There is something about the care and professionalism to be seen on a ward that defies abstract analysis: a reminder of what it is to be human

I watched Nye, the National Theatre’s hit show about Aneurin Bevan, the former Labour MP for Ebbw Vale and his fight to found a national health service, twice. Both times it left me feeling a bit queasy. Bevan is a mighty working-class hero. Probably no other minister, even in that 1945 government of heroes, would have had the vision, the muscle or the sheer energy to make a national health service happen at all in those bleak postwar years, let alone in a way that no incoming government could unpick.

The NHS sits at the heart of politics and for most of my career in journalism, and charting the crises, the numbers, the arguments, the possibilities and the costs was a staple of my work. You can write all that, you can read about all that, but it can feel very different when events dictate that you cross the line from commentator to patient; when, like me, you pitch up as someone who arrives as an emergency, with a condition that might require major surgery and at least a week of post-operative hospital care – or might just go away of its own accord.

Anne Perkins is a writer and broadcaster, and a former Guardian correspondent

Cybersecurity experts reveal what they do for high-profile clients targeted by hackers such as Scattered Spider

They call it “stopping the bleeding”: the vital window to prevent an entire database from being ransacked by criminals or a production line grinding to a halt.

When a call comes into the cybersecurity firm S-RM, headquartered on Whitechapel High Street in east London, a hacked business or institution may have just minutes to protect themselves.

At 20, I went on a European road trip for the summer, where a chance encounter in Cologne taught me the importance of friendship

The clock that ticks at 6am on a Saturday morning at a llama farm in rural Germany, when you wake up hungover next to a naked punk, ticks much more loudly than any other clock. In this case, it was a proper rustic European clock – none of your chrome or plastic nonsense – wooden and ancient, with little figurines which bustled around inside it, on the hour, every hour.

I was 20, on a European road trip, chugging around in an older man’s van in 2014, perpetually hungover.

Must-sees include Beryl Cook’s postwar brilliance, Tracey Emin’s new highs, Frida Kahlo’s confessions – plus Google’s HQ and Gaudí’s finally finished fever dream

Whether you’re cohabiting with flatmates or family, cut down on communal living confusion with these clever tips and tricks, from colour-coded towels to fridge organisers

• How to update your rental home on a budget

Between clashing routines, different cleanliness standards, and that one person who always “forgets” to take the bins out, keeping a shared household running smoothly – whether that’s family or flatmates – isn’t easy.

After years of living in flat-shares, I’ve picked up a few tricks which, in my experience, make the home setup – whatever form that takes – smoother. From fridge organisers to shoe storage that stops your hallway from feeling like an obstacle course, here are 21 ways to cut down on communal living confusion, dread and passive-aggressive Post-it notes.

The Guardian sport photographer selects his favourite images he has taken this year and recalls the stories behind them

This is a selection of some of my favourite pictures taken at events I’ve covered this year, quite a few of which haven’t been published before. Several have been chosen for their news value, others purely for their aesthetic value, while some are here just because there’s a nice story behind them.

Russia’s claim it foiled drone attack on Putin residence shows ‘they do not want to finish this war’, Ukrainian president says

• Ukraine war – latest updates

Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russia on Monday of trying to sabotage peace talks and preparing to bomb government buildings after the Kremlin said it had foiled a Ukrainian drone attack on Vladimir Putin’s residence.

Zelenskyy described the Russian claim as “another lie”. He said he was “expecting” some kind of scandal following his two-hour meeting on Sunday with Donald Trump in Florida, where “progress” was made towards ending the conflict.

MPs reject calls to strip British-Egyptian activist of UK nationality over social media posts from a decade ago

Downing Street has defended its campaign for the release of a British-Egyptian activist and its decision to welcome him to the UK despite his “abhorrent” tweets a decade ago.

Alaa Abd el-Fattah, who arrived in London on Boxing Day after the British government successfully negotiated his release, said he apologised “unequivocally” for his posts after opposition parties called for him to be deported and his citizenship revoked.

Children’s father tried to break into bedroom from outside to rescue them but was beaten back by flames

A woman and two children aged seven and four were killed in a fire in the early hours of Boxing Day after their father, a serving police officer, desperately tried to save them.

The officer smashed his way out of the stone cottage in the Cotswolds and tried to break into his children’s bedroom from the outside to rescue them but was beaten back by the flames.

New head of preparedness at OpenAI will face unnerving in-tray amid fears from some experts that AI could ‘turn on us’

The maker of ChatGPT has advertised a $555,000-a-year vacancy with a daunting job description that would cause Superman to take a sharp intake of breath.

In what may be close to the impossible job, the “head of preparedness” at OpenAI will be directly responsible for defending against risks from ever more powerful AIs to human mental health, cybersecurity and biological weapons.

Israeli PM has been joined by family of the deceased hostage Ran Gvili on his trip to meet US president in Florida

Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to tell Donald Trump on Monday that Hamas must return the remains of the last Israeli hostage left in Gaza before the next stages of the stalled ceasefire can be implemented, Israeli officials and analysts say.

The Israeli prime minister, who is scheduled to meet Trump at the US president’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, is on his fifth visit to see Trump in the US this year.

• British former boxing champion sustained minor injuries

• Two people killed in collision, say police in Ogun State

The British heavyweight boxer Anthony Joshua was injured in a car crash in Nigeria on Monday morning that killed two people, local police said.

The former world heavyweight boxing champion was taken to an undisclosed hospital after his car hit a stationary vehicle at about 11am on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, the Ogun state police commissioner, Lanre Ogunlowo, said. The driver of Joshua’s vehicle was also injured, he added.

Yellow warning for parts of Scotland and amber cold health alert in place for north-east and north-west England

Heavy snow showers are on the way across parts of the UK as a weather warning has been issued by the Met Office.

A yellow warning for snow and ice has been issued for parts of Scotland from 6am on New Year’s Day until midnight on 2 January.

Move comes after party’s exclusion for last two years was lambasted by JD Vance at this year’s event

The Munich Security Conference (MSC) has invited lawmakers from Alternative für Deutschland to join its annual gathering of top international defence officials in February after shutting out the far-right party for the last two years.

The reversal, which was confirmed by organisers, came after the US vice-president, JD Vance, lambasted the AfD’s exclusion in a blistering speech at this year’s event in which he accused Germany of stifling free speech by sidelining the anti-migrant, pro-Kremlin party.

Healthier trends of younger travellers are transforming departure lounge habits, says Manchester Airport Group

Christmas is over and a new year is upon us. Time, then, to start planning your next summer holiday.

Next year, however, you may be more likely to be downing gut health shots and Japanese tea in the airport than the once-traditional morning pints.

Bears are becoming a growing problem in some of Japan’s urban areas as they are forced to venture further in search of food

It came as no surprise, least of all to the residents of Osaki, that “bear” was selected as Japan’s kanji character of the year earlier this month.

The north-eastern town of 128,000 people is best known for its Naruko Onsen hot springs, autumn foliage and kokeshi – cylindrical dolls carved from a single piece of wood. But this year it has made the headlines as a bear hotspot, as the country reels from a year of record ursine encounters and deaths, with warnings that winter will not bring immediate respite.

Organisers hope its hyper-localised ‘levelling up’ agenda will translate into sustainable, long-term uplift

Shanaz Gulzar is taking stock the day after Bradford’s city of culture year officially wrapped. There’s a lot for the creative director to reflect on: more than 5,000 events have taken place and £51m has been spent during a year that was by far the biggest city of culture since the project started in 2013.

Her personal highlights include the opening ceremony Rise in January, when temperatures got as low as -8C; seeing 600 people turn up to the start of The Bradford Progress – Jeremy Deller and Charles Hazlewood’s sprawling musical epic with the Paraorchestra; and the exhibition of Victor Wedderburn’s photographs that captured Black Bradford in the mid-1980s.

For more than three decades, the Nassars have battled Israeli efforts to reclassify their property as ‘state land’

In 1916, Daher Nassar, a Christian Palestinian farmer living south of Bethlehem, made a move considered more than unusual at the time. He bought a 42-hectare stretch of farmland on the slopes and valleys of Wadi Salem, and formally registered the purchase with the Ottoman authorities, who then ruled the region.

A few years later, after transferring the title to his son, Nassar did something even more extraordinary. He re-registered the deed under each successive administration – the British mandate, then the Jordanian government, and finally, after 1967, under Israeli occupation.

Much attention was paid to the problem of misogyny, but focus was also placed on issues such as paternity leave and mental health

The prime minister said it was a “really hard watch”, while a British police force said it should be a “wake-up call for parents”. The Netflix drama Adolescence – which tells the story of a 13-year-old boy arrested for killing a female classmate – was hailed from the school gates to the Houses of Parliament for shedding a spotlight on the toxic influence of the manosphere.

But the national conversation did not end with the final episode of the much-discussed drama. A series of high-profile campaigns, conversations, policy shifts and research have resulted in a sense that 2025 has been the year of the boy.

It is never enjoyable to be stuck in traffic or pressed up against a stranger’s armpit. But there are ways to make the most of your commute. You could even use it to write that novel

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For many of us, the idea of “the perfect” commute might sound laughable. If we travel to an office, it’s likely to involve either peak-time public transport or stressful traffic. You might not expect that either of those offers much scope for joy, but there are things we can do to make them more enjoyable, productive and healthier. It’s worth putting some thought into this, because commuting can increase stress, reduce capacity for exercise and encourage us to consume extra calories in on-the-go snacks.

The former lawyer turned time management coach Kelly Nolan suggests starting with a commute audit to assess its true impact. “Begin by blocking it out on a calendar. Creating a visual representation of how much commuting takes out of your day gives an accurate picture. It’s not just about how much free time you have left, it’s about seeing how commuting affects other activities in your life.”

From the most beautiful show Netflix has ever made to a thriller about a menopausal hitwoman and a dazzling documentary set in outer space, here are some TV gems that may have passed you by this year

In a bizarre move, Netflix released this series by Japanese master Hirokazu Kore-eda – the Palme d’Or winner renowned for movies such as Shoplifters and Nobody Knows – with absolutely no fanfare this year. But Asura was a total knockout – a rich and sumptuously shot drama about four sisters in the 70s who discover that their dad has been having a lifelong affair. It was so good, in fact, that it might even be the most beautiful show they’ve ever released. Talk about selling yourself short. Watch it on Netflix.

Stop stressing about 31 December, keep things simple and go with a flow of prosecco, lambrusco or maybe even a Korean soju …

Oh, you thought it was all over? After all the carolling, gifting and tree-ing (not to mention the eating and drinking) of the actual Christmassy bit, it feels almost cruel to have to do it all again, and on – in my opinion – one of the most stressful nights of the year: New Year’s Eve.

If you’re not paying over the odds and going out, with long queues and stressed-out staff, you’re the stressed-out one yourself. “Is everyone good for drinks?” “When was the last time anyone saw [insert child’s name here]?” And then there’s the clean glass matrix, where no one can remember whose is whose and you’re caught in an endless cycle of washing-up. The antidote to all of the above is, for me, just to stay in with your immediates and a bottle of something nice. Five guests maximum. I don’t like going into the New Year already tense – what hope will I have for 2026 if I’m going into it with high blood pressure and flat wine in a warm glass?

I love many shows on the streaming channels, but the BBC is our storyteller. It defines a nation and its culture – and we must defend it

• Tony Hall was director general of the BBC between April 2013 and August 2020

Don’t let President Trump cloud the real debate about the BBC. Of course, his demand for damages of no less than $5bn has dominated our thinking about the corporation over the past few weeks, as has its cause. But let’s get this into perspective. This was a serious own goal and journalists make mistakes. Salvation in this case would have been a line of script between the clips, or once a mistake had been discovered, a very speedy public acknowledgment. Now, though, the BBC is right not to yield on this. It has apologised. And, unlike other broadcasters and institutions in the United States, it doesn’t need the president’s support. This is a chance to demonstrate the BBC’s independence. Fight on.

But we must not let this derail the conversation about what sort of BBC we all want and need, and I hope that is what dominates discussion in the crucial coming year. The government’s green paper, published in December, starts off with a reminder of what, despite all its travails, the BBC delivers for the country. “It’s not just a broadcaster,” says the introduction, “it’s also a national institution … if it did not already exist, we would have to invent it.” The secretary of state, Lisa Nandy, is even more forthright: “I believe the BBC, alongside the NHS, is one of the two most important institutions in our country. While one is fundamental to the health of our people, the other is fundamental to the health of our democracy.” Seeing the BBC not just as a media organisation, but as a cultural organisation helping to define who we are, is crucial to next year’s debate about what we want the BBC to be. It should be seen as part of our social infrastructure.

I’d like to believe that the horrific darkness of this past year is a necessary prelude to a brighter and saner future

About a year ago, at the start of the Trump 2.0 regime, a woman was about to pass me on the sidewalk and then stopped, turned toward me and almost shouted: “It’s a fucking nightmare!”

It has been a “fucking nightmare”.

Other outlets have asked their writers to compromise, but the Guardian has never – and would never – ask me to pull a punch

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It might be most generous to characterize the behavior of major US media organizations since 2024 as negotiating between competing incentives.

On the one hand, billionaires have consolidated their ownership over major news outlets and platforms. The Murdochs are squabbling over Fox. Jeff Bezos has remade the Washington Post in his own image. The pharmaceutical magnate Patrick Soon-Shiong places a thumb on the scale at the Los Angeles Times, and the Trump-aligned Ellison family has taken over Paramount and CBS, and spent the final weeks of this year making hostile takeover bids for CNN owner Warner Bros. The influence of these billionaire personalities has often reshaped their organizations’ newsrooms and editorial boards, directing investigations and particularly opinion sections towards ownership’s pet projects and preferred policies.

Effects on inflation and employment have not been as bad as feared – but could still materialise with full force in 2026

When Donald Trump took office last January, most economists feared what would happen if he raised tariffs. The expectation was that, as the new duties drove up prices of consumer goods and inputs – affecting households and companies, respectively – surging inflation and falling real incomes would follow. This would be a supply shock, so the US Federal Reserve could not do much to counteract it.

Trump did raise tariffs to shocking levels, violating international agreements and blowing up the Republican party’s oft-professed commitment to free trade. In terms of severity and disruptiveness, Trump’s 2025 tariffs went far beyond the already harmful tariffs of his first term, and even beyond the infamous Smoot-Hawley Act of 1930. According to the Yale Budget Lab, the average effective tariff on US imports rose from 2% to 18%, the highest level since the 1930s, this year. Add to that the uncertainty caused by frequent and inexplicable policy changes, and large adverse effects on inflation, employment and real incomes appeared all but inevitable.

These unfairly maligned animals were nuggets for our ancestors and served for the UK during the second world war

Is there something I would figuratively die on a hill for? Yes, there is – and as it happens, I’m sitting on a literal hill right now, feeding them. Pigeons. Why pigeons? Because it’s about time they get the respect they deserve.

I like pigeons. Because they’re like me, working class. You can tell pigeons are working class because every pigeon looks knackered. It’s about this point in the conversation that people politely make their excuses and slowly back away (literally) while avoiding eye contact. No doubt, reading this, you are doing the same (figuratively).

Toussaint Douglass is a comedian from Lewisham, south London. His show Accessible Pigeon Material will be showing at Soho Theatre, 26-31 January 2026

Some of them are exactly the kind of members you want to meet, others … not so much

When a friend found out the painting she’d given me had made its way to a charity store, I wanted to dig a hole in the earth

As the recipient of an unwanted gift, is it necessary to pretend you like it? This is what most of us are trained to do as children; for some it was our first experience of being instructed to lie.

“Thank you,” I might have said to my grandmother, “for this frilly, itchy lace-trimmed dress identical to the one you gave my sister. I love it.”

Over the holiday period, the Guardian leader column is looking ahead at the themes of 2026. Today we look skyward, where a new lunar contest mirrors humanity’s struggle to live within planetary limits

During the cold war’s space race, the Apollo moon missions were driven by the need to prove American superiority. Having made that political and technological point with the 1969 moon landing, the contest between Moscow and Washington petered out. A new dash across the skies kicks off in 2026, reigniting geopolitical competition under the guise of “peaceful exploration”. The moon’s south pole is emerging as the most valuable real estate in the solar system, offering “peaks of eternal light” for solar arrays and ice deposits in craters shielded from the sun.

The US and a China-led bloc are eyeing the lunar surface and its potential to control a post-terrestrial economy. Space had been humanity’s last commons, supposedly shielded by the 1967 UN outer space treaty that bans state exploitation of the heavens. It is vague, however, on private claims – a loophole that is now fuelling a tycoon-led scramble for the stars. The aim is obvious: to act first, shape norms and dare others to object. Two lunar missions launching next year– Nasa’s Artemis II and China’s Chang’e 7 – are competing for strategic supremacy.

Over the holiday period, the Guardian leader column is looking ahead at the themes of 2026. Today we look at how the struggle to adapt to a dangerously warming world has become a test of global justice

The record-breaking 252mph winds of Hurricane Melissa that devastated Caribbean islands at the end of October were made five times more likely by the climate crisis. Scorching wildfire weather in Spain and Portugal during the summer was made 40 times more likely, while June’s heatwave in England was made 100 times more likely.

Attribution science has made one thing clear: global heating is behind today’s extreme weather. That greenhouse gas emissions warmed the planet was understood. What can now be shown is that this warming produces record heatwaves and more violent storms with increasing frequency.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Readers respond to Polly Toynbee’s article about Labour’s positive record in government

Yes, Polly Toynbee, the Labour government has managed some worthwhile achievements, but its route to those achievements has been convoluted to the point of obtuseness (Let me tell you the good things the government has done in 2025 – because it certainly won’t, 22 December). Keir Starmer’s biographer Tom Baldwin has noted that Starmer is an iterative problem solver who gets the right solution, eventually.

There are three problems with this approach; most importantly, when his starting point is too distant from the right solution he wastes time that could be better put to increase the number of successful achievements; second, he ends up looking weak to parliamentary opposition and the electorate because he’s reversed his position so often; and lastly, he causes anger, frustration and resentment within his own party.

Olympia Bowman champions a middle way. Helen Style says the risks of giving birth without medical assistance are well known

After listening to the Guardian podcast series the Birth Keepers, I feel compelled to share my own story. I believe that it is important to share examples of a middle way somewhere between free birthing and obstetrical violence. Personally, I chose the middle way.

My child was born at home. At the time, we were living off grid in an isolated village in France. We knew of many women who had chosen to give birth at home in our village accompanied by the only independent certified midwife in the area who accepted the risk of accompanying home births in this particularly isolated place.

Sarah Boston on the women who fought for and ultimately won recognition of the skill and value of their work

In her long read article (‘Pretty birds and silly moos’: the women behind the Sex Discrimination Act, 18 December), Susanna Rustin details some of the women who campaigned to make illegal the many forms of legal discrimination against women in services and in the workplace. One of the key groups of women she cites in this campaign were the “187 sewing machinists at Ford’s Dagenham Plant” who “forced the issue” with their 1968 strike for equal pay.

The sewing machinists did not go on strike primarily for equal pay. They were outraged that the 1967 new grade structure introduced by the Ford Motor Company had evaluated the their work as grade B. The sewing machinists believed their work was at least semi-skilled and should have been graded C.

Space junkyards | Additions to signs | No-joke planning reforms | Chris Rea | Last-ditch attempt | ‘Trump class’ | Moving obituary

I do hope countries agree to use the Jules Verne crater on the far side of the moon as a spacecraft graveyard to crash defunct equipment as they use Point Nemo in the South Pacific Ocean as a spacecraft cemetery (Patches of the moon to become spacecraft graveyards, say researchers, 22 December).
Kartar Uppal
Streetly, West Midlands

• In the 1980s, at the time of the nuclear incident in Ukraine, I was driving to the Suffolk coast, passing through Leiston, the nearest town to the Sizewell power station, upon whose town sign some wag had scrawled “Twinned with Chernobyl” (Letters, 26 December).
Margaret Philip
Scole, Norfolk

• Updates from 4pm kick-off (GMT) in Group B

• Get in touch: you can email Will about the game

The stadium in Agadir looks rather empty.

The transfer window is almost upon us.

Young batter had a slightly wasted summer, but his second innings at the MCG showed why England think so highly of him

Until his ice-cool 40 helped England dodge an Ashes whitewash in front of 90,000 people at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Saturday, the most clippable aspect of Jacob Bethell’s tour was probably his performance of YMCA on a dancefloor in Noosa during the team’s much-discussed break.

It is a bit poor when sports people have their down time filmed by members of the public and posted online. But at least Bethell, born 25 years after the Village People’s seminal hit was first released, had the wherewithal to get the tricky “C” the right way round. Rob Key’s Gareth Keenan‑like investigation into Noosa can rule out inebriation here.

• Updates from Championship, League One and Two

• Get in touch: contact Rob via email if you like

Look, it’s complicated. It always is when some but not all third-placed teams qualify. Here’s how things look ahead of tonight’s final round of games.

Morocco 4pts, GD+2

Mali 2pts, GD0 (goals scored 2)

Zambia 2pts, GD0 (goals scored 1)

Comoros 1pt, GD-2

The Argentinian captain has his critics but is the leader and inspiration behind a team finding their feet again

Leave it to a 20-year-old, with three Serie A starts under his belt, to provide a most perceptive analysis of the Italian top flight as we head into a new year. “The most difficult thing to do in this game,” said Francesco Pio Esposito on Sunday night, “is to stick the ball in the net.”

He was speaking in praise of his Inter teammate, Lautaro Martínez, whom he set up for the decisive goal in a 1-0 win away to Atalanta. Pio Esposito had barely entered as a second-half substitute when he was gifted possession by an opponent, Berat Djimsiti. Instead of taking the chance on himself, he froze the last defender and released Lautaro to score with a side-footed through-ball.

All the latest Premier League, La Liga, Bundesliga, Ligue 1 and Serie A deals and a club-by-club guide

• Women’s transfer interactive – all the January deals

Every deal in the WSL, Liga F, Frauen-Bundesliga, Première Ligue and Serie A Femminile as well as a club-by-club guide

• Men’s transfer interactive – all the January deals

• Hot favourite makes all in Grade One Challow Hurdle

• Minella Yoga doubles up on sparkling day for trainer

Days like these were once almost a weekly experience for Paul Nicholls, as he strung together one title-winning season after another, so the 14-time champion will have taken particular pleasure from his double here on Monday as No Drama This End, in the Grade One Challow Hurdle, and Minella Yoga both emerged as contenders for the Cheltenham festival in March.

The Challow has often been an early proving ground for future stars over fences, and No Drama This End, Nicholls’s seventh winner of the race, joined former champions from the yard including Denman, the 2008 Gold Cup winner, and Bravemansgame, the 2022 King George VI Chase winner, on the roll of honour. Sent off at 4-9, the five-year-old made all the running under Harry Cobden and needed little encouragement to maintain a one-and-a-quarter length lead to the line.

• Toby, 13, was in crowd when fourth seed lost

• ‘He has had hate from some trolls online’

Stephen Bunting has revealed his 13-year-old son has been a victim of online abuse. Toby Bunting was in the crowd at Alexandra Palace as his father, the fourth seed, was knocked out in the third round of the PDC World Championship by James Hurrell.

Bunting said in a post on X that his family have been hurt by the social media trolling. “Hi guys, sorry I’ve had a few days away from my socials, but I just needed a small bit of time after my game to recover and rest,” the 40-year-old wrote.

Campaigners say tighter border controls have reduced arrivals but are pushing people on to increasingly dangerous routes

More than 3,000 people died trying to reach Spain by sea over the past year, a sharp fall from the previous 12 months.

However, activists cautioned that the drop reflected tighter border controls that have forced migrants to take increasingly dangerous routes.

Marine robotics firm to renew its search more than decade after plane disappeared with 239 people onboard

The search for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 is expected to resume on 30 December, more than a decade after the plane disappeared with 239 people onboard in one of aviation’s greatest mysteries.

A renewed search by Ocean Infinity, a UK and US-based marine robotics company, had begun earlier this year but was called off in April because of bad weather.

MHRA says buying from illegal online sellers can put health at real risk amid booming black market

Losing weight may be a common new year resolution but health experts have warned against buying medications for such purposes from social media sellers or other illegitimate channels.

Jabs such as Wegovy and Mounjaro have become hugely popular for weight loss, with trials suggesting the latter can help people lose an average of 20% of their body weight after 72 weeks of treatment.

Norfolk police say man believed to be driver of one of the vehicles shot by armed officers after leaving scene holding a handgun

A man believed to be carrying a handgun has been shot and killed by police after a two-vehicle collision in Thetford, Norfolk police said.

Officers were called to London Road at about 8.25pm on Sunday after receiving reports of a two-vehicle collision. Police said one man, believed to be the driver of one of the vehicles, left the scene holding what was described as a handgun.

Attenborough, 99, enthuses about tube-riding pigeons, foxes, parakeets and others in Wild London for the BBC

Filming the wildlife of London requires an intrepid, agile presenter, willing to lie on damp grass after dark to encounter hedgehogs, scale heights to hold a peregrine falcon chick, and stake out a Tottenham allotment to get within touching distance of wary wild foxes.

Step forward Sir David Attenborough, who spent his 100th summer seeking out the hidden nature of his home city for an unusually personal and intimate BBC documentary.

Planet’s oldest bee species and primary pollinators were under threat from deforestation and competition from ‘killer bees’

Stingless bees from the Amazon have become the first insects to be granted legal rights anywhere in the world, in a breakthrough supporters hope will be a catalyst for similar moves to protect bees elsewhere.

It means that across a broad swathe of the Peruvian Amazon, the rainforest’s long-overlooked native bees – which, unlike their cousins the European honeybees, have no sting – now have the right to exist and to flourish.

National Trust says these are ‘alarm signals we cannot ignore’ as climate breakdown puts pressure on wildlife

Extremes of weather have pushed nature to its limits in 2025, putting wildlife, plants and landscapes under severe pressure, an annual audit of flora and fauna has concluded.

Bookended by storms Éowyn and Bram, the UK experienced a sun-soaked spring and summer, resulting in fierce heath and moorland fires, followed by autumn floods.

Spring-like weather experienced by many Americans to end, while heavy snow in Japan brings deadly conditions

A week of extremes in the US as Arctic air plunges southwards across many states, sweeping away record-breaking warmth from last weekend. With low pressure in the west drawing up warm, humid air from the Gulf of Mexico, much of the south and midwest basked in spring-like weather this weekend with temperatures widely an extraordinary 15-20C above normal for late December.

This week, however, most people will ditch their summer clothes for hats and scarves as a ridge pressure builds across the west, allowing for a polar air mass to dive southward, bringing freezing temperatures and the risk of snow.

The Caatinga in the north-east has been transformed by the heating climate in just a generation and could become the country’s first desert

Every Tuesday at dawn, Raildon Suplício Maia goes to the market in Macururé, in Brazil’s Bahia state, to sell goats. He haggles with buyers to get a good price for the animals, which are reared in the open and roam freely.

Goats are the main – and sometimes only – source of income for the people of Macururé, a small town in the Brazilian sertão. This rural hinterland in the country’s north-east is known for its dry climate and harsh conditions.

Raildon Suplicio Maia, a goat farmer from Macururé sells his animals at the market. Grazing has disappeared and he now spends any profit on feed

Isobel Wallace, from Doncaster, described as ‘happiest, smiliest, most adventurous little girl’

A two-year-old girl who died after falling into a garden pond on Christmas Day was the “happiest, smiliest, most adventurous little girl”, her family has said.

Isobel Wallace was discovered during festive celebrations at her parents’ new home in Doncaster, South Yorkshire.

Survivors urge government to stop using suppliers cited in public inquiry into fire in which 72 people died

Survivors of the Grenfell Tower fire have called on the government to stop companies implicated in the disaster from receiving public contracts, after it was revealed several were still in receipt of multimillion-pound deals.

New analysis found at least 87 contracts across the public sector in the government’s own database involve companies criticised in the phase 2 report into the Grenfell fire, published in September 2024, though some contracts may have since expired.

Exclusive: Organisation accuses Sir Mark Rowley of religious discrimination and ‘whipping up conspiracy theories’

Freemasons have demanded an emergency injunction from the high court to halt the Metropolitan police’s new policy that orders officers to tell their bosses if they are members of the organisation.

The Freemasons filed papers in London on Christmas Eve and claim the Met’s policy amounts to “religious discrimination” against Freemasons who are also police officers.

Health minister decries criticism of vaccinations by heads of four authorities as ‘dangerous and utterly irresponsible’

A third of Reform UK’s council leaders across the country have expressed vaccine-sceptic views, openly questioning public health measures that keep millions safe.

The leaders of four of the 12 councils where Reform is in charge or the largest party – Kent, Worcestershire, Warwickshire and Durham – are among those in the party who have publicly criticised vaccinations.

Trump alleged that US forces hit ‘very hard’ in what would mark his team’s first land strike on Venezuela if confirmed

Donald Trump has claimed that US forces struck a “big facility” in Venezuela last week – but the president did not specify what it was, or where, and the White House has not commented further.

“We just knocked out – I don’t know if you read or you saw – they have a big plant, or a big facility, where the ships come from. Two nights ago, we knocked that out. So we hit them very hard,” Trump told Republican donor and New York supermarket owner John Catsimatidis on Friday.

Albin Kurti’s emphatic victory strengthens mandate for domestic reforms including welfare expansion

Kosovo’s prime minister, Albin Kurti has won an emphatic election victory, marking a resurgence for the nationalist leader and ending a political deadlock in Europe’s youngest state.

The win in Sunday’s snap election strengthens Kurti’s mandate to push through domestic reforms, including welfare expansion and higher salaries for public workers, although he faces significant problems including tensions with Serbia and health and education systems that lag behind Kosovo’s Balkan neighbours.

In documentary I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not, the actor and his family revealed that doctors told them to ‘prepare yourselves for the worst’

Chevy Chase suffered “near fatal” heart failure which led to him being placed in an induced coma during the pandemic in 2021, according to a new film about the American actor and comedian.

As documented in I’m Chevy Chase and You’re Not, the star of films such as Caddyshack and the National Lampoon movies, who hosted the Oscars twice, spent a total of five weeks in hospital.

A small boxing academy helping street children in Victoria Falls has inspired an award-winning short featuring Hollywood actor Tongayi Chirisa

Tobias Mupfuti was eight years old when he found himself homeless and living on the streets of Victoria Falls after his father had rejected him and his mother was too poor to feed or clothe him or send him to school. He survived on food handouts from tourists shopping in the Zimbabwean resort town.

Four years later, sick of being bullied and threatened, he asked a boxing coach to teach him the sport for self-defence – a decision that changed his life for ever.

Last few months of the year have seen $1tn in value wiped from the market, despite all-time-high price of bitcoin

As 2025 comes to a close, Donald Trump’s favorable approach to cryptocurrency has not proven to be enough to sustain the industry’s gains, once the source of market-wide optimism and enthusiasm. The last few months of the year have seen $1tn in value wiped from the digital asset market, despite bitcoin hitting an all-time-high price of $126,000 on 6 October.

The October price peak was short-lived. Bitcoin’s price tumbled just days later after Trump’s announcement of 100% tariffs on China sent shockwaves across the market on 12 October. The crypto market saw $19bn liquidated in 24 hours – the largest liquidation event on record. Ethereum, the second-largest cryptocurrency, saw a 40% drop in price over the next month. Eric Trump’s own crypto company endured a similar drop in its value in December.

Acquisition would further expand SoftBank’s investments in artificial intelligence as it tries to center itself in the boom

SoftBank Group will acquire digital infrastructure investor DigitalBridge Group in a deal valued at $4bn, the companies said on Monday, as the Japanese investment firm looks to deepen its AI-related portfolio.

The acquisition would expand SoftBank’s exposure to digital infrastructure as the Japanese conglomerate is positioning its portfolio to focus on artificial intelligence.

SoftBank’s billionaire founder Masayoshi Son is seeking to capitalize on surging demand for the computing capacity that underpins artificial intelligence applications.

As Trump’s tariffs take effect, Britain is likely alternative destination for cars, telecoms and sound equipment

• Business live – latest updates

The UK is poised for an influx of cheap Chinese imports that could bring down inflation amid the fallout from Donald Trump’s global trade war, leading economists have said.

After figures showed China’s trade surplus surpassed $1tn (£750bn) despite Washington’s tariff policies hitting exports to the US, the Bank of England said the UK was among the nations emerging as alternative destinations for the goods.

Candidates will have to sit assessments in person unless there are exceptional circumstances, says ACCA

• Business live – latest updates

The world’s largest accounting body is to stop students being allowed to take exams remotely to crack down on a rise in cheating on tests that underpin professional qualifications.

The Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA), which has almost 260,000 members, has said that from March it will stop allowing students to take online exams in all but exceptional circumstances.

Beyzaie, who has died aged 87, wove myth, folklore and classical Persian literature into stories that defend against a regime which sought to obliterate them

One of the last messages I sent to the great Iranian stage and screen writer-director Bahram Beyzaie was a recent photograph, taken by a friend, of the interior ruins of Tehran’s oldest cinema, Cinema Iran. There, on one of the walls, hung posters of Beyzaie’s 1988 film Maybe Some Other Time, positioned above and below the torn portraits of the supreme leaders of the theocratic regime.

The symbolism – the ideological ruin; cinema and the future – was too striking for something so accidental, particularly given that Beyzaie’s theatre and cinema are intricate mazes of carefully constructed and overlapping allegorical moments.

The standup on studying Ancient Greek comedy at university, his worst gig and having the test scores shouted at him during sets

How did you get into comedy?
Slightly by accident. I had tried standup in my last year at university, then did three open mic gigs at the Edinburgh festival which offered strong evidence that I should give up. So I did. Eighteen months later, after a vague plan to try to get into sports journalism ended with me subediting articles about stock markets for a business publishing company (even less exciting than you might think), I booked one gig, at the Comedy Cafe’s Wednesday open mic night, hosted by Daniel Kitson. If that had gone badly, I don’t think I would have tried standup again. It went well enough to carry on, and within a year I was starting to get a few paid gigs, and standup gradually became my “job”.

Can you recall a gig so bad, it’s now funny?
In about 2002, I did a show in Killarney in Ireland. A very popular local act had to pull out, and they asked me to headline the gig instead. It was in a hotel nightclub where it was cheaper to go to the comedy and stay for the music rather than just go to the music. So the audience was a mixture of people who wanted to see someone else, and people who wanted to dance. The response to my set was a fascinating cocktail of silence, hostility, confusion, apathy, resentment and pity. The noise of the disco then kept me awake until 4am.

Andy Zaltzman: The Zaltgeist is on tour from 13 February

This year saw everyone from Alan Carr to demon sheep run riot on our screens – but there could only be one winner. Here’s our full countdown of the very best television of 2025
• More on the best culture of 2025

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Brilliant biopics, daring documentaries and a host of chillers and thrillers – our critics pick the best from another sensational year of cinema
• Read the US version of this list
• More on the best culture of 2025

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Topped by Rosalía’s multilingual, ultra-ambitious Lux, here are the best albums of the year as voted for by 30 Guardian music writers
• More on the best culture of 2025

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New novels from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Ian McEwan, plus the return of Slow Horses and Margaret Atwood looks back … Guardian critics pick the must-read titles of 2025

The Guardian’s fiction editor picks the best of the year, from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Dream Count to Thomas Pynchon’s return, David Szalay’s Booker winner and a remarkable collection of short stories.

DCI Barnaby and DS Winter deal with an angry artist. Plus: Rob Rinder and AJ Odudu suffer in The Celebrity Apprentice. Here’s what to watch this evening

8.30pm, ITV1
Families, eh? When Stourwick patriarch Henry Shirewell pops his clogs, his eldest son, ceramicist Lucian, announces to his siblings that he plans to transform the family pile into a – shock, horror! – residential artists’ community. That means kicking everybody out for good. But when a letter is discovered that casts suspicion on his actions, DCI Barnaby and DS Jamie Winter are called in to solve a potential murder. Hollie Richardson

The latest in our series of writers highlighting their most rewatched comfort films is an ode to the charming 80s-set comedy

While casting his knockout quasi-biopic The Social Network, film-maker David Fincher must’ve really dug how eventual Mark Zuckerberg portrayer Jesse Eisenberg handled being dumped on screen. A year before the award-lassoing Facebook drama, which led to an Oscar nomination for Eisenberg, the actor agonised through the dreamy foreground of Adventureland as reluctant carny James Brennan.

The parallels between Fincher’s and Greg Mottola’s movies begin and end with their opening unceremonious separations, yet an admittedly romantic logic does allow me to soak in the notion that the great directorial mind behind such zingers as Zodiac and Gone Girl also found solace in this cinematic time machine.

Our grim fascination with the doomed ship shows no sign of abating – so here’s a four-parter which makes it feel like you’re onboard. A truly intense watch

April 2026 will mark 114 years since the night that the RMS Titanic collided with an iceberg, but our grim fascination with the disaster shows no sign of abating. There was, of course, a surge of interest in the Titanic in the late 90s – thanks to James Cameron’s Oscar-bothering blockbuster – and there has been a steady stream of documentaries, dramas and podcasts about its demise ever since, some more sensitive than others (among the less tactful offerings: the 2010 film Titanic II – directed by Dick Van Dyke’s grandson Shane – a cash-in about a replica ship ravaged by a tsunami). Occasionally, the subject matter lurches starkly from the past back into the present. In June 2023, five people died on board an experimental submersible made by the company OceanGate; its passengers had hoped to see the liner’s rusting wreckage up close.

Titanic Sinks Tonight is a part-documentary, part-drama series playing across four nights, its episodes constructed from letters and diaries written by those on board, as well as interviews the survivors would give in the decades after. On the strength of the two episodes released for review, there’s no denying that it sates our appetite for Titanic-themed content. However, in centring the words and memories of those who lived through the terror of that night, it restores much-needed agency to those people. It also does well to bring a sense of reality to events that can sometimes feel unreal on account of their ubiquity, and that uncanny valley of Titanic-themed media. Central to its success is the presence of experts such as historian Suzannah Lipscomb and former Royal Navy admiral Lord West, to sharpen the corners of the story that Hollywood has sanded down.

Cliche-ridden, excessively sentimental and lacking in historical rigour, this film is an act of nationalist self-soothing

Nothing says happy Hanukah like a Holocaust-themed movie, especially if it ends on a feelgood note of survival and reunion after a run of tragic deaths and lashings of suffering. But this Israeli-Belarusian co-production is so excessively sentimental, cliche-riddled and arguably hypocritical considering its provenance, it’s not easy to forbear.

It opens in contemporary Tel Aviv with an elderly man named Ilya receiving news he can barely believe is true: someone dear to him from his childhood is alive. This prompts Ilya to tell his grandsons for the first time about what happened to him during the second world war. Desaturated cinematography then unfolds his story in flashback, showing young Ilya (Andrey Davidyuk) and his little brother Sasha as preteen Jewish boys living in Minsk with their parents, just as the war starts. Dad goes off to the front and is never seen again; the brothers and their mother are soon rounded up by the Nazis, represented by one German actor (Jean-Marc Birkholz) who keeps cropping up throughout to ruin life for Ilya. It’s as if the production didn’t have enough budget to afford a second German-speaking actor or (charitably) because the film-makers are making some kind of symbolic point about the banality – or in this case indistinguishability – of evil. I suspect the former is the case.

Like her forebears Fiona Apple and Giant Drag, Izzy Hagerup puts a distinctly twisty take on indie-rock, and is unafraid of dark emotional truths

From Chicago
Recommended if you like Wednesday, Fiona Apple, Giant Drag
Up next European/UK tour kicks off in May

A word that Prewn, AKA Izzy Hagerup, often uses to describe her music is “dissociation” – the disconnected emotional state embodied by many of the Chicago-born musician’s songs. It’s not an impression anyone would be left with from listening to her bitter, potent take on indie-rock. Hagerup’s guitar lines snake as they thrash; her balladry is grimy and expansive, steered by febrile vocals that recall mid-period Fiona Apple and the drone of the cello she played as a kid. Unexpected moments lurk, such as the shadowy slip into trip-hop on recent single Dirty Dog.

The former Woman’s Hour host speaks candidly with older stars such as Paul Merton and Trevor McDonald. Plus, the secrets of how to win the World Cup!

Former Woman’s Hour host Jenni Murray offers an amiable slant on the celebrity interview podcast. Her Saga magazine series features exclusively older interviewees, speaking about the life lessons they’ve learned thus far. Paul Merton is rather candid when it comes to mental health and Ian Hislop (“Is he as nice as he looks? He’s nicer …”), with Tony Blackburn and Trevor McDonald also appearing this season. Hannah J Davies
Widely available, episodes fortnightly

The band may be relatively new but its members have spent years steeped in the scene, giving them edge and an ear for tracks that rip through a room

From London, UK
Recommended if you like Metallica, Terror, Trapped Under Ice
Up next Performing at Collision festival, Bedford, 11 April

One of the surprise success stories of the last year has been the resurgence of hardcore. From the ascent of the young, Grammy-nominated bands Turnstile and Knocked Loose to the comeback of Deftones and their fresh grip on gen Z, as well as the growth of the UK festival Outbreak, heavy guitar music is enjoying a renaissance. After releasing their debut album, Faded Intentions, in November, False Reality might seem like a new name to watch in this world – but they have deep roots.

The Scots singer thought Kim Wilde was cool and got talked into buying a Cocteau Twins record but which song gives her a slap in the face?

The first song I fell in love with
I remember seeing Kim Wilde do Kids in America on Top of the Pops, and thinking she looked like Marilyn Monroe wearing a leather biker jacket. I loved that she was this cool British chick, doing this amazing American-sounding song.

The first album I bought
I grew up in the 80s and loved Wham!, Bros, Madonna and Bon Jovi. Then I won bookshop vouchers in a writing competition – which you could also use to buy CDs. My goth friend said I had to go and buy Heaven Or Las Vegas by Cocteau Twins from a bookshop in Dundee.

This haunting poem depicts an elusive, dangerous figure of overwhelming destructive power

The Man in the Wind

The man in the wind
who keeps us awake tonight
is not the black monk of the wind
cowering in corners and crevices,
or the white face under the streetlight
stricken with the guilt of his noise,
or the great slapping hand of the wind
beating and beating the rainy alleyways
while the torturer proceeds with the interrogation
and the prisoner’s risen voice
bleeds over cymbals and timpani.

A deep dive into the creation of eight buildings from the 1700s to the 1900s tells some very human stories

History used to be about wars and dates, but to the architecture writer and TV presenter Dan Cruickshank, it’s more about floors and grates. In his new book, he takes a keen-eyed tour of eight English houses, from Northumberland to Sussex, dating from the early 1700s to exactly 100 years ago, and ranging from an outlandish gothic pile to one of the first council flats. In Cruickshank’s pages, classical influences from Rome and Greece give way to a revival of medieval English gothic and the emergence of modernism.

He is particularly interested in who commissioned and built his chosen dwellings, and how they got the job done. It’s a new spin on the recent fashion for historians to explore the homes of commoners, as opposed to royalty and aristocrats, in order to tell the life stories of their occupants. This probably began with the late Gillian Tindall, who wrote a highly original book about the various tenants of an old house by the Thames next to the rebuilt Globe theatre. That was followed by several series of A House Through Time, fronted by Traitors star David Olosuga.

From an acclaimed short-story writer, this epic of power and class across generations in Pakistan is brutal, funny and brilliantly told

Imagine a shattering portrayal of Pakistani life through a chain of interlocking novellas, and you’ll be somewhere close to understanding the breadth and impact of Daniyal Mueenuddin’s first novel. Reminiscent of Neel Mukherjee’s dazzling circular depiction of Indian inequalities, A State of Freedom, it’s a keenly anticipated follow-up to the acclaimed short-story collection with which he made his debut in 2009, In Other Rooms, Other Wonders – also portraying overlapping worlds of Pakistani class and culture.

We begin in the squalor and bustle of a Rawalpindi bazaar in the 1950s, where the heartbreaking figure of a small child, abandoned to his fate and clutching a pair of plastic shoes, is scooped under the protection of a tea stall owner. He proceeds to raise the boy as his own son, having only daughters, but Yazid is also adopted by the stall’s garrulous regulars, who teach him both to read and to pay keen attention to the currents of class, wealth and power which flow past him every day.

From companionship to psychotherapy, technology could meet unmet needs – but it needs to be handled responsibly

There is much anxiety these days about the dangers of human-AI relationships. Reports of suicide and self-harm attributable to interactions with chatbots have understandably made headlines. The phrase “AI psychosis” has been used to describe the plight of people experiencing delusions, paranoia or dissociation after talking to large language models (LLMs). Our collective anxiety has been compounded by studies showing that young people are increasingly embracing the idea of AI relationships; half of teens chat with an AI companion at least a few times a month, with one in three finding conversations with AI “to be as satisfying or more satisfying than those with real‑life friends”.

But we need to pump the brakes on the panic. The dangers are real, but so too are the potential benefits. In fact, there’s an argument to be made that – depending on what future scientific research reveals – AI relationships could actually be a boon for humanity.

PC, Xbox, PlayStation 5; Embark Studios
The breakout hit, which has players coming together (or turning on each other) to battle intimidating robots in an apocalyptic future, is worth the hype

Arc Raiders is an extraction shooter from Embark Studios – so, a game where you deploy into a map full of other players and do as much shooting and looting as you can before making an escape. This is my first real go at the genre, and it’s excellent. It has smooth, only occasionally cumbersome combat, sound design that scratches the brain just right and robotic enemies that genuinely terrify. And it satisfies my constant need to sift through my inventory and rifle through every drawer.

But I have to keep my head on a swivel: Arc Raider’s player v player element means I can get jumped for my precious cargo by a malicious rival at any moment. And also, the knowledge that this game was made with the help of generative AI voice acting makes me slightly ashamed of how much I enjoy it. I play every game sheepishly looking over my shoulder (and my character’s) in case someone in-game takes my sought-after blueprint, or someone in real life kicks down my door to call me a hypocrite.

There was no shortage of fun and video games in the Diamond household in the last 12 months. Which ones did we play so much our thumbs hurt? And which one saved my soul? Let the ceremony begin …
• The 20 best video games of 2025

So, how was 2025 for your household? Was it really all as good as you pretended it was on Facebook? Full of A-grades for the kids and riotous themed fancy dress birthday parties for the grownups? Or was it a sea of disappointment with only occasional fun flotsam? And was any of it actually real, or are we all now seven-fingered AI slop beings with Sydney Sweeney’s teeth?

I have gathered my thoughts (and the Diamond household) together, whether they wanted to or not, to reflect on the most important thing in any given year: which video games we enjoyed the most. Without further ado:

Date a vending machine, watch intergalactic television and make the most out of your short existence as a fly. Here are the best games you weren’t playing this year
• The 20 best video games of 2025
• More on the best culture of 2025

PS5, Xbox, Switch, PC
Have you ever wanted to romance your record player? Date Everything! offers players the chance to develop relationships with everyday objects around your house, in a fully voiced sandbox romp featuring over 100 anthropomorphised characters. Wonderfully meta; you can put the moves on the textbox, or even “Michael Transaction” (microtransaction – get it?) himself. Meghan Ellis

Gaming was once compared to drugs, gambling and alcohol in South Korea. Now its gaming academies offer a chance to earn a six-figure salary – if you make the grade

Son Si-woo remembers the moment his mother turned off his computer. He was midway through an interview to become a professional gamer.

“She said when I played computer games, my personality got worse, that I was addicted to games,” the 27-year-old recalls.

Omnibus theatre, London
Sweet and funny show is based on rumoured vampire sightings in north London in the 1960s and 70s – though it could do with producing a few more goosebumps

For a time in the late 1960s and early 70s, the area around Highgate cemetery in north London was believed to be terrorised by a vampire. There were sightings, exorcisms, illicit grave excavations and even some desecrations. At the frenzied height of the speculation, the local police force got involved.

In real-life events that sound like the stuff of Hammer horror (indeed, the Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing Hammer horror film Dracula AD 1972 was apparently inspired by the incident), two men, David Farrant and Sean Manchester, got involved in hopes of solving the case. But rather than becoming a Holmes and Watson of the supernatural dimension, they embarked on a bitterly fought contest to be the first to vanquish the vampire, each undermining the other man’s authority along the way.

Wigmore Hall, London
Cutting’s programme of songs and music were all connected to the theme of night, in an evening that felt more cabaret than concert

Hugh Cutting is still sometimes described as a rising countertenor. That should surely now be unconditional. Cutting has risen, almost to the top, and 2025 has been a stellar year. This enthusiastically performed and received recital, a world away from the general run of pre-Christmas concerts or countertenor recitals, and accompanied by the eclectically matched eight-strong Refound Ensemble, showed why.

Themed recitals are common, but Cutting’s programme of songs and music, all connected to the theme of night, was built on levels of thought and performative imagination that few such programmes would even attempt, much less bring off. The pieces ranged from the baroque to the brand new, via Schubert, folk song and Don McLean. Few familiar pieces on the programme were played as written, with Cutting preferring arrangements mostly by members of the ensemble. It was compelling from first to last, more cabaret than concert.

Chadderton Town Hall, Oldham
Set over the course of local village hall fundraiser, Jim Cartwright’s play is charmingly performed and has a built-in sense of community

Yesterday it was the salsa class. Coming up is the panto. On other days, it may be anything from language lessons to arts and crafts. Today in this multipurpose venue, it is the turn of the annual Christmas fair, with its bric-a-brac stalls, grotto and tree. Sitting on four sides of the elegant ballroom in Chadderton town hall, a refuge for Oldham Coliseum during renovations, we require no leap of the imagination to picture ourselves at a genuine local fundraiser.

That gives Jim Cartwright’s 2012 play a built-in sense of community. Director Jimmy Fairhurst keeps the house lights up, save for the most poignant speeches, and expects us to clap along to the Christmas hits and cheer the young carol singers as if they were children of our own. Blurring the fact/fiction divide, the interval is less a break in the action than a chance to buy the scented candles and prints by Oldham artists that are otherwise part of the set.

Chichester Festival theatre
A musical adaptation of Matt Haig’s children’s book is visually delightful and heroically performed by Chichester Festival Youth Theatre but the songs are humdrum

This origin story, about how Saint Nicholas came to be an arctic-dwelling gift-giver with an army of elves, began as a children’s book by Matt Haig that was turned into a star-studded fantasy film with appearances by Maggie Smith and Jim Broadbent. Now we have the stage adaptation, which puts to music the tale of young Nikolas.

Aged 11, he is marooned in grief and loneliness after his mother is killed by a bear and his father takes off on an expedition to the North Pole to find the fabled villages of the elves. Nikolas (Devon Sandell, performing on press night and full of energy) follows his father northwards with his pet mouse Miika (Olivia Dickens), to meet a reindeer called Blitzen (Alexander Solly), the Truth Pixie (Daisy Chapman), the elves, and a bevy of other fantastical creatures.

In his memoir, the author recalls the boy he loved while growing up in Jordan – and weaves the tale with his family’s history of dispossession

Seven decades after Tareq Baconi’s grandmother fled in terror from the port city of Haifa, carrying a Bible, a crucifix and a week’s worth of clothes, he followed her directions to the family home a few blocks from the sea.

The building was still standing, almost as she had left it in 1948, instantly familiar from childhood stories. Standing beside his husband, Baconi could not bring himself to ring the bell, to find out who was living in the rooms that held Eva’s childhood memories.

With his new film rejected by official censors, the award-winning film-maker says he is being punished for his outspoken views

In Hong Kong, where dissent is now characterised by silence, few dare openly criticise the government or the Chinese Communist party (CCP) that controls it. Film-maker Kiwi Chow is one of the few.

“The Chinese Communist party’s practice is to try and destroy history and truth,” the 46-year-old director says from his home in the region. “It’s ridiculous that I can still live in Hong Kong without being in jail.”

From Tchaikovsky to Turnage, and Handel to Heggie, here are Guardian photographer Tristram Kenton’s favourite opera images of the year

• Shock and awe: our critics on the best classical events of the year
• The best classical recordings of the year

The French actor Brigitte Bardot has died – we look back at her life, relationships and films

• Peter Bradshaw on Bardot: a zeitgeist-force and France’s most sensational export

Whether it’s an electric toothbrush or the ultimate overnight bag, your favourites make one thing clear: you’re ready for a long nap

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The urge to hibernate through winter is perfectly understandable, but all year? Judging by the products you loved (and bought) most over the past 12 months, you wanted to sleep through 2025. And given that it was the year of Trump 2.0, Kim Kardashian’s acting and the Coldplay kiss cam, we can hardly blame you.

Your favourite item overall was our top-rated mattress, the Otty Original Hybrid. By Otty’s own admission, it’s suffering seasonal delivery delays, so we’ll resist the temptation to spotlight it again here, at least for now. Even without it, the list of your most-loved items reads like a hotel suite inventory, from an electric toothbrush via a silky sleep mask to a sunrise alarm clock – plus an overnight bag to keep them in.

We ran more than 1,000km to test top-rated GPS fitness watches including Apple, Garmin and the best for beginners

• The best running shoes for men and women

Whether you’re hitting the pavements for the first time, running with a club or racing for personal glory, the ability to track your workouts has become an essential part of any training regime. Not only can it help you improve, but you can also use it to avoid injury and share in the social experience. A running watch isn’t the only way to do this, but it is a pretty effective option.

But with the market flooded with options, offering an array of features, you might find it difficult to answer all the questions that arise. Do you need offline maps? Do you want to listen to music while you run? Which brand is best, and how much do you really need to spend?

Best running watch for beginners:
Garmin Forerunner 55

Best budget running watch:
Suunto Run

Prosciutto, coppa, chorizo, jamón serrano … a selection of cured meats makes the perfect platter for Twixmas

The foundation of my culinary education was unconventional, to say the least. In the 90s, I was taught by my best friend, Ben Hodges, formerly of the River Café, and brother to Jake Hodges, who co-founded Moro in London. We’d cater for hundreds at weddings, and thousands at festivals from Glastonbury to Green Man, cooking Spanish- and Italian-influenced food. When we weren’t getting stuck in ditches in muddy fields, we’d be driving to the south of Spain in search of olive oil and life.

That education led to a lifelong passion for Spanish and Italian cuisine, and I’m still enamoured of their effortless simplicity, technique and flavour. The bedrock of Mediterranean cuisine is founded on heritage products created for preservation: prosciutto, coppa and bresaola (cured beef) from Italy, and jamón serrano, lomo and chorizo from Spain, to name just a few.

If you’re aiming to heat the human, not the home – or just love snuggling under something cosy – these are our best buys from our test of 20

• The best heated clothes airers to save time and money when drying your laundry

Aside from hugging a fluffy hot-water bottle, sipping the Christmas whisky and ramping up the thermostat, an electric blanket or heated throw is the best way to ward off the winter chill. When you consider that more than half of a typical household’s fuel bills goes on heating and hot water, finding alternative ways to keep warm – and heating the person, rather than the whole home – seems like a good idea.

Many of the best electric blankets and heated throws cost about 2p to 4p an hour to run, so it’s hard to ignore their potential energy- and money-saving benefits.

Best electric blanket overall:
Carmen C81190 fitted electric blanket (double)

Best budget electric blanket:
Slumberdown Sleepy Nights (super king)

Looking for a new iPhone or a good deal on a refurbished one? Samuel Gibbs has tested and rated Apple’s smartphones, including the new iPhone 17

• How to make your smartphone last longer

The best iPhone may be the one you already own. There’s generally no need to buy a fresh phone just because new models have been released, as hardware updates are broadly iterative, adding small bits to an already accomplished package. But if you do want a replacement handset, whether new or refurbished, here are the best devices of the current crop of Apple smartphones.

Many other smartphones are available besides the iPhone, but if you’re an Apple user and don’t fancy switching to Android, there are still a few choices to make. Whether your priority is the longest battery life, the best camera, the biggest screen or simply the optimal balance of features and price, there’s more to choose from in the Apple ecosystem than you may expect, especially after the release of the cheaper iPhone 16e and super-thin iPhone Air.

Best iPhone for most people:
iPhone 17

Whether you’re trying to stay warm at home or smarten up for guests, we’ve found the perfect slippers and bed socks for everyone – even if you don’t normally like them

• The best women’s pyjamas
• The best men’s pyjamas

If it’s true that you can judge a person by their shoes, then it’s perhaps even more so when it comes to their slippers. What you choose to put on your feet in your own home is a window into what you value most. As such, buying the perfect pair for yourself is an act of self-nurture.

If that all feels too hyperbolic, it feels safe to say that they’re at least a reflection of your favourite mode of relaxation and how high you like to turn up the heating.

Sex is an appetite like any other and there is much you can do to make it a priority, from making sure you find the time for it to building your confidence and maintaining intimacy throughout the day

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If you have sex, chances are, you’ll have a good day. But scheduling it makes it feel like a chore. And unlike any other chore or fitness enterprise, you conceive it more as self-indulgence than self-improvement, and as such, even if you’re already in a relationship, it’s hard to find that chin-out determination to get it done. Yet sex is an appetite like any other, a necessity like any other, a nourishment like any other. If you let it go dormant the effect on your relationship might be as if one or both of you are on a permanent diet – and also lonely. That might be fine for both of you, but for many of us, sex is a thing worth prioritising.

At its core, before you introduce any other domestic obstacles, it’s a two-person job, so you have to be attuned to one another; you can’t just decide unilaterally. To take this in ascending order of hurdles; if you’re a childless couple, the main block is going to be each other – not being in the same mood at the same time, not being in the house at the same time. This is true for your entire relationship, not just sex; I once interviewed a fertility doctor, who described working with a couple, trying to find an appointment time for when one was ovulating and both were in the country. They scrolled through several weeks before they managed it. “I felt as if I was beginning to get to the bottom of why they couldn’t conceive,” she said.

As wars in Ukraine and Gaza continued, anti-government protests erupted around the world. Amid the violence, there were moments of humanity, sporting glory and stunning natural beauty. Photographers reflect on the moments behind the pictures

A man cries out in distress as a fire spreads across multiple buildings on a housing estate in Hong Kong
Tyrone Siu/Reuters
A massive fire broke out around 3pm at Wang Fuk Court, a densely packed housing estate in Tai Po, and I arrived about an hour later. By then, the flames were raging across multiple blocks, with thick black smoke. Unsafe bamboo scaffolding and foam may have led to what became Hong Kong’s worst fire in decades. Residents were streaming out in panic, while emergency crews fought a losing battle against the inferno spreading from one tower to the next.

Move over, nachos: a loaded crisp platter is the new party snack in town

Pimento cheese, a much-loved American spread, has been a permanent fixture in my kitchen this month. Whether it’s a quick sandwich filling in times of chaos or an effortless party dip, I am addicted. My favourite way to serve it, though, is as part of a loaded crisp platter. Use salted or pickle crisps, and load them up with spoonfuls of pimento cheese, sliced pickles, herbs and heat. Move over nachos, there’s a new crisp platter in town.

Zinging hospitality and heart-thumpingly good food

For reasons that may already be apparent, and that are currently playing on BBC One, I have spent much of 2025 watching people cook scallops and souffles in a windowless television location unit in Digbeth, Birmingham. MasterChef, despite being one of the most exhilarating jobs a girl can do, sucked up most of my waking hours this year, and made my free time extra-precious. So the very best restaurants I found this year – those with zinging hospitality and heart-thumpingly good food – became equally extra-crucial.

I’m talking about the likes of Tropea in Harborne, just down the road from the TV studio, and where I’ve spent a fair few Saturdays eating butternut squash arancini, fresh tagliolini and whopping great deep-fried salted cannoli. Over in Bristol, meanwhile, two absolute gems revealed themselves on the very same trip: Ragù and Lapin, both in Wapping Wharf and both in repurposed shipping containers, but entirely different creatures. Lapin I described as a “peculiar, meta, slightly earnest and definitely delicious” slice of France that serves asparagus with sauce gribiche, gnocchi Parisienne and, well, lapin itself whenever local hunters manage to bag some bunnies. Lapin will add caviar to any dish, if you ask for it, they play 80s French pop and serve a mint-green, menthe-over-club-soda diabolo for those French exchange school trip vibes. Ragù, meanwhile, may quite simply be one of the greatest dinners I’ve eaten this decade: crespelle in rich tomato brodo, artichoke fritti and chocolate budino with sour cherries and amaretti – flawless cooking in completely understated surroundings.

Topjaw’s Jesse Burgess is known for asking chefs and celebrities their favourite places to eat and drink. Time to turn the tables …

As the wildly popular social media platform celebrates its 10th year, we ask the Topjaw frontman what he loves – and hates – about eating out during the festive season.

A decadent, cheesy centrepiece to steal the attention at any party, and built for comfort and joy

As 2025 closes, I wanted to leave you with one of my favourite recipes: the pumpkin fondue. This started life as a Lyonnaise dish that I saw Anthony Bourdain enjoy on his TV series Parts Unknown at Daniel Boulud’s parents’ farmhouse. My adapted version could be a centrepiece of your New Year’s Eve party, where the molten cheese mixture can be spread on bruschetta and topped with pickles. Equally, however, it could be a main meal shared with friends alongside a salad, pickles and bread. Either way, it’s built for comfort and for joy. Happy New Year to you.

Fewer children are reading for fun - but parents are trying everything from AI to dramatic voices to keep them engaged

It’s been a tough year for our brains. Merriam-Webster dictionary editors chose “slop” as 2025’s word of the year. New York Magazine recently dropped its “Stupid Issue”, with a cover story exploring America’s collective “cognitive decline”. There are big problems in the humanities: reading test scores are down for students nationwide, and undergraduates cannot read full books any more.

Even storytime – a comfy couch, a cardboard book, a kid’s rapt attention as their parent reads them a story – is an endangered activity. According to an April report from HarperCollins UK, parents have lost the love of reading to their children, with fewer than half of gen Z parents calling the activity “fun for me”. According to the survey of 1,596 parents of children aged zero to 13, almost one in three found reading “more a subject to learn” than an experience to enjoy. Only a third of kids aged five to 10 frequently read for fun, compared with over half in 2012.

After breaking his leg on a mountain bike trail, my husband was airlifted to hospital. I felt relief – then reality hit

• Read more in the kindness of strangers series

For our long-service leave, my husband and I decided to travel around Tasmania with our camper trailer. We were coming all the way from Albany in Western Australia and drove across the Nullarbor to get there – not exactly a “lap of the map”, but still a big trip. We’d packed our bikes, surfboards and our kelpie, Anzac.

It was all going beautifully until we got to St Helens in Tasmania. We were looking forward to hitting the bike trails and the beach. But what was meant to be a fun day of mountain biking quickly turned into a stressful, late-night rescue when my husband broke his leg on the trail.

Two film producers discuss second homes, the use of the word ‘woke’, and the importance of the BBC. Could they find any common ground?

Alex, 28, London

Occupation Assistant producer for documentaries

It might seem like all gains for her and all losses for you, but it’s really the start of an exciting new chapter in your relationship

I am a single mum to an 18-year-old daughter. It has always been just us two, and we have a very open, supportive, healthy relationship.

She is going away to university in the new year and has recently developed a new friendship group I know less well than her old friends. They all seem friendly, look out for each other, and don’t let anyone go home on their own, etc. At first, I found her being out late with her friends particularly worrying. It took me a few days to get used to this new part of life, but we talked and I got across to her that it’s purely me worrying about her safety – I think she felt I was annoyed with her. I just worry, though I really appreciate that she keeps me informed of where she is, and I know many 18-year-olds wouldn’t be so open.

Prevention and and keeping on top of the small problems will save you money in the long term

Looking after electrical goods will save you money in the long term. “Regular, small tasks keep appliances working efficiently and help you avoid early replacements,” says Paula Higgins, the founder of the HomeOwners Alliance.

From a barn conversion with wildlife for neighbours to a recently renovated townhouse on a quaint high street

Scheme has not replied to complaints and Pensions Ombudsman says it needs evidence of that

I retired from the civil service five months ago and I’ve still not received my pension. I’ve complained to the Civil Service Pension Scheme (MyCSP) repeatedly, but it doesn’t reply.

The Pensions Ombudsman says they need evidence that MyCSP has not responded to my complaint. How can I provide evidence of a failure to reply?

Airports say they were not responsible for incidents that led to passengers being out of pocket or ending trip

In September we arrived at Stansted airport to find that a fire within a departure lounge had closed the terminal.

We had to wait outside in the chilly small hours for nearly two hours. It was another hour before security opened in the terminal, by which time our flight had departed empty to maintain the airline’s schedules. We were rebooked for the following day.

Stress releases hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol, which can suppress your immune system – but chronic concerns are more of an issue than short-term worries

‘Stress has a well-established effect on your immune health,” says Daniel M Davis, head of life sciences at Imperial College London. “But stress is a very broad phenomenon. You can feel stressed watching a horror movie, or you can experience long-term stress, like going through a divorce.”

Short-term stress can temporarily affect your immune system. “The number of immune cells in the blood changes,” says Davis. “But it returns to normal within about an hour, so it’s unlikely to have any major impact.”

You don’t have to wake at 5am or commit to hardcore exercise. But by working out a handful of habits that suit you, and introducing them slowly, you can change your life

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The first thing to say about the ideal morning routine is that it probably doesn’t exist. Yes, endless influencers promise that they have tweaked, tested and fine-tuned the process of revving up for the day, but how history’s most productive people actually get things done is so varied that it’s hard to draw definitive conclusions. Beethoven, reportedly, used to count out exactly 60 beans for his morning cup of coffee, while Victor Hugo downed two raw eggs after reading a daily missive from his mistress. Mark Wahlberg, on the other hand, wakes at 3am for pre-workout prayer, chasing up his gym time with a few holes of golf and a jolt in the cryo chamber before he even thinks about doing any work.

It is clear, though, that having some sort of routine is key: a set of automatic actions that you do every day, to ease you into your responsibilities with a bit of momentum and a fresh frame of mind. And there is some stuff that seems beneficial enough that everyone should be doing a version of it, even if individual methods differ: one person’s meditative bean arithmetic, after all, is another’s mindfulness. But if you want to finesse your routine, the key is to add one change at a time. “When you focus on a single behaviour,” says the behaviour change specialist Dr Heather McKee, “you build confidence through quick wins, and give your brain the clarity and dopamine hit it needs to automate that action. Once that habit feels natural, you free up mental space to layer in the next change.” But what habits should you be building?

Disturbed sleep is very common as you adapt to a new environment but, with good sleep hygiene and some practical adjustments, you can quickly settle in

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As the working year draws to a close, many of us only have one hope for the season, and that’s a decent night’s sleep. While not every family visit or post-Christmas getaway is going to be a trip to Rancho Relaxo, a few things can help us catch holiday kip. Pre-departure apps can be useful, so can pillow mists and thermoregulation, but when it comes to maximising rest on the road, some say less is more.

It’s the liver – not the skin – that rids the body of the toxins in alcohol, but exercise can help manage the symptoms

Here’s a useful fact to quote to any smug relatives who say they went for a run the morning after their Christmas party: you can’t get rid of toxins by sweating. “Toxins” is a broad term, says Adam Taylor, professor of anatomy at Lancaster Medical School, covering anything that can damage the body – from heavy metals to chemicals found in plastics, as well as the normal byproducts of our own metabolism. The liver is designed to process the toxins in alcohol and either break them down into usable units or get rid of them. The waste products are then filtered from the blood and excreted in urine or stools.

Sweat, on the other hand, has a very different job. Although it can contain extremely small amounts of some metabolic byproducts, its purpose is temperature regulation (and, in some situations, to signal stress or fear). “Sweating is not the means to remove toxins,” says Taylor. “Going for a run or sitting in a sauna after a night of drinking won’t reduce the toxins produced by metabolising alcohol, and it won’t lower your blood alcohol level.”

Young men swapping Nike Tech fleeces for quarter-zips are all over TikTok, as well as staging IRL meetups worldwide. What’s behind the growing movement centring a once unremarkable garment?

As I’m wearing a quarter-zip jumper and sipping on an iced matcha, you’d be forgiven for thinking it’s my last day of term before the school holidays. The giveaway is it’s a Saturday in London’s Soho, and I’m surrounded by 20 or so young men between the ages of 13 and 21 who are all here for London’s first ever “quarter-zip meetup”.

Organised, rather bizarrely, by sibling rappers OKay the Duo, the meetup is the latest manifestation of a growing tongue-in-cheek trend for quarter-zips and matcha that has taken over TikTok globally. Previous meetups have taken place in Houston and Rotterdam.

Model turned actor never lost the poise from her dancing days – but she also made gingham and leopard print her own

• French screen legend dies aged 91

• Brigitte Bardot: a life in pictures

• Obituary: star who shot to fame in the 1950s

And God Created Woman, the title of the 1956 film that made Brigitte Bardot a global star, is the phrase that captures the magic of her. Bardot had an allure that was dazzling in its glamour, yet so natural that to gaze on it felt like a gift from the heavens.

In style, as in life, timing is everything – and Bardot became the poster girl for that sweet spot of postwar France in which the storied heritage of Gallic culture was electrified by the Bohemian spirit of Paris in the 1950s and 60s.

If you think a year is a long time in politics, it’s even longer in the world of denim. Where once there was a universal shape that was ‘trendy’, now jeans of all shapes and sizes are enjoying moments in the saddle

Never has there been a more fickle or divisive piece of clothing.

Jeans, patented 152 years ago as workwear, have the power to make a wearer feel either on-trend or old fashioned, depending on their cut, wash and length and, most importantly, timing. As we bid farewell to 2025, it’s hard to decipher what exactly the jean of the year has been.

No Santas, no reindeer and zero tolerance of gingerbread men – go for a sweater that is cosy and special but not overtly Christmassy

Don’t know about you, but I find that Christmas is a bit like drinking martinis. It is really fun, and then it is a bit too much fun, and by the time I realise I’ve stepped over that line, whoops, it’s too late. I’ve overdone it, and all I want to do is lie down in a dark room.

Christmas is an intense and immersive experience. It is not just the alcohol, not just the food, although there have definitely been way too much of both of those things round my way. It is the whole sensory world. The new perfume your auntie got for Christmas going head-to-head with the cinnamon-scented tea lights. The nostalgia-soaked playlists and soppy romcoms. The kids on laps, the dogs on sofas, the fridge that barely closes. No doubt there was a point back there when I could have said: “You know what, I’ve had an elegant sufficiency of cheer, just a water and a quiet night with my journal tonight thanks,” but I was too busy singing along to Mariah Carey to notice and the moment passed. No matter. Better to err on the side of too much jolliness than too little, after all.

Coastal erosion may threaten the area around Southwold, but a new ‘movable’ cabin makes a great base for exploring its windswept beaches, remote marshes and welcoming inns

The crumbling cliff edge is just metres away. An automatic blind, which I can operate without getting out of bed, rises to reveal an ocean view: the dramatic storm-surging North Sea with great black-backed gulls circling nearby and a distant ship on the horizon. A watery gold sunrise lights the clouds and turbulent grey water.

I’m the first person to sleep in the new Kraken lodge at Still Southwold, a former farm in Easton Bavents on the Suffolk coast. It’s a stylish wooden cabin, one of a scattering of holiday lets in an area prone to aggressive coastal erosion. The owner, Anne Jones, describes the challenges of living on a coast that is rapidly receding in the face of climate-exacerbated storms: the waves have eroded more than 40 hectares (100 acres), and the family business “is no longer a viable farm”. Instead, it is home to low-carbon cottages and cabins, “designed to be movable when the land they stand on is lost to the sea”. The latest projects include a sea-view sauna and a ‘dune hut’ on the beach for reflexology treatments “with the sea and waves as the backdrop”.

Too much turkey and Baileys? Blow away the Christmas cobwebs on one of our rambles. And if that doesn’t work, they all end at a pub for a hair of the dog

Distance 7 miles
Duration 5 hours
Start/finish Ditchling village car park

Readers revel in winter light, wildlife spectacles and cosy pubs from Norfolk to Northumberland
• Tell us about your favourite European beach – the best tip wins a £200 holiday voucher

Who needs the Swiss Alps when you have Macclesfield Forest on your doorstep? Walking from Trentabank car park, the 506-metre peak of Shutlingsloe is the gift that keeps on giving. The panoramic views from its summit, dubbed Cheshire’s mini Matterhorn, are breathtaking at any time of year. But it’s on the crispest of winter days you get the best views: the Staffordshire Roaches, Manchester’s skyline, the Cheshire Plain, the wonder that is Jodrell Bank, and even as far as the Great Orme in Llandudno. Head back to Trentabank where there is a food truck selling local specialities, including Staffordshire oatcakes.
Jeremy Barnett

As pubs nationwide buckle under soaring costs, one Argyll village spent three years buying and restoring theirs – and has ambitious plans for the future

It’s opening night at Scotland’s newest community pub, Oakbank Inn, which sits on the Holy Loch in the village of Sandbank, Argyll. It’s a clear, cold night, and the inn couldn’t look more welcoming: a cosy glow from within the historic building, the Cowal hills beyond. The Christmas lights are twinkling, the glasses are charged and there’s a palpable sense of goodwill, cheer, and plenty of pride in the air. By 6pm, it’s buzzing. Locals are already propping up the bar as a stylish woman sweeps in and bags the last table. She is Debbie Rycroft, a local haberdasher. “A pint in my own local,” she smiles happily, relishing a toast with her husband and equally dapper 19-year-old son.

First-night hiccups are limited to a wonky nozzle and a brief worry about a small radiator leak. “How many people to fix a heater?” quips someone as a line of concerned faces survey the scene. Almost immediately, a punter walks in with a radiator key. All sorted. Someone orders a Guinness; the bartender pulls it off. A two-part pour, pitchblack perfection with a balanced, creamy top. Good things come to those who wait? Well, this one’s been three years in the making.

With the Danish postal service ending its letter deliveries, we asked what you would put in your final envelope

At the end of December, the Danish postal service will deliver its last letter, focusing on packages, citing the “increasing digitalisation” of society.

While the public will still be able to send letters through the distributor DAO, it made us think about how we would use that last chance to send a letter.

Action began in January, before an all-out strike in March. For locals, the flytipping, vermin, maggots and mess are taking a huge environmental and emotional toll

It’s an icy cold winter morning, and 80-year-old Mohammed Bashir is armed with a broom, tackling the large pile of rubbish that has accumulated outside his terraced house in Small Heath, Birmingham.

This has become an almost daily activity for Bashir since the city’s bin strike started 50 weeks ago and, like many in the city, he is starting to lose patience.

Online audiences seeking out authentic and passionate voices as antidote to AI-generated content

For years, social media fame has been associated with the red carpet glamour of the Kardashians and Cristiano Ronaldo’s megawatt sporting celebrity, but millions of users globally are increasingly turning their attention to unassuming heroes drawn from everyday life.

TikTok says a range of accounts, from a bird enthusiast to an Italian grandmother and a doubledecker bus fan, have grown in popularity this year as social media users latch on to authentic voices.

Swerve the stress on New Year’s Eve and serve up a buffet comprising one big dish with plenty of sides, like this chicken and rice with amba, an amazing, tangy Iraqi condiment

New Year’s Eve has always struck me as the most treacherous of nights. Not because of the drink, or the fireworks, or the pressure of staying awake past midnight (although that alone should qualify as an endurance sport). Like Valentine’s Day and your birthday, what makes New Year’s Eve perilous is the collective insistence that this night has to deliver: the best meal, the best party, the best version of ourselves. High expectations that will inevitably lead to disappointment, and haven’t we had our fair share of that already?

There was one year in the restaurant when we convinced ourselves that the only way to rise to the occasion was a set menu of showstoppers. We thought we had predicted everything, and we assumed (boldly, wrongly) that everyone would choose the chocolate dessert. It made sense: who wouldn’t want chocolate on the most celebratory night of the year? So the tarte tatin went on the menu as a polite alternative, a back-up singer, not the star. Except, of course, everyone wanted the tarte tatin.

Dying is a process and in a person’s final hours and days, Nickie and her Threshold Choir are there to accompany people on their way and bring comfort. Through specially composed songs, akin to lullabies, the choir cultivates an environment of love and safety around those on their deathbed.  For the volunteer choir members, it is also an opportunity to channel their own experiences of grief and together open up conversations about death.

Full interview with Nickie Aven, available here

Exclusive: Chloë Deakin tells how she wrote to Dulwich college master to argue against Farage’s nomination as prefect

It was 1981 and Nigel Farage was turning 17. He was already a figure of some controversy, as would become a lifelong habit, among the younger pupils and staff at Dulwich college in south-east London.

“I remember it was either in a particular English lesson or a particular form period that his name came up,” said Chloë Deakin, then a young English teacher, of a discussion with a class of 11- and 12-year-olds. “There was something about bullying, and he was being referred to, quite specifically, as a bully. And I thought: ‘Who is this boy?’”

Bardot titillated the world for five decades, but the controversy and voyeurism surrounding her shouldn’t overshadow an intriguing film career

• Brigitte Bardot dies aged 91

• A life in pictures

Bardot … there was a time when it couldn’t be pronounced without a knowing pout on the second syllable. French headline-writers loved calling the world’s most desirable film star by her initials: “BB”, that is: bébé, a bit of weirdly infantilised tabloid pillow-talk. When Brigitte Bardot retired from the movies in the mid-70s, taking up the cause of animal rights and a ban on the import of baby seals, the French press took to calling her BB-phoque, a homophone of the French for “baby seal” with a nasty hint of an Anglo pun. But France’s love affair with Bardot was to curdle, despite her fierce patriotism and admiration for Charles de Gaulle (the feeling was reciprocated). As her animal rights campaigning morphed in the 21st century into an attack on halal meat, and then into shrill attacks on the alleged “Islamicisation” of France, her relations with the modern world curdled even more.

In the 1950s, before the sexual revolution, before the New Wave, before feminism, there was Bardot: she was sex, she was youth, and, more to the point, Bardot was modernity. She was the unacknowledged zeitgeist force that stirred cinema’s young lions such as François Truffaut against the old order. Bardot was the country’s most sensational cultural export; she was in effect the French Beatles, a liberated, deliciously shameless screen siren who made male American moviegoers gulp and goggle with desire in that puritan land where sex on screen was still not commonplace, and in which sexiness had to be presented in a demure solvent of comedy. Bardot may not have had the comedy skills of a Marilyn Monroe, but she had ingenuous charm and real charisma, a gentleness and sweetness, largely overlooked in the avalanche of prurience and sexist condescension.

C of E faces dilemma as far right claims Christianity to push agenda that often clashes with gospel message

Gary made sure he got to Whitehall early for the “unite the kingdom” (UTK) outdoor carol service in the run-up to Christmas. After about 150,000 people turned up for the last rally called by Tommy Robinson in September, the leader of the anti-migrant far-right movement, he wanted to be sure of a prime position.

He needn’t have worried. About 1,500 people – perhaps 1% of September’s turnout – came to Whitehall to sing carols and hear preachers in the twilight of a mid-December day. Robinson had publicly insisted the event was a non-political celebration of Christmas; maybe that deterred some of movement’s more ardent activists.

Did you decide not to pursue your dream profession or did you have to retrain? We would like to hear from you

AI will affect 40% of jobs and probably worsen inequality, the head of the International Monetary Fund has said.

What has your experience been of trying to future-proof your career? Have you retrained or moved jobs because your previous career path is at risk of an artificial intelligence takeover?

We’d like to hear from independent retailers about how changes to online searches has affected them. We’d also like to find out from customers about how easy it is to track down independent retailers

We’d like to find out more about how your business has been affected by changes to online searches amid the rise of AI.

Independent businesses have traditionally relied on online advertising for increased visibility and sales, even if they are based on the high street. However, with the introduction of AI mode and AI Overview summaries on Google, and the proliferation of LLMs such as ChatGPT or Google Gemini, people are altering their search habits, which may affect the online visibility of small businesses.

Perhaps you have been living with friends for many years, or live in a commune

Do you have what could be described as unusual living arrangements?

Perhaps you live in communal housing, or a commune or with extended family.

We want to hear from UK parents with experience in temporary accommodation about the impact on their lives, family and schooling

More than 172,000 children were living in temporary accommodation in England at the end of June, according to the latest quarterly official figures from October.

That represented an 8.2% rise on the same period last year. There are now more than 130,000 households households living in temporary accommodation in England, the figures showed.

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