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The Guardian

Britain will help Ukraine make its own long-range missiles, says PM

Kiran Stacey Dan Sabbagh Dnipro

Britain will boost Ukraine's capacity to make its own long-range missiles, Andy Burnham will announce today, as he travels to Kyiv on his first foreign visit as prime minister.

Burnham will arrive in Ukraine on its independence day at a crucial time in the war, with the capital braced

for another wave of Russian missile attacks and the country's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, facing his most direct domestic challenge.

The prime minister will use the trip to announce that the UK government will allow the European defence company MBDA to declassify information about UK-made components of the Anglo-French Storm Shadow/Scalp missiles to help Ukraine build its own version.

While the announcement will probably take years to have an impact on the war, it is likely to escalate tensions with Moscow at an already fraught time in UK-Russian relations.

Burnham said in a statement last night: "On Ukraine's 35th anniversary of independence, the Ukrainian people should be in no doubt: the UK is behind you today and for as long as it takes. I am proud of the contribution our country has made to Ukraine and

I want the Ukrainian people to hear it directly from me that our support will not waver. After all, Ukraine's security is our security.

"The friendship between our two countries will long outlast Russia's illegal war. In both the fight and in the rebuilding to come, we will stand with Ukraine and deliver opportunities for people across both our countries," the prime minister said. "Russia should be in no doubt of our

resolve. We will not back down until there is a just and lasting peace."

Burnham will announce in Kyiv that the UK will help France set up assembly lines in Ukraine for long-range missiles, which the French president, Emmanuel Macron, promised last month.

Macron spoke to Zelenskyy on Saturday to promise to deliver separate interceptor missiles, which could help counter

Board games Paddling in St Ives

▶ People enjoying the more bearable temperatures at Porthminster Beach in St Ives, Cornwall EASTPOGRAPHY JOB SENI/PA

'Shocking' breaches of school food standards

Denis Campbell Health policy editor

Three-quarters of secondary schools in England are breaking the rules on food offered to pupils by serving chips, burgers and hash browns too often - and sweets and crisps at breakfast, according to a new report.

"Shocking" breaches of school food standards are described in an analysis of almost 400 state secondaries undertaken by Bite Back, a food charity set up by the chef Jamie Oliver. D'Arcy Williams, Bite Back's chief executive, said the picture of schools' widespread non-compliance with the government-set standards that emerged from its analysis was alarming.

Three out of four of the menus it analysed at 391 state secondary schools in England contained at least one breach of the standards. Most involved schools offering unhealthy foods more often than is allowed.

For example, 206 schools (53%) were offering products high in fat, sugar or salt that are meant to be banned altogether such as crisps, Oreos, Mini Cheddars, chocolate bars and pastries

Two boys, 17, among dead in A66 collision

Mark Brown North of England correspondent

Two 17-year-old boys were among seven people killed on Teesside when a car going the wrong way on the A66, believed to be using cloned plates, crashed head-on into a police vehicle.

Cole Robert Worthy and Theo Rae, both 17, Makai Saddington, 18, and

23-year-olds Michael Robert Cahill and Jakub Matusiak died when their Volkswagen Passat collided with a marked armed response vehicle early on Saturday near Middlesbrough.

PC Matthew Blades, 37, and PC Tom Clough, 38, of Cleveland police were also killed in the crash and had been driving in the right direction. Tributes have been paid to the officers, with their chief constable, Victoria Fuller,

describing them as "brave officers protecting our communities".

Clough's family described him as "our hero with a fantastic [sense] of humour" and someone who "jumped into action whenever needed, and willing to help anyone for any reason". In a statement issued via Cleveland police, the family said Clough "proudly fought for his country to make the

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The Guardian Monday 24 August 2026

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Burnham: Britain to help Ukraine make its own long-range missiles

● Continued from page 1

the recent barrage of high-speed Russian missile attacks on Kyiv.

Meanwhile, European leaders have condemned Friday's drone attack on a busy shopping centre in central Ukraine, which killed 16 people in Zelenskyy's home town of Kryvyi Rih.

The Ukrainian military has run out of US-made Patriot interceptors, and the US president, Donald Trump, recently backtracked on a promise to let Ukraine build its own.

However, Zelenskyy said over the weekend he still wanted to buy more US-made Patriots, adding that Ukraine was happy to pay for them rather than receive them as military aid. "I wanted to secure 300 Patriot missiles for the winter package," the Ukrainian president said. "The request from our air force is 360."

He added that he had reached an agreement with France on at least one air-defence system this year, and with Germany on the supply of about 600 interceptors in 2027-28.

Macron posted on X on Saturday: "It is crucial to provide Ukraine with all the necessary means to defend its skies and thwart this aggression ... It is essential that all countries with capabilities at their disposal also join this effort."

The British announcement is a small step in a much larger and longer-term project that could lead to Ukraine making its own long-range versions of the Storm Shadow cruise missile in several years' time.

But the move is likely to trigger further criticism from Moscow at a time when tensions between the UK and Russia are already high.

Last week, Russia accused the UK of deliberately escalating the conflict

No UK ambassador

Kremlin withdraws envoy

Russia has withdrawn its ambassador to the UK as the Kremlin continues to try to put pressure on Britain over its support for Ukraine. Andrey Kelin left last month after seven years in the diplomatic post. Tensions have ratcheted up with a warning by the embassy last week of "consequences" after it emerged Britain was supplying attack drones to Kyiv. A spokesperson for the embassy said Kelin's diplomatic mission ended on 21 July. "As for the state of Russia-UK relations across all areas, they have deteriorated to an unprecedentedly low level entirely on London's initiative," they added. Ben Quinn

Iran-linked hackers blamed for cyber-attack on UK power plant

Ben Quinn Political correspondent

Hackers linked to Iran have been blamed for a cyber-attack that caused a British power station to be temporarily shut down.

The incident involved a small-scale energy generator, according to the UK government, which said that at no point was there a risk to the wider energy system. However, it marks an apparent escalation in the threat posed by Iran after the UK said it had given permission for the US to launch "defensive" operations against Tehran from British bases.

The power station was shut down for four days as a result of the attack

last month, according to the Sunday Telegraph, which first reported it.

The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero said: "This story refers to an incident impacting a small-scale energy generator, and at no point was there a risk to the wider energy system. The UK has a highly resilient energy system. We work closely with the energy sector to protect infrastructure and ensure the highest security standards."

The National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), which deals with attacks on critical infrastructure, is understood not to have received any reported outages from regulated operators of power stations.

Hostile states including Russia, China and Iran are increasingly

targeting systems behind the UK's key services, according to a warning this year from the NCSC chief executive, Richard Horne.

The government said last month the UK was "ready to defend itself" after Iran's military warned that any bases being used by the US were "legitimate targets". The UK has allowed the US to launch so-called defensive operations from British bases hosting US planes since the start of its war on Iran but has refused

▲ Richard Horne, the head of the National Cyber Security Centre

by allowing Ukraine to launch attacks with British-made drones, warning that the deeper Britain's involvement, "the higher price it will pay".

This weekend it emerged that Russia had withdrawn its ambassador in London without naming a replacement, sparking speculation it was downgrading its diplomatic presence in the UK.

Burnham has insisted that Russian threats will not weaken British support for Ukraine, saying last week: "We are not fair-weather friends. We will be there in Ukraine's hour of need, and that won't change."

He will today use a meeting of the coalition of the willing, which comprises 34 countries that have promised to help secure Ukraine in the event of a peace deal with Russia, to underline that commitment.

The meeting will be co-chaired by Burnham and Macron, who will join remotely via video link. Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, will also take part in the call as the leaders discuss ways to help Ukraine repel the recent wave of long-distance attacks.

While there, Burnham will attend independence day events, the details of which are being kept secret amid concerns of a major Russian attack, and receive an award in recognition of the UK's support for Ukraine.

His visit comes at a delicate time for Zelenskyy, who is facing the most concerted internal political challenge of his presidency following a call for an election by his former defence minister Mykhailo Fedorov.

Zelenskyy responded to Fedorov's dramatic announcement for the first time at the weekend, telling reporters that holding elections, which have been suspended since the war began, risked splitting the country.

"I believe that if we want to destroy the country, then during such a war we can move in the selection of elections," he said in a briefing to selected journalists that was held on Saturday, but details of which were reported on yesterday.

"I believe that during such a war, elections in general are big risks. Elections right now are a tsunami for the state that will split Ukraine," he added.

PM's difficult autumn Page 6 →

to help in offensive operations. That policy has not been altered by Andy Burnham, who was notified last week that a decision had been made to extend the agreement with the US.

Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said last month: "Any base used for aggression against Iranian territory constitutes a legitimate target for our forces."

Iran has been accused for years of carrying out cyber-attacks on various countries, including in relation to a massive power outage in Turkey in 2015 and several possible breaches of Israeli government websites in 2022.

US government security agencies issued a warning earlier this year of cyber-attacks on critical infrastructure by hackers linked to the IRGC.

The US has alleged that an Iran-affiliated group known as "CyberAvingers" carried out a campaign against it in 2023 that compromised at least 75 devices in multiple infrastructure sectors.

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Monday 24 August 2026 The Guardian

News

Wild at heart

The flower meadow that seeded itself

Patrick Barkham

Tucked away on a country lane, a small field bursts with yellow and pink flowers. Quail and whitethoats call from the thick hedges and the plants, including common centaury, yellow rattle and marsh and common spotted orchids, bounce with hoverflies and butterflies.

More than 150 plant species have been recorded on Sayer's Old Meadow in north Norfolk, which is remarkable when only oilseed rape was growing there 21 years ago.

This transformation has happened without sowing any commercial wildflower mixes or making any other expensive interventions such as deep ploughing or topsoil removal, often undertaken when arable land is "restored" to nature-rich meadow.

Instead, the four-acre field was simply cut for hay once every summer, with an abundance of wildflowers naturally - and rather mysteriously - finding their way into the field.

The findings, published in a scientific paper in Restoration Ecology, could transform the approach to recreating flower-rich meadows. Conservationists and landowners are pushing to revive old meadows because 98% in England and Wales have been destroyed over the last century.

"Everyone is planting and seeding wildflowers, but sometimes we're not patient enough," said Carl Sayer, a professor of limnology and freshwater ecology at University College London and the lead author of the paper. "You don't always

"It's the thing I'm most proud of in my life. I love it. It's hope - we can recover things."

Carl Sayer biology professor

have to reach for that expensive commercial wildflower seed mix. We've forgotten that nature has known what to do for quite a long while."

It is no coincidence that Sayer shares his surname with the meadow: it is owned by his father, farmer Derek Sayer, 86, and has been part of a tiny traditional farm for generations. The land was ploughed and fertilised and sprayed with pesticides as was conventional in postwar farming, but Derek stopped cultivating it in 2005 because the field was "hit and miss" at producing good yields.

Springs feeding the Glaven chalk stream rise in the meadow

and parts of the field were always boggy. The land was "abandoned" for five years and became a forest of thistles before Carl began studying its diversity, beginning an annual hay-cut in 2011.

Fifteen years on, thistles and other arable annual weeds have almost completely disappeared - without any human intervention - to be replaced with a flower-rich perennial sward, which is growing more biodiverse every year.

For Derek, watching farmland run wild with "weeds" was challenging but he gradually became more interested. "He started off saying: 'What are you doing, Carl? What a load of rubbish.'"

▲ Sayer's Old Meadow; top, Derek and Carl Sayer. Top right, the marsh orchid is one plant to have flourished PHOTOGRAPHS: JOSHUA BRIGHT/THIS GUARDIAN

Now he's like: 'How many orchids are there this year?' said Carl.

When Derek arrived to look at the field during the Guardian's tour, he still cast a fierce countryman's gaze over it, checking for "weeds" such as ragwort. "It looked a bit strange at first but I quite like it now," he said.

Each August, a neighbouring farmer cuts the hay, which he feeds to his cattle, grateful for the biodiverse hay crop. "Much more diversity is a tonic to cattle because

it's full of medicinals," said Carl. "The monoculture of a rye-grass field may not give them everything they need. The old farmers had it right."

Cutting it each year prevents the meadow becoming an oak woodland. The sward is full of baby oaks and sallow, and a patch of the field that hasn't been cut regularly is filled with hummocks of sallow as high as a house: still wildlife-rich habitat but not as rare or much-needed as flower-rich meadows.

Removing the grass growth each year with the hay-cut also reduces the nutrients, enabling more delicate wildflowers to flourish. Several years ago, yellow rattle found its way into the meadow. This is known as "the meadow maker" because it parasitises grass and creates space for other wildflowers, although Carl said the meadow was thriving without it.

"Everyone will tell you this approach [not sowing wildflowers] doesn't work unless you're close to a seed source. But no one has done a long-term study like this," he said.

The surrounding land is intensively farmed and the nearest populations of some of the rare flowers now found in the meadow are at least 3 miles away. One possibility is that seeds have been brought in on the hooves or coats of wild deer. "Everyone's accused me of bringing it in on my upturned trousers but I don't wear upturned trousers," joked Carl, who was wearing shorts.

Sayer's Old Meadow looks noticeably different from what some conservationists disparagingly call generic "McMeadows" created from popular wildflower mixes which are dominated by white oxye daisies and purple knapweed. The advantage of "self-willed" meadows is that they are filled with locally appropriate plants which are more genetically diverse than those in commercial seed mixes. This type of meadow creation was also much cheaper, said Carl.

Since last year, barn owls have taken up residence in a field-edge nest box and hunt over the field. The Sayers allow local people to walk in it and an informal path now runs down one side. "Everyone in the village loves it, people walk through it and respect it. It's working to make people happy as well," said Carl. "It's the thing I'm most proud of in my life. I love it. It's hope - we can recover things. We just need to do less in the recovery process."

Marathon medal design mistake suggests a very long way to run

Stephanie Convery

In a week's time, the proud runners finishing the Sydney Marathon will receive a medal showing the landmarks they have just sped past - plus one they definitely didn't.

In what organisers have admitted was an "unfortunate error", a

stadium in Germany was etched on to the event's participation medal instead of a local Sydney landmark.

In an Instagram post on the official Sydney Marathon account revealing the design of the participation medal, runners were told they would "find the story of the course in the details" of the design.

"A beautiful Sydney skyline brings the course to life, featuring

the landmarks runners will experience along the way," the post reads. However, one of the "landmarks" on the medal is the Allianz Arena in Munich, rather than the Allianz Stadium in Sydney.

"A little too much international flavour has found its way onto the back of the finisher's medal, with an incorrect depiction of the stadium," a TCS Sydney Marathon spokesperson said yesterday. "We're not going to run from it, it was an unfortunate error, though it's certainly given everyone something to talk about this weekend, mostly in good humour."

The error was reported by the

▲ 'Unfortunate error': the medal showing Allianz Arena in Munich

BBC and noted with amusement by several running blogs. The Munich stadium, which opened in 2005 and is home to the Bayern Munich football team, responded in the comments of one: "Oh wow, we didn't have that on our bingo card!"

The reverse of the medal features an indigo and gold design by the First Nations artist Ambrose Killian. Killian told the BBC he was not involved in the other side of the design.

The Sydney Marathon will take place on Sunday. Last year, about 35,000 runners from more than 120 countries participated in its first year as a World Marathon Major event.

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National

'No more!!!': Trump lashes out after failure of US-Canada talks and onset of trade war

Lauren Almeida

Donald Trump has hit back at Canada after a breakdown in talks plunged the two countries into a trade war.

In his first public comments since negotiations collapsed on Friday in Washington, Trump wrote on social media: 'Canada wants the benefits of being a State, without being one!!! They have also charged our great farmers, for many years, massive amounts of tariffs. No more!!!'

His comments yesterday came after the US imposed 50% tariffs on $20bn (£14.6bn) worth of Canadian goods, while Mark Carney, Canada's prime minister, has vowed to match them 'dollar for dollar'.

The US tariffs came into force on Saturday. Trade experts have predicted they could result in some job losses, but the biggest impact is expected to be political, triggering fresh tension between the neighbours.

Both sides blamed the other for the breakdown in talks. Carney said the country was 'at war' over trade with the US, after Trump 'miscalculated' by escalating his tariff attack.

'You're at war when you're attacked, and we got attacked,' Carney added. 'We cannot accept what they've offered and we will not give what they've asked.'

Jamieson Greer, the US trade representative, has said the US was compelled to act after a year of retaliatory measures by Canada: 'We've

◀ Mark Carney's 'dollar for dollar' Canadian tariffs are expected to affect steel, dairy, appliances and electronics

said enough and so we've taken countermeasures. Our interest is in protecting American workers and protecting American supply chains.'

Dan Kelly, president of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, estimated that 40% of small Canadian exporters will be directly hit by the US tariffs, and that nearly one-third expect their revenues will drop by 50% or more as a result. The escalation was also met with

anger by Democratic lawmakers and governors from US states that border Canada including Minnesota, New York and Washington.

The governor of New York, Kathy Hochul, posted on X: 'Needlessly picking fights with our allies and raising prices here at home. That's Trump's economic policy in a nutshell.'

The Minnesota senator Amy Klobuchar said the new tariffs meant 'higher costs for small businesses, farmers, and all Minnesota families'. She wrote on X: 'Canada is Minnesota's #1 trading partner. Minnesotans are paying for Trump's chaos.'

Carney was elected as prime minister last year after campaigning to lead a fightback against Trump, who has suggested he wants to make Canada

a 51st state with 'economic force'. Carney's tariffs are expected to take effect from 8 September, with new levies on steel, dairy, appliances and electronics.

The escalation has called into question the future of the North American trade pact between the US, Canada and Mexico, known as USMCA. The pact was signed by Trump during his first term and governs about $2m annually in goods and services between the three countries.

Trump refused to renew the USMCA this summer after Canada and Mexico formally requested that it be renewed for another 16 years.

When asked how the collapse in talks would affect the USMCA, Carney said it was 'certainly not good news'.

Increasingly aggressive rhetoric and trade policy from the Trump administration has also damaged tourism. There was a 21% drop in Canadians entering New York state in 2025 and 3m fewer visits compared with the previous year. A poll this year by the Globe and Mail newspaper found only 9% of Canadians agreed that the US was a 'trustworthy ally'.

'Shambolic' New EU border checks prove stressful for UK travellers

Jane Clinton Rosie Peters-McDonald

On top of fears about extreme heat, Britons taking summer holidays in the EU this year had another thing to worry about - long queues and waiting times caused by new border checks.

The EU digital entry and exit system (EES), which requires non-EU citizens to register and be photographed and fingerprinted on arrival and departure from the Schengen zone, has been technically in full force since April, but beset by teething problems.

Despite reports of passengers facing three-hour delays and missed connections, Brussels rejected calls by airports and airlines to suspend the scheme over the peak summer period. However, border police have been allowed to relax requirements if queues become unmanageable under an opt-out that expires next month.

One of the main purposes of the system is to track whether non-EU citizens have spent more than their permitted 90 days in the bloc in a rolling 180-day period.

However, Martin Farrell, a retired university professor, says his EES record failed to record his exit from the Schengen zone and he had to chase the authorities to update it.

In May, he and his wife arrived by ferry at Hoek van Holland, both

▲ EES kiosks at Madrid-Barajas airport; left, Martin Farrell in Denmark with his dog, Morris; above right, Kevin and Christine on holiday in Lanzarote PHOTOGRAPHS: JOAN MOURAL; BEETRIG; GUARDIAN COMMUNITY

with a full residency allowance. Farrell says the Dutch border police enrolled them into EES 'but no entry stamp was made on our passports. On 30 June, 55 days after entry, we returned to the UK on the Dunkirk-Dover ferry. The French border police asked us where and when we entered Schengen, and we were handed back our passports without an exit stamp.'

Once home, Farrell checked his residency tally and found instead of having 35 days left it was rapidly diminishing. 'It appeared that EES had not been updated to show I'd left the Schengen area,' says Farrell, who lives in Warwickshire. He was concerned that he would be registered as an 'overstayer' at risk of refusal of entry in future.

He reported the error to the Directorate General for Foreign

Nationals in France on 13 July but says he has not received a response.

When he checked on his day allowance on 7 August, the EES website said he had zero days left, but on 17 August it had updated. 'The EES website now claims I have 14 days left to travel in the 180 window! When I checked my wife's passport she apparently has 90 days left despite us both having the same travel to Schengen history.'

Nadia, a solicitor from Greater Manchester, found a trip to Tenerife in June 'quite straightforward', but her experience in July at Frankfurt airport much less so. 'The queue there was ridiculously long, and there was very limited information,' she says.

'People were wandering around trying to work out where they needed to go. I'm very well

travelled and pretty confident, but even I was slightly unsure and was thinking, is there some other queue I should be joining?'

Eventually, her passport was checked. 'He didn't actually take fingerprints then,' says Nadia. 'I think the queue was so long they decided to dispense with that. It's the efficiency of the system I question and the fact that individual member states' systems do not talk to one another.'

'They shouldn't need to get information again if you have already gone through. It's pretty shambolic, and I think people missing their flights because of it is just not acceptable.'

Nadia is unhappy about repeated fingerprinting. 'I've done it in a few countries now, but it's something I feel very strongly opposed to. This is not in keeping with the intention of the scheme, which suggests that once registered, you should not have to keep re-entering your biometric data.'

'People missing their flights because of it is just not acceptable'

Nadia A recent traveller

Evie, 23, from Manchester but studying in Munich, says her student visa has caused confusion. 'In Munich airport, there are TV screens which explain the function of EES as a system to register 'visitors'. As I hold an extended-stay visa for the purpose of studying, I would not describe myself as a 'visitor' as I can stay in Germany for up to 12 months.'

With a British passport, she was often directed toward the EES queue. Evie says this has happened 'virtually every time' she has flown in and out of Germany and believes there should be better signposting to avoid mix-ups.

Kevin, 75, and his wife, Christine, 73, from Merseyside, travelled to Lanzarote in June. 'The arrivals hall was packed, but there were loads of machines,' he says. 'Some were not working. I noticed people getting angry when their fingerprints would not enter. People started holding their fingers in different positions, and when that didn't work, they would hit the glass harder.' There was 'not much assistance to be found' and people queued up to 'have it done manually at the kiosk. You could see people getting anxious.'

Martin, 68, a retired IT worker from Stockport, said he and his wife struggled with screens at Schiphol airport in the Netherlands. 'The fingerprinting system didn't work for me. My wife had similar issues with her 71-year-old hands. Older people with their fingers have trouble with touch screens.' He was sent to manual entry 'where they forgot to stamp my passport'.

'When exiting Dusseldorf, the Germans got a bit excited about that and asked how we got into Europe,' he adds. 'I just said the Dutch didn't stamp our passports, and they accepted that. The interface is poorly laid out and will confuse the less technical. I have an IT background, and it feels like the system was not walked through enough times. It's a mess. It also hasn't been properly tested for older people.'

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OnlyFans How abusers use site revealed in trials Page 8

Mislaid or stolen? Parliament's missing portraits revealed Page 13

National

▲ Cleveland police yesterday named the seven people who died in the head-on collision on the A66 as, clockwise from top left: PC Tom Clough, 38, and PC Matthew Blades, 37, of Cleveland police; Michael Robert Cahill, 23; Jakub Matusiak, 23; Theo Rae, left, and Cole Robert Worthy, both 17; and Makai Saddington, 18

Two 17-year-olds among seven dead in crash on the A66

● Continued from page 1

world a better place. Always on public duty throughout his short life.

"We as a family and Tom's partner would like to express our sincere gratitude for the overwhelming support and condolences from friends, colleagues and the wider community."

Blades' wife said the pain of losing him is "beyond words" and the family's lives "will never be the same".

"No words will ever feel like the right words to honour our Matt - my beloved husband, my best friend, and the most devoted father to our two young boys.

"He was loved beyond words and his loss has left a space that can never be filled.

"He gave his life in the line of duty, protecting and serving others with courage, dedication and selflessness.

Blades' wife also expressed "deepest gratitude and heartfelt thanks" to the police and emergency services and concluded: "Forever loved. Forever missed. Forever our superhero."

A local football club, Seaton Carew FC, said Blades had recently joined as coach and was preparing for the season with the new under-sevens Seahawks team. "He was looking forward to being part of the team and, most importantly, to coaching his own son, who is going to be playing for the Seahawks this season," the club said on social media.

"Matty and his oldest son are much-loved members of our club

and our U10 Lions football family. Our thoughts and deepest condolences are with Matty's wife, his two boys, and all of his family and friends at this incredibly difficult time."

The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) has opened an investigation into the circumstances leading to the crash at 3.39am in South Bank, after a mandatory referral from Cleveland police.

The IOPC said initial inquiries showed the Passat was pursued by police for just under seven minutes before it turned on to the A66 against the flow of traffic. At that point the pursuit was aborted, the IOPC said.

"Approximately 10 seconds later, the Passat collided with another police vehicle which was not involved in the pursuit but in the area to assist in a search for the Passat believed to be using cloned plates that had activated an ANPR camera."

The IOPC director of engagement, Derrick Campbell, said: "Our thoughts continue to be with the family and friends and all those affected by yesterday's collision. We recognise the devastating impact the incident has had on those in the force, and the wider policing community, and offer our condolences."

Anna Turley, a Home Office minister and the local Redcar MP, said it was "devastating" to think of the grief of the families of everyone who lost their lives on Saturday morning.

"All of us in the community here are sending our heartfelt thoughts and sympathies to the families and loved ones of those who lost their lives so tragically," she said.

Security camera footage from local houses appeared to show the police pursuit just before the fatal crash.

Andy Burnham said he was "devastated" to hear that two police officers had lost their lives on duty, as well as five members of the public.

The prime minister said: "My thoughts are with the families and loved ones of everyone involved, and with everyone at Cleveland police. Thank you to the emergency services responding in incredibly difficult circumstances. I would urge people to avoid speculation at this time."

Fuller said she and her deputy had visited the families of the two officers to offer condolences and support.

"This is an incredibly sad day for Cleveland," she said. "These were brave officers, protecting our communities who didn't return home to their families at the end of their shift."

Implant offers hope to people living with the pain of angina, study finds

Denis Campbell Health policy editor

A small implant can significantly reduce chest pain and improve quality of life for patients living with refractory angina, whose symptoms persist despite medication, stents or bypass surgery, a study has found.

Angina, a common form of heart disease, involves pain in the chest, neck, shoulders, jaw or arm. The hourglass-shaped device, which costs the NHS £11,400, is implanted near the heart using keyhole surgery through the patient's neck.

Coroner sinus reduction (CSR) works by narrowing a vein at the back of the heart. That helps to redirect blood to the parts of the heart muscle that are getting too little oxygen.

The study, led by Royal Brompton Hospital and Imperial College London, is the largest of its kind to date. It found that the device brought about a significant fall in chest pain in 75% of participants with refractory angina within six months of its implantation.

"In this respect it is potentially a game-changer," said the consultant cardiologist Dr Ranil de Silva, who co-led the study with Dr Kevin Cheng.

Researchers monitored 491 people with refractory angina between 2014 and 2024, 474 of whom had the implant fitted at 19 hospitals in England and Scotland. Most patients went home the day of the procedure or the day after and serious complications were rare, the study found.

An estimated 300,000 people in England live with refractory angina. According to de Silva, the device can greatly reduce the symptoms that affect people's ability to do normal day-to-day activities as well as preventing hospital admissions.

"Many patients report their lives being transformed and that it helps them to achieve the quality of life they wish for, that they were unable to enjoy prior to the reducer implant - they get their life back," he added.

Despite its apparent success, it is too early to yet see CSR as a standard treatment, he said. More trials are needed and more funding to expand access, he added.

Dr Sonya Babu-Narayan, a consultant cardiologist who is the British Heart Foundation's clinical director, said: "The findings are reassuring as they show that in routine clinical practice the device is being delivered safely and is resulting in fewer symptoms for patients."

The device "offers hope for people living with this challenging condition", she added.

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National Politics

Mayors to be given powers to overrule councils on local planning decisions

Nadeem Badshah Kiran Stacey

Andy Burnham will give mayors new powers to take control of local planning decisions and greenlight large-scale developments in proposals to be presented this week.

Mayors will be able to "call in" the decisions and direct councils to take them forward or refuse them. They will also be able to grant upfront permission so developers can start building without having to apply.

It is intended to stop "nimby" councils blocking developments that could stimulate local growth or help the government achieve its target of building 1.5m homes by the end of the parliament.

But Burnham said the policy could also result in mayors blocking projects that councils wanted to push forward. "Actually it cuts both ways," he told the Sunday Times. "It's not all about nimbyism. Sometimes it's the other way round. It's a local authority putting forward something that's unacceptable in terms of the impact on the community ... so it's a two-way street."

The measures will apply to developments of more than 150 homes, commercial spaces of more than 15,000 sq m, or any building 30 metres or taller - roughly 10 storeys.

Burnham told the paper he understood the argument that devolving

powers to mayors to push through such projects could disempower councillors, MPs and constituents. "The question is: do you want somebody who's elected by the people of that area to consider a decision, or a far less accountable decision-making process?" he said.

Ten of the 14 devolved mayors from different parties have backed the change. It will bring them into line with the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, who was given the powers earlier this year, in what was billed as an emergency measure aimed at unblocking dozens of stalled sites to get thousands more affordable homes built in the capital.

Burnham said: "In my view, it will prompt a much more joined-up discussion about planning and local authorities. I think knowing the mayor has that role, councils will come to the mayor and say: 'How can we work this thing out so that it is acceptable?'"

The government is just over a quarter of the way to its housing target, which Angela Rayner, the housing secretary, recently said remained in place. The decisions must be in line with planning rules, local plans set out for areas and the national policy, and ministers will retain a backstop power to intervene.

Mayors will also get more of a say on how national housing funding from Homes England will be spent in their areas, in addition to being able

to charge a levy on development to fund large infrastructure.

A consultation will be published this week.

The Liberal Democrats said the policy was a "direct attack" that would silence residents. Gideon Amos, the party's housing spokesperson, said: "Taking powers away from communities and local councillors is taking powers away from local people. This plan is a direct attack on communities across the country."

"Instead of silencing residents and handing mayors a blank cheque, the government should be empowering local councils with the resources to deliver genuinely affordable homes alongside the infrastructure to support them."

Burnham faces a difficult autumn after a summer-long honeymoon period, during which a series of announcements by the prime minister has helped his party jump ahead of Reform UK in the polls for the first time in a year.

This year his chancellor, John Healey, will give his first budget. He is likely to be constrained by high borrowing figures and the impact of the war in Iran.

Burnham will also have to make decisions about Shabana Mahmood's changes to immigration, including whether people who are already in the country should have to wait longer to achieve settled status.

The Guardian revealed recently that the prime minister was considering exempting care workers, though that could affect hundreds of thousands of people.

"It's important to see that issue within a bigger picture," Burnham told the Sunday Times. "Migration is down, boat crossings are down, removals are up."

"I think what we've got to do in the autumn is present that full picture, and those decisions around ILR [indefinite leave to remain] will be part of that whole picture."

Asked whether he had made a decision on the overall package, he said: "Not yet, no."

'What a lad'

PM honours bride's plea to stay away

Harry Taylor

Andy Burnham has fulfilled a bride's wishes by not turning up to her wedding. She had asked him not to spoil her big day when she got married in the No 10 North building.

Sarah Burwin had pleaded on TikTok last month for Burnham not to work from the Manchester building that day. The building hosts the city's register office as well as the government's northern headquarters.

Burwin had said she feared Burnham's security detail would ruin wedding photographs when she got married on Friday.

She told the prime minister he would be welcome at her wedding,

but told him to give his security detail "an hour off". She later joked he could DJ the afterparty.

Burnham did not turn up, but did send a video message to her and her new husband, Fred.

"Thank you so much for the invite. But sadly, I'm honouring your initial request for me to stay out of the way, as I'm filming this as I'm about to

▲ Newlyweds Sarah and Fred got a video message from Andy Burnham

leave No 10 North for the day," Burnham said.

He added: "I couldn't let the day go by without sending you both a message. I hope you have the best day celebrating, and thank you for being such a good sport about No 10 North suddenly being a big part of your big day. The DJ set will have to wait for another time, but I hope you play some good tunes on my behalf."

Burwin replied: "Oh my God. What a lad. I love him!"

Burnham opened No 10 North last month. It falls under his new Office of the Prime Minister.

In her TikTok video, which has had nearly 1.5m views, Burwin said: "I saw you set up your new gaff, No 10 North, at Heron House. I saw it on the news; gorgeous, love what you've done with the place."

"But I'm actually getting married there on 21 August, and on the news today, the place was surrounded with police, bollards, all sorts. A lot of stuff that wasn't there before."

"My trouble is, I was planning to get nice photos like after, the register office, outside, and I'm just a bit worried that all of this is kind of ruining the vibe."

Analysis Kiran Stacey

The difficult decisions facing Andy Burnham when MPs return to the Commons

Andy Burnham has enjoyed a month-long honeymoon period since he became prime minister, winning public support with a series of popular but relatively low-cost announcements. They have included cutting VAT on electricity bills, reducing the cost of bus travel and reviewing business rates for small businesses.

But as MPs prepare to return to the Commons in just over a week, the prime minister is about

to face his first real challenge in office as he makes a number of key decisions that could create enemies but define his premiership.

The budget John Healey gives his first budget as chancellor on 28 October with the same constraints that faced his predecessor, Rachel Reeves.

Burnham and Healey have promised to stick to the fiscal rules set by Reeves, which means that the government's day-to-day budget must be forecast to be balanced in three years' time.

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▼ Burnham has to confront tough choices on the budget, migration, welfare and the prisons PHOTOGRAPH: CHRISTOPHER THOMONS/THE GUARDIAN

They have also promised not to raise income tax, national insurance or VAT, which gives the chancellor little room for manoeuvre if he wants to raise money for potentially expensive policies such as bringing utilities under public control.

Many Labour MPs want Healey to raise wealth or business taxes to help pay for the government's promises, but Treasury officials say such a move will not raise large amounts of money.

The economists Jim O'Neill and Andy Haldane, both of whom have advised Burnham in the past, have recently warned against raising taxes on the private sector. O'Neill said this weekend: 'We need more genuine risk-taking and more entrepreneurs, and we need to boost these sort of green shoots of growth that are there.'

Welfare spending

Over the next few weeks, the prime minister will be presented with two significant reports into how the welfare system is working: one on disability benefits by the minister Stephen Timms, and another on

youth employment by the former minister Alan Milburn.

In his interim report, Timms said the current system of personal independence payments (Pip) was not working, but admitted that there would have to be some 'challenging discussions' on how to fix it.

Keir Starmer's attempts to cut £5bn from the Pip system backfired when Labour MPs rebelled en masse, forcing the government to drop the plans altogether, in what was arguably the beginning of the end of Starmer's premiership.

Meanwhile charities are already gearing up to resist any attempt by Milburn and the government to cut benefits or sanction young people who fail to find work.

Migration

Shabana Mahmood, the home secretary, wants to make migrants wait longer before they are eligible for settled status, which allows them to claim benefits and use the NHS for free.

Controversially among Labour MPs, she wants to apply these changes to people who are already

in the country, alongside a series of other changes to the migration system, including forcibly deporting families who refuse to comply with removal orders.

Mahmood has been consulting on some of her proposals, and has suggested that some migrants could be given shorter waiting times than others before qualifying for settled status. It will soon be up to Burnham whether to allow her proposals to remain largely intact or whether to demand exemptions for some workers such as those in the care system.

Asked by the Sunday Times whether he had made a decision on that package, he replied: 'Not yet, no.'

Prisoner release

Next month, 5,000 prisoners are due to be released early to ease the pressure on the overcrowded prisons in England and Wales.

The plans have already been watered down after a public outcry prompted Burnham to exclude those convicted of rape, serious child sexual offences and grooming from the scheme.

Gaza Grassroots groups plan to press for action at Labour party conference

Aletha Adu

Political correspondent

Grassroots Labour groups are gearing up for a conference showdown with Andy Burnham over Gaza, as the party's members seek to force the prime minister to recognise Israel's actions as a genocide and impose a full arms embargo.

Momentum, Labour & Palestine, the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy and the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) plan to ramp up pressure on Burnham before his first Labour conference as prime minister next month.

The groups are circulating a model motion for Labour members to submit to the conference, demanding that the government accept the findings of a UN commission of inquiry that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, and impose 'comprehensive sanctions' including a full arms embargo.

The motion also demands that ministers ban trade that 'aids or assists' Israel's military actions in Gaza or its unlawful presence in the occupied Palestinian territories, including trade with Israeli settlements.

The prime minister has apologised for the party's handling of Gaza under Keir Starmer's leadership, saying Labour had 'not got it right'.

His refusal to use the term genocide, however, has caused frustration among many Labour MPs, not just those on the left of the party. Several MPs told the Guardian they welcomed Burnham's apology but wanted him to go further and explicitly 'acknowledge Israel's actions in Gaza as a genocide'.

Weeks before he became prime minister, Burnham told the Guardian: 'We've got to do more to put pressure on the Israeli government ... let's be honest, the UK was too slow to call for a ceasefire. And we must now do more to strengthen our approach.'

But he stopped short of describing what was happening on the ground in Gaza as a genocide, saying that while there was 'increasing evidence' of war crimes, it was for the international courts to make that ruling.

▲ An Israeli airstrike destroying homes and tents in Gaza yesterday

The UK government has signalled that further measures against Israel could be coming. Ed Miliband, the foreign secretary, said ministers would set out a 'comprehensive set of measures' after Israel moved ahead with its illegal Ex settlement plans in the occupied West Bank.

In the run-up to the 2025 party conference, Labour sought to rule out motions on Palestine being debated at the conference, which triggered accusations that the party was trying to stifle debate. About 30 motions about Palestine from local parties were struck off last September.

But conference went against the then leadership and backed an emergency motion proposed by the Unison union that the Labour government should 'employ all means reasonably available to it to prevent the commission of genocide in Gaza' and 'fully suspend the arms trade with Israel and the UK-Israel trade and partnership agreement'.

The Labour groups are seeking to force the issue back on the conference floor this year, presenting it as an early test of Burnham's promise not to 'stifle debate' within Labour.

Momentum is launching a petition aimed at current and former Labour members and voters, urging the prime minister to stick to the position backed by delegates last year.

Burnham is facing growing pressure beyond Labour's left after more than 100 British and French diplomats wrote to him and the French president, Emmanuel Macron, urging tough action against Israel including suspending arms transfers and taking further trade measures.

Emily Thornberry, the chair of the foreign affairs select committee, this week said Britain should ban imports from the occupied West Bank amid growing concern over Israeli settlement expansion.

It comes as Labour is hoping to win back progressive voters who deserted the party under Starmer.

Polling commissioned by the PSC and Friends of the Earth this summer found 67% of voters who had switched from Labour to the Greens cited Palestine as a factor in their decision to leave Labour.

Sasha Das Gupta, a co-chair of Momentum, said: 'Burnham must not allow the same failures that alienated voters under Starmer to continue. He must listen to the majority of the labour movement and take decisive action on Gaza'.

Dan Iley-Williamson, a political organiser at the PSC, said: 'Burnham's apology for Labour's previous stance on Palestine will mean nothing if his government doesn't decisively break with Keir Starmer's complicity in Israel's crimes.'

'Burnham could use this Labour conference to show the country he will make this break with Starmer. If he doesn't, he risks the same fate: plummeting support and a legacy of infamy.'

The Foreign Office was approached for comment.

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8

National

Trials show how abusers exploit victims to post OnlyFans content

Amelia Gentleman

Two men have been convicted in separate criminal cases that highlighted the potential for OnlyFans to be “weaponised” by abusers.

Alexander Tang, 37, took and uploaded 47 intimate images and four videos of a woman to OnlyFans without her consent, and was paid for the material he posted to the website.

Dean Holmes, 43, coerced a woman to open an OnlyFans account to make money. He pleaded guilty to assault and controlling and coercive behaviour, but denied charges of rape. He was found guilty of rape last Thursday at the end of a four-day trial.

The cases follow warnings from domestic violence charities. In its 2026 report, Women’s Aid said the most common new form of tech-facilitated abuse its frontline teams were assisting with involved “young women being coerced to set up an OnlyFans account to generate income for their abusive partners”.

The Revenge Porn Helpline also

said it had handled reports from women who had been coerced into creating content for OnlyFans.

Bolton crown court heard Holmes had isolated his victim from family and friends. Mark Kellet, prosecuting, said: “She said he put pressure on her to start making money on OnlyFans... She would upload pictures of herself and the defendant would use the account to engage in text conversations with the men.”

The court heard that Holmes set up the account in her name and operated it from his phone. She had initially posted pictures of herself in a bikini, but he told her she needed to upload much more explicit content.

She later told him that she felt ashamed, messaging him to say: “I can’t show my face after putting myself out there showing everything... I can’t go back to work cos people will know.” Holmes is due to be sentenced next month.

Tang pleaded guilty to voyeurism and was given a 26-week suspended sentence last Wednesday. His victim discovered what had happened after being contacted by men who

thought they had been speaking to her on social media and dating apps.

She later discovered the profiles, which she had not set up, had images of her, some naked, taken without her permission or knowledge.

When she realised the pictures had also been posted on OnlyFans, she contacted Northumbria police. Their investigations confirmed that Tang had been selling the images, with the money going straight into his bank account. Tang had managed to take a photograph of the woman’s ID to legitimise the use of her images in his OnlyFans account. The company later removed the images during a routine content moderation check.

▲ Alexander Tang (left) and Dean Holmes posted content on OnlyFans

In a statement she read to the court, the woman said: “I cannot get the images, the videos, or the degrading captions and comments associated with them out of my mind. Knowing that intimate images and videos of me were uploaded to dozens of websites... is something I struggle with every day.”

An OnlyFans spokesperson said: “OnlyFans has a zero-tolerance policy for illegal content and invests heavily in measures to prevent our platform being abused in this way, including strict onboarding processes, payment controls and ongoing account moderation. We work closely with law enforcement and are proud of the work we do to support investigations and help secure convictions.”

Refuge, the UK’s largest domestic abuse charity, said its staff had supported a number of survivors “with cases which involve the weaponisation of OnlyFans by perpetrators”.

Emma Pickering, who leads Refuge’s tech-facilitated abuse team, has previously said of the platform: “While OnlyFans already requires creators to submit proof of consent at the point of upload, for survivors to be properly protected from harm it is essential that this is robustly implemented and monitored.”

For support, call the national domestic abuse helpline on 0808 2000 247, or visit Women’s Aid

Bank holiday traffic will be ‘frantic’ - RAC

Press Association

Drivers are being told to expect a “frantic Friday” as the summer bank holiday is predicted to be the busiest in more than a decade.

The RAC issued the warning as it estimated that 20m leisure trips will be made by car between Friday and next Monday.

That is the highest figure since it began analysing drivers’ summer bank holiday travel plans in 2015.

Monday is a bank holiday in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. This Friday is “likely to be mired in traffic”, the RAC said, with 4.1m journeys predicted.

About 3.8m leisure trips are expected on Saturday, 3.1m on Sunday and 3.4m the following day, when day-trippers will compete for space on the roads with people returning from short breaks.

A further 5.5m journeys will be spread across the four-day period, with drivers unsure which exact day they will hit the road.

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National

Wild beaver kits born in Norfolk for first time in more than 500 years

Donna Ferguson

A pair of wild beaver kits have been born in Norfolk for the first time in over 500 years.

They are the offspring of two free-living beavers who arrived in Pensthorpe nature reserve, near Fakrisham in December. This couple, who have built a lodge on the River Wensum, were the first wild beavers recorded in Norfolk since the species was hunted to extinction in England at the beginning of the 16th century.

How they got to the Wensum remains a mystery. Although beavers have re-established themselves in the English countryside since 2015, the nearest population of wild beavers is thought to be more than 130 miles away, on the River Stour in Kent.

Some suspect the breeding pair were illegally released by conservation activists, a practice known as beaver bombing, which Pensthorpe does not support, according to the reserve's manager, Richard Spowage.

However, Spowage welcomed the arrival of the 'very playful' kits, who are thought to be about three months old. 'It's amazing,' he said. 'We initially saw a single young one with a parent, just pottering around, doing little beaver things, chewing on little bits of branch and leaf. And then in a later piece of footage, it went off ... and suddenly it came running back, and a second kit was running after it.'

The kits appear to enjoy feeding on willow and watermint, but not everything on the menu in Norfolk has proved a hit. 'One got stung by a nettle, we think, because it reacted really suddenly, jumped back and started shaking its face,' said Spowage.

► The kits have been spotted in camera footage

PHOTOGRAPH: PENSTHORPE NATURAL PARK

They are already becoming very independent, and have been learning how to dive into the river and tailslap its surface to make a big bang when they want to scare off a predator. 'We've got footage of an adult tailslapping against an otter ... and one of the little ones is able to do that now, too,' Spowage said.

Although the beavers lived in a secret, inaccessible location in the nature reserve, they might expand their territory and become more visible to visitors in the future, he said.

The birth of the kits presents a conundrum, because they will have no one to breed with in the future except their parents and siblings. 'You can't have just one family in the river system,' said Spowage. 'You need a wider genetic pool.'

The reserve is now crowdfunding so that it can apply to the government advisory body Natural England for permission to legally introduce more wild beavers into the Wensum, which feeds into the Norfolk Broads.

▲ Beavers, once extinct in England, are re-establishing themselves

Foreign-born UK citizens should wait longer for housing - Reform

Kiran Stacey Policy editor

British citizens who were born abroad will be made to wait longer for social housing under proposals to be announced by Reform UK today.

Nigel Farage's party will announce the policy at a press conference in London, under which people born in the UK and young married couples with children will be given priority for social housing.

The party previously said it would

ban foreign nationals from social housing, meaning the new policy specifically prioritises Britons born in the UK over those born overseas.

Richard Tice, the party's deputy leader, said in a statement: 'There are now 1.3 million people waiting for social housing in Britain. The vast majority of them do not have jobs ... and over half a million social homes are occupied by foreign nationals.'

'Meanwhile, young British men and women, who are working hard, can't afford to move out of their family home, and when they do often

► English counties with established wild beaver populations

Source: The Beaver Trust

It will be an expensive project, involving studies of the river system, but Spowage is hoping: 'If we can introduce other beavers, then they will interbreed and the population will expand properly.'

Farmers have traditionally opposed beaver reintroduction over fears their dams could flood fields and damage crops. But during the heatwave, one farmer told the Guardian his best asset had been a family of beavers who had built a reservoir on his land that contains 3m litres of water.

Spowage said: 'There are landowners suddenly realising that when they do have beavers, the beavers are holding back and managing water, which is valuable for farmland in our current climate.'

Introducing more beavers into the Wensum would be a way for the government to lead on species

find themselves sharing a house with strangers, with no realistic prospect of forming a family or getting on.

'It is time for us to prioritise young British workers, and that is what our policy is about.'

The party said some foreign-born Britons would be exempted from the new rules, including those born while their British parents were temporarily overseas. Officials said however the new rules would require legislation to avoid breaking existing laws.

Under the terms of a previous announcement by Farage, foreign nationals would be barred from social housing, with those already in homes given three months to find private accommodation or face deportation.

The new policy would give priority access to British-born people in

recovery, he added, and would help to alleviate the frustration many conservationists feel about the speed and scale of legal beaver releases in the UK.

So far, the impact of the beavers on the reserve has been minimal. 'They haven't made any dams or built anything on the river. The only things they've been doing is clearing trees a bit and digging tiny little channels off to the sides of the river,' said Spowage.

Yet by thinning some of the nearby woodland, the beavers have opened up the rich fen habitat, allowing more light to reach the forest floor and encouraging plant growth. 'That means more food, not just for them, but for all wildlife ... They're doing things we were doing ... but we were doing it quite poorly, and they are doing it really well.'

Blue tits, great tits, blackcaps, water rails, jays, mallards, ducklings, foxes, otters and roe deer have all been recorded using or drinking from the shallow 30cm-wide river channels created by the beavers.

The Natural England spokesperson Matt Heard said: 'We are working with Pensthorpe nature reserve, the Beaver Trust and other stakeholders to ensure the welfare of the animals, and to develop a plan of action. Reintroducing beavers to our landscapes makes a huge difference to nature's recovery and where releases are managed carefully, they can secure long-term environmental benefits.'

employment and married couples under 35 with children.

The party said veterans would be given preferential treatment - though they are already given priority under existing government policy.

Sarah Elliott, the chief executive of the charity Shelter, said: 'Designed to stoke division, these plans will only serve to disrupt the lives of thousands of families, tear communities apart, and put even more people at risk of homelessness.'

A Labour spokesperson said: 'Illegal migrants, asylum seekers and migrants on student or work visas are not eligible for social housing. This policy would go after long-term UK residents that have contributed to our country but are not British citizens, including NHS staff.'

► Continued from page 1

to pupils to buy as snacks, including at breakfast time and at lunchtime. Schools are only allowed to sell nuts, seeds, plain vegetables and plain fruit as snacks.

The research also found that: ● 224 schools (57%) were providing meat products such as burgers, nuggets, sausages and gooijons more often than the two times a week permitted by the standards.

● Hash browns, which as a fried starchy food should only be a menu option twice a week, were being offered more often than that at 144 schools (37%).

● 123 schools (31%) were using chocolate in solid form, such as chocolate chips or chocolate coating, as an ingredient in dessert or bakes, despite it being banned.

'These findings are very alarming and expose a system that is fundamentally failing our children,' said Williams. 'It is shocking to find crisps and chocolate being pushed at breakfast time or processed meats like sausage rolls and bacon hops being served far more frequently than the rules allow.'

'Young people have been telling us for years that their school food is 'beige, bland and boring' and now we have more evidence that they are being surrounded by unhealthy food throughout the school day.'

But in other findings that parents may find reassuring, only eight schools (2%) were flouting the ban on selling confectionery such as KitKats, Haribo-sweets and Maltesers as standalone items. And even fewer - just three schools (0.7%) - were selling banned sugary drinks such as Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Fanta and Sprite.

Campaigners for healthier food voiced concern at the findings. Katharine Jenner, the executive director of the Obesity Health Alliance, said: 'Schools should be one of the places where we can be confident children are being given nutritious food. Yet this research suggests too many are still being routinely exposed to processed meat, fried foods, pastries and confectionery beyond what the standards allow.'

Bite Back's analysis comes as ministers prepare to unveil an overhaul of the school food standards.

The start of the new academic year in England early next month will see a major expansion of access to free school meals in England. From now on all pupils from a household where someone is receiving universal credit will qualify.

The Department for Education acknowledged that schools flouted the standards. A spokesperson said: 'We know not every school is following these standards, which is exactly why we will introduce a strengthened enforcement regime, alongside requiring every school to publish their food policy and menus online to improve transparency for parents.'

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10

National

Yearly cost of afterschool care hits £2,800 per child in England

Donna Ferguson

Parents of primary school children in England will pay 42% more for afterschool childcare this year than they did 10 years ago, with annual bills now exceeding £2,800 per child in some parts of the UK.

A Guardian analysis of data collected by the children's charity Coram has revealed that the annual cost of afterschool care for children aged five to 11 in England has risen by 5% over the past year to £2,636.

In Scotland the cost is even higher, at £2,701, while in Wales prices have risen by 64% in the past 10 years and by 8% in the past year, to £2,824.

Parents also typically pay £191 per

child per week for childcare during the school holidays, Coram found, adding more than £1,700 to the total annual childcare bill.

These costs, which do not include breakfast clubs before school starts, are in addition to the price of extracurricular activities such as swimming and music lessons or sports clubs.

Such activities now typically cost £700 a year and add up to £9,100 over a child's time in school, research by Nationwide revealed today.

Parents also spend an average of £38 each year on school uniform and sports kit - including £43 on shoes, £37 on blazers and £29 on tracksuits - as well as £16 a year on school trips, Nationwide found.

"It's never-ending, really, isn't it, for parents?" said Lydia Hodges,

head of Coram Family and Childcare. "[When a child is at nursery], a lot of parents hear: 'Oh it will be better when they go to school.' But actually, once you factor in paying for afterschool childcare and holiday childcare, it's still a pretty big bill every month."

The impact of these costs can be far-reaching, she said. "It's very stressful, I think, for a lot of parents, and it's something that they have to take into account in their budget when they're thinking about: 'Is it worthwhile working? Does work pay? How many children can we have?'"

Nearly half (49%) of the 2,002 UK parents and guardians surveyed by Nationwide said they were stressed about the cost of their children going back to school this September,

and one in four were delaying non-essential purchases.

Anna, who did not want to give her surname, is a civil servant with three children under the age of seven. She said she and her husband take turns working from home to avoid paying for afterschool childcare.

As a result, she and her husband are constantly under pressure to juggle their working days around their children's needs and activities. "Every week, we always have to have a discussion and a negotiation about who goes into the office."

This year, she estimates she will spend - on each child - about £250 on school uniform and shoes, even though she buys the branded school clothes second-hand via PTA uniform sales. Other items, such as backpacks and lunchboxes, can easily add up to £70 per child, she has discovered.

The couple are high earners but, after a summer of childcare costs and a cheap camping holiday, their bank account is almost empty. "We're not frivolous spenders, so I can only imagine that for the vast majority of people, it's impossible," she said.

Spying device detectors may give false sense of security, study finds

Priya Bharadia

Commercial detectors intended to help domestic abuse victims find hidden spying devices may give a false sense of security, a study has found.

The tools claim to identify hidden cameras, microphones or trackers through methods such as signal-strength readings, infrared lens detection and scanning for wifi or Bluetooth devices.

But researchers at University College London's computer science department found many detectors fail to adequately help users identify hidden surveillance devices, meaning victims may continue to be spied on in their homes unaware.

"There's quite a great disparity in the capabilities of the [spying] devices themselves and the tools that are available for detecting them," said the lead author, Akhil Polamarasetty.

The researchers identified about 1,000 covert surveillance products and 500 detection tools sold in the UK through mainstream websites such as Amazon, AliExpress and eBay.

Hidden devices included small cameras or microphones concealed inside household items such as USB chargers, plush toys and clocks.

In the study, 34 participants were asked to search for hidden surveillance devices inside a simulated living room, and then to do the same again using detection tools. The latter showed only a marginal improvement: participants missed 67% of the hidden devices when searching on their own, compared with a 59% miss rate when using a detector.

Polamarasetty said many of the detection products were not built with at-risk users in mind, often emitting loud alerts that could alert those spying on them. He said: "They're absolutely not safe to be used when you're living with the perpetrator."

The only real solution was to stop the sale of spy devices, which are often marketed as home security or pet tracking tools, researchers said.

The domestic abuse charity Refuge said it had seen a "notable rise" in victims reporting finding hidden microphones or cameras inside their homes. Its policy manager, Bo Bottomley, said: "What is especially worrying is how accessible and affordable these devices are."

Amazon declined to comment. A spokesperson from eBay said the platform "prohibits the sale of many products that are used to transmit or receive signals or for covert surveillance, and all sellers are required to comply with our policies and applicable UK law". AliExpress was contacted for comment.

For support, call the national domestic abuse helpline on 0808 2000 247, or visit Women's Aid.

Kindertransport Woman marks 100th birthday with return to Vienna station

Mark Brown North of England correspondent

Gabriele Keenaghan still remembers the day in April 1939 when she said goodbye to her grandmother at a Vienna railway station for a Kindertransport to Britain - tears were strictly forbidden.

"I was apprehensive because Nazis in black uniforms were on the platform," she said. "I was only 12 ... they were frightening."

"People had been told that there were to be no emotional scenes. I tried not to cry. It was very difficult. My grandmother ... she smiled."

This week Keenaghan will mark her 100th year by returning to Vienna's Westbahnhof, a place which changed, if not saved, her life, and there might be tears. "I probably will feel emotional."

Keenaghan, who is a retired headteacher, is speaking at her home in North Shields before what will be an epic trip to Vienna with several generations of her family.

The plan, hatched for her centenary, was nearly scuppered because Lufthansa cancelled routes from Newcastle. Fortunately, a good samaritan offered a private pet, and the family admit they have been bowled over by the generosity.

Keenaghan is 99 but you would never guess.

She was awarded the British Empire Medal for her services to Holocaust education, recounting what is a remarkable life story in

the hope it might bring "kindness, tolerance and acceptance of diversity" in others.

Keenaghan, an only child, said she did not know she was Jewish until after the Nazis invaded Austria. Her mother, Hildegard, was a Catholic who died suddenly in 1935. Her father, Josef, was Jewish and made heating stoves.

The young Gabriele was a boarder at a Catholic convent school when the Nazis came and told pupils they would all be

▲ A very young Gabriele with her parents, Hildegard and Josef Weiss

moving. "The authorities came into the convent to tell us which schools we had to go to. We were all standing in the hall and names were called for this school, that school. At the end, I was the only one left standing. And I thought: 'What's happening to me?'"

She was told she would have to go to a Jewish school and a yellow star of David was sewn onto her coat. "I hadn't realised my father was a Jew ... I don't think I even knew what being a Jew meant." It was bewildering and people treated her horribly, she said.

Keenaghan never saw her father again. He was deported to Łódź in Poland and was almost certainly murdered in an extermination camp. Her grandmother arranged for her granddaughter to be taken out of Austria on a Kindertransport, the scheme which brought 10,000 Jewish children to Britain as refugees. Keenaghan quickly picked up the language. One of her first

▲ Gabriele Keenaghan was 12 when she left Austria for England from Vienna's Westbahnhof PHOTOGRAPH: CHRISTOPHER THOMING THE GUARDIAN

jobs was as a nanny to an affluent family in Woldingham, Surrey.

She has vivid memories of VE Day and went to London to be part of the celebrations. "It was really euphoric," she said.

Keenaghan trained as a teacher and met her husband, Ken, and raised a family in Wallsend. She became a middle-school headteacher.

She has visited Austria annually to see relatives, especially her grandmother, who died in 1974. The one place she and her family have not been to is the station.

Keenaghan has spoken many times to children about her experiences. "I hope they have learned something from it," she said. "But do we ever learn? Look at the world, the state it is in now."

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Monday 24 August 2025 The Guardian

National

11

Thousands of sex offenders could be given drugs to suppress libido

Rajeev Syal Home affairs editor

Drugs that help control the libidos of people who have committed sexual offences could be rolled out for thousands of male prisoners in England and Wales from December 2028, an expert has said.

Prof Belinda Winder, who has evaluated the use of sex drive-suppressing medication in prisons, said about one in four sex offenders - equating to 3,750 current prisoners - would be considered for the treatment.

Government sources have told the Guardian that Andy Burnham's administration is keen to expand the voluntary use of sex drive-suppressing drugs amid a scramble to ease the prison overcrowding crisis.

However, ministers are re-evaluating whether to press ahead with Shabana Mahmood's decision to explore mandatory chemical castration of serious sex offenders, such as paedophiles and rapists.

About 15,000 prisoners in England and Wales are serving a sentence for a sexual offence, and more than 850 men a month are arrested on suspicion of online child sexual abuse offences.

A pilot, the medication to manage problematic sexual arousal treatment pathway (MMPSA), will expand from 10 to 20 prisons in November. The next phase will extend from south-west England into the north-west and north-east NHS regions.

It is meant to target sex offenders who experience intrusive, persistent and intense sexual thoughts, persistent arousal, and unhealthy sexual urges and sexual behaviours. Prisoners on the trial can be offered drugs including selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), such as sertraline, which helps to limit invasive sexual thoughts, and anti-androgens, which reduce the production of testosterone and limit libido. In some cases, it reduces testosterone to pre-pubescent levels.

Winder said officials could be ready to launch the drugs in prisons and probation services across England and Wales within 28 months if the pilot continued to progress.

"They [the Ministry of Justice] could be ready in December 2028 to roll the programme out if the interim findings look useful," she said.

Those on the scheme would have to receive clinical support if they were to commit to taking the drugs and not reoffend, Winder said. "I am optimistic that a properly resourced, voluntary national MMPSA pathway could ultimately be developed ... A good national service needs appropriately trained clinicians, clear referral routes, appropriate psychological support alongside medication," she said.

Last year Mahmood, the then justice secretary, told MPs she was exploring a national rollout of voluntary chemical castration for sex offenders and whether it could be made mandatory.

Two experts have told the Guardian that the plan will not work. Winder, a co-chief investigator of a Prozac clinical trial with sex offenders, said she had significant concerns.

"A mandatory approach would require screening a very large prison population to identify the much smaller group for whom treatment might actually be appropriate," she said. "It would have substantial clinical and resource implications."

There were also concerns that if it was mandatory there could be a breakdown of trust with offenders and it could be open to abuse, she said.

"Trying to impose and monitor daily medication among people who do not necessarily want to take

11.7% Reoffending rate among sexual offenders in 2023; it was 53.9% for those with convictions for theft

it could be extremely inefficient. It could also introduce a range of consequences that we simply do not yet understand, including effects on trust, disclosure, engagement and the therapeutic relationship."

She rejected characterising the drugs as "chemical castration". "Some people like the idea of castrating people who commit sexual offences," she said. "But these drugs are not permanent ... and must be taken consistently to work."

Burnham announced this month that prisoners convicted of rape, grooming and serious child sexual offences would be excluded from the early release scheme due to begin in October. Other sex offenders serving sentences of under four years will still be eligible to leave prison early.

There is comparatively low reoffending among sexual offenders. According to government data, 11.7% of sex offenders reoffended in 2023, compared with 53.9% of those with an index offence for theft.

Critics have pointed out that long-term testosterone suppression can cause osteoporosis and cardiovascular disease. There is limited data because trials remain scarce.

Andrew Neilson, of the Howard League for Penal Reform, said: "The history of prison-based treatment programmes in this area has proven troubled, which is both a reason for exploring alternatives but also a reason to exercise caution before expanding new approaches more widely. It's also important that nobody is forced into these chemical interventions and that participation is truly voluntary."

Mark Fairhurst, the national chair of the prison officers' union the POA, said: "Anything that potentially protects the public is welcome but I would be cautious about the rollout until we are in receipt of evidence that proves success."

Additional reporting Faisa Mohamed

Chemical control Side-effects, problems and ethical dilemmas

Rajeev Syal Faisa Mohamed

For some prisoners with problematic sexual arousal (PSA), "images of sex flood their minds" all of their waking hours, according to Prof Belinda Winder, a leading forensic psychologist who has evaluated the use of drugs to control libidos.

"I remember talking to one guy a few weeks after he started taking the medication," she said. "He said: 'It's amazing. I followed a film plot. I wasn't just looking for when I could see bra straps, when I could see nipples, when someone's going to bend over so I could see their

bum.' Without the drugs, these images were going around his head all the time. He did not want them any more."

Drugs used in the UK to treat PSA include antidepressants, which help control obsessive urges, and anti-androgens, which lower testosterone levels. The treatments, typically taken as pills, are not suitable for some offenders such as those primarily motivated by anger, or who struggle to moderate their behaviour while using alcohol or drugs.

A similar approach has been used in some European countries. In Denmark and France, chemical suppression has been administered on a voluntary basis. In Germany, the Dunkelfeld project provides free and confidential therapies

including medical interventions to men with paedophilic or hebephilic (attraction to children in early adolescence) obsessions.

Other countries have taken a harder line. Poland has introduced mandatory chemical suppression for some sex offenders. South Korea became the first country in Asia to legalise chemical castration, passing a law in 2010. It grants courts and a Ministry of Justice committee the authority to order involuntary hormone treatment for convicted sex offenders to suppress their testosterone.

In Australia, several states grant courts and parole boards the power to order anti-libidinal treatment for high-risk sex offenders which can then become a condition of release. Kazakhstan and a number of US states already have mandatory prescribing of anti-libidinal drugs to some sex offenders.

Officials in the UK have explored whether taking part in programmes such as these could be made a condition of a parole licence.

However, ethical dilemmas remain over whether it would be right to give someone parole based on whether they take a drug that can be life-changing.

In the 50s, hormone treatments were given to men convicted of crimes related to homosexuality with the promise they could avoid jail. Alan Turing, the computer scientist and codebreaker, who was convicted of "gross indecency" in 1952, accepted chemical castration as a way of avoiding imprisonment. He took his own life two years later, but received a posthumous royal pardon in 2013.

'Without the drugs, these images were going around his head all the time' Prof Belinda Winder Forensic psychologist

The side-effects of anti-androgens in particular can be severe. Some men experience fatigue, hot flushes, muscle loss, mood changes, weight gain and a loss of bone density.

Experts acknowledge that problems remain. The medication is not a cure and does not change underlying behaviours. Some programmes have high drop-out rates.

Each offender would have to be assessed by the Parole Board. "It is never going to be so simple that a decision will be taken on whether to give someone parole based on whether they are taking their meds," Winder said.

"Parole boards take such decisions by assessing many factors, including how receptive [offenders] are to staff and how they interact with their peers. It is really important that people are trained in understanding what it means if someone is taking this medication and how that might affect a person's behaviour."

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National

11

Portraits of Disraeli and Wilberforce 'lost by parliament'

Mark Brown

A photograph of Benjamin Disraeli, an engraved portrait of William Wilberforce and a cartoon of Barbara Castle have all been misplaced by the UK parliamentary authorities, a freedom of information request has revealed.

The Press Association has been given a list of more than 65 artworks which have been missing since 2024.

They also include a photograph of Margaret Beckett, the UK's first female foreign secretary and the first woman to lead Labour, and a satirical cartoon by Martin Rowson from the Conservative leadership battle of 1995.

A parliamentary spokesperson said it was a working collection which meant that objects moved around frequently. None of the works have been permanently written off, they said.

The photo of Disraeli, Queen Victoria's favourite prime minister, was taken by John Isher Edwin Mayall.

Mayall was a prolific Victorian portrait photographer who captured the images of many of the era's best known figures.

Art UK, which catalogues Britain's publicly owned art, lists 212 Mayall works in UK collections including portraits of Charles Dickens, Karl Marx, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the soprano Anna Bishop, the scientist Michael Faraday and the explorer David Livingstone.

Mayall also made a fortune photographing Victoria and the wider

► Portraits of Benjamin Disraeli and above, William Wilberforce

along with a cartoon of Barbara Castle, below, have been misplaced

royal family with his carte-de-visite portraits feeding the 19th-century "cartomania" collecting craze.

The misplaced Disraeli photograph is likely to be the same as one in other collections, including the Royal Collection, showing a tired, heavy-lidded Disraeli in his 60s, with his curly hair and small goatebeard.

The missing print of Wilberforce, the most celebrated campaigner against the slave trade, was made by the printmaker William Holl and his brother Francis.

The Rowson cartoon is from the

1995 Tory leadership campaign when John Major told opponents to "put up or shut up". It shows Major seeking to lance the literal "boil" of the contest, as his deputy, Michael Heseltine, and challenger-apparent Michael Portillo look on.

Rowson said the issue of cartoons going missing was not uncommon.

He said a cartoon of the Foreign Office Christmas party in 2004, sent to the then junior minister Denis MacShane at his department, "never got beyond reception".

Rowson said: "It's a shame but it's

'None of the items have been written off or are considered a financial loss'

Parliamentary spokesperson

hardly the crown jewels - and the point about cartoon originals is that they've been published already: the artefact is probably the impression in the newspaper, as that's its ticket to posterity.

"The original is the modern equivalent to one of Hogarth or Gillray's copper plates used to create the - reproduced - satirical print. That's why we belong more properly to journalism than art."

He said the misplaced work was "small beer compared to one of my cartoons which was part of a touring exhibition of work by members of the British Cartoonists' Association, all of which was destroyed by a Nato airstrike in the Serbian public library it had reached on its British Council sponsored tour in 1998".

The missing satirical cartoon of Castle, a former Labour minister, depicts her as Florence Nightingale.

The number of works involved is much less than the 224 which were reported missing after a similar freedom of information request in 2018.

At the time it included portraits of William Pitt the Younger, and a wartime oil painting by William John MacLeod of the scene after parliament was bombed.

The parliamentary spokesperson said: "None of the items recorded as missing have been written off or are considered a financial loss."

They said five of the "missing" works had been found this year.

The art collection is one of four parliamentary heritage collections containing 26,000 objects including furniture and decorative arts.

Unsolved murders in London mostly involve black victims

Vikram Dodd

Police and crime correspondent

Killers who take the lives of black people have a greater chance of getting away with their crimes than those who target white people, new research shows.

Analysis of unsolved homicides in London between 2019 to 2023 reveals a stark disparity: minority ethnic British people represented 61.7% of reported homicide victims, but 92.9% of all unsolved murder victims.

Black people were victims in 40% of all homicides and represented 73% of all unsolved murder cases during that period. Black victims made up 83.7% (36 victims) of unsolved shootings and 73.5% (39 victims) of unsolved stabbings.

The Metropolitan police's head of homicide, Commander Paul Brogden, said: "We know serious violence disproportionately affects certain communities, particularly

young black men, who have the lowest trust in policing. This means sadly victims or witnesses are less likely to come forward and trust us."

The study, by Action on Armed Violence, also found that deaths by shooting were more likely to be unsolved than those by stabbing.

Between 2019 and 2023, London averaged 124.6 homicides a year, with stabbings accounting for 65.3% of all killings and shootings 8.7%. Yet among the 41 murders in this period that remain unsolved, shootings made up 38%, more than four times their share of overall homicide total.

Brogden said: "That is an added complexity following shootings or stabbings on the streets, where identifying suspects requires more detailed

41

Unsolved murders in London between 2019 and 2023, of an average 124.6 homicides a year

investigative work, particularly when compared to domestic murders. While we use every tool at our disposal such as CCTV and forensics, often it's witness evidence which can prove vital in securing convictions."

The average age of homicide victims in London is about 36. However, for unsolved cases, the average victim's age drops significantly to 28.

Iain Overton, of Action on Armed Violence, said: "Our data suggests that London's unsolved murders are not evenly distributed. Instead, they are concentrated among young black men and in cases involving firearm violence... The result must seem often clear to the victims' families: those communities most affected by deadly violence are often the least likely to see those responsible brought to justice. This is itself risks deepening existing mistrust and creating the perception of unequal protection under the law."

The Met has a high clear-up rate for homicides, with nine out of 10 resulting in justice. Last year the force recorded 97 homicides in London, down from 153 in 2019, the lowest in a decade. The study says between 2015 and 2024 there were 110 unsolved homicides (9%) out of 1,222 killings.

CrossCountry cancels almost all trains after a power cut

Lauren Almeida

CrossCountry cancelled almost all of its train services in Great Britain yesterday after a power cut in Birmingham hit its control centre.

Most services were cancelled until further notice, including routes from Glasgow to Edinburgh, Manchester to Birmingham, Cheltenham to Cardiff and Newcastle to Edinburgh.

The train operator said it expected "near normal service" between Peterborough, Cambridge and Stansted airport, and a rail replacement bus service was running between Leicester and Peterborough. A "very limited" number of trains were to run from about 6pm yesterday, with normal service expected to resume today.

The transport secretary, Heidi Alexander said: "I've asked publicly owned operators to lay on extra services where possible. We've also sent Network Rail power teams who are ... working to restore power and systems as soon as possible."

CrossCountry has told passengers that tickets for its services can be used with other train operators on the same route, and that they will remain valid on its services until Wednesday.

Chiltern Railways said it had added services between Birmingham Moor Street and Oxford, and that it will accept all CrossCountry tickets "via any reasonable route". LNER will also accept CrossCountry tickets.

Passengers are entitled to delay repay compensation for delays of 30 minutes or more. Those who choose not to travel can claim a refund.

It is the latest in a series of delays and cancellations on CrossCountry services.

The passenger watchdog told the train operator this year it needed to improve its performance.

In June, a Transport Focus survey found that while overall 87% of rail passengers were satisfied with their experience, that fell to 79% for CrossCountry passengers.

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14

National

OpenAI leader warns of threat of 'ongoing, persistent' cyber-attacks in new era of AIs

Robert Booth

A senior leader at OpenAI has said people should prepare to defend against 'ongoing, persistent' cyber-attacks from AIs, as cutting-edge artificial intelligence models gain advanced capabilities to plan and launch offensives.

The company announced a pause in development of its most advanced internal models amid rising safety fears. Chris Lehane, its chief global affairs officer, said: 'We are hitting a different chapter, a different moment within AI, in terms of what the capabilities of this technology can do.'

He spoke after cutting-edge AI agents-in-training unexpectedly broke out of a supposedly secure 'sandbox' environment, accessed the internet, and hacked into another company, Hugging Face, last month. OpenAI also said it could not rule out another new model, Astra, having 'critical cybersecurity capability'.

By its own definition, this could

mean it launches cyber-attacks that 'could lead to catastrophe from unilateral actors, hacking military or industrial systems, or OpenAI infrastructure'.

OpenAI said last week that it had paused training of some frontier AI models to implement new safeguards, and it is unclear when training will restart after new guardrails have been put in place.

Mia Glaese, who leads safety and alignment work at the company, said: 'We are very far from everything running back to normal.' Sam Altman, the CEO, said: 'Getting AI safety right is more important than any company's momentum.'

Lehane admitted people would not 'feel great' about the threat of attacks, and described the risk as coming from open-source models - many of which are developed in China - which are only a few months behind 'frontier closed' models built by companies such as OpenAI.

'People are going to be able to access these open-source models and be able to have ongoing, persistent

▲ Mia Glaese said OpenAI was 'very far' from restarting safety training

attacks on you, and you're going to need to have really superior models to fend them off and defend [yourself], he said. 'That's not necessarily going to make the public feel great about things. It is just the reality of where we're going.'

The threat of cyber-attacks crippling businesses, infrastructure and the general public has rapidly risen to the top of the list of urgent concerns about AI. This week, the UK government's National Cyber Security Centre urged caution over the use of AI agents, warning that their safety controls can be bypassed and

that an AI agent 'does not have common sense'. It advised organisations to limit their autonomy: 'You should always be able to 'pull the plug' and halt autonomous AI agent activity immediately.'

Lehane renewed calls for the US government to legislate to create rules for frontier AI safety, and said the fact that the most cutting-edge and unreleased AI models appear to be improving cyber offence faster than defence, was 'among the reasons why I think it's absolutely imperative that this country passes a national law that creates mandatory required safety standards'.

'You would not be able to release or deploy models unless you're proving and guaranteeing a level of safety before they get out into the public,' he suggested. 'I think you have to have a national version in the US, and from there you can create an international version ... I think, ultimately, you're going to need some type of an international structure here.'

OpenAI has filed to list on the stock market with a reported valuation

above $850bn (£623bn), probably this year or next. It has been locked in a race with its rival Anthropic, maker of the Claude chatbot, to develop more and more capable AI models. Anthropic is also expected to debut on the US stock market within the coming year at a mammoth valuation.

In a sign the Trump administration is shifting from its laissez-faire approach to AI regulation amid an intense race to stay ahead of China's progress, the US president in June issued an executive order encouraging pre-deployment testing.

The system will be voluntary and has been criticised for a lack of transparency, but observers think it could pave the way for tougher steps.

'The window where you could see legislation happening is potentially in the first part of next year, when a new Congress comes in,' Lehane said. 'I think there's a growing political consensus that transcends political parties.'

A safety deal with China is also considered important, with Xi Jinping due to meet Trump in Washington next month.

Lehane said: 'Given how important this technology is, given how fast it is moving, given the capabilities, the sooner those conversations begin, the quicker we can actually roll up our sleeves and get into the hard and difficult work and see if we can figure something out.'

Coming soon: The Bayeux Tapestry, 2026 edition

Didn't manage to get tickets to see the Bayeux tapestry when it arrives in the UK next month? Don't worry, cartoonist Edith Pritchett has you covered. Look out for her exclusive poster, capturing the many battles of our times in her very modern version, from tech overlords to toxic trolls.

Only inside the Guardian's Saturday magazine on Saturday 5th September

The Guardian

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National

15

Comedy review

Cave's chaotic slapstick shines a light on muses and silly men

Swoon Pleasance Dome, Edinburgh ★★★★☆

Arusa Qureshi

Some of the most revered works of art across history feature women as their primary focus. But though they might appear as favoured subjects, so often these women are relegated to the margins, their stories untold as they remain silent, often sexualised via the male gaze.

In her new multicharacter comedy Swoon, Bebe Cave interrogates the role of the muse and what it means to be seen yet never heard. We initially meet Cave as Elizabeth Siddal – or Lizzie – who was immortalised as Ophelia by John Everett Millais in the mid 19th century and was a popular model for other pre-Raphaelite artists.

With her comically excessive scouse accent and world-weary exasperation, she is the poster child for being sad and sexy, her story underlining the dichotomy between the elevated status of the muse and their simultaneously poor treatment by artists. The narrative, however, centres on the fictional Bertrude, Lizzie's sister, who is desperate to be noticed and included by the pretentious Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, whose idea of the perfect woman involves her looking near death.

Cave takes on numerous characters at breakneck speed, with baffling dance sequences throughout

► Bebe Cave as Elizabeth Siddal, who was a muse for pre-Raphaelite artists PHOTOGRAPH: REBECCA NEAD: MEDEAR

Swoon sees Cave take on numerous characters at breakneck speed, with appearances from a lanky redheaded mannequin, gloriously baffling dance sequences and casual pop culture references throughout. Cave emits a chaotic energy in her portrayal of the brotherhood and the many characters in their orbit, with her delightfully janky costumes and props and a Millais-coded set design amping up the absurdity. As Dante Gabriel Rossetti, she is the ultimate hipster bro, a printed

Carhartt logo stuck to her top hat adding an excellent touch in the depiction of his obnoxious faux-trendiness. The men's nonchalant misogyny and their lack of care towards women is accentuated by Cave through their cringey edgelord behaviour.

With a Victorian-era Tyra Banks and the Brontë sisters, Swoon is an impressive and creative feat of physical comedy, and its intelligent through-line never takes away from the more slapstick elements. The show has a wealth of jokes that

rely on the audience having some knowledge of art history, but even without this, the message is clear: ridiculous men with pompous attitudes are forever contributing to the erasure of women.

Cave argues that although muses live eternally in art, they deserve more than just being nameless subjects. And in this, Swoon works to dismantle the illusion of impossible beauty standards set and romanticised by clueless men.

Until 30 August

YouTubers fight back over plan to boost visibility of the BBC

Michael Savage Media editor

The millions who subscribe to the content creator Simon Squibb's social media channels are usually delivered tips and hacks on how to turn their dream business idea into reality. But they were recently presented with something completely different.

In an Instagram post entitled "the government wants to control YOU", Squibb issued an urgent call to arms. He asked his followers to fight against a proposal that he said could force content from the BBC and other

traditional broadcasters into their social media feeds and recommendations whether they liked it or not.

Squibb is one of many major UK content creators outraged by a proposal included in a government paper earlier in the summer that would boost content from traditional broadcasters such as the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 in the all-powerful algorithms of YouTube and TikTok.

The idea has been pushed collectively by public service broadcasters as a way of boosting trusted material and preserving distinctly British content. Ministers want to help them survive in a world in which audiences

are ditching traditional TV for digital platforms. They prefer a voluntary deal with digital platforms, but might legislation if necessary.

But content creators see it as shifting the goalposts to allow bigger players to stay on top. If the broadcasters go up the algorithm, they reason content creators will be pushed down.

They have been putting out emergency videos and urging viewers and fellow creators to speak out before the government's consultation ends,

◀ The content creator Simon Squibb says the public must be allowed to decide what it wants to watch

featuring warnings about "the end of YouTube".

Squibb and others have raised comparisons with authoritarian state control. "Russia pushes its channels that it believes the people should watch," he said. "Trust has to be earned. If the BBC is selected as one of the trusted sources, does that also mean that Dragons' Den is going to get prominent coverage over my education and business content? You have to let the public decide."

A spokesperson for the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport said: "We do not see this as a zero-sum game between traditional broadcasters, content creators and other video platforms. We want to create an environment where public service media providers, high-quality news providers and content creators can all thrive."

Theatre review

Korean snack bar serves up sweet lessons on belonging

Haribo Kimchi Festival Theatre Studio, Edinburgh ★★★★☆

Mark Fisher

To get the measure of this slight but sweet one-man show, you need to listen to the singing snail. "In every soul grows a different version of you," sings the animated creature in Korean, projected on a screen.

It is echoing the sentiment just expressed by an eel: "My home has no location," sings a fish that lives a life of transformation as it moves between saltwater and fresh.

Their experience is shared by Jaha Koo, who left his native South Korea for Europe 15 years ago and has the rootlessness of the displaced. His sense of alienation is exacerbated by the racism he encounters, notably the assistant who complains of a stench of garlic despite sitting behind a screen.

That is a rare dark moment in a cheerful show, but the association with food is apt. Koo might be adrift in the world, but he keeps his home with him through his national cuisine. Inviting two volunteers to join him at his pojongmacha (snack bar), he cooks up several courses as the show progresses: a cucumber starter, a kimchi pancake, a bowl of soup and a pudding flavoured with seagrass, mint and lime. They seem to enjoy it.

Not all his food memories are happy: after smelling the corpses lined up after the Gwangju pro-democracy uprising of 1980, Koo's father could not bear the smell of fried chicken and retreated to the countryside to escape it.

But mostly, in Koo's production for Campo in Ghent, he reflects on a country that, like many others, finds community in food. It brings identity and salvation, not least the Haribo gummies that cheer him up away from home. Like the snail and the eel, they keep him company.

Ends today

▲ Jaha Koo serves up Korean cuisine to lucky punters at his snack bar

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16

National Energy

▲ An oil rig in the North Sea in 1974. Jim Callaghan, the prime minister in 1977, said the oil was a God-given opportunity PHOTOGRAPH: ZUMA/SHUTTERSTOCK

Rig the market?

North Sea oil is a totem for Trump and a headache for Burnham

Matthew Taylor Environment correspondent

When oil was discovered off the north-east coast of Scotland in September 1969, industry folklore has it that the duty superintendent on the rig carefully poured it into a pickle jar commandeered from the canteen and took it back to Amoco's office in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk. There, it was emptied into an ashtray, sniffed and then set alight.

From that modest start, North Sea oil - as the huge basin of oil and gas reserves quickly became known - emerged as a driving force of the British economy and a symbol of national power and renewal as the UK emerged from the Opec oil crisis.

By 1977, the then Labour prime minister, Jim Callaghan, declared: "God has given Britain her best opportunity for 100 years in the shape of North Sea oil." A subsequent white paper said it offered "a unique opportunity for Britain to improve her economic

performance, raise her living standards, move forward to full employment, and develop a socially just society".

A decade later, the basin became a central part of Margaret Thatcher's political project, with its revenues approaching 10% of the UK's total tax take at times, supporting a programme of tax cuts and privatisation.

Output peaked at the turn of the century, when the basin produced a staggering 4.4m barrels of oil equivalent a day. Aberdeen, chosen over Dundee by the fossil fuel corporations for their onshore headquarters because it had fewer links to bothersome trade unions, was booming, with offshore jobs plentiful and well paid.

Ewan Gibbs, a specialist in the history of energy in the UK at the University of Glasgow, said that as the oil began to flow, it was seized upon by politicians and the public as a symbol of British imperial might. "At its peak, oil was associated not only with immense wealth but also with power and international prestige," said Gibbs. "It came to embody a sense of national renewal."

Now, those boom years are firmly in the past. The amount of

economically viable oil and gas has declined rapidly in the past two decades and by 2030 the basin will produce just 15% of its peak output.

Many of the biggest oil and gas corporations have left as stocks dwindle - BP was the latest, announcing this summer an end to six decades in the basin. And the jobs are going too. During the boom years, North Sea oil directly employed about 120,000 people and supported hundreds of thousands more jobs indirectly. Data from the Office for National Statistics suggests that figure has now dropped to about 27,000 direct employees.

However, although its economic significance has waned, the idea of North Sea oil has retained a disproportionate grip on the national psyche, and - as culture wars over the climate crisis continue to be stoked by politicians and media on the right - it remains a useful symbol of sovereignty and power for some.

"Even as it declines, there is still a strong sense for many people that this is Britain's oil, that it is bountiful and belongs to the country, and that if we don't exploit it we are turning our back on something important," said Gibbs.

"It is this emotional attachment, this idea that this is our oil that means, even as the area becomes less economically significant, it retains an outsized importance in the country's imagination."

Culture wars

In the run-up to the 2024 general election, Labour announced there would be no new exploratory licences for oil and gas in the North Sea. It was a significant moment in the fight against climate breakdown. In 2021, the International Energy Agency had said there could be "no new investments in oil, gas and coal" if the world was to avoid the worst impacts of the climate crisis. Now, the government of one of the richest countries in the world was making it clear it was moving away from fossil fuels to focus on renewable energy.

It was also a victory for Ed Miliband. As shadow energy secretary and then in office he made the case within Labour that a rapid transition to cleaner energy systems would not only help tackle the climate crisis but had the potential to make the UK a "clean energy superpower" and unshackle it from the increasingly volatile

fossil fuel market, creating jobs and lowering bills.

But fast forward two years, and despite wars in Iran and Ukraine again highlighting the perils of dependence on a volatile fossil fuel market and an escalating climate crisis, those plans are once more at the centre of a political storm.

The leader of Reform UK, Nigel Farage, and the Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, have called for a massive expansion of drilling in the North Sea, saying they would reverse the ban on new licences if elected.

In a speech this year, Farage declared that the UK should be "self-sufficient in gas". Badenoch followed with the promise of a growing UK oil and gas industry that would "ensure our energy security for generations to come".

Donald Trump is also a fan of a UK version of "drill, baby, drill" in the North Sea. In one of several interventions on the subject, he claimed the basin was "one of the greatest reserves anywhere in the world ... with 500 years of oil and gas reserves left".

Such statements have left climate experts, geologists and energy specialists scratching their heads.

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9

17

▲ Brent oilfield in the North Sea; left, firefighters at the site of wildfires near Dunwich Heath, Suffolk, in July, amid a heatwave fuelled by the climate crisis

Steve Pye, a professor of energy systems and the deputy director of the energy institute at University College London, said: 'The North Sea basin has been in decline since 2000. There are no credible prospects of reversing this.'

But in the midst of a cost of living crisis, others are making the case for any intervention, however small, that might ease the burden on households and boost Treasury coffers. Some trade unions and parts of the Labour party are in favour of exploiting the North Sea's existing licences, arguing they provide some jobs and bring in at least some tax revenue.

Experts, however, point out that energy prices are set globally and

there is not enough oil or gas in the North Sea to have any impact, so there would be no reduction in UK bills whatever the country did.

Also, the vast majority of what is left in the North Sea is oil that overwhelmingly goes abroad to be refined and then sold on the international markets, meaning it has no impact on the UK's energy security.

More of the gas produced in the North Sea goes to UK homes and businesses but there is less of that left, certainly not enough to make any meaningful impact on our reliance on imports. A recent study by Carbon Brief found that even if the government allowed new licences it would only make a

UK North Sea oil and gas production and demand

Million tonnes of oil equivalent ● Production ● Demand

Source: North Sea Transition Authority. Note: demand data is based on the UK's net zero strategy

fractional difference: gas extraction from the North Sea is forecast to drop 99% by 2050 without new licences, compared with 97% if new licences were awarded.

Conversely, the study found that the continued expansion of renewables and low-carbon technologies in the North Sea would reduce reliance on volatile gas imports much faster than allowing new drilling, with energy from new wind and solar from the latest government auction expected to produce six times more electricity by 2030 than new drilling licences would.

On employment, the campaign group Uplift points out that the number of jobs supported by the oil and gas industry has more than halved in the last decade - from 441,000 to 214,000 today - despite previous governments issuing hundreds of new licences in six separate licensing rounds.

And on tax, critics have questioned the scale of the benefit once you take into account state subsidies to oil and gas companies, which globally run into the hundreds of billions of pounds.

Others question the public appetite for fattening the profits of oil and gas companies, which made a record $93bn (£68bn) in profit in the three months to June, while fossil fuel-driven climate disasters, including wildfires and droughts, hit Europe, the UK experienced five heatwaves this summer, and energy costs continued to rise.

In June last year, when he was still the mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham backed the fossil fuel treaty, a proposed international pact on phasing out coal, oil and gas - calling it a 'lifeline' that 'all governments' should join.

In recent weeks, Burnham, now prime minister, has spooked many who want to see this commitment transferred to national government when he said he would take a 'pragmatic' approach to oil and gas drilling in the North Sea and that the government could not ignore the potential resources it holds.

Miatta Fahnbulleh, who replaced Miliband as energy secretary, has expressed similar views since taking office, although previously she has spoken out about the realities of the climate crisis. With consultations on the Jackdaw and Rosebank field projects now closed, a decision from the government could come at any time.

Tessa Khan, the director of Uplift, said it was 'a dangerous fantasy' to talk up the potential of North Sea oil as a fix for Britain's problems.

'We have seen that, time and again, the arguments put forward by the fossil fuel lobby and their supporters in favour of more drilling have fallen away upon making contact with reality - from falsehoods about lowering bills to exaggerations about improving energy security. After 50 years of drilling, the fact is the UK has burned through most of its gas reserves, while most of what remains is oil that is largely exported.'

Green jobs

In October last year, the UK government unveiled plans for an extra 400,000 jobs in the burgeoning green economy over the next five years.

Making the announcement at the Siemens turbine factory in Hull, Miliband said the government planned to double the number of people working in green industries by 2030, with a particular focus on training those coming from fossil fuel jobs, school leavers, the unemployed, veterans and ex-offenders.

The green economy is certainly becoming an increasingly significant part of the UK's future. A recent report from the Confederation of British Industry found it already supported a million jobs and higher wages, with nearly half a trillion pounds of further investment in the pipeline.

This rapid growth is visible in the North Sea itself, with huge windfarms springing up across the basin. The electricity they generate accounts for about 18% of the UK's total. Overall, in 2025, renewables provided 50.4% of the UK's electricity, compared with 31.8% from fossil fuels.

Despite this rapid growth, there are growing concerns that any benefits from these developments are bypassing the workers and communities that need them most.

Unite and GMB, the unions representing oil and gas workers, say the transition to renewable energy is not delivering the secure long-term jobs that were promised and - to the dismay of climate activists and others within the

▲ Ed Miliband has long advocated moving away from fossil fuels

union movement - they have been vocal about their support for more drilling in the North Sea.

Others fear the renewables sector is experiencing a repeat of mistakes made during the oil boom, when a big slice of the profits and benefits were taken by private oil companies. Connor Watt, of Platform, which works with current and former oil workers, unions, community groups and climate activists across Scotland, said: 'The three main wins from the transition to renewables should be jobs, cheaper energy and income from electricity generation that can be used to bolster public finances, to help local communities. But at the moment, despite huge renewable projects going ahead, none of those three things have materialised and people are beginning to wonder why.'

Oil and gas workers, unions and community energy groups have organised a campaign to rethink how the government is conducting the 'just transition'. They are calling for a greater role for community ownership and nationalisation to stop the profits and benefits bypassing local workers and communities. Watt said North Sea oil had brought some local wealth and jobs but after a decades-long boom there was 'no real legacy to speak of'.

Many campaigners look to Norway, where the government set up a sovereign wealth fund when it discovered oil and gas in the North Sea. It is used to safeguard the economy and fund future public spending and is now worth more than $2bn - the biggest fund of its kind in the world. Analysts say that if the UK had taken a similar approach, a UK sovereign wealth fund could be worth about £850bn now.

Watt said: 'If you compare what has happened here with what Norway did with its sovereign wealth fund, which has had huge benefits for the people of that country, we did something totally different - a market-led approach which has seen the vast majority of the benefit flow into the profits of global corporations rather than local communities.

'Once again we are seeing a market-led approach [in the renewables industry], where the vast majority of benefits are simply not going to local communities. People are increasingly disillusioned after decades of economic decline. Life is getting harder and the likes of Reform are exploiting that frustration to deepen division and line the pockets of their industry backers.'

The debate about North Sea oil and gas extraction looks set to rumble on. But for many whose lives and livelihoods are entangled with what happens there, it is a distraction from the decisions that will actually shape their future.

Watt said: 'The real question policymakers and local communities must grapple with now is: can the UK capitalise on the renewable energy revolution? And if it does, will it be the workers and communities across the UK who benefit, or corporate profit margins?'

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National

New diabetes pill that aids weight loss available in UK

Hannah Devlin Science correspondent

A new daily pill that treats diabetes and helps with weight loss will be available in UK pharmacies from today. Pharmacists said it would be welcome for people who cannot use

weight loss jabs, but also issued a warning over the growing problem of fake, unlicensed or counterfeit versions of GLP-1 tablets.

Orforgipron, known as Foundayo and made by the US pharmaceutical firm Eli Lilly, was authorised by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) this

month. The UK is the first country in Europe to approve the pill. The MHRA approved another weight loss pill - a tablet form of Wegovy - in June.

"The UK is the first country in Europe where Foundayo is now available," said Khalil Asmar, the vice-president of cardiometabolic health at Lilly Northern Europe.

"We're pleased that this means there is another oral treatment option for eligible UK patients alongside licensed injectable treatments."

The drug will initially be available through private prescription, with

Eli Lilly saying it is working with the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice) on its assessment of Foundayo for a potential rollout on the health service in England.

The drug is licensed for people with a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or above, or those with a BMI of between 27 and 30 and at least one weight-related condition. It can also be used to improve blood sugars in patients with poorly controlled type 2 diabetes. The pill is taken once a day, at any time, with no food or water restrictions.

Henry Gregg, chief executive of the National Pharmacy Association, said: "This is another significant day with a second weight loss pill available ... This is particularly significant for patients who cannot or do not want to take an injectable medicine and could make weight loss treatment available to a wider range of patients."

However, there are concerns about the marketing of fake, unlicensed or counterfeit drugs. Patients are being urged to ensure that they access weight loss treatments only through safe and regulated pharmacies.

LEGAL NOTICE

No: CR-2026-002324

IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE BUSINESS AND PROPERTY COURTS OF ENGLAND AND WALES COMPANIES COURT (ChD)

IN THE MATTER OF

THE CO-OPERATIVE BANK PLC

and

IN THE MATTER OF

COVENTRY BUILDING SOCIETY

and

IN THE MATTER OF

PART VII OF THE FINANCIAL SERVICES AND MARKETS ACT 2000

NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that, on 18 August 2026, The Co-operative Bank plc ("Bank") and Coventry Building Society ("CBS") made an application (the "Application") to the High Court of Justice, Business and Property Courts of England and Wales, Companies Court in London (the "Court") for:

• (1) an Order under section 111(1) of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (as amended) ("FSMA") sanctioning a banking business transfer scheme (the "Scheme") providing for the transfer to CBS of the Transferring Business (as defined in the document setting out the terms of the Scheme (the "Scheme Document")). The Transferring Business consists of the entire business of the Bank, including, amongst others, all current accounts, savings accounts, mortgages, credit cards and loans, with the exception of a small number of contracts and arrangements, including employment-related contracts, its obligations to registered pension arrangements and assets and liabilities (including contracts) governed by non-UK law, which constitute Excluded Business (as defined in the Scheme Document); and
• (2) the making of ancillary provisions in connection with the Scheme under section 112 of FSMA.

The proposed transfer will result in the Transferring Business, which is currently being carried on by the Bank, being carried on by CBS.

A copy of the Scheme Document, an explanatory statement setting out the terms of the Scheme and this notice will be sent free of charge to any person who requests it using the contact details set out below. These documents will also be made available to collect from 1 Balloon Street, Manchester, United Kingdom, M4 4BE from the date of publication of this notice until the date on which the Application is heard by the Court. These and other documents relating to the Scheme are also available on the Bank's website at www.co-operativebank.co.uk/coventry-transfer/

All questions or concerns and any requests for information relating to the Scheme should be referred to the Bank using the following contact details:

Online form: www.co-operativebank.co.uk/coventry-transfer/ Telephone: 0800 028 4321 By post: 1 Balloon Street, Manchester, United Kingdom, M4 4BE

The Application is due to be heard before the Court at the Rolls Building, Fetter Lane, London EC4A 1NL, United Kingdom on 2 December 2026. If approved by the Court, it is currently proposed that the Scheme will take effect on 1 January 2027.

Any person (including any customer or employee of either the Bank or CBS) who thinks that they may be adversely affected by the carrying out of the Scheme may attend the Court hearing and express their views either in person or by a representative.

Any person planning to attend the Court hearing or send a representative is requested to notify the Bank (along with their reasons for objecting) before 25 November 2026 using the contact details set out above. Any person who does not intend to attend the Court hearing but wishes to make representations about the Scheme or considers that they may be adversely affected should communicate their views to the Bank using the contact details set out above, preferably before 25 November 2026.

A record of the number of respondents will be maintained and, together with copies of any representations, provided to the Court at the date of the hearing and a summary of any objections will be provided to the Prudential Regulation Authority and the Financial Conduct Authority. A failure to give notice in advance does not prevent any person who wishes to do so from attending the Court hearing in person or by a representative, or from making representations in writing to be put before the Court. Any representative does not need legal training.

The costs of any representative will be borne by the person appointing them. If objections are to be made by a representative, they will need the permission of the Court to speak or have appropriate rights of audience before the Court.

Addleshaw Goddard LLP

41 Lothbury London EC2R 7HG

Ref: KOEHB / BROOOC

Solicitors for Bank and CBS

Medieval barn at risk in Heathrow expansion, warn critics

Dalya Alberge

Six hundred years after it was built, England's largest surviving medieval timber-framed barn could now be "shaken to pieces" by aircraft vibrations, campaigners warn.

The public has until 1 September to submit responses to the Heathrow airport expansion, which could threaten the survival of the New Barn at Harmondsworth, considered a remarkable example of medieval architecture.

The barn was built in 1426 and was bought in 2011 by English Heritage.

Its significance lies in its extraordinary scale, as well as the near-complete survival of its medieval structural timbers.

It is nearly 60 metres long, 12 metres wide and 11 metres tall, with 13 massive oak trusses holding up the roof. It was described as a "cathedral" by the former poet laureate Sir John Betjeman, who was struck by the size and atmosphere of this magnificent structure.

Justine Bayley, English Heritage's former archaeological scientist, said the boundary of the extended airport is barely a few hundred metres from the barn, which "could be shaken

to pieces by the vibrations from airplanes taking off".

The barn was built to store agricultural produce 600 years ago this year. The land had been bought in 1391 by the bishop of Winchester.

Bayley said: "It's not plus or minus 10 years or half a century. How many late-medieval buildings do we know when they were built? Its structural timbers are more than 95% original. Most of the big medieval barns and other large timber-framed buildings have been repaired, and you're lucky if 50% of the original timbers are there."

If the Heathrow expansion went ahead, Bayley questioned whether the barn would "still be here".

The government is consulting on amendments to the Heathrow expansion national policy statement, for which it is seeking comments. It is a continuing process that involves Heathrow airport running its own consultation later this year.

Bayley, who chairs the Stop Heathrow Expansion campaign, said: "The Department for Transport (DTT) has declared that Heathrow is a critical national infrastructure and therefore all the legislation to do with environmental limits and climate change and so on can be just ridden roughshod over because they've decided that it was more important that Heathrow's expansion goes ahead.

She said actual measurements of the vibrations from the northern runway have not been taken, although it is a similar distance from the nearby village of Longford, which would be demolished. "Longford has dreadful vibrations. You can stand in a house and feel it coming up through the floors. Heathrow was saying 'no, you're imagining things'. If they were to monitor vibrations and the noise, that would throw up warnings for the barn."

▲ The medieval timber-framed barn in Harmondsworth was built in 1426, 600 years ago, to store agricultural produce PHOTOGRAPH: HISTORIC ENGLAND

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National

19

Recycled ancient manuscripts reveal reading habits of Guernsey islanders

Dalya Alberge

Unprecedented insights into literary and intellectual life on Guernsey during the middle ages have been revealed through the discovery of 17 medieval manuscript fragments.

Dating from between the 12th and 15th centuries, they offer evidence of wide-ranging reading tastes and include an extract from a play, an Ovid poem, passages from the Bible and a travel text.

These sizable fragments reveal that Guernsey's medieval citizens had broad literary tastes and that when they read for pleasure, they did so not in English but in French - a clue to where their intellectual interests lay at that time.

The fragments had been hiding in plain sight, having been cut up and recycled into practical bindings for rent books and other administrative records during the 16th and 17th centuries. Whoever recycled them could never have imagined their historical value today. But

▲ The fragments had been cut up and recycled PHOTOGRAPH: STATES OF GUERNSEY

their make-do-and-mend approach ensured that the fragments were preserved for centuries.

They are held in the public collections of the Island Archives and His Majesty's greffier's strongroom. The fragments were identified by Island Archives staff working alongside Dr

David Rundle, a manuscript expert at the University of Kent's Centre for Medieval and Early Modern Studies, and Prof Tamara Atkin, a book historian at the University of Oxford.

Rundle told the Guardian: "Why Guernsey is exciting is [that] nobody's known of anything here.

Elsewhere, the Reformation in England, the dissolution of the monasteries, often involved the breaking up of manuscripts. Quite a lot of those manuscripts were liturgical. There are many more non-religious fragments in this Guernsey collection than you would expect."

He added: "Although French was available in England throughout the middle ages as a literary language, it was declining at the end of the middle ages. But it looks to be continuing to be significant on Guernsey."

Fragments from French literature include a dramatic poem from L'Estoire de Griselda, a secular play thought to have been written around 1395 by Philippe de Mézières. The poem reworks the story of Griselda, first told by Italian writer Giovanni Boccaccio in The Decameron in 1353.

The Griselda story was a medieval blockbuster across Europe but this version is exceptionally rare. Crucially, this fragment reveals that the manuscript play was being read beyond the French royal court circles, where it probably first circulated.

The Bible fragments include one in Latin that dates from the late 12th century with an early 15th-century annotation, possibly by a priest.

Research by Callum Tostevin-Hall, an archives assistant at Island Archives, led to these discoveries. He said: "This first began when I was asked to track down a 16th-century

'This collection hints at a culture which has not been imagined'

David Rundle Manuscript expert

copy of Edward III's 1331 Extente of Guernsey and I noticed that the shelf mark contained reference to a vellum cover with Latin text that had been removed from the notebook in a previous round of conservation. I checked this cover and was astonished to find that it was clearly a reused bifolium from a medieval manuscript.

"The project has been a real baby of mine and seeing it finally come to fruition, as well as being able to lay claim to the discovery of several of these manuscript fragments, is both an honour and a privilege."

Rundle said: "This collection is exciting in its variety, of subjects and of dates, and hints at a culture which has not even been imagined."

The academics believe further fragments are waiting to be found in the Guernsey archives and elsewhere.

Island Archives will host an academic study day on 10 September, supported by the University of Kent, involving academics from the UK and France.

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20

World

Holding elections in wartime could destroy Ukraine, warns Zelenskyy

Dan Sabbagh Dnipro

Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said holding elections in Ukraine during wartime would risk splitting the country at a time when Russia is amassing ballistic missiles and considering whether to mobilise an extra 300,000 soldiers.

The Ukrainian president, responding for the first time to a demand made by the sacked former defence minister Mykhailo Fedorov, sharply criticised an idea that he said was impractical given Russia appeared to have no interest in a ceasefire.

"I believe that if we want to destroy the country, then during such a war we can move in the selection of elections," Zelenskyy said in a briefing to selected journalists, details of which were reported yesterday.

"I believe that during such a war, elections in general are big risks. Elections right now are a tsunami for the state that will split Ukraine," he said, adding that his plan was to end the war and preserve Ukraine as an independent state.

Elections have been suspended in Ukraine since martial law was imposed at the start of Russia's full-scale invasion. Zelenskyy's five-year term ended in May 2024 but there had until recently been little desire to hold a contest while the war continued. That shifted when Fedorov, a popular minister who had been dismissed by Zelenskyy a month earlier, called for a fresh contest.

Zelenskyy said, according to a transcript from the briefing, that if Ukraine's allies were to establish "specific conditions" under which elections could be safely, legitimately and democratically held in Ukraine, he would support them.

It would require "the participation of the military, in frontline territories, abroad, where millions of our citizens have gone, fleeing the war" and a poll would have to take place safely "without strikes and shelling", he said.

Fedorov, he said, had been removed from his post because he had overreached, trying to cover functions belonging to the military. He had been offered four alternative jobs in the government but declined all four, the president added.

"I really had and still have a very positive attitude toward Mykhailo," Zelenskyy said. "We have been

► People kneel during a moment of silence at a protest in Kyiv against Mykhailo Fedorov's sacking

PHOTOGRAPH: ANATOLE STEFANOV/REUTERS

through a lot together. But I believe that he himself goes, or is pushed, into the wrong things."

Russia had a stockpile of 600-630 high-speed ballistic missiles, and was trying to build more than 100 more a month in the run-up to winter, Zelenskyy said.

Ballistic missiles have been used to bomb Ukrainian infrastructure and warehouses and to attack Kyiv, causing increased civilian casualties. There is a shortage of US-made Patriot interceptors, the only weapon that can effectively counter them.

"I wanted to secure 300 Patriot missiles for the winter package. The request from our air force is 360," Zelenskyy said. He said he had reached an agreement with France on at least one SAMP/T air-defence system this year, and with Germany on the supply of about 600 PAC-2 and PAC-3 interceptors in 2027-28.

The US could help by supplying "some small percentage" of its stockpiles - about 5% to 10%, he added. Ukraine was willing to pay and it would mean the country "could get through the winter", he said, calling on the US to make what would be "a very significant difference both in protecting lives and diplomatically".

On Saturday, President Emmanuel Macron said he had agreed to strengthen French support for Ukraine, including through the delivery of interceptor missiles, without giving further details.

Ukraine's allies in the so-called coalition of the willing - an initiative led by France and Britain - will meet today to look at how to increase pressure on Moscow to halt its invasion.

Russia is seeking to build up forces for a renewed effort to capture the rest of the eastern Donetsk province by the end of the year, though Zelenskyy said he was confident Moscow would fail to capture the area, comprising principally the cities of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk.

The president said he believed Russia would try to conscript a further 300,000 soldiers after parliamentary elections next month. It would be a "peripheral mobilisation" conducted away from main cities in an effort to regain momentum in the almost deadlocked frontline, he said.

'She was fearless' Woman accused of assassinating a Russian commander

Pjotr Sauer

It was just after dawn in Sevastopol when a powerful explosion tore through a quiet square in a residential district of the Russian-occupied Crimean port city. Hidden inside a rubbish bin, a bomb containing the equivalent of about 500g of TNT detonated on 13 August as Robert Shageev, the deputy commander of a Russian Black Sea fleet submarine brigade,

walked past in naval uniform. He was killed on the spot.

Within hours, investigators had a suspect. Police detained Margarita Reutt, a 32-year-old resident of Sochi, the Russian resort city about 300 miles across the Black Sea from Sevastopol.

Investigators said they had found a remote control they believed was used to detonate the bomb that killed Shageev, a former commander of Ukraine's only submarine who switched allegiance to Russia in 2014 when Moscow annexed Crimea.

According to the security service, she confessed to the attack and said that a handler linked to Ukrainian intelligence had promised her a large payment in cryptocurrency and documents that would allow her to leave Russia afterwards.

The FSB also said Reutt showed no remorse.

Those assertions could not be independently verified, and Russian security agencies have previously publicised purported confessions from detainees before their cases have reached court. But several people previously accused by Russia of carrying out similar attacks against military figures were later found by reporters to have been involved in the operations Moscow had accused them of conducting.

What exactly drove Reutt to allegedly embark on such an audacious mission remains unclear. As with other cases involving accused Ukrainian intelligence

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'It's a whirlwind'

Kurdish rapper on his sudden global fame Page 25

Anger in Amatrice

Italian town marks 10 years since quake Page 26

25

operations, her trial is likely to take place behind closed doors, offering little opportunity for her to give her own account publicly.

But interviews with a dozen friends and acquaintances, combined with an examination of years of her social media activity, offer a portrait of a determined and adventurous woman whose attitude towards her country appears to have hardened gradually, with signs of a more striking change emerging in the months leading up to the attack.

'Rita believed that the country was going in the wrong direction,' said a longtime friend, using the diminutive form of her name. 'But I am still shocked she went so far.'

Russia quickly accused Reutt of carrying out the attack on the orders of Ukrainian intelligence. Kyiv has not commented on the bombing or Reutt's alleged role.

Since the start of the full-scale invasion, Ukraine's intelligence

agencies have been linked to a string of assassinations and attempted killings of senior Russian military officers whom Kyiv has accused of involvement in the invasion. Ukrainian officials have occasionally acknowledged involvement in such operations, but mostly have remained silent.

The attacks have involved an array of methods and recruits, from committed anti-Kremlin saboteurs to Russians promised large sums of money. In other cases, unsuspecting couriers and delivery

'Rita believed that the country was going in the wrong direction. I am still shocked'

Friend of Reutt

workers have effectively been used as mules.

Usually, little is known about those accused of carrying out such attacks or how they prepared for them. Some have managed to escape, or were never publicly identified by Russian authorities, while others were killed carrying out their operations.

The swift capture and naming of Reutt, however, offers a rare opportunity to examine the journey of a Russian citizen accused of turning against her own country.

Reutt, born Margarita Yakovleva, grew up in Yaroslavl, a city north-east of Moscow, where she took the surname of the grandmother who largely raised her after her parents divorced. Friends recalled a largely unremarkable childhood, remembering her as warm and sociable, but also unusually drawn to adventure and risk.

'Margarita was fearless. She would climb trees, jump off cars, do things most boys were scared of,' recalled one friend.

That streak followed her to Novosibirsk, thousands of miles to the east, where she studied management and threw herself into university life. Reutt became a regular at a local parachuting club, with photographs showing her jumping from Soviet-era aircraft, often the only woman among groups of men in camouflage gear.

She also won prizes in amateur go-karting competitions and took up water polo, becoming goalkeeper for the university team and quickly distinguishing herself despite being new to the sport. 'Margarita was so talented and never afraid of the ball,' recalled her water polo coach at the time.

There was little then to suggest hostility towards the Kremlin. In Novosibirsk, Reutt became a well-liked member of a patriotic volunteer group that searched for the remains of Soviet soldiers killed during the second world war, part of a nationwide movement dedicated to recovering and rebuking the war dead.

After graduating, Reutt moved south to Sochi, the Black Sea resort that became her home. She briefly tried her hand at running a travel agency before joining Vitauct in the early 2020s, an alternative medicine company specialising in longevity.

'She was the most ordinary person,' said Gennady Garbuzov, the company's founder. 'There was nothing to indicate she would do this. She must have fallen under someone's influence.'

On the surface, her online life was similarly unremarkable. She posted frequently about health and animal rights and took to Telegram forums to discuss alternative medicine.

Reutt also travelled widely. Leaked records from travel databases and photographs posted online show frequent trips abroad, including Turkey, Thailand and

▲ Margarita Reutt's anti-war stance had split into the open by July 2025

Sri Lanka, where she often shared photographs of herself in bikinis at beach resorts.

'Margarita just seemed to be living her life and had lots of plans for the future,' said another colleague at Vitauct.

'She was good-looking and popular,' the colleague added.

In October 2025, Reutt travelled to Minsk for her sister's wedding. Photographs from the celebration show her smiling among relatives and catching the bridal bouquet.

To one friend she painted an idyllic picture of her life in Sochi, traversing mountains, waterfalls and canyons. 'You can explore endlessly here, everything is lush and green,' she wrote.

But beneath that outwardly happy life, another side of Reutt was becoming visible. She increasingly expressed concerns about environmental problems plaguing Sochi, and started to become involved in local volunteer initiatives, friends said.

After a large oil spill in the Black Sea in December 2024, when two Russian tankers were wrecked in a storm, Reutt travelled to Anapa to join volunteers cleaning mazur, a heavy fuel oil, from beaches.

Exactly when dissatisfaction with her surroundings hardened into something more political is difficult to establish. Friends described a growing estrangement from Russia that deepened after the country launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

'The war came as a shock,' said one friend, who recalled Reutt becoming increasingly outspoken in public about the fighting in Ukraine. 'I told her once to keep quiet, otherwise she would get us both into trouble,' the friend said.

By July 2025, her anti-war feelings had split into public view. While travelling on a Samara-Adler train, Reutt was fined under Russia's sweeping law against 'discrediting' the armed forces after reportedly shouting 'serves you right, Russians!' when news

broke of a Ukrainian drone strike on a railway station in the Rostov region.

The following February, Reutt posted the results of a genetic test showing she was 98% Russian, adding a hashtag declaring that she was 'ashamed to be Russian'.

Yet to friends and acquaintances, Reutt appeared to carry on much as before. She picked up occasional jobs, appeared in video clips made by friends and continued to travel. As recently as March, photographs from a trip to Cuba showed her drinking from a coconut.

It was only in late spring, several people who knew her said, that her behaviour began to change in ways they struggled to understand at the time. 'She became more withdrawn,' recalled one friend.

Around the same time, a group of friends began planning a trip together for the autumn. Reutt declined to join them without much explanation - an unusual response from someone friends said could be counted on to say yes to a new adventure.

Another friend remembered Reutt suddenly acquiring a second phone. 'She bought this second phone in the spring. She explained that she needed it for work, but it didn't really make sense to me at the time. Margarita was hiding something,' the friend said. 'I thought maybe she had a new boyfriend.'

By the summer, Reutt had begun spending more time in Crimea, the place where she would eventually be arrested. One acquaintance said she explained the trips to Crimea by saying she was scouting possible locations for video shoots, having recently begun appearing more frequently in music clips.

What she was actually doing in Crimea - and when, if at all, she came into contact with Ukrainian intelligence - remains unknown.

If Russia's allegations that she was recruited by Ukraine are true, Reutt would join a growing group of Russian citizens accused of being enlisted by Ukrainian intelligence to carry out sabotage and assassinations deep behind the frontlines.

Such recruits offer obvious advantages: they can move around Russia more freely, attracting less scrutiny than Ukrainian operatives, and they can reach targets far from the frontline without putting trained agents at risk. Women have featured prominently in several of the most high-profile operations, potentially attracting even less suspicion.

For those close to Reutt, there is no easy explanation for how the woman they remember ended up accused of carrying out an assassination. But a friend of two decades recalled a stubborn determination to follow through on whatever she decided to do.

'If she had a plan in mind, she would do it,' the friend said. 'Even if it was something like this.'

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22

Eyewitness

◀ The Lonach Pipe Band marching to the gathering

▶ Whisky is served to the marchers

▶▶ The event, organised by the Lonach Highland and Friendly Society, showcases traditional Highland dancing, music, food and games

▲ Members of Clan Wallace taking part in the tug-of-war

◀ Highland dancers in competition. The games take place on the fourth Saturday every August

▶ Lonach Highlanders gather to march through Donside to the gathering, marking the official start of the games

▶▶ Members of Clan Wallace and Clan Forbes taking part in the relay race PHOTOGRAPHS: JEFF J MITCHELL/GETTY; JANE BARLOW/PA

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●

Bellabeg, Aberdeenshire

Crowds flocked to the village on the edge of the Cairngorms on Saturday for the annual Lonach Highland Gathering and Games

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24

World

Iran dismisses threat of US sanctions but acknowledges 'many problems in society'

Sam Jones

Iran's foreign minister dismissed the threat of a fresh round of US economic sanctions as a 'desperate' ploy yesterday, even as its president acknowledged that the Iranian people were facing 'many problems' amid Washington's efforts to isolate and debilitate the country's economy. Last week, Donald Trump announced a new campaign to increase the pressure on the Iranian economy, calling it 'the most crushing economic operation ever taken against any country'.

The US Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, is expected today to announce further punitive economic measures, which he has described as 'the toughest sanctions in history'.

Despite the threats, Iran's foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, insisted the country remained unbowed.

'The fact that [US leaders] have moved on from military operations ... to bringing up the same old plans shows that they are desperate,' he said in a video posted on Telegram.

'We have never been afraid. All of their actions - whether blockades or other military moves they have made - have failed, and this new issue of their will fail as well.' Araghchi urged Washington to speak to Iran respectfully to find 'a solution based on justice and honour'.

His defiant message came hours after Iran's president, Masoud Pezeshkian, said Trump had thrust his country into 'a full-scale economic, military and security war'.

'I understand we have many problems in society right now. We are

trying to prevent these as much as we can,' he said in a speech broadcast on state television. 'We are striving with all our hearts to overcome inflation, livelihood problems, unemployment, and to secure the future of the people, so that they can live with dignity and pride.'

The Iranian government has faced several waves of mass protest in recent years, often triggered by economic hardships, including inflation and exchange-rate swings. At the end of last year, a protest movement initially sparked by the rising cost of living turned into mass demonstrations denouncing those in power.

Authorities reported more than 3,000 deaths during the unrest, accusing the US and Israel of orchestrating the violence. Foreign-based NGOs said Iranian officials had launched an indiscriminate crackdown.

The new leader of Iran's top security body has warned the country's neighbours against joining new US efforts to squeeze Tehran's economy, and threatened US commercial interests in the region, as Trump doubled down on his view that the strait of Hormuz was a new US territory.

Mohsen Rezaei, the hardline leader of Iran's supreme national security council, told state television that Iran would target oil-shipping routes out of the Gulf - alternatives to the strait of Hormuz - if its neighbours joined the 'economic war' waged by the US. Those neighbours would be 'considered an enemy' and 'we will target their interests', he said.

Trump's efforts to finish the war he started along with Israel on 28 February have foundered after a ceasefire agreement signed in June collapsed, leaving Iran in control of the strait

of Hormuz, a waterway that was the conduit for one-fifth of the world's oil supplies before the conflict.

Washington has called on other governments to join its efforts to isolate the Iranian economy, notably China, among Iran's top strategic partners. However, Beijing has criticised the initiative, arguing that US sanctions will not resolve the conflict in the Middle East.

The US Treasury has for months been aiming to cut off Iran's funding with targeted sanctions, while a naval blockade in the strait of Hormuz has sought to block Iranian oil exports that are vital in keeping the country's economy afloat.

Trump has in recent days repeatedly raised the concept of declaring the strait a US territory, sharing a map identifying it as such in a social media post on Saturday.

Rezaei said in his interview that discussions continued with Iran's cross-strait neighbour Oman over management of the waterway, and said fees would be imposed.

Additional reporting Agence France-Presse, Associated Press and Reuters

Elections Experts concerned as Trump questions integrity

George Chidi

A series of moves and statements by the Trump administration to sow doubt on the integrity of US elections have intensified concern among voting experts that it could declare a national emergency before November's US midterms.

Donald Trump used a television address in July to claim - not for the first time - that US elections were vulnerable to foreign manipulation, and repeat the lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen.

Asked earlier this month if he would 'declare a national security emergency for elections', Trump told Real America's Voice, a rightwing cable channel: 'Let me just say, stranger things have happened, OK?'

Aria Branch, a partner at the Elias Law Group who led a lawsuit blocking Trump's previous executive orders on election administration, said the administration was 'trying to lay the groundwork to declare

some sort of emergency to nationalise elections'.

A 'Government Transparency Task Force' - composed of members of the office of the director of national intelligence, the National Security Agency, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Department of Homeland Security

(DHS) - has released declassified 'election integrity' documents on the White House website.

The first tranche, released after Trump's TV address, included memos that described electronic voting machine vulnerabilities, foreign access to state voter registration data and foreign digital

manipulation strategies. Much of it was already known to the public and amounted to a US intelligence assessment that found no evidence that Beijing altered the 2020 vote.

A week later, Trump and his allies quickly seized on an announcement from Mike Sherrill, the New Jersey governor, that 6,600 non-citizens had registered to vote because of a software error. While fewer than 400 of them voted, the disclosure was used to escalate false claims that there are scores of noncitizens on the voter rolls. On 31 July, DHS released a public notice arguing that New Jersey's administrative errors demonstrated a need for standardised federal oversight.

The taskforce also declassified documents in a Michigan case where the FBI investigated

suspected fraudulent voter registrations by a get-out-the-vote organisation, in which no criminal charges were filed, and investigative material related to a data scrape of voter information in Maricopa county, Arizona.

Last Monday, the taskforce declassified files related to an investigation into Chinese intelligence, which disclosed how a disgraced former Democratic US representative had told FBI agents how he had 'occasionally hooked up' with a Chinese national allegedly engaged in a political influence campaign.

On Tuesday, the US Census Bureau released a brief claiming it had identified 24,000 noncitizens voting in the 2020 election in a preliminary match of 128m records. It was sharply criticised by democracy advocates.

'This alleged analysis based on census data fails the laugh test,' said David Becker, executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research.

Branch suggested the Trump administration was 'searching for' the legal basis for an executive order. 'All of the fear and narrative around that issue [of non-citizen voting] is just completely unfounded, and it's really just to stoke fear and lay the groundwork for future action,' she said.

Asked about the possibility of an executive order declaring a national emergency on elections, Lauren Bis, a White House spokesperson, said: 'Extreme liberal Democrats are keeping Americans from having full confidence in their elections by refusing to vote for the Save America Act.'

The act would require states to submit their voter rolls to federal inspection, in effect giving DHS the power to deregister anyone it deemed ineligible to vote, sharply curtail mail-in voting, and require documentary proof of citizenship to register to vote and a narrow set of photo IDs to cast a ballot.

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World

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23

'It's insane'

How Kurdish Kiwi rapper Fat Papi went suddenly viral

Eva Corlett Wellington

Two months ago, Baban Hussain, a 22-year-old Kurdish New Zealander, was working from a self-run studio in Auckland, putting out music to a few thousand followers as little-known rapper Fat Papi.

Then, as modern fairytales go, he made a viral hit that has amassed over 7.5bn views across YouTube, gained him nearly 10m new monthly listeners on Spotify, and catapulted him on to global charts - including the US Billboard Hot 100.

The last feat made history: Hussain is the first Kurdish artist to land on the Billboard Hot 100, and only the second New Zealand rapper to do so.

"It's a whirlwind," Hussain said on a video call from a hotel in New York where he has been promoting his music and meeting with industry. "My life is completely different. It's a very intense time and honestly amazing and everything we have ever wanted."

Hussain seemed candid and relaxed despite having only spoken to media a handful of times. He was joined on the call by producer Owen Omen, an Australian-based artist known as Prodshushy, who was beaming in from Perth.

Their now-viral song Freaked Out was released in May and initially got little attention. "It was doing terrible numbers," Hussain said. After various attempts at promoting it online, Prodshushy released a short dance video, backed by a clip of the song in which Fat Papi raps: "Get that bag, you ain't ever comin' last."

It quickly clocked up 1.5m views and caught the attention

► Baban Hussain aka Fat Papi in Manhattan, New York. The rapper's success on TikTok has seen him amass 10m monthly listeners on Spotify

PHOTOGRAPH: AHMED GAREK/THE GUARDIAN

of UK-based TikTok influencer Jocelyn Meiere, or Miss Diva Bob, who posted a video to her 3.1m followers of her slick bob haircut, using the song as a backing track.

"We look back a week later and it's growing and growing," Hussain said. "From that point, it was over, it was everywhere, it was insane."

TikTok has been flooded with copycat videos of people shaking their haircuts to Freaked Out, including one by British artist Raye. US rapper Megan Thee Stallion posted a video of her making enchiladas as she mouths along.

The song became No 1 on Shazam globally; hit the UK, Australia and US charts; and then debuted at 88 on the Billboard Hot 100.

Omen, who is of Papua New

Guinean and Solomon Islander descent, said it was a surreal moment. "No one where I'm from has ever reached this point in their career, like music producing-wise. It was such a big moment for me and also my people back home."

The song's success has also been moving for Hussain, whose parents fled Iraq as refugees in 1999. He grew up in a tiny Kurdish community in Auckland, and was the only Kurdish student at school.

"It's history, it's insane," he said. "That's a big thing - representing people and our home towns. Being able to do that for my people was insane. I still struggle to find the words to show love for that."

The duo only began working together four months ago, and met

in person for the first time in July. Their collaboration came about after Hussain rapped over one of Prodshushy's beats and sent it back to him. "I didn't expect him to reply - he had 20,000 followers at the time, I had 800," Hussain said. "But I was like, OK, I'm going to shoot my shot ... and he really liked it."

Hussain is drawn to 2015 club music, US rapper Kid Ink, producer Mustard, and east and west coast hip-hop. He said growing up listening to Kurdish music shaped his ear for different styles.

To make this viral moment into something "bigger, forever" will require hard work, Hussain said. "Even if it doesn't happen, we'll definitely give it our best go, and we've got that confidence with us."

Thirty killed in landslide at Guinea waste mound, government says

Reuters Conakry

A landslide at a landfill in Guinea's capital killed 30 people, the government said yesterday, after heavy rains overnight prompted the collapse of a massive mound of waste that engulfed nearby tents and shacks.

The incident occurred less

than a week after the government announced plans to close the site and relocate the waste because of the threat it posed, especially during the ongoing rainy season, which causes landslides and fatal flash floods each year in crowded parts of West Africa.

The landslide took place about 2am (0200 GMT) in the Gbesia commune of Conakry, according to a government statement.

The death toll was 30, with six people seriously injured and 16 more lightly injured, the statement said. Rescue workers were using

▲ Rescue workers use excavators to clear the site after the landslide

excavators and other tools to clear the site of the landslide, which witnesses said was large enough to bury an apartment building.

One woman, Cire Diallo, told reporters at the scene that her five children were killed. "I have lost all my children. All I can do is put my trust in God," she said.

The prime minister, Amadou Oury Bah, visited the landfill yesterday to assess the damage and supervise the response. He said people should "remain calm, show solidarity, and strictly follow the instructions of rescue services and the competent authorities".

In brief

Australia

Seal found dead of bird flu as virus spreads

Australia has confirmed its first case of H5N1 bird flu in a mammal after a long-nosed fur seal was found dead in South Australia state. The country has been grappling with rising cases of the virus after it was detected there in June. The seal's death marks an escalation just days after more than 1,000 greater crested terns were found dead on offshore islands in three mass mortality events. The federal agriculture minister, Julie Collins, called the news distressing but "not unexpected" and said it was "not possible to avoid significant losses". Lisa Cox and Sarah Basford Canales

Japan

Man reprimanded for leaving son on Mt Fuji

A man who abandoned his seven-year-old son on Mount Fuji has been reprimanded by local police. A worker on Japan's highest mountain discovered the child sitting alone on a bench near the sixth station of the Fujinomiya trail at an altitude of more than 2,000 metres (6,500ft) on Thursday.

After inviting the boy to take shelter, the worker called police, who took the child into custody. It emerged he had told his father he was too tired to continue up the trail. The father told him to wait and continued a five-hour ascent to the summit with the child's older brother. Donna Ferguson

South Africa

Former boxing world champion shot dead

The former boxing world champion Zolani "Last Born" Tete, 38, was shot dead outside his home in South Africa on Friday.

The athlete (below) was arriving at his house in the Mdantsane township, Eastern Cape province, when two men in balaclavas got out of a car and shot him. He was declared dead at the scene. A 27-year-old woman was also shot multiple times and taken to hospital. Police said the motive remained unclear, but they had started investigations. South Africa has had a decline in homicides, but remains one of the world's murder hotspots. William Christou

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20

World

▼ A member of a search and rescue team walks through the centre of Amatrice in early September 2016

PHOTOGRAPH: ALESSANDRO DI MEOZEA

▲ The mayor, Giorgio Cortellesi, in the ruins this month

Ten years on Italian town still in ruins after deadly 2016 quake

Angela Giuffrida Rome

As people gather in Amatrice today for a mass to mark the 10th anniversary of the earthquake that struck the hilltop town and several neighbouring communities, killing 303 and leaving thousands homeless, politicians and other public figures will pay tribute.

But for many, their words will offer little comfort: 10 years on, much of Amatrice, whose historic centre was wiped out by the 6.2-magnitude quake, is still being rebuilt and more than half of its roughly 2,100 residents continue to live in temporary housing.

“They will make a good show of it, bow their heads and say: ‘We did a lot,’” said Sonia Santarelli, the president of Comitato Civico 3e36, a grassroots initiative established soon after the disaster. “But nobody will put their neck on the line. They will say the reconstruction is going well ... but how can that be when so many are in homes that are uninhabitable?”

A report published last week by ActionAid Italy highlighted delays in rebuilding Amatrice and other areas damaged by the earthquake. According to the findings, as of April 2026, construction on roughly two-thirds of the planned public projects had yet to begin, rising to seven in 10 in the hardest-hit areas. Some €4.85bn (€4.15bn) has been earmarked for the works, the report said.

The earthquake struck in the early hours on 24 August 2016, its tremors felt as far as Rome. Santarelli, who owns an

agriturismo, or farm stay, in the hamlet of Torrita close to Amatrice, recalled being woken by a loud blast and the sound of buildings collapsing. There was virtually nothing left of the hamlet, she said, but fortunately nobody there died.

Santarelli counts her blessings that she was not made homeless either. Comitato Civico 3e36, whose name references the precise time - 3.36am - the earthquake hit, was founded to defend the communities affected and to ensure citizens have a voice in the reconstruction process.

Prefabricated housing villages were set up in 41 sites across the affected areas. The wooden homes are cramped and especially stifling in the heat. “The heat and humidity squelch you,” said Santarelli.

Furthermore, they are undignified places in which to die, she claimed, owing to limited space restricting the easy movement of coffins. Residents have also complained that the rooms are too small for traditional wakes.

Some of those displaced are still paying mortgages on homes that don’t exist any more. “You cannot make people live in these conditions for so long,” said Santarelli. “So much work still needs to be done.”

Projects that have been completed include a school and a handful of buildings in the historic centre. Construction of a new hospital is nearing completion and could open in 2027, provided it is fully equipped and staffed.

There are many explanations for the sluggish reconstruction. Matteo Renzi, the prime minister at the time of the quake, had pledged to rebuild the towns as they were. Renzi resigned at the end of 2016 after a referendum defeat and since

21 May 2016

▲ A satellite image of Amatrice before the 6.2-magnitude earthquake struck the hilltop town

▶ A day after the quake hit, this image shows the devastation that killed 303 people and made thousands homeless

18 July 2021

▲ Ten years on from the quake the historic centre of the town is still being rebuilt and residents are yet to return

PHOTOGRAPHS: GONGLI/VANTOR AND PLEIADES/CNES/REUTERS

then Italy has had five different governments, each appointing commissioners for the rebuild.

Reconstruction has been mired by bureaucracy, legal disputes and the general complexity of rebuilding historic centres in mountainous areas.

Much of the pressure falls on

the mayor. Elected in 2021, Giorgio Cortellesi said reconstruction efforts had been hampered by the Covid pandemic and then by a government eco-renovation scheme, which was intended to revive the post-pandemic economy but instead pushed up the cost of building materials and lured

construction workers away to more profitable jobs elsewhere in Italy.

Cortellesi, an engineer, was determined to contribute to Amatrice’s revival after finding his two sons alive during a desperate search through rubble. He said the reconstruction had gathered pace over the past couple of years.

However, there is “a significant housing emergency”, he acknowledged, exacerbated by construction firms renting out homes for their staff, in turn driving up rents for people who live there. He said the council is working to reclaim some of those properties.

As for the prefabricated villages, which are nearing the end of their 10-year warranty, they will need to be dismantled and their residents moved into their rebuilt homes. “They will return to their homes, which will be the safest in Italy and the most energy efficient,” Cortellesi said, but without offering a timeline for completion.

Amatrice’s population has declined over the past decade but there is also a resilience among those who have stayed.

Sergio Pirozzi, who was mayor at the time, is one of them. Within minutes of the earthquake striking, he summed up the devastation: “Half of the town is gone.”

A football coach, Pirozzi had been at a dinner marking the 50th anniversary of the local team a few hours before. “Of those who I was with that night, 36 died and there were others who lost their wives and children. It is not something I will ever overcome,” he said.

And yet, despite also having to live with the delays and frustrations of rebuilding, Pirozzi’s attachment to Amatrice is undiminished: “For me, even today, this is the most beautiful place in the world.”

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Unsolid bonds

Fears the US may be on verge of debt crisis

Page 29

29

Business

Onshore wind applications hit 10-year high in England

Jillian Ambrose Alex Clark

Plans for new onshore windfarms in England have reached their highest annual level in a decade, with about 45 applications submitted in the year to March, according to a Guardian analysis of government data.

Onshore wind power capacity entering the planning system has more than tripled since Labour, within days of coming to power just over two years ago, overturned a de facto ban imposed by the Conservatives in 2015, the analysis reveals.

Before the party's election victory in July 2024, applications for about 9 megawatts of onshore wind were submitted in England each month on a 12-month rolling average basis.

But by the beginning of this year that rate had reached about 36MW a month, according to the data, as renewable energy developers began to return to England.

The onshore wind resurgence is even greater when compared with the nadir of onshore wind in England in the months before September 2023, when Conservative ministers first began to loosen the regulatory red tape on onshore wind developments.

Then, onshore wind applications averaged about 1MW a month. At the time, the Guardian revealed that Ukraine was completing more onshore windfarms than England, even as it was occupied by Russian soldiers.

A government spokesperson said: 'For too long, a de facto ban held back onshore wind in England, despite its

► Wind turbines in Rye, East Sussex. Monthly onshore wind applications in England have hit about 36MW

PHOTOGRAPH: DAN KITWOOD/GETTY BRAGES

Franchising sector to be reviewed after Vodafone case

Simon Goodley

How franchising businesses are policed is to come under scrutiny, as ministers consider introducing new laws after high-profile allegations about conduct in the sector.

A Guardian investigation last year

potential to strengthen our energy security, grow the economy and get bills down for good.

'That is why we lifted the ban, backed the largest onshore wind-farm in England in a decade through our flagship renewables auction, and made it easier for farms and factories to install a single small turbine - no bigger than an oak tree - without needing planning permission.'

In February this year the Imreys project, near St Austell, Cornwall, became the largest onshore windfarm in England to secure a government subsidy since the ban was lifted.

The 20MW project is dwarfed by many Scottish onshore windfarms,

and underlines the trend for smaller windfarms in England since the ban was lifted. Only one windfarm with a capacity above 100MW has been proposed in England since the onshore ban was lifted. Eighteen onshore windfarms with a capacity greater than 100MW have been proposed in Scotland over the same period.

Tara Singh, the chief executive of RenewableUK, welcomed the return of onshore wind to England.

'Onshore wind is one of the UK's cheapest sources of new electricity, generating power at around half the cost of new gas-fired generation,' she said. 'What's more, new projects can be built quickly, strengthening our

energy security and reducing our exposure to volatile global gas prices at a critical time for the country.'

Singh added: 'With the new prime minister focusing on driving growth across every part of the UK, onshore wind can make an immediate contribution by delivering investment, skilled jobs and lower energy bills for households and businesses.'

'The benefits are being felt locally too. Community benefit funds worth £5,000 a year for every megawatt of onshore wind capacity installed across England are helping local people invest in the priorities that matter most to them - and we have nearly 3,000MW fully operational in England so far. For every £1 in post-tax profit a developer makes, around 37p is typically invested back into the local community.'

The UK's onshore wind supply chain could add up to £56bn to the economy by 2050 by increasing the manufacturing of high-value components such as blades and towers, according to data from RenewableUK.

Productivity stronger than official figures suggest, new analysis claims

Heather Stewart Economics editor

Productivity in the UK - a vital measure of economic health - is growing more strongly than official figures suggest, according to new analysis from the Resolution Foundation.

The thinktank suggests the chancellor, John Healey, may have inherited an economy finally starting to emerge from the long shadow of the 2008 global financial crisis.

Productivity measures the economic output produced by each worker, and is a crucial determinant of growth.

The Resolution Foundation reconsiders the UK's recent productivity record, using what it argues is a more accurate snapshot of the workforce than the widely criticised labour force survey.

Simon Pittaway, the thinktank's principal economist, said: 'Britain's dismal productivity record since the global financial crisis explains a lot of its economic stagnation and weak living standards growth.'

'But while official figures suggest that the output of workers has worsened further in the mid-2020s, our more accurate productivity measure suggests that it has been improving in recent years.'

Some economists have argued the potential uptick in productivity has resulted from layoffs in relatively low-skilled sectors such as hospitality and retail, meaning the average worker has become more productive.

But the thinktank rejects that idea, pointing out that the share of the workforce employed in hospitality is no lower now than it was in the late 2010s, and only just below its post-pandemic peak.

It also suggests the uptick cannot just be AI-related, as it is more widespread across different sectors of the UK economy.

Pittaway said: 'Some have suggested that recent productivity gains have been driven by an early AI boom, and workers leaving low-productivity sectors like retail and hospitality. But neither explanation is borne out by the data. Instead, the UK's productivity recovery has been achieved by the same workers, doing the same jobs, and working in the same sectors.'

Resolution Foundation's report was the latest to paint a relatively optimistic picture of the economy, after official figures last week showed the UK was the joint fastest-growing economy in the G7 in the first half of 2026.

revealed claims that Adrian Howe, a former Vodafone employee who agreed to start a franchise in 2018, had taken his own life after pressure from the FTSE 100 telecoms group.

The Department for Business and Trade is understood to be working with the British Franchise Association on an in-depth report into the domestic market. It has also engaged the Centre for Economic Policy Research to analyse different models in operation internationally.

The studies will feed into an assessment of the legal framework required to 'ensure franchisees are properly protected, while avoiding unnecessary burdens on small businesses'.

Keir Starmer as prime minister pledged to review laws governing franchising agreements, as part of the official response to the Howe case.

The former store manager was found drowned days before his franchise was due to open its doors. Relatives said he had become convinced his deal with the multinational would prove financially disastrous.

Two former Vodafone franchisees have since said commission cuts by Vodafone in 2020 had caused their companies to run up huge debts. Both said this contributed to them making attempts on their own lives.

They were among a group of 62 former franchisees who brought a high court claim in 2024, alleging Vodafone had 'unjustly enriched' itself.

Last month, Vodafone settled via a confidential agreement 'without any admission of liability'. Howe's family has said they will continue to press for an 'Adrian's law' to protect franchisees.

Campaigners have argued that franchisees are uniquely exposed under the current system as the law treats their small companies as equals to huge corporations - even though there are often large imbalances in power formalised within the franchise agreements that govern the relationship between both parties.

A Vodafone UK spokesperson said: 'While we are sorry if any partners have had a difficult experience, we reject any suggestion that our franchisees were put under undue pressure. We continue to run a successful franchise operation of over 350 stores, and many of our existing franchisees have expanded their business with us by taking on additional stores. We encourage everyone to raise issues, and we will always seek to resolve them.'

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24

Business

Business rate valuations to be 'made fairer' for hospitality

Lauren Almeida

The government has promised that business rate valuations will be "made fairer" for pubs and hotels in England and Wales in future, as Andy Burnham faces calls to help the hospitality sector.

An independent review will look at improving the system for hospitality venues, which were hit by higher business rate bills this year after the end of pandemic-era relief and

when new revaluations took effect. It comes after Burnham announced last month that he would cut business rates for pubs, social clubs and live music venues in England by 20% from April.

Hospitality businesses have struggled to cope with rising energy and food bills in recent years.

The review, which will be led by Jerry Schurder, an independent business rates specialist, will report to the Treasury by March 2027. It will consider valuations before the next revaluation date in 2029. The rise

in valuations this year will not be affected. James Murray, the financial secretary to the Treasury, said: "Pubs and hotels are vital for communities and bringing growth to every postcode," adding that a "rethink of valuations" would help "build a fairer system for the future".

Allen Simpson, the chief executive of the trade body UK Hospitality, said it was positive the government was looking "seriously" at the valuation methodology for pubs and hotels.

Emma McClarkin, the chief executive of the British Beer and Pub

Association, said the review was "sorely needed" as pubs had "paid a disproportionately higher business rates bill to keep the doors open".

However, the industry has repeatedly called for the reform of the whole business rates system. Estimates suggest that two pubs are closing a day across Britain this year, hit by higher running costs.

The government has suggested that it will reform business rates, including small business rates relief, at John Healey's first budget on 28 October.

Tata warns of hit from cheap steel imports despite new UK tariffs

Alex Daniel

At Tata Steel's factory in Llanwern, south Wales, production lines are falling quiet for parts of the day, with workers being put on to maintenance and cleaning work while machines sit idle.

There are not enough orders to keep them running full time, the company says, because of a surge of cheap steel coming from Asian countries that is threatening the viability of several UK sites that make similar products.

"The line has been left running half-empty, and the result of that is it won't last very long unless we can find a solution here," said one insider.

New 50% import tariffs introduced last month were designed to protect against cheap steel imports from undercutting UK producers such as Tata. But for some products, such as the galvanised steel made at Llanwern, near Newport, the situation worsened after the government increased tariff-free quotas for some countries.

India's allowance of galvanised steel rose from 98,000 to 125,000 tonnes, while Vietnam's more than tripled, from 51,000 to 174,000 tonnes. South Korea was given an increased quota of 100,000 tonnes.

The larger quota for India is understood to have been a last-minute

move to help get a trade deal over the line. World Trade Organization rules forced the increase in quotas to Vietnam and South Korea.

The Tata UK boss, Rajesh Nair, said recently he was "very concerned" about the new arrangement. Now, nearly two months later, Llanwern is struggling to compete on price. The factory produces about 600,000 tonnes of galvanised steel a year, nearly half the UK's total demand.

The company is understood to have met Blair McDougall, the minister for industry, two weeks ago, and laid out the scale of the problem facing Llanwern. Russell Codling, the commercial director of Tata Steel, said: "Our world-class Zodiac galvanising line in Llanwern is already being significantly impacted by the new quotas, and that situation just isn't sustainable."

Tata is in the process of switching from its old blast furnaces in Port Talbot, south Wales, to a 3m-tonne electric arc furnace to reduce carbon emissions, but an industry source said prolonged tariff pressure could endanger that switch.

The government has said it will review the quota system before it changes again in July 2027. A spokesperson said: "Our steel measure aims to strike the right balance between protecting domestic production and maintaining a secure supply, and final quotas were shaped by extensive engagement with industry."

▲ A worker at Tata Steel's factory in Llanwern, where production lines are 'running half-empty' because of a lack of orders PHOTOGRAPH: DAVID LEVERSON/ALAMY

---

Business

29

Economics viewpoint

Trump risks triggering a US debt crisis

Heather Stewart

Look, there's nothing magic about that $40tn number," the US Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, told

CNBC insouciantly last week, as the country's debt mountain surpassed another bleak record.

Yet Bessent's decision to intervene in government bond markets in an effort to combat soaring yields belied his studied calm in TV interviews - and reignited fears the US may be on the road to a debt crisis.

Half a lifetime ago, in 1992, Bessent cut his teeth in markets shorting the pound alongside George Soros in the chaos that led up to Black Wednesday, when the UK plunged out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism.

Today he is on the other side of the tussle between policymakers and markets. When the US Treasury intervened to help prop up the Japanese yen this month - crucially by selling euros, not the US dollar - it was widely read as a sign of weakness.

Japan is a mega holder of US treasuries, and it looked as though the Trump administration was fretting that Tokyo might be about to dump a chunk of them to buy yen - potentially pushing up the yield, or interest rate.

Japan's announcement that it planned to use a little-known

► There were concerns in Washington that Japan might dump its US bond holdings PHOTOGRAPH: PHILIP FORGAFF/GETTY

facility called the Foreign and International Monetary Authorities Repo Facility, in effect to borrow against its treasury holdings without having to sell them, was read as another sign of concern.

In last week's fresh intervention, Bessent promised to double the rate at which the Treasury would buy up the longest-dated bonds - hoping to massage the yield downwards.

It was the clearest sign yet of anxiety in Washington about a sell-off that has pushed up yields on 30-year government bonds to levels last seen before the 2008 global financial crisis.

There are several, overlapping reasons for the bond market sell-off. One is inflation. Treasuries, which pay a fixed amount each year, are in part betting on the future value of money - with higher inflation eroding the real value of those payments.

With the Iran conflict slipping towards a forever war, keeping oil prices elevated, and amid concerns

about the new Federal Reserve chair Kevin Warsh's willingness to raise interest rates, investors are fretting more about future inflation.

Another reason lies in the extraordinary AI investment boom. Tech giants have been funding the buildout of vast datacentres by issuing a wall of corporate debt.

Debt issuance by the "hyperscaler" AI companies is already $219bn (£160bn) so far this year, according to analysis by JP Morgan - potentially offering investors an alternative to treasuries and crowding out public debt.

Third, and most worrying, is the gnawing sense that despite robust economic growth, the US is not the rock-solid creditor it once was.

US public debt has exploded in recent years, smashing through every forecast. It lurched higher after the financial crisis and took another leg up during the Covid pandemic. It has continued to surge in Donald Trump's

second term, as tax cuts have been unmatched either by tariff revenue - some of which is now being repaid - or by spending cuts from Elon Musk's short-lived Department of Government Efficiency.

Without radical policy change, for which there seems little appetite on Capitol Hill, the independent Congressional Budget Office expects US government debt to rise from 100% of GDP today to 175% in 30 years' time.

Meanwhile, with his unwinnable war in the Middle East, capricious tariff regime and penchant for self-enrichment on an epic scale, Trump is turning the US into an increasingly unpredictable player in the global economy.

Instead of the guarantor of rules-based markets and open global trade routes, the US has become a source of uncertainty and chaos.

As Adam Posen of the Peterson Institute for International Economics put it in a recent piece: "The entire world is now doing

business, investing, and trying to make a living in the post-American world economy."

The withdrawal was largely a deliberate decision by Trump's Maga crew, who felt the US was covering too many of the running costs of the geopolitical order.

Yet it was partly this role as the anchor of the global economy, with treasuries the quintessential safe haven asset, that prevented the logic of runaway deficits and soaring debt from hitting home.

By contrast, Bessent's panicky intervention last week smacked of rising anxiety on how markets now view the US fiscal position.

Far from drawing a line under the bond rout, 30-year yields were rising again by Friday afternoon, while at the same time the dollar was sliding - a cursed correlation more often associated with emerging economies.

The risks are clearly growing of a self-inflicted bond market crisis. Its consequences would ripple out far beyond the US.

New Fed chair faces test at bank summit as inflation fears grow

Richard Partington

Senior economics correspondent

The new US Federal Reserve chair, Kevin Warsh, faces a critical test this week amid anxiety in government bond markets over inflation and Donald Trump's tax and spending plans.

As the world's most powerful central bank prepares for its annual conference in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, analysts said bond traders would be looking for signals from Warsh over the Fed's commitment to fighting inflation.

The Trump-appointed head of the US central bank has previously signalled reluctance to "spoon-feed" financial markets over how it plans to set interest rates to keep fast-rising prices in check.

However, anxiety over Trump's handling of the economy and investor fears that his war with Iran is stoking inflation have rocked global financial markets amid a dramatic sell-off in US government bonds.

Dan Coatsworth, the head of markets at the stockbroker AJ Bell, said: "Investors will be looking for a comfort blanket when Federal Reserve

chair, Kevin Warsh, addresses the Jackson Hole meeting." James Smith, an economist at ING Bank, said: "By offering less commentary on where rates are headed ... [Warsh] risks injecting yet more volatility into an already febrile bond market."

Warsh is expected to give a highly anticipated speech on Friday at the Fed's annual symposium in Jackson Hole, against a volatile backdrop in global financial markets.

The gathering of the world's most powerful central bankers is a blue-riband event in the financial calendar, as a vital platform for the Fed chair and other top officials to signal their policymaking approach.

However, Warsh has signalled reluctance to use his speech for the "more traditional setup" of dropping hints over how the US central bank

may respond to inflationary pressures when its officials next meet to set interest rates in September and December. Instead, he has said his speech could be "focused on bigger questions", including concerns over productivity and demographics.

However, the meeting comes as selling pressure intensifies in the $30tn (£22tn) US government debt market despite efforts by the Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, to assuage investor fears after he committed to at least double Washington's purchases of US Treasury bonds.

$40tn

The size of the US national debt. Investors are concerned about the inflationary effect of the Iran war

With investors fretting over the inflationary impact of the Iran war and the US national debt surpassing $40tn for the first time, the yield - in effect the interest rate - on long-term US Treasury debt at first fell, before rising back towards the highest levels since 2007.

Investors accused Warsh of sending confusing signals in his first press conference as Fed chair in July, after he expressed a commitment to curbing inflation, without giving details.

The Fed held rates in July, and trading in financial markets reflects investor expectations for a hold again in September, although a rise is thought possible. Markets anticipate at least one quarter-point increase by the middle of next year. Trump, who appointed Warsh, has called on the Fed to cut rates.

---

10

Weather

Monday 24 August 2026

UK and Ireland Noon today

Forecast

Carbon count

Daily atmospheric CO₂ readings from Mauna Loa, Hawaii (ppm):

Latest 14 Aug 2026 427.80 Weekly average 09 Aug 2026 427.59 23 Aug 2025 425.53 23 Aug 2016 403.08 Pre-industrial base 280 Safe level 330 Source: NOAA ESRI.

Around the UK

Atlantic front

High tides

© Crown Copyright and/or database rights. Reproduced by permission of the keeper of Public Records and the UK Hydrographic Office

Aberdeen	1110	3.4m	2323	3.6m
Avonmouth	0401	9.5m	1634	10.1m
Barrow	0856	7.0m	2116	7.7m
Belfast	0845	2.8m	2104	3.1m
Cobb	0226	3.1m	1501	3.3m
Cromer	0349	4.1m	1641	4.0m
Dover	0833	5.4m	2109	5.5m
Dublin	0918	3.3m	2123	3.6m
Galway	0304	3.8m	1511	4.2m
Greenock	0948	2.6m	2221	3.0m
Harwich	0852	3.2m	2134	3.4m
Hollywood	0812	4.4m	2020	4.8m
Hull	0313	5.8m	1604	5.7m
Leith	--	--	1226	4.4m
Liverpool	0845	7.3m	2059	7.9m

London Bridge	1054	5.6m	2334	6.0m
Leviotmouth	0934	3.2m	2139	3.4m
Milford Haven	0335	5.2m	1602	5.6m
Newquay	0220	5.0m	1456	5.4m
North Shields	0036	4.0m	1324	4.1m
Oxon	0400	2.9m	1557	3.2m
Penzance	0203	4.2m	1426	4.5m
Plymouth	0242	4.1m	1507	4.5m
Portsmouth	0907	3.8m	2118	3.9m
Southport	0800	7.0m	2014	7.6m
Stormway	0453	3.6m	1656	4.0m
Portland	0353	1.2m	1618	1.5m
Whitby	0120	4.5m	1356	4.5m
Wick	0907	2.7m	2107	2.9m
Workington	0915	6.3m	2131	6.8m

Sun & Moon

Sun rises	0500
Sun sets	2004
Moon rises	1849
Moon sets	0314
Fall Moon	28 Aug

Forecasts and graphics provided by AccuWeather ©2026

Lighting up

Belfast	2036 to 0619
Birm'ham	2013 to 0606
Brighton	2002 to 0603
Bristol	2015 to 0613
Carlisle	2023 to 0605
Cork	2019 to 0635
Dublin	2033 to 0622
Glasgow	2032 to 0609
Harlech	2023 to 0615
Inverness	2036 to 0602
London	2004 to 0601
W'sheeler	2017 to 0606
Newcastle	2019 to 0600
Norwich	2002 to 0554
Penzance	2023 to 0626

Starwatch

Friday 28 August will reward very early risers in the UK, Europe and Africa with a fine lunar eclipse. Though not quite a total eclipse, it will transform the moon into a dramatic sight as dawn approaches.

The partial eclipse begins at 3.33am BST, when the moon's full disc begins to disappear behind the shadow of the Earth. By the time the eclipse reaches its greatest extent, shortly after 5.10am, only a thin sliver of the moon will remain in direct sunlight. The rest is likely to glow a muted coppery red as sunlight beat into the Earth's shadow and filtered through its atmosphere reaches the surface.

As the eclipse unfolds, the moon will be sinking, so find an observation site with a view towards the western horizon. Unlike a solar eclipse, a lunar eclipse is safe to watch with the naked eye. Binoculars will reveal subtle shades of colour across the lunar surface. Stuart Clark

Around the world

Algiers	10	Lisbon	25
Ams'dam	10	Madrid	27
Athens	10	Malaya	32
Auckland	10	Melb'row	33
B-Airns	10	Mexico C	34
Bangkok	10	Miami	35
Barcelona	10	Milan	36
Bosra	10	Montbasa	37
Beijing	10	Moscow	38
Berlin	10	Mumbai	39
Bermuda	10	N-Orleans	40
Brossets	10	Nairobi	41
Budapest	10	New Delhi	42
C'hagen	10	New York	43
Cairo	10	Oslo	44
Cape Town	10	Paris	45
Chicago	10	Perth	46
Corfu	10	Prague	47
Dakar	10	Reykjavik	48
Dhaka	10	Rhode 2	49
Dublin	10	Rome	50
Florence	10	Shanghai	51
Gibraltar	10	Singapore	52
H Kong	10	Stockholm	53
Harare	10	Strandry	54
Helsinki	10	Sydney	55
Istanbul	10	Tel Aviv	56
Ja'burg	10	Tenerife	57
K'Lumpur	10	Tokyo	58
K'mandu	10	Toronto	59
Kabul	10	Vancouver	60
Kingston	10	Vienna	61
Kolkata	10	Warsaw	62
Kingston	10	Waltham	63
Kalijata	10	Well'ton	64
Langolles	10	Zurich	65
Lagos	10
Lima	10

---

Football

Alonso seeks calm as Chelsea start at Fulham

Page 38 →

Cycling

Le Court lifts Tour of Britain title for Mauritius

Page 35 →

Sport

31

'A brilliant initiative': Youth Sport Games gets a big leg up

Celebrities and billionaires help out in Croatia at the 30th edition of a huge amateur sports event for children

Paul MacInnes

Split

On a dais overlooking the Adriatic, 20 children are playing chess. Arranged in a circle, they are competing not against each other but against the grandmaster Nigel Short, who passes awkwardly around the group playing one move each time. The children are no slouches, the best young chess players from the Balkans. But, in a twist, they can also call on the support of celebrity coaches. And so we have the unusual sight of precocious chess talents being coached through their games not just by the former French Open champion Ana Ivanovic, but by the former Burnley manager Sean Dyche and, in quite the eyebrow-raiser, the rightwing tech billionaire Peter Thiel.

This is just one event at the Plazma Youth Sport Games (YSG), which is celebrating its 30th anniversary in the Croatian city of Split this month. Described by some of its more esteemed visitors as 'the Davos of sport', it brings eminent figures from the world of sport and politics to the Dalmatian coast each summer. More important, it is also the biggest amateur sports event for children in Europe. Just under half a million young people from across Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Slovenia and North Macedonia took part in qualifying for this year's event. The finals in 10 sports - from chess to 3v3 basketball - are then held over the course of a week in Split. Alongside the competition, children are encouraged to learn lessons in teamwork, collaboration and putting phones away. The organisers describe Plazma as both a sporting event and a 'social project'. The

▲ Aleksander Ceferin, the president of Uefa, shows off his ball skills at the event in Split KARLO INTALOU COURTESY OF YSG

◀ Grandmaster Nigel Short gives the benefit of his experience to competitors in the chess tournament COURTESY OF YSG

message has proved a winning one for any number of sportspeople and celebrities who have become ambassadors for YSG - from Zlatan Ibrahimovic to Alastair Campbell. It's now par for the course to see visitors come away evangelised. Dyche calls the Games 'a brilliant, brilliant initiative', with a particular highlight being the girls' mini-football final.

'It was terrific, they were playing good football; getting properly stuck into each other, properly playing,' he said. 'You could feel that they felt free and were being supported in that environment.'

Dyche says he is sceptical that something similar to the YSG could have sprung up in the UK. 'It seems to me that every time you try and get an initiative off in England, there's a million rules and regulations that make it difficult,' he said. 'I know how hard it can

'It's great that at a time when there's a lot of negativity in the world that this can exist'

be to get funding too and times are tough for people.'

The Plazma games were themselves born of hard times, however. Founded by Zdravko Maric in the aftermath of the breakup of Yugoslavia and the Bosnian war, his motivations were less about bringing peace and more about countering the drug problems that existed among Croatia's young people at that time.

'It's a lifetime project and we live with it every day,' says Slaven Maric, Zdravko's brother, who has also worked on the games since their inception. 'But when Zdravko started it we didn't have an idea that it would develop into this. It's not about sport or the results, its about social life, it's about being together. There were many issues with drug abuse [then], now it's about bringing the kids to spend some time together in real life.' Getting kids off their phones is indeed a key message for the games in 2026. Maric says attempts by esports brands to become involved in the event have been rebuffed.

In bringing the games to Split, the Maric family were adding a new layer to the city's incredible sporting history. A small city with a contemporary population

▲ Alastair Campbell (left) alongside fellow ambassador Sean Dyche

of only 160,000 people, Split has raised stars such as Goran Ivanisevic and Bernard Vukas (before Luka Modric, the man adjudged the greatest Croatian footballer of all time). Across the decades, however, they can boast champions in any number of sports: from Branko Cikatic, one of the greatest kickboxers, to the NBA threepeat champion Toni Kukoc and the celebrated mountaineer Stipe Bozic. Split even has its own Olympic 'walk of fame', celebrating its 73 medal winners in Hollywood style. It also has its own

sport, picigin, a kind of hackysack for the hands, and played in the shallows of the Adriatic.

The connection between the games and the city runs deep, therefore, and the pride in its success on the part of locals is obvious. Slaven Bilic is another native, the former Premier League player and manager now inevitably a YSG ambassador. 'I'm not objective because I've known Zdravko for more than 30 years but it's great that at a time when there's a lot of negativity in the world that this can exist,' Bilic said. 'Especially in this part of the world that is supposed to be unstable.'

The question of where the games go next is clearly looming large for organisers and associated parties alike. One clear ambition appears to be to increase the number of nations involved. North Macedonia competed for the first time this year, while Ukrainian teams were invited guests. Discussions have taken place with six other countries about joining in the future. Sponsorship deals are also growing, with Coca-Cola a partner as well as the Topps brand and the leading Croatian telecom firm Telemach. Perhaps more relevant, there are now 11 billionaires associated with the games, a number of whom have invested money in its success. One of those investors is understood to be Thiel, the founder of PayPal and Palantir and a mentor to JD Vance, the US vice-president. When asked by the Guardian why he had chosen to take a stake in the games, Thiel did not respond and passed down the rivera with his security detail.

Aleksander Ceferin, the president of Uefa, whose organisation also provides funding to the YSG, has his own view. He sees them as an example of big sport doing things right. Reluctant to answer questions about his continuing battle with Fifa while he was in Split, Ceferin's praise for the games still seemed to carry some subtext. 'I think that top sport, and the money that you get with top competition, should be used for the development of sport and this is the development of sport,' he said, prompting an inevitable comparison with Gianni Infantino's attempts to sell a stake in the World Cup to private investors.

The Games ended on Friday night with their own version of Soccer Aid. A football match between a YSG team and 11 all-stars seemed somewhat imbalanced, given the all-stars could boast Claude Makélélé, Pavel Nedved and Ibrahimovic in their ranks. On the other hand, the local players had Dyche as their coach. Building bridges, forming memories, and getting proper stuck in. A decent way to finish your birthday week.

---

Football results

PREMIER LEAGUE
	P	W	D	L	F	A
Brighton	1	1	0	0	4	0
Arsenal	1	1	0	0	3	0
Brentford	1	1	0	0	3	0
Courtson	1	1	0	0	2	0
Hull	1	1	0	0	2	0
Ipswich	1	1	0	0	2	1
Man City	1	1	0	0	2	1
Leeds	1	1	0	0	1	0
Liverpool	1	0	1	0	2	2
Newcastle	1	0	1	0	2	2
Chelsea	0	0	0	0	0	0
Falkirk	0	0	0	0	0	0
Bournemouth	1	0	0	1	1	2
Sunderland	1	0	0	1	1	2
Rotten Tomsk	1	0	0	1	0	1
Crystal Palace	1	0	0	1	0	2
Man Utd	1	0	0	1	0	2
Coventry	1	0	0	1	0	3
Tottenham	1	0	0	1	0	3
Tottenham	1	0	0	1	0	3

Adams	1	0	0	1	0	4	0
Brentford	2	1	0	1	3	3	0

Brentford City	2	1	0	1	3	3	0
Huddersfield	2	1	0	4	1	3	4
Luton	2	0	2	0	3	1	0
Wrexham	2	0	2	0	2	2	0
Birmingham	2	0	2	0	2	2	0
Sheffield Utd	2	0	2	0	0	0	2
Man Utd	2	0	1	1	3	4	-1

Derby	2	0	1	1	3	4	-1	1
Berkeley	2	0	1	1	3	5	-2	1
Brent City	2	0	1	1	2	2	4	-2
Lincoln City	2	0	0	2	2	5	-1	0
Preston	2	0	0	2	2	5	-1	0
Stoke	2	0	0	2	2	5	-1	0
Norwich	2	0	0	2	1	5	-4	0
Southampton	2	1	0	1	1	3	4	-1

Portsmouth	2	1	0	1	4	4	0
Middlesbrough	2	1	0	1	3	3	0
Cardiff	2	0	2	0	3	1	0
Wrexham	2	0	2	0	2	2	0
Birmingham	2	0	2	0	2	2	0
Sheffield Utd	2	0	2	0	0	0	2

Man Utd	2	0	1	1	3	4	-1	1
Hyde	2	0	1	1	3	4	-1	1
Berkeley	2	0	1	1	3	5	-2	1
Brent City	2	0	1	1	2	2	4	-2
Lincoln City	2	0	0	2	2	5	-1	0
Preston	2	0	0	2	2	5	-1	0

Stoke	2	0	0	2	2	5	-1	0
Norwich	2	0	0	2	2	5	-1	0
Southend	2	0	0	2	2	5	-1	0
Stamford	2	0	0	2	2	5	-1	0

St. James	2	1	1	0	2	1	-1	4
Baltimore	2	1	1	0	2	1	-1	4
Arsenal	2	1	1	0	2	1	-1	4

SKY BET LEAGUE ONE
	P	W	D	L	F	A
Midland City	2	2	0	0	5	0
West Brom	2	2	0	0	5	2
Charlton	2	2	0	0	4	2
Wolves	2	3	1	0	5	3
QPR	2	1	1	0	3	1
Blackburn	2	1	1	0	4	3
Watford	2	1	1	0	3	2
Vanessa	2	1	1	0	2	1
Bolton	2	1	1	0	2	1

SECOND TEST (second test of feet)
Aspiritalia v Bangladeshi
Work by Australia/And Bangladesh by arriving and 51 runs.
Bangladesh First inning:
Manitowoc (Swan) (Swan) (Swan)	0
Taoudi House, Manitowoc (Swan)	0
Montreal House, (Swan) (Swan)	0
Montreal House, (Swan) (Swan)	0
Wagong (Phnom Penh) (Phnom Penh) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
McIntosh House Minors (Swan) (Swan)	0
Macau (Swan) (Swan) (Swan)	0
Macau (Swan) (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0

West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0

West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0

West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0

West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0
West Point (Swan) (Swan)	0

Manfield	2	1	0	1	3	3	0	3
Sheffield	2	1	0	1	2	2	0	3
Petersborough	2	1	0	1	2	2	1	1
MK Dams	2	0	2	0	3	3	0	2
Notts County	2	0	2	0	3	3	0	2
Weycombe	2	0	2	0	2	2	0	2
Reading	2	0	1	1	3	4	-1	1
Leicester	2	0	1	1	2	3	-1	1
Strasse	2	0	1	1	2	3	-1	1
Bromley	2	0	1	1	2	3	-1	1
Doncaster	2	0	1	1	2	3	-1	1
Preston	2	0	1	1	2	3	-1	1
Worcester	2	0	1	1	2	3	-1	1
AFC Wimbledon	2	0	1	1	0	3	-1	1
Wigan	2	0	0	2	2	5	-1	0

AFC Wimbledon	2	0	1	0	3	3	0	3
0.74
Bromley
Adelphius 81
4,938
Doncaster
Leicester
Barns 42
27,748
Manfield 68
MK Dams
Collies 54
5,500
Petersborough
Woods 50
Leonard 80+3
Strasse
Robens 80+8
Wolters
5,500
Wigan
Wigan

Bromley
Adelphius 81
4,938
Doncaster
Leicester
Barns 42
27,748
Manfield 68
MK Dams
Collies 54
5,500

Petersborough
Woods 50
Leonard 80+3
Strasse
Robens 80+8
Wolters
5,500
Wigan
Wigan

Wigan
Wigan
Wigan
Wigan
Wigan
Wigan
Wigan

Wigan
Wigan
Wigan
Wigan
Wigan
Wigan
Wigan
Wigan
Wigan

Leicestershire v Glamorgan
Grace Road Leicestershire (13pts) best Glamorgan (13pts 4G net)
Leicestershire First inning (13)
Glamorgan First inning (13) Glamorgan First inning (12) Glimband 4-30, 100% Wile 4-30)
Leicestershire Second inning (2.7 (5St) Gonds 93)
Glamorgan Second inning (overnight 126-5)

*ES Carlisle + BA Patch Bar Plant	99
AMR Barney + BR Patch Holland	3
*CS Cooke Sea 5 Holland	33
MK Dams Best 50/57/60	33
Wit Dams Best 50/57/60	0
Wit Dams Best 50/57/60	0
Wit Dams Best 50/57/60	0
Wit Dams Best 50/57/60	0
Wit Dams Best 50/57/60	0
Wit Dams Best 50/57/60	0

Wit Dams Best 50/57/60	0
Peterborough
Wit Dams
Collies 54
5,500
Petersborough
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams
Wit Dams

Somerset v Essex
Toxtown Somerset (27pts) best Essex (23) by eight wickets.
Somerset First inning 400 (14) Thomas (13) 100% Golds 96, 201 Mar 74, 78 March 85, 15 June 4-92.
Essex First inning 110 (80) (Crickley 50)
Mt Leach 4-171.

Essex Second inning
Oldhamton (overnight 114-3)
CMJ Allison + Break Leach
MJJ (Crickley) 2-80 (5) Lech
NEW Thane + Red 5 Leach
*MC Pepper + Red 5 Leach
SR Warren V Vaughan
5 Sreder 5 Vaughan

---

Monday 24 August 2005 The Guardian

● ● ●

Choltenham	2	1	0	1	3	3	0	3
Crawley	2	1	0	1	2	2	0	3
Chesterfield	2	1	0	1	1	1	0	3
Rotherham	2	0	1	1	2	3	-1	3
Northampton	2	0	1	1	0	1	-1	3
Accrington Stanley	2	0	1	1	2	4	-2	3
Port Vale	2	0	1	1	1	2	-2	3
Gillingham	2	0	1	1	0	3	-3	3
Sufford	2	0	0	2	1	4	-3	6
Neckdale	2	0	0	2	1	5	-4	0
Stroudsburg	2	0	0	2	3	5	-4	0

Bristol Rovers	(1)5	Newport County	(1)3
Port Hague 40-41		Sturgess & Swengon 81
St. 52 00-93		Jerviske 71
Jerviske 57-92, Kansas 74		10,349

Colchester	(0)2	Oldham	(1)1
Anderman 63		Appiah-Forton 20
Temple 60-64		5,188
St. 52 00-93
Jerviske 57-92, Kansas 74

Colchester	(0)2	Oldham	(1)1
Anderman 63		Appiah-Forton 20
Temple 60-64		5,188

Crown	(0)1	Northampton	(0)0
Merrit 54		5,375
Exeter	(2)2	Accrington Stanley	(0)0

Edmonton 2		5,318
Cromwell 33up
Rotherhead	(0)0	Gillingham	(0)0

Port Vale	(1)1	Trammen	(0)1
Byers 35pm		Iron 72
		5,938

Neckdale	(0)1	Crawley	(1)2
Sturton-Lundell 54		Renner 11
5,329		Jerviske 10

Swindon	(1)2	Choltenham	(0)1
Devon 37		Rareen 83
Clarke 55		8,833

Walsall	(0)0	Browley	(0)0
8,400

UNIVERSE NATIONAL LEAGUE
	P	W	D	L	F	A

Southend	2	0	0	0	2	2	+5	3
Sutton	3	1	0	0	6	1	+5	9
Warrington	3	1	1	0	10	1	+5	7

Burnham Wood	3	2	1	0	9	4	+5	7
Northport	3	2	0	1	4	2	+2	6
Boston	3	2	0	1	3	1	+2	6

Woodsbach	3	2	0	1	6	5	+1	6
Eastleigh	3	2	0	1	5	4	+1	6
Worthing	3	2	0	1	5	4	+1	6

Forest Green	3	2	0	1	5	6	+1	6
Yavell	3	1	2	0	5	2	+3	5
Carlisle	3	1	1	1	7	5	+2	4

Folk	3	1	1	1	6	4	0	0	4
Alderwick	3	1	1	1	2	2	0	4	1

P	W	L	T	NR	RR	Pts
Northamptonshire	9	4	5	4	14	135
Sunderland	9	4	3	3	18	133

Moore Laddon	9	3	3	1	15	130	27
Glamorgan	9	3	1	3	14	110	24
Sussex	9	4	3	2	19	108	21

Yorkshire	9	4	4	1	12	108	24
Yorkshire	9	4	4	1	12	107	23
Surrey	9	1	1	1	18	94	20

Leicestershire	9	2	1	2	19	91	24
Hampshire	9	2	2	1	7	75	24

Division Two
Glaucestershire v Worcestershire

Choltenham Worcestershire (2bpts) best Gluucestershire (3) to eight assists.

Gluucestershire First innings 150 (TW Bournan 60; RR Millson 3-15)

Worcestershire 287 (BL D Oliveira 51, RW Edwards 63, 45 Bollson 4-35)

Worcestershire Second innings (overnight 240-1)
Q1 Price 0-80 km

TW Bournay 5 (wanquet ...	127
TW Bournan 1 Albion 0 Waltz	127

Q1 (Rome) 0-100km (wanquet ...	5
EWD Middlesex not out ...	10

RS Middlesex not out ...	10
RS Middlesex not out ...	10
RS Middlesex not out ...	10

Exeter (54, 36-1)	10
Total (for 7 de... 114 over.)	395

Fall cont 350, 301, 335, 300, 0
Did not bat 34 Res. 90.54 Bollson

Bowling Taylor (3-5-7-9-1, Albion 19-3-70-1; Stanstead 22-8-49-4; Landa (3-10-103-0; O'Donnell 8-9-26-0, Jiffy 3-0-3-0

Worcestershire Second innings
SW Latrogan 1 P(63pc) Middleton ...

20 Libby not out ...	107
8 Swanstead 0-8 Middleton ...	107

42 Water not out ...	4
Extern 50, 58, 1-2)	4

Total (for 2-10 overs)	285
Fall 244, 277
Did not bat 104 (Edwards, 41, D'Illinois, 41) Colton,

W. Wales, Tel Taylor, BM Albion, PT Landa, FGH Redlands.
Bowling Station 18-2-79-0, Millaion 4-0-25-0, 4-0-25-0, 4-0-25-0, 4-0-25-0, 4-0-25-0, 4-0-25-0, 4-0-25-0, 4-0-25-0, 4-0-25-0, 4-0-25-0, 4-0-25-0, 4-0-25-0

Two Gluucestershire (no) not in last
Umpires 40: Wharf and 8 (Freerall)

2 anti-cadrire v Northamptonshire
Unit 5 national Northamptonshire (2bpts) best Lancashire (1) to by 150 runs.

Northamptonshire First innings 264 (GA Bartlett 82; Robinson 4-70)

Lancashire First innings 137 (RW Sanderson 4-35)
Northamptonshire Second innings 200 +4 de

(R) Vancrouckle 100, 54 (2-8 55-16)
Lancashire Second innings (overnight 24-2)

W. Williamson 0-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1

TE Bailey's Guthrie ...	19

Kidderminster	3	1	1	1	2	4	-2	4
Hallfax	3	1	0	3	7	7	0	3

Greenfield	3	1	0	2	5	5	-2	3
Woking	3	0	0	2	5	7	-4	2

Cranthouse	3	0	1	3	5	5	-2	1
Barrow	3	0	1	3	3	6	-3	1

Woodsberg	3	0	1	2	5	6	-3	1
Woods Hargreaves	3	0	1	2	5	6	-3	1

Yorkshire	3	0	1	2	5	5	-2	1
Yorkshire	3	0	1	2	5	5	-2	1

Yorkshire	3	0	1	2	5	5	-2	1

York	3	0	1	2	5	5	-2	1
York	3	0	1	2	5	5	-2	1

York	3	0	1	2	5	5	-2	1

---

64

---

Sport Cricket

England could find silver lining after summer mess

TOYOTA

For all the upheaval and neurosis, it may yet be that the darkest hour came just before the dawn for this team

Ali Martin

To say England's summer of Test cricket has not gone entirely to plan would be a bit of an understatement. At times it has been like watching Gromit frantically laying track in front of a runaway locomotive.

Even now the England and Wales Cricket Board find themselves throwing down the sleepers, reacting to footage of centrally-contracted Brydon Carse in police handcuffs outside a bar in Derby on Saturday night following a match for Durham. Whatever the precise details - Carse was released without charge - it continues a madcap season.

To recap, their talismanic captain was stung by a disciplinary and then retired mid-Test to turn a series defeat into a bizarre

Viking funeral. The head coach was then sacked from the format soon after, both men having been backed to continue just weeks earlier. Little wonder a common sight at nets has been folks in official training kit puffing out their cheeks with a wide-eyed "WTF" expression.

Joe Root now wearing the captain's blazer full-time and working with a new coach who is 11,000 miles away via Zoom, is clearly not the vision of stability that Richard Gould and Rob Key sold during their Ashes review back in March. But for all the upheaval and neurosis, including a curfew that has since evaporated, it may yet be that the darkest hour came just before dawn.

Clearly there is a danger of getting ahead of ourselves by declaring an on-field resurrection. For all that England's quickfire innings victory over Pakistan in the first Test where the attack crackled and put smiles back on faces, it was a jarring mismatch. When people start asking whether a side is the worst to visit these shores in X number of years, huge pronouncements are dangerous territory.

Yet before Carse's night out, the temperature around the team

did lower a touch last week. Ben Stokes is a remarkable, compelling cricketer, who as captain lifted a team up by their bootstraps. Players loved sharing a dressing room and breathing in the residual fumes. But perhaps it is not the worst thing that the team's mood is no longer pegged to a player whose emotions lurched a fair bit.

It wasn't just the era-defining Ashes defeat, where Stokes abandoned England's attacking mantra at 2-0 down and a confused team blinked on the one surface, Adelaide, where it could have delivered. In Pakistan the previous winter England weren't just spun out on fan-dried pitches but also "treading on eggshells" as Stokes lost his cool to the point of feeling moved to apologise.

Even this year began with Stokes swearily pledging his love for Test cricket, only to whip himself into

They realised that without Stokes, the team would still struggle to shake off the Bazball tag

a state during the five-month wait for its resumption and self-destruct after one win. Root will no doubt have his moments as he looks to change the story of his own captaincy. But the peaks and troughs will be less pronounced.

The second aspect is Brendon McCullum. Gould and Key could have easily put the 2-1 defeat to New Zealand in June down to the Rex Rooms saga and the chaos it unleashed, before handing the New Zealander another chance. "The Ben Stokes show" had started to become a common phrase behind closed doors.

But they realised, slightly belatedly, that with Stokes no longer around, the team would still struggle to shake off the Bazball tag; that ultimately the shadow of its worst excesses would remain an impediment, even as the team tried to evolve into adopting a more adaptable, nuanced approach.

That Root wants to keep the better elements is no bad thing. McCullum injected positivity into an inherently cautious cricketing nation - heaven forbid someone try something different - and for a generation of well-drilled but jaded senior players, it was

transformative. But clearly there were limitations. The lack of a marquee series win said as much, likewise the key moments that were not grasped or the number of younger players who did not kick on in the environment.

The danger here was an over-correction. Stephen Fleming is yet to start as head coach, beyond

---

---

Root brings calm after the storm

Joe Root is hoping to have a more successful time in his second stint as captain SHUTTERSTOCK.

his long-distance dialogue with Root. But his reputation as a details-focused man manager, and a tactically dynamic Test captain back in the day, means the pendulum is not lurching the other way. That he has a trusting relationship with McCullum, who stays on with the white-ball team, should soften the inherent issues of split-coaches, including that age-old battle for resources.

Another area where England's Test team suddenly looks a touch healthier is in selection, which is not necessarily to claim they have cracked it. Rather, you look at the team at Headingley and, beyond Root and the remarkable Harry Brook, there is welcome competition for places. Caps will no longer be pumped into preferred players, regardless of returns, in the name of fostering a brotherhood. England continue to pick attacking players but things feel less prescriptive than before.

Jordan Cox made people sit up with a controlled but confident 73 from first-drop. In theory Cox is keeping a spot warm for an injured Jacob Bethell. But with others like Dan Lawrence and Emilio Gay also looking to nail down positions,

it might not be Cox who makes way. Jamie Smith, improving as a keeper, needs some runs, not least with Cox also being a gloveman.

Then there is the bowling which, without Stokes to balance things, is clearly limited in one regard – namely the difficulty of accommodating a frontline spinner, were they to actually have one. But in home conditions, the four-pronged pace attack is quietly exciting all the same.

The re-emergence of Ollie Robinson is the key, even if he still has to show he can string a run of Test matches together.

For all that Stokes did not commit when asked back in June if he could ever play under another Test captain, a return for next summer's Ashes is not totally out of the question given his bond with Root. As Key put it, even if simply to dodge a headline, it would be a great story. Watching Stokes fire in the whites of Durham and look so carefree doing so, it might be that he simply needed a sabbatical.

But for now the Test team has its own chance to breathe, rediscover itself under a calmer leadership style, and start getting things back on track.

Rothesay County Championship

Northants keep pace with Kent as Bess spins Yorkshire to win

Tanya Aldred Old Trafford

Northamptonshire handed Lancashire a stonking defeat at Old Trafford, a win that keeps them close to Kent at the top end of Division Two. Lancashire started the day 24 for four and were able to muster only another 105 runs against an on-song bowling attack. Extras top scored, followed by debutant Ben Walkden with 22. Poor Joe Moores was out obstructing the field after hitting the ball into the ground and catching it as it bounced up. He dropped it like a hot coal but it was too late.

Meanwhile, Matt Parkinson polished off Middlesex with two wickets in two balls, to give Kent their third win on the bounce. But a ninth-wicket partnership of 74 between Joe Cracknell and Tom Helm kept Middlesex hopes alive. Kent travel to Wantage Road on Thursday for a big battle.

Leicestershire's delight at beating Glamorgan at Grace Road was tempered when the match officials asked the ECB's grounds advisor to inspect a pitch that had been occasionally capricious. Kiran Carlson's fighting 99 took Glamorgan to within 81 of the target, but they finished 42 short. Ian Holland shouldered the attack with five for 19, while Ajaz Patel bowled 29 overs unchanged, pocketing three for 41.

Yorkshire stand-in captain Dom Bess (five for 103) was the difference in the relegation dinding at Southampton. His ever-Tiggerish bowling eventually coaxed out a patient Hampshire.

There were five wickets too for Jack Leach, who whistled up match figures of nine for 118 at Taunton. Leach made the crucial breakthroughs when Essex's Matt Critchley edged him to second slip for 94 and Charlie Allison fell for 114 as the last seven wickets were skittled for 73. Somerset's target of 102 caused few problems and the win carries them into second place.

Worcestershire chased down 279 with 4.5 overs to spare. The magic came from Dan Lategan's maiden first-class hundred and an unbeaten 107 from Jake Libby. James Bracey had earlier made 127 before Gloucestershire declared and set what seemed like a tricky target.

▲ Jack Leach took a vital five-fer as Somerset beat Essex by eight wickets

▼ Kim Le Court lifts her bike aloft after completing her Tour of Britain victory ALEX WHITTERAD/SWFK.COM/SHUTTERSTOCK

Cycling Lloyds Tour of Britain Women

Le Court holds on for glory after Wiebes' sprint finish

Jeremy Whittle

Kim Le Court sealed overall victory in the Tour of Britain Women in Royal Leamington Spa, as Lorena Wiebes took her fourth sprint win in this year's race and the 11th stage victory of her career.

Wiebes has surpassed Mark Cavendish's career mark of 10 stage wins and now has the most victories of any rider competing in either the men's or women's Tour of Britain. Le Court, who won a stage and finished ninth overall in the Tour de France Femmes earlier this month, based her success on a solo victory in Friday's uphill finish to the Great Orme, overlooking Llandudno. It was the most significant race victory of the Mauritian rider's career.

"This win is really special," she said. "This is my first general classification win and it is a first GC win for me in a team."

"People had questioned if I am a GC rider or not, and it is good to know that the mental state is still quite high and I'm glad I could achieve that for me and the team," the AG Insurance Soudal rider said.

The 30-year-old has had a chequered past in the British race, but this year proved the strongest of the overall contenders.

"I had a bad experience last year and I just wanted to redeem myself after that," she said of her 2025 Tour of Britain, when she won the first stage, only to crash out of the race on day two.

"In 2015 I came here and I was dead last, so I didn't have a good experience of the Tour of Britain in the past. I think the challenge is not to carry the form [from the Tour de France Femmes] but to carry the recovery process and make sure you are recovering mentally and physically, so you don't burn out."

If Le Court was the best overall rider, then Wiebes's four stage wins allied to second-place overall – a matter of days after she won two stages in the Tour de France Femmes – were evidence of her status as the fastest sprinter in the Women's World Tour.

"It feels pretty good because last year we expected way more from the Tour of Britain, but this year it was really successful," the Dutch rider said. "I'm happy to finish this week off with four victories, and the team worked hard for it."

Wiebes, who is quickly becoming more than simply a fast finisher, admitted that the overall classification was not her ambition but added: "When I crossed the finish line on stage three and was still third on GC, I knew we could fight for second."

Le Court, who was placed in an induced coma as a child due to malaria, is one of cycling's great survivors and has shown immense resilience to become one of the world's top riders.

She has now worn the yellow jersey in the Tour de France Femmes, won stages in both the Tour and Giro d'Italia, the coveted classic Liège-Bastogne-Liège and has now added the overall title in the Tour of Britain to her résumé. The final stage was characterised by a resilient three-rider breakaway that built a lead approaching two-and-a-half minutes until the climbs of Sun Rising Hill and Burton Dassett took their toll and the chasing field picked up speed.

Sara Martin, of Movistar, British rider Alice Towers and Eva van Agt, teammate to the 2026 Tour de France Femmes winner, Demi Vollering, at FDI United-Suez, slipped clear with 110km to race and worked well to distance the peloton.

However, in a frenzied final 20km, their advantage was steadily eroded as the peloton accelerated on the approach to the Warwickshire spa town. Even with under 5km remaining the trio still led by half a minute but they were finally reeled in with barely a kilometre to race, as Wiebes once again moved ahead of her peers to claim another success.

'This is special. My first general classification win'

Kim Le Court Tour of Britain winner

---

60

Sport^{}[] Formula One Dutch Grand Prix

Revved up Norris sweeps past Antonelli to break into title race

World champion sets sights on catching teenager after winning the final Dutch GP

Giles Richards Zandvoort

Lando Norris's victory in the Dutch Grand Prix, a display of fighting spirit worthy of a world champion, was not only an epic finale for the meeting's last entry on the Formula One calendar but, as the British driver feistily declared, also hopefully heralds what could be an equally heroic fightback in the world championship.

The task facing Norris is huge but as the season enters the run-in to the title, the McLaren driver knew he had to at very least chip away at championship leader Kimi Antonelli's advantage. For a great swathe of the Dutch GP it looked beyond him, with the Italian teenager assured out front.

Yet Norris was having none of it and with a steel and determination that he is perhaps not often enough credited with, he and McLaren threw themselves into the final third, taking a gamble on going long before their final pit stop that proved to be inspired. When Norris emerged on fresher rubber, he hared after the Mercedes, as Antonelli struggled for grip and made a bold, decisive move to take the lead with 15 laps remaining. It sealed the win with Antonelli second.

"The fight is still on, let's keep going!" he said as he took the flag for his second victory in a row. The gap to Antonelli is still a chasm, Norris now trails him by 83 points but is equally aware more than aware of quite how a season can turn.

He did not finish in the Netherlands last year but the following race marked the start of a remarkable comeback that would culminate in his first title. Max Verstappen went on to overcome a seemingly insurmountable 104-point deficit after Zandvoort, to close to within two points of Norris by the end. On this form the defending world champion might yet believe a similar feat might be on the cards.

Certainly he demonstrated no lack of mettle during a weekend when he repeatedly battled back. Disgruntled with a lack of pace in the sprint race, he hit back with pole and then the win despite having been behind Antonelli for the majority of the race. He may be

fighting to extract the maximum from the McLaren but he is giving it his all and that Mercedes early-season dominance looks to be all but equalled.

A sell-out crowd was in attendance in the dunes by the North Sea for its final hurrah and they were treated to a corking show, albeit one where there was sadly no grand farewell for the home hero, the race marked on the opening lap with a high-speed crash for Red Bull's Verstappen, who fortunately emerged unscathed after his car was left in pieces.

The Dutchman dipped a wheel on to the white line on the inside of the final corner, still damp from the rain, lost the rear and spun across the track to take a major hit into the barriers. He was ricocheted back into the inside wall, all four corners in pieces, testament once more to the safety standards of the modern cars and the four-time champion held his hands up to a misjudgment.

"I got caught out. It was still quite wet in that corner and as soon as I saw the dry patch coming, I was like: 'Now you can accelerate', but clearly that didn't work. So probably it was still a bit too early," he said.

The opening phase, of which the crash was part, was crucial, with the race in Antonelli's hands after he made two decisive moves. He passed George Russell to take second place on the off and then Norris for the lead when they resumed with a restart after a 40-minute stoppage to clear the debris of Verstappen's car.

He held the place with control, only for Norris to prove unbowed. He went long looking for a tyre advantage and came in on lap 48, seven laps later than Antonelli and was very quick on the fresh rubber, hurtling up to the Italian within a few laps.

Given a sniff of a chance, Norris barreled past Antonelli with a bold, bravura move at turn one round the outside, even as they both were within inches of Lewis Hamilton in front, with the Ferrari driver yet to stop. The crowd roared approval that there was to be no procession to the flag. Hamilton had problems of his own, finishing fourth after angry exchanges with the team over a strategy he felt cost him a shot at a podium.

For Norris and McLaren the victory represents a turnaround that must be acknowledged. For the first half of this season the car had been a handful to drive and off the pace but the team were clear they had expected to

---

---

17

Results and standings

1	Lando Norris GB	25pts
	McLaren	2hr 4mins 44.859sec
2	Kimi Antonelli R	18
	Mercedes	+11.336sec
3	George Russell GB	15
	Mercedes	+15.906
4	Lewis Hamilton GB	12
	Ferrari	+16.755
5	Charles Leclerc Mnc	10
	Ferrari	+17.258
6	Oscar Piastri Aus	8
	McLaren	+32.332
7	Liam Lawson NZ	6
	Red Bull	+1.19.915
8	Nica Hülkenberg Ger	4
	Audi	+1 lap
9	Fernando Alonso Sp	2
	Aston Martin	+1 lap
10	Pierre Gasly Fr	1
	Alpine	+1 lap
Also finished
11	Yuki Tsumida Jpn Racing Bulls	+1 lap
12	Arvid Lindblad GB Racing Bulls	+1 lap
13	Gabriel Bortolotto Br Audi	+1 lap
14	Franco Calapinto Arv Alpine	+2 laps
15	Sergio Pérez Msc Cadillac	+2 laps
16	Carlos Sainz 5v Williams	+2 laps
Not classified
RET	Max Verstappen North Red Bull	DNF
RET	Esteban Ocon Fr Haas	DNF
RET	Alex Albon The Williams	DNF
RET	Lance Stroll Can Aston Martin	DNF
RET	Oliver Bozeman GB Haas	DNF
RET	Valtteri Bottas Fin Cadillac	DNF
Championship standings
Drivers: 1 Antonelli 2 Kyris; 2 Russell 183; 3 Hamilton 183; 4 Norris 159; 5 Leclerc 155; 6 Verstappen 112; 7 Piastri 104; 8 Hadjar 66; 9 Lawson 49; 10 Gasly 44
Constructors: 1 Mercedes 425pts; 2 Ferrari 338; 3 McLaren 263; 4 Red Bull 166; 5 Racing Bulls 66; 6 Alpine 63; 7 Haas 21; 8 Audi 16; 9 Williams 11; 10 Aston Martin 3; 11 Cadillac 0

▲ Lando Norris leads the Ferrari of Lewis Hamilton and Kimi Antonelli's Mercedes CLIVE MASON/ GATTH IMAGED

▼ Max Verstappen crashed out on the first lap of the final edition of his home grand prix AND SHUTTERSTOCK

make real steps with their upgrades including a new swathe here.

They have been extraordinarily successful even as it remains yet to be quite the complete package, with a weakness through the slow corners that has frustrated Norris.

Russell said he believes McLaren are now the team to beat and Antonelli similarly opined that they have the fastest car. Points perhaps still moot but not surprising opinions given they had just been beaten, however that McLaren are back in the mix is undeniable.

There is an awfully long way to race but as first steps go Norris can feel he is on the front foot for the first time.

'Wasting time'

Hamilton says team cost him podium finish

Giles Richards Zandvoort

Lewis Hamilton has told his Ferrari team that they must up their game if he is to remain in the Formula One world championship fight after the British driver was angry with strategy calls at the Dutch Grand Prix, comparing them unfavourably with the decisive way his former team Mercedes had acted.

The race was won by McLaren's Lando Norris from Mercedes' Kimi Antonelli and George Russell. Hamilton was fourth but believed he might have had a shot of a podium had Ferrari moved Charles Leclerc aside sooner when Hamilton, on a different tyre strategy, was quicker than his teammate.

"Great way of wasting time, good job," was his unusually blunt admonishment when Ferrari finally pitted Leclerc. In contrast Russell had been given swift instruction to move over for Antonelli in the final stages of the race when the Italian was similarly on much faster rubber.

"I think what's clear is I'm looking ahead and seeing Mercedes execute like that," Hamilton said. "They've got the car, they're fighting for the championship, in the lead and they did it straight away. Here, I'm sitting back, losing seconds. It's something that we need to discuss offline."

Despite Antonelli finishing second he has extended his lead over Russell and Hamilton, who are now 59 points behind the Italian, and Hamilton was adamant that his team could not afford to drop any points.

"Today was definitely frustrating for me," he added. "I'm here to win and I really believe that this team can win. To win championships you have to pick up every point. The last few races have been difficult with penalties and today I lost several seconds behind Charles which I think ultimately would have made the difference at the end.

"My goal is to try and lead this team to the championship and we've got some work to do for sure."

Mercedes' quick intervention with team orders was questioned, not least by Russell at the time given he is also vying for the title, but the British driver accepted it had been the right call.

"We've always said as a team, when we're on different strategies, we're never going to fight, that's always just been our sort of rules," he said. "Kimi was ahead of me anyway, so he deserved to finish ahead ... So it's the right decision."

'I lost several seconds ... which made a difference'

Lewis Hamilton Ferrari

▼ Arthur Fils climbs to No 11 in the rankings after victory in Cincinnati MARK LEWIS/SZA

Tennis Cincinnati Open

Fils demolishes Tiafoe in final set to secure historic Masters win

Tumaini Carayol Lindner Family Tennis Center

Arthur Fils has always believed he was on the path to the very top of his chosen sport. Even when others considered him too young, too green or far too self-confident, he has entered the biggest tournaments in the world with the intention of winning them, ambitions he did not hesitate to express.

On a historic afternoon in Mason, Ohio, Fils took an huge step forward in pursuit of those massive goals as the 22-year-old became a Masters 1000 champion for the first time in his young career. His greatest achievement was secured with a supreme mental effort under pressure as the Frenchman dragged himself back into contention after a desperate second set, recovering to defeat Frances Tiafoe 6-3, 1-6, 6-0 and win the Cincinnati Open.

Even before a ball was struck, this was a historic moment: the first ATP Masters 1000 final played between two black players. The pair have built such a great rapport that before this match, the biggest final of their careers, they cracked jokes together as they departed the practice courts side-by-side. After taking a customary picture with the guest invited on-court to deliver the coin toss, Fils insisted on taking a picture with Tiafoe alone to mark the occasion.

However, they were far more conscious of the enormous opportunity before them. One winnable match stood between each man and their first ever Masters 1000 title. That shared tension is perhaps what made for a disjointed battle, with sharp momentum swings and minimal rhythm. In the end, it was Fils

who managed his emotions at the beginning of the final set and willed his best tennis to the surface when it mattered most.

This victory hopefully marks the end of a cruel period in Fils's career and the ascension of a special talent capable of remaining at the top for many years. He has long been one of the best young players on the tour and until last year he was steadily rising. His momentum was broken by a series of injuries, starting with a stress fracture in his back that essentially sidelined him for nine months until his February. He then endured an injury to his hip and back area that forced him to miss the French Open this year. Fils has finished only one grand slam tournament without an injury, Wimbledon this year, since the 2024 US Open.

Between those injuries, however, Fils has been comfortably one of the best players in the world and this result is merely reflective of that. Despite his injury layoffs, he now sits at No 5 in the ATP race and at a career high ranking of No 11. With Jannik Sinner absent and Carlos Alcaraz only just returning from his four month wrist injury layoff, he heads into the US Open as part of the top group of contenders competing for their first grand slam title.

As was the case for much of this

▲ Frances Tiafoe had no answer to the final-set mauling from Fils

week, Fils burst into the match serving at an incredible level from the start, with five aces in his first three service games.

With Tiafoe struggling to land his first serve, Fils broke serve in his opening return game and he followed up his supreme serving by relentlessly attacking his forehand as he rolled through the first set.

Tiafoe had been so mentally tough all week and he immediately reset after being outplayed in the first set. After being handed a break from Fils at the beginning of set two with a loose, erratic service game, Tiafoe began to find rhythm behind his first serve and it freed up his groundstrokes in turn. He spent the remainder of the set striking the ball so cleanly and rushing Fils with his early shotmaking and he eased through to level the match. Just 54 minutes into the encounter, they were in a deciding set.

While Tiafoe soared, Fils's entire game had been in freefall throughout the second set. After a brief bathroom break, Fils immediately trailed 0-30 on his serve at the beginning of set three. He responded with ample first serves and relentless aggression off both wings, recovering to seal an essential hold at the start of the decider. Having halted the momentum against him, Fils resumed his serving dominance and took control of the baseline as he dominated an erratic Tiafoe.

Fils leaves Cincinnati having provided another supreme exhibition of his talent, and more evidence in favour of the increasingly popular belief that he could be the player to challenge Sinner and Alcaraz once they are both healthy and at full strength again.

His forehand, with all its monstrous pace and spin, is the biggest groundstroke on the tour, and his excellent backhand means there is no safe place on the court against him once the ball is in play. He is serving better than he ever has and very few players move as well as him.

Most importantly, though, he has full belief in his capacity to achieve great things on the court, and he continues to move in the direction of those objectives.

---

18

Alonso out to banish the chaos of youth

Chelsea change course before tonight's trip to Fulham, with the new manager focusing on experience and potential

Jacob Steinberg

It is a necessary reset. Although it would be pushing it to say that Chelsea have switched from development centre to retirement home, even after the signings of Jordan Henderson and Danny Welbeck, there has been a clear shift in strategy this summer. Some growups are in the room at last and, for Xabi Alonso, the hope is that bringing in more experience will help a squad still packed with youngsters show more composure when adversity strikes.

Discipline was a problem for Chelsea last season: they had 11 red cards in all competitions and a lot of the wounds were self-inflicted. Chelsea were impetuous, on the receiving end of too many bookings for dissent and prone to collapsing at the first sign of trouble. No wonder Alonso, who was the epitome of calm during his playing career, has focused on maintaining 'emotional control' before opening his tenure as manager with tonight's trip to Fulham.

It will be a test of Chelsea's mentality. Craven Cottage has been the setting for some spectacular implosions during the BlueCora, the path to two 2-1 victories for Fulham over their neighbours smoothed by João Félix earning a red card on his Chelsea debut in 2023 and by Marc Cucurella getting himself sent off after 22 minutes last season.

Chelsea need to change, and hiring Alonso was a tacit

admission that their approach required fine-tuning. Internally there was a recognition that the club had undervalued the importance of aura when it came to hiring coaches.

They blundered with Graham Potter and Liam Rosenior, neither of whom were capable of standing the heat. Alonso is a different breed. The 44-year-old burnished his reputation by leading Bayer Leverkusen to the Bundesliga title in 2024 and he wowed Chelsea during his discussions over the role, so much so that they broke with the past by naming him manager rather than head coach.

Now the players can look to the dugout and see an authority figure. Alonso has not seized absolute power - he is still part of a wider structure, collaborating with an extensive recruitment team - but there is no doubt that his arrival has lent credibility to a project that was in danger of falling apart when the Rosenior experiment ended.

Of course, it remains to be seen if success in Germany means Alonso can dominate in England. Leverkusen was special but Real Madrid left him with a scar. Then again, the Bernabéu is not exactly where managers go to develop. It makes Álvaro Arbeloa, who stepped in at Madrid after Alonso's sacking last season, a similar unknown after replacing Marco Silva at Fulham.

Yet there is optimism around Chelsea. Can they mount a title challenge for the first time in a decade? There is a lot of ground

There is talent at Chelsea. There always has been. The flaw has been around mindset

Sport Football Premier League

to make up after finishing 10th last season. Weaknesses linger, particularly in goal, and a push for the top four looks likelier.

However, no European football could be a blessing, giving Alonso more time in training. He looks tactically flexible. Chelsea switched between a back four and a back three during pre-season. Cucurella has joined Madrid but Marco Palestra, signed from Atalanta for £43m, and Pep Chavarria, a £16.3m arrival from Rayo Vallecano, could play as wingbacks.

The recruitment looks purposeful. After years of buying promising youngsters Chelsea have targeted ready-made players. Maxence Lacroix, the 26-year-old France centre-back, is a sensible signing from Crystal Palace. Morgan Rogers, signed from Aston Villa for £117m, can play in a range of positions in attacking midfield and could form an exciting partnership with a rested Cole Palmer, who has a point to prove after missing out on England's World Cup squad.

There is talent here. There always has been, though. The flaw has more been around mindset. It is a footballing norm to have wise heads around to protect young players. Chelsea went too far in the opposite direction and it is one of the first areas Alonso has addressed.

Perhaps he has heard the tale of one of his predecessors having to deal with a player prioritising a haircut over a team meeting. Either way it did not feel on brand when Chelsea made an unsuccessful attempt to sign the 33-year-old Granit Xhaka from Sunderland in June. Yet it underlined their desire for more leadership and the box was ticked when Welbeck, 35, joined from Brighton in a cut-price deal and Henderson, 36, was brought in on a free transfer from Brentford.

They could be canny moves. Perhaps there is an element of overkill, a sense of Chelsea taking their new direction too far, but Welbeck and Henderson still have something to offer. Welbeck scored 13 league goals for Brighton last season and will provide cover for João Pedro up front, while Henderson did not look out of place for Brentford and, according to Jude Bellingham, is someone coaching staff will always go to when there are problems to resolve.

Alonso needs order. There are still rumblings of instability off the pitch, with Todd Boehr and Mark Walter looking to sell their stakes in the club to the majority shareholder, Clearlake Capital. Quiet is rare. Chelsea need to shift a host of players before the transfer window shuts and questions hover over Enzo Fernández, who favours a reunion with Enzo Maresca at Manchester City.

There has been a lot of noise around Fernández. The midfielder has made no secret of his desire to leave but speaking out so much when Chelsea were wounded underlined the decline in standards. Alonso needs leaders. He needs trust. He still has to prove the hype is justified but his attempts to change Chelsea's mentality is an encouraging first step.

Hull punish United's defence, but attack is the big concern

Michael Carrick's side again struggled against a back five as the promoted hosts exploited set-piece weakness

Andrew Beasley

Hull scored nine league goals from set plays last season, the joint-fewest in the Championship. Yet two in 21 minutes earned them a victory over Manchester United on Saturday.

It was a disastrous start to the campaign for the visitors. While Michael Carrick said before the game it would not be easy, he would not have expected victory being so straightforward for Hull. It was a match United simply had to win given the gulf in resources and expectation. Opta rated their chance of victory at 68.9% before kick-off.

United's inability to deal with Oli McBurnie as the target man was painful to watch. Their slack defending on the set pieces from which Hull scored will also draw focus. Their attacking should be the greatest concern, though.

A glance at expected goal numbers can paint a false impression. Hull generated 1.01 expected goals to United's 1.83, so did the visitors deserve to win? The issue is the breakdown of chances that contributed to the total. United had 21 shots, 16 of which were worth less than 0.1 expected goals.

This was a theme last season, albeit less obvious when they performed well under Carrick. United's open-play shots were worth an average of 0.104 expected goals in 2025-26, the third worst rate among teams that finished in the top half of the Premier League. Against Hull, this figure was just 0.087.

Manchester United struggled to create valuable chances against Hull

Expected goal value of shots in Hull City 2-0 Manchester United

● Goals ● Other shots

Appl Hull 17'	6.33
Mbeumo Utd 78'	6.33
Dorgo Utd 29'	6.33
Mendy Hull 38'	6.33
Mazzoudi Utd 67'	6.33
McBurnie Hull 17'	6.33
Curha Utd 79'	6.33
Heaven Utd 50'	6.33
Dorgo Utd 44'	6.00

Source: Opta

Not until the 78th minute did a notable opportunity fall to a player they would hope to have one, as Bryan Mbeumo received a through ball from Matheus Cunha. Before that, their highest-value chances fell to Patrick Dorgu and Noussir Mazraoui. The former has experience as a winger, and started in the attacking midfield trio in United's 4-2-3-1 formation, but the duo have just 16 top-flight goals between them. They are not reliable chance converters.

Marcus Rashford is far stronger. He should take Dorgu's berth in the long term, assuming he remains with the club. His natural attacking instincts may have aided in the creation of better chances in the first half. Regardless, it was alarming how hard United found it to fashion valuable opportunities against a club that conceded the second-most expected goals in the 2025-26 Championship.

Hull's manager, Sergej Jakirovic, used a back five. He deployed three centre-backs on 10 occasions last season, notably in victories in the playoff semi-final second leg against Millwall and the final against Middlesbrough.

It worked against United, with the extra bodies at the back able to crowd out attackers. Opta's shot map showed Hull conceded eight efforts in the 'danger zone' - the centre of the penalty area that covers the width of the six-yard box out to the 18-yard line. Five of the eight were headers, which are harder to convert, leaving little else of note. Space in the most valuable real estate came at a premium at the MKM Stadium and United were unable to penetrate it.

This structure has caused United problems before. They have now won only one of their last six league matches against teams that started with a back three or five. Leeds won 2-1 at Old Trafford in April with a 3-4-3 formation and used the same system to draw 1-1 two weeks ago in a pre-season friendly. Milan employed the same framework when beating United 4-2 in their final warm-up game.

'We got beat, we're hurt and it's not a nice feeling. It doesn't mean it's going to change the whole direction of how we're going as a team or as a football club,' Carrick said. As sensible a long-term approach as that may be, United's attack needs work.

Manchester United were eighth worst for chance quality in the 2025-26 Premier League

Worst 10 teams for expected goals per open play shot

Wolves*	6.333
Burnley*	3.087
Fulham	3.000
Spurs	3.000
Sunderland	2.000
N'ham Forest	2.000
Aston Villa	2.000
Man Utd	2.000
Liverpool	2.000
West Ham*	2.000

Source: Opta *relegated

---

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60

Sport Football Premier League

▼ Marc Guéhi powers home Manchester City's equaliser MICHAEL STEELE/GETTY IMAGES

Guéhi and Gvardiol

late show secures Maresca's first win

Manchester City

Guéhi 84, Gvardiol 90+1

Bournemouth

Tavernier 26

Jamie Jackson

Etihad Stadium

"WELCOME BACK ENZO" read the tifo beforehand and by the breath- less close this was a joyous return for Manchester City's new manager, Enzo Maresca, as a damaging defeat became a memorable win due to Marc Guéhi's 84th-minute equaliser and Josko Gvardiol's added-time winner.

Until then, Marco Rose had been closing in on leading Bournemouth to a first away victory at City. But two lapses in defence and suddenly City were the ruthless proposition they were not before.

First, Rayan Cherki floated in a cor- ner from the right and up rose Guéhi to head past Djordje Petrovic, the Cherries No 1 left stranded by a defec- tion off Adrien Truffert. Maresca, former assistant to Pep Guardiola, sighed hard, then bounced around when the winner was converted.

Cherki, a second-half substitute, tapped to Gvardiol and he scored - the video assistant referee ruling this legal after an initial offside flag.

Zoom out, though, and this remains a disjointed first Premier

League outing for Maresca's side. When Jack Grealish entered on 82 minutes it was for Phil Foden who was as impotent as Erling Haaland, and City, overall.

Maresca, dapper in a baggy suit reminiscent of a 1980s Hollywood movie, offered a tactical surprise by deploying Guéhi as a holding mid- fielder, alongside Elliot Anderson, on the £16m signing's debut.

Of interest, too, was Nico O'Reilly, City's player of the year at left-back, preferred at No 10 to Foden, who lined up on the right. On this show- ing, this Maresca blueprint requires work, though he hinted it may only be a stopgap as players become fitter.

Rose's team arrived unbeaten in 18 league games, a fine record achieved under Andoni Iraola, now at Liver- pool, and when Rayan ran in and let fly their potency was clear. Gianluigi Donnarumma saved the effort, an act the keeper's opposite number did not have to do when O'Reilly whipped the ball in from the left. Haaland, long locks newly shorn to a crew cut, caught between a header and shot, managed only an innocuous chest of the ball, so failed to record goal No 163 on his 200th City appearance.

With Rodri departed for Barcelona, Anderson in City's new No 6 - charged with controlling the game, serving up incisive passes and mopping up, as he did expertly in his area to snuff one Cherries move out.

Bouaddi set for City move

Manchester City have agreed a deal with Lille worth £95m (£81.4m) plus £5m in potential add-ons for Ayyoub Bouaddi, with the Morocco midfielder's arrival to take the club's summer spend to nearly £200m after Elliot Anderson's £16m signing earlier in the window. The 18-year-old was stood down from Lille's Ligue 1 match against Angers yesterday before a medical with City. The majority of the fee for Bouaddi will come from Rodri's £65m move to Barcelona. City remain interested in Enzo Fernández, but Chelsea want £120m for the Argentinian while City are thought to value him at a lower figure. Jamie Jackson

Yet Anderson and his teammates were nowhere when torn apart by the sequence that closed with Marcus Tavernier's opener. From the visitors' right-back corridor the ball was flipped upfield. Rüben Dias and Abdudicor Khusanov had a mix-up. Rayan, profiting, turned the ball to Evanilson whose ball from the right caught Rico Lewis out of position and Tavernier poked home.

This was excellent for Rose and his men, a head-shaker for Maresca, who went straight to his monitor to dissect it. The answer was naivety - and after last weekend's 3-0 Community Shield drubbing by Arsenal this was a fourth unanswered strike in Maresca's two most important games - so far.

Maresca's City could be described as Guardiola-esque. Quick balls to Haal- and, and Foden - he found one that released the No 9 - and the wingers, particularly Antoine Semenyo, to drive in, prime components of the plan. Semenyo appealed for a penalty

when Adam Smith grappled him - but the referee Jarred Gillett was uninterested, ditto when Anderson, twice, upended a visiting player: the first, on Alex Scott, appeared worthy of a yellow card.

By the break Rose's side were far happier - and dominant. Tavernier spurned two chances to increase their lead and when Evanilson was booked towards the end of the half for rough play this showed their ascendancy: Bournemouth were in City's face.

Maresca made zero changes for the second half - of personnel or mode. So Guéhi, not for the first time, proved clunky in an attacking region. Exhibit A: a miss from inches away from an Anderson corner.

Maresca's first change was on 57 minutes - Matheus Nunes for Lewis, who had forced a sharp early save from Petrovic. Then on 63 minutes came Anderson's enforced removal with what appeared a knee problem, hardly great news for City though he ambled off unaided.

This brought Mateo Kovacic on, with Cherki taking over from O'Reilly. The latter switch suggested the experiment of him as playmaker was a misfire. Immediately, Cherki fed Semenyo, who caused Petrovic's opening save of the half, and the Frenchman's quick feet also allowed Haaland to shoot but to no avail.

Next, the striker's snapshot was gathered by Petrovic and Maresca's spin on the sideline was one of frus- tration. But, then, came the end.

Manchester City 4-2-3-1 Donnarumma, Lewis (Burns 57), Khusanov, Dias, Gvardiol, Anderson (Kovacic 82), Guéhi, Federici (Goradish 82), O'Reilly (Cherki 63), Semenyo, Haaland Subcost used Ralf, Maresca, Goradish, Al-Nouri, Rico

Bournemouth 4-2-3-1 Petrovic, Smith, Hill, (Alvar), Truffert, Cook (Adams 75), Scott, Tavernier, Barnett (Teldi 75), Rayan (Gannon-Busk 85), Evanilson (Jackson 75) Subcost used Dennis, Brooks, Duntie, Sánchez, Rodríguez

Referee: Jarred Gillett Attendance 60,645

City off mark

'Unfortunately this is a work in progress'

Jamie Jackson Etihad Stadium

Enzo Maresca said Manchester City remain a "work in progress" after yes- terday's last-gasp win over Bourne- mouth at the Etihad Stadium. Marc Guéhi's 85th-minute equaliser and Josko Gvardiol's 91st-minute winner gave City's new manager victory in his first game, after Marcus Taver- nier's first-half strike for the visitors.

Maresca thought his side per- formed similarly to last Sunday's 3-0 Community Shield loss to Arsenal. "I feel in the same position as after Arsenal," the Italian said. "It's nor- mal you judge after results but I don't see big changes. Unfortunately, this is a work in progress and I'm looking for solutions. For sure when you win games it helps."

"If you think of the Premier League - it won't happen that you will concede nothing. The goal we conceded was their first shot. They had two or three dangerous moments but it's how you react. We've still got [Erling] Haaland, Elliot [Anderson], Marc [Guéhi], Nico O'Reilly [who all started], who are in pre-season still. It's a huge difference in terms of physicality and we are going to get better and better."

Before the game City unfurled a huge tifo bearing his image that said: "Welcome back Enzo." He said: "It is the perfect day. I was very pleased to see the banner when the game started. We gave them [fans] the joy at the end. It was quite emotional. The spirit was fantastic. It's a game we deserved to win [but] you don't need to wait for the last five minutes. We missed chances, then they scored and it became more complicated."

Maresca fielded Guéhi in an unfa- miliar midfield role. "I know Marc from [Crystal] Palace and I always thought he could play as a midfielder because he is very good," the man- ager said. "So we tried it for a few days and I think he was quite good. He gives us a solution for the future."

In his first game managing Bourne- mouth, Marco Rose came close to leading them to a first away win against City. "We're competitors, we came here to win for the first time," said the German. "We were in a good way to do so. But we did many good things. We have a lot of things to improve. At the end, how the game went was quite unlucky to lose that way. We had two situations - one corner kick and one attacking [move] - when we defended too passively."

▲ Enzo Maresca said he was 'looking for solutions' after his first victory

---

●●●

21

Hinshelwood makes hay as sad Villa suffer coastal implosion

Brighton

Lindelöf Bay, De Cuyper 18, Hinshelwood 30 11

Aston Villa

David Hytner

Amex Stadium

It is important to say that Aston Villa were not the only team here to have lost key players over the summer; to play under the threat of further departures; to be without others because of injury. It has been a testing time for the Brighton manager, Fabian Hürzeler, who has said goodbye to Danny Welbeck, Jan Paul van Hecke and James Milner, among others.

Hürzeler was without Carlos Baleba and Yankuba Minteh, officially because of injuries although their proposed moves to Manchester United and Liverpool, respectively, were surely a part of things. Kaoru Mitoma was out with a more cut-and-dried fitness matter.

Villa's problems have been similar, if a little better documented. The sales of Eri Konsa, Morgan Rogers, Lucas Digne and Youri Telenans. The continuing uncertainty over Ollie Watkins, who is the subject of interest from Al-Hilal and seemingly ready to leave. He was not a part of the match-day squad and with Brian Madjo and Tammy Abraham injured, Unai Emery had no available centre-forward; he pressed Emiliano Buendia into emergency service in the position. Emiliano Martinez is also set to leave. The marquee signing, Johan Manzambi, is still not fit.

Only one club dealt with their problems. It was a red-letter day for Brighton, who began the season with a statement of intent; plenty of hard running and some ruthless finishing, too. Jack Hinshelwood led the way during a first-half onslaught, scoring twice while Maxim De Cuyper got one and put another in off the defender Victor Lindelöf.

Ceferin brands Infantino plan as 'worse than Super League'

Nick Ames

The Uefa president, Aleksander Ceferin, has described Gianni Infantino's doomed attempt to sell stakes in the World Cup as 'even worse than the Super League plan' and warned his embattled Fifa counterpart that he will face an opponent if he runs for re-election next March.

Ceferin has led Uefa's firm collective stance against the Football

It was a humbling for Villa. Their supporters wanted to remind everybody at kick-off time of how they had won the Europa League in May. They were left stunned by what followed - the four concessions before the interval and the knowledge that the damage could have been much worse. Their one piece of luck was that Brighton did not turn the screw in the second half. Hürzeler's men had done enough.

The symbol of Villa's wretchedness was the new signing Joko Gomes, who was passed fit after an injury concern but proceeded to get himself sent off for violent conduct in the 40th minute at 4-0. The debutant aimed a high boot at the Brighton striker Georginio Rutter. Gomes might have been dismissed before that. He was

▼ Jack Hinshelwood slots home Brighton's fourth from close range ANDREW COULDRIDGE/ACTION IMAGES/REUTERS

horribly off the pace. Then again, he was not alone in Villa colours.

When it was all over, the Brighton celebrations exploded around the Amex Stadium, Emery beat a hasty retreat. There was no handshake for Hürzeler, only worry lines across his brow. There is so much for him to ponder.

Brighton's start was the stuff of dreams, De Cuyper forcing the own goal out of Lindelöf, Villa's defence in disarray, and it is fair to say that it set a tone. Brighton went from strength to strength; Villa subsided. The jitteriness was everywhere. They fought a losing battle to control their discipline.

Hürzeler named three centre-halves in his lineup but there was no surprise switch to a back five. Rather he started with Olivier Boscagli at left-back, which allowed De Cuyper to play further up the left flank. It was one of the many decisions that

paid off handsomely for Hürzeler. Brighton got away with a bit of defensive looseness in the fifth minute, Yasin Ayari robbed by Ross Barkley and Buendia trickling a low shot past the far post. He was well placed with only Bart Verbruggen to beat. When Villa made their first error, they were not so fortunate. It was the prompt for them to fall apart.

It was just a dreadful attempted back-pass by Pau Torres for the goalkeeper Marco Bizot. The centre-half could not have seen De Cuyper, who turned smartly to throw off Bizot and open up the shot at the empty net. When the ball came back off the post, it hit the covering Lindelöf and went in.

Forward Enterprise (FFE) scheme, which was shelved amid widespread opposition. Uefa are pushing for Infantino to quit, also drawing on support from Concacaf and the Asian Football Confederation, and are yet to drop a threat to boycott Fifa competitions while talks are under way with Concacaf to set up a combined Nations League tournament.

In an interview with the podcast The Rest is Politics: Leading, Ceferin denounced Infantino's project as more damaging than the breakaway Super League that was shelved in 2021 after large-scale protests. 'I think this plan is even worse than the Super League plan,' he said. 'In the first case, super-important clubs wanted to do their own league, which is wrong and would destroy football. But in this case, football would be literally sold.'

'I'm absolutely sure that the [FFE] plan is dead. For me, the most

important thing is that we stopped another try to sell the sport. It's hard to imagine what kind of people would sell the sport that belongs to everyone.'

Ceferin, who revealed Infantino had not been in contact since the FFE scandal broke, believes the Fifa president's path to survival is narrowing.

'I didn't speak with him, he didn't contact me since this happened,' he said. 'But there are two options. One option is that he realises that he

▲ Aleksander Ceferin is keeping the pressure on Gianni Infantino

doesn't have the support. And the second option [is] that he goes to the elections in March, but in that case, I think he will have a candidate against him. I don't know yet who.' The Concacaf president, Victor Montagliani, has been tipped as a potential opponent for Infantino if he chooses to run in Rabat.

Ceferin has proponents of his own but ruled out making his own bid for the Fifa presidency. 'My credibility is much, much, much higher if I'm not interested in the position,' he said.

Asked whether Infantino had become too close to Donald Trump, with whom he forged a close relationship before the recent World Cup, Ceferin said: 'To be honest, I think you are naive if you think that a politician like that, or any politician, is your good friend. The moment you are a problem, you stop being a friend of a politician.'

That friendship came under the

Brighton wanted it more. They dominated the duels, winning tackle after tackle. The most obvious example during a first half that pounded like a migraine for Villa came on the goal for 4-0, Ayari robbing Gomes on the edge of the Villa area to tee up Hinshelwood for a straightforward finish. Gomes beat the ground in fury. He wanted a foul. It was not there. His afternoon was about to go from very bad to impossibly terrible.

Gomes was booked on nine minutes for demanding a yellow card for Pascal Gross, who had fouled him. He was spared a second caution for a foul on Ayari in the 14th minute, which led to a flare-up between the benches. His dismissal - after a video assistant referee review - was a straight red for kicking up and out at Rutter after the Brighton striker had dispossessed him. Rutter was a rampaging presence. All around him Villa shrank.

De Cuyper scored for 2-0 after Rutter had sprinted around Torres to cross low - Boscagli sparked the move with a precision long ball - while Brighton's third showcased their slickness. Luka Vaskovic pinged a lovely diagonal out to De Cuyper, who crossed deep where Diego Gómez headed square for Hinshelwood to nod home. Brighton could have had more by the interval. De Cuyper twice went close. Rutter and Gómez worked Bizot. Emery looked to have had the air sucked out of him.

Hürzeler watched his new signing Costinha hit the post with his first touch in a Brighton shirt after coming off the bench; another replacement, Charalampos Kostoulas, put the rebound into the net only to be flagged offside. Ibrahim Osman, who also came on as a substitute, might have had a penalty after a John McGinn body check and it was notable that Emery did not make any changes until the 74th minute. A message to the Villa board? He could not get out of the Amex fast enough.

Brighton 4-2-2-1 Verbruggen, Moffler (Yokoski 78), Vaskovic, Bute, Boscagli, Grossin, Ayari (Costinha 64), Gómez (Valcay 66), Hinshelwood (Kostoulas 64), De Cuyper (Osman 78), Rutter (John 64) and Stone, Struijs, David, Svoboda

Aston Villa 4-2-2-1 Bizot, Czehin, Lindelöf, Torres (Mingo 74), Mastron (Roggan 62), Kossens, Gomes, McGinn (Alkman 62), Barkley (Bogorla 74), Ferenberg, Sturach (Garoucha 66), John 64 and Suzuki, Rowe, Burrows, Lynch

Referee: Peter Bankes

spotlight when Trump said he had called Infantino to ask for a review of the red card given to the US striker Folarin Balogun, whose ban for the last-16 tie against Belgium was suspended. 'That was more than shocking,' Ceferin said. 'We have rules and if you don't respect your own rules, then the game doesn't make any sense. That's shocking and, trust me, almost everybody was shocked. Just not everybody dared to speak.'

Meanwhile, in a fresh show of European opposition to Infantino, the six Nordic football associations issued a statement saying they had 'lost confidence in the Fifa president and have serious concerns about the governance and high-level decision making of the organisation'. They asked for binding assurances that Fifa will never again 'open its governance or competitions to private ownership' and called for a full third-party review into the FFE scheme.

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12

Sport Football Premier League

Szoboszlai salvages late leveller to make Newcastle pay penalty

Newcastle 2 Elanga 5, 8006x3.57

Liverpool 2 Gakpo 55, Szoboszlai 90+5yen

Possession 100%	Losses 60%
Shots on target 4	4
Total attempts 13	26

Louise Taylor St James' Park

Before kick-off a banner was raised in the Gallowgate End inscribed with a quotation from the late Kevin Keegan. "I want people to dream about their football," it read. "We should all be dreamers at heart."

Out on the pitch it swiftly became apparent that both Matthias Jaissle, Keegan's latest successor in the Newcastle dug-out, and Liverpool's new manager Andoni Iraola are on individual missions to create forms of organised chaos capable of subjecting the best opponents to torrid nightmares.

Despite a few, ultimately forlorn, attempts to introduce semblances of control on the parts of the visiting playmaker Florian Wirtz and Newcastle's elegant central midfielder Lewis Miley, this was sheer, unadulterated, mutual mayhem of the sort to make Iraola's more purist Anfield predecessor Arne Slot wince.

Along the way to a draw secured by Dominik Szoboszlai's 99th-minute penalty for Liverpool, the returning former Newcastle striker Alexander Isak left minimal imprint on a match that had been supposed to be all about him. Instead Isak was upstaged by Jaissle's forward William Osula.

No sooner had the heartfelt tributes to Keegan, a player and manager adored by both clubs, been completed it very quickly became apparent that Jérémy Jacquet and Virgil van Dijk had no answers to Osula as the young Dane turned and accelerated towards goal following Ryan Gravenberch's inexplicable surrender of possession.

The stage was set for this most unpredictable of strikers to spot Anthony Elanga, then in the process of leaving Milos Kerkez for dust down the right, slide a pass in the winger's direction and watch as, a steadying touch later, Elanga's shot flashed beyond Alisson's reach.

Only five minutes had passed, Jaissle's tenure as Newcastle's manager was off to perfect start and Iraola looked distinctly stressed.

His defence did not convince, with Kerkez finding few answers to Elanga. Like Jaissle, Iraola is a high priest of pressing but Liverpool's best hope here seemed to be to retain posses-

▲ Anthony Elanga's early goal gave Newcastle a perfect start

sion, impose their technical superiority and out-pass Newcastle.

Significantly their best moments coincided largely with those albeit sporadic occasions when Wirtz - who would be withdrawn midway through the second half - managed to get on the ball and began unnerving a Newcastle side supposedly in the throes of a dramatic transition.

It is only three weeks since Jaissle succeeded Eddie Howe but the former Al-Ahli manager has certainly succeeded in not merely re-ener-

gising a mentally jaded team but sharpening a swarm pressing game that had become a little half hearted and untidy. "The manager is top," said Elanga. "Playing for him is fun."

Given that Jaissle has inherited a team shorn of last season's luminaries - Anthony Gordon, Sandro Tonali and Bruno Guimarães - this achievement was all the more impressive. The 38-year-old German trusted 18-year-old Sean Steur, recently arrived from Ajax, alongside Miley in the key holding roles in his 4-2-3-1 system and for long periods they held their own.

Behind them, Malick Thiaw and Sven Botman excelled in central defence while Amar Dedic shone at right-back following his £30m move from Benfica.

There are ways to leave a football club but the route Isak chose - mounting a one-man strike before forcing a record £125m move to Liverpool last summer - ensured he was greeted by chants of "rat, rat, rat," as he alighted from the visiting team bus.

If Isak seemed quite unconcerned the Sweden striker added to Iraola's problems by miscuing his sole chance of an alarmingly anonymous afternoon. Instead it was a forward facing an uncertain future at Anfield who kept Liverpool in it. When Jaissle's midfield inexplicably stood off him Cody Gakpo's first time shot from outside the area defied Lukas Hornicek.

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With Osula now limping, on came Joe Willock leaving the impressive Yoane Wissa to shift from the No 10 to No 9 ride. Willock is reportedly close to joining Besiktas but delighted in immediately offering a reminder of his enduring worth on Tyneside.

When Wissa dodged three supposed markers his ensuing pass to Willock was superbly calibrated and the latter returned the compliment by curling a shot past Alisson and in off a post. Tellingly, Willock was mobbed by every teammate.

Low on creativity, Liverpool seemed beaten until deep in injury time the substitute Victor Muñoz was felled when the otherwise convincing Newcastle left-back Lewis Hall rather unluckily caught his knee in the penalty area.

All that remained was for Szoboszlai to lash his ensuing penalty high into the roof of the net and level a game as swashbuckling as anything even Keegan might have conjured.

Newcastle 4-2-2-1 Hornstock (Indo., Thow, Berman, Hall, Miley, Bhatta 76), Stear (Harrow 56), Elanga (Murphy 76), Misanti (Schir 90), Barnes, Shale (Willock 56), Sule not used (Jones, Town), Moltenade, Shahar

Liverpool 4-2-2-1 Alisson, Finspanish, Jacquel (Anaya 70), Van Slyke, Kermuth, Szekszala, Greenbush (Harrow 70), Ngumoha (Mukaz 63), Wirtz (Woo Albister 63), Gakpo, Isak, Sule not used, Mantaribowli, Tomkus, Ende, Nyoni, McConnell

Referee Stuart Attwell Attendance 52,630

▲ Joe Willock breaches the Liverpool defence and curls Newcastle into the lead LEE UNIT/NACT/UN IMAGES/REUTERS

Analysis

Sam Dalling St James' Park

Sliding doors moments add dramatic twist to storyline of remembrance

It's 4.35pm on Tyneside. William Osula sets Anthony Elanga away, slightly right of centre and just short of 50,000 draw collective breaths. Pace is no issue; Elanga has no shortage of that, and Milos Kerkez won't catch him.

But Newcastle fans have seen this clip before and remember the ending. Muscles tighten, cheeks clench, as they brace themselves for it to start again like it carried on before. (Yet) another memeable-moment inbound.

A tiny part of each of them, though, thinks: "Wait, hang on, this is a new season, a fresh start."

Elanga takes a touch, a tad heavier ideal but it pushes the ball away from Alisson. A moment of composure follows and Newcastle lead. An entirely goalless league season passed after Elanga's £55m transfer from Nottingham Forest and now, within five minutes of a new one, his drought is broken.

Elanga missed a much easier opportunity against Aston Villa on the 2025-26 opening day, and his confidence never recovered. Can you walk back through a sliding door?

Nearly two hours later, there remain just a few precious seconds for Liverpool to salvage something. Victor Muñoz is brought down clumsily by Lewis Hall. Dominik Szoboszlai converts the resulting penalty. 2-2.

Muñoz apparently gave Newcastle positive noises about joining them during summer. Then, in a flexing of financial muscle, Liverpool met the Osasuna forward's release clause and to Anfield he went. What was that about sliding doors?

Those two goals bookended an afternoon that was, if you want to do go down that road, a fitting tribute to the recently departed Kevin Keegan. Entertaining but flawed.

As a term, legend is so chronically overused now that it is meaningless. But Keegan is a prime example of the word's proper application. Shortly before kick-off everyone present paid an emotional tribute to him. Legend, Hero, King. All subjective labels essentially turned objective.

With Liverpool, Keegan's seven trophies in six years - including three titles and the European Cup - set the club up to

be the behemoth they now are. Across three spells at Newcastle, he jabbed syringes of hope into a flailing, helpless shell.

St James' Park is not quite the house that Keegan built, but it is no stretch to say it is the house built because of him. Without his steering Newcastle to Second Division safety in 1992 as manager, the club in its current guise might not exist.

So, why does Keegan remain so adored? He is in effect a symbol of what football once was and should still be, can be even. Maybe.

Forget spreadsheets, financial acronyms and PR-doused messaging. Ignore expected this and that, low blocks and cancelling each other out. Find the joy. Forget perfect; take a risk. Failure and fallibility? Both absolutely OK.

Those are sentiments Andoni Iraola and Matthias Jaisle would do well to remember as they look to settle themselves into new gigs.

The former, with Liverpool being champions two seasons ago, will be under the greater pressure. A repeat of his start at Bournemouth, where he won only at the 10th time of asking, would be difficult to tolerate.

There were promising signs for Iraola, sure. Jeremy Jacquet grew into his debut. Cody Gakpo had only just whipped a strike narrowly off target before his fine

There will continue to be imperfections, and things Guimarães would have done

equaliser just after half-time. Rio Ngumoha was quiet but that he has impressed sufficiently to start the season opener is itself a plus.

But there were familiar failings, too. The full-backs looked shaky and Iraola needs much, much more from both the sums and the whole of the £24m Florian Wirtz and Alexander Isak combo.

Isak is about as popular in Newcastle as government-mandated balaclava wearing in a heatwave would be, but the stick-cum-abuse he received didn't seem to bother him. However, what should keep Isak up at night is how he can and must refund the level that rightly saw him tagged one of the leaguers best forwards not so long ago. A skied left-footed effort was the closest he came to silencing the heckles.

Jaisle is likely to get more slack. Everyone is aware of what Newcastle have, where they are and, most pertinent, what they have lost. Something fresh was absolutely needed but that requires time and patience. There are, and will continue to be, warts, imperfections, things that Bruno Guimarães might have done.

A midfield pair sold for north of £180m were replaced by a double pivot with a combined aged of 38 and less than 50 league starts. Lewis Miley and Sean Strur looked the part but made mistakes. That they did so seeking the positive option will only endear them to fans. As will more similar performances from Yoane Wissa. A player who last season looked sluggish and largely static, was suddenly full of everything in the No 10 role.

A decent start. Room for improvement. Apply that to both sides.

'A better taste'

Iraola happy with hard work to equalise

Louise Taylor

Andoni Iraola said he "wouldn't have signed up for this result" after his Liverpool side left it late to secure a 2-2 draw at Newcastle yesterday thanks to Dominik Szoboszlai's contentious 99th-minute penalty.

"Scoring at the end probably gives you a better taste and I'm obviously happy we've recovered one point, but we had done more than enough to score that goal," said Liverpool's head coach. "If it had been earlier, probably the run of the game was for us. But I value that we never gave up."

Liverpool fans were disappointed to see the former Newcastle forward, Alexander Isak, underwhelm on his first return to St James' Park following his acrimonious record £125m transfer from Tyneside to Merseyside last summer.

Isak seemed undeterred by a hostile atmosphere but still struggled to impact the game. "I think Alex expected a bit the atmosphere," said Iraola. "It wasn't a big surprise for him. He has tried everything and given us good positions on the ball. I value that he has continued pushing and fighting. It's a good step for Alex."

Matthias Jaisle, Newcastle's new head coach, was left with "mixed feelings" after an encouraging performance from his young team. "It was indeed a game of mixed feelings," he said. "For me, it was no penalty. It was a really soft one. If you give that, we will see many, many penalties. I don't think that Lewis Hall [who caught substitute Victor Muñoz on a knee] can do anything, he cannot just disappear on the field."

"When you lose two points like that, it's really hard to digest but there is also a lot of confidence and we are really proud of what we saw. The young lads are doing an amazing job with all the challenges of a transition period. This was special, they are already delivering on a high level. It makes us proud. You can see the lads are a unit and really committed to what we're doing. It's a really good base to build on."

Jaisle had high praise for Yoane Wissa, describing his performance in the No 10 role as amazing and also suggested he might resist interest in Joe Willock, the scorer of Newcastle's second goal. "With these performances I definitely want to keep Joe," he said. "It was the Joe we wish to see."

▲ Andoni Iraola said his side deserved to score an equaliser

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City on limits Gvardiol caps late comeback to give Maresca opening win

Page 40 →

Doubling up Norris leaves Antonelli in wake again after Dutch thriller

Page 36 →

The Guardian Monday 24 August 2026

Sport

SCOTT HEPPEL/MINTERS

Carse put in handcuffs by police outside nightclub

Tanya Aldred

Brydon Carse has become the latest England cricketer involved in a late-night incident after footage emerged of the fast bowler in police handcuffs outside a bar in Derby.

The England and Wales Cricket Board has confirmed it is investigating the incident, which occurred after Durham, the Division Two leaders, completed a three-day thrashing of Derbyshire in the County Championship on Saturday. Matthew Potts and Ben Stokes can also briefly be seen in the footage.

"We are aware of an incident, which is reported to have taken place in Derby last night, and are currently investigating," read the ECB statement. "We will provide a further update when possible."

According to reports, Carse was released without charge.

The incident comes after a spate of bad publicity off the field for England and just five days after Joe Root, the returning England captain, spoke of his desire for his players to be "really good role models, good human beings".

England's winter tour of Australia was rocked by various off-field incidents, including the infamous boozy week in Noosa during a mid-Ashes break and the hushed-up account of Harry Brook being punched by a nightclub bouncer in Wellington last November, the night before leading England out in a one-day international against New Zealand. Then this summer, Stokes and Gus Atkinson were suspended for the second Test against New Zealand after breaking the team's newly imposed midnight curfew following the first Test win - an incident that was the catalyst for Stokes's shock retirement from international cricket.

Carse is in the squad for the second Test at Lord's.

England's silver lining Page 34 →

▲ Brydon Carse was released without charge after the incident

Did Watkins refuse to play?

Angry Emery ducks questions over striker after Brighton rout

David Hytner Amex Stadium

Unai Emery did nothing to deny that Ollie Watkins had refused to play for Aston Villa in their sobering 4-0 defeat by Brighton at the Amex yesterday. The head coach had a selection crisis up front with Brian Madjo and Tammy Abraham injured. However, he did not include Watkins in the matchday squad as the England striker considers a move to Al-Hilal in Saudi Arabia.

Emery was forced to rely on the attacking midfielder Emiliano Buendia as an emergency striker and his team disappeared without trace on the south coast. They were 4-0 down after 31 minutes and had their new signing João Gomes sent off on his debut in the 40th minute.

Al-Hilal have made a number of bids for Watkins, all of which have been rejected. It is understood the 30-year-old is open to the move and Emery talked on Friday like a manager who was realistic about the sale happening. Villa would plainly like

to replace Watkins should he depart as they approach the end of another difficult summer window. They have already sold Ezri Konsa, Morgan Rogers, Lucas Digne and Youri Tielemans, while they are expected to move on Emiliano Martinez.

Emery was asked why he had not picked Watkins against Brighton. "This question is for him," he said. "I can answer only with my silence." Emery was then asked if Watkins had refused to play, to which he said: "I think you can call him and you can call his agent and he can respond."

The Guardian have contacted Watkins's agent for comment.

"He [Watkins] can only explain his answer, I can't," Emery added, after being asked if he felt let down by Watkins.

Emery reported that Madjo would be out for "two weeks more ... more or less" while attacking midfielder Johan Manzambi would "need maybe some days more [than that]".

Match report Page 41 →

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Burnham's challenge is to define Britain's place in the world Editorials, page 2

Marine Le Pen is a bigger threat to France than ever Mujtaba Rahman, page 3

The hill I'd die on: music festivals are better with children Iman Amrani, page 4

G2 Daily pullout life & arts section Inside

Opinion and ideas

Journal

The fight for an inclusive Britain is taking place in the countryside

John Harris

A fortnight or so ago, my two teenage children and I set out on a three-night visit to the Peak District. We stayed at a youth hostel - more of which in a moment - and began the trip with the 20-minute ascent of Mam Tor, a modest peak yet one with a jaw-dropping view.

The next bit might sound self-parodically Guardian-esque, but what the hell: the most striking sight of all was the diversity of the walkers. Women in their 20s wearing hijabs picnicking on rocks; multiracial gaggles of young men racing to the top; solo and shirtless white fitness freaks; retirement-age dog walkers. With plenty of justification, country walking has long been typified as one of the most white pursuits there is. But here - presumably because of the proximity of Manchester and Sheffield - things looked very different.

The scenes didn't quite suggest Britain in microcosm, but they weren't far off. I began to wonder, in fact, whether I was witnessing the extremely belated next phase of a story that began with the mass trespass at nearby Kinder Scout in 1932, led by the Jewish anti-fascist Benny Rothman: the protest in which hundreds of men and women defied the law to walk on privately

owned Derbyshire hills and moorland. Five of them received prison sentences, but the way was thereby opened to the creation of the UK's first national parks.

The latter-day people and organisations working to make walking more inclusive - in response to national statistics that remain depressing, and often in the face of straight-up prejudice - surely deserve as much praise as Rothman and his comrades. Black Girls Hike was founded in 2019 by the brilliant Mancunian Rhiane Fatinikun, aimed at creating "a safe space for Black women to explore the outdoors ... challenging the status quo". Soon after, the Coventry-based rambler Haroon Mota started Muslim Hikers, and began group walks just over a year later. In the same city, Cherelle Harding created Steppers UK, intended to "normalise black and brown faces in outdoor spaces and create a community of outdoor enthusiasts".

All this reflects aspects of our culture and politics that can be inspiring, but also aspects of some modern political and cultural divides that are very unsettling. If he were to visit the Peak District, Nigel Farage would presumably get no further than his chosen pub. But his vision of bucolic England is symbolised by the outfit he tends to wear when he wants to accuse the "metropolitan elite"

ILLUSTRATION: THOMAS PULLIN

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2

The fight for an inclusive Britain is taking place in the countryside John Harris

← Continued from front

of neglecting the countryside: flat cap, Barbour jacket, wellies, fag and pint. It is replete with meaning, and not just in its embodiment of what a cultural-studies specialist might call white rurality. Look, for example, at the fuss Farage and his allies made over the National Trust's drive to be open about some of its properties' links to colonialism and slavery, and the same organisation's campaigning to protect the environment.

Further to the right, somewhere in the heart of every nativist lurks darkly romanticised a vision of the British landscape. Last year, two wooded stretches of land in mid-Wales were bought by the Woodlander Initiative, a scheme led by the far-right activist Simon Birkett. He has links to Patriotic Alternative, reckoned to be the UK's largest fascist organisation. They were never going to target urban land: to the fascist mind, the countryside, not a cosmopolitan city, best represents notions of racial purity. From some far-right activists, there was sympathetic talk about 'indigenous heartlands - places for our people'.

The upshot is obvious: the UK's rural expanses can be as toxified and contested as any other aspect of our national life, and without wanting to sound too dour - walking is meant to be fun, after all - we need to actively promote the idea that the countryside belongs to all of us. To do so is to deprive the opportunities and hate-mongers of the hard and far right of any idea that the British landscape might be theirs to monopolise.

There is another, more everyday obstacle to all this. In many places, hotels and hospitality increasingly embody a different kind of exclusivity: the upgrading of pubs and hotels to boutique, gastro-centric establishments with sky-high prices. Those charged on such platforms as Airbnb are part of the same problem. So if your ambitions extend further than a day trip and such luxury is beyond your budget, where can you stay?

Part of the answer lies with the Youth Hostels Association (YHA) of England and Wales, and Hostelling Scotland. However, the pandemic caused the YHA to lose £40m of income in the first year alone, and in March last year, it said that its energy costs had quadrupled. In 2023 it had about 150 hostels; to date, it has announced the sale or closure of 29. Eight are now run as hostels thanks to a YHA franchising scheme, and there are similar hopes for at least one of my threatened favourites: Bellever on Dartmoor.

But here is the crucial point: the YHA runs a programme that provides fully or 'partly funded stays at youth hostels for young people and families facing significant challenges' (including young carers, and those involved in refugee and migrant groups), and a scheme called No Child Left Behind that helps to ensure that financial hardship does not stop kids going on residential school trips. It is an organisation that should be expanding, not shrinking.

Back at our accommodation - Hartington Hall, a 17th-century manor house owned and run by the YHA - I noticed a plaque fixed to the wall, presumably from the distant days when guests were obliged to snack in with chores rather than sample the £14 burger-and-beer meal deal. 'This youth hostel,' it said, 'is one of many, both in this country and abroad, where young people, regardless of race or creed, may spend the night. The buildings are diverse in character but they have a common purpose: to help all, especially young people of limited means, to a greater knowledge, love and care for the countryside.'

How, then, to preserve as many hostels as possible, bring in more young people and make those words real? An injection of cash from big-spending philanthropists? A modest tourist tax on hotels and short-let accommodation? Or some loose change from the government? Some parts of the British landscape are starting to undergo an overdue and very welcome change, but it needs support in the form of husk-beds and brickwork. In a country whose divisions are constantly inflamed by demagogic chancery, that challenge is a lot more urgent than it might seem.

The Guardian

Founded 1821 Independently owned by the Scott Trust № 55,993 'Comment is free... but facts are sacred' CP Scott

Foreign policy

Burnham's challenge is to define Britain's place in the world

A run of volatility in domestic British politics in recent years has tracked a period of global turbulence, and yet foreign policy over the same period has been an area of relative stability. What little is known about Andy Burnham's approach to international relations expresses more continuity with Sir Keir Starmer's administration than deviation. In negotiations with the EU, the red lines that prohibit membership of the single market or customs union still stand. Where Washington is concerned, Mr Burnham shows no interest in performances of bonhomie with Donald Trump, but his predecessor had already swapped that approach for a cooler pragmatic tone by the end of his tenure.

The new foreign secretary, Ed Millband, has opened a good dialogue with Marco Rubio, his US counterpart. Such is the density of integration in defence and security matters that incoming UK prime ministers, regardless of ideology, have little choice but to invest time in cultivating a bond with whoever sits in the White House. Anyone hoping for a spectacular transatlantic rupture and sudden clinch with Brussels will be disappointed.

Some patterns of consistency date back beyond the recent transfer of power within the Labour party to the previous Conservative administrations. Support for Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression was one of the few creditable positions taken by Boris Johnson, and that line has held through four transfers of power in Downing Street.

The process of rebuilding functional relations with European neighbours predated the 2024 general

election. Rishi Sunak negotiated the Windsor framework for Northern Ireland. He also ditched a bill that threatened chaos for businesses by vaporising retained EU laws without a timetable to replace them.

The business secretary who executed that U-turn in defiance of the Tories' fanatical Eurooceanic tendency was Kemi Badenoch. It was not a choice she highlighted in her subsequent bid to become Conservative leader. By then the party, relieved of the burden of governing responsibility, was in no mood to consider the merits of pragmatism where Europe was concerned.

Having withdrawn to an ideological comfort zone, the Tories still cannot pretend that Brexit has been a success. Sir Keir became gradually more confident in attributing Britain's economic woes to the terms of departure from the EU. But the shift was largely rhetorical because he was locked into a manifestly commitment that precluded a substantial change of direction. Mr Burnham has accepted the same constraint as a condition of his hand-me-down electoral mandate.

Having accepted the parameters of Boris Johnson's hard Brexit and acknowledged Britain's security dependency on Washington, the prime minister doesn't have much room to innovate in foreign policy. Nor has he shown much interest, focusing instead on domestic issues that are much more salient to voters than geopolitics.

That is a rational priority for a new leader hoping to win over sceptical voters. But with no sign of global volatility abating, an international crisis will force itself on to Mr Burnham's agenda soon enough. Global strife, especially when it whips up economic headwinds, quickly manifests itself as pressure to act in domestic politics. The prime minister has proved adept at connecting with an audience close to home. That advantage will be degraded if he cannot also connect his domestic agenda to a coherent strategy for engagement with the wider world.

Hungary

Brussels should reward a prime minister who is de-Orbánising at pace

Some elections are more important than others. Since taking office in May, Hungary's new prime minister, Péter Magyar, has embarked upon the country's most far-reaching and dramatic programme of transformation since the fall of communism in 1989. Mr Magyar's predecessor, Viktor Orbán, established a soft autocracy which thrived on corruption and, over 16 years, exerted its grip on most areas of Hungarian life, from religion to culture and the media. It is being dismantled at extraordinary pace.

Last week, a newly appointed president took office following the sacking of Tamás Sulyok, accused by Mr Magyar of having rubber-stamped the erosion of the rule of law in the country. In stark contrast, András Baka is a former president of Hungary's supreme court, a role he was removed from by the Orbán regime in an action judged unlawful by the European court of human rights.

On Hungary's national day last Thursday, news bulletins returned to the main state television channel, having been shut down for six weeks. In July, viewers had encountered a blank screen along with the message: 'Public media should not lie. We are sorry for doing it for so long.' Ending naked bias on state TV was one of Mr Magyar's key pledges, in a campaign that saw him buck an electoral system weighted in favour of Mr Orbán and win a landslide.

The tempo has been equally relentless when it comes to attacking networks of corruption and clientelism built up over a decade and a half. Well

over €100bn in public funds, including billions of euros of EU money, is believed to have been siphoned off during the Orbán years. Investigators have been empowered to go after it via a new National Asset Recovery and Protection Office. Mr Magyar has also confirmed Hungarian participation in the European public prosecutor's office, enabling the EU to better protect itself from financial crime in the country.

It will take time for Hungary to feel like a normal pluralist European democracy again. For now, Mr Magyar is functioning as a one-man political whirlwind, heading what amounts to a national unity government elected by voters across the political spectrum. Concerns have been raised over constitutional manoeuvring to ensure many MPs in Mr Orbán's Fidesz party cannot stand again, and Mr Baka has warned against appearing to take revenge on the former prime minister's supporters. But a root-and-branch approach to de-Orbánising Hungary was what was needed, and continues to be rewarded by record levels of popularity in polls.

The next major threshold is likely to be crossed in the autumn. Brussels has given Hungary's new government until the end of this month to demonstrate that enough is being done on corruption to warrant the release of over €10bn in frozen funds. If, as seems likely, the vast majority of the funds are disbursed, it will seal the ongoing rapprochement between the EU and its former rogue member state.

In May, Mr Magyar relocated the prime minister's office away from a controversially condensed-off former Carmelite monastery used by Mr Orbán, opening the building up to the public. 'I was not elected simply to change the government, but to change the regime,' he had told interviewers soon after taking power. Three months on, the symbolism is being supplemented by a peaceful political revolution.

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Opinion

3

Now Marine Le Pen is back, she's a bigger threat than ever

Mujtaba Rahman

France loves a battle-scarred survivor. Charles de Gaulle, François Mitterrand and Jacques Chirac clawed their way back from political failure to become presidents of the republic. There is a significant chance that Marine Le Pen will be next. Now that the Paris appeal court has unshackled her from an electoral ban for fraud, the far-right veteran has double appeal in the race for the French presidency next year.

She will run, as always, as an outsider and a scourge of the political elites - despite continuously holding office since 1998. She can also now pose as a "miraculous survivor", a "mother courage" and "a battling granny", as senior French political figures, including former ministers, described her to me on a recent trip to Paris.

Le Pen will be a much more formidable candidate than her young understudy, Jordan Bardella, might have been. The other candidates were wary of Bardella, but they did not fear him. They do fear a resurrected Le Pen. Her party, the National Rally (RN), has a new campaign slogan: "Renaissance". The rebirth of Le Pen's political career, the party says, foretells the rebirth of France.

One might almost think Le Pen was acquitted of fraud on 7 July. She was not. The judges essentially ruled that voters, not the courts, should decide who is president. They reduced Le Pen's five-year ban from electoral politics, imposed by the Paris criminal court last year, to time already served.

She is now a twice-convicted embezzler of more than €4m in EU funds. If her final appeal to France's highest court is heard rapidly and rejected, she might have to campaign next spring wearing a prison bracelet on her ankle.

And yet. Two opinion polls since her reprieve suggest that she could defeat all imaginable opponents in the two-candidate second round next year. Previous polls were almost as good for Bardella, but there were reasons to believe that he would not stay the course. The two-week-long second-round campaign traditionally stress-tests the capacity of the candidates not just to govern

Le Pen and Jordan Bardella, both of the National Rally party, in Paris, September 2025 PHOTOGRAPH: BERTRAND GUAVAFF/GETTY IMAGES

Mujtaba Rahman is the managing director for Europe at Eurasia Group, a political risk research and consulting firm

Freed from her electoral ban, she will be a far more formidable candidate than her understudy, Jordan Bardella, might have been

France, but to represent it. Voters will wonder: do they have a stature présidentielle? Bardella will be 31 in September. He has been an RN party apparatchik since he dropped out of college at the age of 19. Would voters have been able to imagine this talented but glib young man going toe-to-toe with a Vladimir Putin or a Donald Trump?

That question - presidential weight - is especially important for older voters. Of the 50 million registered French voters, 28% are over 65. Unlike younger people, they turn out in huge numbers.

A recent opinion poll showed Le Pen beating the former prime minister Edouard Philippe, the strongest of the many candidates looking to carry Emmanuel Macron's centrist torch, by 54% to 46% in the second round. She had almost exactly the same lead among the over-65s. It is the first time any poll in any national election had shown the RN ahead with the "grey vote".

Bardella was also popular with older voters, but his appeal to young and old was starting to fade. He comes from a working-class, Italian migrant family but had begun to show a Nicolas Sarkozy-like attraction to the high life, including romantic dates in Monaco with an heiress from Italy's remnant nobility.

Le Pen was born into a wealthy family and political business, but cultivates an image as a gruff-voiced people's champion, a single grandmother living with her best friend, a breeder of cats and, above all, a survivor.

There is, however, another issue that is crucial for older voters: economic stability. Le Pen's feeble TV debate performances on the economy in 2017 and 2022 helped Macron to defeat her. The RN's economic policies remain an incoherent jumble of high social spending and low taxes, free markets and state interference. Bardella tried to shift the party towards a more traditional rightwing, low-tax policy, and a more reformist approach to the EU, taking inspiration from Italy's prime minister, Giorgia Meloni.

But Le Pen's return means a return to "Marinomics" and a policy of wrecking the EU from the inside. With France €3.5tn in debt and permanently teetering on the brink of fiscal crisis, the prospect of a far-right government may disturb older and better-off voters.

Le Pen will have an obvious riposte. Macron bamboozled you twice all with his clever people's talk, she will say. Look where that got you: another €1tn in debt. Time to give a down-to-earth grandmother a chance. I could hardly do worse.

But she could. Much, much worse. A President Le Pen or a President Bardella would take France and the EU into dangerous new territory. Bardella, at least, appeared aware of the difficulty of being so outlandishly anti-EU and trying to govern with slogans. Le Pen is not.

A Le Pen presidency from next May is not a certainty. But it is, for the first time in seven decades of the family's involvement in politics, a strong possibility. The comfort blanket for the mainstream parties of right, left and centre - the implausibility of a 31-year-old slightly more pragmatic President Bardella - has been snatched away.

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4

Opinion

ELLIA BARON

A music festival isn't a music festival if there are no children

The hill I'd die on Iman Amrani

The woman I used to be died the day I had twins. That life - full of spontaneous travel and a decorated social calendar - evaporated, giving way to a blank canvas of motherhood and two glorious little human beings. While I was inside that summer, many of my friends continued on their child-free paths, enjoying festivals and sleeping in tents with pop-up communities that I used to be a part of.

So when the twins turned one last summer and we'd found our rhythm, I decided to take on the challenge of sharing the magic of live music with them. It went better than I'd expected. Before their second birthday, we had danced at day festivals such as Situation Dance, put on by Femi Koleoso from Ezra Collective, camped out overnight in the Brecon Beacons for Green Man and been to the child-focused TOTFest.

Some people think it's wild, bordering on neglectful, to take children to festivals that also cater to adult punters. Mothers, especially, are used to being told that everything we could possibly enjoy is going to damage our children. Thankfully, wise women around me whose kids are now grown up have reminded me to ignore these pressures.

Taking young children to festivals does require a new level of research. Ear defenders are packed; festivals more aligned with drugs and debauchery are avoided. But different worlds can coexist. Selecting the family camping area is game-changing - adult audiences get their late night, while the early risers include not just families but the wellbeing crowd.

Having families around often has a positive effect on an event. People operate with more moderation when there are kids present, and you have to be a real Scrooge to get upset at barefoot children with glitter on their faces having fun alongside their parents.

Iman Amrani is a former Guardian multimedia journalist

I don't want to spend the rest of my life listening solely to the Wiggles, and decided early on to expose my babies to a wide range of sounds. We have instruments at home and they're fascinated by how it all works. They've taken to live music so easily, it's a joy to watch them engage with something so human.

I've heard it said that other European countries are more inclusive of families and children, but the UK really shines during its festival season. My favourite ones are a microcosm of what coexistence can look like in the real world. My motherhood canvas is filling up with music, and I've found festivals are where we can all get a bit of what we want.

GUARDIAN DESIGN/GETTY BRAGGS

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Letters

guardian.letters@theguardian.com

5

Established 1906

Country diary Tylorstown, Rhondda Valley

My friend John and I are climbing Tylorstown Tip – a summit also known as Old Smokey, named after the hot ash it was partly made with. We want to see how much of south Wales has burned.

The tip towers over the surrounding hills, a perfect crow's nest from which to witness the blackening of the region. From the summit, with its sitka spruce and flowering heather, the expanse of St Gwynne's forest spreads out before us, all 6,533 acres of it. Browned, dead plantation forestry gives way to grassland burned to cinder. A veil of smoke lies above the forest for miles.

Sticking our heads up like a couple of lanky prairie dogs, we try to cut up the summer's burns – many we can see, many more we've heard tell of, just out of sight. There's Treherbert, Wattsville, Cwm, Maerdy, Ynyshir, Ferndale, Llwyn Onn, Blaenavon, Dowlais, on and on. Coal areas, for ever shaped by fire and ash.

The fires in south-east Wales this summer have been so numerous and devastating, their impact has weighed heavy on people's psyche. With such little rain from late June to August, sparks that would normally fizzle and die without consequence have raged over large areas in a flash.

Here in the valleys, where forestry, absentee landownership, industrial waste and dense terraced housing all sit close, the wildfires have felt like they're right in your face. You could be forgiven for thinking it was all of Wales aflame, living in the smoke for weeks, tasting the smog on your lips.

Meanwhile, up north, desperate residents of the blazing Rhinogyd had to wait days for helicopter support, as it was busy in England and Scotland. In some places a kind of madness has taken hold, with children photographed and put through trial by social media for listening in woodlands during summer holidays.

At long last, recent days have seen rain – real rain. Many burns still smoulder in deep peat, but soon it'll be time to worry about floods instead, as denuded slopes flush ever more water into catchments that cannot contain it. Whatever happens next, it's a summer that will linger in the memory.

Eben Muse

We do not publish letters where only an email address is supplied; please include a full postal address, a reference to the article and a daytime phone number. We may edit letters. Submission and publication of letters is subject to our terms and conditions: see theguardian.com/letters-terms

To end homelessness, look to the root causes

As a vulnerable teenage girl carrying my life in a rucksack, I have been the person Andy Burnham describes people walking past in his article (I won't abandon anyone to sleep rough on our streets. That's my £442m promise, theguardian.com, 19 August). That experience taught me that homelessness is far more complex than rough sleeping alone, and that ending it takes more than getting people off the streets.

Getting everyone in for Christmas is an important ambition. But lasting success means preventing people from reaching crisis point and giving those who do the practical support and opportunities they need. I was lucky. Public sector work gave me structure, stability, and someone willing to believe in my potential.

Housing must sit alongside education, healthcare, employment and social mobility, giving people not just somewhere to live, but a genuine route to stability, independence and opportunity.

This is why charities and initiatives such as Homewards, with a collaborative, prevention-first approach, are so important. Solving homelessness takes joined-up support, earlier intervention, and a

belief that people need routes into housing, work, health, safety and belonging. As Mr Burnham rightly says, homelessness is a problem to solve, not step around. Prevention must be at the heart of that solution.

Dr Sabrina Cohen-Hatton Chief fire officer, Hampshire and Isle of Wight Fire and Rescue Service

The prime minister's pledge to end rough sleeping is admirable, and he's right about the importance of catching people 'long before they hit the pavement'. But to succeed, the he must confront the Home Office's role in creating homelessness. Last year, around 21,000 households in England needed homelessness help after eviction from Home Office accommodation.

Research by the Refugee Council and others has highlighted how delayed documentation, inadequate support and too little time to find accommodation leave refugees facing homelessness and destitution within weeks of a being given leave to stay in the UK.

Current plans making refugee status more precarious, putting refugees in thousands of pounds of debt and further restricting asylum

support will only worsen this. Until the Home Office stops pushing refugees on to the streets, ending rough sleeping will be out of reach.

Imran Hussain Refugee Council

As a psychiatrist, I have seen an increasing number of patients with severe mental health difficulties ending up homelessness, and the local council concluding that it doesn't have a duty to house them as they have made themselves 'intentionally homeless' by failing to stick to the rules.

This is usually because the patient has used drugs on the premises and they are evicted from their temporary accommodation. They are then expected to demonstrate three months of abstinence while being street homeless before they can try again for accommodation – with no understanding that housing will aid their ability to get off drugs.

While I have some sympathy for the local authority's position, we need to have a system that thinks housing first, with recognition the reducing drug use takes time and requires wraparound support from mental health and drug services.

Until that happens, I fear Andy Burnham's new initiative will result in accommodation being found, but the patient quickly falling foul of the rules, and the local authorities washing their hands of them again.

Dr Charles Dixon Exeter

Is this why close encounters have so far eluded us?

When thinking about why we have not encountered intelligent aliens yet, as Adam Kirsch does (The long read, 11 August), it seems to me that one factor gets neglected: fossil fuels. Alien life could develop intelligence on myriad planets, but to develop advanced technology that would enable them to get off-world, they need to go through an equivalent of the Industrial Revolution, and that needed first coal, then oil and gas.

There could be many intelligent alien races out there, but on planets without an easily accessible fossil fuel equivalent, they'd never get past a 17th-century level of development.

Even if we can eventually detect life on planets outside our solar system, we'd never know these civilisations existed, as their signature from afar would be indistinguishable from that of a planet with just plant-like life and a fire ecology.

It is entirely probable, as a result, that almost all alien races, if they exist, are living in an eternal equivalent of Game of Thrones's Westeros, not Iain M Banks's

Culture, doomed never to be detected from afar.

Ian Simmons Westcliff-on-Sea, Essex

Adam Kirsch's article misses one possibility: that any advanced civilisation might simply be keeping its distance. Humans have long imagined such watchers. The Kayapó people of Brazil, for example, tell of Bep Kororoti, a visitor who shared knowledge and helped their ancestors build a stable and sustainable society.

It's easy to imagine a similar conversation among distant observers today. A younger voice might look at our atomic weapons and shake its head, predicting that we'll finish ourselves off. An older voice might reply that humans have a habit of rebuilding, and that societies like the Kayapó show we can live with balance when we choose. Their verdict might be to wait a while, and see whether we can keep our civilisation going, before attempting contact. Given our history, who could blame them?

Miland Joshi Birmingham

Maybe aliens have arrived, but were too small for us to notice? Perhaps they fell down a drain, were eaten by seagulls, or ended up in an ants' nest?

Sheila Preston Shoreham-by-Sea, West Sussex

Unwise to end local checks on NHS trusts

I wonder how many members of the public are aware that the latest health plan for England, due to be ratified by parliament this autumn, abolishes the role of statutory governors on all of its constituent health trusts?

For a number of years I have volunteered to act as a governor at two hospital trusts in Yorkshire. As a former health professional and principal nursing educator, I have brought years of experience to the role, for which I have been elected locally. For any organisation to wilfully remove hundreds of such skilled and committed activists from their supportive scrutiny seems ill-advised.

Local scrutiny by informed practitioners seems an essential check on the powers of a centralising Department of Health and health minister. I suspect that their newspeak of replacement by 'more dynamic stakeholders' is shorthand for health industry shareholders. For a Labour government to be proposing such bureaucratic butchery seems strange indeed. I hope a concerned public can prevent this centralisation of hospital oversight.

Jean Flanagan Scarborough, North Yorkshire

Corrections and clarifications

A review of the Netflix documentary Freefall: A Reckoning for Boeing was accompanied by an image captioned as being of the 'wrecked fuselage of a Boeing 737 Max'. In fact, the photograph showed the reconstructed wreckage of TWA Flight 800, a Boeing 747 that crashed in July 1996, killing all 230 people onboard (Two plane crashes, 3,46 deaths and still no answers, 20 August, G2, p10).

Editorial complaints and corrections can be sent to guardian.orders@theguardian.com or 'the reader' editor, King Place, 90 York Way, London E1 9GG. You can also leave a returned on 020 3353 4736.

Does one care about the Sussexes' return?

I understand from your report (Sussexes' security funding on their move back to UK is private matter, says Burnham, 21 August) that a YouGov poll as to whether or not the Sussex family should return to the UK offered the options 'yes', 'no', and 'don't know', which were chosen by 21%, 33% and 45%, respectively. Would there have been the same outcome with the addition of the option 'don't care'?

Anne Cowper Bishopston, Swansea

I didn't change my name when I married, but my brother's wife did, so we enjoy confusing bureaucracy by both being Catherine M Bracey (Letters, 22 August). No problem for friends and family – I'm Cat, she's Cathy. Problem is, my husband's called Muw and hers Hugh.

Cat Bracey Bristol

In every room in parliament, beside the fire safety notices, should be an additional warning: 'Because you are an MP, you will be offered gifts. And because you are an MP, you must decline them' (MPs have already accepted £400k of freebies this year, 22 August).

Patricia Baker-Cassidy Oxford

Doug Kessler writes about the bafflingly hard pain parents feel when their children leave for university (Letters, 21 August). As the mother of four young adults still residing at home, I'm more familiar with the bafflingly hard pain when they don't leave for university.

Rowan Haynes Thorningstone, Leicestershire

I must protest at your half-finished limerick 'There once was a man from Wirral / Who woke up in bed with a squirrel...' (Pass notes, 20 August). It's 'the Wirral'.

Heather Royles Hitchin, Hertfordshire

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6

Obituaries

Tan Kennedy Martin

TV writer behind the creation of The Sweeney who later worked on the pioneering Juliet Bravo

The writer Ian Kennedy Martin, who has died of pancreatic cancer aged 90, created one of British television's most realistic, groundbreaking TV police dramas. With action shot on the streets of London, the 1970s series The Sweeney featured screeching tyres, punch-ups, officers who could be as violent as the criminals, and lines such as: "Get your trousers on - you're nicked."

It began as Regan, a 1974 story in the ITV Armchair Cinema series, starring John Thaw as DI Jack Regan and Dennis Waterman as DS George Carter, members of the Flying Squad (known in cockney rhyming slang as Sweeney Todd), a Metropolitan police section tackling armed robbers.

Martin's elder brother, Troy Kennedy Martin, had a decade earlier created Z Cars, which moved TV's depiction of the police on from the homely Dixon of Dock Green. But that portrayal of flawed officers in a modern world, along with its two Softly Softly spin-

offs, seemed tame by the time Ian Kennedy Martin formulated his own rumbustious programme.

He said Softly Softly: Task Force was "like a soap", adding: "It just didn't reflect what was going on in the police. At that time, drugs were becoming a big issue and armed robbery was the major crime in London. None of this was seen. It was all internecine rows at HQ and people talking about budgets. We needed two cops on the streets."

The Sweeney ran for four series, from 1975 to 1978, with two film spin-offs. Complaints about the violence and bad language were just swatted away, at a time when the Met was facing accusations of brutality and corruption.

Martin devised the part of Regan specially for his drinking buddy Thaw, having worked as script and story editor with him on the military police drama Redcap (1964-66).

However, Martin quit after the pilot, before the series went into production. His visualisation of a studio-based programme on videotape, with the emphasis on dialogue, placed him, he said, "at loggerheads" with that of the producer, Ted Childs, and the

The Sweeney, 1975, with John Thaw, left, as DI Jack Regan and Dennis Waterman as DS George Carter. Right, Martin admitted being 'kicked out' of Trinity College Dublin after immersing himself in the city's theatres THAMES T'CALLISTAR; CHRISTINA BURTON

fledgling Euston Films, a division of the ITV company Thames Television. They wanted it shot on location on 16mm film, giving it a gritty, grainy look and faster pace.

"It was all about interpretation of the script," Childs told me, "and it eventually came down to, 'It's me or him.'" Childs kept his job, while Trevor Preston, Ranald Graham, Roger Marshall and Martin's brother were among those who scripted the series.

Martin firmly kept the action to a minimum when he later created Juliet Bravo (1980-85) for the BBC. Like The Gentle Touch on ITV, which beat it to the screen by several months, it was pioneering in featuring a female officer in the starring role. The series was set in the fictional sleepy Lancashire town of Hartley, with Inspector Jean Darblay, played by Stephanie Turner, facing male prejudice after taking charge of its police station. The character was based on Supt Wynne Darwin, a real-life officer based outside Manchester.

During its run, Martin's third key TV police drama, The Chinese Detective (1981-82), brought another dimension to the genre. David Yip played the maverick British Chinese officer DS Johnny

He devised the part of Regan specially for his old drinking buddy John Thaw

Ho, a scruffy loner in London's Docklands, and the issue this time was racism within the force.

Martin also left a legacy to the film world by dreaming up the initial idea for The Italian Job (1969), the heist caper starring Michael Caine and red, white and blue Mini Coopers. He scripted a play for the BBC about a robbery in Regent Street, London, involving a new computerised traffic system, but most TV drama was then studio-based, so it never went into production. Troy, aware of such a system in Turin, bought the story and rehashed it, set in Italy.

Ian was born in London, to Scottish parents of Irish ancestry, Francis Martin, a toolmaker and engineer, and Kathleen (nee Flanagan), a teacher, who died when he was 11. Both Ian and his brother, born Francis, had the middle name Troy - which Francis later used in his professional career.

In 1954, on leaving Finchley Catholic grammar school, Ian began a degree in history and political science at Trinity College Dublin, but he admitted to being "kicked out" after fully immersing himself in the city's theatres.

Encouraged by his brother's early success, he scripted two television plays. Neither was produced, but in 1962 he joined the BBC's writers' pool for new talent, working with producers and editors.

This led him to adapt Bridget Boland's 1954 stage drama The Prisoner, set in a totalitarian state, for a 1963 BBC Sunday-Night Play. Then, he moved on to Redcap on ITV before becoming story editor on the soap Weavers Green (1966).

Having scripted a 1963 episode of The Saint, he concentrated on contributing episodes to other "production line" drama series such as The Troubleshooters (between 1966 and 1968), Parkin's Patch (1969-70), Hadleigh (in 1971), The Onedin Line (in 1971) and Colditz (from 1972 to 1973).

Among his other TV creations was King & Castle (1986), a drama with a light side, starring Derek Martin as a bent former police officer running a debt-collecting agency with a martial arts-proficient assistant played by Nigel Planer. He continued as a writer-for-hire, scripting episodes of series such as Bergerac (in 1989), The Chief (in 1995) and The Knock (from 1996 to 1997), but a planned remake of The Sweeney in 1998 never happened.

Martin's stage play The Berlin Hanover Express, a second world war drama about the issue of neutrality faced by Irish diplomats in Berlin, was premiered at Hampstead theatre in 2009.

In 1970, Martin married Barbara Ohrbach, who survives him, along with their daughter, Lucy, and son, Daniel, two grandsons, Joseph and Lucas, and his sister, Mo (Maureen).

Anthony Hayward

Ian Troy Kennedy Martin, writer, born 23 May 1936; died 27 June 2026

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obituaries@theguardian.com

7

Sir Christopher Ondaatje

Businessman whose philanthropy included funding a new wing at the National Portrait Gallery

By 1988, the businessman Christopher Ondaatje had made a great deal of money as a publisher and stockbroker on the Canadian stock exchange.

As he later described it to Sue Lawley on Radio 4's Desert Island Discs in 2002, while on holiday in Tanzania he decided to give up his business interests and devote himself to "having fun" - travelling, writing, spending time with his family, and giving large chunks of his wealth away.

He had already invested in a home for himself, Glenthorne, a rambling 19th-century house in a remote place next to the sea north of Exmoor, allowing him to turn his attention to British institutions, including the National Portrait Gallery, the Royal Geographical Society, the Royal Society of Literature and the Labour party.

Ondaatje approached philanthropy in the same way as his business transactions, doing research on how the money could transform institutions.

I first met him in September 1996, when I was director of the

National Portrait Gallery. We were in the early stage of raising money for a new wing, actually a back-of-house extension, designed by Jeremy Dixon and Edward Jones.

We had been promised funds by what was then the Heritage Lottery Fund on condition that we raised £4m. I intuited, as it turned out correctly, that this was a project that Ondaatje might be willing to help fund.

He did so with extraordinary generosity, providing the great bulk of the matching funding required for a building project that opened in 2000 as the Ondaatje Wing. Although the project is now nearly invisible under its recent make-over, it transformed the way the public used the gallery. At a time when public institutions were being required to seek private support, Ondaatje demonstrated how venture philanthropy could be used to good effect.

Ondaatje was born in Kandy, Ceylon (Sri Lanka), to a prosperous tea-planting family of part-Dutch, part-Sinhalese descent, one of the four children of Doris (nee Gratiaen) and Mervyn Ondaatje. But, as his younger brother, the writer Michael Ondaatje, terrifyingly describes in his 1982 memoir *Running in the

Ondaatje at Glenthorne, his home in Devon, in 1998. He filled it with his library and collection of Victorian furniture, portraits and Sinhalese antiquities

MARC HILL/ALAMY

Family, their father took to the bottle and his parents divorced after Christopher had been sent away to boarding school in the UK. It was a humiliation that gave him his drive and the ambiguity of his relationship to the British.

Educated at Blundell's school in Tiverton, Devon, Ondaatje excelled at sport, but had to leave a year early when the money for his education ran out. In 1951, his mother moved to England, to Notting Hill Gate, in London, where she ran a boarding house. Christopher went to work for National and Grindlays Bank in the City, but realised that the prospects for someone part-Sinhalese were not good, so, in 1955, aged 22, with 13 Canadian dollars in his pocket, he emigrated to Canada.

In Toronto he joined a brokerage firm, Burns Bros & Denton, for a year before moving, first, into selling advertising and copyrighting for magazines in Montreal and then into financial journalism back in Toronto. In 1959 he married Valda Bulins, a Latvian-born, tennis-playing science graduate.

Ondaatje discovered he had a gift for making money, became a founding partner in 1970 of the stockbrokers Loewen Ondaatje McCutcheon, established a publishing firm, Pagurian Press, in 1967 and used it as a vehicle for wider-ranging investments. His wealth made it possible to buy Meisner's Island off the coast of Nova Scotia and persuade Michael to study at Toronto University.

In 1983, Ondaatje was visiting Blundell's when he discovered that Glenthorne, on the coast near Countisbury, which he had visited as a schoolboy, was for sale. He bought it, renovated it, and filled it with his library and collection of Victorian furniture, portraits and Sinhalese antiquities.

He began to spend an increasing amount of time in England, for which he had a strongly romantic, partly nostalgic and imperial fondness, in spite of the fact that he sometimes felt cold-shouldered by the British establishment.

Meanwhile, Ondaatje was establishing himself as a writer. It was always assumed that this was in competition with Michael, who was so colossally successful - best known for his Booker prize-winning novel The English Patient - but I never saw evidence of this. It was more a way of pursuing his interests in travel and exploration.

His first book, co-written with Gordon Currie, was Olympic Victory: The Story Behind the Canadian Bob-Sled Club's Incredible Victory at the 1964 Winter Olympic Games (1967), describing his involvement as a member of the second bobsleigh team. This was followed the same year by The Prime Ministers of Canada, 1867-1967.

In 1992, he published The Man-Eater of Punanai: A Journey of Discovery to the Jungles of Old Ceylon. Sindh Revisited: A Journey

His wealth made it possible to buy Meisner's Island off the coast of Nova Scotia

in the Footsteps of Captain Sir Richard Burton appeared in 1996, and a second effort following the routes of the Victorian explorer, Journey to the Source of the Nile, was published in 1998; he was passionately interested in the life of Burton.

These led him to support the Royal Geographical Society (RGS), where he funded its handsome new lecture theatre and helped the digitisation of its collections. He also supported an annual prize for the Royal Society of Literature (RSL) "for a distinguished work of fiction, nonfiction or poetry, evoking the spirit of a place", and was, for a time, joint owner of the Literary Review.

It was perhaps even more surprising, since his politics were not obviously of the left, that he became a donor to Tony Blair's Labour party, but he regarded Blair as nearly as rightwing as Margaret Thatcher. He got on well with Tessa Jowell and enjoyed playing tennis with the Labour peer Michael Levy. He was made CBE in 2000 and knighted in 2003.

Ondaatje is survived by Valda, their three children, David, Sarah and Jans, and his siblings, Michael and Gillian (another sister, Janet, predeceased him).

Charles Saumarez Smith

Philip Christopher Ondaatje, financier, philanthropist and writer, born 22 February 1933; died 20 July 2026

Birthdays

Paulo Coelho, author, 79; Penelope Curtis, former director, Tate Britain, 65; Elizabeth Debicki, actor, 36; Sir Stephen Fry, actor and writer, 69; Rupert Grint, actor, 38; Lady (Poppy) Gustafsson, former minister, co-founder of Darktrace, 44; Dafydd Iwan, folk singer and former president, Plaid Cymru, 83; Jean-Michel Jarre, composer, 78; Linton Kwesi Johnson, poet, writer and broadcaster, 74; Charlie Massey, chief executive, General Medical Council, 56; Sir Alexander McCall Smith, novelist and emeritus professor of medical law, Edinburgh University, 78; Madsen Pirie, co-founder and president, Adam Smith Institute, 86; Ali Smith, novelist, 64; Sam Torrance, golfer and commentator, 73.

Announcements

In Memoriam

HALL, Robert (Bob), died 24/8/2025. So loved and slowly missed by Doris (Doll), our beloved daughters Lisa and Flooney, our granddaughters Holly, Scout and Florence and the family.

For Announcements, Acknowledgments, Adoptions, Announcements, Birthdays, Births, Deaths, Engagements, Memorial Services and In Memoriam, email us at announcements@theguardian.com including your name, address and telephone number or phone QSO 353 2114.

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8

Puzzles

Saturday's solutions

Sandwich sudoku

Killer Sudoku 1036

Cryptic crossword

Solution No. 30,086

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Killer sudoku

Easy

The normal rules of sudoku apply: fill each row, column and 3x3 box with all the numbers from 1 to 9. In addition, the digits in each inner shape (marked by dots) must add up to the number in the top corner of that box. No digit can be repeated within an inner shape.

Medium

Guardian cryptic crossword No 30,093 set by Vulcan

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Codeword

Each letter of the alphabet makes at least one appearance in the grid, and is represented by the same number wherever it appears. The letters decoded should help you to identify other letters and words in the grid.

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Across

1 Plain starter of meal daddy's eating (6) 5 At court, a new sovereign (8) 9 Having cooked bean soup, one requires attendance (8) 10 Take another attitude to rest (6) 11 Once Standard English no longer heard at opening of Parliament (6,6) 13 Slippery equine? (4) 14 18 on a course that is dry (8) 17 Typically male slob struggling with hike (8) 18 Drop tools here (4) 20 Tense morning working for Europeans (12) 23 Try to stop celebrity endlessly showing sexual urge (6) 24 Old records from accomplished country singer (8) 25 Raise the hinge that's wonky (8) 26 Make a mess of motorway gradient (6)

Down

2 No place for pandemic, just fever (4) 3 Whippersnapper very quietly suppressing single sound from mouse (9) 4 Appeared to do this from Nice beach? (6) 5 Contrary to inclination, objecting to Scotch? (7,3,5) 6 Birds in most of the riverside plants (8) 7 Manage to get round small group of trees (5) 8 Move cat aside, keeping very connected (10) 12 Killer's destiny in being caught by subterfuge (10) 15 Alumni's pub evening is a thing! (9) 16 Initial contribution to thread that gives clear directions (8) 19 Relax on firm topper on mattress for programme (6) 21 Securing hearing without resistance (5) 22 Enthusiasm in the heart of Commonwealth country (4)

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Life & Arts

Monday 24 August 2026

'I thought: well,

I've had a good run'

How Russ Abbot soared to Saturday night success - then walked away

Emma Beddington Can the PM fix my daily gripes?

page 3

Tipping fatigue The controversy over service charges

page 4

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The Guardian G2 Monday 24 August 2026

2

A NEW START AFTER 60

I became a grocer - it made my body stronger and quieted my mind

Robert Solomon loves the early mornings, picking out the apples and tending to the broccoli. At 71, he says it's the best job he's had

Paula Cocozza

When Robert Solomon's working hours were cut during the pandemic - he did building management and tech support for a nonprofit organisation - he got an extra job at a food cooperative, helping to stock the store. It was, he says, the most ordinary job, but that's what made it special.

That job ended with the pandemic, but in 2022 he left the nonprofit and hunted for grocery positions. Now, at 71, he is the assistant buyer in produce (ie fruit and vegetables) at an independent market in New York. "I love the opportunity to do physical, creative work with my body, hands and mind," he says. "I'm working harder than I have since my 30s and I love it."

Solomon's favourite time of day is the morning. He often starts at 5.30am or 6am. "I put the rugs back on the floor and the carts out in the yard. And then I start stocking." Certain products make him particularly happy.

"I like fussing up the dandelion greens," he says. (Though dandelions are often considered weeds, the leaves and roots are edible.) "I have a little bucket of water and I swish them around head first, so they're fresher. We have to restock broccoli many times a day, and I like that." When it's in order, "it makes a sea of broccoli". We are speaking on a video call; Solomon lifts his phone to show waves of blue-green broccoli heads.

"The work requires good attention," he says. By "attention" he means his mind doesn't wander

Tell us: has your life taken a new direction after the age of 60? Fill in the online form at theguardian.com/new-start-after-60

▼ Robert Solomon in Brooklyn, New York City

too often. "One of the big attractions is that it's a low-fantasy job. I spend most of my time working, not fantasising about what a wonderful job I'm doing and how I'll get famous for it next year.

"My political belief is that all work is important," he says.

Solomon grew up in Brooklyn, five miles from the shop. His mother was a musician turned director of a daycare centre, his father a professor of art history. "They were first-generation immigrants from Russia, and to them it was a step up to be doing something technical or managerial." His father "probably" wanted Solomon to be a scientist.

Solomon left school at 17. He had stints at night school, but got his degree at 46 "with independent study and life credits". For most of his working life, he was "a house painter, handyman and cabinet maker". After the degree, he worked for a neighbour's company that sold energy-efficient lighting solutions and had two stints at the nonprofit.

Through it all, he says, "I kept trying to change my job to a better job and it just didn't work for me." At various times, he aspired to become a computer programmer, an interfaith minister and a nurse practitioner. "In each case, things went terribly wrong."

At an interview to be an emergency medical technician, having scored an A on the course, Solomon was asked if he would cross a picket line. "No way," he said. "My mother would roll over in her grave." He watched his application drop into the bin.

Sometimes Solomon has a feeling his late parents would disapprove of his grocery job. But recently he's remembered one of his mother's sayings when he'd pitch a tantrum: "Stop running around like a chicken with your head cut off!"

Solomon thought that impossible, but she explained: "When she was a girl, they had a little shop on the porch of their home. When my mother would get home, my grandfather would take a break, and if someone came in for a chicken, she would have to kill it."

Solomon doesn't handle poultry, but "all these things I learned from her that she didn't mean to teach me are coming back... She knew how to clean lettuce and she knew how to pick a good apple. I'm like: 'That's how I know all of this.''

Initially, shop work was challenging. On the subway home, it was hard to stand up again. "But now it feels fine," he says. "I feel quieter mentally. My knees hurt less. I feel stronger.

"There are no guarantees on how long I will be able to work. But I think this is the best employment I've had. It's an appreciation of good things."

PHOTOGRAPHS: TOBIAS EVERESTER GUARDIAN

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THE PET I'LL NEVER FORGET

Ernie the danger

dog, who keeps cheating death

Ernie found his way into our hearts and home about nine years ago, when he strategically crawled into my lap during a family visit to meet a litter of puppies. While all the other beagle puppies ran wild, Ernie sat comfortably on me with his long, soft ears dangling down. We chose him because of his placid nature and named him Ernie after my mum's late dad, who coincidentally also had short legs and a bit of a round belly.

After a few weeks we realised that Ernie was anything but placid. His gentle temperament quickly morphed into an unruly and persistent need to find his way into danger.

The most shocking incident happened one morning in November 2022. Ernie spotted a deer in the forest behind our house. He darted away from me and my mum, through the forest and towards a busy dual carriageway. Ignoring our screams, Ernie crossed the road, missing multiple lorries and cars, making his way to safety on a small patch of grass on the pavement. It was a miracle he had managed to avoid injury.

Escaping death was a recurring theme. As a puppy, he ate through an entire tray of freshly baked brownies, which we mistakenly left on the kitchen counter to cool. As chocolate is toxic to dogs, we were terrified that he had been poisoned, but, indestructible as ever, he was fine. Since then he has also eaten a four-pack of raw chicken breasts; spring rolls, including the paper bag they came in; three Easter eggs with the foil on; and an entire six-pack of hot-cross buns.

Last year, during what was supposed to be a relaxing weekend on a canal boat with my mum and her partner, Ernie decided to jump head first into the River Wey. Initially sinking in the fast currents, Ernie resurfaced a short while later and saddled his way to the bank, unaware of the panic he had once again caused.

Despite all of this worry, and the ever-mounting vet bills (more than £12,000 so far), the love Ernie has brought to our lives far surpasses any amount of stress he has caused. He has been with our family through three house moves, breakups, job changes, birthdays, exams and just about everything in between.

His craziness has started to ease in recent years, but he's still as charming and gentle as ever. Just a simple walk can end up as an adventure with Ernie. There's never a dull moment with him by my side. Farryn Stock

Emma Beddington

Andy Burnham says

he'll fix daily vexations. Here's my list

This is a vulnerable confession, but I spend way too much time on the social media of the New York City mayor, Zohran Mamdani. Whether he is seemingly effortlessly speaking Mandarin, hanging out with kids or charmingly accepting that he should wear a cycle helmet, the man with the million-watt smile is my antidepressant. (Even more vulnerable confession: I believe, irrationally, he is looking after my elder son, who lives there.)

This means that I know all about Mamdani's fight against what Business Insider recently deemed the "annoyance economy" — daily frustrations that make you poorer or drive you slowly, miserably mad. These include the absurd complexity of cancelling subscriptions; hidden fees; never being able to find a public toilet; and potholes. He has taken to responding when he gets tagged in people's "Mamdani, fix this" posts to the point where Britons online are even jokingly asking him to take on our problems.

He may not need to, because Andy Burnham has started doing something similar with his "everyday fixes": bringing forward the ban on auto-renewed subscriptions; tackling vape shops and misleading "sale" prices; and capping bus fares in England.

It's surely human nature to start by sweating the small stuff — faced with a to-do list, most of us tick off the quick wins first — and would you rather tackle climate breakdown or potholes? It also plays well for politicians online. These fixes are visual and easily communicated. As Eric Phillips, who was press secretary for the former New York mayor Bill de Blasio, says: "Theatre is part of the job." But does Burnham really think fluttering his eyelashes and telling me it will be easier to cancel a Paramount+ subscription I forgot about means I'll forget all about his unconscionable attitude to North Sea drilling?

I suppose it's not impossible. It's nice to feel as if someone in power understands the low-level irritations that sap our joy, energy and resources — and will do something about them. And,

just possibly, winning public confidence by sorting minor gripes could build goodwill to tackle the big, hard, slow, unpopular stuff.

I'm not won over by British pothole politics yet — Burnham doesn't have Mamdani's magic. So, having seen the consumer champion Martin Lewis suggest that the government fix "100 small things that piss people off", I've compiled my own list.

Obviously, start with the scourge of delivery companies claiming you were out when you were in all day, staring out like a lonely dog. Please also eliminate the headbanging futility of updating "delivery preferences" only for them to be ignored. I could reconcile myself to the surveillance state, I reckon, if the surveillance included a database of everyone's whereabouts and preferences, so you never had to argue with a bot or retrieve your contact lenses from your mortal enemy at No 114. Perhaps the surveillance state could also remind me where I've put my keys?

Then there is the "digital annoyance economy", by which I mean shopping sites that, when you click on an item and then click back, return you to the top of the page, so you have to scroll back through all the items you've already seen: this outrage needs to be stamped out. And if I buy something and the seller signs me up to marketing gulf unless I opt out, I want to be able to press a big red button that places the company in administration and bars the entire board from holding corporate office in perpetuity. Please impose the same punishment for having a non-functioning "unsubscribe" option on emails.

The CEO of every manufacturer of plastic-film lids needs to demonstrate they can open them effortlessly, using their non- dominant hand, before they can sell them. See also sticky tape — make them prove it unrolls without ripping or the end disappearing. Washing machines should have a built-in tissue sensor; bread should be bio-engineered to fall butter side up and we need free scissor and nail clipper distributors on every street corner. Also, issue everyone with a single, universal sock. Once you've fixed all that, @andy.burnham, you might just get my vote.

▼ Never mind the red tape, prime minister ...

3

John Lewis's

freshers list is hilariously out of touch

Of all the questions this year's freshers may be nervously asking themselves as they prepare for this next phase — did I pick the right course? Will I make friends? Is unworth 30 grand when my future job prospects may be limited to dusting a datacentre? — one is particularly pressing: "How many clothes hangers do I need to bring?"

Fret no longer, enquiring young minds: John Lewis has the answer on its packing checklist for students. Thirty to 40, it claims, wildly, "consisting mostly of standard velvet or plastic hangers". "Standard" velvet? I missed this memo.

I found the list via the student news site the Tab, which posted a TikTok mocking J-Lew's notions of what constitute "essentials": a £495 Marc Jacobs bag, a £399 desk and an £80 spice rack carousel.

In fairness, most of the stuff on there is fine, but the Stanley cups and shower squeegees conjure a slightly dispiriting picture of wellness-focused, sensible, hygienic youth. I know that's their generation's reputation, but it would be nice if parents could be persuaded not to stock up, instead letting them go rogue and fill their kitchens, bathrooms and bedrooms with chaotically impractical stuff they choose themselves. Isn't that what early adulthood is all about? I'm optimistic, based on my own experiences: you needed a hazmat suit, not a shower squeegee, for my elder son's student bathroom; the main feature of the younger's kitchen was the Death-Star-sized air fryer he and his flatmates won at bingo.

He's back home, post- graduation, and the surviving uni purchases are all over the house: deflated duvets, half-melted spatulas, singed tea towels. I WhatsApped to ask if there was anything particularly good or bad. It was mostly fine, he replied (from his bedroom, although the colourful multipurpose pan I was influenced into buying in a moment of emotional weakness proved underwhelming. The real "door-opener", apparently, was a kilo bag of Belgian chocolate chips I got him, so that is my freshers "essential" tip: social currency (and a delicious snack) for £18.99.

OFFICE PHOTOGRAPH: DAVID LEVINE/THE GUARDIAN. THIS PAGE: COURTESY OF PARKIN STOCK

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4

'It's absolutely criminal'

US tipping culture has reached the UK and is causing chaos. Many consumers now feel obliged to pay service charges - even for a cup of coffee - that were once optional. How do we navigate all this?

Emine Saner

In a London pub, Greg Double was brutally confronted with the reality of Britain's evolving tipping culture. 'I was annoyed about the pint being eight quid, but then when you put service on top, it's absolutely criminal,' he says. In the past, you might have told the bar staff to keep the change or have a 'drink' on you, but since when did we routinely tip in pubs? Or coffee shops? Or, worst of all, at self-service machines? Tip creep is happening.

Tipping was awkward enough in the UK when the general rule was 10% at a restaurant, plus anxiety about whether you should tip the hairdresser, babysitter or food-delivery driver. Now, with tipping suggested ever more frequently, US-style, it has become a minefield to Britons. The amounts edge higher - in fancier London restaurants, a 15% service charge is relatively commonplace. And it's often asked for - in coffee shops for example, when you pay - before any service is delivered.

Tipping may be a social behaviour, but politics and economics also inform it. Since October 2024, all service charges and tips in Great Britain must go to staff, which boosts low salaries. Hospitality businesses, struggling with the rises in minimum wage and national insurance, are surely happy that it's tipping customers who are supplementing wages, rather than themselves. As the news site London Centric pointed out recently in an article headlined 'How American tipping culture came to London', adding an 'optional' service charge avoids tax, puts more money in the pockets of staff and means businesses don't have to raise prices, which puts off customers.

But how 'optional' is a service charge when the person serving us is looking expectantly as they hand over the card machine? Now, the variables around tipping seem endless and changeable, with

each of us having to create our own rules.

Double, a creative director for a PR company, says that in a coffee shop without table service, he wouldn't tip - but he might if he were sitting there, working, 'to take into account that I'm going to make this coffee last'. He wouldn't tip if he'd walked up to a bar and bought a drink for himself, but he might acquiesce if he bought a round. Since drinking Guinness became fashionable, it almost calls out for a tip. 'Because you're like: well, you've had to wait around for five minutes for every pint being poured,' says Double. 'If you order four pints of Guinness, you immediately see the bar staff think: 'Oh, for god's sake.'

Double also highlights a new tipping anxiety. Sometimes a bar worker will press zero on the tip screen before handing you the payment machine, 'if they don't think they're worthy. There's even that Britishness of the bar staff.' But what if they don't? 'It almost makes me think that if they've not pressed 'no' to the tip, that means they think they deserve one.'

Many of those I speak to think tech has pushed this change forward - and rapidly. The shift away from cash towards card and digital payments is usually framed as removing 'fiction', says Prof John Vines, the chair of design informatics at the University of Edinburgh's School of Informatics. 'It's about being more convenient. This is all a trend towards making it easier for us to spend our money.' The software in point-of-sale terminals prompts the customer for a tip. 'These systems are presented as a way of making giving a tip easier. We don't have to think about it too much, we don't have to fiddle with coins and notes. But, really, it's about encouraging us to spend more.'

Faced with three options on a screen, with the third perhaps an outrageous 35% tip, I often panic and go for the middle box. I wouldn't want to seem cheap

'Social rapport and connection with a server have a substantial impact on tips'

by going for the first option, but I end up feeling bullied into giving a generous 20% or more.

'Again, that's presenting those options to you partly to reduce that friction - it's taking away the need for you to mathematically calculate things. But, of course, it's a way of controlling the options as well,' says Vines. 'While we have the ability to press zero, the act of getting asked at the point of sale likely increases the chances of someone giving something, especially in situations where, at least in the UK, we culturally don't expect a tip to be given in the first place.'

Is it too cynical to suggest that tech companies who run the software, and who take a cut of every transaction, are making more money from pushing tips? 'That probably is a bit cynical, but also probably true,' says Vines, with a laugh.

It goes deeper than tech companies skimming a percentage. 'A lot of our technological infrastructure is dependent on platforms and systems that come from the US and, in particular, California,' says Vines. 'We tend to import a lot of the values and customs that are embedded with them. Even if it's not intended, they get inscribed into these systems and flatten out the diversity of other cultures, the things that would be acceptable or normal elsewhere.' The example of tipping, while small, he says, 'actually is an example of how [US tech companies] that get imported actually have quite significant long-term consequences, because it rewrites social expectations.'

It's embarrassing, says Peter, who works in a pub in Lincolnshire, to ask customers for tips. A few months ago, they got new card

ILLUSTRATION: NUCLELY/ELI/INT/AP/AG/ETTY/GUARD/AN DE/EN/FR/TO/GRAPES/VE/ET/EN/AG/ETTY/PO/ED BY MORELY/SOMER/LO/ANG/GO/C/ETTY

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Monday 24 August 2026 The Guardian G2

5

machines that automatically suggest adding one. Peter always presses no before he hands it over to customers. "It can rub people up the wrong way," he says. The pub's manager occasionally asks people if they want to add a gratuity, "but even he doesn't do it very often. It just feels pointless to us. You only tip someone if they've looked after you, you've been sat down and it's been good service. You don't tip someone for just pouring you a pint."

Tipping culture was also changed by the pandemic, even in the tip-heavy US. "During Covid, we started tipping people that we didn't traditionally tip," says Michael Lynn, an emeritus professor of consumer behaviour and marketing at Cornell University and the author of The Psychology of Tipping. It was akin to "hazard pay", he says, plus there was a

◀ 'You don't tip someone for just pouring you a pint'

perception that some people were more likely to be struggling financially. "People started being willing to tip and businesses took that as a message that consumers will bear it."

The accepted level has always increased over time, says Lynn. This could be due to any number of factors. "The population of the US is more urban than it used to be and urban people tend to tip more than rural people," he says. Then there's the move away from cash. "People who pay with a card or digitally tend to tip more than people who pay with cash." And big tippers - who do it for reasons of status, or to ensure good future service - ruin it for the rest of us. "It creates this upward pressure," says Lynn. "It's got to stop somewhere, right? We're at close to 20% today [in US restaurants]."

Several times a year, I have a gnawing anxiety about whether or not to tip my hairdresser. It's not that I don't think he deserves it, but would it be condescending? "One of the impediments to tipping is concern about status and power implications," says Lynn. "Money commodifies the relationship. If you view it as a social relationship, you don't want to contaminate it with tips. It's very hard to tip people that you have a long-term relationship with."

Why do I tip my hairdresser (I'm too embarrassed to press "no"), but not the plumber or the dentist? It's usually because with the latter two - or an accountant, a lawyer or a doctor - "I'm worse off than they are", says Lynn. "Not only financially, probably, but also they're helping solve a problem for me. When I go to something in a hospitality context, or even for a haircut, it's generally something positive. I'm enjoying myself and that worker is doing not such pleasant work."

The late anthropologist George M Foster, says Lynn, "argued that tipping began as an attempt by patrons to say: 'Don't envy me because I'm having fun and you're working.' The primary evidence he had for this was that the word

for tip in many languages is 'drink money'."

Social expectation is the main reason people leave a tip. The second, he says, is "social connection and rapport. If a server is attractive, if a server is the opposite sex, if the server smiles, calls you by name, squats down, there are so many variables that impact the social connection, but they all have a pretty substantial impact on tipping."

This, of course, is affected by blatant bias, sometimes unconscious, in the person leaving a tip. Some research shows that Black waiters and cab drivers receive lower tips, says Lynn. "Having said that, there are also a number of studies not finding this. There's enough data on both sides that my conclusion is clearly there is racial discrimination, but it's not universal and we don't fully understand when it occurs and when it doesn't."

You get more tips from the opposite sex, says Lynn, so "waitresses tend to get slightly better tips. And attractive waitresses get better tips than less attractive waitresses."

▼ Customers are often presented with three tipping options

When British football fans went to the US earlier in the summer for the World Cup, many were baffled and frustrated by the tipping culture. One fan told the BBC it was "weird" to be asked for a tip when buying a bottle of water. Ollie Thomas, a football content creator, says he went "with the expectation of [tipping] being very much in your face and quite intrusive. But I live in London and I didn't think [restaurant tipping] was any different, really."

"The main difference I found in the US was that the service was a lot better. I guess the backdrop of the US tipping culture is that there is a massive weight of expectation on the customer's shoulders to tip because the waiters don't earn much money. Whereas it feels like there's not that level of pressure on the customer in London because the general living wage is a bit higher here."

But even in the US, says Lynn, tip fatigue is real. "In surveys, I was asking people: 'Would you rather tipping be eliminated?' In 2016, about 12% of people said yes. By 2018 it was 42% and by 2022 it was 52%. I haven't repeated that since, but other surveys have asked similar questions. It seems to have gone back down to about 40%. But, absolutely, people say they're being asked to tip for more services than ever before and, even for traditionally tipped services, they're being asked to tip larger amounts. It negatively impacts consumer sentiment."

So, how do we deal with this emerging tipping nightmare? We could do with some guidelines that everyone can agree on, perhaps beginning with a national discussion on how much we really want US tech companies to influence our proud British cheapskate culture. As for current good practice, Jo Bryant, an

'We have always been awkward about class and status - unlike Americans'

etiquette coach and training director at The English Manner, says we should continue to tip in restaurants, but watch out for the service charge. "People shouldn't feel pressure to double tip. For restaurants, generally, it's around 12%."

However, there's no reason to tip at the bar in pubs or coffee shops "apart from for food or table service", says Bryant. But if it's somewhere you go regularly, you may want to consider tipping: you don't want to become known as the non-tipper. It's completely acceptable to press the "no" button to a tip request in a place we wouldn't usually tip, even with the person serving you in front of you, but do it briskly and confidently. "As soon as you start apologising and making a thing that you're not tipping, then it becomes awkward."

What about in more grey areas? If in situations that feel more condescending or uncomfortable - tipping someone who cleans your house or looks after your children, say - Bryant suggests just giving a generous tip at Christmas. "If you wrap it up into the Christmas cheer, it can feel less awkward."

It's very British, says Bryant, to view tipping through a lens of anxious social appropriateness and class. "Americans don't have that feeling at all. I've provided etiquette classes to Americans and get tipped. It's a great novelty. They'll say goodbye to you and put a note in your hand. I think it stems from the Brits not talking about money. We've always been awkward about wealth and class and status."

It's why, she says, we never developed a tipping culture - and why it feels unsettling. "We all just find it so brazen to be getting out your wallet and handing money to people ... we've been left in this slightly muddy zone." We could fight it - and I'm open to fighting the influence of US tech - but faced with an expectant barista offering me the choice of three buttons, I'm more likely to panic-hit the middle one and hope it wasn't 25%.

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6

The big interview

'In 1984, I worked 363 days'

At the height of his fame, Russ Abbot's Saturday show had 18 million viewers. Then came West End musicals and sitcoms. But a decade ago he disappeared from the limelight. What happened?

Simon Hattenstone

The electronic gates slide open to reveal a gorgeous Portuguese villa, a swimming pool and a beansprout of a man. 'You've made me feel very important,' says Russ Abbot with a smile. 'Come in!'

It's more than 30 years since Abbot, aged 78, dominated Saturday night TV with his sketches, songs and impersonations. He appealed to all sorts. Kids, parents and grandparents united around the TV - first for Russ Abbot's Madhouse, which ran from 1980 to 1985, then The Russ Abbot Show, from 1986 to 1991. He was joined by the inimitable Bella Emberg and a cast of young comics, including Les Dennis, Dustin Gee and Michael Barrymore. But make no mistake, it was Abbot's show and the 80s was his decade. At his peak, he attracted 18 million viewers an episode.

When TV commissioners tired of his brand of sketch comedy, he did stints in the sitcoms Boomers and Last of the Summer Wine and played it straight in the moving TV drama September Song. There was a run of West End musical smashes - Fagin in Oliver!, Roger de Bris in The Producers, Alfred P Doolittle in My Fair Lady. Then, in 2016, he quietly retired. For the past seven years, he has split his time between Barbados and the Algarve, where I find him today.

Abbot introduces me to his wife, Trish, who has a smart silver bob and a northern accent. How long have you two been married, I ask her. 'Sixty years,' she says quietly. 'Not even the Train Robbers got that!' Trish, 80, giggles.

We're standing in a large, airy hall. On a table are figurines of Laurel and Hardy - Abbot's heroes. Upstairs, I can make out lots of

Abbot with his wife, Trish

framed photos. He takes me on a tour. There are pics of him with the great entertainers of his era (Brucey, Elton, Tarby, Shaky) and the royals (Philip, Anne, Charles). We pass the silver discs from his brief period as Britain's unlikeliest pop star (who can forget Atmosphere?). 'That's a certificate acknowledging the biggest box office in summer season history,' he says, like an accountant conducting an audit of his success. 'And that's whatshisname.' He squints at a picture. 'Live Aid. Bob Geldof.'

Pride of place is a photo of him dressed as Cooperman, with Tommy Cooper. Cooperman was one of Abbot's more surreal mashup characters - Superman meets the brilliantly bumbling comic giant, who died on stage in 1984. He adored Cooper. 'It was so funny at the funeral. All the faces were there. Max Bygraves, Eric Sykes, me. And when the cortege came in, we'd forgotten he'd got a younger brother who looked just like him. He walked in and we're like: 'Oh God! Another Tommy prank.' When the curtain closed on the coffin, I thought: he's going to come out in a minute because he was such a practical joker.'

He pauses. Now he sounds

emotional. 'After the funeral, we were walking out paying our respects to his wife, Gwen, and she said to me: 'He thought you were the cat's whiskers!' I filled up. Amazing.'

More photos. Dennis and Gee, the double act who memorably impersonated Coronation Street's Mavis Riley and Vera Duckworth on his show. Gee died in 1986, at 43. 'So talented. Died too young.' We come to a picture of Abbot dressed as CU Jimmy, the incomprehensible, ranting Scottish stereotype that he'd struggle to get away with today. He says the character was based on his Scottish mother, whose accent got thicker the nearer the family got to Scotland for their holidays. He impersonates her - and she sounds as incoherent as Jimmy.

Abbot's mother, Elizabeth, was in domestic service to the Duke of Westminster when she met his father, Don Roberts, a tanker driver. Young Russell Roberts was a bright lad who went to Chester Grammar. But he became obsessed with drumming, flunked his O-levels and left school at 16 to join a band called the Black Abbots. He supplemented his income with a job as a stagehand at the Royalty theatre in Chester, where

the band had a residency. They soon became a comedy band, with Abbot dismounting the drums to tell daft jokes. The band won the talent show Opportunity Knocks six weeks in a row, became huge in the working men's clubs, but never had a hit record. By 1973, Abbot was appearing on the TV standup comedy show The Comedians and his manager, Mike Hughes, didn't think Russell Roberts had a ring to it. He suggested he become Russ Abbot. 'He said: 'Think about it, if your bill is in alphabetical order, you'll always be top of the bill.' He said: 'Abba could top you, but that's about it.' That's clever, isn't it?'

By the late 1970s, Abbot was well known as a comic and starred in the original Madhouse series with the more famous Freddie Starr. After 17 years as a Black Abbot, he left to go solo. Within months, Russ Abbot's Madhouse started on ITV (The Russ Abbot Show would move during its run to the BBC) and he was a Saturday night fixture.

We join Trish outside. She's made us coffee and piled a plate with digestive biscuits. Did life change when he became a household name? 'No.' He looks at her for confirmation. 'Just in the sense we moved up the ladder homewise, didn't we, Trish? So we started in the caravan. Trish's dad had a win on the pools that paid for the caravan as a wedding present. Then my dad got us a place with £1-a-week rent. Two up, two down. Then we got a £10,000 bungalow and sold it for twice the price.'

'Yep,' says Trish. 'Then we moved down south, we moved to Wentworth. We looked at this nice house...'

'And that was it, yes,' says Trish. 'We bought it, cash.'

Were loads of women interested in you? 'Not really, no,' he says. There's a glint in his eye. 'Oh, I suppose in my drumming days. Early.' The glint vanishes. 'Actually, it was more the singers. Because I was just the drummer in the back.' He tells me how he met Trish. 'She came to the stage door of the British Legion in Ellesmere Port as I was packing my drums up. We had a bass player in those days called Paul Dodd.' Trish says: 'Is the bass player around?' I said: 'No, he's gone love.' She said: 'Oh, that's a shame, I wanted to say hello to him.'

Did you fancy the bass player, I ask Trish.

'Yeah.' So you got the wrong bloke? 'Yeah, I got him instead.' 'I said: come on, I'll buy you a drink. Then I said: let me give you a lift home. She said: I only live

Abbot performing on ITV circa 1980

across the road. I said: you can't walk alone at this time of night. So I left with a kiss and a cuddle. And it all started from there, didn't it, Trish?'

Did she find him funny? 'Oh no. Very normal. Lovely brothers, lovely mum and dad. Just normal, like the boy next door.'

He must have been stopped a lot over the years by fans. 'No, not really,' he says. 'It was always a nod and a wink and a smile. There's one funny story. We went to the opening show of Miss Saigon.' Trish is already giggling. 'We go into the VIP area. We sit there and Trish nudges me. All these heads are turning. And I say: 'It's all right! The lights will go down in a minute.' I say: 'Trish, it's a compliment.' And she nudges me again and says: 'Look who's sitting next to me!' And it was Burt Lancaster. She fell about.'

Abbot never considered himself a star. 'I always think I'm playing that role of Russ Abbot. I go in the stage door as Russ Abbott and come out as Russell Roberts.' And he was too reserved to play the big I am. 'I never used to like chatshows, because I was shy and I found them embarrassing. It's like, now I'm retired, I'm not so shy and I can talk about it because it's past.'

Trish has always been his biggest

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fan, he says. Then he corrects himself. 'Trish and my mum. She used to do handouts for the WI. I'd sign the autograph and she'd sign the back: 'Russ's mum!' She loved it!'

In her 70s, his mother got dementia. She went into a home, but Abbot didn't realise how bad it had got until he arranged for her to come to a show. 'Trish brought her up to the dressing room and Mum walked in and said: 'What a pleasure to meet you. Thank you so much, I've been so entertained. It was absolutely marvellous, and now to meet you in person.'

'I stood there and said: 'Mum, it's me,' and she said: 'I'll have to go now, my family's waiting for me.' So Trish took her back. I slammed the dressing room door three times. It was terrible. It's a terrible illness. She died about a year later. She was still a very elegant lady, very smartly dressed. She didn't act like she had dementia. She just couldn't remember who I was.'

Abbot worked incredibly hard in his heyday. 'In 1984, I worked 363 days.' Meanwhile, Trish was working incredibly hard, too, bringing up their four children. 'Trish raised them all. I was always away, summer season tour or pantomime. Pantomimes, gosh! You'd get home Christmas Eve, put

the presents under the tree, go to bed, have breakfast, watch the kids open the toys and then go back to do a matinee.'

But, he says, they were great times. He tells me of all the wonderful people he worked with. It sounds like an Oscar acceptance speech. Barry Cryer wrote much of his material, but there was a whole team involved and there is not an actor, producer, writer or manager he misses out.

He was the ideas man, he says, rather than the wordsmith. 'I loved it. All the nonsense.' He talks about the silly names they invented for characters. 'My favourite was

Miss Funnyfanny instead of Miss Moneypenny. I think that was my cousin Russell. I loved Basildon Bond because of the silliness of it.'

Suddenly he's quoting a 40-year-old monologue from a sketch featuring his James Bond parody. 'My name's Bond. Basildon Bond, licence to kill and drive a heavy-goods vehicle. I'd been away on holiday when I was summoned back to headquarters to see my boss P... 'Was it a good holiday Bond?' I said: 'Yes, thank you, sir, I went away for a bit of peace and quiet. I found a nice little piece. I just hope she keeps quiet. He said: 'Don't bother me with a silly little thing

◀ Performing the Cooperman sketch with Bella Emberg on Russ Abbot's Madhouse

◀ 'Now I'm retired, I'm not so shy'

▶ As a young man with his band, the Black Abbots

'I've seen something on YouTube saying 'The tragedy of Russ Abbot''

like that.' I said: 'It's funny, that's what she said.'

He quotes the monologue word-perfect, in all its anachronistic glory. For all the inappropriateness, there's also an innocence to it, as there is to him. I notice he doesn't swear and I ask if he's religious. 'Oh, I believe in God. I say my prayers every night.'

Abbot fell out of fashion in the 1990s, as did virtually all the standup rooted in working men's clubs and seaside summer seasons. Did he mind when his TV show got cancelled? 'I wasn't distressed or angry or anything. It came about when the head of entertainment gave an interview and said: 'The BBC's going to change. No more of this, no more of that,' and somebody said: 'Does that mean Russ Abbot?' and he said yes, meaning the sketch shows. So then it became 'BBC sacks Russ Abbot', but that didn't bother me. I thought: well, I've had a very good run.'

'Also, I'd just cracked the West End, so I was doing everything I wanted to do without the stress of the TV shows.'

Why did he fall out of fashion? 'It was when the new wave came in. Alternative comedy. I thought, alternative comedy? What's it alternative to? If the thing's funny, it's funny. Political correctness came in, and you can't laugh at each other and you can't laugh at yourself. At the same time, a lot of comedy started going blue and I thought: I'm not going down that road.'

So much of his show's humour was rooted in stereotyping and many of the jokes were at the expense of his great friend Emberg's weight. Did he understand why that was no longer acceptable? 'Yes. Some of the scripts I used to look at myself and wonder. I'd say: 'Bella, have you read the script?' and she'd say: 'Yeah, I think it's funny'. I'd say: 'Are you sure?' and she'd say: 'Yeah, why?' 'I'm just asking your opinion,' and she'd say: 'I think it's hilarious,' and I'd say: 'So do I?' Did she ever get upset? 'No, she never got upset once.' Emberg died in 2018 at 80. Of all the people he's worked with, he says he misses her most.

I loved it when Emberg as Blunderwoman lifted Abbot over her shoulders and carried him off. Even at his heaviest, he weighed only 12 and a half stone. Not much for a man over six foot tall. These days, Emberg would have had even less trouble. He's lost two and a half

stone. He knows Trish is worried, but he's had every test going and nothing has been diagnosed. As for Trish, he says, she's had two strokes in the past year, so they are taking it easy. Which doesn't mean they're not up to a round of golf. Abbot is a fine player and used to play off a handicap of 12, but he insists Trish is better than him. To be fair, so does she.

Stories circulated that Abbot retired because he was embittered that comedy had changed and no straight roles were being offered to him.

It's true that he's not a great fan of today's comedy and he was disappointed when Boomers and Last of the Summer Wine were cancelled, but he insists the stories are nonsense. He actually retired because Hughes, his manager, was retiring and he thought it was a good time to call it quits and spend more time with Trish and have a social life.

'I've seen something on YouTube saying 'The tragedy of Russ Abbot' and 'He's run away to Portugal!'. He smiles.

'We just watched it once,' says Trish. 'I said, don't watch it, Russell.'

It doesn't look much of a tragedy to me, I say, glancing out at the cloudless sky, swimming pool and topiained bushes.

'Thank you,' Trish says. 'I've had a wonderful career,' Abbot says. 'Wonderful!' 'He's always said that,' Trish says.

And now you're enjoying a richly deserved retirement? 'Absolutely,' he says. How would Trish feel if he decided to go back to work? Her eyes light up. 'Happy,' she says. Why? 'I'd like him to do something like Last of the Summer Wine. I think he does miss it, I've got to say.'

Abbot gives her a look. 'Yeah!' he says. 'But not desperately, Trish.'

PHOTOGRAPHS: DAVID LEVEN/STEE GUARDIAN; PHOTOSTERSTOCK; ARNAB WISCONSIN/LAMY; IT'S BECOMYSTERSTOCK

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Arts

'They'd joke: I'm crying - and you'd rather take my picture than deal with the issue'

slamming, because there was nowhere to go!"

Indeed, we are not spared from seeing the children at their least flattering: "We used to have a running joke where Lawrence would say: 'You're the only parent that would photograph me when I'm crying rather than deal with the issue straight away,'" admits Haymes, "but I like to think I was attentive."

There are also multiple shots of the boys naked - not just running around the house as young children but as they transition into adulthood too. I suspect most teenagers would not be cool with this, but Haymes insists he has their approval. "They don't have an issue," he says. "I've been lucky enough to have some very nice photographers in my household at various times, so they're aware of the creative process." He shrugs: "There are bigger themes in the book than child nudity. That was just a part of our daily life."

Besides, when Philipp and Lawrence reach their teens - all bleached hair, tattoos and stubble - they work out an ingenious method of rebellion. Instead of sulking or turning away from the camera, Haymes says his kids smiled and put their thumbs up, knowing that the last thing their dad wanted was a posed family portrait. "That was basically their way of telling me to clear out of their lives," he says.

Born in Stratford-upon-Avon, Haymes hoped to study art but ended up dropping out. "I took way too many drugs in my 20s and had a bit of a breakdown," he says. After couch-surfing in London for a bit, he found work in a photo studio, eventually assisting Jürgen Teller. In 1999, he packed two cameras

▲ 'It made me realise that life is very short'... Lawrence, left, and Philipp

'I didn't want it to be saccharine'

From verrucas to their pet hamster dying, from bloody noses to the first sproutings of armpit hair, Nick Haymes photographed his two sons as they grew from drooling babies into young men

Tim Jonze

Not many family photo albums open with images of the twin towers on fire. But for Nick Haymes, it made perfect sense. "When 9/11 happened," he says, "I realised life was very short." At the time, he was living in New York, trying to forge a career, while his friend, colleague and future wife Lina was dealing with the fallout of her previous marriage. "It made us realise we should probably get together and have a family. It was this huge historical event, but on a very micro level, it also shaped my relationship with my wife and children."

Chronograph is a photography book that runs from those terrorist attacks to the present day, tracing the journey of Haymes's two sons, Philipp and Lawrence, as they grow from drooling babies into young men. We are given a ringside seat as arms get broken, beloved pets die and hairs start sprouting from armpits. The mundane side of life - verrucas, messy kitchens, Lina cleaning out an ear with a cotton bud - is captured in the same way as birthday parties and rites of passage.

"Because we lived in this tiny, 800 sq ft apartment in Manhattan, you don't miss a thing, all the ups and downs, all the mood swings," says Haymes. "There was no door

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into a bag and decided to try his luck in New York. It was here he met Lina, a Jewish refugee who, as a teenager, had moved to the US with her parents from Ukraine – then part of the Soviet Union. She was working on a magazine and gave him a commission that allowed him to get a visa and stay.

Haymes’s own difficult transition from youth to adulthood is perhaps what draws him to his subjects. Between Dog and Wolf captured his road trips across California and Oklahoma with a group of young skateboarders. Follow-up Gabe TM unfurl over many years hanging out with Gabe Nevins, the teenage star of Gus Van Sant’s Paranoid Park. Unexpectedly, Haymes found himself chronicling Nevins’s homelessness and addiction in the wake of making the movie. Dancing on the Fault Line, published in 2024, was another mammoth excursion, following teenager Love Bailey and her extended queer family right up to her decision to transition in her 30s.

Haymes doesn’t intend to foster such deep relationships with his subjects. “I always think, ‘Oh, I’ll just do a nice quick shoot.’ But then I get attached to everybody, they become part of my life. You can become a father figure to them, or a therapist maybe.”

It was during Covid that Haymes found the time to go through all his family negatives and work out what to do with them. “It moved me pretty heavily,” he says. “I also had to try to be as impartial as I could because I didn’t want it to be saccharine.”

Besides Lina and the boys, the other key figures in the book are Lina’s parents Nadia and Mikhail. “They were big characters,”

says Haymes. “I had to learn how to become a little more emotional and a little more warm and compassionate.”

One striking image is of Mikhail sitting with wrapping paper on his head. He’s in a full tracksuit, giving off a slightly intimidating Paulie Walnuts vibe. “He was a very loving person,” says Haymes, “but yeah, maybe a bit of a rogue. Whereas my mother-in-law had her issues and I think maybe undiagnosed bipolar disorder. She also became a victim of prescription medication in the US, and we had to deal with that. She was certainly a tough mother-in-law, but at some point you fall in love with her anyway.”

There are some portentous images in the book. Scars on Mikhail’s stomach mirror Lina’s caesarean scars, although we can only guess why he’s been cut open. Then there is the pet hamster, who we see being held, adored and then grieved for as it rests in its cardboard coffin.

The book’s closing passages are extremely moving, as we see Nadia and Mikhail in hospital together, their conditions slowly deteriorating. At some point, Haymes converted the home art gallery into a hospice.

In the book, it appears as if the couple died at the same time. In reality it was a year apart and the couple had gone through a divorce by that point. “There are things that don’t need to be known,” says Haymes of the story his book tells. “Everybody has a family album, and through those you only remember certain parts.”

Despite their divorce, Nadia and Mikhail were buried together in LA. “I’m not sure if Lina’s father is enjoying it right now, but that’s what happened,” says Haymes with a smile.

He says he had been asked to make a photography book of his family for 15 years but it was only when the grandparents died that he realised the project was complete. “The book starts with death and ends with death,” he says. “It’s gone full circle.”

Interspersed with beautiful, closeup images of flowers received at the funeral, we see Philipp and Lawrence standing by the graveside with the urn. “For them to be able to communicate those emotions and to speak at a service, for me that felt like, ‘OK, they’re on their own now. They’ve become men.’”

He pauses, then laughs like only a dad can. “Having said that,” he adds, “they’re still on my Uber account.”

◀ ‘Ab-sol-utely incredible!’ ... Jennifer Stahl in Mere Mortals; below, Aszure Barton

What’s really in Pandora’s box?

Aszure Barton thinks Pandora, the first woman, has had a bad rap. So now the choreographer is using dance to put that right

Lyndsey Winship

Aszure Barton is taking herself back to the creation of Mere Mortals, remembering the creative buzz of the studio at San Francisco Ballet. “Sam was fiddling around making magic in one corner,” she says – that’s Sam Shepherd, AKA electronic musician Floating Points, who plays live in the show. Digital art duo Hamill Industries were there too, designing visuals for giant LED screens. “I was in a corner with the dancers,” says Barton. “Principals and apprentices, everyone working together. It was a really shared experience, which I loved.” In fact, it’s a “curiosity for real collaboration” that drives the Canadian-American choreographer. “If it was just about me,” she says, “the work wouldn’t be as powerful.”

Mere Mortals, which opened in San Francisco in 2024, is finally getting a European premiere, at this year’s Edinburgh international festival. While Barton’s memories of making the show are all about human connection, the subject matter is the opposite: artificial intelligence. It’s inspired by the myth of Pandora’s box, but instead of a box unleashing the evils and sorrows of humanity, it is reimagined as a cautionary tale about AI.

The idea came from SF Ballet’s artistic director Tamara Rojo, who took over the company in 2022 after 26 years in the UK, notably as a principal dancer at the Royal Ballet and artistic director of English National Ballet. “She was very hands-off in terms of the work itself,” says Barton, but Rojo assembled a crack international team for her ambitious commission, which garnered some rave reviews for the intensity of its

scale, score and visual impact. Barton had worked with Rojo before, when she choreographed Fantastic Beings for English National Ballet in 2016, a dance full of endlessly inventive, quirky movement. Beyond that, the 50-year-old isn’t well known on this side of the Atlantic (Rojo has called her “completely underrated”), although she’s been choreographing for more than two decades with major companies all over the world, as well as for her own, Aszure Barton & Artists. She was mentored by the great Mikhail Baryshnikov at his Baryshnikov Arts Center in New York. What did she learn from him? “On day one, he said, ‘Never ask me for money’ and ‘I like your willingness to work your ass off.’”

In the making of Mere Mortals, it turns out the richest conversations were not about the perils of AI, but the myth of Pandora, or “a myth that had been misconstrued”, says Barton. “A false story spread throughout history of this powerful being who didn’t have any agency and was toxic.”

There’ll always be different tellings of Greek myths, but Pandora does seem to have had a bad rap. She was the first woman, an Eve-like figure, created from clay and given by Zeus to Epimetheus, unbeknownst to him, as a punishment for his brother Prometheus giving humans fire. “One of the things I was really driven by was the fact that she was an agent of change,” says Barton. As well as looking to a fictional

figure from the past, however, Barton also used what was right in front of her in the present: the dancer in the lead role, Jennifer Stahl. “Ab-sol-utely incredible!” she says of Stahl, wide-eyed. “This stunning, powerful, amazing woman that I was getting to create with made my job very sweet.” Stahl, who has danced with SF Ballet for 20 years, will be returning to the Pandora role, having had a baby in between premieres.

In the same way the inspiration for Pandora was right there in the studio, the show’s theme was all around her in San Francisco, the AI centre of the world. “You’re living the reality,” says Barton, “the systems and the chaos and the beauty, and I was really intuitively responding to that moment.” Barton uses lots of tech in her working life, not so much AI, more video, to endlessly document, analyse and deconstruct her way through the creative process. “I love dance because it’s so human and so beautiful. You can do cool stuff with technology, but there’s nothing like sharing a space with a dancer.”

She’s not anti-AI. Some choreographers use it as a tool to find new ideas. “That’s cool,” says Barton, although her own creativity is sparked by interacting with dancers. “You never have choreographer’s block if you’re open to what’s right in front of you,” she says. “Dancers don’t get credited enough for their input.”

Barton wants the audience of Mere Mortals to be “showered with energy”. She can’t sit in her chair and watch it, she says. “I have to be in the back, bouncing up and down like I’m at a rave.” Between the dancers and the musicians (from the Royal Scottish National Orchestra) there are 87 performers in the show. “Masses of people sharing themselves, sharing this raw beauty,” says Barton. “It’s delicious.” Mere Mortals is at Edinburgh Playhouse, 28-30 August and Sadler’s Wells, London, 9-12 September

PHOTOGRAPHS: COURTESY OF THE ARTIST AND MACK

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TV and radio

REVIEW BY LUCY MANGAN

The Terror: Devil in Silver

Behind this rote hospital horror, a perfectly decent drama is lurking

Sky Atlantic/Now

Things that go bump in the night? Bad. Things that go bump in the night in a dilapidated psychiatric hospital? Infinitely worse. That, basically, is the premise of Devil in Silver, the latest volume of the anthology series The Terror, which began in 2018 with a supernaturally charged tale of a polar expedition to find out what happened to the English explorer Sir John Franklin's 1845 Arctic voyage. Crikely, it does not end well.

The next was set during the second world war and was about shapeshifters from Japanese folklore terrorising a Japanese-American community in southern California. A hiatus followed, but now The Terror is back with a double dose of horror: a malevolent spirit moving in and out of the bodies of the patients of New Hyde psychiatric hospital, and the more tangible but no less frightening diabolism of the US mental healthcare system.

Pepper (Dan Stevens, still of Downton Abbey fame despite his many varied roles since the series ended) is in New Hyde because the three policemen who arrested him after they caught a few punches he was aiming at his girlfriend's controlling ex threw him in there rather than completing the paperwork the station would have required. There he meets the lost and suffering souls who have ended up in what amounts, due to underfunding and understaffing, to a holding pen rather than a rehabilitative or care facility.

Dorry (Judith Light) is the longest-serving resident - put there decades ago by her husband because of her endless crying fits, though her later memories reveal a greater darkness. Kofi (Chinaza Uche) - or Coffee, as he is called by the rest of his companions until it is too late - was a structural engineer in Ghana

but now depends on medication to keep himself steady. Loochie (played by non-binary actor b) ended up in the system after a violent incident with a sibling, but at least one member of staff believes her charge is able to cope in the real world and, as the hospital's evil spirit gathers strength and wrath, gets the chance to prove it.

Pepper comes to understand from his fellow patients - and some of the staff, none of whom is an out-and-out villain and many of whom are almost as trapped by circumstance as their patients are - that the key to whatever is haunting the hospital lies behind a locked silver door. Beyond that door is a single-occupancy room containing the comatose body of a man who has, in one state or other, been at New Hyde even longer than Dorry. Arnold, the man in question, received a transorbital lobotomy after killing a doctor a year after he was sent to the ward.

Jump scares, gory set pieces, flickering lights, endless corridors and an extremely unsettling turn from John Benjamin Hickey as the hospital's founder, Dr Walter, take care of the required horror element of the show in a fairly rote manner. We have seen it all before, often more punchily done (though the ending does redeem the lack of previous innovation). Ditto the idea of monster as metaphor for both mental instability and the systems that are supposedly in place to steady it.

You could say that Devil in Silver does not shy away from the latter point. If you were feeling less generous, you could say it labours it. Dorry embodies the effects of misogyny and patriarchalism on the medical profession. The question of racial prejudice permeates the fates of all the patients of colour. None of the patients/prisoners comes from the kind of money that might have protected them - or at least got them placed in a facility that does not require the services of a nurse like Scotch Tape (Hampton Fluker), so called because of his talents for keeping mod cons running with little more than a roll of the stuff and a prayer.

It works best as a straightforward drama. The real-life horrors of old-fashioned treatments (as we see when Dorry's backstory starts to play out), and of contemporary care standards for the forgotten and marginalised masses, are bleaker than any imaginary beastie prowling through psyches and corridors. The ease with which Pepper gets trapped in the system - drugged on arrival, he sleeps through discharge time - the guilt he wrestles with over his abandonment of his young son and how an essentially good man can find a way to redemption: these are all more terrifying and more mesmerising to contemplate than any bogeyman under the bed.

WHAT TO WATCH

Buried With Michael Sheen

9pm, BBC Two

There's a lagoon in Ruabon, north Wales, that is so toxic that the barrels containing the chemicals dumped in it have now rotted away. Until about 20 years ago, children used to play around it. Michael Sheen's compassionate and enraging exposé of the alleged poisoning of parts of his homeland decades ago by contractors working for the now defunct chemical company Monsanto concludes with the actor meeting people with cancer who are searching for accountability. Spoiler alert: it's an uphill battle.

Phil Harrison

Martin & Roman's Irish Road Trip 8pm, Channel 4

The final leg of the father and son's tour takes them to a snowy Northern Ireland. They spend a night in Ballygally Castle - said to be the most haunted hotel in the country - play a game of hurling, vampire-hunt, and swim in the freezing sea. You can't accuse them of not getting stuck in. Hollie Richardson

My Life Is Murder 8pm, U&Alibi

More low-stakes antipodean crime-solving fun with Lucy Lawless as the former detective turned private investigator Alexa Crowe. This time round, she deals with the case of a wealthy woman who is killed amid a dog custody dispute. She finds herself in the bizarre world of millionaire dating, before racing to save another pet victim. HR

Long Lost Family: Born Without Trace - What Happened Next 9pm, ITV1

The lovely but emotionally devastating show speaks to another pair of foundling siblings: Natasha and Lee-Ann

want to know who left them as babies, two years apart, in the toilets of two different south London hospitals. And nurse Liz provides updates on what has happened since she shared her story of being found as a baby severely ill in a hedge. HR

Celebrity Hunted 9pm, Channel 4

Celebrity status adds a different dimension to this entertaining if always mildly sinister nationwide game of hide and seek. Is it really possible to blend in with the civilians? In this penultimate episode, one of our celebrities makes a basic error and seeks refuge with a known contact in Scotland. Oops. PH

Secret Lives of Gypsy Wives 10pm, Channel 4

The buzzy reality show starring Gypsy influencer Tewley Precious ends its first season on a high with the social media star celebrating her 26th birthday in typically boisterous style. But there is also an emotive wedding dress fitting for her sister Pearly and a potentially problematic brand partnership to consider. Graeme Virtue

◀ Chinaza Uche as Coffee and Dan Stevens as Pepper in The Terror: Devil in Silver

What's On Scan the QR code below to sign up for the What's On newsletter, our free TV email with the best reviews and news direct to your inbox every Monday

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BBC One	BBC Two	ITV1	Channel 4	Channel 5	BBC Four
6.0 Breakfast (T) 9.30 Morning Live: Top Tips and Best Bits (T) 10.30 Garden Rescue (T) (R) 11.15 Homes Under the Hammer (T) (R) 12.15 Bargain Hunt (T) 1.0 News (T) 1.35 Regional News and Weather (T) 1.45 News (T) 2.0 Money for Nothing (T) 2.45 Escape to the Country (T) 3.30 The Repair Shop (T) (R) 4.30 The Answer Run (T) (R) 5.15 Pointless (T) (R) 6.0 News (T) 6.30 Regional News and Weather (T) 7.0 The One Show (T) 7.30 EastEnders (T)	6.15 The Answer Run (T) (R) 7.0 Day Zone: The Repair Shop (T) (R) 8.0 Match of the Day (T) (R) 9.0 News (T) 1.0 Richard Osman's House of Games (T) (R) 1.30 The Edge (T) (R) 2.15 Do You Know Your Place? (T) (R) 2.45 Animal Park (T) (R) 3.30 Serengeti II (T) (R) 4.30 Vintage Antiques Roadshow (T) (R) 5.15 Flag It! (T) (R) 6.0 Richard Osman's House of Games (T) (R) 6.30 Great Continental Railway Journeys (T) (R) 7.0 Global Eye (T) 7.30 Mastermind (T)	6.0 Good Morning Britain (T) 10.0 This Morning (T) 1.30 News and Weather (T) 1.55 Local News and Weather (T) 2.0 Dickinson's Real Deal (T) (R) 3.0 Deal Or No Deal (T) (R) 4.0 Tipping Point (T) (R) 5.0 The Chase (T) (R) 6.0 Local News and Weather (T) 6.30 News and Weather (T) 7.30 Fletchers' Family Farm (T) (R)	6.30 The King of Queens (T) (R) 7.45 Everybody Loves Raymond (T) (R) 9.10 Fraser (T) (R) 11.10 Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares USA (T) (R) 12.05 News (T) 12.10 Find It, Fix It, Flag It (T) (R) 1.10 The Great House Giveaway (T) (R) 2.10 Countdown (T) 3.0 A Place in the Sun (T) (R) 4.0 The Great B&B Challenge (T) (R) 5.0 Chateau DIY (T) (R) 6.0 American Pickers (T) (R) 7.0 News (T)	6.0 Milkshake! 9.15 Jeremy Vine (T) 11.30 Storm & Alexis (T) 12.45 News (T) 12.50 Matt Allwright (T) 2.20 L&M A View to Kill For (Brittany Underwood, 2023) (T) 4.0 Castle (T) (R) 4.55 Love Nature (T) (R) 5.0 News (T) 6.0 Motorbomming With Merion & Webster (T) (R) 7.0 Cycling: Vuelta a España 2026 (T)	7.0 The Architecture the Railways Built (T) (R) Tim Davis Follows his family's roots by exploring Metroland. 7.45 The Flying Gardener (T) (R) Extraordinary lawn designs.
8.0 Sort Your Life Out With Stacey Solomon (T) (R) A family discover they own more than 2,000 greetings cards, 74 Christmas pines, and 99 odd socks. 9.0 Death in Paradise (T) (R) A prestigious chess match ends in murder, while the commissioner is confronted with his past.	8.0 Only Connect (T) Victoria Coran Mitchell hosts. 8.30 University Challenge (T) Pembroke College takes on the University of St Andrews. 9.0 Buried With Michael Sheen (T) The actor visits Ruabon in north Wales, where many residents have voiced concerns about high local incidences of cancer.	8.0 Emmerdale (T) It is Joe and Dave's wedding day. 8.30 Coronation Street (T) Tim makes a confession to Lucy. 9.0 Long Lost Family: Born Without Trace - What Happened Next (T) Davina McCall and Nicky Campbell find out what happened to foundling Natasha and her full sister Lee-Ann.	8.0 Martin & Roman's Irish Road Trip (T) The Kemps head to snowy Northern Ireland, diving into Selkie myths, hurling, haunted hotels and Derry's Halloween festival. Last in the series. 9.0 Celebrity Hunted (T) One fugitive heads north to Loch Lomond, while a pair make an appearance at Bristol Pride.	8.0 Street Cops: Catching the Nobs (T) A unit of armed officers are called to Northampton's high street. 9.0 Fare Dodgers: At War With the Law (T) TTI, investigators track down a suspected serial fare evader who is accused of using a blocked card to rack up more than £2,000 in unpaid fares in a month.	8.0 Archaeology: A Secret History (T) (R) The history of archaeological breakthroughs. 9.0 Mastermind (T) (R) The second heat from 1977. 9.30 Call My Bluff (T) (R) Patrick Campbell, Francesca Amis and Michael. Layston take on Frank Muir, Pamela Harlech and Robin Knox-Johnston.
10.0 News (T) 10.30 Regional News (T) Weather 10.40 Have I Got News for You (T) (R) Stephen Morgan hosts. 11.10 L&M Emily (Frances O'Connor, 2022) (T) Future novelist Emily Bruntis is drawn to the parish curate. Drama, with Emma Mackey. 1.10 Weather for the Week Ahead (T) 1.15 News (T)	10.0 Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing (T) (R) 10.30 Newsnight (T) Weather 11.05 L&M Iowa 2, Leannas Towers, 1978) (T) A man-eating shark attacks teenagers at a seaside resort. Thriller, starring Roy Scheider. 12.55 Sign Zone: Countryfile (T) (R) 1.50 Bergerac (T) (R) 2.45 This is BBC Two (T)	10.0 News (T) Weather 10.30 Local News (T) Weather 10.45 L&M Rush Hour (Brett Rahner, 1998) (T) A Hong Kong detective in LA is teamed with a local cop. Comedy adventure, starring Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker. 12.25 Shop on TV 3.0 The Staircase (R) 4.0 Unwind With ITV (T) 5.10 Dickinson's Real Deal (T)	10.0 Secret Lives of Gypsy Wives (T) Last in the series. 11.05 Celebrity Goggles (T) (R) 12.05 Emergency Helicopter Medics (T) (R) 1.0 Kitchen Nightmares USA (T) (R) 1.55 L&M Dirt Music (2019) (T) Drama. 3.40 Find It, Fix It, Flag It (T) (R) 3.45 Come Dine With Me (T) (R) 4.40 Hollyoaks Omnibus (T) (R)	10.0 Police Interceptors: Taking Down the Shoplifting Gangs (T) (R) 11.05 Traffic Cops (T) (R) 12.05 Police Interceptors (T) (R) 1.0 Cruise TV (T) (R) 2.0 GPS: Behind Closed Doors (T) (R) 2.50 Castle (T) (R) 3.35 Friends (T) (R) 4.35 The Highland Vet (T) (R) 5.25 Entertainment News (T)	10.0 John Betjeman: The Last Laugh - Reputations (T) (R) 11.05 Beside the Seaside: Bird's Eye View (T) (R) 11.55 Metroland (T) (R) 12.45 A Passion for Churches (T) (R) 1.35 The Flying Gardener (T) (R) 1.50 John Betjeman: The Last Laugh - Reputations (T) (R) 3.0 Archaeology: A Secret History (T) (R)

Other channels

BBC Three 7.0pm The Catch Up 7.05 Deadly 60 7.30 Deadly 60 8.0 The Great British Seating Box 9.0 Top Gear 10.0 Silent Witness 11.0 Silent Witness 11.55 L&M Monkey Man (2024) 1.50 The Trouble With Kanye 3.05 Vigil U&Dave 6.0am Teleshopping 7.25 Top Gear 8.20 Border Force: America's Gatekeepers 9.30 Border Force: America's Gatekeepers 10.20 Rick Stein's India 11.20 Yukon Gold 12.20 Top Gear 1.20 Top Gear 2.20 Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing 3.0 Guy's Garage 4.0 Hairy Billiards Best of British 5.0 Rick Stein's India 6.0 Rick Stein's India 7.0 Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing 7.40 Would I Lie to You? The Unseen Bits 8.20 Would I Lie to You? At Christmas 9.0 How I Did a Bit More News for You 10.0 Q1 11.10 Telemonitor 12.0 Nickle the Week 12.40 Would I Lie to You? The Unseen Bits 1.20 Would I Lie to You? At Christmas 2.0 Q1 3.0 Richard Osman's House of Games 3.30 Parks and Recreation 4.0 Teleshopping

E4 6.0am Hollyoaks 6.30 Hollyoaks 6.55 Rudolish Tube Shorts 7.0 Couples Come Dine With Me 8.0 Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares USA 9.0 Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares USA 10.0 America's Fumier Home Video 11.0 Below Deck: Mediterranean 12.0 The Simpsons 2.0 Brooklyn Nine-Nine 2.30 Brooklyn Nine-Nine 3.0 Modern Family 3.30 Modern Family 4.0 Modern Family 5.0 The Simpsons 5.30 The Simpsons 6.0 The Simpsons 6.30 The Simpsons 7.0 Hollyoaks 7.20 The Simpsons 8.0 Ladies of London: The New Reign 9.0 Below Deck Down Under 10.0 Goggles 11.0 First Vision 12.05 Naked Attraction 1.10 Below Deck Down Under 2.10 Ladies of London: The New Reign 3.0 Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares USA 3.55 The Goldbergs 4.20 The Goldbergs 4.45 Brooklyn Nine-Nine 5.10 Brooklyn Nine-Nine 5.35 Brooklyn Nine-Nine Film4 11.0am L&M Charade (1963) 1.75 L&M Howards End (1992) 4.05 L&M Shenandoah (1963) 6.25 L&M

Moonfall (2022) 9.0 L&M Public Enemies (2009) 11.45 L&M Heat (1995) PBS America 6.0am Teleshopping 8.0 Westhered: Earth's Extremes 8.35 The World After Stonehenge 9.55 The Normans 11.10 The War Cabinet 12.0 The War Cabinet 1.0 Westhered: Earth's Extremes 1.35 The World After Stonehenge 2.10 The Normans 4.05 The War Cabinet 5.05 The War Cabinet 6.05 The World After Stonehenge 7.10 The Normans 8.30 The War Cabinet 9.30 The War Cabinet 10.30 Once Upon a Time in Northern Ireland 12.0 The Normans 1.15 Westhered: Earth's Extremes 2.0 Teleshopping Sky One 6.0am Mornings With Ridge and Frost 8.0 Stargate SG-1 9.0 Stargate SG-1 10.0 La Brea 11.0 The Simpsons 11.30 The Simpsons 12.0 Africa's Hunters 1.0 Hawaii Five-0 2.0 Hawaii Five-0 3.0 S.W.A.T 4.0 S.W.A.T 5.0 The Simpsons 5.30 The Simpsons 6.0 Rob & Ronnell vs Country Music 7.0 The Simpsons

7.30 The Simpsons 8.0 Shark: British Isles Special With Steve Backshall 9.0 Never Mind the Rucksters 10.0 Last Week Tonight With John Oliver 10.40 Rob Beckett: Wallop 12.0 Grimm 1.0 U-2 2.0 Best Medicine 3.0 Hawaii Five-0 4.0 S.W.A.T 5.0 S.W.A.T Sky Arts 6.0am Musical Masterpieces 7.0 Battle of the Irish Dancers 8.0 Artist of the Year: Masterclass 8.30 Artist of the Year: Masterclass 9.0 Tales of the Unexpected 9.30 Tales of the Unexpected 10.0 Alfred Hitchcock Presents 10.30 Alfred Hitchcock Presents 11.0 Discovering: Peter Finch 12.0 The Art of Film With Ian Nathan 1.0 Tales of the Unexpected 1.30 Tales of the Unexpected 2.0 The Alfred Hitchcock Hour 3.0 The Nineties 4.0 Discovering: Gene Wilder 5.0 Portrait Artist of the Year 2023 6.0 Tales of the Unexpected 6.30 Tales of the Unexpected 7.0 Alfred Hitchcock Presents 7.30 Alfred Hitchcock Presents 8.0 André Rose: The Flying Dutchman 9.15 André Rose: The Flying Dutchman

10.30 HMS Pinafore With ENO 12.30 Mozart's Woman: A Musical Journey 2.0 National Theatre Live: Much Ado About Nothing 4.30 Inside Art: Van Gogh at the Courtauld Gallery 5.0 The Art of Film With Ian Nathan Sky Atlantic 6.0am The Garst Wing 8.0 Billions 10.15 House of the Dragon 12.40 Homicide: Life on the Street 1.35 Homicide: Life on the Street 2.30 Billions 3.35 Billions 4.40 Django 5.40 Django 6.35 House of the Dragon 7.45 House of the Dragon 9.0 L&M Nightcrawler (2014) 11.05 Possession 12.05 Dune: Prophecy 1.20 Dune: Prophecy 2.50 House of the Dragon 4.10 Urban Secrets A Emily, BBC One

Radio

Radio 3 6.30am Breakfast 9.30 Essential Classics 1.0 Classical Live. From the Proms, Malkin's Das Lied von der Erde, featuring the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Arjo Birkman, with mezzo Jamie Barton and tenor Clay Hilley. Plus, from Cheltenham music festival, Mozart's Violin Sonata in E minor, E 304, with violinist Hana Chang and pianist Jonathan Marx. 4.0 Composer of the Week: Sally Beamish (1/5) 5.0 In Your 7.0 BBC Proms 2026. Live from the Royal Albert Hall, Maitre Alsop conducts the Philharmonia Orchestra and Marcus Roberts. For in June Tower's Fanfare for the Uncommon Woman, Copland's Appalachian Spring: Sadie, Goodwin's Rhapsody in Blue (Lion) 6.0, at Marcus Roberts, Moroccan's The Big Country: Prelude, Bernstein's Symphonic Dance: From West Side Story, Grant Vick's Three Visions: No 2 - Summerland and Bernstein's On the Town: Three Dance Episodes. 10.0 Night Tracks (R) 11.30 Round Midnight (R) 12.30 Through the Night

Radio 4 6.0am Today 9.0 The Great Crime Mystery. Why is public perception that the crime rate is increasing when in fact it's coming down? (2/2) 9.30 How Did We Get Here: No World Order. Topics include Barack Obama's Nobel peace prize acceptance speech. (5/6) 10.0 Women's Hour 11.0 All Kinds of Minds Nathan Fier explores the impact of neurodysregime on everyday life. (1/2) 11.45 Book of the Week: All the Beauty in the World. By Patrick Brimley. (1/5) 12.0 News 12.04 You and Yours 12.57 Weather 1.0 The World at One 1.45 Human Intelligence. Naomi Alderman profiles Voltaire. (6/10) 2.0 The Archers (R) 2.15 Fags, Mags and Bags (R) 2.45 Opening Lines (R) 3.0 Great Lives. Author James Aldred nominates wildlife cameraman Eric Ashby. (1/9) 3.30 You've Dead to Me (R) 4.0 The WhatsApp Underground (R) 4.30 Soul Music (R) 5.0 FM 6.0 News 6.30 Just a Minute. With Paul Morton, Rachel Parris, Gyles Brandeith and Lucy Porter. (5/6) 7.0 The Archers 7.15 Front Row 8.0 The Briefing Room (R) 8.30 Inside Science

(R) 9.0 The Great Crime Mystery (R) 9.30 How Did We Get Here (R) 10.0 The World Tonight 10.40 Book at Bedtime: Mr Sidhu's Post Office. By Annemar Brar. (6/10) 11.0 There's Something I Need to Tell You (R) 11.30 Everything Is Fake and Nobody Cares (R) 12.0 News 12.30 Book of the Week: All the Beauty in the World (R) 12.48 Shipping Forecast 1.0 As World Service 5.0 News 5.04 The WhatsApp Underground (R) 5.34 Shipping Forecast 5.43 Prayer for the Day 5.45 Farming Today Radio 4 Extra 6.0am Five Red Herrings (1/8) 6.30 Kill the Pharaoh! (1/8) 7.0 The Adventures of John and Tony (2/4) 7.30 Dad's Army (15/20) 8.0 55 and Over (1/4) 8.30 Underland (1/5) 8.45 Breathing Underwater (1/5) 9.0 Just a Minute (1/5) 9.30 Human Hosts (1/5) 9.45 Daily Service 10.0 Sounds Natural 10.30 Children of the Enemy 11.0 Five Red Herrings (1/8) 11.30 Kill the Pharaoh! (1/8) 12.0 The Adventures of John and Tony (2/4) 12.30 Dad's Army (15/20) 13.0 55 and Over (1/4) 13.30 Underland (1/5) 14.45

Breathing Underwater (1/5) 2.0 Woodaholics (6/6) 2.30 A Whole 'Nother Story (6/6) 3.0 The July Ghost 3.45 Rose-Coloured Tracts 4.0 Sounds Natural 4.30 Children of the Enemy 5.0 Five Red Herrings (1/8) 5.30 Kill the Pharaoh! (1/8) 6.0 The Adventures of John and Tony (2/4) 6.30 Dad's Army (15/20) 7.0 55 and Over (1/4) 7.30 Underland (1/5) 7.45 Breathing Underwater (1/5) 8.0 Woodaholics (6/6) 8.30 A Whole 'Nother Story (6/6) 9.0 The July Ghost 9.45 Rose-Coloured Tracts 10.0 Just a Minute (1/8) 10.30 Truly, Madly, Bletchley (1/8) 10.45 Quando, Quando, Quando (1/8) 11.0 The People Have Been (2/3) 11.30 The In Crowd (4/5) 12.0 Sounds Natural 12.30 Children of the Enemy 1.0 Five Red Herrings (1/8) 1.30 Kill the Pharaoh! (1/8) 2.0 The Adventures of John and Tony (2/4) 2.30 Dad's Army (15/20) 3.0 55 and Over (1/4) 3.30 Underland (1/5) 3.45 Breathing Underwater (1/5) 4.0 Woodaholics (6/6) 4.30 A Whole 'Nother Story (6/6) 5.0 The July Ghost 5.45 Rose-Coloured Tracts

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12

Friday's solutions

Wordsearch

Sudoku no 7,424

Suguru

Word wheel MORTALITY

Saturday's Quick crossword

Solution no 17,565

Looking for more? Download the Guardian app for more puzzles, including our new Premier League game, On the Ball, and our movie quiz, Film Reveal. Plus clues and answers to all our interactive crosswords and sudoku. Available in the Apple App Store and Google Play.

Puzzles

Quick crossword no 17,566

Across

1 Fumbler - briefest grunt (anag) (13) 8 Ostentation (4) 9 Relative by marriage (3-2-3) 10 Moderately loudly (music) (5-5) 12 eg an HB or a 2B (6) 14 Jenny _ (comedian) - choux pastry (6) 15 From that point on (10) 19 Large Hadron _ (8) 20 Entranced (4) 21 Sad tree? (7,6)

Down

2 Still sealed (8) 3 Precious stone - 1969 Hitchcock thriller (5) 4 Tranquil (7) 5 Ear, tube or city (5) 6 Well-bred (7) 7 Madrid, time or life (4) 11 Satisfy, as in expectations (4,2,2) 13 Pet door (7) 14 Hairy arch (7) 16 Counterpart to broadside (3-2) 17 Untamed (5) 18 Only - fish (4)

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Sudoku no 7,428

Easy. Fill the grid so that each row, column and 3x3 box contains the numbers 1-9. Printable version at theguardian.com/sudoku

Suguru

Fill the grid so that each square in an outlined block contains a digit. A block of two squares contains the digits 1 and 2, a block of three squares contains the digits 1, 2 and 3, and so on. No same digit appears in neighbouring squares, not even diagonally.

Wordsearch

Can you find 15 old occupations in the grid? Words can run forwards, backwards, vertically or diagonally, but always in a straight, unbroken line.

Word wheel

Find as many words as possible using the letters in the wheel. Each must use the central letter and at least three others. Letters may be used only once. You may not use plurals, foreign words or proper nouns. There is at least one nine-letter word to be found. Target: 33. Good: 42. Very good: 51. Excellent: 60

Trivia corner

What is the collective noun for creatures that live at the lowest level of a body of water?

a. Benthos

b. Infauna

c. Nekton

d. Plankton

Answer top right

TODAY'S TRIVIA CORNER ATHWES BERTHOS