits have misinterpreted this as meaning women should not celebrate a landmark legal victory in a case it was a travesty they ever had to fight. It’s a product of the rank misogyny embedded everywhere, from right to left. Can you imagine angry leftwing men railing against any other group that’s managed to secure their rights? Chastising them for not being gracious enough in victory? Me neither. The reaction to the judgment serves as an important reminder that, while the law is the law, our culture remains dead-set against women who say no to men. It’s how women’s and lesbians’ rights were so rapidly eroded by Stonewall and its allies in the first place, and why women have been bullied, hounded and sacked simply for trying to assert their legal protections.
The same people are ignoring the supreme court’s emphasis that none of this takes away from trans people’s existing rights, and are scaremongering and infantilising trans people as victims. Lloyds Bank wrote to all its employees to say it “stood by” and “cherished” all its trans employees. Several unions have organised an emergency demo in support of trans rights, giving the impression they are being rolled back. It’s easy to forget that all that has happened is that the supreme court has been clear that a male desire for validation does not trump women’s rights to single-sex spaces and services. That if you are a male police officer or nurse demanding to strip-search or carry out a smear test on a woman, the answer is no. Part of being a grownup is understanding that the world cannot always be structured around your own wants and needs. It’s not kind, compassionate or healthy to indulge a failure to accept that.
The judgment means trans rights activists are at a crossroads. Do they double down and try to argue that MPs must respond by dismantling women’s legal protections? Or do they put a stop to an ideological crusade that’s harmed not just women and lesbians, but the many trans people who aren’t dogmatic about gender ideology, and instead advocate for gender-neutral third spaces, open and female categories in sports, and specialist services for trans people, and against discrimination based on gender non-conformity? If they pick the latter path, they’ll find willing allies in women like me.
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And finally, to the countless women who lost so much in fighting to re-establish what was supposed to be ours all along, there could be no happier way for me to round off my last regular column for the Observer than by saying: you are heroes. Pop those champagne corks. Celebrate as hard as you like. You deserve it.
Sonia Sodha is an Observer columnist | {
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6f71c306815e8abe2d70e1c33bfcceb8 | Ella Baron on Vladimir Putin’s Easter ceasefire in Ukraine – cartoon
Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning | {
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f61834c9b27b65c4d4ab4ce19e6e8eed | The May elections are a perfect opportunity for Nigel Farage to peddle his politics of grievance
For his next trick, perhaps Comrade Farage will belt out all the verses of The Red Flag and tell us that his favourite book is The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists. Brother Nigel has popped up on the government’s left flank by demanding the immediate nationalisation of the steel industry. He’s also expressed a solidarity with trades unionists hitherto undetected in this longtime admirer of Margaret Thatcher.
At an event at a working men’s club in one of the more deprived wards of County Durham, the old fraud even claimed to have a personal affinity with steelworkers because he used to be in the “metals business” himself. This was a disingenuous reference to his time as a trader at the London Metal Exchange, which involved long lunches in the City fuelled with copious quantities of port. Or maybe he was thinking of his gig as a paid “brand ambassador” for a firm that deals in gold bullion.
Many descriptions come to mind when contemplating the leader of Reform UK, but I’m finding it a stretch of the mental elastic to get to working-class hero. Maybe he’s forgotten his recent vote against outlawing fire-and-rehire and his party’s opposition to banning zero-hours contracts.
So what is going on here? With his trademark malevolent grin, he told us exactly what he is up to during an attention-seeking swing through Labour heartlands in the north of England where Reform is hoping to make hefty gains in the local elections. He cackled about “parking their tanks on the lawns of the red wall”, a phrase he’s used before, but not previously with quite such an intensity of intent. The plan makes sense. If he is to advance on his stated ambition to be the next prime minister, it won’t be sufficient to get the better of the Tories in the scrap between the two of them for traditionally rightwing voters. He’s also going to need to garner support from at least some of the voters who backed Labour last July.
The local elections on 1 May will be a first test of whether this strategy has viability. The outcome of these contests are awaited eagerly by Reform, nervily by Labour people anticipating a difficult night, and even more fretfully by the Tories, who are expecting an absolutely diabolical one. Kemi Badenoch is so desperate to depress expectations that she’s warned her party that it could lose “almost every single one” of the more than 900 wards being defended by the Conservatives. Sir Keir Starmer’s party has many fewer seats to lose, but much to fear if there’s evidence that Farageism has the potential to wreck Labour at the next general election as grievously as it hurt the Conservatives at last year’s one.
Reform is a vehicle for the angry to express their discontent with the quality of their lives and local areas
With both an unpopular government and a floundering official opposition to go at, this is fertile territory for Reform, and the more so because polls suggest its vote share is up about 10 points since the general election. That said, the path towards polling day has been rocky for Reform’s leader. The fat cheque once rumoured to be on its way from his erstwhile “hero” Elon Musk has never materialised. The billionaire has since said Mr Farage “doesn’t have what it takes” and transferred his benedictions to Rupert Lowe, the MP for Great Yarmouth who is now sitting as an independent as a result of a ferociously ugly falling out between him and Mr Farage. Mr Lowe, a wealthy fellow with deep pockets, has just announced that he is going to sue for defamation because of allegations made about him by the Reform leader and his acolytes.
The bromance with Donald Trump has been much vaunted, mainly by Mr Farage himself. That looks to be even more of an electoral liability since the US president ignited the trade war that has unleashed mayhem on global markets. Nige made like a submarine for a while. When he finally surfaced to break his radio silence, he was forced to admit that his buddy in the White House might have blundered just a little bit, putting it down to doing “too much too soon”.
Many Labour people used to be rather complacent about Reform, thinking it to be mainly a menace to the Tories. Now Morgan McSweeney and other Labour strategists are treating it as a serious threat. Sir Keir has been taking the gloves off by calling the Reform leader a danger to the NHS and attacking him for past fawning over Vladimir Putin. Then there is Mr Farage’s unfortunate habit of attracting the repulsive to his ranks. For all his boasts that the party has become much stricter in vetting the characters it allows to be its candidates, a string of them have had to be ditched for making comments so repellent that even Mr Farage couldn’t dismiss them as banter.
Disowned candidates, being a Trump tribute act and internecine warfare. That’s a cocktail you might expect to be toxic to a party’s popularity if the normal rules applied. But it doesn’t seem to be off-putting to Reform supporters. His well-honed talent is for exploiting grievance, and there’s a lot of that about. As Ukip and the Brexit party were before it, Reform is a vehicle for the angry to express their discontent with the quality of their lives and local areas, and to vent their animosity towards Tory and Labour parties that Reform’s leader is adept at painting as two failed faces of a dismal status quo. The tactics are ruthless, but the policies are vacant. He’s promising voters that Reform mayors and councillors will implement a Musk-inspired “British form of Doge” to purge alleged inefficiencies and excesses in council spending, with diversity and equality programmes predictably topping the hitlist. The chainsaw may be coming to your city, county or town hall. Burning it all down Musk-style will not solve, it will deepen, the problems in the areas that Reform is targeting.
The party’s national prospectus is no more plausible. He claims he’ll slash taxes, but starts waffling whenever asked how he would pay for it. Unfunded tax cuts are from the Liz Truss school of fiscal responsibility and economic management. None of which is likely to matter much on 1 May because for those attracted to Farageism, it is not, and never has been, about its credibility as a programme for government. He provides a spittoon for the angry voter to gob their fury into.
The poison between him and Mr Lowe suppurated into public view when the other man made a mocking reference to Reform being a “protest party led by the Messiah”. I’m not with him on the Messiah bit, but the first half is correct. It is precisely because Reform is a protest party that it ought to do extremely well at these elections. Polling suggests that big majorities of voters in the North and the Midlands agree that “Britain is broken” and heading in the wrong direction. For those who feel they were betrayed by the Tories and are now being let down by Labour, Reform offers a boot with which to inflict a kick in the ballots on both the older parties.
skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to Observed Free weekly newsletter Analysis and opinion on the week's news and culture brought to you by the best Observer writers Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion
In some ways it is a rightwing nationalist version of the Lib Dems, past masters of harvesting protest votes, who are also looking to make chunky gains, concentrated in southern England in their case. Reform hopes to replicate the Lib Dems’ successful model of building a substantial base of councillors and using them as beachheads to go on to capture parliamentary seats in the same localities.
He’s predicting a “turquoise wave” across the North and Midlands. Polling suggests Reform won’t just gain councillors, but also councils and possibly bag a mayoralty in Lincolnshire and another in East Yorkshire. The Runcorn and Helsby byelection, also on May day, ought to be winnable if Reform has as much momentum as Mr Farage claims. On paper, the Cheshire seat is the 16th safest in Labour’s possession, but the concept of “safe” seats has much less relevance these days when the political landscape is so volatile and fragmented. The circumstances that triggered this byelection – the former Labour MP assaulting a constituent – also work in Reform’s favour.
Whatever he may claim, a victorious night for Nigel Farage won’t mean that he is marching on Downing Street. It will mean deeper existential angst in the ranks of the Conservative party and elevated anxiety among Labour people that they haven’t found an answer to the seething mass of grievances that he so cunningly and cynically exploits. | {
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354f02d25121a7cc638f49c7ddbf43e5 | Katy Perry got into space but I can’t get to Norwich | Stewart Lee
A group of six women returned to Earth from space on Monday, including Katy Perry, the former wife of the Trump cheerleader Russell Brand; and the former Fox news presenter and philanthropist Lauren Sánchez, fiancee of Donald Trump’s media lapdog Jeff Bezos, who bent Washington Post editorial policy to favour the New American Fascism ™ ®. It’s a shame they didn’t fly straight into the heart of the sun.
The six compliant women were sent to space as a costly PR exercise for Bezos’s commercial space flight ambitions, although Perry said it was actually about “finding the love for yourself” and “feeling that divine feminine”. Tell that to all the women worldwide whom Bezos’s pal Trump’s policies are penalising. Singing idiot. Katy Perry said she kissed a girl and she liked it. As Trump rolls back on LGBTQ+ rights I’m surprised the Trump-adjacent Bezos allowed a bi-curious woman into space. I suppose discussions of sexual identity don’t matter if they’re mere titillation. And if Perry is bisexual, she is at least less likely to influence vulnerable young people while orbiting the Earth.
Sánchez, meanwhile, is vice-chairman of Bezos’s Bezos Earth Fund, an environmental group that ended its funding of decarbonisation initiatives in February, in line with Bezos’s support of Trump, who denies climate change while simultaneously seeing that a defrosting Greenland offers superb mineral mining opportunities. Why are all these wankers so totally and unashamedly full of shit?
So I have come to Cornwall for a week, but still I can’t escape the news. As I drove the Penwith peninsula in search of sacred underground Cornish fogous to decompress in, the dead car radio suddenly found a frequency to tell me Perry had sadly survived her Bezos-boosting spaceflight. If those women really cared about the future of the planet they’d have sabotaged themselves to discredit Trump’s big tech donor, but they selfishly chose not to. History will be their judge.
Ostensibly I’m here to see the Tate St Ives exhibition of the mighty 20th-century surrealist Ithell Colquhoun, whose greatest works were inspired by the landscapes of Cornwall, and who died in its loving arms in 1988. Like the late standup comedian Jethro, Colquhoun is indivisible from the land that nurtured her talent, and both created works called This Train Don’t Stop Camborne Wednesdays, though only one features an impressionistic portrayal of the vulva as twin columns of flame.
I’m the Ralph McTell of champagne socialist satire. Let me take you by the hand.
Thirty years ago I’d pick up Colquhoun’s signed books, their value unacknowledged by vendors, in secondhand shops and wonder at her obscurity. But tides turn, and now she is venerated, 47 years from her passing. Maybe one day I may yet help Bloomsbury’s Museum of Comedy stage that long mooted Jethro retrospective? But first, I have to file my final Observer column.
My sister asks why I am not appearing at Norwich Theatre Royal, and so do I, as my tour shows always sell it out, sometimes twice over. I begin rambling about “visibility”, and how a whole generation of us, as printed news and trustworthy current affairs television began to wither, came to rely on social media to bob us along on its churning sewage-strewn surface. Then Trump’s tech bros skewed the algorithms away from liberal content and, in Google’s case, even agreed to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to appease him. History is mutable, it seems.
I can feel people glazing over as I explain this. What does the end of verifiable information matter to them? After all, The White Lotus was fine, despite the flawed final episode, and that’s enough surely? And all politicians are as bad as one another anyway. And I realise I sound like that American bloke on acid at a Butthole Surfers gig in 1988 saying The Man is controlling our minds with miniature ear robots and hidden smells. But this time around, all those stoned paranoid imaginings are finally true!
We put our futures, and it seems the future of facts themselves, in the hands of bent balding billionaires, still nursing a grudge against the kids from their high school who played guitar or drew cool comics. The Trump administration, accommodated by the likes of Keir Starmer and Katy Perry, is the geopolitical equivalent of a football player stuffing the face of the boy who won the spelling competition into the toilet bowl. For ever.
Here’s where we, and random Venezuelans with random tattoos, start paying. Sometimes, I think one routine I wrote about immigration sometime in the early 00s was shared by socials so often it basically gave me a career, culminating in the Times calling me the world’s greatest living standup comedian by osmosis. I’m the Ralph McTell of champagne socialist satire. Let me take you by the hand.
But now everything has changed. Campaigns, comedians, critics, charities, writing careers and worthy causes that gained traction in the tiny toilet window between the downturn in print media and the twin horrors of Musk’s annexation of Twitter and Google’s apparent abandonment of its “Don’t Be Evil” mantra would never flourish today. We give birth astride the grave. The light gleams an instant as Twitter helps Tracey Thorn from Everything But the Girl become a bestselling author. Then it’s night once more.
I think someone needs to build a new global news network, disinvested from media money men and Trump knee-benders, to save objective truth as we know it. Maybe Andrew Neil could do it, using the skills he learned from kickstarting GB News? Meanwhile, sign up to my monthly mailing list at stewartlee.co.uk to find out if I ever play Norwich Theatre Royal again, or whether my permanent absence from eastern England becomes just another victory for the fascist future. So long and thanks for all the fish! | {
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34d74022b0b0866739c960ce8c1240cf | I told a truly weird lie on a first date 30 years ago – and it worked out surprisingly well | Emma Beddington
In 1994, I went on a date. I had just arrived in a new country and I liked the guy: he seemed funny and confident. He took me to a hardware store (weird, but not a dealbreaker) and then for a Tex-Mex meal during which, at some point, I told him I drove a Land Rover.
It was a truly weird, dumb, lie – I knew nothing about cars and cared even less. Maybe I thought it made me sound grown up, tougher and more capable than I was, or maybe the margaritas went to my head? I’m sure I told him other lies (I remember giving the impression that I enjoyed clubbing), but that one was memorably stupid.
I was reminded of it recently by a trailer for Channel 4’s new dating show The Honesty Box. It’s another reality TV product of the Love Island genus in which attractive, spray-tanned young people lie around in swimwear generating low-stakes drama, but the twist this time is they must not lie, because a “state-of-the-art lie detection system” will probe their true feelings. The trailer sets some archetypes of dating liars to music – the guy with a filtered profile pic and fake age; the couple who claim they are polyamorous but are “actually nowhere near emotionally mature enough to handle that”; the girl whose healthy gym selfies conceal daddy issues “and crabs”! It’s playing on a deep sense of weariness at dating dishonesty, though whether an E4 competition with a £100,000 prize is the best medium to address this is debatable.
There is so much obfuscation, omission, embroidery and brazen fibbing around romance. We’ve crafted a whole lexicon of deceit to describe it, from catfishing to gaslighting or roaching (not disclosing you’re seeing other people). In 2024, a US survey found that 21% of respondents had lied about their age on dating profiles; 14% about their income and hobbies and 12% about their height. This seems low (are people even lying in survey responses?), but I suppose telling profile lies – kittenfishing – is the tip of the lie-iceberg; when you’re messaging and meeting up, lies can proliferate. When you realise you like on someone, you could choose to get real with them, but there’s also a danger of doubling down on deceit, since there’s more to lose.
This might be me trying to justify my own idiotic fibbing, but is it all, always, awful? Obviously, there are egregious lies: the ones about your relationship status, sexual preferences, wanting kids when you don’t – the stuff that causes real harm. In a jaw-dropping viral 52-episode TikTok saga last year, “Who the fuck did I marry?”, a woman described how the man she met online and married turned out to have lied about work, finances, family and everything else; in its wake, the Cut spoke to five other women who discovered they were dating pathological liars of various stripes.
But I think these are – sorry – “outliars”: lesser dating lies are much more common. Many are attempts – however wrongheaded – at kindness or politeness. Researchers at Stanford named them “butler lies”, the kind of face-saving fictions and manufactured excuses your butler might have proffered on your behalf back in the day. Lots more are surely born of insecurity. I suppose there must be people so serenely accepting of their personality, appearance and history that they are comfortable immediately offering their unvarnished selves to potential romantic partners, but they’re surely rarer than white rhinos. Lots of dating lies seem like a sort of wishful thinking, an attempt to be the better selves we assume others want. Is that a million miles away from wearing Spanx, concealer or Cuban heels?
Humans lie all the time – of course they do it in this most vulnerable of contexts and maybe sometimes that merits a compassionate blind eye. Easy for me to say, I suppose, after decades off the dating market. DIY-store date guy found out years later. He was baffled – he wouldn’t have cared remotely if I’d told him I was a carless loser – but thankfully, it wasn’t a dealbreaker. If I had faced interrogation from a state-of-the-art lie detector, maybe he wouldn’t be enjoying the dubious privilege of me 30 years later, in all my unlovely truth. | {
"authors": [
"Emma Beddington"
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} |
297fa501e54bb62aaa8e318a98eceb23 | It’s not too late to stop Trump and the tech broligarchy from controlling our lives, but we must act now
To walk into the lion’s den once might be considered foolhardy. To do so again after being mauled by the lion? It’s what … ill-advised? Reckless? Suicidal? Six years ago I gave a talk at Ted, the world’s leading technology and ideas conference. It led to a gruelling lawsuit and a series of consequences that reverberate through my life to this day.
And last week I returned. To give another talk that would incorporate some of my experience: a Ted Talk about being sued for giving a Ted Talk, and how the lessons I’d learned from surviving all that were a model for surviving “broligarchy” – a concept I first wrote about in the Observer in July last year: the alignment of Silicon Valley and autocracy, and a kind of power the world has never seen before. The key point I wanted to get across to this powerful and important audience is that politics is technology now. And technology is politics.
But as I wrote several drafts in the week leading up to last week’s talk in Vancouver, Canada, I had what felt like a slow-motion anxiety attack. One insistent question throbbed like toothache: why? Why, after everything that had happened last time, was I putting myself through it all over again?
In 2019, my first Ted Talk, entitled “Facebook’s role in Brexit – and the threat to democracy”, sent a shock wave across the conference, then the internet and then my life. I ended up facing a defamation suit over 19 words contained in it, that ate up my time, energy and, as time went on, my sanity.
And now here we are. In the first weeks of the second Trump presidency, with Elon Musk ripping up the US government. The power of the tech titans – the subject I’ve been investigating and reporting and talking about for the past nine years – is now finally front and centre. But now it all feels too late. My warning then – that democracy may not survive technology – was not heeded.
I’d be speaking, again, directly to Silicon Valley, to the men – because it is men – who are building the latest most powerful technology yet – AI – the runaway train that is coming for all our lives. Men who, crucially, are now marching in step with Donald Trump, the head of what is increasingly looking like a rogue state.
And what could I say? How could I address the collapse of the postwar international order and the role that technology is playing in it in the 10 to 12 minutes I’d been allotted? It was absurd. Most Ted Talks are written and learned months in advance, but I was a late addition to the lineup and the day before I was due to depart I didn’t even have a finished script.
I could feel a wave of hostility coming from one small section of the audience
Things reached a head on a Zoom meeting with the two lead curators and the head of Ted, a British media entrepreneur and philanthropist, Chris Anderson, who gently tore apart my latest draft, based on a viral column I’d written for the Observer: How to Survive the Broligarchy, 20 lessons for the post-truth world, a cross between a manifesto and a handbook about what techno-authoritarianism is going to mean for us all.
Did I really need a slide of Musk doing what looked like a Nazi salute, asked Anderson, given that Musk had denied it and it would alienate part of the audience from the off. Last time around, Anderson pointed out, I’d managed to take the audience with me as I laid out the story.
Last time around, I told him, it felt like the situation was redeemable. In 2019, I thought that “the gods of Silicon Valley”, as I’d described them, could be persuaded to take measures to prevent the harms of their platforms. “But that ship has now sailed.” In 2019, people in Silicon Valley could claim ignorance. Now, the leaders of Silicon Valley companies have made a clear and unmistakable choice.
Anderson’s counter was that people who work at these companies, and who would be in the room, “are still the best chance of effecting change”. It was actually bracing to hear his pushback, but when he suggested that perhaps I remove a line about the lawsuit I became tearful.
The line was about the importance of defending facts, and for me it was what lay at the heart of the entire case. “It’s just really profound for me,” I said. “It’s what it was all about.”
“Look,” he said at the end of the call. “We invited you. It’s up to you to choose what you want to say.” The weight, the freedom, the responsibility of that lay on me as I fiddled endlessly with my copy on the long flight across the Atlantic.
Two days later I stood on the Ted stage and gave the opening talk of the conference. It began with an unexpected cheer when I put up a slide that read: “It’s a coup”. We can’t fight it if we can’t see it, I said, and we can’t see it if we can’t name it. I wasn’t expecting the spontaneous response. It hadn’t even seemed controversial to me. (All week, in the days after the talk, people told me what a “release” it had been to have someone say the words out loud. “It hit me somewhere beneath my solar plexus,” a fellow speaker said. “I can’t explain how powerful it was to have someone say that, especially here.”)
But as I went on, I became aware of another current in the room. I could feel a wave of hostility coming from one small section of the audience. I’d had cheers and whoops but I could also see folded arms, hostile stares. Later, I would meet one of them, a close friend of Musk’s whose husband sat on the board of his companies.
“In 2019 I called out the gods of Silicon Valley. Sam Altman, Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk,” I said in my closing statement. “I was wrong. You are not gods. You are men and you are careless … You are collaborators. You are complicit in a regime of fear and cruelty.”
Walking off stage, I gave a loud involuntary sigh that’s audible on the film of the talk. I tried. I tried in 2019, and I’ve tried again now. It’s my best effort to communicate why we face such profound risk. And that’s the emotion that’s visible, audible, all the way through the talk. It’s why I put myself back out there.
Because what happened to me is now coming for so many other people. Not just weaponised lawsuits against other journalists and online campaigns of harassment and abuse – though that is coming – but the everyday surveillance and data harvesting to which we are all subjected. In the new political landscapes, that carries new risks. I’ve been on the sharp end of that. I know how it feels. Terrifying. But it’s also the business model of Silicon Valley, and it’s why, as individuals, we must take steps to protect ourselves.
What I can’t stress enough is how much worse the situation is now, six years on.
Most of us – and I include myself here – have no idea how fast this technology is accelerating and how much power we are voluntarily giving up, how exposed and vulnerable we are.
I’m now back home. I did a follow-up interview with Anderson in which he called the talk “an absolute blockbuster”. And it now has a life outside the conference; it’s landed on YouTube where it’s gainedalmost 1m views in less than a week.
American friends and total strangers have sent me heartfelt notes. And two MPs, one Labour, one Conservative, and two members of the House of Lords have sent me messages about a specific reference I made to the UK government’s proposed bill that is seeking to tear up our 300-year-old copyright laws to make it easier for AI companies to use artists’ intellectual property for training their models. It’s called the data use and access bill and it’s currently working its way through the Commons despite protests from thousands of people across the entire UK creative industries, including the likes of Elton John and Paul McCartney.
But none of that was a given. I almost didn’t go through with it. I’d been unnerved by a back and forth with Tamsin Allen, a UK libel lawyer, hours before my talk. Ultimately, there was risk attached to me saying even the most seemingly innocuously factual things about the case, because it was me, because it was Ted, because the one lesson I’ve learned the hardest way is that when someone wants to attack you, they will find a way.
“Watch her talk from five years ago,” reads one of the thousands of comments on YouTube. “She was much more animated, much more upbeat and bright. Now she looks and sounds completely terrified, dejected, exhausted and heartbroken.”
AI is in the hands of a small group of reckless, careless men who seem to have no understanding of society
The internet we’ve created, captured by big corporations and built on data tracking, was not inevitable. Nor is what’s coming next. And it’s why I wanted to write this piece. Because as hopeless as things are, there’s no inevitability to what comes next. It’s why I’m so appalled at the naivety of the British government, which, at the very moment that it should be seeking to strengthen UK national sovereignty against US tech power, is doing the exact opposite. This is not a partisan issue. David Davis, the Conservative MP, leaves me a voice note telling me that he views “the proposed changes in copyright law somewhere between theft and intellectual slavery”. It is, he says, an inversion of property law.
The big difference between Ted of six years ago and Ted in 2025 is AI. It dominates almost every conversation. The scale and pace of advancement in the technology is mind-blowing in the true sense of the word. AI’s domination of Ted is just a snapshot of its domination of every coming aspect of our lives.
It’s going to blast away whole industries, concentrate even greater power in an even smaller group of men, deplete the planet’s resources even further, and it’s in the hands of reckless, careless people who seem to have no understanding of society. To them, it’s just a race; a winner-takes-all competition. All while the world still looks much the same – same streets, same houses, same politicians talking on the same TVs. It’s why it’s so hard to get your head around it.
In my talk I made a point of criticising Sam Altman, another Ted speaker and the chief executive of OpenAI, the company that rocked the world when it unveiled ChatGPT in 2022. And at the end of last week, Anderson interviewed him live on stage and put my words directly to him: “In our opening session, Carole Cadwalladr showed ChatGPT give a Ted Talk in the style of Carole Cadwalladr and, sure enough, it gave a talk that wasn’t quite as good as the talk she gave, but it was pretty impressive. And she said, ‘OK, it’s great, but I did not consent to this.’”
Should OpenAI be using work of people who haven’t consented, he asked. Shouldn’t they be paid?
Altman simply avoided the question. “So right now if you use our image generation thing if you say I want something in the style of a living artist, it won’t do that,” he said, referring to the new image generation tool and conveniently evading the fact that it does exactly that for writers and journalists.
Instead, he talked about “the creative spirit of humanity” that AI would now “democratise”. New tools that would allow “new people to make better art, better novels, better content that we all enjoy”.
A Canadian editor for the Globe and Mail told me they were now sending reporters to the US with burner phones and wiped laptops
The point I’d made in my talk is that this entire AI gold rush is theft. So much of the training set for this entire industry is coming from us: our work, our words, our labour. Not just writers, but anyone who’s ever written anything online, as well as photographers, film-makers, musicians. It’s not innovation, it’s theft. But in talk after talk at the conference, this inconvenient truth was glossed over.
Afterwards, backstage, I ran into Altman himself. His security guard hovered. “I don’t want to intrude,” I said. “No, I’m happy to answer questions,” he said. But the foundational question of taking other people’s work without permission is something he just can’t answer.
“What’s the difference between me reading your work?” he asked. It’s all free to read. What’s the difference? You’re outputting to potentially millions of people for commercial gain for no recompense, I said. It’s fair use, he countered. It’s really not, I said. You’ve ingested the entire body of my work. It’s so easy to establish that.
And he was gone. Back to the controls of the tank that is soon to roll over all of us.
It wasn’t just the AI dominance that had changed Ted. My talk was the only one that addressed the current political moment, and among the 1,700 people there, it dominated conversation after conversation. A Ted fellow, a next-gen rising star, told me that some of her cohort in the US on visas or green cards had cancelled their trips, worried that they might be detained at the border when returning home. A Canadian editor for the Globe and Mail told me they were now sending reporters to the US with burner phones and wiped laptops. A historian at a non-profit specialising in black history told me of cancelled grants.
Even Steven Pinker, the Harvard professor and popular science author who has documented what he sees as the upwards path of human progress, was uncharacteristically downbeat. The attacks on universities, including his own, had left him shaken.
Meeting Pinker at the conference was another personal landmark. I first went to Ted 20 years ago as a guest of his. I watched Jimmy Wales give a talk on the online encyclopedia that anyone could write and anyone could edit and thought: “Well, that’ll never catch on”, and then he demo-ed Wikipedia and it blew my mind.
I wrote up the event for the Observer, and it was the spark that led to me writing about these topics in a 20-year career with the paper. In 2011 and 2012 we put on our own Ted event, TEDxObserver, which I co-curated with the Observer’s former editor, John Mulholland. Ted and the Observer have been entwined in my understanding of this world, from excited tech-utopian to where we are now, witnessing Silicon Valley’s merger with an axis of autocracy across the world.
These vast data-harvesting tech monopolies that control our online world were never inevitable. And there is another way. We can go back to the future, to the democratic, inspiring, non-corporatised web that Wales proved was possible.
We are not powerless. There are things we can do collectively. I learned that when 30,000 Observer readers rose up to support me in my legal case. Last week’s talk is dedicated to them, because without them I don’t know where I’d be now. But together, we were able to hold power to account. And in the darkness that’s falling, I believe that rebuilding our information system – together – is the first step to getting out of this mess. This is my last signoff for the Observer. It’s been a ride. Thanks for reading. | {
"authors": [
"Carole Cadwalladr"
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"title": "It’s not too late to stop Trump and the tech broligarchy from controlling our lives, but we must act now",
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} |
f03f03f767f26f09a1f38f76b09c99a2 | The Guardian view on City deregulation: a recipe for recklessness
In its desire to ensure the City of London remains attractive after Brexit, the Treasury seems to have forgotten one of the major lessons of the 2008 financial crisis: when regulation is lax, risks accumulate. This month, it launched a consultation about whether it was time to lighten the rules governing alternative asset managers, including private equity and hedge funds, in the belief that doing so will boost growth. There is little evidence to support this idea, and every reason to think it could exacerbate systemic risks.
The proposal is consistent with Rachel Reeves’s belief that expanding the financial sector will deliver economic prosperity. The chancellor has suggested that post-crisis regulations went “too far”. Those regulations included an EU directive targeting alternative investment funds. Before 2008, these funds operated mostly in the dark. There was no means of systematically tracking the leverage they were using, nor the dangers this might pose.
Under the EU rules, leveraged funds managing €100m or more in assets had to comply with strict reporting requirements and hold enough capital to absorb losses. The Treasury is now considering lifting that €100m threshold to £5bn, which would exempt many funds from the full list of EU rules. It will fall to the Financial Conduct Authority to decide which rules to apply. This is troubling.
Ms Reeves has instructed the FCA to encourage financial “risk-taking”, and the regulator has boasted about slashing “red tape”. Both sound like recipes for recklessness. Though the marketplace for private equity and hedge funds was too small to cause a crisis back in 2008, it has since tripled in size. Many private equity funds have started borrowing from shadow banks, which aren’t subject to the same regulations or capital requirements as normal banks. Others have begun taking on even more debt than usual. The Bank of England raised the alarm about these risky practices in 2023, and has suggested that mainstream banks may be unwittingly exposed to the industry. These are reasons for more oversight, not less.
If the FCA loosens the rules, fund managers will have got their way. They lobbied to have the EU directive watered down in 2010, and the UK was one of the few countries to oppose the rules. Then, as now, the government wanted to protect the City, believing it to be a goose that lays golden eggs. This antipathy towards financial regulation was a prelude to the “Singapore on Thames” worldview promoted by Brexiters. Hedge fund and private equity managers donated lavishly to their cause. A study of Electoral Commission data by the academics Théo Bourgeron and Marlène Benquet revealed that these fund managers donated nearly £7.4m to the leave campaign, and just £1.25m to remain.
The Treasury seems to think that unless the City gets what it wants, Britain may lose its fund managers to countries such as Luxembourg. There are many reasons to be wary of liberalising finance. One is that it will hinder, rather than help, economic growth. Research suggests that once the sector exceeds a certain size, it starts to become a drag on growth and productivity. A study from the University of Sheffield found that the UK lost out on roughly three years of average GDP growth between 1995 and 2015 thanks to its bloated financial sector. Watering down regulations might be helpful for fund managers. It is hard to see who else would benefit. | {
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"title": "The Guardian view on City deregulation: a recipe for recklessness",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/business/commentisfree/2025/apr/20/the-guardian-view-on-city-deregulation-a-recipe-for-recklessness"
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c4dd92495c22ce0faa28019b254c73b2 | The Guardian view on a new deal for travel in Europe: bring back student exchanges | Editorial
Strong hints that a rebranded “youth opportunity scheme” will top the EU’s wishlist at next month’s EU-UK summit are good news for anyone who regrets the diminished travel opportunities that were one result of Brexit. Rising expectations of new European train routes – possibly including direct trains from London to Italy – can only add to the appeal of a potential rule change.
There were more consequential impacts of Brexit than restrictions on travel. The disruption of trade, which is predicted by the Office for Budget Responsibility to cause a 4% reduction in long-run productivity, is far more significant economically. Drug shortages continue to create risks to people’s health, and cause problems for doctors and pharmacists. Cancer research and trials have also been badly affected, according to a new report, because of the increased difficulty of attracting scientists and funding.
But the cancellation of the UK’s membership of the Erasmus student exchange programme, the removal of the automatic right for UK citizens to work in EU countries (and the reciprocal right for EU citizens), and the erection of numerous other obstacles to travel, have together made for a big change in the cultural weather. Collectively, and as Brexiters intended, we have become more cut off from our neighbours.
Spending extended periods in Germany, Spain, France or another EU country was never something that most young adults did. Yet in 2019-20 almost 17,000 UK students and trainees undertook placements under Erasmus, while 22,000 European young people came for similar stays in the UK. Theresa May proposed a youth exchange scheme as part of her Brexit agreement. This was dropped under Boris Johnson. But since foreign travel is widely regarded as one of life’s great pleasures, and most people want the next generation to thrive, it is not surprising that a recent poll found 66% of the British public are in favour of relaxing the rules – including large majorities in Brexit-voting areas.
Partly owing to the powerful pull of London, and the wish of millions of European young people to learn English, EU governments are keen to rebuild arrangements so that more young people have the chance to live in the UK. But when proposals for a new agreement were floated by the European Commission last year, they were briskly shut down by both Rishi Sunak, who was prime minister at the time, and Labour. Diplomats have learned from this and engaged in some tactful rephrasing. Rather than “mobility”, which is thought to evoke echoes of free movement, any new scheme will be framed around “opportunity”. This would involve a special visa allowing citizens, probably up to age 30, to work or study abroad for up to four years. While the UK government has already shown an interest in bilateral schemes, it appears that the EU will negotiate any deal as a bloc.
Particularly given the recent actions of the Trump White House, the UK ought to be seeking strengthened economic and political ties as well as cultural ones. Hurdles to cooperation on science and medicine must be cleared away. The renewal of a youth exchange scheme might seem unimportant by contrast. But while it would not be utterly transformative, at a time of geopolitical tumult, its importance shouldn’t be understated. Sir Keir Starmer should embrace the idea without delay. There is no easier way to signal that he is serious about closer cooperation. | {
"authors": [],
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"title": "The Guardian view on a new deal for travel in Europe: bring back student exchanges | Editorial",
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9caa83f46999ce5cadd2ac1104e474b6 | Richard Dawkins’ prophetic vision of ‘new colour’
“Hue new? Scientists claim to have found colour no one has seen before”. Congratulations on a genuinely witty double pun in the online headline on your article, which was also in Saturday’s paper under a different heading.
And – forgive a little self-congratulation – my co-author Yan Wong reminds me that in our book, The Ancestor’s Tale (first published in 2004, with a second edition in 2016), we wrote: “This raises an intriguing possibility. Imagine that a neurobiologist inserts a tiny probe into, say, a green cone and stimulates it electrically. The green cell will now report ‘light’ while all other cells are silent. Will the brain ‘see’ a ‘super green’ hue such as could not possibly be achieved by any real light? Real light, no matter how pure, would always stimulate all three classes of cones to differing extents.”
This is precisely what has now been done. Makes a nice change to be cast in the role of prophet.
Richard Dawkins
Oxford | {
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} |
2ae4028901b7a0b17adab4a990a78b3a | Blue Origin’s all-female spaceflight brought down to earth
For those who have not already read Ursula K Le Guin’s 1976 essay Space Crone, it is the perfect antidote to this weird Charlie’s Angels-in-space exploit (So Katy Perry went to space. Wasn’t there anyone else we could have sent?, 14 April).
Le Guin rightly suggests that it is an apparently unremarkable postmenopausal woman who is the ideal candidate to represent humanity on a space mission. The “crone” has a depth of experience of being human that no young, fit, looks-great-in-Lycra man or woman can match.
Sure, Blue Origin didn’t expect to encounter alien life on a suborbital flight on the edge of space – unlike Le Guin’s intergalactic ambassador – but this flight, as Zoe Williams suggests, is still deeply symbolic of who is chosen as representatives of our strange race.
The crone, having travelled through and embraced all stages of being a woman, is fit not just to represent womankind; having also endured life and death and change in a way that no man has ever experienced, she is most suited for representing humanity as a whole.
Thankfully we do have alternative narratives which are more powerful than this tech bro fantasy. Le Guin’s Space Crone is a must-read.
Georgina Treloar
Folkestone, Kent
Publicising the posturing of the “crew” of Blue Origin (Blue Origin crew including Katy Perry safely returns to Earth after space flight, 14 April) overlooks as usual the achievements of the many engineers and scientists who made this trip possible, however pointless, both through their design of the craft and their control of its operation.
In CM Kornbluth’s rather dark short story The Marching Morons (1951), Earth’s problem of overpopulation is solved by persuading the masses to board rockets that are making one-way trips to nowhere, in the belief that they are heading for a new and comfortable life on Venus.
If Messrs Bezos and Musk could be persuaded to be part of the next “crew” of Blue Origin, perhaps the backroom team could help solve some of Earth’s current problems by providing enough extra boost for the rocket to be able to break out of Earth’s gravitational field.
And yes, I am aware of what happened in the story to the person who came up with the idea, but I’m willing to take the risk.
David Budgen
Durham
I am in full agreement with Zoe Williams’ view about the wanton money waste of the recent flit into space by a group of women with luxuriant hair and tight clothing. But I have to disagree that they resembled Charlie’s Angels. Surely they were cosplaying early Star Trek, a TV series which I suspect would have been one of Jeff Bezos’s favourites.
Claire Whatley
Berwick St James, Wiltshire
Your piece on the Blue Origin flight (Celebrities criticize all-female rocket launch: ‘This is beyond parody’, 15 April) says that it was “the first all-female space flight since 1963, when Soviet astronaut Valentina Tereshkova flew into orbit solo”. However, this overlooks the achievements of females such as Martine, a pig-tailed macaque, sole occupant of a French Vesta rocket launched on 7 March 1967. She survived the flight, living for several years afterwards, and – rather inspiringly – never tried to cash in on the experience.
Andrew Carroll
Castletimon, County Wicklow, Ireland
Contributors to your letters page (15 April) criticise the short journey into space taken by Jeff Bezos’s wife and her friends. The environmental damage done by such a trip is “colossal” (Chris Burr). Those on board were not “crew” as often described, merely passengers (Dan Stacey). The triviality of the jaunt is captured by Toby Wood’s phrase “ladies who launch”. We might expand on this: there is no such thing as a free launch.
Richard Smith
Durham | {
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c8a155c9949da9d30f59e6957f477ad6 | Melting glaciers will harm us all. Yet still we watch, unmoved
The problems that now afflict attempts to establish a military presence in the far north of Canada and Greenland provide timely warnings about the miseries that lie ahead for the rest of the planet as global warming continues its remorseless spread.
The Arctic has suffered especially early impacts because temperatures here are rising faster than in any other part of our planet. Crucially, this process threatens to trigger even greater climatic mayhem.
Ice is highly effective at reflecting solar radiation back into space, so when the region’s floes and glaciers start to disintegrate and disappear, more and more of the dark soil and ocean that lie below are exposed to sunlight and start to heat up, causing further warming. In effect, humanity is turning up the thermostat that once reflected sunlight and cooled the planet.
This loss of ice has other disturbing consequences. As it disappears, shipping and oil drilling are expanding across the entire region while tourism is spreading. More and more giant cruise ships and tankers are making increasing numbers of visits to the land of ice and snow. In their wake, air and noise pollution in the Arctic are worsening, disruptions to marine ecosystems are increasing, and the risks of catastrophic oil spills or major waste discharges are rising with each passing year.
At the same time, Inuit communities, which were once linked by ice, are now facing major social disruption as it disappears and leaves their towns and villages isolated. People living in the Arctic also face major health risks from the increasing fragility of local sea ice and from the spread of diseases in the region’s warming air.
Then there is the impact on wildlife. Polar bears use ice as platforms for hunting, while other creatures, such as seals, find refuge beneath it. In fact, the region’s entire food chain is affected, starting with algae. It grows on the underside of sea ice and is eaten by krill, which are then eaten by Arctic cod, which in turn are eaten by seals, who are a favourite prey for polar bears. Take away the underpinning layer of algae and all sorts of unpleasant consequences could occur.
An avalanche of disruption and desecration has began to sweep the world’s upper latitudes. These should act as stark warnings about the risks that face the rest of our planet.
Sadly, such alerts seem to be having little impact on humanity, which still shows few signs it is going to stop burning fossil fuels or curtail greenhouse gas emissions, the prime causes of global heating. The blight that now affects the Arctic seems destined set to spread to other lands and continents in the near future. | {
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64cfe946e4ebb6e63805010a5f9cb5b5 | ‘Cañahua chose me’: can an ancient relative of quinoa revive rural Bolivia’s economy?
Few young people remain in Bolivia’s highland plateau, the Altiplano. The rising frequency and severity of extreme weather events, such as drought and frost, have reduced their economic prospects and migration has accelerated as the environment becomes more unpredictable.
“The climate isn’t like it used to be,” says Nico Mamani Lima, a farmer and agronomist from Ayo Ayo.
But Mamani and others believe they have found a solution in cañahua, a little-known relative of the Andean staple crop quinoa. Known for its resistance to drought, pests and frost, the plant – what is known as a pseudocereal – is packed with protein and nutrients and grows faster than quinoa.
These characteristics, say farmers and agronomists, could make cañahua important in stemming the tide of migration from Bolivia’s countryside.
View image in fullscreen The plant grows faster than quinoa and is resistant to pests, drought and frost. Photograph: Manuel Seoane/The Guardian
Bolivia’s exodus from the countryside is driven mainly by the climate crisis and regional factors combining to cause dramatic changes in precipitation, with chronic drought interspersed with torrential rains. The high, dry Altiplano is especially sensitive to drought, with once-vast lakes disappearing in its wake; Lake Poopó, once the country’s second-largest lake, was officially declared evaporated in 2015.
Many communities are unable to sustain themselves in this less hospitable climate. As rural areas are hollowed out, Bolivia’s population has become increasingly concentrated in cities. At least 1.8 million Bolivians live abroad, about 16% of the country’s population.
Most of Mamani’s childhood friends and classmates have left their home town to live in Chile, Argentina and Brazil, where they work in textile factories or harvesting crops. Mamani is one of only three people of his generation still living in Ayo Ayo.
View image in fullscreen Eugenia Clotilde Layme Quispe, 74, and her sister Justina Layme Quispe, 72, both members of the Ayo Ayo association of cañahua producers, talk with Nico Mamani Lima. Photograph: Manuel Seoane/The Guardian
For those who find work in neighbouring countries, living conditions are difficult. “They have to work seven days a week and barely get to rest six hours, or sometimes not at all,” says Mamani.
Migration from the countryside also threatens food security and the country’s sovereignty. “The majority of farmers are elderly,” says Jorge Eduardo Jiménez García, who works in cañahua marketing. “If we think about it, who will grow our food in 10 years?”
To create economic opportunity in rural areas, Mamani founded an association of cañahua producers in Ayo Ayo in 2019, hoping that the crop’s adaptability to climate change could provide alternatives to migration.
This crop is ancient and highly adaptable
Though native crops such as cañahua (Chenopodium pallidicaule) and quinoa (Chenopodium quinoa) were staples in the Andean highlands in pre-Hispanic times, the arrival of wheat during Spanish colonisation threatened to wipe them out.
“The production of cañahua and quinoa was prohibited,” says Trigidia Jiménez Franco, 58, an agronomist who cultivates the Andean plant on her farm, Granja Samiri.
View image in fullscreen Trigidia Jiménez Franco inspects cañahua grains. Photograph: Manuel Seoane/The Guardian
After Bolivia’s independence, farmers continued growing the crop, but it was eaten mainly by those who produced it. When globalisation brought wheat and sugar to rural communities, it was again at risk of disappearing. “People used to drink pito de cañahua,” says Jiménez, referring to a soft drink made by toasting and grinding the grain. “It was being replaced by Coca-Cola.”
Recently, cañahua has begun to make a comeback due to its resilience to drought and frost, its faster growth cycle and stable market prices compared with quinoa.
Cañahua “is shorter in stature, but more resilient”, says Jamir Inti Canaviri Jiménez, 29, Jiménez’s son and Granja Samiri’s production manager. Its high tolerance of salty soils, which are quite common in arid conditions such as the Andean highlands, also means it can thrive where other crops cannot. “It seems to use salts as essential nutrients,” he says. “It beats every other crop.”
The plant also tolerates variations in the length of the growing season, which have become more unpredictable with the climate crisis. “This crop is ancient and highly adaptable,” says Ernesto Huanca Limachi, who leads the Andean Grains Project at the National Institute of Agricultural and Forestry Innovation (INIAF).
View image in fullscreen Jiménez in the cañahua fields on Granja Samiri in Bolivia’s western Oruro department. Photograph: Manuel Seoane/The Guardian
Trigidia Jiménez is largely responsible for cañahua’s resurgence. Born into a family of wheat farmers, she and her family migrated to the nearby city of Oruro when she was young. After studying agriculture, Jiménez returned to the countryside in 2001. “As an agronomist, it wasn’t my thing to be in an office,” she says.
After her original plans to raise sheep went awry with an early rain season, Jiménez tried growing cañahua on her in-laws’ land in Bolivia’s western Oruro department. Friends and family members doubted her decision, as it was seen as a food only consumed by rural farmers with little market value. But she followed her gut instinct and now says: “Cañahua chose me.”
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Twenty-four years later, Granja Samiri is Bolivia’s largest producer of cañahua. As an agronomist, Jiménez combined scientific and ancestral practices to breed several varieties of seeds and fine-tune organic production methods, improving yields.
View image in fullscreen Jiménez is Bolivia’s largest producer of the grain and has used a combination of scientific and ancestral practices to improve yields on her farm. Photograph: Manuel Seoane/The Guardian
Jiménez and Granja Samiri also worked to create a market for cañahua, as the seed was not previously sold commercially. Along with international and Bolivian government partners, she founded the Bolivian National Network of Knowledge and Expertise in Cañahua, which promotes the production and consumption of the crop as well as educating people about the grain.
View image in fullscreen Pito, a toasted and ground form of the crop, from Granja Samiri which are part of government subsidy packages for prenatal and lactating parents. Photograph: Manuel Seoane/The Guardian
In recognition of its nutritional value as a “superfood”, it was incorporated into the Bolivian government subsidy packages for prenatal and lactating women.
Granja Samiri now processes cañahua into various finished products, including pito (the toasted and ground form used in drinks), flour and popped cañahua. High-end restaurateurs have begun incorporating it into their dishes, and the Killa artisanal distillery is developing a cañahua whisky.
It has even been included in meals for Nasa astronauts. Granja Samiri is now working on exporting cañahua to other countries in Latin America as well as new markets such as Britain.
Granja Samiri is an intergenerational affair, with Jiménez’s adult children and extended family members participating in producing, processing, and commercialising the Andean seed.
Jorge Eduardo Jiménez García, 28, Jímenez’s nephew, hopes that cañahua might help other families to build their livelihoods in the countryside. “We want young people to be able to return to the countryside,” he says, “because you can also make a living in rural areas.”
In Ayo Ayo, Mamani sees early signs of that vision being possible. When he started the association of cañahua growers in 2019, almost no one was interested, he says. “Everyone said: ‘What good is cañahua?’”
View image in fullscreen Cañahua pancakes. The pseudocereal can be ground into a flour and used as a wheat replacement. Photograph: Manuel Seoane/The Guardian
Wilmer Quispe Calle, 43, has cultivated cañahua all his life but only recently started selling it after the cañahua growers’ association was formed. “When a frost comes, it kills all the potatoes,” he says. “Cañahua is resistant: it’s affected, but not as much.”
Quispe’s children are now studying in La Paz and Brazil, and plan to return to Ayo Ayo after graduation. The long-term economic and social impacts of cañahua in Bolivia remain to be seen, but many who cultivate the seed are hopeful.
“I always have faith in cañahua,” says Canaviri. “It changed my whole social and economic outlook. That’s why it came to this world – to protect food sovereignty.” | {
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0108c6b71772a0e242a4f98a5fa975ae | Fears that UK military bases may be leaking toxic ‘forever chemicals’ into drinking water
Three UK military bases have been marked for investigation over fears they may be leaking toxic “forever chemicals” into drinking water sources and important environmental sites.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) will investigate RAF Marham in Norfolk, RM Chivenor in Devon and AAC Middle Wallop in Hampshire after concerns they may be leaching toxic PFAS chemicals into their surroundings. The sites were identified using a new PFAS risk screening tool developed by the Environment Agency (EA) designed to locate and prioritise pollution threats.
RAF Marham and AAC Middle Wallop lie within drinking water safeguard zones. RM Chivenor borders protected shellfish waters, a special area of conservation, and the River Taw – an important salmon river.
PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a group of synthetic chemicals widely used in firefighting foams and industrial processes as well as in aconsumer products including waterproof fabrics, non-stick cookware, cosmetics and food packaging. They are known as forever chemicals because they do not break down easily in the environment, and have been found polluting soil and water across the world. Some PFAS build up in the human body over time and have been linked to a range of serious health problems including cancers, immune system disruption and reproductive disorders.
Military bases with airfields have used firefighting foams laden with PFAS for decades. Certain chemicals in foams including PFOS, PFOA and PFHxS have been linked to diseases and banned, but they remain in the environment.
Prof Hans Peter Arp, from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, said contamination at UK military sites would not be surprising. “Most, if not all, military bases in Europe and around the world have used vast quantities of firefighting foams that contain PFAS,” he said. “They now have substantial PFAS concentrations in the soil and groundwater beneath them, as well as soaked into the concrete of their buildings.”
He warned that PFAS pollution will continue for “decades to centuries” unless immediate local clean-up actions are taken. “These PFAS that are leaching now likely took several decades to get there. There are more PFAS to come.”
View image in fullscreen RAF Puma helicopters above AAC Middle Wallop, Hampshire. Photograph: Neil Watkin/Alamy
This month the Environmental Audit Committee launched a formal inquiry into PFAS contamination and regulation across the UK. Campaigners and scientists warn that until the full scale of PFAS pollution is understood and addressed, the threat to human health and the environment will continue to grow.
Alex Ford, professor of biology at the University of Portsmouth, said: “The EA has now identified thousands of high-risk sites around the UK with elevated concentrations of PFAS compounds. These forever chemicals are being detected in our soils, rivers, groundwater, our wildlife – and us.
“It is very worrying to hear PFAS is being detected … close to drinking water sources. The quicker we get this large family of chemicals banned the better, as their legacy will outlive everybody alive today.”
He added that the cost of cleaning up these pollutants could run into the billions – costs that, he argued, should be footed by the chemical industry.
Not all water treatment works can remove PFAS, and upgrades would be costly. A spokesperson for Water UK, which represents the water industry, said: “PFAS pollution is a huge global challenge. We want to see PFAS banned and the development of a national plan to remove it from the environment, which should be paid for by manufacturers.”
Prof Crispin Halsall, an environmental chemist at Lancaster University, called for greater transparency and collaboration. “The MoD shouldn’t try to hide things. They should come clean and set up monitoring,” he said.
The UK’s monitoring of PFAS is trailing behind the US, where contamination on military sites has been the focus of billions of dollars in federal spending on testing and clean-up operations.
In July, the US Environmental Protection Agency and US Army launched a joint project to sample private drinking-water wells near army installations. UK authorities only recently began to investigate the scale of the problem.
Brad Creacey, a former US air force firefighter, spent decades training with firefighting foam on military bases across the US and Europe. During fire exercises, Creacey and his colleagues would ignite contaminated jet fuel and extinguish it with AFFF (aqueous film-forming foams) – often wearing old suits that were soaked and never cleaned. On one occasion he was doused in the foams for fun.
Twenty years after he had stopped working with the foams, a blood test revealed that Creacey still had high PFOS levels in his blood. He has been diagnosed with thyroid cancer and now suffers from Hashimoto’s disease, high cholesterol and persistent fatigue.
“We’ve taken on too much of a lackadaisical attitude about this contamination,” he said. “Unless this is taken seriously, we’re doomed.”
Creacey is pursuing compensation through the US Department of Veterans Affairs and a separate lawsuit against 3M and DuPont.
Pete Thompson is a former Royal Air Force firefighter who served at several UK airbases including RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire. During his service he regularly used firefighting foams in training exercises and equipment tests, and said they usually sprayed them directly on to grass fields with no containment.
“We used the foam in the back of what was called a TACR 1 – basically a Land Rover with a 450-litre tank of premixed foam on the back. Every six months we had to do a production test to prove that the system worked. That production test we just produced on to the grass … there was no way of stopping it going anywhere other than just draining in through the ground.”
View image in fullscreen Calm waters at the mouth of the estuary where the River Taw meets the River Torridge in Chivenor, North Devon. Photograph: Terry Mathews/Alamy
The MoD is working with the EA to assess its sites, and work has begun to investigate whether to restrict PFAS in firefighting foams. Military sites are not the only sources of PFAS pollution – commercial airports, firefighting training grounds, manufacturers, landfills, paper mills and metal plating plants can also create contamination problems.
An EA spokesperson said: “The global science on PFAS is evolving rapidly, and we are undertaking a multi-year programme to better understand sources of PFAS pollution in England. We have developed a risk screening approach to identify potential sources of PFAS pollution and prioritise the sites for further investigation. We have used this tool to assist the MoD in developing its programme of voluntary investigations and risk assessments.”
A government spokesperson said: “There is no evidence that drinking water from our taps exceeds the safe levels of PFAS, as set out by the Drinking Water Inspectorate.
“Our rapid review of the Environmental Improvement Plan will look at the risks posed by PFAS and how best to tackle them to deliver our legally binding targets to save nature.”
The guidelines for 48 types of PFAS in drinking water is 0.1 micrograms per litre (100 nanograms per litre).
Earlier this year, Watershed Investigations uncovered MoD documents raising concerns that some RAF bases might be hotspots of forever chemical pollution. In 2022, the Guardian reported that Duxford airfield – a former RAF base now owned by the Imperial War Museum – was probably the source of PFOS-contaminated drinking water in South Cambridgeshire. The site is now under investigation by the EA.
Patrick Byrne, professor of water science at Liverpool John Moores University, said current monitoring efforts only scratch the surface. “We’re at the tip of the iceberg. We’re only monitoring a handful of PFAS compounds. There are many others we don’t yet fully understand or detect.
“There are tests that measure the total PFAS load in water, and we’re finding huge discrepancies between those results and the levels of individual compounds. That tells us there’s a lot more PFAS in the environment than we know.”
Even where testing is under way, labs are overwhelmed. “The Environment Agency’s lab is inundated. Private labs can’t keep up either,” he said. “Analytical technology is improving fast – but we’re racing to keep pace.” | {
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dfc49d48a167697bf2f10f0b320880cb | Climatologist Friederike Otto: ‘The more unequal the society is, the more severe the climate disaster’
Friederike Otto is a senior lecturer in climate science at Imperial College London. She is also the co-founder of the World Weather Attribution initiative, which seeks to determine the influence of global warming on intensity and likelihood of an extreme weather event. The project also examines how factors such as ill-suited architecture and poverty exacerbate heatwaves, hurricanes, floods and wildfires. This is the theme of her second book, Climate Injustice: Why We Need to Fight Global Inequality to Combat Climate Change.
The thesis of your book is that the climate crisis is a symptom of global inequality and injustice. That will be quite topsy-turvy to some people, who think global heating is caused by the amount of carbon that we are putting into the atmosphere.
Yes, of course, if you just stick to the physics, then the warming is caused by the amount of carbon in the atmosphere, but the amount of carbon in the atmosphere is caused by the burning of fossil fuels. And it is also the case that those who benefit from the burning of fossil fuels are the few already wealthy people who have stakes in or own the companies themselves. The vast majority of people do not benefit. The American dream is social mobility, not burning fossil fuels.
You are arguing that racism, colonialism and sexism all underpin global heating. Tackling those things seems more challenging than a technical solution for the climate crisis.
Of course it’s more challenging than just inventing some stuff. But we have solar and other renewable sources of energy and this isn’t solving the problem. The problem will only be solved if we address the underlying causes. I argue those are the inequalities in our society.
Some would say those kind of statements are political, and scientists should stick to the science.
The idea of writing this book came through my work because every time we do a study, we look at what the role of climate change is in the weather event that ultimately led to disasters. But we also look at what else is happening, who was affected, why were they affected. I would say in all cases, what turns weather into a disaster is not how much it rained but how vulnerable people are and how well prepared. Therefore, depending on which type of weather event we are looking at and where in the world we are, we always find that the more unequal the society is, be that a US city or a state in western Africa, the more severe the consequences.
View image in fullscreen A man carrying a jug of water during the 2021 heatwave in Portland, Oregon. Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images
The relationship between the extraction of fossil fuels and colonialism and racism seems clear, but can you explain how sexism intersects with global heating?
In all the studies we have done, we have found that the more patriarchal the structures in a society, the worse the consequences of climate change are. If women are excluded from decision-making and don’t have access to finance, many more people die and lose their livelihoods in extreme weather.
Why do you find the term natural disaster misleading?
There are natural hazards, although because of climate change, they’re also becoming quite unnatural in some instances. But whether it turns into a disaster has very little to do with nature and a lot to do with social vulnerability.
Is the Cop [UN climate summit] process fit for purpose? It seems to be more about maintaining the status quo.
It is definitely not fit for purpose because it’s not achieving what we need: faster change and change that would really benefit the majority of the people and not just the very few. But it’s not the fault of the Cop process. It has actually achieved quite a lot because if we hadn’t had this conversation, we would be on track to a four- or five-degree [warmer] world. We are now on track to a three-degree world, which is still a world we absolutely do not want to live in. But it is thanks to the Cop process that we talk about climate change on an international global level. The Paris agreement states that we care about climate change because it violates human rights and we want to do something about it. That is a major achievement. What we have to do now is not to say: “Oh it’s all shit, let’s abandon it all.” But how can we make these institutions stronger because they can serve us well and we need them.
Do individuals bear responsibility too? Politicians, businesspeople, even scientists?
The process – as in the institutions, Cop, international justice etc – is great, but it can only work if all individuals support it. At the moment we see that many try to dismantle them, all of us have a duty to fight for them, policymakers, scientists etc. Without these institutions there will be no prosperity.
You write about the Pacific north-west heatwave of 2021, which caused more than 1,000 deaths and had enormous economic impact. Does it concern you that tragic events like this don’t appear to be wake-up calls?
We do need wake-up calls, but we need more than that. Without having an idea of what to do, they won’t suffice. But we have learned some things from these events. For example, the biggest difference in every extreme event for the death toll is whether there are functioning early warning systems or not. We saw this with Hurricane Helene: in Florida people are used to hurricanes and are aware that if there is a forecast that says evacuate, you have to evacuate. But a bit further north in the Appalachians, [where] people are less used to it, they didn’t. Plus there was a lot of disinformation and the FEMA [Federal Emergency Management Agency] was attacked for trying to help people. So the death toll was much higher.
View image in fullscreen Damage in Florida caused by Hurricane Helene. Photograph: Chandan Khanna/AFP/Getty Images
One Republican congresswoman suggested that the US government created the hurricane.
The fact that you can say that and probably half the people who would listen to you would think: “Yeah, why not?” That’s a big issue. I don’t know how to solve the “facts don’t matter any more” problem.
Calling those people climate-crisis deniers seems inadequate.
The more incredible the lie, the better it sticks. We have so many lines of evidence and so much data and it all shows the same thing. By questioning the data, you can’t create arguments that climate change isn’t happening. So I guess the fact-free approach is actually the result of the success of science.
You described the Pacific north-west heatwave as being “mathematically impossible”; that it was so rare that it could only happen once in 100,000 years.
Yes, if you don’t take climate science into account. Once you take global warming into account, it goes from being outside everything you would expect from a normal statistical assessment to 1 in 100 or 200.
And those odds are shortening?
Yes, very much so. So in a two-degree world you would expect to see this once every five years or so.
Earlier this month a board member of global insurer Allianz SE noted that we are on track for a rise of 2.2C and 3.4C above preindustrial levels. He said a rise of 3C would render many regions uninsurable and make investment too uncertain – ultimately capitalism would cease to be viable. Does that ring true to you?
It’s interesting to hear it in such terms from an insurer. Capitalism as we know it now would be unviable. We are on track to tear it down by accident. | {
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} |
ecd02c60cec42d95168bda1836a6f19d | British firms urged to hold video or in-person interviews amid North Korea job scam
British companies are being urged to carry out job interviews for IT workers on video or in person to head off the threat of giving jobs to fake North Korean employees.
The warning was made after analysts said that the UK had become a prime target for hoax IT workers deployed by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. They are typically hired to work remotely, enabling them to escape detection and send their wages to Kim Jong-un’s state.
Google said in a report this month that a case uncovered last year involved a single North Korean worker deploying at least 12 personae across Europe and the US. The IT worker was seeking jobs within the defence industry and government sectors. Under a new tactic, the bogus IT professionals have been threatening to release sensitive company data after being fired.
John Hultquist, the chief analyst at Google’s Threat Intelligence group, told the Guardian that North Korea had turned to Europe, and the UK in particular, after it became more difficult to implement its fake worker ploy in the US.
He said: “North Korea is facing pressure in the US and it is particularly focused on the UK for extending its IT worker tactic. It is in the UK where you can see the most extensive operations in Europe.”
The fake IT worker scam typically works with the help of “facilitators”, or people with a physical presence in the country where the company inadvertently employing the North Korean agents is based.
These facilitators carry out important assisting work such as providing false passports and maintaining a physical address in the country, where laptops are sent to the IT employee when they are hired.
This laptop is then made accessible to a person working for Pyongyang, who typically does not reside in the same country as the facilitator. However, the fake workers are also known to be taking advantage of companies offering “bring your own device” employment, in which the devices are less easily monitored.
“The bottom line is their operations have a physical presence in the UK, which is the most important step to grow across multiple sectors in the country,” said Hultquist.
Hultquist said carrying out job interviews in person or on video would disrupt North Korean tactics.
“Many of the remedies are in the hands of the HR department, which usually has very little experience dealing with a covert state adversary,” he said. “If you want to you’ve got to use background checks, do a better job checking physical identities, and ensuring the person you’re talking to is who they claim to be. This scheme usually breaks down when the actor is asked to go on camera or come into the office for an interview.”
Sarah Kern, a North Korea specialist at the cybersecurity firm Secureworks, said the threat was “more widespread than companies realise”.
She added that British firms could fight the threat by verifying candidates thoroughly and educating their HR departments about the ploy. They should then conduct in-person or video interviews to check that the prospective employee they are considering hiring tallies with who is on their CV.
“In the US it has also been fruitful to conduct in-person interviews, or at the very least video interviews, and checking that you’re talking to who was actually advertised on the résumé,” she said.
Kern said telltale signs that an IT worker may not be who they claim to be include frequent changes in address and where they want their wages sent – such as money exchange services rather than a conventional bank account.
The bogus IT professionals are being recruited in Europe recruited through online platforms including Upwork, Freelancer and Telegram. Upwork said any attempt to use a false identity was a “strict violation of our terms of use” and the company takes “aggressive action to … remove bad actors from our platform”.
Kern added:
“We observed that they were very avoidant of video interviews because often they’re located in a working centre where there’s a lot of these North Korean IT workers working from one small room.
“They wouldn’t want to show their video, or it sounded like they’re in a call centre, but with no actual reason as to why.” | {
"authors": [
"Dan Milmo"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/541f778d442da9f485a2b07debac0d16d1e3c96c/0_193_5750_3452/master/5750.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=418cdaba546b152b336d46211e9501d6",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "British firms urged to hold video or in-person interviews amid North Korea job scam",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/apr/20/british-firms-urged-to-hold-video-or-in-person-interviews-amid-north-korea-job-scam"
} |
9f6c17ff9a4c3a56af31562442be0f02 | Nigel Farage defends allowing US chlorinated chicken into UK as part of trade deal
Nigel Farage has defended allowing labelled chlorinated chicken from the US into the UK as part of a trade deal, as a poll suggested his Reform UK party could be on course to take the highest number of seats at a general election.
Speaking before the local elections in England on 1 May, Farage said British consumers already ate chicken from places such as Thailand reared in poor conditions, and accepted chlorine-washed lettuce.
He told the Sunday Times: “If you have a look at the chicken we are currently importing from Thailand, you look at the conditions they’ve been reared in, and that every single bag of pre-made salad in every single supermarket has been chlorinated … once those basics have been accepted I’ll have a debate with you.”
Asked how he would prevent British chicken farmers being undercut by cheap producers from the US, he said: “I want to promote British farming as being a high-end product. I think the growth of farmers’ markets, they are a much more discerning audience that wants to know where their meat comes from. I don’t think British farmers have anything to fear from this long term.”
Both the government and the Conservatives have objected to US demands for its producers to be able to sell chicken with lower welfare standards in the UK. Britain does not allow imports of products such as chlorine-washed chicken and hormone-injected beef and Donald Trump has been pushing for agriculture to be part of a trade deal if the UK wants tariffs to be lowered on its exports such as cars and steel.
In the interview in Lancashire, where Reform is challenging both the Tories and Labour for council seats, Farage also spoke about his rift with Trump’s adviser the US billionaire Elon Musk, who had been pushing for him to take a harder line on immigration and support the far-right figure Tommy Robinson.
He said he had been in contact with Musk since their spat on X, but added: “I’ve fought against this for 25 years. You can’t bully me, I know what I think is right and what I think is wrong. Nobody pushes me around – not even him.”
Reform is hoping to take hundreds of seats off the established parties at the local elections, with a three-way split in the polls between Farage’s party, Labour and the Tories.
Keir Starmer’s Labour is narrowly ahead in most surveys. However, an MRP poll by More in Common found this weekend that Reform could win more seats than the other parties at a general election even if it has a slightly lower vote share.
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The poll looking at constituency-level splits surveyed 16,000 people, with its model suggesting 180 seats for the Reform party on 23.7% of the vote, 165 for the Tories on 24.3% of the vote and 165 for Labour on 24.5%. It indicated 67 seats for the Lib Dems on 13.3% of the vote and 35 for the SNP on 2.2%.
Its modelling suggested that if a general election were held now then Labour could lose 246 seats, including 10 cabinet ministers, with losses to Reform in the ”red wall” and Welsh valleys, and to the SNP in Scotland.
The poll also indicated Labour was being squeezed from both sides, with progressive voters looking to the Lib Dems, Greens and independents causing seats to be lost to the right.
The polling suggests the main parties could be on course for difficult local elections on 1 May, although they are hard to forecast on account of the often low turnout. | {
"authors": [
"Rowena Mason"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/97b8dfdeeeefedf6f96beea625caf70f1c935059/0_227_7415_4449/master/7415.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=3846efd8d2e59ddb61ce4c1f43020a83",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Nigel Farage defends allowing US chlorinated chicken into UK as part of trade deal",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/apr/20/nigel-farage-defends-allowing-us-chlorinated-chicken-into-uk-as-part-of-trade-deal"
} |
ee19e0542996c50f7fae3dbb76a6576d | UK taxpayers contributed £89m to the most expensive movie ever made
A leafy corner to the west of Watford was transformed into a jungle last year. Authentic-looking exotic flowers lined the floor, tree trunks soared up to an artificial canopy and reeds hung from their branches. Peering between them was Hollywood A-lister Scarlett Johansson.
The extravagant construction was a set in Sky Studios Elstree where the movie Jurassic World: Rebirth was being made. Filming there, instead of in an actual jungle, enabled Universal Pictures to pocket millions of pounds of UK taxpayers’ money to partially cover its blockbuster costs.
Jurassic World: Rebirth, which is released in cinemas in July, is the third movie about dinosaurs that Universal has made in the UK. Recently filed documents reveal that HMRC gave its predecessor, 2022’s Jurassic World: Dominion, £89.1m – believed to be the largest payment for a film since the UK government incentive scheme began in 2007. The scheme, designed to drive investment in the UK’s film industry, gives studios a reimbursement of up to 25.5% of the sum they spend on making a movie in the UK, provided that at least 10% of its total cost is incurred there.
Analysis of more than 400 sets of filings also shows that Dominion was one of the most expensive movies of all time, with total costs of £453.6m, just overtaking the £452m spent on Star Wars: The Force Awakens in 2015.
The £89.1m from the incentive scheme, along with £2.8m from the coronavirus job retention scheme, brought the net cost of making Dominion down to £361.7m. Its 2018 prequel, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, banked a further £70.7m from the scheme, bringing the total to £159.8m for the two. Universal’s movie division made combined profits of £3.9bn ($5.2bn) during the time that Dominion was made.
View image in fullscreen On the set of dinosaur blockbuster Jurassic World: Dominion. Photograph: Photo 12/Alamy
The latest data from HMRC shows that, in 2023, it handed a total of £553m to movie studios, bringing the total paid since 2007 to £5.9bn. When it increased the level of tax relief for the film industry about a decade ago, the government noted that “this measure is expected to have a positive impact on the film industry, but is not expected to have significant wider macroeconomic impacts”.
The latest data from the British Film Institute (BFI) shows that, in 2019, every £1 of reimbursement handed to studios generated £8.30 of additional Gross Value Added (GVA) benefit for Britain’s economy. It led to a total of £7.7bn in GVA being generated by the film incentives in 2019.
View image in fullscreen Laura Dern in a scene from the £453m movie Jurassic World: Dominion. Photograph: Landmark Media/Alamy
Released in December 2021, the BFI’s Screen Business report shows that, between 2017 and 2019, the incentives to studios yielded a record £13.5bn of return on investment to Britain’s economy and created more jobs than ever before. Filming drives spending on services such as security, equipment hire, transport and catering. In 2019, this spending created 49,845 jobs in London and 19,085 throughout the rest of Britain. Universal alone spent £37.5m on the staff behind Dominion and Fallen Kingdom.
Critics, however, have queried the effectiveness of the scheme. Some argue that Britain’s filming facilities, talent and landscape are strong enough to attract studios without incentives, so the UK could reap the benefits without the government needing to spend any money.
John O’Connell, chief executive of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, which campaigns for reform of UK taxation , said: “It’s little wonder that the majority of taxpayers feel hard done by when they see the eye-popping sums saved by larger companies. Inward investment is a major boon for the UK but the right balance must be struck.”
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The incentive scheme has made the finances of films more transparent. The cost of movies made in the US is usually a closely guarded secret as studios tend to absorb the cost of individual films in their overall expenses and don’t itemise how much was spent on each one.
In contrast, studios set up separate companies for movies made in the UK to show more than 10% of the total cost was spent here, in order to qualify for the scheme. The companies have to file annual accounts, which lifts the curtain on everything from staff numbers and salaries to total costs.
Dominion starred Chris Pratt, along with Laura Dern, Sam Neill and Jeff Goldblum – the original cast of the 1993 Oscar-winner Jurassic Park. It was made at the height of the pandemic in 2020, causing the cast to quarantine for five months at the opulent Langley hotel, a former manor home of the third Duke of Marlborough where rooms cost more than £400 a night.
William Sargent, chair of London-based visual effects firm Framestore, said: “The spend happens and taxes are paid a year at least before the government writes a cheque in return.” He added that film industry workers then spend the money they have been paid which, in turn, generates more tax receipts for the government: “If you follow the actual tax collection against the impact of this onward money, it vastly exceeds the payout.”
Universal Pictures was contacted for comment. | {
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"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
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"title": "UK taxpayers contributed £89m to the most expensive movie ever made",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/apr/20/uk-taxpayers-contributed-89m-to-the-most-expensive-movie-ever-made"
} |
9f0203bd96291517f35b8dbf016da133 | From kumquats to lime caviar: UK foodies embrace a whole new world of citrus
When life gives you pithy cedro lemons and sweet Tacle mandarins, what exactly do you make with them?
British chefs and home cooks are increasingly embracing new and unusual varieties of citrus in recipes, with supermarkets and greengrocers offering a rising number of speciality fruits. Retailers like M&S now offer punnets of kumquats, while Waitrose has reported a 27% rise in sales of yuzu juice.
Riverford, which offers boxes of organic produce for home delivery, has noticed a similar trend. The company has seen steady sales of kumquats, with sub-varieties and hybrids like Tacle mandarins (a cross between a clementine and a Tarocco orange) and Ruby Valencias (which have the sweetness of orange but the flavour of grapefruit) performing especially well.
“It’s generally unknown just how much variety there is in shape, size, flavour, and use of citrus,” said Dale Robinson at Riverford. “When consumers see that, they want to try it.”
Emilie Wolfman, trend innovation manager at Waitrose, said unusual types of citrus were seeing a boom in popularity and the supermarket has seen an increase in recipe searches for premium fruits like Sorrento lemons, blood oranges and red grapefruit. “Chefs and home cooks alike are embracing its year-round versatility,” she said.
As ever, restaurants have led the charge, with chefs using slices of cedro lemon, squeezes of kalamansi, and pearls of lime caviar in savoury and sweet dishes across the UK.
View image in fullscreen A fruit sculpture celebrates the 90th Lemon festival in Menton, France, last year. Photograph: Sébastien Nogier/EPA
“These citrus varieties bring a whole new vocabulary of taste,” said chef Mauro Colagreco, whose restaurant at the OWO in Raffles hotel, London, recently gained a Michelin star. Bergamot and makrut (commonly known as kaffir) lime are used to flavour broths, and the zest of Buddha’s hand (a variety with finger-like segments) and yuzu are grated over everything from raw fish to meringue-based desserts.
Colagreco has brought his passion for citrus diversity from his 130-variety garden in Menton, a town in the French Riviera, where his three-Michelin star restaurant, Mirazur, is located.
“I believe British chefs are more than ready for a citrus revolution,” he said. “In fact, I think it has already begun.”
Tom and Mathilda Tsappis, the husband-and-wife team behind Killiecrankie House in Perthshire, Scotland, use different citrus fruits depending on the season. “In winter, we showcase Japanese varieties like yuzu, sudachi, and mikan,” said Mathilda. “We use yuzu in a turbot beurre blanc and Ecclefechan tart to balance the sweetness. We also turn yuzu peels into a punchy miso condiment for fatty meats and fish.”
Shrub, a UK fruit and vegetable wholesaler established in 2020, has partnered with Todolí Citrus Foundation, a research centre in Valencia. Shrub is now handling the logistics and distribution of Todolí’s unique citrus fruits to consumers in London and the south-east.
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View image in fullscreen Southeast Asian citrus varieties include the kumquat. Photograph: BIOSPHOTO/Alamy
The foundation works as a living seed bank, focused on preserving the biodiversity, history and culture of rare citrus fruits. “It’s rare to be given a brand new set of ingredients to work with and this is incredibly exciting for UK cuisine,” said co-founder Harry Dyer. In addition to supplying restaurants, a 3kg mixed Todolí citrus box has been made available to home chefs.
Cornish Citrus at Curgurrell Farm is now commercially producing Meyer lemons and limes in the UK, using unheated glass and polythene, resulting in virtually carbon-free citrus. One chef who has taken notice is Andy Benyon of the Michelin-starred Behind in London Fields, who is incorporating in-season Tahiti and makrut limes into his kitchen. “I grate them straight into dressings for a clean hit of acidity,” he said.
Colagreco’s research and development team at Mirazur discovered that mandarins arrived in Europe via England in 1805, when two varieties were introduced at London’s Kew Gardens, before spreading to the Mediterranean by 1850. Mediterranean citrus culture is therefore “a heritage that we owe to the English”, Colagreco said.
“The citrus revolution isn’t just about flavour. It’s about connection to nature, cultural exchange, and rethinking what freshness can mean.
“British chefs are not only ready – they’re helping to lead this movement.” | {
"authors": [],
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"title": "From kumquats to lime caviar: UK foodies embrace a whole new world of citrus",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/food/2025/apr/20/from-kumquats-to-lime-caviar-uk-foodies-embrace-a-whole-new-world-of-citrus"
} |
c7aad75e05a60680f6b565c8634972da | Prince Andrew joins Charles and Camilla for Easter Sunday service
The Duke of York has appeared at the Easter Sunday service at Windsor Castle with King Charles, days after it emerged that an alleged spy helped him write birthday letters to China’s president.
Prince Andrew arrived at St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, with the princess royal, as well as his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York, and Anne’s husband, Vice-Admiral Sir Tim Laurence.
He quickly entered the chapel ahead of his sister, Princess Anne, as she spoke outside with the Dean of Windsor, the Right Rev Christopher Cocksworth.
Charles and Queen Camilla, who arrived a few minutes later than Andrew, waved and smiled at crowds gathered outside the chapel.
The royal family began to distance itself from Andrew after his infamous BBC Newsnight interview with Emily Maitlis in 2019 about his relationship with the convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. In January 2022, he was stripped of his military roles and use of HRH title a month before he settled a legal dispute with one of Epstein’s victims Virginia Giuffre, who alleged she had been assaulted by the the duke.
Andrew’s links to an alleged Chinese spy, Yang Tengbo – also known as Chris Yang – have heaped further embarrassment on the royal family. Andrew missed the traditional Christmas gathering at Sandringham last year, after Yang was banned from the UK on security grounds.
Yang has denied suggestions he was involved in espionage and said he had “done nothing wrong or unlawful”.
Papers released from a special immigration tribunal earlier this month disclosed that Yang had advised Andrew on letters he wrote directly to China’s president, Xi Jinping.
According to one document, from Dominic Hampshire, who worked for Andrew from 2019 to 2022, these letters were written each year on Xi’s birthday. Hampshire’s statement to the tribunal said: “The royal household, including the late queen, were fully aware of this communication – it was certainly accepted and it may be fair to say it was even encouraged – it was an open channel of communication that was useful to have.”
Also attending the Easter service were the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh and their son James, the Earl of Wessex, Princess Eugenie and her husband, Jack Brooksbank, and Princess Beatrice and her husband, Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi.
The Prince and Princess of Wales are spending the weekend with their children in Norfolk. The Waleses, who have a country home, Anmer Hall, on the Sandringham estate, missed the annual service last year after Kate, who is in remission, was diagnosed with cancer.
Meanwhile, the archbishop of York gave the Easter sermon on Sunday, in place of the archbishop of Canterbury. Delivering the Church of England’s primary Easter message from York Minster, Stephen Cottrell called for peace, citing Israel and Gaza, Ukraine, Myanmar, Sudan and DR Congo as “places of conflict that convulse our world”.
He also spoke against “the madness of a world which ‘others’ others, drives wedges between communities, breeds hatred and promotes greed”.
The former archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, announced his resignation in November in the wake of a report that found he could have brought the serial abuser John Smyth to justice if he had reported him to police in 2013. Cottrell, his interim replacement, has also faced calls to resign over his decisions when handling the case. | {
"authors": [],
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"title": "Prince Andrew joins Charles and Camilla for Easter Sunday service",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/apr/20/prince-andrew-joins-charles-and-camilla-for-easter-sunday-service"
} |
8bfaa6d47639e2b7b7f0159d790f70b9 | UK prison officers to demand electric stun guns for dangerous jails
Prison officers will demand the immediate issue of electric stun guns to protect staff guarding Britain’s most dangerous jails when they meet the justice secretary this week.
Wednesday’s meeting with Shabana Mahmood was called after the attack on three guards at HMP Frankland, allegedly by the convicted terrorist Hashem Abedi. Two were seriously injured after being doused in hot cooking fat and stabbed, one five times in the torso, in a sustained assault.
The body representing prison officers will call for all staff to have stab vests, and also for electric stun guns for selected officers. It will also demand that an American “Supermax”-style regime is imposed on Britain’s worst inmates.
The Prison Officers’ Association (POA) wants electric stun guns issued to specialist teams in at least the highest-security prisons, to quell attacks that threaten the lives of officers.
The devices fire 50,000 volts to incapacitate a suspect, and are billed as a less lethal option than firearms, though some uses have been linked to deaths.
Abedi, 28, the brother of the Manchester Arena bomber, Salman, is serving a 55-year sentence. The attack on the three officers happened in a kitchen area of the separation unit at HMP Frankland.
Mark Fairhurst, the chair of the POA, said: “We now need the tactical use of Taser as an option when faced with life-threatening situations. The threat in our prisons is such that we need that option available.”
Police officers across the UK can be issued with electric stun guns to use on the streets if they perceive sufficient threat.
Fairhurst said electric stun guns should be available for those guarding terrorists and other seriously violent convicted criminals when prison officers believed their livesor those of their colleagues were at risk.
He said: “Say staff are getting attacked by someone with a sharp-edged weapon, who is trying to kill them. All we have available at the moment is pava spray [similar to pepper spray] and a baton. When I call for assistance, what we need is a response team to turn up who have the option of using Taser.
“A sharp-edged weapon is as deadly as a knife. The idea we are going to fight them off with a baton and a canister of spray is putting my members’ lives at risk. You can’t run away, you are in an enclosed environment.”
The POA is asking for electric stun guns first to be given to response teams at the highest-security prisons, which all have separation units or their equivalent, for prisoners deemed to be highly dangerous or disruptive.
Those prisons include Frankland, where the attack took place on Saturday 12 April; Belmarsh, where Abedi had previously attacked officers; Full Sutton; Long Lartin and Whitemoor.
The meeting on Wednesday afternoon will be between the POA and Mahmood. Fairhurst said parts of prisons with the ultimate security should adopt “Supermax” rules.
In this plan, selected high-risk inmates would leave their cell only when handcuffed and escorted by three staff, there would be no mixing with other prisoners, and they would be restricted to their basic entitlement of rights and privileges.
Fairhurst said: “It’s called a separation centre for a reason. We’re just treating them like everyone else.”
He said the set of demands was reasonable and that he was hopeful, adding that the strength of feeling was such that the government would be “foolish not to consider them”.
The Ministry of Justice did not comment on whether it would consider issuing Tasers to some prison officers. The government has announced a review and has already banned inmates in separation units having access to knives or being allowed to prepare meals in kitchens.
“This will look into how this was able to happen, and what we must do to better protect our prison officers in the future,” Mahmood said on Friday.
The attacks are being investigated by counter-terrorism police because of Abedi’s past. They have searched the prison looking for where and how the makeshift blade was made, and signs of violent Islamist extremist literature.
Also in the separation unit at HMP Frankland was Anjem Choudary, serving life imprisonment after being convicted of directing a terrorist organisation, membership of a proscribed organisation, and encouraging support for a terrorist organisation. | {
"authors": [
"Vikram Dodd"
],
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"title": "UK prison officers to demand electric stun guns for dangerous jails",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/apr/20/uk-prison-officers-electric-stun-guns-dangerous-jails"
} |
62a5a34c55c3a46cfdaa162144bd772d | ‘The whole policy is wrong’: rebellion among Labour MPs grows over £5bn benefits cut
Labour MPs opposed to the government’s massive £5bn of benefit cuts say they will refuse to support legislation to implement them, even if more money is offered by ministers to alleviate child poverty in an attempt to win them over.
Legislation will be introduced to the House of Commons in early June to allow the cuts to come into force. They will include tightening the criteria for personal independence payments (Pip) for people with disabilities, to limit the number of people who can claim it. Under the changes, people who are not able to wash the lower half of their body, for example, will no longer be able to claim Pip unless they have another limiting condition.
A major rebellion appears to be hardening on the Labour benches rather than subsiding, despite frantic efforts by whips and government ministers to talk MPs round.
View image in fullscreen ‘We are being asked to take a leap of faith. It does not make sense’: Neil Duncan-Jordan, Labour MP for Poole. Photograph: Peter Flude/The Guardian
One idea being floated as a way to win over rebels is for ministers to publish their long-awaited child poverty strategy shortly before the key Commons votes, and in it offer additional money for poor parents of children under five. Work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall is understood to be examining a proposal focused on the youngest children that would cost less than the £3.6bn needed to scrap entirely the controversial two-child limit on benefit payments. It is now accepted in government that, given the state of public finances, the cap cannot be scrapped in the short term.
Many of the several dozen Labour MPs who are angry at their party’s cuts say they will refuse to get involved in any such “trade off” involving children in poverty and the disabled.
Rachael Maskell, the Labour MP for York Central, who is planning to vote against the legislation, said: “You can’t compromise with a trade-off under which you say you will take more children from poor families out of poverty by placing more disabled people into poverty. That simply cannot be right.
“The government really does need to start listening to MPs, civil society and the population at large because there is really widespread opposition to these policies.”
Ministers and the Labour whips have been holding talks with concerned MPs over recent days, only to find the strength of feeling is not abating. A group of MPs is understood to be preparing to break cover by calling for a complete rethink. One government source said: “If anything, I think there is more worry than there was. It is like this is non-negotiable for many of our people.”
View image in fullscreen ‘The government really does need to start listening’: Rachael Maskell, Labour MP for York Central. Photograph: Richard Saker/The Guardian
Another major complaint from Labour MPs is that they will be asked to vote on the legislation to implement the benefits cuts before the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has concluded an impact assessment on the effect they will have on getting people off welfare and into the workforce – the stated objective of the cuts. The OBR report is not due until the autumn.
Last month, Keir Starmer said there was a “moral” as well as an economic case for reforming the benefit system. “It is indefensible, economically and morally, and we must and we will reform it. We will have clear principles, we will protect those who need protecting.
“We will also support those who can work back to work, but Labour is the party of work – we’re also the party of equality and fairness.”
Another Labour MP opposed to the cuts, Neil Duncan-Jordan, who won the seat of Poole in Dorset by just 18 votes last July, overturning a Conservative majority of 19,000, said he had more than 5,000 Pip recipients in his seat.
He said he could not support any compromise or “trade off”. “There is not a hierachy of need,” he said. “The whole policy is wrong. It goes without saying that if these benefits cuts go through, I will be toast in this seat.”
Duncan-Jordan said it did not make sense that MPs were being asked to vote on the cuts before the OBR had reported on how effective they would be in returning people to the workplace. “We are being asked to take a leap of faith. It does not make sense.”
In its report accompanying Rachel Reeves’s spring statement, the OBR said that “the full impacts of these policies are very uncertain, given the complexity of how trends in health, demography and the economy interact with the benefits system (as our 2024 welfare trends report explored).
“Welfare reforms incorporated into previous OBR forecasts have in many cases saved much less than initially expected, such as the transition from disability living allowance to Pip, or taken far longer to implement than expected, as was the case for the roll-out of universal credit.”
The OBR added: “We will undertake a full assessment of the potential impact of the Green Paper polices on the labour market ahead of our next forecast.” | {
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"title": "‘The whole policy is wrong’: rebellion among Labour MPs grows over £5bn benefits cut",
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f4428ee52857ff0b1a161622cd9a5015 | ‘I’ve been assaulted’: Reform’s minority ethnic candidates seeking local election wins
“I’ve been assaulted, I regularly get verbal abuse, I got a death threat one time. But until the people come to their senses, I will stand,” said Raj Forhad, a Reform UK candidate.
The 43-year-old, who owns a software business, is part of a growing group in politics: British voters from minority ethnic backgrounds who campaign for Nigel Farage’s party.
Recent research has found Reform tends to poll best in areas with a large white population. Polling indicates the party, which is criticised by anti-racism campaigners, had a vote share of 3% among minority ethnic voters, compared with 16% among white voters.
However, the party fielded 17 candidates from ethnic minorities in the 2024 general election, and some insiders regard the ability to win over voters traditionally loyal to Labour – including Black and Asian people in big cities – as “pivotal” to its growth.
The local elections on 1 May represent a milestone for Reform, which is also eyeing the Runcorn parliamentary byelection and mayoral elections on the same day.
But some party activists are already looking ahead to 2026, when London’s local elections take place, eager to learn if they can turn values among minority ethnic communities – particularly regarding enterprise, education, family and faith – into votes.
“We’re putting the same effort into bringing over true Labour voters as we did into bringing over Conservatives. London is the acid test,” said Neville Watson, Reform’s only Black branch chair.
Hainault is an east London ward that will be voting on 1 May, in a Redbridge council byelection in which Forhad is standing. He stood in last year’s general election as the candidate for Ilford South, where he said he was attacked on the campaign trail for standing for Reform, but did not report it to police.
Forhad came to the UK from Bangladesh in 2010. “The main reason I joined Reform is because of the policies they have, the contract they have with the people, the country, on the NHS, on immigration,” he said. “Myself as an immigrant, the way illegal migrants are brought in this country, that’s impacting everyone.”
View image in fullscreen Neville Watson, the chair of Reform’s Enfield branch.
Watson, who chairs Reform’s branch in Enfield, north London, says he “firmly” supports “positive immigration that is managed, coordinated and thoughtfully timed”.
“It’s about space, not race,” the father-of-two said when asked how he reconciled his identity as the son of Jamaica-born Windrush generation parents with perceptions of his party. “I have the values my family – who put so much in – have always stood for: hard work and aspiration.”
A community activist with a background in social enterprise, youth work and SEND, Watson “personally” supports economic reparations for the “unimaginable wrong” of slavery. He said it had driven a “deep-rooted and sometimes subconscious racism” and “left a deep, indelible mark on the lives of a people”.
So what attracted him to Reform? “Brexit,” for starters. He added: “I sought a political home where I could express my authentic voice, one that embraces my Christian faith with confidence. Reform UK represents the values that were once central to mainstream politics but have now shifted to the right. It’s a space where these principles can thrive and be championed unapologetically.”
Like Watson, Navtaij Sangha, a former British army bursar from a “military Sikh family”, is a north London-based Reform activist who believes Britain is exemplary. “Where in the world would you have access to the best education, the best job opportunities?” the 45-year-old management consultant said. “There may be barriers and challenges, but it probably is somewhere like the UK.”
He added: “We haven’t got it 100% perfect. But I think it’s class that drives [inequality], not race.”
Forhad, setting out from home to put leaflets through doors, agrees. He is insistent that if he can get on, anyone can.
“All this campaigning I feel I owe to this country, because this country has given me everything: my life, my future, my career,” he said. “The way this country has given me the foundation, with my intellect, my talent, that’s understood by Reform UK – and they valued my contribution. Some of the negative campaigning that Reform is a racist party I think is complete nonsense.”
He added: “Myself, I’m a Muslim, but I believe my religion is a private matter, nothing to do with my politics, because if I consider myself as a Muslim voter then I’m not considering my residents who are Christian, or Jews, who are Hindu, who are atheist. I have that kind of positive mindset.”
Labour dominates Forhad’s area, at ward and constituency level. But he sees an opportunity to win people over on local issues – such as potholes, policing and Ulez – along with the message of “family, community, country”.
In north London, Sangha has been working on a long-term strategy for how Reform “can take the big cities … something the Tories cannot do”.
Like Watson, Sangha thinks Labour, which enjoyed a 46% vote share among minority ethnic voters, has taken that popularity for granted. His father, Mohinder Singh Sangha, is a Labour councillor in Leicester.
Research has found that 35% of minority ethnic voters born outside the UK supported leave in the EU referendum, compared with 21% of those born in the UK, for a variety of reasons.
“I think discussing immigration is not a bad thing,” Sangha said. “People that came in the 60s, the 70s … huge numbers of those settled immigrant communities voted for Brexit.”
He added: “It is very easy to allow the debate to be hijacked by people who are frankly just nasty racists. But it’s equally destructive to just label anyone who wants to discuss these things as far-right.”
Sangha said voters from British minority ethnic communities he had met while campaigning were wary of what he called “identity politics”.
He said: “They kind of want to be left alone, to just get on with life, earn a living and bring up kids. And now suddenly the politics they’ve tried to escape is being imported.” He doesn’t accept that Reform has its own brand of “identity politics”.
“I’m a big believer in the UK nation state,” Sangha added. “There has to be some kind of national unity … people just want things to work.”
Watson said “past missteps” – incidents that may lead people to question whether Reform is really a force for national unity – were “opportunities to learn and grow”. Like Sangha, he said he had encountered patronising and divisive attitudes from some people on the left before joining Reform.
“There’s a common misconception Black and Asian voters form a homogenous group,” he said. “While we may share certain aspirations – such as striving for the best for our children and valuing entrepreneurship, family and gender roles – our perspectives and priorities are as diverse as our communities.”
Asked how he would answer criticism that Reform has a track record of statements and positions that are harmful to Britons from ethnic minorities, Watson said: “I’d acknowledge their concerns and emphasise that Reform is committed to evolving and listening.
“It’s important to highlight that the party’s focus is on creating policies that benefit all Britons, regardless of background. Actions speak louder than words.” | {
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25893c524ef0049a46b06b51cac0fc61 | Parents must make tough choices on smartphones, says children’s commissioner for England
Parents should be prepared to make difficult decisions over their child’s smartphone usage rather than trying to be their friend, the children’s commissioner for England has said.
Dame Rachel de Souza said this should include parents considering the example they are setting their children through their own phone usage.
Writing in the Sunday Times, de Souza said that “if we are serious about protecting our children, we have to look at our own behaviour”.
She added: “The temptation as a parent to give in to a child’s pleas is a real one. Every parent has been in that position. A few more minutes in front of the television to keep them out from under your feet … A new smartphone, ignoring the nagging voice in your head that questions it, because ‘all my friends have one’, despite knowing how much time you spend on your own smartphone.
“You are not supposed to be your child’s friend. Sometimes being the parent means making difficult decisions in your child’s long-term interests, no matter how loudly they disagree.
“They need you to give them love, understanding, support and boundaries. It means listening to your child, always encouraging the height of their aspirations, but not just doing exactly what they want.”
Nearly a quarter of children spend more than four hours a day on an internet-enabled device, a survey for the children’s commissioner suggested earlier this month.
A YouGov poll of 502 children in England aged eight to 15 found that 23% spent more than four hours a day using an internet-enabled device with a screen, such as a computer, phone, tablet or gaming console.
One in four (25%) spent two to three hours a day on such a device, while a fifth (20%) spent three to four hours a day, according to the survey, which was carried out in March and April.
De Souza added that parents needed to “feel confident having challenging conversations with their children about the things they see online”.
“We need parents to give their children the opportunities to talk about violent or sexual content they see online without simply having their device confiscated, because it will find them elsewhere,” she said. “As adults we are ourselves dopamine-addicted, stuck in a cycle of scrolling yet we still have no idea of what our children are seeing.”
The education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, is looking at the effects of smartphone bans in some schools in England, a policy idea supported by the National Education Union amid growing concerns of the impact of social media on children.
The current non-statutory guidance states that schools should prohibit the use of mobile phones throughout the school day during lessons as well as break and lunchtimes, but does not say how schools should enforce the bans.
De Souza’s survey of 15,000 state schools in England found that 99.8% of primaries and 90% of secondaries limited the use of mobiles during the day, including banning phones on school grounds, requiring children to hand in phones or leave them in a secure place that they cannot access in the day, or requiring them to be kept out of sight.
De Souza, a former headteacher, has previously said banning mobile phones should be a school leader’s choice rather than imposed nationally by the government.
She wrote in the Sunday Times that she believed “schools are only part of the solution”.
“Head teachers have told me that despite their own policies they remain deeply concerned about children’s safety online, because most of the time children spend on their phones is outside school hours when they are in their parents’ care,” she said.
Last month, the Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, questioned why the government had opposed a Tory amendment to the children’s wellbeing and schools bill to require schools to ban the use of phones.
Keir Starmer, the prime minister, described the proposal as “completely unnecessary” as he claimed that “almost every school” already banned phones. | {
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83130497cc875fbfdf82e6893c11d9f2 | Police investigating murder of Paria Veisi in south Wales find her body
Police investigating the murder of a woman from Cardiff who was last seen leaving work a week ago have found a body.
Paria Veisi’s body was discovered by South Wales police at an address in Penylan, Cardiff, on Saturday, the force said.
She was reported missing after leaving her workplace in the Canton area of the city at about 3pm on 12 April.
Veisi was driving her black Mercedes GLC 200, which was later found on Dorchester Avenue in the Penylan area, five miles away.
A 41-year-old man from Penylan has been charged with murder, preventing lawful and decent burial of a body, and assaulting a person occasioning them actual bodily harm.
A 48-year-old woman from Australia Road, White City Estate in west London, has been charged with preventing a lawful and decent burial of a dead body and conspiring to pervert the course of justice.
They both appeared at Cardiff magistrates court on Saturday. Both have been remanded in custody until their next appearance at Cardiff crown court on Tuesday.
In an earlier appeal, South Wales police said Veisi’s disappearance was “totally out of character”.
On Thursday the force said the case was being treated as a murder investigation, led by its major crime team. | {
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"title": "Police investigating murder of Paria Veisi in south Wales find her body",
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2971f1aa2a57105e3d51e2a746ab0b4a | Israel has ‘no choice’ but to continue fighting in Gaza, says Netanyahu
Benjamin Netanyahu said again Saturday that Israel had “no choice” but to continue fighting in Gaza and will not end the war before destroying Hamas and freeing the hostages.
The Israeli prime minister also repeated his vow to make sure Iran never gets a nuclear weapon.
Netanyahu is under growing pressure at home, not only from families of hostages and their supporters but also from reservist and retired Israeli soldiers who question the continuation of the war.
In his statement, he claimed Hamas had rejected Israel’s latest proposal to free half the hostages for a continued ceasefire.
He spoke after Israeli strikes killed more than 90 people in 48 hours, Gaza’s health ministry said Saturday. Israeli troops have been increasing their attacks to pressure Hamas to release the hostages and disarm.
Children and women were among the 15 people killed overnight, according to hospital staff. At least 11 dead were killed in the southern city of Khan Younis, several of them in a tent in the Muwasi area where hundreds of thousands of displaced people stay, hospital workers said. Israel has designated it as a humanitarian zone.
Mourners cradled and kissed the faces of the dead. A man stroked a child’s forehead with his finger before body bags were closed. “Omar is gone … I wish it was me,” one brother cried out.
Four other people were killed in strikes in Rafah city, including a mother and her daughter, according to the European hospital, where the bodies were taken.
Later on Saturday, an Israeli airstrike on a group of civilians west of Nuseirat in central Gaza killed one person, according to al-Awda hospital.
Israel’s military in a statement said it had killed more than 40 militants over the weekend.
Separately, the military said a soldier was killed on Saturday in northern Gaza. It confirmed it was the first soldier death since Israel resumed the war on 18 March.
Hamas’ armed wing, the Qassam brigades, said it ambushed Israeli forces operating east of Gaza City’s al-Tuffah neighbourhood.
View image in fullscreen People take part in a protest demanding the immediate release of hostages held by Hamas in the Gaza Strip, in Tel Aviv, Israel, on Saturday, 19 April 2025. Photograph: Ariel Schalit/AP
Israel has vowed to intensify attacks across Gaza and occupy indefinitely large “security zones” inside the small coastal strip of more than 2 million people. Hamas wants Israeli forces to withdraw from the territory.
Israel also has blockaded Gaza for the past six weeks, again barring the entry of food and other goods.
Thousands of Israelis joined protests on Saturday night pressing for a deal to end the war.
“Do what you should have done a long time ago. Bring them all back now! And in one deal. And if this means to stop the war, then stop the war,” former hostage Omer Shem Tov told a rally in Tel Aviv. | {
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838c2a72b613952f73a960d976d723b4 | Sarah Palin’s defamation suit retrial against the New York Times raises first amendment concerns
When Sarah Palin arrived at a federal court on Monday, her appearance promised little in the way of legal fireworks.
Palin was in downtown Manhattan for a retrial in her defamation lawsuit against the New York Times. She lost her first trial against the newspaper in 2022 and the legal basis of Palin’s civil claim – that an incorrect editorial unlawfully smeared her – remains the same.
The retrial granted to the former Alaska governor and 2008 Republican vice-presidential contender stems from procedural errors rather than factual questions. The US second circuit court of appeals revamped Palin’s case in 2024, having determined that Judge Jed Rakoff wrongly intruded on jurors’ decision-making.
While the jury was originally deliberating, Rakoff decided that if they delivered a verdict in Palin’s favor, he would set aside this decision. Rakoff, who stated that he presumed Palin would appeal what he expected to be an unfavorable verdict, told both sides that an appeals court “would greatly benefit from knowing how the jury would decide it”, according to NBC News.
Some jurors received push notifications on their phones about Rakoff’s decision while they were actually deliberating. The second circuit also found that Rakoff erred by keeping information from jurors potentially showing that James Bennet, then the editorial page editor at the New York Times, knew this piece was incorrect.
While trial proceedings that started last week are largely a replay of Palin’s initial trial, first amendment constitutional advocates contend that they reflect a troubling trend. Politicians and public figures – especially Donald Trump and his allies – are waging campaigns against US media organisations that are critical of them.
Many of these lawsuits are unlikely to pass legal muster: public figures have a high burden in proving defamation. But many outlets lack the resources to fight a costly years-long legal battle against defamation claims in a culture that’s increasingly media-averse, suppressing free expression.
“Every libel case these days feels like it has significant implications because of the fear and concern that the supreme court might ultimately want to change the legal standards for public officials and public figures,” Roy S Gutterman, the director of the Newhouse School’s Tully Center for Free Speech at Syracuse University, said.
That said, Palin’s case might not be a referendum on the first amendment outright as “the actual malice standard, which requires the plaintiff to prove that the false information published about them was done either knowingly or with reckless disregard for the truth, is not an easy standard, which is why plenty of libel plaintiffs like Governor Palin do not win defamation lawsuits”, he added.
If Palin loses again, however, this does not equate to an automatic victory for first amendment rights. “She will almost certainly appeal again and keep appealing,” Gutterman said. “Appellate courts set precedent, so we might still be a ways away from seeing how strong the first amendment ultimately is these days.”
And if Palin were to land a shocking win, “it would not be great for the New York Times or the free press altogether. Even if she wins a nominal amount of money, both sides might still keep appealing,” Gutterman said.
Robert Corn-Revere, chief counsel at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (Fire), said the Palin proceedings hinge on procedural issues rather than a referendum on the first amendment. Philadelphia-based Fire is defending Iowa pollster J Ann Selzer from the US president, who is suing her over a poll which concluded that he was trailing Kamala Harris in the state just before his decisive victory in Iowa as well as nationally in the 2024 election.
“The retrial is more of a standard defamation claim,” Corn-Revere said. “The question is whether or not Sarah Palin will meet the very high bar that is required for a public figure deflation case.”
That said, the case is unfolding in a time where there is “contempt for constitutional norms”.
“People who want to bring some kind of action will do so regardless of whether or not they have some kind of valid claim, or whether or not such a claim even exists,” Corn-Revere said.
The 2017 editorial referred to the 2011 mass shooting that gravely injured then Arizona Democratic congresswoman Gabby Giffords and left six people dead. Prior to this attack, Palin’s political action committee (Pac) published an ad, featuring cross-hairs, spanning over several congressional districts led by Democrats.
The editorial article in question erroneously associated the Pac’s political rhetoric with the mass shooting. Asked about Palin’s claims, the Times said: “This case revolves around a passing reference to an event in an editorial that was not about Sarah Palin. That reference contained an unintended error that was corrected within 18 hours.”
Tom Spiggle, the founder of the Spiggle Law Firm, said that the retrial presents a “second bite at the apple” for Palin but “it really comes down to a factual issue at this point”.
“Can they show actual malice?” Spiggle said. “That’s going to be a jury question.”
Although the legal question is very specific, the case does speak to broader ongoing public discourse about free speech in the Trump era. “Trump has in the past made statements that he would like to reform defamation law and make it easier for people to win defamation cases,” he said.
But if Palin loses again, this could make an important statement for free speech.
“I think it does send a message that just because you’re angry at the New York Times – or insert your media source here – doesn’t mean you’re going to prevail. The standards are still high,” Spiggle said. “Actual malice is tough to prove, and there’s a reason for that, right? It’s because we want these reporters … not [to] be on pins and needles every time they publish a story.”
Lawyers for Palin did not respond to a request for comment.
The retrial is scheduled to resume on Monday. Jurors are expected to start deliberating midweek. | {
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61403a2aed19b609b17fab192df200af | Pope Francis makes brief appearance at Easter Sunday mass in St Peter’s Square
Pope Francis, who is recovering from a severe bout of pneumonia, marked Easter Sunday by blessing thousands of people who had gathered for mass in St Peter’s Square and then embarking on a surprise popemobile tour around the piazza.
The 88-year-old pontiff, who nearly died during his recent five-week stay at Rome’s Gemelli hospital, did not celebrate mass in the square, delegating the service instead to Cardinal Angelo Comastri, the retired archpriest of St Peter’s Basilica.
When mass ended, Francis appeared on the loggia balcony over the basilica entrance, prompting huge cheers.
“Brothers and sisters, happy Easter!” he said, his voice sounding stronger than it has for weeks. The crowd, which responded with chants of “Viva il Papa!” or Long live the Pope! and “Bravo!”, was delighted when Francis looped through the square in his open-topped popemobile and then up and down the main avenue leading to it. He stopped occasionally to bless babies brought up to him, a scene that was common in the past but unthinkable just a few weeks ago when he was fighting for his life.
“It is excellent, a miracle,” said Margarita Torres Hernández, a pilgrim from Mexico who was in the square. “Now that he has come out, for me it’s a miracle, it’s something very big, very beautiful.”
Marcin Popowsky, a pilgrim from Poland, said he had been very touched to see the pope: “We’re very happy that we can see a pope in good shape,” he said.
View image in fullscreen Pope Francis is mobbed by well-wishers as tours St Peter’s Square in his popemobile. Photograph: Angelo Carconi/EPA
Francis has made only a handful of public appearances after leaving hospital and returning to the Vatican on 23 March. He skipped the solemn services of Good Friday and Holy Saturday, but had been expected to make an appearance on Sunday to celebrate the most important day in the Christian calendar.
In accordance with his doctors’ orders for two months of convalescence and respiratory therapy to improve his lung function, he has cut back his workload.
He did, however, find time on Sunday to meet the US vice-president, JD Vance, who had had “an exchange of opinions” with the Vatican’s secretary of state over international conflicts and immigration when they met a day earlier. Vance and Francis have previously disagreed very publicly over the Trump administration’s attitudes to migrants and migration.
According to a short statement from the Vatican, Vance met Francis at his residence for a few moments on Sunday morning “to exchange Easter greetings”.
View image in fullscreen JD Vance speaks to the pope. The US vice-president converted to Catholicism in 2019. Photograph: Vatican Media/AP
In the traditional Urbi et Orbi message, which was read out on his behalf, Francis reminded Roman Catholics that Easter was a day of joyful resurrection but lamented the “contempt … stirred up at times towards the vulnerable, the marginalised, and migrants”.
He also stressed the importance of using Easter to “revive our trust in others, including those who are different than ourselves, or who come from distant lands, bringing unfamiliar customs, ways of life and ideas. For all of us are children of God”.
He went on to remind people of the suffering in Palestine, Israel, Ukraine, Sudan, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Myanmar, among many other places.
“I appeal to all those in positions of political responsibility in our world not to yield to the logic of fear, which only leads to isolation from others, but rather to use the resources available to help the needy, to fight hunger and to encourage initiatives that promote development,” he said. “These are the ‘weapons’ of peace, weapons that build the future instead of sowing seeds of death.”
The team of doctors who treated the pope for pneumonia revealed last month that he had come so close to death that they had to choose whether “to let him go, or push forward”.
Francis suffered four breathing crises during his stay in hospital, the most critical episode being on 28 February, when he inhaled his vomit.
“We were all aware that the situation had further worsened and there was a risk that he would not make it,” Sergio Alfieri, a general surgeon at Gemelli hospital, said in an interview with Corriere della Sera published at the end of March.
“We had to choose whether to stop and let him go, or push forward and try with all the drugs and therapies possible, running the very high risk of damaging other organs. In the end, we took this path.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report | {
"authors": [
"Sam Jones"
],
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"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Pope Francis makes brief appearance at Easter Sunday mass in St Peter’s Square",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/apr/20/pope-makes-brief-appearance-at-easter-sunday-mass-in-st-peters-square"
} |
c841e538e0ec3f23941af1cee5b442ca | US citizen wrongfully arrested by border patrol in Arizona held for nearly 10 days
Immigration officials detained a US citizen for nearly 10 days in Arizona, according to court records and press reports.
As the NPR affiliate Arizona Public Media, first reported, 19-year-old Jose Hermosillo, a New Mexico resident visiting Arizona, was detained by border patrol agents in Nogales, a city along the Mexico border about an hour south of Tucson.
According to a border patrol criminal complaint, on 8 April, a border patrol official found Hermosillo “without the proper immigration documents” and claimed that the young American had admitted entering the US illegally from Mexico. Two days later, the federal court document notes that Hermosillo continued to claim he was a US citizen. On 17 April, a federal judge dismissed his case.
Hermosillo’s wrongful arrest and prolonged detention comes amid escalating attacks by the Trump administration on immigrants in the US. Since Donald Trump took office, the administration has emboldened immigration officers to arrest and deport undocumented people, including foreign students whose visas have been revoked, leading to a series of errors.
“Under the Trump administration’s theory of the law, the government could have banished this U.S. citizen to a Salvadoran prison then refused to do anything to bring him back,” Mark Joseph Stern, a legal analyst for Slate, wrote on Bluesky. “This is why the Constitution guarantees due process to all. Could it be more obvious?”
During his campaign for the presidency, the US president promised to carry out “mass deportations”. In the three months since he took office, several foreign tourists have been wrongfully detained, federal agents from other agencies have been deputized to engage in immigration enforcement and Trump has invoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, declaring that Venezuelan gang members are a leading foreign invasion of the United States to give himself the power to expel immigrants to a notorious Salvadorian prison.
According to AZPM’s report, Hermosillo was visiting the Tucson area from Albuquerque, got lost without identification and was arrested by border patrol officials near its headquarters in Nogales. Hermosillo’s girlfriend’s family made numerous calls looking for him before they discovered he was being held at the Florence Correctional Center, a privately run Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) facility. After his arrest, the court docket shows, he was temporarily detained in the custody of the US marshals.
After the family tracked him done, they provided officials with his birth certificate and social security card.
“He did say he was a US citizen, but they didn’t believe him,” Hermosillo’s girlfriend’s aunt told AZPM. “I think they would have kept him. I think they would have, if they would have not got that information yesterday in the court, and gave that to Ice and the border patrol. He probably would have been deported already to Mexico.”
Ice, Customs and Border Protection, the Department of Homeland Security and Hermosillo’s attorney did not respond to requests for comment.
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Federal magistrate judge Maria S Aguilera dismissed the case on 17 April. Hermosillo was released later that evening.
Since Trump stepped into office, there have been a rising number of US citizens detained by immigration officials around the country. But immigration officials’ detention of citizens is not new, and it has taken place across presidential administrations. In 2021, the Government Accountability Office found that from 2015 through 2020, Ice arrested 674 US citizens and deported 70 of them. And from 2007 through 2015, 818 US citizens were held in immigration detention, according to a 2016 analysis from NPR.
In recent months, the Trump administration has revoked the visas of hundreds of foreign students, many for taking part in Gaza solidarity protests the administration call antisemitic . Among those swept up in that crackdown is Aditya Wahyu Harsono, an Indonesian student in Minnesota, who is married to a US citizen, arrested at his hospital workplace this month after his visa was secretly revoked. | {
"authors": [
"José Olivares"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/cbfef30392575583987696eeaa4fc2095a168dc7/0_407_6500_3902/master/6500.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=777eb2c63672ae9ad29d3e3a28ea5d41",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "US citizen wrongfully arrested by border patrol in Arizona held for nearly 10 days",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/20/us-citizen-jose-hermosillo-border-patrol"
} |
4b091f72d252384a1016f0e1c9377e95 | Jim Ratcliffe’s chemicals business under pressure from Trump tariffs, Moody’s warns
Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s loss-making chemicals business could take longer than expected to recover its financial health because of Donald Trump’s trade tariffs, analysts have said.
The billionaire industrialist has faced growing concerns over the state of his chemicals group amid problems with his business interests in Manchester United and All Blacks rugby.
In a fresh cause for concern, one of the key companies within Ratcliffe’s sprawling business empire, Ineos Quattro, has reported that its financial losses more than doubled to €819m (£702m) at the end of last year, from €291m in 2023, its first loss in at least five years.
The chemical company, which supplies a range of industries including carmakers and pharmaceutical companies, said in its annual report that its “substantial indebtedness” crept almost half a billion euros higher during 2024 to reach nearly €7.7bn.
The latest troubling results were released days after a leading credit rating agency, Moody’s, downgraded its outlook for the business over concerns that “trade barriers” could keep the company under pressure for the next two years.
The rating agency, which provides financial health checks for most big companies, issued the warning days after the US president set out his global trade tariffs – some of which have since been paused – which economists fear could tip major economies into recession.
Weaker economic growth typically leads to lower demand for the petrochemicals used in heavy industry, which has a knock-on effect on the demand for crude. Oil prices tumbled to four-year lows of under $60 a barrel after Trump’s tariff announcement, and the International Energy Agency has slashed its forecasts for global oil demand growth by a third for the year ahead.
Moody’s said its negative outlook for the Ineos subsidiary reflected the risk that it will not make a recovery within the next two years, “with challenging market conditions and uncertainty related to trade barriers”.
The spiralling losses at Ineos Quattro over recent years stand in contrast to the €2.3bn profit it made in 2022 from manufacturing petrochemicals at its 45 sites across the Americas, Europe and Asia.
Ratcliffe has blamed high energy costs, “the deindustrialisation of Europe” and “extreme carbon taxes” for the change in fortunes for the Ineos empire, which is made up of about 30 distinct companies that together operate more than 170 sites across 32 countries.
Ineos Group, the empire’s main corporate unit, revealed earlier this month that it would not pay out any dividends to its owners – Ratcliffe, Andy Currie and John Reece – so that the cash can be reinvested in the business, in an example of “discipline and prudent financial management”.
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Ratcliffe’s wealth fell to £23.5bn in 2024, down from £29.7bn in 2023, according to the Sunday Times.
The company also reported a swing from a pre-tax profit of €407.8m in 2023 to a loss of €71.1m last year in large part because of the rising cost of its €10.6bn debt pile. Its debts are forecast to reach almost €12bn this year, the Guardian reported in February.
A spokesperson for the company said: “Despite the challenging global backdrop in 2024, Ineos Quattro maintained its position as one of the most competitive producers in the European chemicals sector.
“We’re a low-cost, high-efficiency operator with market-leading positions and €2.14bn in cash. With strong liquidity and well-invested plants, we are well-positioned to navigate current market challenges. And we see opportunities to benefit from industry rationalisation ahead. We are confident in our ability to deliver long-term value.” | {
"authors": [
"Jillian Ambrose"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/c2b16890675444f099057ef18c0dbd022863da45/102_195_2242_1345/master/2242.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=8034c6a571e308c65d19263b7ebaafb9",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Jim Ratcliffe’s chemicals business under pressure from Trump tariffs, Moody’s warns",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/apr/20/jim-ratcliffe-chemicals-business-under-pressure-from-trump-tariffs-moodys-ineos-quattro"
} |
2d8309e1e5ccf4303985d2e3e208eb82 | Massachusetts governor calls Trump’s attacks on Harvard ‘bad for science’
Massachusetts governor Maura Healey said on Sunday that Donald Trump’s attacks on Harvard University and other schools are having detrimental ripple effects, with the shutdown of research labs and cuts to hospitals linked to colleges.
During an interview on CBS’s Face the Nation, the Democratic governor said that the effects on Harvard are damaging “American competitiveness”, since a number of researchers are leaving the US for opportunities in other countries. After decades of investment in science and innovation, she said: “intellectual assets are being given away.”
In the past week, the US president cut off billions of dollars to Harvard in federal funds, after the university refused to concede to a number of the administration’s demands. Trump also called for its tax-exempt status to be revoked, a potentially illegal move, against the world-famous college in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Of the moves against colleges, Healey said: “It’s bad for patients, it’s bad for science, and it’s really bad for American competitiveness. There’s no way a state can make up for the cuts from federal funding.”
She added: “I was in a hospital recently, Boston Children’s, where some of the sickest kids in the country receive care. Cuts to Boston Children’s and other hospitals are a direct result of Donald Trump’s actions, as these are part of a teaching hospital system.
“These cuts to universities have significant ripple effects, resulting in layoffs of scientists and doctors, and clinical trials for cancer treatments have been shut down.
“As governor, I want Massachusetts and America to soar. What Donald Trump is doing is essentially inviting other countries, like China, to take our scientists and researchers. This is terrible, especially considering what he has done to the economy. I am working hard every day to lower costs in my state, cut taxes, and build more housing, while Donald Trump is making life more expensive and harder for all of us.”
Since Trump took office, his administration has deployed an “antisemitism taskforce” to demand various policy changes at different universities around the country.
Columbia University, one of the first institutions targeted by the taskforce, quickly caved to the Trump administration’s demands to restore $400m in federal funding. Some of the measures that Columbia conceded to included banning face masks on campus, empowering security officers to arrest people, and placing control of the Middle Eastern department under a new senior vice-provost.
Former Columbia University president Lee Bollinger said on Sunday that the Trump administration’s attacks on academic institutions represent a significant attack on first amendment rights.
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“This is a kind of weaponization of the government’s power,” Bolinger said on CNN, adding that it “seems like a campaign of intimidation”.
“This is a kind of weaponization of the government’s power,” he said.
Earlier this month, the federal government sent Harvard two separate letters with specific demands. After the university publicly rejected those demands, the administration quickly froze nearly $2.3bn in federal funding.
The conflict between the administration and the elite university took a strange turn on Friday, with the New York Times reporting that an 11 April letter from the administration with additional demands – which escalated the showdown – was “unauthorized”. The university disputed that the letter was “unauthorized,” claiming the federal government has “doubled down” on its offensive. | {
"authors": [
"José Olivares"
],
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"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Massachusetts governor calls Trump’s attacks on Harvard ‘bad for science’",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/20/maura-healey-trump-harvard-attacks-research-hospitals"
} |
25f1d93a38950fac0cef91b3063b357a | ‘It blew us away’: how an asteroid may have delivered the vital ingredients for life on Earth
Several billion years ago, at the dawn of the solar system, a wet, salty world circled our sun. Then it collided, catastrophically, with another object and shattered into pieces.
One of these lumps became the asteroid Bennu whose minerals, recently returned to Earth by the US robot space probe OSIRIS-REx, have now been found to contain rich levels of complex chemicals that are critical for the existence of life.
“There were things in the Bennu samples that completely blew us away,” said Prof Sara Russell, cosmic mineralogist at the Natural History Museum in London, and a lead author of a major study in Nature of the Bennu minerals. “The diversity of the molecules and minerals preserved are unlike any extraterrestrial samples studied before.”
Results from this and other missions will form a central display at a Natural History Museum’s exhibition, Space: Could Life Exist Beyond Earth?, which opens on 16 May. It will be a key chance for the public to learn about recent developments in the hunt for life on other worlds, said Russell.
View image in fullscreen The Rosalind Franklin Mars rover. Photograph: Stocktrek Images, Inc./Alamy
As the exhibition will reveal, the basic chemical building blocks for life can be found in other objects in the solar system such as meteorites. However, the material from Bennu, which is named after an ancient Egyptian mythological bird, have been found to be particularly rich in these deposits. “Its parent world clearly had underground lakes of brine, and when these evaporated they left behind salts that resemble those found in dry lake beds on Earth,” said Russell.
In addition, phosphates, ammonia and more than a dozen protein-building amino acids that are present in life forms on Earth – as well as the five nucleobase building blocks that make up RNA and DNA – were found in the samples brought back by OSIRIS-REx.
“These strongly suggest that asteroids similar to Bennu crashed on to Earth, bringing crucial ingredients that led to the appearance of life here,” she added.
Scientists do not believe life evolved on Bennu itself but do think other asteroids like it might have supplied other worlds with the basic ingredients for life. On Earth, with its warm, stable environment, this led to the first appearance of reproducing organisms more than 3.7 billion years ago. It remains to be seen if they appeared on other promising worlds such as Mars and the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, that include Europa, Ganymede, Titan and Enceladus. These are now the subject of a number of missions that will feature in the exhibition and include two probes now heading for Jupiter’s ice-covered moons Europa and Ganymede, which are known to possess liquid water oceans.
In addition, the UK-built Rosalind Franklin robot rover is scheduled to land on Mars in 2029 and will drill deep into its soil, seeking evidence of life.
View image in fullscreen Bennu asteroid samples. Photograph: Jonathan E Jackson/Natural History Museum
In the past, samples of extraterrestrial rocks made available for study have been limited mainly to meteorites, pieces of the moon brought back by astronauts and robot probes, and lumps of Mars that were blasted towards Earth when large objects struck the red planet and blew debris into space – with some eventually falling on to our world as Martian meteorites.
Visitors to the exhibition will be able to touch samples of lunar and Martian material as well as a meteorite that landed on our planet after breaking off from an asteroid. Intriguingly, this rock is older than the Earth itself.
“This is going to be a blockbuster,” said Sinead Marron, the museum’s senior exhibitions manager.
OSIRIS-REx brought back 120gm of Bennu dust to Earth, and the museum has been given around 200mg to study, said Russell. “When we first opened the capsule, we saw this black dust everywhere, with white particles in it. We thought it might be contaminated. But it turned out to be a compound of phosphorus we have not seen in meteorites but which is absolutely crucial to the development of life. I was astonished.”
The prospects that life might exist elsewhere in the universe made headlines last week when it was announced that observations of the exoplanet K2-18b by the James Webb space telescope had revealed the chemical fingerprints of two compounds that, on Earth, are only known to be produced by life.
On their own, the chemicals, dimethyl sulfide (DMS) and dimethyl disulfide (DMDS), do not amount to proof of alien biological activity but they have boosted hopes that we are not alone in the universe.
Conclusively proving that life exists on distant worlds outside our solar system will be extremely hard, scientists acknowledge – short of a signal from an extraterrestrial intelligence announcing its existence.
By contrast, alien lifeforms within our solar system will be easier to collect and study and may prove, one day, that life on other worlds does indeed exist.
“What we would do about such a discovery is a different matter,” Marron said. “One of the things we will be asking exhibition visitors to think about is how we would treat life if we found it on Mars or another world. Would we stay away from it or try to interact with it?
“Or would we try to eat it, like we eat lifeforms with whom we share this planet? Such questions about alien life help us reflect on the ways we engage with other forms of life in our own world.” | {
"authors": [
"Robin Mckie"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/3b93bbf15689eb79646e98b9585b18ca96094b79/0_374_5616_3370/master/5616.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdG8tZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=e240535326953f7f8f644c92824d2316",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "‘It blew us away’: how an asteroid may have delivered the vital ingredients for life on Earth",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/apr/20/it-blew-us-away-how-an-asteroid-may-have-delivered-the-vital-ingredients-for-life-on-earth"
} |
30c5019321009253f071af266e269fbb | Moscow may gain key role in Iran nuclear deal as US talks progress
Russia could play a key role in a deal on the future of Iran’s nuclear programme, with Moscow being touted not only as a possible destination for Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium, but also as a possible arbiter of deal breaches.
Donald Trump, who abandoned a 2015 nuclear pact between Tehran and world powers in 2018 during his first term, has threatened to attack Iran unless it reaches a new deal swiftly that would prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon.
Four hours of indirect talks between the US and Iran in Rome on Saturday, under the mediation of Oman, made significant progress, according to US officials. Further technical talks are due in Geneva this week, followed by another high-level diplomatic meeting next weekend in Oman.
Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, who was at the heart of the Rome talks, wants an agreement wrapped up within 60 days, but is likely to face resistance from Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, who believes the levels of distrust and the technical nature of the talks make such a swift agreement unlikely.
The two most daunting issues are the storage or destruction of Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium, and the external guarantees that can be provided to Iran if the US was to breach an agreement to lift economic sanctions in return for Iran putting its civil nuclear programme back under external supervision by the UN inspectorate, the IAEA. Iran wants a guarantee of consequences for the US if it pulls out of or breaches another deal.
Iran wants to keep its uranium stockpiles inside the country, but the US rejects this and wants either the stockpiles’ destruction or a transfer to a third country, such as Russia.
Iran believes it has received assurances that the US objective is not the entire dismantling of its nuclear programme. Before the Rome talks, in an intervention that sowed confusion in Iran and the US, Witkoff had on social media seemed to endorse such an objective, causing consternation in Iran, but in Rome he gave the impression that this was largely domestic political messaging.
Mohamed Amersi, a member of the advisory board at the Wilson Center, a Washington thinktank, said: “From the Iranian perspective there had been some conflicting messages on social media and in interviews about the US wanting the complete elimination of their nuclear programme and that was not at all what Araghchi had agreed, so the first assurance was that there had been no expansion in the US objectives. If he had not got that assurance it’s likely the whole negotiation would have been wrapped up, and ended immediately.”
On guarantees, Iran believes the only secure agreement is a treaty signed by US Congress, but Araghchi was told it would be anyone’s guess whether Trump could get such an agreement through Congress given the strength of pro-Israeli opinion there.
Another option is for the US to agree to cover Tehran’s losses if Washington were to pull out of a deal. The Iranians floated the idea of a financial penalty before, but the enforcement mechanism in the absence of a treaty remains problematic. A third option if the US is in breach is for Russia to be empowered to return the handed-over stockpile of highly enriched uranium to Tehran, so ensuring Iran would not be the party punished for non-compliance.
Such an arrangement potentially gives Russia a pivotal role in the future US-Iran relationship, and might freeze out Germany, France and the UK, the current guarantors of the 2015 agreement. Neither Iran nor the US want to keep a major future role for the UN.
Rome was seen by some as an important site for the talks, since if they went wrong the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, has the best relations with Trump, and so was well placed to mount a rescue operation. A tentative proposal for a meeting between Araghchi and the US vice-president, JD Vance, who was in Rome, was seen as premature.
There is pressure on Witkoff and Trump to deliver on one of the three negotiations in which they are involved – Iran, Hamas-Israel, and Russia-Ukraine. One source said: “Whatever you may think of Iran, they are rational actors, and they are more likely to strike a deal.”
Iran’s negotiating position was strengthened before the talks by the visit of the Saudi defence minister to Tehran to see the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The visit was intended as a message of solidarity that it opposes and would not collaborate in any US-Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear sites.
The Omani foreign ministry said the goal of the talks was to reach “a fair, sustainable and binding agreement … to ensure that Iran is completely free of nuclear weapons and sanctions, while preserving its right to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes”. | {
"authors": [
"Patrick Wintour"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/f1a0f76bc0f5517ab3299c8a3bbdbedc59cda31a/0_128_6000_3600/master/6000.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=50fe5535ba422519073ec6aa0efdff8b",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Moscow may gain key role in Iran nuclear deal as US talks progress",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/apr/20/moscow-may-gain-key-role-in-iran-nuclear-deal-as-us-talks-progress"
} |
43b736d1a39f473c69e5625257e75ac2 | Sri Lankan police investigate photo of Buddha’s tooth relic
Sri Lankan police have launched an investigation into a photo circulated on social media claiming to show a Buddha tooth relic, which has gone on display under tight security.
The Criminal Investigation Department was ordered to determine whether the widely shared image was taken during the rare display of the relic, police said.
Photography is strictly prohibited during the public viewing of the highly venerated object, which went on display this month for the first time since March 2009.
View image in fullscreen Soldiers and police provide security and assistance for the waiting crowds. Photograph: Ishara S Kodikara/AFP/Getty Images
Devotees are frisked before being allowed into the sacred area of the Temple of the Tooth in the central city of Kandy. No bags or parcels are permitted and the use of mobile phones is banned.
“If someone took a photo inside the temple, it is a serious security lapse,” a police official told Agence France-Presse. “There is a significant presence of plain-clothed officers inside the temple,” he said, requesting anonymity as he was not authorised to speak to the media.
View image in fullscreen People have been camping out for a rare chance to see the relic. Photograph: Ishara S Kodikara/AFP/Getty Images
A police statement said detectives would investigate whether the photo had been taken by a worshipper during the current exhibition, or whether it was a doctored image.
Police reported that an estimated 125,000 people worshipped the relic on the first day of the display, which was open for just two and a half hours. On subsequent days, the exhibition is open for five and a half hours. The 10-day viewing ends on 27 April.
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View image in fullscreen Drummers at the temple entrance. Photograph: Ishara S Kodikara/AFP/Getty Images
Sri Lanka’s majority Buddhist population believes that the Buddha’s left canine is enshrined in the temple. It is more than an object of religious devotion – it is also a symbol of state sovereignty.
The huge crowds visiting the Temple of the Tooth have led to traffic chaos in Kandy, while tens of thousands of devotees have also been camping overnight to worship the relic.
| {
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5043e47cb475eb07b6a1588076dcc707 | Tunisian court hands prison sentences of up to 66 years in mass trial of regime opponents
A Tunisian court has handed down prison sentences of 13 to 66 years to politicians, businessmen and lawyers in a mass trial that opponents say is fabricated and a symbol of president Kais Saied’s authoritarian rule.
Businessman Kamel Ltaif received the longest sentence of 66 years on Saturday, while opposition politician Khayam Turki was given a 48-year jail term, a lawyer for the defendants said.
The court also sentenced prominent opposition figures, including Ghazi Chaouachi, Issam Chebbi, Jawahar Ben Mbarek and Ridha Belhaj, to 18 years in prison. They have been in custody since 2023.
Forty people were being prosecuted in the trial that started in March. More than 20 have fled abroad since being charged.
Saied secured a second five-year term in 2024 with 90.7% of the vote after coming to power in 2019. Rights groups say he has had full control over the judiciary since he dissolved parliament in 2021 and began ruling by decree. He dissolved the independent supreme judicial council and sacked dozens of judges in 2022.
“We are not surprised by these unjust and vengeful verdicts that seek to silence the voices of these opposition figures,” Chaouachi’s son Youssef said
“I have never witnessed a trial like this. It’s a farce, the rulings are ready, and what is happening is scandalous and shameful,” said defence lawyer Ahmed Souab on Friday before the ruling was handed down.
Authorities say the defendants, who also include former officials and the former head of intelligence Kamel Guizani, tried to destabilise the country and overthrow Saied.
“The authorities want to criminalise the opposition,” said the leader of the main National Salvation Front opposition coalition, Nejib Chebbi, on Friday. Chebbi was also among the defendants.
Saied said in 2023 the politicians were “traitors and terrorists” and that judges who would acquit them were their accomplices.
The opposition leaders involved in the case accuse Saied of staging a coup in 2021 and say the case is fabricated to stifle the opposition and establish a one-man, repressive rule.
They say they were preparing an initiative aimed at uniting the fragmented opposition to face the democratic setback in the cradle of the Arab spring uprisings.
Most of the leaders of political parties in Tunisia are in prison, including Abir Moussi, the leader of the Free Constitutional party, and Rached Ghannouchi, the head of Ennahda – two of Saied’s most prominent opponents. | {
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6a0535778a07701f197f870a5c78eca9 | Stephen Mangan: ‘With three people in a bed, who goes in the middle?’
Stephen Mangan, 56, was born in Enfield to Irish parents. He studied law at Cambridge but took a year out to care for his mother, who died of colon cancer aged 45. Weeks after her death, he successfully auditioned for Rada and went on to become a stage actor. His TV breakthrough came in Adrian Mole: The Cappuccino Years. He has since starred in Green Wing, Episodes and The Split. He co-hosts Landscape and Portrait Artist of the Year on Sky Arts, and a weekly show on Classic FM. He is currently appearing in throuple comedy Unicorn in the West End and is the author of six bestselling children’s books. His seventh is out in May.
Your sister Anita illustrates your books. What’s it like working with a sibling?
Great fun. Essentially we’re trying to make each other laugh, like we have done since childhood. But because I’m her annoying older brother, I deliberately put things in the book that are difficult to draw.
Do you use your three sons as a focus group?
I use my 14-year-old as a plot consultant. If I’ve painted myself into a corner, I’ll have a chat with Frank. He’s very good at talking me through my logical inconsistencies. Then Jack, who’s now nine, reads a draft while I try not to be the person going: “What were you laughing at there? Why aren’t you laughing at this bit?”
What things do you need to write?
A lot of food and coffee. I come up to my office with a tray full of coffee, nuts and apples. Then I try not to stare out of the window, while eating like a demented squirrel. Acting is a team sport whereas writing is solitary, so it’s nice to yo-yo between the two.
View image in fullscreen Mangan with Annabel Scholey in The Split. Photograph: BBC/Sister Pictures
You’re approaching the end of your West End run in Mike Bartlett’s Unicorn. Have you enjoyed it?
I’ve loved it. It’s a play full of good ideas and great lines. Also Erin [Doherty] and Nicola [Walker, his co-stars] are two of the very best. They’re both so present on stage. Sometimes you work with actors who’ve worked out their performance in their bathroom at home and are going to give that performance come hell or high water. What’s lovely is that we all listen to one another and every night is genuinely very different. It’s great that a new play has done so well in the West End. And it feels absolutely contemporary.
With three people in a bed, who goes in the middle? What happens if you have to get up to go to the loo?
What’s been the audience reaction? Has it started conversations or inspired any “throuples”?
We do get standing ovations at the end but we also get people leaving after 10 minutes because they weren’t expecting that nice couple from The Split to be telling each other what they want to do in bed. I know people who’ve had uncomfortable taxi rides home afterwards. We’ve had throuples come to talk to us at the stage door. The other day, we had a bloke and two women who’d been together for 40 years. We’ve had three women who’d been together 20 years. In a way, I’ve got more questions for them than they have for me. You just want to know how it works. Even sleeping arrangements. With three people in a bed, who goes in the middle? What happens if you have to get up to go to the loo?
Have you seen Erin Doherty in Adolescence?
I’ve put it off because we’re doing this play together and it would feel weird. As soon as Unicorn’s run finishes this week, I’ll sit down and watch it. Partly because Erin’s in it and Stephen Graham, who’s fantastic. But also because I’ve got three boys and I think it’s an important thing to watch.
Who do you get more recognised as nowadays – Dan Moody from I’m Alan Partridge or Guy Secretan from Green Wing?
I still get “Dan!” shouted at me several times per week. It tends to be Guy if I go near a hospital. Suddenly a lot of doctors emerge, wanting to tell me that he’s a hero to them, especially if they’re an anaesthetist. Which I’m not sure is terribly reassuring to hear [laughs].
View image in fullscreen L-r: Erin Doherty, Nicola Walker and Stephen Mangan in Unicorn. Photograph: Marc Brenner
What’s your dream role?
I’ve been playing quite nice people or bumbling idiots lately, so I’d like to play someone really unpleasant. It’s always fun to exercise those bits of you.
Would you like to play an Irish character?
Yeah, I mean for goodness sake! Here I am, Mr Irish – even if I don’t look it. People think I’m a posh English boy, which in some ways I am. I had a posh English upbringing but my family background is entirely Irish. My mum was flame-haired, freckled Mary Donohoe.
Your wife, Louise Delamere, is also an actor. How would you feel if your sons wanted to act professionally?
Well, it’s given me a fantastic life. I’m forever grateful that I decided not to be a lawyer and became an actor instead. Why wouldn’t I want that for my children? Although of course you’re aware of how precarious it is and how buffeted by the winds of fortune you can be.
How do you relax when you’re not working?
I’ve had a Spurs season ticket since 1997. It’s been hellish this season. It’s like going to a huge group therapy session, where 60,000 people sit in a circle and try to examine what’s gone wrong in their life to bring them to this point. And I’m a big runner. A two-hour run is my meditation. I’m doing the London Marathon this week.
What cultural things have you enjoyed recently?
Like everyone else, I watched The White Lotus. My son saw A Complete Unknown and has become obsessed with Bob Dylan, so we’ve been ploughing through all the various Dylan documentaries. I listen to a lot of history podcasts and just read Helen Castor’s book on Richard II. In terms of fiction, I loved The Bee Sting by Paul Murray, Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon and The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley.
You play piano and were in a prog rock band at school. Do you secretly dream of rock stardom?
I think all actors want to be rock stars. But the great thing about acting is you can still do it when you’re 80 and no one goes: “Why is he still doing that?” | {
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3479430c63e8874a0cebd529a63c4c3c | ‘Their pursuits are the cigar and the siesta’: how two centuries of British writers helped forge our view of Spain
Almost 200 years ago, the pioneering British travel writer Richard Ford offered an observation that has been happily ignored by the legions of authors who have traipsed in his dusty footsteps across Spain, toting notebooks, the odd violin or Bible, and, of course, their own particular prejudices.
“Nothing causes more pain to Spaniards”, Ford noted in his 1845 Handbook for Travellers in Spain, “than to see volume after volume written by foreigners about their country.”
Given some of his waspish pronouncements, the pain in Spain was thoroughly justified. Catalonia, to Ford’s mind, was “no place for the man of pleasure, taste or literature … here cotton is spun, vice and discontent bred, revolution concocted”. He found Valencians “vindictive, sullen, fickle and treacherous”, while reporting that the “better classes” in Murcia “vegetate in a monotonous unsocial existence: their pursuits are the cigar and the siesta”.
Ford, whose often acid nib belied a deep love of all things Iberian, is one of 20 British authors profiled in a new Spanish book, Los curiosos impertinentes (“the annoyingly curious”), that explores the UK’s enduring fascination with Spain and reflects on how two centuries of travel writing have shaped the country’s image abroad.
The book is prefaced by Ford’s pain quotation and by another, from the late Spanish writer Ramón J Sender: “There’s nothing like a foreigner when it comes to seeing what we’re like.”
The writers selected by the book’s author, the British journalist and writer William Chislett, include Ford and his contemporary, the Bible salesman George Borrow, as well as some of their 20th-century successors, among them Laurie Lee, Gerald Brenan, Norman Lewis, VS Pritchett and Robert Graves. Authors from more recent decades are represented by Miranda France and Giles Tremlett, and by the late Michael Jacobs, to whom the book is dedicated.
View image in fullscreen Robert Graves outside his house on the island of Majorca. Photograph: GRANGER/Historical Picture Archive/Alamy
“I deliberately began in the 19th century with Ford and Borrow and didn’t go further back because I felt I had to start somewhere,” says Chislett, who has lived in Spain for almost 40 years. “One could regard Ford’s book as the first travel book … Then we skip forward to the 20th and 21st century for 18 other people, most of whom are absolutely unknown here, let alone in the UK.”
The book, which was originally conceived of as an exhibition, is published by the Instituto Cervantes, the governmental organisation tasked with promoting the Spanish language and Hispanic culture.
Chislett says there is no escaping the fact that all the books he cites “have forged an image” of the country that has shifted over the centuries.
He points out that the old British idea of Spain as a dark, devout place – built on anti-Spanish propaganda and best summed up by the austere majesty of El Escorial, Philip II’s monastery-cum-palace near Madrid – began to give way to something altogether more wild and romantic in the 19th century. In the aftermath of the peninsula war, Britons began to be seduced by Spain’s history, architecture and culture, and El Escorial had given way to the distant, Islamic splendours of the Alhambra in Granada.
“It was unknown territory and had all these exotic elements,” adds Chislett. “Word got around that there were all these abandoned castles and flamenco … You’ve got these two contrasts: you’ve got the ‘black legend’ version of Spain and then you’ve got the romantic version of Spain.”
Borrow and Ford were followed by Lee, who immortalised Spain on the cusp of civil war in As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning and by Lewis, whose Voices of the Old Sea captures a dying way of life in Farol, a profoundly superstitious village on the Costa Brava, as fishing gives way to mass tourism.
The authors’ reflections also reveal that concerns over what is known today as overtourism are hardly new. Ford, who perhaps did more than most to put Spain on the tourist map, complained that the “implacable march of the European intellectual is crushing many native wildflowers”, while Pritchett later lamented that Spain had been “invaded by tourists”.
Equally familiar, as Chislett and others mention, is Spain’s love-hate relationship with how it is viewed through foreign eyes. “Maybe Spaniards are prickly because so much has been written about them,” he says. “I haven’t come to any conclusion, but maybe you could say Spaniards – unjustifiably now, but maybe justifiably during the Franco regime – have an inferiority complex, which I like to think they’ve got rid of totally, given what’s happened over the last 50 years.
“In many ways, Spain is way ahead of other European countries.”
While Chislett describes the book as a “labour of love” and an attempt to repay Spain for its kindness and hospitality over the past four decades, he hopes it will also introduce Spanish readers to some of the great British travel writers. “There are books earlier than Ford and Borrow, going back to the 18th century,” he adds. “It’s about highlighting this tradition, which still goes on.”
In his foreword to the book, the Spanish novelist and travel writer Julio Llamazares advises his compatriots to cast aside their “pride and patriotism” so that they might glimpse themselves anew in its pages.
“It’s worth being prepared to accept the foreign gaze or, perhaps more accurately, the foreign gazes, given how many authors have written about us after touring our country and getting to know it,” he writes.
“Like English-speaking Quixotes, they paint our portraits with their words, even as they demonstrate their passion for a country and a culture that, despite being so different to their own, has marked them forever and for life.” | {
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1394ae05246804678c79afe8b96ae6a5 | The Illegals by Shaun Walker review – Russian spies hiding in plain sight
One muggy afternoon in June 2010, Don Heathfield and his wife, Ann, were relaxing over a bottle of champagne with their two sons, Tim and Alex, when they heard a loud knocking at the door. The family was celebrating Tim’s 20th birthday at their comfortable home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, after lunch in a restaurant. Tim’s mother went to answer the door, calling out as she did so that some of his friends must have arrived to wish him a happy birthday. Instead she found a group of men dressed in black waiting on the doorstep. Bellowing “FBI”, they barged their way into the house and handcuffed Ann and her husband, before marching them outside and driving them away.
Alex assumed that there had been a terrible mistake; his parents were much too boring to warrant such a dramatic arrest. But there was no mistake. His parents were not Don Heathfield and Ann Foley, prosperous Canadians living in the US, but Andrei Bezrukov and Elena Vavilova, Russian spies who had assumed false identities before Alex and his brother were born. Together with their parents, the two boys were stripped of their Canadian citizenship and flown to Moscow. Alex was handed a Russian passport, identifying him with a name he could not even pronounce properly. “Typical high school identity crisis, right?” he remarks, with a wry smile but an undertone of understandable bitterness, while being interviewed by the author of this book, Shaun Walker, an international correspondent for the Guardian who was based in Moscow for more than 10 years.
This was an unnatural existence, one of constant strain, isolated from friends, family or home, sometimes for decades
Alex’s parents were products of a programme that dated back to the earliest days of the Soviet Union: planting agents in enemy countries who would live apparently normal lives while spying for the motherland. Such spies were known as “illegals”, to differentiate them from spies with diplomatic cover. The system originated with the pre-revolutionary Bolsheviks, who had operated clandestinely as an underground movement to evade capture by the tsarist secret police. After the Russian Revolution many hostile countries refused to recognise the new Soviet Union, which therefore had no embassies from which conventional spies could operate. These were the heroic years of the “great illegals”, who posed as European aristocrats, Persian merchants or Turkish students while spying on the capitalist enemy, using Bolshevik konspiratsiya (“subterfuge”) to elude detection. This generation of illegals was wiped out in the purges of the 1930s. Stalin saw enemy illegals where none existed – he was especially suspicious of those who practised deception, though they did so for the communist cause, and he mistrusted or ignored much of the valuable intelligence that they presented to him.
During the great oatriotic war, illegals once more became heroes of the Soviet Union, credited with assassinations of top Nazi officials. Then, in the cold war, the KGB selected individuals with outstanding language skills to undergo intensive training so that they might live undercover in enemy countries – principally, of course, the US. Typically, such illegals would assume the identity of someone who had died as an infant. Even in a nation of immigrants, posing as a native for any extended period was extraordinarily difficult, so they would usually be allotted a third nationality – Canadian, for example, or German. This was an unnatural existence, one of constant strain, isolated from friends, family or home, sometimes for decades. Husbands were separated from wives, and men and women allotted new partners from the pool of potential illegals. Couples were warned never to speak to each other in Russian, not even in their most intimate moments; one pregnant illegal feared that she might betray herself by crying out in Russian during labour. Many cold war illegals had no active role. They were known as “sleepers”, ordered simply to lie low and wait until their country needed them.
View image in fullscreen Elena Vavilova, AKA Ann Foley, in 1983. Photograph: Elena Vavilova
Illegals received training in tradecraft familiar to any le Carré reader. A white chalk symbol on a lamp-post indicated that an illegal was ready to make a drop; a blue chalk mark on a bench signalled that a handler was ready to receive it. At any rendezvous illegals greeted their handlers according to a pre-arranged formula. A stranger approached one illegal operating in New York and asked: “Have you read any books by Elie Wiesel lately?” The illegal replied: “No, I have been reading Hemingway.” It would be hard to imagine a more stilted exchange.
As Walker shrewdly observes, there was a paradox at the heart of the process. The Soviet Union was a closed society, which struggled to understand the west. The KGB wanted operatives who were intelligent, flexible and worldly enough to slip into the identity of a westerner, yet so ideologically firm as to withstand the strain of living undercover for years or even decades, while remaining oblivious to the increasingly obvious flaws in Soviet society. Many cracked under the pressure. After the collapse of communism some idealistic illegals returned to Russia dismayed by the changes they found. Was it for this that they had sacrificed so much?
As part of his desire to restore Russian pride, Putin revived the cult of the illegals. He praised their “strong morals” and “firm character”. In his Russia the achievements of the illegals have been wildly exaggerated; in reality they produced little to justify the enormous effort necessary to train and sustain them, and Walker demonstrates that the meagre intelligence that they were able to gather was often ignored or poorly analysed. Nevertheless their strange lives make compelling stories. The author ends his very readable book by quoting from a recent interview with a western intelligence officer. How many illegals are still out there? asks Walker. “I’ll be honest with you,” his informant replies. “Nobody knows.”
Adam Sisman’s most recent book is The Secret Life of John le Carré (Profile) | {
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b5d5659488826fd912dacca8523368c1 | ‘Performing is not some gigantic thing – it’s just me breathing’: Obongjayar on the journey from shyness to stardom
Right before he began work on his second album, someone told Obongjayar it was time to “start writing songs”. “I remember being really pissed,” laughs the artist, whose real name is Steven Umoh – though, in person, he goes by “OB”. “Like, what the fuck? What do you think I’ve been doing this whole time?”
The incredulity seems fair. The 32-year-old Nigerian singer has been releasing work for more than a decade, running the gamut of genres from hip-hop to Afrobeat to experimental electronics to spoken word, alt-rock and soul. It has made him something of a critics’ darling, but if you’re not familiar with his solo music (his debut album, 2022’s Some Nights I Dream of Doors, was stunning), odds are you’ve heard his lithe, gravelly inflections on Richard Russell’s Everything Is Recorded project, or warming up UK rap star Little Simz tracks such as 2021’s glorious Point and Kill, or sampled by super-producer du jour Fred Again on the 2023 behemoth Adore U.
The last of these, which interpolated vocals from Obongjayar’s I Wish It Was Me, was eye-opening for Umoh. Appearing on stage with Fred Again to perform the track, he saw how tens of thousands of people were responding to it in real time. It was “crazy”, he says, and invaluable. “Fred knows the crux of the song, the thing that’s going to hold you and shake you, and distils it down to that. And when you see how people relate to something, how it touches people, that’s when I started to get it.” The experience drove Umoh to reconsider what it meant to “write songs” – not as a newly commercial endeavour, but recognising that art should reach people. He comes up with an analogy about aliens needing to translate their language in order to be understood and have actual impact.
Umoh is like this: pouring out long, thoughtful metaphors on the spot, gesticulating wildly, full of such sincere warmth and enthusiasm for, as he puts it, “yapping”, that he leaves the full English he ordered untouched for the entirety of our conversation – and then the ensuing photoshoot. At one point he’s waggling his hand in my face in the shape of a gun to reiterate how strongly he stands for his beliefs: “If you said you’d shoot me dead unless I said what you wanted me to say, I’d say, ‘Cool, kill me bro!’”
He has not always been this exuberant. Back in Calabar, a port city in south-eastern Nigeria where he spent most of his childhood, Umoh was extremely shy. Aged six, his family laughed at his dream of performing songs to a huge crowd. It was Umoh’s grandmother, of whom he speaks fondly, who coaxed him out of his shyness. She was his main caregiver after his mum, a survivor of domestic violence, relocated to the UK while pregnant with his younger sister. Umoh recalls her encouraging him to be less afraid. “She said, ‘There’s no point. What’s the worst that can happen?’” he recalls. The notion stuck with him, and he now thinks of shyness as its own form of self-centredness: “The only person who really cares is you.”
If it sells a million first week? Incredible. If it sells two pounds first week, it’s incredible too
Today, Umoh cuts a striking figure. He is tall, beaming, dressed in an “I heart London” T-shirt, lurid green sunglasses and bulky silver jewellery. “I’ve been awake since 3am,” is the first thing he announces as he takes a seat outside the Deptford cafe he has chosen for our interview, not too far from where he lives in south London. The sun is shining, and he suspects it’s his hay fever that’s been keeping him up. He is also on the precipice of releasing album number two, Paradise Now. It’s a glorious record of big songs, from gleaming pop numbers to strutting basslines to tender quasi-bossa-nova undercut by occasional west African grooves. This is all topped with a playful, Kate Bush-esque knack for the voice as its own instrument: yelping falsettos, silky crooning, seething growls, all woven together with his trademark honeyed sweetness. The album finds Obongjayar dwelling on family, the passage of time, relationships, faith, self, his anger at the British government. None of this is a cynical rehash of Adore U; instead, it seems the lesson Umoh has learned is to whittle further into himself, toying with the bones of classic song structures, repeating the mantra: “Of me, from me, for the world.”
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Pål Hansen
Surely knowing that people are about to hear the album has got to be at least somewhat stressful? “I know that I love the record,” he shrugs. “So my thinking is: it’s gonna come out and whatever’s gonna happen, it’s gonna happen. It’s like a fingerprint, it’s your voice – there’s nothing you can do about how people receive that. If it sells a million first week? Incredible. If it sells two pounds first week, it’s incredible too. I’m just in this place of contentment.” He likens the feeling to getting on stage. In live performances, Umoh exudes vibrancy, the music moving through him, a picture of confidence. “I know what I am, I know what I can do,” he says, “I wrote the songs, I love the songs – it came from me. So performing the songs is not this gigantic thing … it’s just me breathing.”
Clearly, his grandma’s words have had an effect. By the time he was 17 and had moved to Ashford, Surrey to live with his mum, Umoh was uploading raps online, putting on an American accent. He went to university in Norwich, where he began to sing in his own voice, and it was not long after that his SoundCloud began to gain traction. Still, early 2000s hip-hop was his first love, and he points to the genre as an example of what all great art should aspire to do: “When people say that a lot of white people love hip-hop or whatever? [That means] it can translate to people who have nothing to do with that culture nor have any experience or understanding of it. That’s music that has had an effect on the world.”
The Conservatives, Keir, it’s the same shit; they’re so spineless and it pisses me off
Umoh does not shy away from politics in his music. His first album featured Message in a Hammer, a track about the 2020 Lekki toll gate massacre in Lagos; on Paradise Now, there’s Jellyfish, a scathing song about spineless British politicians. For Obongjayar, like his heroes Fela Kuti and Bob Marley, music having a message does not mean it has to be at the expense of a good tune. “I think there was a point where I was like …” he puts on an affected, earnest voice, “‘I gotta be conscious, bro, I gotta write stuff that’s gonna change the world!’” He laughs. “Nah man, I don’t think music operates like that, or that it has the licence to do that. Saying what you feel shouldn’t come at the cost of the music. If you’re trying to hammer in a message, you’re putting yourself in front of the thing and it becomes indulgent. If you shout at people, no one gives a shit.”
Jellyfish is an engrossing, high-energy rager with distorted staccatos of electronics and percussion. Only by listening closely will you hear lines like: “My heart is watermelon” and “Bomb bomb spawned by the stars and stripes”. For Umoh, this isn’t telling people what to think, but rather expressing his own anger. “Seeing how governments move, people in power, corporations – how for whatever monetary reasons you sell yourself,” he says, hitting the table for emphasis. “I was really pissed off with how spineless Britain was in response to Israel-Palestine. Waiting for America? Why are you being such a bitch, bro? You’re in a position where you can turn the tables, where you can say, ‘That’s fucked up, that’s wrong, we don’t stand for that.’ The Conservatives, Keir, it’s the same shit – they’re so spineless and it pisses me off.”
On social media, Umoh is “Obongjayar, Devil Slayer”, but he says this is more about reckoning with his own demons. Umoh was raised as a Christian, and though he wouldn’t describe himself as such these days, his work and person is still imbued with spirituality. Album two finds cries of “hallelujah!” and reflections on prayer – and, obviously, it’s called Paradise Now. He explains: “This isn’t about paradise as a destination. I think paradise is now, it’s here, this is part of it. Every moment is an opportunity to soak in beauty. It’s not taking ‘now’ for granted, it’s your relationship with yourself and the world around you.”
For Obongjayar, success will be in his ability to communicate that sentiment through writing songs. As he says: “The most important part is being able to take my perspective on how I see the world and where I’m from, what my mind sees, and translate that vision into a language where everyone else can understand what it is. That’s peak artistry.” | {
"authors": [
"Tara Joshi"
],
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"title": "‘Performing is not some gigantic thing – it’s just me breathing’: Obongjayar on the journey from shyness to stardom",
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} |
921e0aa9cf63af669d6f96f5f94f7d33 | ‘When medieval times return, I’ll be ready’: Bella Ramsey on friendship, fashion and The Last of Us
Bella Ramsey self-recorded their audition tape for The Last of Us at their parents’ home in Leicestershire and sent it off more in hope than expectation. Ramsey, who was 17 at the time, had never played the post-apocalyptic zombie video game on which the new TV series was based, but knew it was a big deal: released in 2013, it had sold more than 20m copies. It would later emerge that Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann, the show’s creators, looked seriously at more than 100 actors for the role of Ellie, the sassy and quirky but also complicated and vicious American protagonist of The Last of Us. “Yeah, I’ve been told,” says Ramsey with a wry smile.
When Ramsey got the first callback from Mazin and Druckmann, they joined the Zoom from their childhood bedroom. “I’ve gotten very used to sending in a self-tape and forgetting about it,” they say, when we meet at a photo studio in north London. “But the problem was when there was a self-tape that really meant something to me, like The Last of Us did. It feels quite scary. And when I got the phone call saying they wanted me to be Ellie it did feel surreal for a few days. I understood that if I said yes – which obviously I was going to – my life was going to change.”
Life-changing is one way to describe it. Ramsey was hardly inexperienced when they were cast: their professional debut was aged 11 as the no-nonsense Lyanna Mormont in Game of Thrones; they had also been the star of the CBBC series The Worst Witch and appeared in the BBC/HBO adaptation of His Dark Materials. But The Last of Us was something else. About 40 million people watched the first episode in 2023 and the series, which is said to have cost $100m, became the most popular HBO show ever in Europe. Brutally violent at times, but also tender and poignant, the odd-couple chemistry between Ramsey’s Ellie and Pedro Pascal’s Joel has attracted an obsessive fanbase far beyond video-game nerds.
I go out in my joggers, I go out in my ripped T-shirt that needs a wash. I’m sort of in denial about it
Ramsey, who has an uncompromising centre-parting, dark, doll-like eyes and bow lips, has in turn had to sacrifice a quiet life living with their folks in the Midlands. When their casting was announced, there was immediate and persistent criticism from fans of the video game that Ramsey didn’t look enough like Ellie. Ramsey, new to the attention and curious, sought out all the most hurtful comments. Then, during promotion for the series, Ramsey came out as nonbinary and said that the they/them pronouns were “the most truthful to me”. This generated more attention – perhaps more than was helpful for a teenager, they concede – and again became a hot topic with trolls already furious at the inclusion of LGBTQ characters in the games.
Thankfully when the show aired, both it and Ramsey were manifestly excellent, and everyone moved on. “What makes Ellie so fascinating is that she has a lot of the fear and exuberance of a child, but also this strange, sad, heavy, beautiful wisdom and violence,” Mazin, the co-creator and co-writer, has said. “What you’re waiting for [in casting] is the person that makes it undeniable, where you’re like, ‘Oh, we’re done. Everything’s OK.’ And that was Bella.”
View image in fullscreen Ramsey and Pedro Pascal in a scene from The Last of Us season one. Photograph: AP
But here we are again with season two. The first series followed Ellie and Joel as they travelled across an America infested with zombies; Ellie is immune to the Cordyceps fungus that causes the zombifying infection, and the suspicion is that she could be humanity’s saviour. But the season ended on a cliffhanger – spoiler alert! – with a lie Joel told Ellie that saved her anguish but maybe compromised the rest of the planet. Season two promises to reveal if Joel gets found out.
Still, Ramsey has changed their mind on one aspect of the process: it doesn’t have to be life-changing after all. “With the release of season two, I’ve realised that there is a large element of it that’s out of my control – but a large element of it also is. Yeah, I’ve been still getting the tube. And just walking around. My day-to-day life hasn’t changed. I go out in my joggers, I go out in my ripped T-shirt that needs a wash. I’m sort of in denial about it. Or can’t comprehend it so just carry on as if nothing’s happened.”
Do people think, I wonder, “That can’t be Bella Ramsey, they’ve got a dirty T-shirt on”? They adopt a fashion pose: “Darling, I only go out in Prada.” (Today, for what it’s worth, Ramsey wears joggers, a blue sweatshirt, which appears to be freshly laundered, and trainers, all Adidas.)
That could be a classic actor flex – “I still take the tube,” says the A-lister who last used public transport in 2004 – but you believe Ramsey. They come across as a funny and self-deprecating but basically pretty normal 21-year-old who happens to have landed on the biggest show on TV. “What I’ve realised is that you reach that level of fame for a few months, then people move on to the next thing, the next show. Now going into season two, I’m aware that it’s going to hype back up. I’m going to be more recognisable, people are going to want to talk to me a bit more for a couple of months. Then it’ll just die down again…”
Ramsey pauses, lets out a long breath, perhaps a sigh, “Which is a really, really big relief.”
It’s hard to believe, seeing that they have been doing it professionally for half their life, but Ramsey insists that they never set out to be an actor. Their parents were not in the industry, but dabbled in am-dram, and when Ramsey was four they joined their older sister in a local drama club, Stagecoach, in Loughborough. Their highlights reel from those days would have included roles as a monkey, a spoilt American brat and, in a breakthrough performance aged eight, the back half of a cow (their sister, pulling sibling rank, was the front) in Jack and the Beanstalk. But aged 10, Ramsey applied to the Television Workshop, a drama group in Nottingham that helped to bring through Samantha Morton, Felicity Jones and Jack O’Connell. From there, they auditioned for Game of Thrones.
View image in fullscreen As Lyanna Mormont in Game of Thrones. Photograph: Landmark Media/Alamy
Wasn’t Ramsey nervous when they were cast? “Not nervous, because I hadn’t built it up in my head. Really, I’d never known that I’d wanted to be an actor. It wasn’t like this thing that I’d been dreaming of all my life.”
On the set of Game of Thrones, though, Ramsey loved it. They had struggled to make friends as a child; now, in adult company, something clicked. “It felt very natural. Immediately it felt like a place where I belonged, which I’d never felt anywhere else in my life, not at school, not in any of the millions of clubs I was a part of.”
A much bigger deal for Ramsey was landing the lead, Mildred Hubble, in The Worst Witch, which aired in 2017. “Because I watched CBBC,” they explain, “so I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is it.’” Ramsey was in the show for three seasons, shooting for 16 weeks each summer in Cheshire. Chaperones were not allowed, so Ramsey was away on her own, without a parent, Monday to Friday. “I was quite anxious as a kid anyway, and I was away from home for the first time,” they say. “I didn’t even go on a residential school trip before, because I didn’t want to be away from home.”
At the end of the first season, Ramsey developed anorexia. They think now that it was down, in large part, to the stress of feeling that they had to set an example to the cast and crew. “Leading a show, you have the responsibility of that on your shoulders. There is a maturity that’s required of you that thankfully came quite naturally to me, but it’s just… it’s hard. It’s just hard.”
Ramsey recovered from the anorexia with counselling, and those experiences have inspired them to write a film script, Toast and Jam (the title comes from what they ate each night to help them recover from the illness). The screenplay is about a 14-year-old girl with an eating disorder and Ramsey wants to direct it. “It’s finished,” they giggle. “I’ve finished it so many times, but now it’s finished-finished, ready-to-be-sent-out finished.”
Talking to Ramsey, there’s a sense that they have experienced a lot, been through a lot, for someone so young. They agree: “There is now an element of me looking back and being like, ‘Oh, I was never a teenager.’ I do feel like I went from kid to adult. I had to show up on set every day and be responsible and have this very adult job.”
View image in fullscreen ‘It’s certainly a wild ride’: Ramsey, left, and Isabela Merced in the second season of The Last of Us. Photograph: HBO
It is perhaps not surprising that Ramsey has always found adult company easier than people their own age. But they have left home now and moved into a flat in London, so that is something they are working on. “Because I’ve grown up a lot with people much older than me, that is the dynamic that I’m really comfortable in and really good at,” says Ramsey. “Now, living in London, I’ve got a small group of friends who are my age – for the first time, really. That’s been a really, really positive thing of letting go of the shy, loner kid inside of me. Honouring that part of me, but also being, ‘No, I can get along with people my age! And I do like hanging out with you, and you like hanging out with me, which is maybe even crazier.’”
Something that has bolstered Ramsey in recent times is being diagnosed as neurodiverse. The process started in January 2023, when they were shooting the first season of The Last of Us. “Someone on set just assumed that I was autistic,” they recall. “They had a kid who was and were like, ‘You are, right?’ And I was like, ‘Whoa!’ I’ve always thought that maybe I was, but I thought I’d sort of been making it up. Then I went through the whole diagnostic process. And it turns out I am, which has been so helpful for me. Like, every day.”
I never had the experience as a kid of friendly fighting with friends so it felt like I was living a childhood dream
Neurodiversity also helps to explain why Ramsey has been drawn to acting. They are certainly not a method actor; their approach is much looser. In 2022, they starred in the Lena Dunham-directed film Catherine Called Birdy, about a headstrong 14-year-old girl in 13th-century Lincolnshire. “I learned about the 1200s, but really specific things,” they say. “Like what everyday life was like, what it would be like to be a peasant. I don’t really know the big events that happened. My prep for everything is just to make it feel like I’m not acting really. Make it feel like I’m immersed in this world, and I’d know what I’d be doing at lunchtime or stuff.”
For Dunham, Ramsey’s versatility gives them the ability to play almost anything. “Bella reminds me of Tilda Swinton in Orlando,” the director told Vogue, which featured Ramsey on the April cover. “[They have] that ability to shapeshift and become new in front of your very eyes. They have a quality that is both modern and totally timeless. They’d fit as easily at a rave in Dalston as in a Renaissance court.”
Because of not going to school during her teenage years – Ramsey studied online at King’s InterHigh and has followed it up with courses on environmental science from the Open University – they accept they have some gaps in their knowledge. Instead, acting has bestowed them with more esoteric talents such as horse-riding and broadsword fighting. “Medieval skills,” Ramsey says. “You never know when the medieval times are going to come again. And when they do, I’ll be ready.”
Nothing quite so left field was required for the new season of The Last of Us. Ramsey did a lot of physical training and Brazilian jujitsu sessions to make it convincing that someone 5ft 1in could fend off hordes of snarling zombies. “You are always sore,” they say. “But it was a really nice thing for me to do grappling and fighting. Because I never had the experience as a kid of friendly fighting with friends. So it felt like I was living a childhood dream.”
View image in fullscreen Portrait by David Vintiner.
Ramsey is intensely proud of the new series. “The second season, there was definitely an expectation and pressure to live up to the first one,” they say. “But everyone’s goal was not to live up to it, but to surpass it. And I feel pretty confident in the fact that people are going to be really happy.” Ramsey stops, and seems to scroll through how the episodes unfold. “Well, I wouldn’t say happy, actually. More just emotionally traumatised and shocked. It’s certainly a wild ride.”
A main thread in the new season is Ellie’s relationship with Dina, played by Isabela Merced. The Last of Us is a progressive show – there are gay characters, and this series introduces Lev, a trans teenager – and Ramsey believes that can have a powerful impact in introducing a mainstream audience to queer storylines. “On set, there’s no having to hide or feel like you’re out of place,” they say. “Everyone feels like they belong working on the show, and hopefully as a viewer as well.”
How does Ramsey feel about their decision to come out as non-binary? “Part of me looks back and I wish that I didn’t, because I didn’t want it to become a headline and a big thing,” they say. “And obviously it was going to, and I didn’t really understand that at the time. And I wasn’t really prepared for that. But on the other hand, people have said to me that it’s been very helpful for them seeing some representation.
“So it’s been a mixed bag, but overall, I think it was a good thing, just for me living more freely, without feeling like I’m keeping a secret,” Ramsey goes on. “But now I’m like, ‘I’ll talk about it, but I don’t want it to be the focus any more.’ I guess I’m just quite chill with it. And I want everyone else to be as chill with it basically.”
Ramsey seems to be in a good place; not long before we meet they deactivated their Instagram account. Part of the inspiration was the actor and director Jesse Eisenberg, whom Ramsey worked with on the 2020 war drama Resistance, and Kit Harington from Game of Thrones. “Those are the two actors who I just thought were the coolest people to ever walk the earth, and neither of them had social media,” Ramsey says. “I remember them just being so normal and funny and interesting. They were famous because they were great at something, not because they were celebrities. They never pushed themselves out there and made themselves more famous.”
Ramsey had never planned to have a social-media presence: they started their Instagram account initially because there were fake accounts pretending to be them. “The problem was that I did sort of enjoy it,” Ramsey admits, with a grin. “I’m so susceptible to the dopamine hits of scrolling, I’d lose sleep just scrolling on Instagram. And I didn’t need that in my life any more.”
As for the future, a third season of The Last of Us has already been announced. They want to write, direct, but really, seeing as they are still only 21, anything feels possible. Mainly, though, they want to keep acting, exploring their limits there. “If I passed away on a film set, I’d be happy,” says Ramsey, as we part. “I would like to be acting until my last breath, for sure.” | {
"authors": [
"Tim Lewis"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/a403d8739fc10805d9417f773308ca6f787641cf/0_499_7446_4467/master/7446.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdG8tZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=a58990e3ea6ded050a82b9b764e6ecad",
"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
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"title": "‘When medieval times return, I’ll be ready’: Bella Ramsey on friendship, fashion and The Last of Us",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2025/apr/20/bella-ramsey-ellie-the-last-of-us-season-two-interview"
} |
81c7e800b82fe34d23e8d65631cb3cae | Central Cee review – UK rap superstar tentatively enjoys stadium success
Central Cee has exported UK rap like no one else before, by sculpting UK drill for TikTok with fast-paced, bite-sized packaging that often remixes a recognisable hit, all sealed with his steely demeanour. An influential fashion figure and Gen Z icon, his success is global and previously inconceivable. His 2023 hit Sprinter with Dave sat in pole position in the charts for 10 consecutive weeks. The crowd at Co-Op Live arena reflects his youth appeal all the way down to primary-schoolers. But while the squealing girls and balaclava-wearing boys have their fun, sometimes it feels as though the rapper is too reticent to join in.
Arenas aren’t suited to reserved characters, but Cench, as his fans call him, is smart enough to match the Co-Op’s scale. He stands in front of a multitiered structure that, using screens, becomes an open dollhouse that tells the story of his come-up through the key places in his life, from his family home to his new pad. Unwinding into tracks from his initial mixtapes, his barbed flow rolls like a series of verbal jabs: “Your dad left home from young / And you ain’t done shit for your mum, ah man,” he berates on his breakout 2021 single Day in the Life.
There being 20,000 pairs of eyes on him occasionally produces some wonderfully human moments that overcome his persona. However, if his tracks follow a formula, his performance on stage is no more mercurial. He sticks to a stiff set of hand gestures as if he’s cycling through Fortnite emotes, and when guest verses are often played in their entirety, he’s left clueless as to what to do on stage.
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Katja Ogrin/Redferns
There are no issues vocalising on the mic though. He is just as cosy traversing the Brazilian funk rhythm of CRG as he is the sepulchral atmospheres knocking with doom-stricken gunshot snares on St Patrick’s. On an island stage, he flirts through Me & You in a black tank top and glittered snapback. Some people record on Snapchat, others resort to launching their phones on to the stage in the hopes of getting a photo from the social media king. His onscreen connection with fans defines the show, as he performs Gen Z Love through a live FaceTime with fans at the barricades. “If it weren’t for the algorithm, I wouldn’t have found my woman,” he raps to the phone.
Cench’s biggest solo hits are thoroughly optimised to clock in at under two minutes, but on his debut album Can’t Rush Greatness, he shoots for longer, verse-heavy tracks. So while tracks such as Doja are met with an almost unholy chorus of screams, the moment is over far quicker than tracks like Now We’re Strangers, which are greeted with a more polite response. The show concludes with Cench hopping back in his Yaris, revealing the whole show to be a dream. If only we could relive the highlights some more. | {
"authors": [
"Nathan Evans"
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} |
8840990b5a2e1701498f780bd6b0999a | Sunscreen and snail slime: what skincare experts do – and don’t do – to their skin
Looking after your skin used to seem so simple: for decades, a basic “cleanse, tone, moisturise” routine was seen as the gold standard. But the skincare industry has recently exploded with thousands of new products, while skincare influencers have been racking up millions of views with often bewildering (and conflicting) advice.
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So, should you be putting snail slime or beef tallow on your face, like that video you saw on TikTok? And which products are safe for your teenager to use, if any? We spoke to eight dermatologists to find out their own skincare routines – and which mistakes they see most often. Spoiler: none of them use snail slime.
‘I wish I’d known my skin was beautiful when I was younger’
Dr Angela Tewari, consultant dermatologist at King’s College hospital, London, and founder of the Dermatology Studios
What’s your daily skincare routine?
At the moment I’m using a mild glycolic wash from Tropic, which contains jojoba oil, because I’m prone to dry skin. I then use a DNA repair serum by Neova, which has a number of encapsulated enzymes that fight off residual sun damage, followed by Phyto A+ Brightening Treatment by SkinCeuticals, which enhances radiance. This is followed by Clinique’s Moisture Surge Sheertint Hydrator SPF 25.
What’s your bargain beauty buy?
Nivea body lotion Q10. It contains nourishing almond oil and I feel I’m rejuvenating my body.
Which beauty trend would you never recommend trying, and why?
Snail mucin – it contains hyaluronic acid, but putting snails on your face or using their slime is not my cup of tea. There are cheaper ways of getting moisture into the skin with a more generic hyaluronic acid.
What skincare do you recommend for children – and what should they stay away from?
They should be avoiding glycolic acids, high-dose salicylic acid and retinoids – anything that would increase the turnover of their skin cells. Until our early 20s, our skin turnover is excellent, so we do not need to accelerate this at a younger age.
What treatment/gadget would you blow the bank on?
I’ve found the Lightinderm LED device very helpful. You insert capsules of DNA repair enzymes into it and these are activated by the wavelengths it produces. This enables repair of any sun-induced changes and pigmentation, and it lifts skin. The device costs £400.
What skincare advice would you give your younger self?
I wish I’d known that, actually, my skin is beautiful, but it’s very hard to realise that at the time – we always think we look a lot worse than we do.
What’s the product you can’t live without?
DNA Total Repair serum by Neova. It goes on the skin after washing and improves radiance while reducing fine lines and helping with pigmentation.
What’s the most common mistake you see?
People going for filler when they really need a booster – polynucleotide injections are anti-inflammatory and promote collagen – and good skincare.
What do you do that would surprise people?
Sometimes if I’m very tired, after putting my three children to bed, I don’t take my makeup off before going to sleep. Ideally, you should remove those layers of dirt and pollution at night, as we know they contribute to oxidative stress and skin damage.
‘Advice to my younger self? Don’t waste money on luxury brands’
Dr Ophelia Veraitch, consultant dermatologist at 101 Harley Street and University College London Hospitals NHS foundation trust
What’s your daily skincare routine?
During my morning shower, I cleanse with Cetaphil Gentle Skin Cleanser. Then I apply one of my Hyperpigmentation Day Serums, a prescription product to target pigmentation, which I am prone to. Next, I apply the Skinceuticals Skin Brightening SPF 30. At night-time, I use the Skinceuticals Blemish + Age Cleanser Gel and apply my Dr Ophelia Acne Night Serum, which helps prevent congestion.
What’s your bargain beauty buy?
The Cetaphil cleanser is gentle and suitable for my whole family, including a daughter with mild eczema and a son who is beginning to develop mild acne. Cetraben Moisturising Lotion is suitable for everyone’s face and body.
Which beauty trend would you never recommend trying, and why?
Collagen supplements – there are no high-quality scientific or clinical studies to suggest that ingesting collagen helps restore the lost collagen in our skin. Similarly, biotin supplements (taken to thicken hair) interfere with a large number of blood tests, including those used for diagnosing heart attacks and thyroid function. There is an FDA warning against biotin supplementation, and I have seen a number of patients with excessive hair shedding caused by taking these supplements.
What skincare do you recommend for children – and what should they stay away from?
My daughter recently turned 10, and I had offers from other parents to buy her skincare vouchers, which I politely declined on her behalf. I don’t want her getting obsessed with these trends that could damage her skin. She and my 12-year-old son both use Cetaphil in the shower, and Cetraben as a moisturiser. On occasion, I have given them stronger products to help get rid of patches of dry skin or breakouts of spots.
What treatment/gadget would you blow the bank on?
Once a year I have Thermage FLX – a radio frequency device that is very good for tightening and lifting the skin. It costs about £2,000 for a full face treatment and gives very natural, but definite, results. It’s good for those who aren’t open to surgical options; I’m finding that patients are wanting to go for cosmetic surgery less and less.
What skincare advice would you give your younger self?
Not to waste money on luxury brands. I suffered from awful acne and pigmentation when I was younger, despite always buying into the most expensive ranges. As a result, I am highly sensitive to many ingredients, which has taught me simple skincare with effective treatments is the best approach.
What’s the product you can’t live without?
A daily SPF.
What’s the most common mistake you see?
Only wearing an SPF in the summer rather than all year round; following skin influencers on social media instead of seeking proper professional help; rotating through many different skincare products.
What do you do that would surprise people?
I often go through long periods of just cleansing, then using an SPF. If serums for hyperpigmentation or acne work, you shouldn’t need to keep using them for ever!
‘Even inside, if I am using a computer, I wear an SPF’
Dr Tanja Phillips, laser and aesthetic medicine specialist at the HVN, alongside her own clinic
What’s your daily skincare routine?
ZO Skin Health is my go-to. I use its exfoliating cleanser in the morning, which has tiny biodegradable beads to remove dead skin cells, followed by one of ZO’s Complexion Renewal Pads. Next, I apply its Firming Serum, which has a lot of growth factors and peptides to stimulate new growth and improve skin barrier function. After that, I apply Daily Power Defense, which also helps to improve cell turnover, followed by Heliocare 360° Pigment Solution Fluid, which protects against UVA, UVB and HEV (blue light from devices). I’ve just started using AWvi products, which work with your gut and skin microbiome. I use their cleanser, serum and face cream in the evening, which comes with an oral dose of probiotics – you sprinkle them on your tongue to help regenerate skin from the inside out.
What’s your bargain beauty buy?
CeraVe face washes are great – they’re unscented and uncomplicated, and have good clinical trials behind them. They’re very effective for anyone with combination skin or acne.
Which beauty trend would you never recommend trying, and why?
Lemon Bottle fat-dissolving injections. They’ve been huge on TikTok, and my clinics get a lot of calls requesting them, but for me, the answer has to be no – there aren’t any good clinical trials to suggest they are effective. Instead, I’d recommend injecting a product called Pluryal, which is very effective at breaking down the membrane of fat cells, helping to get rid of stubborn pockets such as back fat or love handles.
What skincare do you recommend for children – and what should they stay away from?
I love that children are interested in skin health, and I wouldn’t pooh-pooh their interest, but it doesn’t mean that they have to be obsessed. They just need a good, gentle facial wash (CeraVe is great), there’s no need for acids or exfoliants. Most young people don’t need any additional hydration, but I would recommend an SPF every single day from as young as possible. From about 20 they can start considering whether they might need a moisturiser, but most 20-year-olds won’t.
View image in fullscreen ‘It amazes me how many people don’t wash their face properly.’
What treatment/gadget would you blow the bank on?
I’m a big laser fan. Fotona is a collagen-stimulating laser, which is a natural way of improving cell turnover, and one of the few treatments that work on rosacea. For younger people, it can be great for treating excessive oiliness and acne. It’s versatile, safe, and delivers results with no need for downtime because it penetrates the glands without damaging the surface. It costs from about £550 for a treatment.
What skincare advice would you give your younger self?
I was a sun-worshipper – I wish I’d known to use SPF come rain or shine. I tell patients of every age that SPF will save them spending a fortune seeing people like me for pigmentation reduction, loss of collagen, and wrinkles. You can still tan while wearing SPF, just stay in the shade during the hottest part of the day.
What’s the product you can’t live without?
Other than my SPF, a good cleanser (such as the ZO Exfoliating Cleanser) to get rid of pollutants.
What’s the most common mistake you see?
It amazes me how many people don’t wash their face properly. I wouldn’t recommend using just cleanser and your fingers – you’d be surprised how much more comes off if you use a mitt or muslin cloth. I always recommend a double cleanse in the evening to prevent free radicals from damaging your skin overnight. Also, applying SPF from the middle of the face out and forgetting the edges. I see a lot of pigmentation towards the hairline where SPF hasn’t reached.
What do you do that would surprise people?
Even if I’m inside without any windows, if I am using a computer screen, I will wear an SPF to protect from HEV rays (blue light), which contribute to overall skin damage. When choosing an SPF it should protect against UVA, UVB and HEV rays.
‘Homemade sunscreen is an absolute no – never do that!’
Dr Aamna Adel, consultant dermatologist and skin and hair loss specialist
What’s your daily skincare routine?
I’ve got quite dry skin so I don’t use a cleanser first thing – for people with dry, sensitive skin, splashing your face with water in the morning is fine. I use the Garnier Micellar Cleansing Water, which hydrates my skin, followed by SkinCeuticals’ Dual Antioxidant Treatment with vitamin C. At the moment I’m using the Beauty Pie Triple Hyaluronic Acid cream to moisturise, and a sunscreen. I love La Roche-Posay Anthelios UVMune 400 because it’s tinted. In the evening, I double cleanse using CeraVe Hydrating Facial Cleanser. I use a prescription tretinoin, then a Haruharu Wonder Black Rice Bakuchiol Eye Cream, which is anti-ageing without being irritating.
What’s your bargain beauty buy?
Nivea is a great budget sunscreen – it’s much cheaper than anything else on the market without any of the greasiness or chalkiness of cheaper brands.
Which beauty trend would you never recommend trying, and why?
People using beef tallow as an alternative to moisturiser. A lot of “natural” trends tend to do more harm than good. There’s no evidence that animal fat is particularly hydrating, and it’s more likely to cause irritation than a standard moisturiser. Homemade sunscreen is another absolute no – never do that!
What skincare do you recommend for children – and what should they stay away from?
My daughter is two-and-a-half and she’s already interested in skincare – I think a lot of children watch their mums do a skincare routine and want to copy them. Children only need to use a cleanser and an SPF and moisturiser combo, for simplicity. In my clinic, I see a lot of young people who have damaged skin barriers from using products that aren’t designed for them. Early exposure to certain active ingredients, such as retinol and vitamin C, can lead to allergies in the long term.
What treatment/gadget would you blow the bank on?
There’s lots of data to suggest that LED masks help to stimulate collagen. CurrentBody has a good one. It costs £399.99.
What skincare advice would you give your younger self?
I wish I’d known to take my makeup off before bed when I was at university. It dries out the skin and leads to irritation.
What’s the product you can’t live without?
Eucerin UreaRepair Original is my ride-or-die face cream. It’s great if you have dry skin, or just want to keep a baseline of hydration.
What’s the most common mistake you see?
Doing too much. Overcomplicated skincare routines lead to skin not being as healthy as it should be. There’s also a misconception that skincare alone can fix everything – when it comes to things like acne or rosacea, it’s better to seek professional advice early on. It’s much easier to treat acne with antibiotics or prescription retinoids than to treat acne scarring.
What do you do that would surprise people?
I don’t use retinol every day – the goal shouldn’t be to get to everyday use, it should be to get to a frequency that works for you. On average, I use it three times a week.
‘I don’t reapply my SPF during the day. I’m too lazy!’
Dr Joney De Souza, aesthetic doctor and member of the British College of Aesthetic Medicine
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What’s your daily skincare routine?
I always advise people to keep it simple: a good cleanser, antioxidant and retinol. The cleanser should have salicylic acid – it works like a detergent to scoop out all the oil and dirt inside the pores, which can become blackheads (the ZO Exfoliating Cleanser has a high concentration). Then I apply an antioxidant vitamin C serum – SkinCeuticals has a very good range. I wear SPF 30 during the daytime because I have very oily skin, so I can end up breaking out. At night I use a Retinol Skin Brightener from ZO.
What’s your bargain beauty buy?
Eucerin moisturisers are nicely priced and not too oily – they work really well.
Which beauty trend would you never recommend trying, and why?
The “glass skin” trend encourages people to use whitening products designed for those experiencing melasma, which is pigmentation that appears during pregnancy. They contain hydroquinone, a bleaching agent used by people in a lot of Indian and African countries, that can lead to serious complications.
What skincare do you recommend for children – and what should they stay away from?
Children have thinner skin barriers, so it’s important to use sensitive products. I would recommend La Roche-Posay moisturiser and a spray SPF because it’s easier to apply if they hate being rubbed. For a teenager with oily skin and breakouts, I’d suggest a cleanser with salicylic acid, something like Clean & Clear. For young people with eczema, products with lactic acid are very moisturising.
What treatment/gadget would you blow the bank on?
A red-light treatment – the results are incredible. It stimulates circulation so it promotes healing, and can be used for hair loss. We usually combine it with other treatments: CO2, chemical peels or facials. Red-light treatments are quick and easy, so can be done from about £60 a session.
What skincare advice would you give your younger self?
Growing up in Brazil, I wish I’d known the importance of SPF – sun exposure is the cause of 80-90% of visible ageing. Some people are good at applying SPF to their face, but forget their arms. You risk not only dark pigmentation but white spots (loss of pigmentation), which you cannot get rid of.
What’s the product you can’t live without?
Retinol. As we age, our skin becomes lazy, which means a buildup of dead skin, which looks very dull and sallow. Retinol causes enough irritation to increase the speed of cell turnover. I would recommend retinol for everyone – sometimes people with sensitive skin think that they can’t use it, but it’s just a matter of using a lower dose and adapting.
What’s the most common mistake you see?
People like using very oily, buttery creams – expensive ones like Crème de la Mer. They feel amazing when you apply them, but what you are doing is adding oil on top of dead skin cells, which encourages your skin to be even lazier and dull-looking. A lot of people have the impression that Dior or Chanel skincare is the best, but it doesn’t contain any active ingredients because they don’t want their consumers to complain that they’ve caused irritation. People often think that they’re allergic to products that are actually doing their job.
What do you do that would surprise people?
I don’t reapply my SPF during the day. I’m too lazy!
‘Bottom line: smearing animal fat on your face isn’t the best idea’
Dr Jonathan Kentley, consultant dermatologist at Montrose London and Chelsea and Westminster hospital
What’s your daily skincare routine?
In the morning I wash my face with warm water in the shower, then I use the Dr Rossi Derm MD range, which contains a sea anemone peptide to prevent irritation. The range consists of an essence containing lactic acid and niacinamide, a serum with hyaluronic acid and a titanium dioxide-based mineral sunscreen. In the evening I’ll cleanse with a simple CeraVe Hydrating Facial Cleanser, or a twice-weekly hydroxy acid, which acts as an exfoliant. This is followed by the all-important tretinoin and a low-potency retinoid around the eyes (I like skinbetter’s EyeMax AlphaRet Overnight Cream).
What’s your bargain beauty buy?
I don’t believe you need to spend a huge amount on moisturisers. I’ll use one of the pharmacy brands like La Roche-Posay, Avène or Eucerin as they have ranges formulated for all skin types at a good price point – but even Nivea and Simple are absolutely fine.
Which beauty trend would you never recommend trying, and why?
The TikTok trend for applying beef tallow to the face has been pushed as a solution to many skin problems. Personally, I find this mad. Beef fat is really greasy and blocks pores, and I’ve seen a few patients come to the clinic with quite severe acne breakouts as a result. Bottom line: smearing animal fat on your face probably isn’t the best idea.
What skincare do you recommend for children – and what should they stay away from?
Keep it simple: sunscreen and a moisturiser if they are prone to dry skin. The trend for tweenagers to use actives like retinoids and hydroxy acids does more harm than good – they aren’t meant for immature skin.
View image in fullscreen ‘It’s never too soon to start using sunscreen.’
What treatment/gadget would you blow the bank on?
I was quite sceptical of LED face masks when they appeared on the market, but there is quite a lot of evidence that they are beneficial. I also like to do an annual non-ablative fractional laser. This essentially drills microscopic holes in your face and your body’s response is to create new collagen and elastin as a wound-healing response, leaving the skin with great tone and texture, and preventing fine lines.
What skincare advice would you give your younger self?
Definitely sunscreen. With 80-90% of visible ageing and the vast majority of skin cancers caused by UV exposure, it can never be too soon to start using it!
What’s the product you can’t live without?
Lanolips 101 Ointment. This rich hydrating cream is amazing as a lip balm as well as for dry patches on the hands, elbows or anywhere.
What’s the most common mistake you see?
Overdoing it! Patients often apply about 20 different actives and turn up to clinic with a carrier bag full of serums that are actually causing significant skin irritation. It’s important to stick to a few effective actives tailored to your individual skin needs.
What do you do that would surprise people?
If I’m being completely honest, I don’t wear SPF on a cloudy day in winter, especially if I’m going to be at work all day. Cancer-causing UVB rays are very low in winter, and even though UVA (which is responsible for ageing) is present all year round, it seems that in the UK it is at lower levels than previously thought. The amount of UVA I encounter on my morning commute is unlikely to cause much damage.
‘Follow your skin type, not trends’
Dr Sharon Belmo, clinical lead for skin of colour at the Centre of Evidence Based Dermatology at the University of Nottingham
What’s your daily skincare routine?
In the morning I wash my face with Dr Naana Fresh Face Cleanser, which is packed with soothing and moisturising ingredients such as an oat-derived surfactant, aloe vera and glycerin. It has been tested on all skin types, which is a rarity. Afterwards, I apply Revision Skincare C+ Correcting Complex and Epionce Renewal Facial Lotion, which is very moisturising without clogging the pores. My favourite sunscreen is Colorescience Sunforgettable Total Protection Face Shield in bronze. In the evening, I use the same cleanser and renewal lotion.
What’s your bargain beauty buy?
Eucerin Aquaphor – it’s the best for dry lips.
Which beauty trend would you never recommend trying, and why?
DIY or bargain injectables/fillers – these should only be performed by a licensed professional. Unfortunately, the market is very poorly regulated in the UK and there are many non-medical practitioners performing such procedures in beauty salons or even at home. To stay safe, choose a qualified medical professional, eg a dermatologist, cosmetic surgeon, GP, dentist or nurse, who is fully registered with the relevant professional body (for doctors, the General Medical Council; for nurses, the Nursing and Midwifery Council).
What skincare do you recommend for children – and what should they stay away from?
I did not think about skincare as a tween – I think it has gone too far. Less is more for most people, but particularly at this age. My daughter is five and I focus on hydration, with fragrance-free moisturisers such as CeraVe moisturising cream. Unless prescribed, I would not advise tweens to be using retinoids.
What treatment/gadget would you blow the bank on?
Microneedling – this is a great multifunctional treatment and can be used on all skin types. It uses tiny needles to create micro-injuries to the skin, boosting collagen, which can improve the texture and appearance of the skin. It can also be used to treat fine lines, acne scars and hyperpigmentation. It costs about £100-£300 a session (usually sold in packages).
What skincare advice would you give your younger self?
Sunscreen! The prominence of uneven skin tone and hyperpigmentation, as a result of exposure to UV light being so prominent in darker skin tones, was not discussed when I was younger.
What’s the product you can’t live without?
Epionce Renewal Facial Lotion is my go-to. It is light but packed with ceramides and hyaluronic acid, which help retain moisture levels. The cream version is richer and perfect for winter or more mature skin.
What’s the most common mistake you see?
Using too many products, too many steps and over-exfoliating, all of which can lead to skin irritation. A basic routine is cleanser, antioxidant-based product, if you are using one, moisturiser, and sunscreen in the morning. Then, at night: cleanser, retinoid-based product, if you are using one, and moisturiser. There may be additional steps for specific concerns such as acne, ageing skin or hyperpigmentation but I would advise taking advice from a dermatologist, who may prescribe treatments that are multifunctional and more efficient.
What do you do that would surprise people?
I don’t use a retinoid/retinol! They’re great, but not for everyone. For some, they are too harsh and cause irritation. Follow your skin type, not trends.
‘The best product? The one you like to wear every day’
Dr Rhys Beynon, GMC-registered aesthetic doctor with a background in surgery and emergency medicine
What’s your daily skincare routine?
I like to keep things as simple as possible; the three essential products I recommend for most of my clients are sunscreen, vitamin C and retinol/tretinoin. In the shower, I cleanse using AlumierMD’s SensiCalm Cleanser before applying its 15% vitamin C serum, which helps with fine lines and wrinkles, boosts collagen and brightens the skin. I use La Roche-Posay Anthelios Age Correct, an SPF, which also contains hyaluronic acid and niacinamide so I don’t need to add a moisturiser. In the evening, I use a prescription-only tretinoin, which improves skin texture and helps fight fine lines and wrinkles. I prefer prescription tretinoin to retinol because it is more potent and gives better results.
What’s your bargain beauty buy?
CeraVe Hydrating Facial Cleanser is a perfect gentle cleanser that will refresh the skin without overstripping it or leaving it feeling tight and dry. It contains ceramides that help boost your skin’s natural barrier. I also love The Ordinary’s Azelaic Acid suspension 10%. Azelaic acid is a natural and effective antioxidant found in grains; I often recommend this product to clients who have redness, rosacea or acne. It also helps improve skin texture, so is a great anti-ageing treatment, too.
Which beauty trend would you never recommend trying, and why?
There are so many! But my main concern at the moment is about plasma pen treatments, which use an electrical current to heat the skin, causing it to contract and tighten. If done incorrectly, this can cause bad scarring and long-term skin damage.
What skincare do you recommend for children – and what should they stay away from?
I think it’s amazing that young people are thinking about their skin, but I do have significant concerns about the effect of social media on young people’s perceptions of themselves. I’m also concerned that the information they see is not regulated and maybe not aimed directly at teenagers – adolescents should not be using active ingredients such as vitamin C and retinol (unless prescribed by a doctor). Young skin is very delicate and should only need a gentle cleanser, light moisturiser and factor 50+ sunscreen if out in the sun. Paula’s Choice has some good advice for managing teenage breakouts.
What treatment/gadget would you blow the bank on?
I’d recommend CurrentBody’s Dermalux Flex MD LED Light Therapy Device, which is the most powerful light-treatment device that you can have at home, and is three times more powerful than other home devices. It has three light sources: red light, which is anti-inflammatory and boosts collagen and hydration in the skin; near-infrared light, which works at a deeper level for healing; and blue light, which is great for acne/breakouts. It’s mainly used in clinics, but the company does sell them for home use. This device costs £1,999.
What skincare advice would you give your younger self?
To stay out of the sunshine and to start wearing factor 50 every day – when my clients come for a skincare consultation, including a factor 50 SPF is the first step I add to their daily routine. I’m always asked what the best product is and I always say, “It’s the one that you like to wear every day.” There are hundreds on the market so find the one that suits you.
What’s the product you can’t live without?
At the moment, I’m obsessed with AlumierMD MicroDerm Polish – it leaves my skin feeling so smooth, refreshed and polished.
What’s the most common mistake you see?
People buying expensive skincare products that don’t have any active ingredients in them. They don’t work at a cellular level, they just make the skin feel nice.
What do you do that would surprise people?
I have very few steps to my skincare routine. When things get busy, all I manage to do is wash my face in the shower and put my sunscreen on – life is complicated enough as it is! | {
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085897c36fecc6354f7c26c16e4eadc9 | ‘Has the texture of feta, but not much else’: the best (and worst) supermarket feta, tested
While feta is often synonymous with Greek salad, you’ll find a range of uses for this brined, tangy white cheese, and a real range in finishes, too. On the whole, though, the longer the feta has been aged, the punchier its finish will be. Young cheese needs only about two to three months to mature, and can vary in anything from its saltiness to its tanginess and strength. One thing is for certain, however: if the cheese is labelled “feta”, it will have been made in Greece due to a European PDO (protected designation of origin), so you can be assured that it’s the real deal and made with sheep’s milk, or a blend of sheep and goat’s milk.
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Personally, I like the salty, tangier varieties in salads, with crunchy veg or crumbled over pasta, and I save milder, creamier ones for the likes of pies, sweets and even doused in honey, wrapped in filo and fried. Try out a few brands for yourself, because the stronger ones can put people off. I stand by the statement that “everything is better with feta” – you just need to find the right one for you.
The best supermarket feta
Best all-rounder:
Attis Totally Greek feta
£2.69 for 200g at Bakkali
£2.70 for 200g at Sainsbury’s
★★★★☆
Creamy, and not too punchy or tangy. Would work well with honey or in a pudding or sweet dish – it would be perfect in my baklava cheesecake.
Best splurge:
Odysea organic feta
£3.35 for 200g at Ocado
£3 for 200g at Odysea
★★★★★
The best balance of all the key feta attributes: perfectly creamy, tangy and salty, and not too punchy, either. I’d love this sliced and served simply with watermelon.
Best bargain:
Kolios authentic feta
£2.09 for 200g at Bakkali
★★★★☆
A good, solid feta. Creamy yet firm, and easy on the purse strings.
And the rest …
Sainsbury’s Greek feta
£1.80 for 200g at Sainsbury’s
★★★★☆
I really like this. It’s surprisingly creamy, and not too intensely flavoured. It would work well in a whipped feta dip or in a pudding.
Cypressa Greek feta
£2.69 for 200g at Aspris & Son
£2.80 for 200g at Ocado
★★★★☆
This firmer-textured feta is sharp and salty. Its texture and punchiness would work well in a Greek salad.
skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to The Filter Free weekly newsletter Get the best shopping advice from the Filter team straight to your inbox. The Guardian’s journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion
Waitrose Greek feta
£2.32 for 200g at Waitrose
★★★★☆
Hits a lot of the key notes, making this a good all-rounder. Tangy, salty and well balanced. Refreshing. I’d love this crumbled over pasta or baked on to a pastitsio.
Melis feta
£2.58 for 200g at Asda
£3.39 for 200g at Bodrum
★★★☆☆
Nice, but pretty middle-of-the-road. Has some of the key elements of feta, but not too intense. Bit of tang. Bit salty. Pretty decent.
Yamas authentic Greek feta
£2 for 150g at Tesco
★★★☆☆
An OK block, but with a weirdly dry texture for something that comes in brine; it has a good tang, though. I’d probably use this if a recipe called for the feta to be baked into something, rather than in a salad.
Dodoni feta
£3 for 200g at Ocado
★★★☆☆
A drier finish than some of the others, and without that creamy-yet-firm texture I’m looking for. Nice tang, though. Would probably work well in skewers or wrapped in filo and fried.
Emporium Greek feta
£1.69 for 200g Aldi
★☆☆☆☆
Lacks flavour and all the key elements I’m looking for. This has the texture of feta, but not much else, I’m afraid. | {
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936a2175f901b8f068ca80a0c0c864cb | The best pressure washers: eight expert picks for cleaning garden furniture and patios
The trouble with the great outdoors is that it gets a bit untidy. Your lawnmower might do a good job of keeping your garden in check, but keeping your patio, decking and outdoor furniture spick and span can take hours, especially if you rely on a bucket of soapy water and a scrubbing brush.
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That’s where the pressure washer comes in. These handy tools connect to your hose pipe and squirt water at any cleaning problem. Stubborn and unpleasant stains, from bird dirt to years of neglect, can be lifted from your garden’s hard-wearing surfaces in seconds. With the right attachments, you can also use your pressure washer to hose down cars, bikes and boats.
At a glance
Why you should trust me
I’ve been testing all sorts of cleaning gadgets for years. I’ve tested vacuum cleaners, mops, hard-floor cleaners, carpet cleaners, window vacs and various robots designed to do jobs automatically, from internal cleaning to lawn mowing. I’ve got a keen nose for a labour-saving device, and I live in a busy household that never seems short of a dirty surface to test things on, including an extensive patio area and a filthy car. There was a perfect alignment of dirty jobs crying out to test these pressure washers on.
How I tested
View image in fullscreen ‘I found a neighbour with a deck that hadn’t had a deep clean for a few years.’ Photograph: Andy Shaw
I gathered eight pressure washers of various types and prices from a range of manufacturers, and put each through the same tests. First, I used each washer to clean one of the dirty paving slabs at the side of my house. This is where the dog gets washed after walks and it’s a well-trodden thoroughfare, making it a dark and grimy corridor.
Next, I wanted to test the washers on decking. Unfortunately, I don’t have a deck of my own, so I had to find someone else’s to clean. Fortunately, a shoutout on our neighbourhood WhatsApp group found a neighbour with a deck that hadn’t had a deep clean for a few years, so it was primed and ready to challenge the washers. This was by far the wettest job of the lot – but my neighbour was delighted with the extreme hose down I gave it.
I then washed the wheels of my car. As with most cars, it has only four, so I washed half of each wheel with each washer, so I could compare their work.
Where appropriate, I tried the various attachments and settings that I hadn’t used previously on other jobs. It included cleaning out empty water butts, clearing a few years of built-up algae off my whirligig and testing the supplied foam cannon on the rest of my car.
All of the pressure washers were supplied by their manufacturers, most of whom will pick them up when I’ve finished. Any that don’t get collected will be given to Workaid, a Chesham-based charity that refurbishes tools of all kinds. It donates them to training centres and self-help organisations in Africa and the UK, to help young people develop new skills or start their own businesses.
The best pressure washers in 2025
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Andy Shaw
Best pressure washer overall:
Ava Go P40
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Andy Shaw
£149.90 at Ava
£149.90 at Amazon
Ava may not be a household name in the UK but the Norwegian pressure washer manufacturer has entered the market with affordable products that are designed to last. The P40 is a great entry-level device that should last for years, with a 10-year warranty to back it up.
Why we love it
It’s clear that the design focused on how the product would be used. It feels better built than similarly priced rivals, from the kink-free steel-lined pressure hose to robust but easy-to-release clips that hold all the parts together.
My favourite feature is the extendable lance. At the push of a button, the lance can extend from 84cm to 116cm. If you’re working on cleaning a floor, there’s no question this will reduce the amount of bending you have to do.
The kit I reviewed came with two nozzles (one variable for adjusting the width and pressure of the cleaning area, and another turbo nozzle for particularly tough jobs) and a foam cannon. Matching this with Ava’s detergents made car cleaning a breeze, and it performed well in all my tests.
It’s a shame that … it’s not as powerful as the most powerful products we’ve tested here, so it can be bettered for stubborn dirt on the hardest surfaces.
Suitable for: patio, decking/fences, garden tools, garden furniture, drains/guttering, vehicles
Pressure hose length: 6m
Weight: 4.5kg
Corded or cordless: corded
Cleaning power: 11,313 cleaning units (6.5 litres a minute x 1,740PSI)
Attachments included: zoom lance, turbo nozzle, vario nozzle, foam cannon
Warranty: 10 years
Best budget pressure washer:
Kärcher K 2 Classic
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Andy Shaw
£72 at Argos
Kärcher sells more pressure washers than any other manufacturer, with the low price of the K 2 indicating why. None of the other washers we tested were as affordable as this compact unit.
Why we love it
Its affordability makes it ideal if you want something quick for occasional use. Considering the low price you’re still getting a surprisingly effective cleaner. It doesn’t have the clever design and high build quality of corded rivals from Ava and Bosch, but there’s been no skimping on raw cleaning power.
It’s a lesser specification but still comes with two nozzles, which are pre-attached to their own lances. One produces a lighter spray at a fixed angle, while the other is a turbo nozzle that sends out a powerful rotating jet. The turbo nozzle was good at cleaning paving slabs and the lighter nozzle did good work on my car wheels.
It’s a shame that … you get what you pay for in build quality: the pressure hose wants to stay curled up, no matter what you do with it, and the unit is so light that it’s prone to falling over.
Suitable for: patio, decking/fences, garden tools, garden furniture, drains/guttering, vehicles
Pressure hose length: 3m
Weight: 3.2kg
Corded or cordless: corded
Cleaning power: 9,573 cleaning units (6 litres a minute x 1,595PSI)
Attachments included: single spray lance, dirt blaster lance
Warranty: five years
Best cordless pressure washer:
Stihl Rea 60 Plus
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Andy Shaw
£219 at Just Lawnmowers
£224.99 at Charlies
Moving from corded to cordless washers usually incurs an increase in cost and a decrease in pressure. But while the mega battery for Stihl’s Rea 60 Plus is pricey, it can push out water at pressures that rival corded tools.
Why we love it
During testing, the Rea 60 Plus surprised me with its high pressure, which is closer to corded levels than the other battery-powered washers we tested. Although full-pelt washing diminishes the battery rapidly, Stihl has added a power dial that lets you tame the jet. That means you can wash at a lower pressure for longer, and this lower pressure is useful for more delicate tasks as well. You can also control the flow with the handy nozzle, which lets you choose between three jet types (fan, rotary and cleaning agent, with the latter fed from a hose on the side of the main unit).
What I really admired about the Rea 60 Plus was how neatly it all packs away, largely thanks to its pressure hose reel. When you start you can just pull out what you need, up to its 5m length. The storage clips for the dismantled lance and gun and the lack of a power cord also help keep things neat and tidy.
It’s a shame that … although the Rea 60 Plus is affordable, it doesn’t come with a battery or charger, which adds another £197 to the cost.
Suitable for: patio, decking/fences, garden tools, garden furniture, drains/guttering, vehicles, away from home
Pressure hose length: 5m
Weight: 6.7kg
Corded or cordless: cordless
Quoted battery run time: 25mins
Cleaning power: 8,485 cleaning units (4.5 litres a minute x 1,885PSI)
Attachments included: 3-in-1 nozzle
Warranty: three years
Best for high-power deep cleaning:
Bosch UniversalAquatak 135
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Andy Shaw
£135 at B&Q
£128.25 at Amazon
The Bosch UniversalAquatak 135 is a corded pressure washer that offers a good balance between high pressure, reasonable price and usable design.
Why we love it
With a high maximum pressure and a high flow rate, the cleaning power of the UniversalAquatak 135 isn’t really in question. In my tests it quickly lifted dirt from every surface I pointed it at.
There’s a little assembly to be done but it’s nothing too arduous and doesn’t require any tools: it’s just a case of clipping the wheels on to the unit and assembling the handle mechanism. Despite having wheels, it’s not particularly large or heavy, so there’s no problem lifting it and carrying it around.
It comes with a single nozzle that can be rotated to select one of three jet settings – fan, rotary and pencil – to provide various pressures to suit your requirements.
It’s a shame that … I found the long 7m pressure hose had a strong desire to stay curled up, and it doesn’t have the extendable lance or extra-long warranty of the Ava P40.
Suitable for: patio, decking/fences, garden tools, garden furniture, drains/guttering, vehicles
Pressure hose length: 7m
Weight: 6.9kg
Corded or cordless: corded
Cleaning power: 14,685 cleaning units (7.5 litres a minute x 1,958PSI)
Attachments included: 3-in-1 nozzle, 450ml detergent nozzle
Warranty: three years
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The best of the rest
View image in fullscreen ‘The most powerful washer I tested’: the Titan TTB1800PRW. Photograph: Andy Shaw
Ryobi 18V One+ 22bar cordless power washer kit
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Andy Shaw
£149.99 at Ryobi
£199.99 at B&Q
Best for: weight and portability
For lightweight duties, the Ryobi 18V One+ is quick to set up and use. In the garden, you can connect your hose directly to the lance, so there’s no pressure hose to worry about, but you do then have to drag your hose around. I didn’t find this to be any more of a problem than using it for regular watering, though.
It comes with its own hose, too, which you can connect up and dip into any water supply, further enhancing its portability. This would be great for washing down equipment after a boating trip, for example, where there’s a plentiful supply of water. You could also use it with captured rainwater from a water butt or similar.
It didn’t make the final cut because … it doesn’t provide the same kind of pressure as the winners, although it’s certainly the right tool for the right job. The lack of pressure wasn’t particularly apparent in my cleaning tests, but you will notice it when tackling the toughest jobs.
Suitable for: patio, decking/fences, garden tools, garden furniture, drains/guttering, vehicles, bikes, away from home; pressure hose length: N/A; weight: 2.7kg; corded or cordless: cordless; quoted battery runtime: 24mins; cleaning power: 1,091 cleaning units (3 litres a minute x 360PSI); attachments included: 3-in-1 nozzle, 6m siphoning hose, 18V battery and charger; warranty: three years
Bosch UniversalAquatak 36V-100
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Andy Shaw
£391 (including battery and charger) at Bosch
£177.95 (no battery) at Amazon
Best for: an affordable cordless pressure washer
This battery-powered Bosch sits somewhere between the Stihl and the Ryobi in terms of its cleaning power. It doesn’t have the full-pelt power of the Stihl but it’s more affordable. And while not quite as portable as the Ryobi, it does at least have the option of portability, whether you’re using it around the garden or flinging it in the car to take elsewhere.
It comes with much the same equipment as the mains-powered Bosch, including the handy three-in-one nozzle and a clip-on detergent tank you can use to quickly cover a dirty item in cleaning foam.
It didn’t make the final cut because … it’s not quite as portable as the Ryobi or as neat as the Stihl.
Suitable for: patio, decking/fences, garden tools, garden furniture, vehicles, away from home; pressure hose length: 4m; weight: 4.7kg; corded or cordless: cordless; quoted battery run time: 45mins; cleaning power: 4,496 cleaning units (3.1 litres a minute x 1,450PSI); attachments included: 3-in-1 nozzle; warranty: three years
Kärcher K 3 Classic
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Andy Shaw
£130 at Argos
£129 at Amazon
Best for: a better-built version of the K 2
If you’ve got a little more to spend than the sub-£100 for the K 2, then the K 3 is a level up in build quality. The pressure and flow rate are improved, so you get a more powerful clean, though I didn’t notice a huge difference in my tests. However, the device itself is a definite step up, with a longer pressure hose, wheels for dragging it about and an extendable handle.
Otherwise, it’s largely the same as the K 2, but better balanced and less prone to falling over.
It didn’t make the final cut because … if you’re moving up from the K 2 and can afford it, the Ava P40 and the Bosch UniversalAquatak 135 are better options for only a few pounds more.
Suitable for: patio, decking/fences, garden tools, garden furniture, vehicles; pressure hose length: 6m; weight: 3.8kg; corded or cordless: corded; cleaning power: 11,023 cleaning units (6.3 litres a minute x 1,740PSI); attachments included: single spray lance, dirt blaster lance; warranty: five years
Titan TTB1800PRW
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Andy Shaw
£79.99 at Screwfix
Best for: affordable power
The Titan TTB1800PRW from Screwfix is a no-nonsense pressure washer that’s affordable and powerful. In fact, it’s the most powerful washer I tested, yet is available from Screwfix for less than £100, with only the less powerful Kärcher K 2 Classic beating it on price.
Once I’d assembled the washer (see below) it made short work of the cleaning tasks I set it. It comes with two nozzles and I generally preferred the power nozzle over the other, as it did a significantly better job of lifting off dirt. It was also the only model to come with a patio cleaning brush tool, though I found this to be too light to be of much use and preferred the roto nozzle during testing.
It didn’t make the final cut because … it took more assembly than any others, requiring a screwdriver to put together some of the parts. I didn’t like the extendable handle: it doesn’t lock into place and can catch you out when reaching to pick it up.
Suitable for: patio, garden tools, vehicles; pressure hose length: 6m; weight: 7.1kg; corded or cordless: corded; cleaning power: 14,891cleaning units (7.3 litres a minute x 2,031PSI); attachments included: vario fan nozzle, roto nozzle, patio cleaner; warranty: two years
What you need to know
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Andy Shaw
How do you use a pressure washer?
Pressure washers are simple tools that accept water from a water supply, build up the pressure using an electric motor, and then squirt out the water again from a gun attached to a separate hose (called a pressure hose).
All the washers I tested use a universal garden hose attachment that lets them easily hook up to your water supply. My garden hose has a Hozelock connector, which fitted perfectly on to every model, so check yours is compatible. Once the water is connected and the tap is on, you can power up the washer either by connecting it to the mains or charging and slotting in a battery.
Then you simply select an appropriate attachment or setting, depending on the pressure you want, and point it at the dirt. The gun has a trigger so you can start and stop the water as you please without returning to the main unit or closing the tap.
What safety equipment do you need?
Keep in mind that dirt and debris can fly around when squirted at high pressure. Safety glasses, long trousers and proper shoes should be worn. Gloves are a good idea, and you might want to deck yourself out in some waterproof clothing.
What is a good pressure for home use?
Different jobs require different amounts of pressure. Heavy-duty dirty work, such as blasting a concrete paving slab, is best done with high-pressure washers that can produce pressure in excess of 100 bar (1,450PSI). You can get decent results from lower-pressure washers, too, but it might take a bit longer.
Softer surfaces, such as wooden fencing and decking, shouldn’t be attacked with the highest pressure settings of a powerful washer but can be hosed down with a less powerful spray. Washers with pressure of less than 100 bar can be used for this kind of thing. Try your washer on a small and inconspicuous area first to see how it fares before tackling the whole thing.
Some jobs are best done with the pressure at a minimum, such as washing your car. Although you can still use a pressure washer for this, you should use a rinse setting, or a fan setting from a safe distance – the pressure is most intense at the tip of the nozzle. Pressure washers with foam cannon are good for covering a car with soap, which you can then rinse after it’s lifted off some of the dirt. Don’t mix detergent with your pressure washer’s main water supply, though, as this can damage the device.
Are pressure washers noisy?
None of the pressure washers I’ve reviewed here were particularly noisy. Your nextdoor neighbour will notice when you’re using one, but they’re quieter than lawnmowers and hedge trimmers. There’s no requirement to wear ear defenders.
Andy Shaw is a freelance consumer journalist and technology addict. Having reviewed tech products professionally for more than 30 years, his favoured working environment is a small desk surrounded by big boxes. His greatest weakness is that he never, ever remembers how things came out of their packaging, so they rarely fit back in again when it’s time to return them | {
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dacc320a6daecf94c538051cdc7eae50 | Beat brain rot: clear your mind with 55 screen-free activities, from birdwatching to colouring books
I’m sure many of us are guilty of relying on our phones to decompress, even when taking some downtime. But if your social media feeds are anything like mine – an endless stream of fad workouts, meal plans and extravagant skincare routines – it’s more likely to whip you into an anxious frenzy than leave you feeling calm and relaxed. Whether you have social media anxiety, insomnia or are just terrified by the idea of “brain rot”, you need a way to de-stress that doesn’t involve a screen, especially when many of us stare at one all day for work or school.
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I’m sure we’re all familiar with the concept of mindfulness and how the practice can help to reduce symptoms of anxiety and boost concentration. But you might not realise how easy it is to incorporate it into your everyday life – after all, at its core, mindfulness is just about keeping yourself in the present moment. So to help you do just that, I’ve compiled a list of screen-free activities to help you clear your mind, get outside (if the weather allows) and be more mindful, without meditating.
Gardening
It’s hardly new information that immersing yourself in nature can positively affect your mental health. But exposure to the great outdoors isn’t the only benefit of gardening – all that planting, pruning and weeding is also a great way to calm your mind and focus on the present. So, whether you have a back garden, allotment or a few plant pots to tend to, here are some tools to help you get stuck in.
Three-month vegetable seed subscription
£36 at Not on the High Street
£36 at Virgin Experience Days
Among the most therapeutic and satisfying parts of gardening is growing your own plants or crops. Start a vegetable patch with three deliveries of four seasonal vegetable seeds, from Swiss chard to chillies. Each pack comes with tailored growing instructions for each vegetable, making it a great option for beginners.
View image in fullscreen Photograph: Clemmie Power Collins
Burgon & Ball bypass secateurs
£23 at Farrar & Tanner
If your garden is in need of a tidy-up, you’ll no doubt need a trusty pair of secateurs. When Matt Collins, head gardener at London’s Garden Museum, put the best pairs of secateurs to the test, this surprisingly affordable model from Burgon & Ball came out on top.
Niwaki hori hori knife
£39 at Burford
Garden knives are among the most versatile tools in any gardener’s arsenal, taking on weeding, planting and digging (to name a few of their uses). Experts swear by the Niwaki hori hori knife.
For more gardening inspiration, check out our guide to getting your garden ready for summer
Bulb planting augers
From £5.59 at Crocus
Level up your garden with these gamechanging augers that make it easier to plant bulbs.
Velvet gladioli collection
£34.50 for 90 corms at Sarah Raven
If you want to plant some bulbs now, these gorgeous gladioli would make an excellent addition to any garden, and you can expect them to flower from July.
Copper gardening tools
From £49 at Burford
For a satisfying gardening experience, you need the right tools. Gardening expert Alys Fowler says these copper gardening tools are “a joy to handle, lightweight and comfortable, and the more you use it, the more the copper shines”.
Large terrarium DIY kit
£52.49 at Debenhams
£69.99 at Argos
If you’re not lucky enough to have a garden, you can still reap the calming benefits of gardening with a terrarium. This DIY kit comes with the glass bowl terrarium as well as charcoal, gravel, sand and rocks to get you started. Then you can buy some terrarium plants of your choice to create a perfect miniature garden.
For more expert recommendations, check out our guide to the best gardening tools
Jigsaws for adults
The focus needed to complete jigsaw puzzles can stop your thoughts from wandering elsewhere and help you stay in the now. Find one that fits your interests, whether you’re a Wes Anderson fan or an avid cook.
Accidentally Wes Anderson 1,000-piece jigsaw
£16.26 at AbeBooks
£18.39 at WH Smith
Piece together a gallery wall featuring framed pictures of locations that capture the aesthetic of film director Wes Anderson.
Michael Storrings Cherry Blossoms 1,000-piece jigsaw
£13.45 at Hive
£14.99 at WH Smith
A beautiful scene of cherry blossoms in a Washington DC park by award-winning illustrator Michael Storrings.
Cooked 1,000-piece jigsaw
£14.35 at Hive
£18.99 at Amazon
Complete this puzzle to reveal a collection of your favourite chefs’ cookbooks designed by illustrator Harriet Thomas-Bush.
The world of Jane Austen 1,000-piece jigsaw
£16.99 at the Guardian Bookshop
£16.99 at Waterstones
Step into the world of Jane Austen and celebrate the 250th anniversary of her birth with this puzzle inspired by her life and works.
Jigsaws for kids
If your children tend to be glued to a TV, phone or tablet, entice them away with a puzzle of their favourite characters. Jigsaws are thought to help children develop their hand-eye coordination and problem-solving skills.
Paddington 1,000-piece jigsaw puzzle
£7.50 at Argos
Paddington gets around, whether that’s having tea with the late queen or getting up to mischief in Peru. If your kids love the films, then perhaps a Paddington puzzle is just the thing to give them a screen break.
Stitch 3D puzzle
£9.99 at Argos
£14.99 at Ravensburger
If they’re more of a Disney fan, they might enjoy this 3D Stitch puzzle, a really fun take on a traditional jigsaw.
Bluey 4 in a box jigsaws
£5.59 at John Lewis
£5.59 at Amazon
For younger ones, this set comes with four puzzles featuring scenes from the kids’ cartoon Bluey. The jigsaws range from 12 to 24 pieces, so they can gradually build up their puzzle skills.
Birdwatching
Birdwatching and observing wildlife in general are other ways to relax and unwind in the great outdoors. Try reconnecting with nature by sitting in your garden or a park and watching any birds, insects or other animals that cross your path.
RSPB Cabin nest box
£25 at RSPB
Entice more birds into your garden with this sweet bird house, perfect for species such as blue tits, house sparrows and nuthatches to set up camp. Hand-crafted in the UK using FSC-certified timber, the side panel of the house opens so you can carefully empty it at the end of nesting season and make room for the next occupant.
Roosting pockets
£15 for three at RSPB
These handmade roosting pockets are made from natural materials and offer a safe shelter for small birds. They come with two different-sized holes that you can switch between depending on the size of bird you wish to attract.
Our Garden Birds
£14.99 at the Guardian Bookshop
£9.99 at Amazon
This beautifully illustrated book of British garden birds offers a whimsical tool for identifying all the species you spot.
RSPB Birding Journal
£15 at RSPB
If you need somewhere to keep track of your observations, this birdwatchers’ journal from the RSPB is the perfect place to keep notes. Plus, it’s made of 100% recycled paper.
Nikon Monarch M7 binoculars 8x30
£319 at John Lewis
£319 at Jessops
If birdwatching is an activity you’d like to do more of, then investing in a good pair of binoculars could really enhance your experience. When researching the best for beginners, this pair from Nikon cropped up again and again on birdwatching forums and blogs. It has 8x magnification and offers a wide field of view so you can track moving birds more easily.
Celestron Nature DX 10x42
£159.99 at Argos
£159 at London Camera Exchange
If you’re not ready for such a big investment just yet, this more affordable pair of binoculars is also highly recommended by birdwatchers. The design is waterproof and fog-proof, making it ideal for use even during April showers.
Children’s Nature Trail Journal
£4.95 at Rex London
£4.95 at Hive
Get kids excited about nature with their own journal. This book is full of illustrations of animals, plants and insects that may be found along a British nature trail, with room to make notes of everything you spot.
Colouring books for adults
Colouring isn’t just for kids: it’s seen a real rise in popularity among adults in recent years, with many people claiming the pastime helps them to relieve stress and focus on the present moment.
Manchester colouring book
£14.99 at Etsy
£14.99 at Colour Your Streets
Colour Your Streets has a range of books filled with landmarks from cities, counties and areas around the UK and abroad. From Barcelona to York, dozens of places are covered, so there’s sure to be a book for somewhere meaningful to you.
Coco Wyo colouring book
£7.42 at Amazon
Coco Wyo’s colouring books have become popular with adults thanks to their cute and comforting scenes. Immersing yourself in these books will no doubt soothe your inner child and leave you feeling cosy.
Mindfulness colouring book for adults
£6.43 at WH Smith
£3.49 at Amazon
If you’re after something with a more mature feel, intricate patterns like those in this book take more focus and help you to stay in the moment.
Colouring books and art for kids
Let your kids colour outside the lines with colouring books, sticker mosaics and crystal art kits that nurture their creativity and keep them off their phones.
Jumbo doodle chalk
£6 at John Lewis
For those fair-weather days, encourage them to take their creativity outside with jumbo chalks that are perfect for drawing on pavements.
British Museum: Around the World colouring book
£6.99 at Blackwells
£6.43 at Amazon
From an ancient Greek marketplace to a traditional dragon parade, scenes inspired by the British Museum’s artefacts are the canvas in this book.
Football Heroes colouring book
£7.35 at WH Smith
From Messi to Haaland, bring football heroes to life with this 80-page colouring book filled with legends of the game.
Sloth crystal art kit
£19.99 at Craft Buddy
A modern take on paint-by-numbers, this canvas reveals an adorable image of a sloth once you place the coloured crystals on to their corresponding places.
Animal kaleidoscope sticker mosaics
£4 at Hobby Craft
Use the different neon stickers to complete these kaleidoscopic wildlife mosaics. This set comes with 32 pages to keep your kids occupied.
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Colouring pens and pencils
For a satisfying colouring experience, make sure you choose the right tools. Pencils are better for beginners thanks to their finer tips, which offer more control. They’re also better for building colour and creating shading, which can allow you to be more creative with your colouring. Alternatively, felt tips are better for creating more vibrant pictures, and many come with dual tips, allowing you to cover large areas quickly and do finer details.
36 colouring pencils
£9.99 at Ryman
£10 at Argos
120-pencil set
£19.19 at Amazon
48 colour alcohol-based pens
£38.99 at Amazon
80 graphic dual-tip markers
£12.85 at Art Discount
Outdoor yoga
Staying present is already a big part of yoga, but why not take your practice outside for that extra serotonin boost?
Lululemon 5mm yoga mat
£88 at Lululemon
Whether you want to stretch it out on the beach, at the park or in a forest, a thicker yoga mat will keep you comfortable on uneven surfaces or help to flatten down thick grass. This mat from Lululemon is 5mm thick and made with FSC-certified rubber, so it can be easily wiped down after outdoor use.
Nonslip jute travel mat
£57.99 at Complete Unity Yoga
£65.55 at Etsy
If you want a more portable mat, this travel one can be rolled up or folded, so you can easily transport it wherever you want. It’s made from jute fabric and sustainably harvested natural tree rubber.
Journaling for adults
Journaling is great if you’re hoping to practise gratitude as well as mindfulness. A journal with prompts is helpful for beginners who aren’t sure where to start, but if you just want an outlet for your thoughts with no structure, then go for a blank notebook.
Gratitude journal
£26 at Papier
Papier’s gratitude journal contains daily prompts and activities to help you feel grateful even after a bad day. It also comes in various colours, so you can find one that suits you.
The Calm Workbook
£20 at the Guardian Bookshop
£15 at Blackwells
A workbook full of exercises and prompts to encourage self-compassion and help build a calming routine into your daily life.
MindJournal
£10.99 at the Guardian Bookshop
Aimed at men, the MindJournal contains writing exercises to help you understand how to look after yourself and help build a healthier and happier life.
Journaling for kids
Journaling isn’t just an outlet for adults, it can also help children to better understand their feelings and improve their emotional regulation. Find a journal aimed at kids and encourage them to have a quiet moment to reflect on how they feel.
HappySelf Junior journal
£24.90 at HappySelf Journal
Created for six- to 12-year-olds, this journal is intended to be used for a few minutes each day. It’s designed to encourage gratitude and reflection on emotions.
Big Life Journal for kids
£24.90 at Big Life Journal
The Big Life Journal aims to teach children how to believe in themselves, face challenges and grow from their mistakes through stories, illustrations and activities. Recommended for ages seven to 10.
Lego for kids
Lego has been around since the 1930s, and it’s as popular as ever. Share it with the next generation and get a set you can build together (you might even enjoy it more than they do). With sets aimed at various age groups, it’s the perfect activity to keep restless hands busy and help hone concentration skills.
R2-D2
£66.99 at John Lewis
£89.99 at Lego
This 1,050-piece R2D2 is the perfect dose of nostalgia for grownups and a fun activity for kids aged 10+.
Wild Animals: Panda Family
£27.99 at John Lewis
£34.99 at Lego
From Lego’s Wild Animal range, this adorable panda family comes in 626 pieces and is aimed at children 8+.
Beekeepers’ House and Flower Garden
£89.99 at Lego
£90 at Argos
This super-cute beekeeper’s house will keep them entertained even after it’s built, doubling up as a doll’s house. Aimed at kids 12 and older, this set comes in 1,161 pieces.
Lego for adults
From landmarks and buildings to animals and plants, there are seemingly endless Lego sets for adults. And just like jigsaws, the repetitive but mentally engaging activity can help to clear your mind.
The Botanical Garden
£289.99 at Lego
Put together this 3,792-piece set to reveal a beautiful botanical garden with 35 different plant species.
Tuxedo cat
£89.99 at Lego
£90 at Argos
This furry friend comes in 1,710 pieces and can be built into different poses – puurfect for cat lovers.
Wildflower bouquet
£43.99 at John Lewis
£54.99 at Lego
For flowers that will last for ever, check out Lego’s range of buildable bouquets and plants.
Running
Studies have shown that combining mindfulness and physical exercise can improve your mental health more than either practice alone. With this in mind, running is great for helping to clear your mind while also improving your cardiovascular health. Get outside for a run and try to focus on not letting your mind wander.
Kiprun hydration running belt
£14.99 at Decathlon
This handy running belt is perfect for keeping your keys, phone and a small drink on you.
For more, read our guide to the best gifts for runners
New Balance Fresh Foam X 1080 v14 Shoes
£160 at New Balance
From £152.20 at Amazon
If you predominantly run on roads or pathways, try these trainers from New Balance. They were deemed the best trainers for road runs in our guide to the best running shoes.
Asics Trabuco Max 4
£160 for women’s at Asics
£160 for men’s at Asics
If you’re more likely to run on rough terrain or nature trails, the Asics Trabuco Max 4s come highly recommended for trail runs.
Puzzle books for adults
Puzzle books are a great way to work out and distract your brain. Whether you want an achievable challenge or something that takes a bit more thought, there are plenty of options from sudoku to word searches.
The Mindfulness Puzzle Book
£9.99 at the Guardian Bookshop
£9.19 at WH Smith
Wind down your mind with this book of fun and achievable activities designed to relax you.
Wordle Challenge Puzzle Book
£7.99 at the Guardian Bookshop
£7.99 at Waterstones
Remember Wordle? If you’ve been hooked on this addictive word-guessing game, try the puzzle book version so you can play without adding to your screen time.
Guardian sudoku and crossword books
From £7.99 at the Guardian Bookshop
For puzzle traditionalists, you can’t beat a sudoku or crossword to train your brain. This Guardian collection of classic puzzles is a good place to start.
Puzzle books for kids
If your kids could benefit from something more challenging than relaxing, then puzzle books are a good way to go. Get them flexing their mental muscles with fun but stimulating riddles, mazes and mysteries.
I Spy Spooky Night picture riddle book
£13.94 at Amazon
Take a trip through a haunted house filled with spooky riddles. Each page contains a creepy scene in which rhyming riddles must be solved to locate objects. Fun for all ages thanks to the varying difficulties of each page.
Planet Earth Mazes puzzle book
£7.99 at Usborne
Mazes that become increasingly harder, set in scenes around the world – from piles of recycling to the rainforest. This book is a brilliant way for kids to learn about the planet while honing their focus skills.
Murdle Junior: Curious Crimes for Curious Minds
£5.99 at Scholastic
£7.49 at Waterstones
Filled with code-breaking, map-reading and maze-solving puzzles, this junior edition of the popular Murdle books will keep them entertained while they practice their problem-solving skills. | {
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567beee0cfb0b8a1a117115d391030ea | ‘An epic expanse of golden sand’: the sweeping appeal of North Devon
For so many years Devon was viewed as the poorer relation to Cornwall; its coastline less rugged and epic, its beaches smaller, less elemental. For us, the county was always just a cut-through to the treasure beyond and never a destination in itself. The fact that Cornwall was much further to get to somehow proved its remoter superiority. How wrong we were.
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North Devon, in particular, is having a moment. Its 30km coastline is the UK’s first World Surfing Reserve, joining Australia’s Gold Coast and California’s Malibu and Santa Cruz as one of 12 officially chosen. Move over Newquay and Fistral beach.
But even if you’re not a surfer, north Devon beaches easily compete with Cornwall’s finest. Our first stop is Woolacombe and what takes us by surprise is the sheer scale of it. An epic expanse of golden sand – quarter of a mile wide at low tide and two miles long – under a dome of bright blue sky framed by undulating green hills. And not a development in sight, thanks to the National Trust which owns the surrounding area.
Woolacombe itself is less gentrified than your Padstows or Polzeaths, certainly, but all the more charming for it. The affluent second-home-owners are refreshingly absent and it’s much less expensive, too. There’s no chance of paying £16.95 for Rick Stein’s cod and chips here.
View image in fullscreen The harbour at Ilfracombe. Photograph: Westend61/Getty Images
We stop for lunch instead at Fudgies Bakehouse, close to the seafront, where you can feast on fresh pasties and homemade ice-cream for less than a tenner a head, followed by beers at Bar Electric with a sun terrace and views across the beach.
Our base for the week is Willingcot, a collection of timber-clad eco homes in a lush green valley two miles inland from Woolacombe. Perfect for families, there’s acres of space, a contemporary open-plan sitting room and kitchen area with outdoor decking and seating where you can watch the children explore the expanse of greenery it’s set in.
Close to the house is a bridle path that used to be the old railway line; cutting through pretty countryside, it’s handy for cycling or walking to all the local bays. We follow it into Ilfracombe, less gentrified than Croyde and noticeably less busy than Woolacombe, but worth a visit for its Victorian harbour and, depending on your taste, Damien Hirst’s striking 66ft-high sculpture, Verity, a pregnant woman with sword raised high, her exposed skull and foetus clearly visible. For tea and cake, and splendid views across the harbour, the Lime Kiln café is a handy pit stop.
Fifteen minutes down the road is Braunton with a pleasant high street lined with boutiques and cafés. Beyond the village, you can follow the river Caen from Velator Quay with views across Braunton Burrows, a Unesco biosphere reserve due to the rarity of plant and insect life here. You may well spot, as we did, a large and rather hostile-looking herd of cattle, whose grazing helps maintain the dunes’ natural habitat.
The next day we strike out for nearby Putsborough, taking a path from the beach up to the top of the hill and then following the South West Coast Path high above the sea. A patchwork of green fields stretches out behind us and either side is the glittering, panoramic sweep of the ocean as we head around the rocky headland of Baggy Point. We end up at Croyde, another bay that’s a surfer’s paradise, although the chief draw for us after a long trek is a pint in the much loved local pub, the Thatch.
View image in fullscreen Sea views from the South West Coastal Path. Photograph: Victoria Ashman/Getty Images/iStockphoto
On our final day we walk from Mortehoe village to Morte Point where waves crash over the deadly “devil’s teeth”; craggy rocks that have been responsible for many shipwrecks down the centuries. Nowadays you’re more likely to spot seals in these choppy waters – we saw several frisking in the waves below us.
After a long trek back to Willingcot, the biggest treat is a glass of wine in the outdoor hot tub, the perfect antidote for blisters and aching limbs after a blustery walk around the headland.
Luxury Coastal (luxurycoastal.co.uk) offers seven nights at Willingcott from £728 (sleeps eight), including a welcome hamper. A three-night break starts at £679 | {
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a09b2d7891e65dafc970d9cf18771bee | The kindness of strangers: the petrol station worker paid for my fuel and saved my date
I was temporarily living in my home town of Wangaratta while caring for my grandmother, who had dementia. I got weekends off and on one of those occasions I met a girl called Marie. During that lovely early period of a new relationship where you’re still getting to know each other, I took her camping at Mount Buffalo in Victoria.
On the way home we stopped in Myrtleford, a small town at the foot of the mountain, to get petrol. I fuelled up and Marie stayed in the car while I went inside to pay.
I was in my early 20s at the time and wasn’t earning money because I’d been caring for my grandmother, so I deliberately put only $20 worth of petrol in the tank. But when I went to pay, my card was declined. This was a time before mobile phones, so I couldn’t call someone else to ask them to put money in my account. I’d have to ask Marie for the money, which I couldn’t face. I vividly remember looking out at her sitting in the car and feeling utter panic wash over me. I was trying to impress her – we weren’t yet a sealed deal. What was I going to do?
Behind the counter was a young fella, maybe a couple of years younger than me. He just had this incredible read on the situation I was in. Very quickly, without any fuss, he went and got his backpack, took out his wallet and said, “Mate, I’ll pay for the fuel. When you get the money, just post it back to me care of the petrol station.”
Of course, I politely declined and said I couldn’t possibly take his money. But he insisted, saying he understood that sometimes this happens. He seemed to have a wisdom beyond his years.
When I got back in the car, I said nothing to Marie – the shame was real. But on the drive home I silently committed to getting that $20 back to him as soon as I could, and I did. Back then, $20 felt like a huge amount of money, as it does when you’re young. The cashier was probably working there part-time while finishing school, so I’m sure it was a lot of money for him too.
In the years after, whenever I was in the area, I always drove past that petrol station hoping to bump into him again. I never did. But it was a lovely bit of male-to-male camaraderie for this fella to surmise the situation and want to save me that embarrassment. There was this mutual understanding between us of the horror of my predicament.
For him to so generously offer me that money had a big impact on me, and made me want to be a better person. I’m still touched and amazed by it.
What is the nicest thing a stranger has ever done for you?
Share your experience What's the nicest thing a stranger has ever done for you? From making your day to changing your life, we want to hear about chance encounters that have stuck with you. Please share your story if you are 18 or over, anonymously if you wish. For more information please see our terms of service and privacy policy Tell us here Your responses, which can be anonymous, are secure as the form is encrypted and only the Guardian has access to your contributions. We will only use the data you provide us for the purpose of the feature and we will delete any personal data when we no longer require it for this purpose. For true anonymity please use our SecureDrop service instead. What is your name? Where do you live (city, state and country)? Tell us a bit about the kind act you've experienced? Where and when did this encounter take place? Can we publish your response? Yes, entirely Yes, but contact me first Yes, but please keep me anonymous No, this is information only Are you comfortable with a journalist contacting you about this story for potential publication? Yes No What is your phone number? Optional Your contact details are helpful so we can contact you for more information. They will only be seen by the Guardian. What is your email address Your contact details are helpful so we can contact you for more information. They will only be seen by the Guardian. By submitting your response, you are agreeing to share your details with us for this feature. Submit Show more
If you’re having trouble using the form click here. Read terms of service here and privacy policy here | {
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a991305cb6c9dbbb0c48c9498829fe5e | Dove, London: ‘inventive, unusual, tantalising’ – restaurant review
Dove, 31 Kensington Park Road, London W11 2EU (020 7043 1400; dove.london). Starters £4-£16; mains £12-£33; wine from £35
I am a potentially dull person to eat with. However much I love and relish food, food is not my friend and I have a host of verbotens, ranging from garlic, onion and chives, which for me are headache-inducing, to butter, which I have always hated. Each meal in a new restaurant where I’m not familiar with the idiosyncrasies of the menu begins, “Do you have anything without garlic?” My meal might end up seeming plain to an onlooker, but this plainness divulges so many nuanced flavours – a grilled chop floods my nervous system with relaxing endorphins. The pleasure of eating something that agrees with me is in itself a huge delight.
View image in fullscreen ‘Somehow cloudlike’: raw scallop, finger lime, chicken salt, potato cake Photograph: Sophia Evans/The Observer
Offered the chance to be a restaurant critic for a day, my first thought was who would be the most fun to invite as my date. A sadly long-departed film producer friend called Hercules Bellville – Hercy – pronounced that the most important thing about a restaurant was the amount of space between the tables. In his book, food came about third on the list. I agree in part – for me the thing that matters most is the atmosphere.
But my number one priority is who I get to converse with, and how much they will enjoy all the things denied to me that I can vicariously experience. For the last 10 years I have been going for lunch with the brilliant fashion journalist Tim Blanks. He has taken me for birthday lunches at our local Japanese. We have discussed music, fashion and politics in great detail. He normally drinks the most fabulous-sounding concoctions while I benefit from the contact high.
View image in fullscreen ‘Insanely good; feather-light’: potato pizzette with mortadella. Photograph: Sophia Evans/The Observer
Tim accepted my offer of lunch at chef-owner Jackson Boxer’s new restaurant Dove on Ladbroke Grove’s Kensington Park Road in London, which opened in early January; we were already fans of its previous incarnation, the seafood restaurant Orasay, which occupied the same spot and closed on New Year’s Eve 2024. Someone told me that Dove has this incredible burger on the menu made from 50-day dry-aged beef, with gorgonzola on top. They only make something like 15 portions per day and they sell out within minutes. We missed them, but there were other tantalising delicacies to deliberate over.
Tim and I usually dawdle for hours, analysing the most recent fashion gossip and the current switcheroo creative director merry-go-round. He had to rush off sooner than usual to get an exclusive phone scoop direct from Haider Ackermann on his Tom Ford debut, so we ordered fast. A few weeks earlier Tim tripped on a tiny kerb differential and somehow managed to break his arm in three places and smash a few ribs. He started the meal with a glass of Château Cantemerle, a Bordeaux that doesn’t usually come by the glass and was one of the “Weekly Specials Pours By Glass” – so that was nice. I opted for a non-alcoholic drink called Jin Jin with lime and soda, which was slightly sweet and vinegary, which is something I adore and find delicious.
View image in fullscreen ‘Out of this world’: grilled wild sea bream with confit garlic and guindilla peppers. Photograph: Sophia Evans/The Observer
The menu at Dove is inventive with unusual combinations, which are tantalising even for me who is wary of too much artistry in cooking. Writing this a few hours later I wish I had ordered more dishes, but to start I opted for raw scallop, finger lime, chicken salt, potato cake.
Tim chose fried-potato pizzette, bonito, burrata, mortadella, but without the mortadella as he doesn’t eat meat, and I don’t like mortadella. Both of these starters were so light, with flavours that kept emerging and multiplying with every tiny bite. The potato bases of both were fried, but somehow cloudlike in their enhancing functions as a base. My morsels of scallops on top of the finger lime were so moreish and each taste was both exquisite and balanced, like an orchestral composition. What was relaxing, too, was the lack of annoyance or resistance we met with when asked to remove things like the mortadella from the potato pizzette, which was insanely good even without it: rich in taste and feather-light to consume.
View image in fullscreen ‘So much charm’: fior di latte soft serve with olive oil, and oat cookies. Photograph: Sophia Evans/The Observer
For our main we went for grilled wild sea bream, confit garlic (which I didn’t touch) and guindilla peppers for two. Looking around, I spied bowls of chunky-looking duck fat fries, so we ordered them, too, with a bitter leaf salad. The sea bream arrived, opened and flat with its head flattened like a hammerhead shark. The addition of a few elegant guindilla peppers scattered over it turned it into a scene from a meal in Breaking Bad. This fish was out of this world, so fresh and light it fell off under the fork, which was good for Tim’s left-hand manoeuvring. It was so tasty and flavoursome that we barely bothered with the chips (unheard of). The bitter leaf salad was as high class an arrangement of leaves as you could get, but again the fish… Tim said the confit garlic didn’t really add anything, but it was because the bream didn’t need anything.
For pudding we both ordered Estate Dairy fior di latte soft serve, early harvest olive oil, oat cookies and a coffee cardamom caramel cream to share. The fior di latte ice-cream arrived like two Mr Whippy’s, with a light sheen of pale olive oil adorning its ripples like tiny rivulets. It almost didn’t matter what it tasted like, it had so much charm – though it was daintily appetising and freezing, accompanied by warm, just-baked oatmeal cookies. The pièce de résistance was the tiny little bomb of flavour that was the coffee cardamom caramel: sweet but not sweet, the texture like a memory from a 19th-century novel. It hit the heart and woke up your appetite all over again. It made you crazy with desire. That is a real art in cooking.
View image in fullscreen ‘Texture like a memory from a 19th-century novel’: cardamon caramel cream. Photograph: Sophia Evans/The Observer
The food at Dove is amazing. The décor is simple and elegant; light floods in from the windows at the front, and further in there is a roof light that makes for soft, flattering, European-style ambience. The staff who work there are attentive, efficient, friendly and no one asked us whether we were enjoying our meal. | {
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939762871bbb631cedba2742630e682d | Are there more pips in lemons than there used to be?
Are there more pips in lemons than their used to be? That’s definitely my impression. What’s going on? Andrea Wilson, Manchester
Post your answers (and new questions) below or send them to [email protected]. A selection will be published next Sunday. | {
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44a4785737d4d643a100ad08c85e9c3c | Castles, causeways and crab sandwiches in Northumberland
1 Craster, a short drive from Alnwick, is a charming fishing village with a rugged coastline, crashing waves and bracing coastal walks. It is also a foodie delight. The Jolly Fisherman (thejollyfishermancraster.co.uk) is ideally placed to enjoy the sea views. In its airy conservatory at the back of the pub, you can tuck into a feast of fresh fish on the daily menu, including crab, North Sea prawns, moules frites, salmon &and haddock fishcakes. Outside the pub, you’ll notice a distinctive smoky aroma, no surprise as the shop opposite, L Robson & Sons, is home to the kipper, smoking fish on its site since 1856 and now awarded grade 11-II listed status.
2 Chances are that a stay in Northumberland will include rain, which is when Bamburgh Castle (bamburghcastle.com) really comes into its own. Less overrun with tourists than Alnwick, it’s also cheaper. Overlooking an epic sweep of beach and perched above the sand dunes, this 900-old castle has 14 rooms to explore, from the medieval kitchen to the Victorian Kings Hall, along with a fascinating history from its Norman origins to the current family living there.
View image in fullscreen Fishing pots stacked at Craster harbour. Photograph: Alamy
3 Idyllically pretty Warkworth village is the perfect base for exploring the coastline, with a quaint high street, regency cottages and a castle on the hill. It’s also a 15-minute walk to a stunning beach. Along this vast, sandy – and surprisingly empty – sweep of coastline you’ll find neighbouring Alnmouth, another picturesque village with dunes and grassland overlooking the bay. Head for Main Street with its cosy tearooms and pubs; a local favourite is the mahogany panelled Red Lion Inn, although the fresh crab sandwiches at Bistro 23 are well worth a detour, too (bistro23.co.uk).
4 For something distinctly less quaint, more mysterious and otherworldly, head to Holy Island. The drive across the causeway is reason enough to visit – the narrow strip of land, submerged by sea during high tide, is flat, desolate and eerily beautiful. There’s much else besides; the 12th-century Lindisfarne priory, the epicentre of Christianity in Anglo Saxon times, and Lindisfarne castle perched on a rocky plateau. Don’t miss Pilgrims Gelato, part of the Oat Kitchen on the main street (theoatkitchen.co.uk), with homemade vegan ice-cream and sorbets well worth the regular queues.
View image in fullscreen Lindisfarne Priory, founded by St Aidan in AD635. Photograph: Gannet77/Getty Images
5 Hadrian’s Wall stretches 73 miles coast to coast, from the River Tyne in the east to the Solway Firth in the west. Inland, Steel’s Rigg near Sycamore Gap, has some of the best views along the wall, including ancient Roman ruins and a glacial lake. For a treat at the end of your walk is the Twice Brewed Inn (twicebrewedinn.co.uk) – their Sycamore Gap pale ale and fishfinger sandwiches are highly recommended.
6 Stay at the Old Stables, nestled in the curve of the River Coquet and right next to Warkworth’s bucolic church green. It is stylishly restored and converted with exposed brick and double-height kitchen giving it a loft-style feel. (The Old Stables (seven nights from £860, two bedrooms, sleeps four; sykescottages.co.uk.) | {
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f2111370877360d3c08f529517c24b8d | Can my marriage recover from my sex addiction?
The question I am a man in my mid-50s, living with my wife and our children. Two years ago, I admitted to an affair, texting sex workers, watching porn and checking out women in public. I was not upfront with my wife and it badly affected her self-worth. Since then, I have been in therapy and some childhood issues have come to light around secrecy, lying and feeling unlovable. But I take responsibility for my actions. We have also done couples’ counselling and spent two difficult years working through it all while raising the family.
In recent months, things have been better. Trust has been rebuilding, we’ve felt closer and the future felt hopeful. But last week she caught me looking at a woman on the street in a way that upset her. I lied about it at first, then admitted it later. It reopened all the old wounds and I’m angry at myself for repeating the same damaging behaviours around dishonesty and ogling.
She now says she plans to leave me when the children finish school in two years unless I can show her I’ve really changed. She says she doesn’t care what I do in that time because it’s how she protects herself. I feel anxious that we’ll drift further apart as she shuts down.
Should I respect her need for distance and trust that change might shift something for us both? Or are we better off ending the relationship now so I can do the work independently without hurting her more?
Philippa’s answer You say you feel anxious and unsteady, I can understand that. You have worked hard to rebuild trust after doing significant damage to your relationship. The two of you have invested a great deal in trying to repair what was broken and just as things were beginning to feel better you broke the agreement again.
You know this. You have already said as much. What you are now facing is the consequence of that. Not the punishment, but the consequence. Your wife has taken a step back to protect herself. She has said she doesn’t care what you do. That sounds like she is withdrawing emotionally in order to manage the pain. You say you feel anxious this will lead to further distance and disconnection. That is possible. But this is not something you can control. Your job now is not to manage her feelings but to focus on your own behaviour. That includes facing what happens in the moment you are confronted. That is where the damage often lands. You looked. Then you lied. That pattern is familiar to you. You say you are angry at yourself and want to change. That is the work in front of you.
She has set out what she needs in order to feel safe. It might help to take her at her word. Not in the sense of treating the two years like a probation, or trying to convince her of anything, but by continuing to work on yourself without the expectation of a guaranteed outcome. If she sees change, she might stay. If not, she might not. Either way, the changes you need to make are about you becoming the partner – and the person – you would rather be. Not just for her, but for yourself, too.
You seem to find it hard to live with an uncertain future, but clarity is not something you are owed at this moment
You also ask whether it would be better to separate now so that you can do this work alone. It sounds like you find it hard to live with an uncertain future. It may be that your anxiety is pushing you to seek clarity, one way or another. But clarity is not something you are owed at this moment. You have hurt someone who trusted you and who took a risk to rebuild something with you. She has pulled away as a way of managing her own safety. It is not easy, but it is understandable.
You might also find it helpful to seek support that goes beyond individual therapy. There are groups such as Sex Addicts Anonymous that offer structured peer support for those struggling with compulsive sexual behaviours, including pornography and affairs. Exploring more of your own relationship with sex and intimacy in therapy might also help. This is not about shame. It is about understanding your patterns and making space for something different.
I recommend doing some research about how trust is rebuilt after betrayal, and how habitual behaviours can be understood and changed. Out of the Doghouse by Robert Weiss is written for men who want to rebuild trust after infidelity. If compulsive patterns around sex and secrecy are part of what you are addressing, Your Brain on Porn by Gary Wilson explores how certain behaviours take hold and what it takes to shift them. Neither book replaces therapy, but both can help you make sense of what has happened and support you.
Whether the two of you stay together or not, change that is genuine will serve you. You are not powerless here. The relationship may or may not survive, but the work on your integrity, your truthfulness and your awareness is yours to do.
Every week Philippa Perry addresses a personal problem sent in by a reader.
If you would like advice from Philippa, please send your problem to [email protected]. Submissions are subject to our terms and conditions | {
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52676b4c022baa0066133c769db92a35 | Tell us: have you been inspired to declare your love inspired by a piece of art?
The Guardian’s Saturday magazine is looking for people who declared their love after being inspired by a certain song, book, TV show or film. Did you confess your feelings for your best friend after watching When Harry Met Sally? Did you propose after seeing Four Weddings and a Funeral? Did you decide to have a baby with your partner after reading The Argonauts?
We’re looking for funny, unexpected love stories – and they don’t have to have happy endings. Maybe you married the wrong person, and now you realise that all that really held you together was a deep and undying love of The Arctic Monkeys? Perhaps Fleabag made you proposition your priest? | {
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"title": "Tell us: have you been inspired to declare your love inspired by a piece of art?",
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8793c520308bc45d56e5bfa9cb11f145 | Share a tip on food and drink finds in France
There’s no denying great food and drink make a holiday – and we want to know about your under-the-radar finds in France. Perhaps it was the menu du jour in a hidden bistro in a Paris suburb, wine tasting at a family vineyard in Provence, eating oyster from a shack on the Brittany coast, or an outstanding mountain hut restaurant loved by the locals. Tell us where it was, what you ate or drank and why it was so special for the chance to win a £200 Coolstays voucher.
If you have a relevant photo, do send it in – but it’s your words that will be judged for the competition.
Keep your tip to about 100 words
The best tip of the week, chosen by Tom Hall of Lonely Planet, will win a £200 voucher to stay at a Coolstays property – the company has more than 3,000 worldwide. The best tips will appear in the Guardian Travel section and website.
We’re sorry, but for legal reasons you must be a UK resident to enter this competition.
The competition closes on 21 April at 9am BST
Have a look at our past winners and other tips
Read the terms and conditions here | {
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71df6d30e982a02554bc77e5489c8bcb | Share how changing US tariffs may affect your business
China has raised tariffs on US imports to 125% in an escalation of the trade dispute between the world’s two largest economies.
US tariffs on Chinese goods now total 145%, while most other countries, including the UK, have maintained a 10% tariff on goods following Donald Trump’s announcements on Wednesday pausing “reciprocal” tariffs for 90 days.
We’d like to find out how the changing tariffs are impacting your business in the UK and elsewhere. How are you being affected? How are you dealing with the uncertainty? What are your main concerns? | {
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66e410ec8315025b2ba7e239030960e9 | People in the UK: have you moved away from the city and now returned?
Data analysis from the property website Rightmove has found that London is once again the most searched-for location on the website, and the majority (58%) of people living there are looking to stay rather than to leave.
This is a a reverse from five years ago, when in the early months of Covid lockdowns, would-be house buyers were looking for a move to coastal and rural areas as a bigger garden, access to nature and more room for home working became the priorities.
However now many companies require staff to be more present in the office and some who moved out of the city have experienced buyers remorse. | {
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"title": "People in the UK: have you moved away from the city and now returned?",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/money/2025/apr/09/tell-us-have-you-moved-away-from-the-city-uk-and-now-returned"
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c90c41ed3b5ea6358c338634d2b10056 | ‘Sell America’: investors are increasingly avoiding the US – here’s what it means for Australian markets
At the same time as Australians are cutting back on plans to visit the US under Donald Trump, a new type of investment strategy designed to avoid America is fast gaining popularity.
The “sell America trade”, an expression that barely existed before Trump spooked markets by unveiling his new tariff regime late on 2 April, is now a common expression among traders and appears regularly in investment notes to explain the day’s price movements.
Given what happens in the US affects global markets, the emerging strategy could have a significant impact on Australia.
What is the ‘sell America trade’? For decades, the US has been viewed as a reliable place to invest, be it through shares, currency or bonds. That view soured when the tariff program was revealed, and then partly revoked, triggering a tumultuous period that pushed markets around in extreme bouts of fear and relief. Trump’s tariffs are rattling Australian markets. Here’s what not to do to protect your investments Read more Investors are still unsure if some exemptions, such as those applied to smartphones, laptops and other electronic products from import tariffs on China, will prove short-lived, amplifying uncertainty. The volatility has convinced many investors to sell an assortment of US assets and direct their money to more stable markets elsewhere, in a strategy now known as the “sell America trade”. Sign up for the Afternoon Update: Election 2025 email newsletter Peter Dragicevich, a Sydney-based currency strategist at Corpay, said investor confidence in the US has been shaken. “It’s not a complete loss of confidence, but it has been shaken by the chopping and changing in terms of US policy,” said Dragicevich. “There’s more economic risk in the US now and policy uncertainty from the Trump administration, so that’s going to dampen that demand for capital to find its way into the US markets.”
Which assets are affected? There was an unusual moment at the height of trade tensions when US government bonds, traditionally seen as one of the world’s safest financial assets, were sold off. The US dollar, another safe haven, also lost value, as did American equities. This meant two safe-haven assets and one risk asset – shares – all fell at the same time, rather than moving in different directions as they typically do. The message was clear; investors were fleeing America. “This odd combination of market moves points to a widespread rejection of US assets,” says Ryan Swift, a US bond strategist at BCA Research. Swift says the trade war has damaged consumer and business confidence enough to “push the US economy into recession within the next few months”. Omkar Joshi, chief investment officer at Sydney-headquartered Opal Capital Management, says the US is “not a market that feels very stable”. “There’s a bit of a ‘sell America’ shift evolving,” Joshi says. Donald Trump’s tariffs are disrupting markets around the world – here’s why it could be hurting your super Read more Trump’s subsequent backdown on many of the supersized tariffs offered some relief to markets, although enormous volatility remains. Against this backdrop, the Australian dollar has surged in recent days against a weak greenback, recovering all of its recent losses. Other currencies, such as the euro and the pound, have strongly outperformed the US dollar over the past month, in what could be interpreted as a vote of no confidence in the American economy. Such currency movements could persist should the “sell America trade” gain momentum. | {
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2c7ac1419127b89e7c2cf16a9e750429 | ‘My daughter just loves you’: stars of One Zoo Three have high hopes for Hertfordshire
Outside the enclosure, eager visitors jostle for a glimpse of the rare Asiatic lions Sahee and Sonika, Hertfordshire Zoo’s newest residents. The beasts yawn imperiously in the sun, every twitch of their tails sparking an excited murmur.
But when Aaron, Tyler and Cam Whitnall are spotted, the animals are instantly forgotten. The stars of children’s BBC programme One Zoo Three, are tenderly, but relentlessly, mobbed. “We got up at 5am to drive here,” explains one delighted, if bleary-eyed dad. “My daughter just loves you.”
She is not the only one. The three brothers have become stars of children’s TV since the first series about their lives on their family zoo aired in 2000. But four decades after their grandparents bought “the worst zoo in the UK”, they have their sights on becoming a world-leading conservation organisation.
“We want to be a beacon of hope here,” says Tyler, the middle brother, recovering from the adoration with a cup of tea in Zoo HQ. “One day we want to be known as the best zoo in the UK, up there with Chester, and a leader in terms of education, wildlife conservation, sustainability. We literally want to be at the top.”
It’s a big ambition. Hertfordshire Zoo is small, even by UK standards, with about 1,000 animals across 16 acres – by comparison, Chester has at least 37,000 animals over its 128-acre site. But as the home of One Zoo Three, its footprint in the online world and children’s imaginations is outsized – and its presence on the global stage is growing.
“We’ve got our fingers in every pie,” says Cameron, the youngest of the brothers, who admits to finding it a “bit awkward” when mums approach him about the show in the pub.
The trio rolled out their fifth season of One Zoo Three last year, and the corporation added the show to BBC Bitesize, its educational offering for schools. On the conservation front, the zoo has recently protected penguins in South Africa, released rehabilitated lions back into the wild in Uganda and brought five traumatised lions from the war zone in Ukraine to their sister site the Big Cat Sanctuary in Kent. It is also moving into research and preservation, recently signing a deal with Nature’s Safe, a wildlife biobank to cryopreserve skin and semen samples.
In the Easter holidays the busy zoo – with its colourful information boards, rammed play parks and regular talks – is a far cry from the bleak site that Peter and Grace Sampson, the brothers’ grandparents, bought in 1984 to build a depot for their successful coach company.
It looked “as if a hurricane had gone through it” says the boys’ mother and zoo chief executive Lynn Whitnall. Animals were living in inhumane conditions. Footage from the old zoo shows a chimp dressed in human clothes, with a chain around its neck, smoking a cigarette. Its main attraction, a lion called Bobby, was kept in a small enclosure with a corrugated iron roof and had never felt grass under his feet.
Plans for the depot went out of the window. “The love of the animals took over,” says Lynn. After closing for 18 months and pulling in favours from coach drivers and mechanics to build new enclosures, the zoo was given a licence and opened as Paradise Park and Woodland Zoo in Easter 1986.
“People weren’t really all that supportive, especially within the zoo profession,” says Aaron. “They kind of saw the family as outsiders.”
skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to Down to Earth Free weekly newsletter The planet's most important stories. Get all the week's environment news - the good, the bad and the essential Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion
Many of the original animals had been rescued from closing circuses, and the family pulled every business lever from hospitality to animal petting to fund new habitats. After decades of investment and supporting conservation projects, the zoo’s reputation has “come a full 180”, he says. “Since Covid, we’ve had more zoo directors and important people from within the world of conservation visit us than we did in the 20 years before.”
By any reckoning, growing up on site at the zoo gave the brothers an extraordinary childhood. When Cam, the youngest, got in a grump he would go and sit with the monkeys. Aaron slept with a rescued lioness cub who had been rejected by her family for several months. “We wouldn’t do it now, but after hours we would just go and sit in with the meerkats or the porcupines or the tapirs in the evenings,” says Cam.
Those moments fired their passion to share a love of wildlife – either through experiences in the zoo, through the show or in their hyperactive social media output, says Tyler.
At a moment when vast swathes of natural habitats are being destroyed by human development and the climate crisis – according to the most recent figures, wildlife populations have plunged by an average of 69% between 1970 and 2018. The brothers admit to a heavy feeling of responsibility, but argue that showing what good zoos can do – and making kids laugh, care and have hope – is critical to the conservation fight.
“The way we’ve grown up is getting close to animals, that’s how we’ve fallen in love with them,” he says. “Sharing the wonder of wildlife is our slogan for a reason.” | {
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0f2e07a96db3710a6188222d3becc412 | ‘I just ask God that he’s OK’: family of Venezuelan musician sent to El Salvador prison agonizes over his fate
In a recording studio in downtown Santiago, where the dad she has never met once sung, a four-month-old baby girl snuggles in her mother’s arms, noise-cancelling earmuffs shielding her tiny ears from the sound.
Nahiara Rubí Suárez Sánchez is equally oblivious to the plight of her father, a Venezuelan musician who is thought to be languishing in a maximum-security prison thousands of miles away in El Salvador after being swept up in Donald Trump’s anti-migrant crusade.
Arturo Suárez Trejo, 33, is one of more than 200 Venezuelan men sent to the Central American country from the US, accused by Trump’s administration – with no evidence – of being terrorists, rapists and gang members.
More than a month later, Suárez’s relatives – who insist he is innocent – remain completely in the dark about his whereabouts, his wellbeing or how long he might be trapped behind bars.
View image in fullscreen Arturo Suárez, a Venezuelan musician deported from North Carolina to the notorious Cecot prison in El Salvador. Photograph: Cristóbal Olivares/The Guardian
“Right now I have no idea what’s happening to him – I just ask God that he’s OK,” said Suárez’s 27-year-old wife, a fellow Venezuelan called Nathali Sánchez, who lives with their child in Chile’s capital. “If something happens to my husband, I will hold Donald Trump and [El Salvador’s president] Nayib Bukele responsible.”
Critics have decried Trump’s decision to banish asylum seekers and immigrants to a jail in an authoritarian foreign land as part of a disturbing democratic backslide in one of the world’s largest democracies. “This is the beginning of an American policy of state terror,” the historian and author Timothy Snyder recently warned.
For Suárez’s loved ones, the policy represents an emotional sucker punch that follows years of hardship after they, like nearly 8 million Venezuelans, fled economic and political turmoil in their South American homeland.
“[It’s] fucked up, man,” said Denys Zambrano, a rapper known as Nyan who became one of Suárez’s best friends in Santiago after they migrated there from different parts of Venezuela.
Suárez’s elder brother, Nelson, said they had left Venezuela in 2016 after joining anti-government demonstrations that were sweeping the country amid food shortages and hyperinflation. For challenging Nicolás Maduro’s government, the siblings were threatened by armed pro-regime gangs called colectivos.
View image in fullscreen Soldiers stand guard outside the Cecot prison in Tecoluca, El Salvador, on 4 April. Photograph: José Cabezas/Reuters
“It was a really difficult time,” recalled Nelson Suárez, 35, whose brother relocated to Cartagena and Bogotá, in Colombia, before moving to Chile, where hundreds of thousands of uprooted Venezuelans have migrated over the past decade. Nelson Suárez headed north to the US.
In Santiago, Arturo Suárez built a new life, fixing fridges as he chased his dream of becoming a famous singer-songwriter, under the stage name is SuarezVzla. He became a relentless promoter of Venezuelan music, founding an event called Urban Fresh to showcase budding reggaeton and trap stars. “Arturo’s my mentor,” said Mariangelica Camacho, 20, a dancer and singer who fled Venezuela with her parents at age 14 and whose career he helped launch.
At one gig he met his future wife.
But making ends meet was a struggle, particularly after the Covid pandemic hammered Chile’s economy. Last May, Suárez decided to join his brother in North Carolina and embarked on a five-month odyssey to the US that involved crossing the treacherous jungles of the Darién Gap between Colombia and Panama.
Sánchez, who was pregnant, decided not to risk the journey having suffered a miscarriage the previous year, and remained in Santiago. Before setting off from their shoebox apartment looking out across the Andes, Suárez wrote a message to his “lioness” and his unborn child on a whiteboard hanging over her cot. “Soon we’ll be together again,” it says. “I love you both with all my life.”
By September, after two months toiling in a Mexico City tortilla shop, Suárez reached the southern border, crossing into San Diego after making an immigration appointment on the Biden-era smartphone app called CBP One. From there he made a beeline for New Bern, North Carolina, where he found work as a handyman, mowing lawns and cleaning pools to support baby Nahiara, who was born in early December.
But Suárez’s American dream quickly crumbled. In February, three weeks after Trump’s inauguration, he was detained by immigration officials while making a music video in Raleigh. After a stint in an Atlanta detention centre, he was moved to Texas and then – to his family’s horror – sent to El Salvador after being told he was being deported to Venezuela.
View image in fullscreen Nathali Sanchez, the wife of Arturo Suárez, on 16 April. Photograph: Cristóbal Olivares/The Guardian
On 16 March, 24 hours after Suárez was incarcerated in Bukele’s terrorism confinement centre (Cecot), Sánchez spotted her shaven-headed husband in a propaganda photo released by the Central American country’s government. She recognized him because of tattoos on his neck and thigh and a childhood scar on his scalp. “I felt like the world had collapsed on top of me,” Sánchez said. Since then she has heard nothing and, in her darkest moments, fears he may not even still be alive.
“We’ve lost all communication,” said Krubick Izarra, 26, a music producer who is godmother to the couple’s child.
Trump’s El Salvador deportations – which activists call enforced disappearances – have grim echoes in Latin America, where such tactics were common during the US-backed dictatorships of the 1970s and 80s.
skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to This Week in Trumpland Free newsletter A deep dive into the policies, controversies and oddities surrounding the Trump administration Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion
In Santiago, a brutalist museum commemorates the hundreds of people spirited into custody during Gen Augusto Pinochet’s 17-year regime – most never to return. “Nobody believed that in Chile people could disappear,” reads an entry in a picture book displayed in one exhibition room about the dictatorship’s dungeons.
Half a century later, campaigners say the scores of Venezuelans sent to El Salvador find themselves in a similar void, deprived of contact with their families and lawyers, without due process and, in most cases, never having been convicted of any crime.
“It’s a legal black hole – and in that legal black hole, I think it’s unlikely the families should expect a judicial remedy,” said Noah Bullock, the director of Cristosal, a rights group which has spent the last three years denouncing the plight of the 85,000 Salvadoran citizens incarcerated as part of Bukele’s hardline anti-gang crackdown. At least 368 of them have died as a result of torture, according to the Cristosal’s count.
View image in fullscreen Friends of Arturo Suárez rehearse a music event that Suárez was planning remotely from the US before he was sent to El Salvador by the Trump administration. Photograph: Cristóbal Olivares/The Guardian
Bullock believed the fate of prisoners such as Suárez hinged on whether it was “politically viable” for Trump and Bukele to keep them behind bars, despite mounting evidence of their innocence. “The only option for them, I think, is public advocacy and building sufficient political pressure for their freedom,” he said.
Making noise is something Suárez’s musician friends in Santiago are good at.
One evening last week, they gathered in a rehearsal room to practise for their latest concert and defend a man they called a cheery, kindhearted, teetotal dreamer whose only crime was seeking a better life.
“Arturo has never harmed anyone – and he certainly isn’t a terrorist,” said Heberth Veliz, a 29-year-old musician who suspected his friend had been targeted because of his numerous tattoos, which include a tribute to his late mother, a map of Venezuela, a palm tree, some musical notes and the phrase “The future will be brilliant.”
Veliz, whose body is also covered in tattoos, said he struggled to contain his anger when he saw the US president on television smearing Suárez as “the worst of the worst”. “I feel like jumping into the screen and slapping him so he stops talking nonsense. ‘Shut up, Trump! You don’t know what you’re talking about!’” he fumed, although he admitted he was not surprised by his friend’s treatment. “Everyone knows that the most ruthless people wear suits and ties,” he said.
Cradling baby Nahiara in a pink shawl, Sánchez said she was determined to stay strong for the sake of her daughter and her absent husband. “It’s up to me to be the pillar of the family now,” she declared, vowing to continue denouncing her husband’s capture. “When he gets out, I want him to see that I didn’t give up – and I want him to feel proud.”
View image in fullscreen Nathali Sanchez at her home with her four-month-old daughter, Nahiara, in Santiago, Chile, on 16 April. Photograph: Cristóbal Olivares/The Guardian
Speaking from the US, Nelson Suárez said he believed Trump was using innocent Venezuelans such as his sibling as “guinea pigs” to show off to his base. He felt “morally and psychologically shattered” by his disappearance.
“I always wanted my brother to become world famous,” Suárez said. “But not like this, you know?” | {
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69e757ab81ef1bdf8545ff8fb5a3ebd6 | Liverpool academic’s scent workshops help prisoners remember their past
“Smell it, but don’t stick your nose straight in it,” says Michael O’Shaughnessy, pulling a small white card, sealed twice in ziplock bags, out of a metal chest. “Waft it, close your eyes. Does it remind you of anything?”
O’Shaughnessy, an illustrator and senior lecturer at Liverpool John Moores University, first began using smells with art students, asking them “to develop projects and concepts” based on scents “because it’s a leveller”.
“You’ve got kids who are bright and they can run with design, illustration projects,” he added. “But this project in particular, I noticed that the clever kids didn’t always respond more effectively than the kids who may be mixed ability.”
He was running a similar workshop for the public at Tate Liverpool when he was approached by a prison education provider, who asked if he would fancy trying to run one in jail. “I was fascinated,” he said. “I really wanted to do it.”
Now, his prison workshops, named Perfume Stories, have been so successful that he has trained in-house staff to deliver the workshops. O’Shaughnessy sources the scents himself and volunteers his time to teach.
View image in fullscreen Participants in the workshops write down their memories after smelling certain scents. Photograph: Christopher Thomond/The Guardian
Participants are given small white cards, which have been doused in perfume. They are asked to smell them and use that scent as a springboard to create prose, a poem or – if they are less comfortable with writing – a drawing.
“The thing about smell is that you don’t have to be clever to have that memory; that’s your memory,” O’Shaughnessy said – those who may not have excelled in school may have a more developed sense of smell than others who did.
O’Shaughnessy chooses the fragrances he works with carefully; he wants to invoke positive memories, and take prisoners back to happier times. “I avoid certain very heavily masculine smells, in case any of them have had bad male experiences,” he said.
At the end of the session, he asks the students to write a single observation on a sticky note. “Opening brand new toy soldiers on Christmas Day. Good times as a kid. 53 years ago,” one inmate wrote.
Others recalled holidays, smelling the roses on walks in the park with a dog or spending their pocket money on trips to the sweet shop. Some say the workshop brought back memories of parents, children or former partners.
“This smell reminded me of being at my nan’s as a young kid, messing around with all the creams, perfumes and hair oil on her chest of drawers,” another wrote. “This memory takes me back to the ages of seven, eight, nine, and 10, and is a memory I’ve never actually thought of before.”
Perfume Stories is mainly used in English lessons, but at HMP Holme House in Stockton-On-Tees, O’Shaughnessy’s project has been used across the curriculum, in hospitality, business studies and barbering.
In hospitality, food scents were used to help learners to recall specific dishes from their childhoods, with them then drawing up a bistro menu inspired by their memories. These included dishes named after their inspiration, such as “Nana Betty’s hotpot”.
View image in fullscreen Michael O’Shaughnessy was approached by a prison education provider after running scent workshops in art galleries. Photograph: Christopher Thomond/The Guardian
In business studies, learners considered how scents can be used in marketing, and to drive purchasing.
“Learners gain a great deal of skills from it, from debating skills, to writing skills, to analysis skills,” an education manager at the prison said. “It has been a great project used at Holme House, and the learners always engage well in it.”
As he sought to expand his work, O’Shaughnessy approached some of the biggest fragrance houses across the globe, hoping to find collaborators for his project. While initially he had little success, he found help closer to home, from Carvansons, a bespoke perfume creator in Haslingden, Lancashire.
“Basically we were the only ones that responded,” said Vicki Last, the company’s marketing manager. “He sent out his advertising portfolio and some of the work he’d been working on, and said: would you be interested in just even talking about it?”
Carvansons has produced several bespoke fragrances for O’Shaughnessy, which he has used in his workshops. One of the many smells in his silver chest, requested by a member of staff at a prison in the north-east, was “tomatoes ripening in a greenhouse”. Another scent, that he bought from a company in Los Angeles, was “box-fresh trainers”.
When asked what prison smells like, O’Shaughnessy responded enthusiastically: “I’ve got the smell of prison!”
He added: “I think it’s like a room which has had no air, and it’s had roast beef made in it, left for weeks, and it’s got that musty old food smell, no air smell.
“It’s got like an animalistic thing at the heart. “It’s a combination of old sweat, beef, and it’s very distinctive, but it’s not nice.” | {
"authors": [
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"title": "Liverpool academic’s scent workshops help prisoners remember their past",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/apr/20/liverpool-academic-scent-workshops-help-prisoners-remember-their-past"
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65b5eca460ad589eae6d6fdf40bfbd74 | Noble cause: meet the drag kings holding court in Australia’s queer spaces
It’s just past 11pm on a warm Wednesday night at Sircuit bar in Smith Street Collingwood, in Melbourne’s inner north. The venue is filling up with an assorted crowd of predominantly punky and boyish-looking people of all genders. There’s no shortage of fauxhawks, baseball caps and mullets in the room.
Holi Dae Knight, introducing the drag king show tonight called SlayBoy, has just taken to the stage in a green sequined dress, hot pink hair and a full moustache and bushy beard performing Cher’s Believe. It’s the last night of a three week season of SlayBoy and the crowd is here to see drag kings. The first performers are Justin Sider and Johnny Cocksville doing a version of Right Said Fred’s I’m Too Sexy – they strut wildly on stage simulating raunchiness but it’s all in good fun.
Randy Roy takes to the stage about midnight in a homemade blue Nineteen Eighty-Four-inspired boiler suit embroidered with eyeballs and beautiful fine-lined blue and red makeup on top of a white face mask and flowing ponytails performing to Pink Floyd’s Comfortably Numb that then morphs midtrack into Dream Police by Cheap Trick as Roy crawls and gyrates between heavy metal hair flicking and air-guitar solos.
Welcome to the world of drag kings – a movement that has a strong history in Melbourne but is now experiencing something of a DIY renaissance in Melbourne and Sydney underground bars and clubs, including a regular Sydney monthly Genesis night hosted by Magnus Opium, and regular drag king nights at the Fox hotel, UBQ and Cafe Gummo in Melbourne.
View image in fullscreen Mirror, mirror … Belial B’Zarr (L) and Randy Roy backstage at Sircuit. Photograph: Penny Stephens/The Guardian
Roy says he got into drag via cosplay – after cosplaying a lot of men he realised that he especially enjoyed the transformation aspect. “Even before that, going to an all girls school meant that sometimes girls would be playing boys in drama and dance classes, and I was always the boy. And for some reason I enjoyed it a lot too – which I later realised was perhaps an early sign that I was transgender.”
Roy says the current wave of drag kings shows are mostly produced and hosted in a DIY fashion by the performers themselves.
“Are there more shows being produced and hosted by drag kings at the moment? Absolutely,” he says.
“But on the flip side, there’s less of a king presence integrated into the rest of the community, more of a divide when we used to have drag kings appear more often on lineups alongside queens.”
The term “drag king” was first cited in print in 1972 in the book The Queens’ Vernacular – a Gay Lexicon by Bruce Rodgers but early records of women dressing as men for performative purposes go back as far as the 7th century Tang dynasty in China, where the practice of female-men characters (or kunsheng) was common for stage performances.
In the west there are many notable performers such as British singer Vesta Tilley who performed between 1869 and 1920 as a male impersonator and the notable Stormé DeLarverie who performed in male drag throughout the 1950s and 60s and was credited as the original spark that ignited the stonewall riots in New York in June 1969.
View image in fullscreen Randy Roy eyes the crowd. Roy says it is up to the wider queer community to make more space for drag kings in their venue programming. Photograph: Penny Stephens/The Guardian
According to Australian drag king pioneer Sexy Galexy, the local drag king scene took off in the 1990s with Sydney pioneers like Divinyl, who created DKSY (Drag King Sydney at Arq nightclub) before establishing Kingki Kingdom and Moist in the early 2000s, after she had performed for many years in Perth throughout the 1990s.
“Back when I started out, there was no social media or mobile phones, we connected by going out and being part of our community,” Sexy Galexy says.
“The clubs, bars, and streets were alive with underground drag and creative energy, with plenty of venues to perform at. Drag kings were rare, especially ones doing glam drag like I was as far as I knew, I was the first. Women would dress up too, slipping on moustaches, becoming suave, sexy kings for the night, and with no cameras around, the scene felt private, raw, and wildly experimental.”
View image in fullscreen The Sircuit crowd cheers on a performer. Photograph: Penny Stephens/The Guardian
But it was in Melbourne that the strongest drag king scene emerged – with King Victoria, Melbourne’s popular drag king club that ran for 11 years between 2000 and 2011, claiming to be the longest-running weekly drag king club in the world. The club hosted more than 500 distinct cabaret events, featuring thousands of lesbian, trans, non-binary and queer artists, with both local and international performers.
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According to Bumpy Favell, cofounder of King Victoria, it was while running a female-centred queer night called Club Core at Salon Kitty in Melbourne that they had a lightbulb moment realising their masc and trans identifying friends had nowhere to perform, so they incorporated a drag king competition into Salon Kitty.
“The first heat of the drag king competition at Salon Kitty was packed. It had a 150 venue capacity and over 500 people lining up outside the door.”
View image in fullscreen Belial B’Zarr and Justin Sider run through their routine before the show. Photograph: Penny Stephens/The Guardian
After the success of these competitions, Favell established the weekly King Victoria nights at the Star Hotel in Collingwood. “Anyone who wanted to be a drag king could have at least one go. People would come to the technical run through looking shy and drab and as soon as they got their moustache on they were strutting – defiant, proud, funny and sexy.”
Although encouraged to see the more underground, DIY resurgence of drag kings today, Favell has also noticed some differences in the way drag kings present themselves now.
“The main thing I’ve noticed is many drag kings now do a lot heavier drag queen style makeup. They don’t necessarily pack or bind like we religiously did. I think around 2000 when we started, lesbians and queer/trans people felt very separate from the dominant world, and we used to make fun of everything, create ridiculous stories about male tropes and heroes.”
View image in fullscreen Belial B’Zarr brings some sparkle to the stage during SlayBoy. Photograph: Penny Stephens/The Guardian
Roy says it is up to the wider queer community to make more space for drag kings in their venue programming.
“Queer venues and events often make statements about community and diversity, but at the end of the day the performers being spotlighted are what speaks the loudest.”
Author and historian Art Simone, who has recently published the book Drag Queens Down Under, says that despite the ongoing presence of drag kings on the fringes of queer culture, they remain relatively marginalised.
“With mainstream shows such as Drag Race still refusing to spotlight kings, they are forced to remain in the shadows of their big-wigged counterparts and keep knocking down the doors of opportunity.”
| {
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"title": "Noble cause: meet the drag kings holding court in Australia’s queer spaces",
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} |
3f8d9dae2e6ee994cb073336f786ce82 | Anti-Trump protesters in the US might look to the Czech Republic: ‘We are an example’
A former cold war communist dictatorship and component part of the Habsburg empire seems an unlikely source of hope for Donald Trump’s opponents.
One such country, Hungary, is often cited as the model for Trump’s no-holds-barred authoritarian assault on US institutions. Viktor Orbán, the central European country’s prime minister, has been a guest at the president’s Mar-a-Lago estate and has won Trump’s praise for transforming Hungary into an “illiberal state” that extols “traditional” values – and for projecting the kind of “strongman” persona the president admires.
Now in his fourth consecutive term, Orbán and his Fidesz party have captured state institutions, tamed the media and been successfully re-elected, despite periodic waves of anti-government mass protests – the most recent this week against an attempt to ban the annual Pride march.
It seems an ominous portent for Trump critics who took part Saturday in a second weekend of mass demonstrations, organized across 50 states by the 50501 group, following the “Hands Off” rallies staged in 1,000 locations across the US on 5 April.
Yet the contrasting political fate of one of Hungary’s neighbours with similar historical antecedents may provide a glimmer of hope for the prospects of mass protest laying foundations for a successful onslaught against Trump, leading to victory at the ballot box.
The Czech Republic – once part of what was cold war-era Czechoslovakia and, coincidentally, birthplace of Trump’s first wife, Ivana – is a possible blueprint for how street protest can bloom into a unified electoral strategy that eventually unseats a billionaire leader with autocratic aspirations and apparent scorn for democracy.
In 2018, a popular movement, Million Moments for Democracy, began organizing rallies in the Czech capital, Prague, and other cities to protest the anti-democratic tendencies of the country’s prime minister, Andrej Babiš, who had been labelled “the Czech Trump”.
View image in fullscreen A rally against the outgoing cabinet led by the Czech prime minister Andrej Babiš on 9 April 2018 in Prague. Photograph: Michal Čížek/AFP/Getty Images
Babiš, a billionaire oligarch who was the country’s second-richest person, had taken office as head of a coalition that relied on support from the remnants of the Czech communist party after his populist ANO (Action for Dissatisfied Citizens) party won the previous year’s election.
Opponents accused Babiš – whose sprawling Agrofert conglomerate controlled vast segments of the Czech economy and two of the country’s biggest newspapers – of fraud and multiple conflicts of interest, while abusing power to further enrich himself. There were also complaints about past ties – upheld in court, despite Babiš’s denials – to the communist secret police, the StB, for which he reportedly acted as an informer.
Early protests attracted crowds of up to 20,000, but within months attendances had skyrocketed as rallies were staged more regularly, always climaxing in calls for his resignation. By June 2019 – three months after Babiš was hosted by Trump at the White House in a visit that seemed to boost his international standing – Prague saw its biggest political protest since the 1989 fall of communism, with more than 250,000 turning out in opposition to the prime minister and his close ally, the elderly pro-Russian president, Miloš Zeman.
An even greater number turned up in November 2019, ostensibly to mark the 30th anniversary of communism’s collapse – which had itself been triggered by mass protests. The prime minister stood firm, and as the Covid-19 virus forced the country into prolonged lockdown, protests diminished and Babiš’s position seemed more assured, despite widespread discontent over his handling of the pandemic.
Yet in 2021 parliamentary elections, Babiš and his lavishly funded party were defeated by a five-party coalition whose ideological differences were superseded by their hostility toward the prime minister.
View image in fullscreen A protest against Andrej Babiš on the eve of the Velvet Revolution anniversary, on 16 November 2019 in Prague. Photograph: Michal Čížek/AFP/Getty Images
The demonstrations, despite the lost momentum caused by Covid and Babiš’s stubborn refusal to resign even as police lodged criminal fraud charges, had worked by converting discontent into votes at the ballot box.
“We certainly had some role in the election results,” said Benjamin Roll, Million Moments for Democracy’s spokesperson and deputy leader at the time. “I believe we in the Czech Republic are an example of how long-term civic-society activities can bring, or help bring, political change.
“Those protests gave us all the feeling we have the power, that we were not alone, and we can do something. I think this emotion is really crucial.”
It is a potentially decisive factor amid swirling debate about how to respond to Trump as he has smashed long-established norms and assailed institutions at breakneck speed since his inauguration on 20 January.
While the leftwing Vermont senator, Bernie Sanders, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the progressive New York representative, have attracted vast crowds on their Fighting Oligarchy road tour that seems to emphasize the value of popular dissent, other Democrats have adopted a less confrontational approach, with some opting not to fight Trump at every turn.
The party’s leader in the senate, Chuck Schumer, drew fire from many on his own side for leading a group of fellow Democratic senators in voting for a six-month Republican funding bill last month, averting a government shutdown.
The move sharpened criticism that congressional Democrats had reacted too passively to Trump’s authoritarian power grabs.
At the same time, the party’s exclusion from power in the White House and on Capitol Hill has prompted questions over the effectiveness of mass protests. The failure of demonstrations to translate into electoral defeat for authoritarian-type leaders in some countries – Hungary, Turkey and Serbia are recently cited examples – has fed such doubts.
View image in fullscreen Czech students with a banner reading ‘Never Again with the Soviet Union’, a play on the former Czecho-Stalinist slogan ‘Forever with the Soviet Union’, on 1 January 1968 in Karlovy Vary, Czechoslovakia. Photograph: Bettmann Archive
However, Steven Levitsky, a politics professor at Harvard University and a specialist on authoritarian threats to democracy, said dismissing mass rallies as futile – which he called “a new conventional wisdom” after years of thinking they guaranteed a dictator’s downfall – was misplaced.
“Mass protest is less likely to bring down a government in a place where elections are a viable channel, meaning where it is still a democracy or near-democracy,” he said. “Protest is not going to lead to Donald Trump’s resignation, or Orbán’s, but that doesn’t mean it’s not relevant. Protest can weaken the government, can shape public opinion and the media framing and discourse, which is very important.”
At the “Hands Off” rally in Washington DC on 5 April, which drew tens of thousands of people, participants said one aim was to embolden reticent voters and Trump critics who might be intimidated by the president’s blustering tactics.
Jiří Pehe, a Czech political analyst who is the director of New York University in Prague, said that message had its echoes in the Czech precedent.
“It was this overall, this strategy of waking people up and telling them: ‘Look, you have agency. You can change things. You are not just passive observers of what’s going on, but you can change things, but you have to be active,’” he said.
But allowing millions of dissatisfied Americans simply to vent their frustrations would not be enough, Pehe warned. “If the Czech Republic is to be an example, these demonstrations need to happen again and again across the United States and they need to have one or two strong messages. There has to be a very strong message towards the political class because only it can actually change things. And in this case, there should be pressure on the Democrats, saying: ‘Look, it’s your task to stop Donald Trump.’”
Speaking to the Guardian at the 5 April Washington rally, Jamie Raskin, a Democratic representative from Maryland who is the party’s top member of the House judiciary committee, said “a popular resistance strategy” featuring protests could only work in harness with “an effective legislative strategy”, a tall order since the Republicans control both the Senate and the House of Representatives.
“Ultimately, we’re going to have to win the elections next year, and when we take back the House and the Senate, we will be back in the driver’s seat,” he said.
That aim evokes another lesson from the Czech example, observers say: the need for the Democrats to take their cue from the demonstrators and put aside their ideological differences for the sake of unity.
“What you’ve seen in the Czech Republic is a broad array of political forces coming together to form a pro-democracy coalition and I think that’s instructive for the US,” said Norm Eisen, a former US ambassador to Prague and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, who called for a “big tent” approach encompassing anti-Trump Republicans.
“They were for putting aside particular differences on partisan issues, on ideology. That is one of the critical ingredients for success, and I believe we are seeing that here. In these deportation disputes, we filed a brief at the supreme court by more than three dozen conservatives, [who served in] every Republican presidential administration, from Nixon to Trump 1, and I was the lawyer on that, together with a senior justice department official from the Bush administration.”
Levitsky said the US protests had assumed outsize importance given the failure of other institutions and pillars of the establishment – including major CEOs, law firms, the Catholic church and, until this week, universities – to mount a stand since Trump took office.
“This emerging protest movement, and the size of the crowds at the Bernie Sanders and AOC events, is going to compel Democratic politicians to become more active, follow their base rather than so as not to lose it,” he said. “What the protest movement can do is contribute to an erosion of Trump’s popularity, and embolden opposition politicians and probably contribute to an electoral outcome in a couple years.
“In that sense, these guys are not wasting their time. I think it’s a very, very important step in getting the opposition off the sidelines.”
Back in Prague, Roll – recalling the intoxication of the anti-Babiš rallies – had advice for US demonstrators: stay positive and, whatever Trump’s provocations, avoid hateful rhetoric – something he fears the US’s two-party system makes hard to avoid.
“The division in the United States is really dangerous because you see the other side as the enemy,” he said. “It’s crucial to remain non-violent and hopeful. Talking in front of lots of people, we realised you have to be careful about your language because if you are too negative or hateful, it can defeat your purpose. Remember that the other side are people. They’re your brothers and sisters.” | {
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d4f69843f33de5534dd4d18812dd2d43 | Two-party politics is dying in Britain. Voters want more than just Labour and Tories
A byelection in a normally safe Labour seat was Keir Starmer’s first big electoral test as Labour leader. A similar scenario now provides his first test as prime minister. The loss of Hartlepool to Boris Johnson’s Conservatives in 2021 provoked the biggest crisis of Starmer’s time as opposition leader, forcing sweeping changes in personnel and approach. The loss of Runcorn and Helsby to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK could be similarly bruising. Labour ought to start as favourites, having won this socially mixed marginal corner of Cheshire by a massive margin less than a year ago. But with polls showing a Labour slump, a Reform surge and a restive, dissatisfied public, all bets are off.
The Runcorn result will set the tone for this year’s round of local and mayoral elections. A Labour hold will take the pressure off a harried government; a Reform breakthrough will stoke the heat up further, boosting Farage’s claim to be parking his tanks on Labour’s lawn, and jangling the nerves of anxious Labour MPs in the restored “red wall”. While Farage may hurt Labour in Runcorn, it is the Conservatives who face the most pain in this year’s English local elections. Most are in blue-leaning parts of the Midlands and south, and the Tories swept the board when they were last contested in 2021, with Farage off the scene and the government riding a “vaccine bounce” in the polls. Nearly 1,000 Conservative councillors are up for re-election in May, and with Kemi Badenoch’s party polling below its disastrous showing last July, hundreds look set to lose their jobs. Nearly a year on from their worst ever general election result, the Conservatives still have further to fall.
The big story of these contests will be the search for something new. Reform’s rise has taken the headlines, and with Farage’s party on the ballot in nearly every local contest, it looks set to surpass its predecessor Ukip’s best performances. Many seats are available in heavily leave-voting areas such as Derbyshire, Lincolnshire and Kent, all areas where Reform candidates did well last July. Reform may also capture bigger prizes. The party has fielded a defecting Tory MP in Lincolnshire and an Olympic gold medallist in Hull and East Yorkshire, and a fragmented field could deliver either mayoralty to the insurgents.
Reform, though, is not the only game in town for voters unhappy with traditional politics. Both the Liberal Democrats and the Greens have been surging in recent local elections, and both look set to make further gains. Hundreds of seat gains since 2022 have restored the Lib Dems’ fortunes in local government after the harrowing experience of coalition, and formed a springboard to last July’s best-in-a-century result. Ed Davey will hope to cement his party’s status as the dominant force in the home counties with another strong showing in once true-blue shires such as Oxfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Gloucestershire, and perhaps come through the middle in one of the fragmented mayoral contests.
View image in fullscreen Nigel Farage’s Reform UK is looking to take seats from Kemi Badenoch’s moribund Conservative party. Composite: PA
The Greens have also been on the rise, fielding ever more candidates and making hundreds of gains in recent years. Like the Lib Dems before them, the Greens hope that a growing presence in town halls can provide the crucial credibility needed to turn polling advances into Westminster seats. All three Green gains in the general election came in areas where the party had built a strong council presence. An even bigger prize may also be in reach in the west of England mayoralty, where scandal has tainted the outgoing Labour incumbent and given the Greens an opening in a combined authority taking in their stronghold of Bristol.
With Labour sliding, the Conservatives moribund, the Liberal Democrats restored to health, and Reform and Green challengers springing up almost everywhere, this will be the first true five-party local election contest. This unprecedented fragmentation puts the electorate on a collision course with the electoral system. First past the post is an amplifier: the winner takes all, everyone else gets nothing. But when voters divide evenly between multiple choices, this is a recipe for chaos.
Hundreds of councillors and mayors are likely to be returned next month despite large majorities voting for someone else. With votes splitting three or four ways, divided opposition will become as important as local support. Subtle variations in geography and popularity, like the proverbial flap of the butterfly’s wings, will often be the difference between triumph and disaster.
Such instability and inconsistency will make next month’s contests harder to understand and their outcomes harder to justify. Fragmented fights with messy outcomes will also underline something deeper: two-party politics is dying in Britain. Voters no longer want to be forced to choose between Labour and Tory, and ignore the institutional constraints supposed to channel them into this choice. Support for the establishment parties hit an all-time low last July and has kept falling in polling since. The electoral system held back this tide, much to Labour’s benefit, but no flood wall is impregnable. Next month we may see what happens when the dam breaks. | {
"authors": [
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99586d635fbeb01b02cb969992ff288c | ‘You’ll never amount to anything’: the boxing world champion you’ve never heard of
The soft early evening spring light floods the room behind the world champion you’ve probably never heard of. In front of a big poster of a shirtless Bruce Lee adorning her wall, Diana Prazak smiles and laughs often as she talks about her most unlikely career and her road to the top.
The expatriate from Melbourne is arguably the most successful professional boxer that Australia has produced – she attained the ranking of best active professional boxer pound-for-pound in 2014 – but celebration of her world champion status remains disappointingly muted in her home country.
“It’s kind of broken my heart really because growing up we were always told what a sports-mad country Australia is and how proud we were of our athletes. And here I had done something no other Australian had ever done and there was just no [media] coverage back home,’’ she says in a call from the home she shares with her American wife, Naomi, in Riverside County on the border of Los Angeles County in California.
“It is demoralising. My country hasn’t really acknowledged anything we’ve done.”
She says this without apparent bitterness or anger. Women’s professional boxing has never had the profile or prize money of the men’s sport. Now, two years retired, she can see other up-and-coming women starting to build a profile that was never possible for her.
View image in fullscreen Diana Prazak is two years retired. Photograph: Kayla James/The Guardian
Earlier this month when Prazak, 45, was inducted into the International Women’s Boxing Hall of Fame in Las Vegas as a legend of her sport, it was a fitting if overdue celebration of an extraordinary career that almost didn’t happen.
As a child in Hoppers Crossing, deep in Melbourne’s western suburbs, Prazak was always good at sport. She was a small-framed cross-country runner and tennis player. But she also experienced abuse – something she did not begin to psychologically deal with until well into adulthood.
“My abuse happened when I was a child and [is] something I only dealt with later in life as I was able to come to terms with it.
“My fitness diminished because I became a workaholic [in information technology] and had no goals. My coping mechanism was food and alcohol.
“Being a fighter was a way for me to feel like I was in control again as well as an outlet. I felt like I wasn’t supported and didn’t want my life defined by what was in my past.
View image in fullscreen ‘I had done something no other Australian had ever done and there was just no [media] coverage back home’: Diana Prazak. Photograph: Kayla James/The Guardian
“I was really quite the drinker. I was a chain-smoker and I was really quite overweight.”
She explains how she got into the sport that would captivate her.
“My ex was a muso and we were at a gig together one night, and I was just on the piss is the honest truth … and then a mate came along and said there was a new [boxing] gym [nearby] just opened up and if I wanted to come and check it out with them I could and … that’s how it started,” she says.
“I asked the owner of the gym about sparring and he said, ‘What’s the bloody point – you’re too old, you’re too fat and you’re also a girl – you’ll never amount to anything in this sport.’ And they were some motivating words for me. But I never thought I was going to actually be any good at boxing.’’
But she was wrong. She was very good. She had natural talent. But she also quickly became addicted to a desire to get better and better while sparring.
“It was a way, initially, for me to get into better shape. But then it became an absolute compulsion for me to get better and better, to train harder every day. I really wanted to be the best. Definitely. And to win.”
View image in fullscreen Diana Prazak is arguably the most successful professional boxer Australia has produced. Photograph: Kayla James/The Guardian
But Prazak was already nearly 27 – a definite disadvantage given many of her contemporaries had been in the ring since their mid-teens and fighting competitively for years. After just six months of training Prazak had her first amateur fight. She won it – and her next five amateur bouts.
She decided to turn professional. To stand any chance of becoming one of the world’s best she says she felt she had no choice but to move to the United States. So in 2012 she moved from Melbourne to Los Angeles.
She had no promoter and no sponsor.
“I just had to do it off my own bat,” she says.
But she engaged as her trainer the celebrated world champion Dutch boxer, kickboxer and actor Lucia Rijker, dubbed by the sport’s media as “the most dangerous woman in the world”. She rented a room in a motel on Sunset Boulevard while they prepared for a shot at the World Boxing Council women’s super featherweight title in Sweden.
LA was a culture shock. It was often lonely and sometimes frightening because of random street crime – including the threat of mugging.
“I was there [at the motel] for about four weeks,” she says. “I would shit myself every night. It was nothing like what I thought it was going to be like. I was too scared to walk down the street after dark. It was crazy. But I had to run, like all boxers do – we run – to train. So I would do my work during the day and then I would run at night. It was so scary. But I was fast because I just had to be.
View image in fullscreen ‘I definitely wasn’t flying business class. It was cattle class the whole way’: boxer Diana Prazak. Photograph: Kayla James/The Guardian
“Every night there was a stabbing or a shooting and you heard sirens 24/7. It was just a massive culture shock.”
But her sights were on Sweden where, in 2013, she won the super featherweight world title, knocking out the champion Frida Wallberg in the eighth round. She received little publicity for her efforts back home even after successfully defending the title.
While top professional male boxers stand to make millions of dollars from prize purses and sponsorship, the financial reward for Prazak was as scant as the publicity. Pre-fight training expenses were often up to US$20,000.
“It’s a gigantic inequity. We would be in the red after almost every fight. I’ve been retired for two years now and I think the most I ever made was 17 grand for a fight. It was very rare that I found myself with money in my pocket after a fight … I definitely wasn’t flying business class. It was cattle class the whole way.”
When she eventually retired, Prazak had lost just four of her 18 professional fights, eight of which she won by knockout.
She says that while boxing – and her enormous drive to win – has involved enormous personal sacrifice and, at times, physical pain, it also gave her life a meaning she could not have imagined before she entered the ring.
“Boxing took so much away from me but it also gave me so much. It gave me balance in my life … it allowed me travel the world, it made me a champion and it gave me a goal I thought I’d never achieve. And I never would have met my wife if I didn’t come to America. It gave me so much more than it ever took away from me.”
View image in fullscreen Diana Prazak’s induction into the International Women’s Boxing Hall of Fame was an overdue celebration of an extraordinary career. Photograph: Kayla James/The Guardian
Prazak says she feels a deep affinity with Australia even though she has lived in the US for the past 13 years during which she has witnessed enormous political and cultural change.
“When I arrived [Barack] Obama was president and he was seeking re-election,” she says. “Back then the haters weren’t speaking up so you didn’t hear the hate here so much. But as we all know that has changed. I’m in a same-sex relationship and I’m a dual citizen over here. But I’ll never be an American and they know that and I feel that.”
Having conquered the world of women’s professional boxing, Prazak has her eyes on returning home to Melbourne.
“My end goal is definitely to come home to Australia and to stay at home and to visit the States so that my wife can see her family as opposed to me visiting Melbourne so I can see mine.’’
A homecoming for a boxing world champion who only ever entered the ring by chance in the first place. | {
"authors": [
"Paul Daley"
],
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"publish_date": "2025-04-20 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "‘You’ll never amount to anything’: the boxing world champion you’ve never heard of",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/apr/20/youll-never-amount-to-anything-the-boxing-world-champion-youve-never-heard-of"
} |
484d9c3bcbb412a0ff13241c82e91b2f | Blind date: ‘She called me a dork, which is what every man dreams of’
Kat on Matt
What were you hoping for?
Great food, a fun story and hopefully someone to explore London with.
First impressions?
Very friendly and warm. He’d also kindly saved the booth seat for me, which I appreciated.
What did you talk about?
Carbs. Copenhagen v London prices (I’m from Copenhagen). Beach holidays. Films we haven’t seen. Our lack of hobbies. And Voldemort.
Most awkward moment?
Maybe when I started talking about my lactose intolerance after we’d ordered about four different dishes that contained a lot of cheese.
Good table manners?
No notes.
Best thing about Matt?
How easy he was to talk to. And that he didn’t seem to mind me basically interrogating him (in a nonthreatening way).
Would you introduce Matt to your friends?
Yeah, they’d get along swimmingly.
Q&A Fancy a blind date? Show Blind date is Saturday’s dating column: every week, two strangers are paired up for dinner and drinks, and then spill the beans to us, answering a set of questions. This runs, with a photograph we take of each dater before the date, in Saturday magazine (in the UK) and online at theguardian.com every Saturday. It’s been running since 2009 – you can read all about how we put it together here.
What questions will I be asked?
We ask about age, location, occupation, hobbies, interests and the type of person you are looking to meet. If you do not think these questions cover everything you would like to know, tell us what’s on your mind. Can I choose who I match with?
No, it’s a blind date! But we do ask you a bit about your interests, preferences, etc – the more you tell us, the better the match is likely to be. Can I pick the photograph?
No, but don't worry: we'll choose the nicest ones. What personal details will appear?
Your first name, job and age. How should I answer?
Honestly but respectfully. Be mindful of how it will read to your date, and that Blind date reaches a large audience, in print and online. Will I see the other person’s answers?
No. We may edit yours and theirs for a range of reasons, including length, and we may ask you for more details. Will you find me The One?
We’ll try! Marriage! Babies! Can I do it in my home town?
Only if it’s in the UK. Many of our applicants live in London, but we would love to hear from people living elsewhere. How to apply
Email [email protected] Was this helpful? Thank you for your feedback.
Describe Matt in three words.
Kind, cool and witty.
What do you think Matt made of you?
Probably that I talk too much about pasta. But hopefully he also found me funny.
Did you go on somewhere?
We went to a pub around the corner for pints and people watching.
And … did you kiss?
Maaaaaaybe.
If you could change one thing about the evening what would it be?
I’d invite our fab waiter Pietro along to the pub – what an absolute legend!
Marks out of 10?
A strong 9.
Would you meet again?
Yeah, for sure.
View image in fullscreen Matt and Kat on their date
Matt on Kat
What were you hoping for?
To meet someone fun and have a bit of a different evening out.
First impressions?
We were a little awkward for about 10 seconds, then clicked pretty quickly.
What did you talk about?
Worrying about climate change. How a lot of 2000s romcoms are based on Shakespeare. Whether Voldemort should be viewed as an asexual being.
Most awkward moment?
The waiter thought we were influencers who were going to give them a review.
Good table manners?
She said I wasn’t allowed to write “impeccable” for this one. We shared bits of everything, which was great.
Best thing about Kat?
Impeccable table manners.
Would you introduce Kat to your friends?
Absolutely, she was great fun.
Describe Kat in three words.
Top-tier vibes.
What do you think Kat made of you?
She called me a dork, which is what every man dreams of.
Did you go on somewhere?
To the nearest pub for a couple more drinks.
And … did you kiss?
What happens on the Piccadilly line stays on the Piccadilly line.
If you could change one thing about the evening what would it be?
For the waiter to join us for the last glass of wine.
Marks out of 10?
Nine. It’s a 10 really, but I’m English – we’re never 100% happy with anything.
Would you meet again?
I would. And we swapped numbers, so fingers crossed!
Kat and Matt ate at Officina 00, London WC2. Fancy a blind date? Email [email protected] | {
"authors": [],
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"title": "Blind date: ‘She called me a dork, which is what every man dreams of’",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/apr/19/blind-date-matt-kat"
} |
e03ec79c2e71f61525888566798ae393 | ‘There were no warning signs’: what happens when your partner falls into the ‘manosphere’?
Samantha thought of her partner as the most progressive man she had ever had a relationship with. Her Swedish boyfriend seemed, to her, more feminist than many British men she had dated.
“I never had to ask him to clear up,” she says. “All our labour was shared. He had done therapy. He was happy to talk about his emotions.”
When they broke up, however, Samantha, who is in her 30s and based in Sheffield, saw a very different side to him. She recalls going to his flat to collect her belongings. “I got into a debate with him,” she says. “It became clear his beliefs had become centred around the idea that men are more sexual than women, and men and women can’t be friends.
“He said: ‘Now we are not together, I don’t need to agree with everything you say.’”
He told her he had become involved during the pandemic in what he described as a men’s mental health group. Samantha has since discovered the group was influenced by Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson, who has expressed controversial views about women, and a far-right Swedish influencer whom her ex-boyfriend had appeared with in photos on social media. “It’s that strand of the manosphere that is focused on self-help and spirituality,” she says. “The whole time we were together, there were no warning signs.”
View image in fullscreen Charities have observed a crossover between men involved in the manosphere and the far right. Photograph: Edefoto/Getty Images
Samantha’s experience is not an isolated case. Several women told the Observer their partners had been sucked into the manosphere – the name given to parts of the internet that circulate misogynist content – or consumed far-right material online.
With surveys reporting that an increasing number of young men are subscribing to these beliefs, the number of women finding that their partners share the misogynistic views espoused by the likes of Andrew Tate is also on the rise. Research from anti-fascism organisation Hope Not Hate, which polled about 2,000 people across the UK aged 16 to 24, discovered that 41% of young men support Tate versus just 12% of young women.
“Numbers are growing, with wives worried about their husbands and partners becoming radicalised,” says Nigel Bromage, a reformed neo-Nazi who is now the director of Exit Hate Trust, a charity that helps people who want to leave the far right.
“Wives or partners become really worried about the impact on their family, especially those with young children, as they fear they will be influenced by extremism and racism.”
His organisation supports women whose loved ones become involved in the manosphere or the far right, as well as the individuals themselves.
Bromage, who was involved in far-right groups for two decades, warns that the charity is seeing a “crossover” between those involved in the manosphere and the wider far right.
“Over the last few years, the rhetoric of the manosphere has increasingly leaked out of isolated forums on to mainstream platforms,” says Anki Deo, Hope Not Hate’s senior policy officer. “It has been taken up by influencers with a much wider audience and is no longer just a ‘dark corner of the internet’.”
Rachel, who is in her 30s and lives in London, met her partner on the popular dating app Hinge, and was struck by his generosity. He insisted on buying her gifts and giving her cash to spend. She thought her now ex-partner was a “normal, decent guy”. But as the relationship progressed, she began to feel uneasy as he forced more gifts on her. Four months into the relationship, she began to realise his political views were profoundly different from her own.
“I was talking about the gay community. He got aggressive with me,” Rachel recalls. “He was super homophobic – I didn’t know until then.”
A few days later, he interrupted an argument to show her a video of Tate. “I don’t think Tate fuelled him,” Rachel says. “He was always like that, but it validated his beliefs. He really liked the flashy lifestyle. He just had a lot of hatred.”
He became more controlling as the relationship unfolded, she recalls, complaining that she had male friends and a career. He argued that she shouldn’t be focused on work because it was his duty to provide for her.
The relationship ended after six months. His behaviour had escalated to the point where he raped and assaulted her, and was convicted of both offences after they broke up.
View image in fullscreen Jordan Peterson addresses the Demographic Summit at the Fine Arts Museum in Budapest in 2023. Photograph: Attila Kisbenedek/AFP/Getty Images
Dr Lisa Sugiura, associate professor in cybercrime and gender at the University of Portsmouth, who specialises in online misogyny, says that although there is widespread concern about men being radicalised by the manosphere, there is not enough focus on the “really concerning” risk these individuals pose to their female partners.
Commonly held views in the manosphere, says Sugiura, include being anti-feminist, thinking that misandry is equivalent to misogyny and believing society is systemically sexist against men. “They want to go back to this time where women had no rights in society at all and were completely owned by their father and then their husband.”
Debbie, who is in her 50s, says her ex-husband’s “mask started to slip” after they moved in together. “When I got a good job and started earning more money, passed my driving test and became more independent, that was when he started watching far-right and misogynistic content online,” she says.
Her husband was an avid fan of a YouTuber known for his misogynistic and Islamophobic views, and also consumed content from Christian militia groups, Debbie says.
“He put crucifixes all over the back of his van. The reason I knew what content he was viewing was because he would proudly talk about it in front of our kids.”
She says he told her that he hated feminists and the women’s liberation movement. Debbie also says he was violent towards her.
Roisin, from Belfast, says that after she broke up with her partner, he began subscribing to increasingly extreme views. She shares a daughter with him and says he has shown her manosphere videos and told her that she can’t leave the house in certain clothes.
“He has made derogatory remarks about other races and cultures in front of her,” Roisin adds. “And said: ‘If you ever got pregnant, I wouldn’t allow you to get an abortion.’”
Sugiura says that female partners of men sucked into the manosphere are being neglected by society. “I don’t think anybody is thinking about the impact on them. There is concern for these people who are being indoctrinated or radicalised by these harmful ideologies, but what is the risk to those in relationships with them?
“We need to ensure their voices and experiences are not forgotten.”
Names have been changed to protect identities | {
"authors": [
"Maya Oppenheim"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/5dc71fbac61a4df0ff75da82cc244933f6032d81/0_103_5633_3380/master/5633.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdG8tZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=702e6c0c515f93fb07857a2dfe5b1634",
"publish_date": "2025-04-19 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "‘There were no warning signs’: what happens when your partner falls into the ‘manosphere’?",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/apr/19/there-were-no-warning-signs-what-happens-when-your-partner-falls-into-the-manosphere"
} |
6995bfcbbe2597db760be9341a1e759a | Gina: The first-born son – episode 4
Twenty years ago, John Hancock had dinner with his mother, Gina Rinehart. He says it’s the last positive interaction he had with her. In an in-depth interview, he explains how his relationship with his mother fell apart and discusses a high-stakes legal case that could threaten the foundations of her empire | {
"authors": [
"Sarah Martin",
"Joe Koning",
"Luca Ittimani",
"Shelley Hepworth",
"Miles Martignoni"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/ec923f5b055f29b866b564f0dcd3a3bef9150c45/0_0_2499_1500/master/2499.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=be5a900d773fe43379fc568fd1bd789f",
"publish_date": "2025-04-21 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "Gina: The first-born son – episode 4",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/news/audio/2025/apr/21/gina-the-first-born-son-episode-4"
} |
b6d36c2d82e0b9da8ddc5ae83511678a | America’s universities stand up to Trump – podcast
This week, Harvard University, the oldest and wealthiest in the US, defied Donald Trump a list of demands. The Trump administration responded by freezing $2.2bn in federal funding for the Ivy League school.
This week, Jonathan Freedland speaks to the Harvard professor Ryan Enos to consider why the university is pushing back, how far this fight may go and why other universities are watching closely | {
"authors": [
"Jonathan Freedland",
"Danielle Stephens",
"Zoe Hitch"
],
"image_url": "https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/3b43d65c786c181ab5424cf98a584317ab72872f/0_236_5890_3534/master/5890.jpg?width=1200&height=630&quality=85&auto=format&fit=crop&overlay-align=bottom%2Cleft&overlay-width=100p&overlay-base64=L2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctZGVmYXVsdC5wbmc&enable=upscale&s=bbfab83fc6431fd39a4e46d7d7de9eb4",
"publish_date": "2025-04-18 00:00:00",
"source": "The Guardian (UK Top Stories)",
"summary": "",
"title": "America’s universities stand up to Trump – podcast",
"url": "https://www.theguardian.com/politics/audio/2025/apr/18/trump-vs-universities-podcast"
} |
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