Chancellor could slash departmental spending in spring after ruling out tax increase, officials reveal

Rachel Reeves is considering imposing steeper cuts to public services to repair the government’s finances after a bruising week in which investors drove up the cost of UK borrowing and pushed the pound to a 14-month low.

Government officials have told the Guardian the chancellor is prepared to reduce departmental spending even more than planned, having ruled out increases to either borrowing or taxes. Any measures to avoid breaking her fiscal rules could be announced at an emergency statement in the spring.

Martin Rosenbaum fought for 18 months to reveal who had supported nominations of two former special advisers

The reasons given for a peerage awarded by Boris Johnson have been described as “inadequate” and a “mystery” by a freedom of information campaigner after an 18-month struggle.

Charlotte Owen, a former special adviser in the Conservative government, was appointed to the House of Lords in Johnson’s resignation honours list in 2023.

Kenneth fire erupts and grows quickly, while officials say thousands of structures ruined in Palisades and Eaton fires

• Full report: wildfires continue to rage in Los Angeles
• Visual explainer: why are the LA wildfires so bad?
• Californians: have you been affected by the wildfires?

Five people have died in the Eaton fire in Altadena, an increase from the two reported deaths earlier today, Los Angeles county sheriff Robert Luna told ABC Los Angeles station KABC.

Here are some of the latest images from the newswires from the wildfires raging though Los Angeles County.

President-elect had sought to overturn New York appeals court ruling but sentencing will go ahead on Friday

The US supreme court on Thursday declined to delay Donald Trump’s upcoming sentencing in his hush-money case.

Trump had asked the US’s highest legal body to call off Friday’s sentencing after New York courts refused to postpone it.

Royal College of Radiologists calls move ‘shortsighted’ and says it puts Labour’s waiting times plan at risk

Dozens of NHS hospitals have banned their cancer or diagnostic units from hiring new staff, despite GPs referring growing numbers of people who they fear may have the disease.

Doctors warned that widespread recruitment freezes imposed on both types of units over the last year risked undermining Keir Starmer’s drive, outlined this week, to cut waiting times for NHS care.

13 of 54 cancer centres (24.1%) had a recruitment freeze imposed on them last year, along with 29 out of 150 (19.3%) radiology departments.

The 42 hiring bans were imposed by 40 different NHS trusts or boards.

At least one freeze was implemented in each of the four home nations and each region of England.

Resale prices could be capped at 30% over face value, while resale websites face greater legal obligations

The price at which tickets for live events can be resold is to be capped under “gamechanging” proposals put forward by the government to crack down on touting in the sector.

In a move hailed by music industry figures, the culture minister, Lisa Nandy, has launched a consultation that she said would end the “misery” of fans being exploited by touts, some of whom have made huge profits by selling hundreds of tickets a year.

Emissions caused by wealthiest 1% so far this year would take someone from poorest 50% three years to create

The world’s richest 1% have already used up their fair share of the global carbon budget for 2025, just 10 days into the year.

In less than a week and a half, the consumption habits of an individual from this monied elite had already caused, on average, 2.1 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions, according to analysis by Oxfam GB. It would take someone from the poorest 50% of humanity three years to create the same amount of pollution.

Scotland Yard imposes Public Order Act owing to proximity of Broadcasting House to a nearby synagogue

Scotland Yard has banned a pro-Palestine march from gathering outside the BBC’s London headquarters next week, owing to its proximity to a synagogue.

Protesters were planning to gather outside Broadcasting House in Portland Place on Saturday before marching to Whitehall. On Thursday evening, police said they had imposed the Public Order Act to prevent the rally from gathering in the area as it risked causing “serious disruption” to a nearby synagogue on the Jewish holy day, as congregants attend Shabbat services.

X owner and far-right politician appear to agree on everything, as Musk faces accusations of meddling in German election

Elon Musk has praised the co-leader of Germany’s far-right Alternative für Deutschland party, as he repeated his claim that “only the AfD can save Germany” during a controversial live talk on his social media platform X.

The virtual encounter between Musk and Alice Weidel on Thursday took place amid growing criticism over the US billionaire’s vocal support of far-right, anti-establishment parties across Europe, and accusations he is meddling in the campaign for Germany’s 23 February election.

Leader reportedly freed after being ‘violently intercepted’ having left hideout to lead protest against Nicolás Maduro

Allies of Venezuela’s most influential opposition leader, María Corina Machado, said she had been “kidnapped” from the streets of Caracas by regime officials after sneaking out of her hideout to lead a major protest against the authoritarian president, Nicolás Maduro.

About three hours after the announcement, Machado supporters said she had been released having been knocked off a motorbike and “taken away by force” while leaving the rally and had been compelled to record a number of videos.

James Howells, 39, took council to court to try to force it to let him search site for hard drive thrown away by accident

A computer expert’s decade-long battle to recover a £600m bitcoin fortune he says has been lost in a council dump has been halted by a judge.

James Howells, 39, launched a legal case to force Newport city council to allow him to search the site to retrieve a lost hard drive containing the bitcoins.

With winds scattering embers across swaths of land, the Eaton fire burns down some houses while leaving others unscathed

• Tell us: how have the California wildfires affected you?

Ash was falling gently over the Historic Highlands neighborhood of Pasadena, California, on Thursday as residents began to grapple with the toll of the Eaton fire still being fought in the mountains above.

This area was under an evacuation order on Wednesday, and the next day the streets were still littered with fallen branches from Tuesday night’s intense windstorm. The fire broke out early in the evening and spread rapidly amid the powerful gusts, killing at least four people and destroying more than 5,000 structures in the area, which also includes the Altadena and Sierra Madre neighborhoods. As of Thursday afternoon, the blaze had burned 13,690 acres and remained 0% contained.

Ishmael Toroama tells the Guardian sovereignty from Papua New Guinea is a ‘matter of time’ as long-running process enters next phase

Ishmael Toroama’s life has been dominated by a single ambition. The president of Bougainville, an autonomous island that is part of the Pacific nation of Papua New Guinea, has for decades fought for his island to claim its sovereignty.

“Bougainville is for independence,” the president insists. “It is only a matter of time.”

Memorial service heard of humility and integrity amid a hyper-partisan, smash-mouth political landscape of 2025

• Biden hails Carter’s strength of character in eulogy
• Jimmy Carter funeral: in pictures

“Character. Character. Character.”

Speaking from the pulpit of a hushed Washington National Cathedral on Thursday, Joe Biden seemed to be eulogising something bigger than the late US president who lay in a stars and stripes-draped casket before him.

Criterion theatre, London
It goes on and on but this madcap spoof of the blockbuster film has a sparkling cast, including Lauren Drew as Dion and Layton Williams as the iceberg

Imagine James Cameron’s 1997 disaster film romance Titanic as a camp musical spoof narrated by Céline Dion, who famously sang its signature number. Every character onboard this ill-fated liner is a closet-door short of coming out – including Jack and Rose. Then add enough smutty double entendres and rapid cultural references to bedazzle a pantomime dame, alongside a score of mainly Dion songs (My Heart Will Go On is set to electric guitar).

You might come close to preparing yourself for this madcap musical fantasia which has fetched up from off-Broadway to reprise (ruin?) the love story between Rose (Kat Ronney) – who is engaged to rich Cal (Jordan Luke Gage), with Grindr on his phone – and the poor artist Jack (Rob Houchen).

I’ll never stop trying, but parents and childfree people both have to work hard to maintain a community

We’d been riding our mountain bikes and chatting for a solid half-hour when my friend casually said: “Oh yeah, I’m pregnant.” She said it the same way one might say: “I stopped by the grocery store” – although this was, in fact, a conversational hand grenade. My stomach dropped. No, I thought.

It was a weekday afternoon, and she’d been one of my few friends without children to pick up from school or care who could join me for a spontaneous outing. And now she was the third one of my friends in as many years who’d never been outwardly intent on motherhood to unexpectedly announce their pregnancy.

The businessman with a heart takes on crooked payday lenders in this predictable sequel that gets by on its heartfelt performances

It won no prizes for subtlety, but cheerful, victory-of-the-underdog comedy Bank of Dave featured a stonking lead performance by Rory Kinnear as Dave Fishwick. He’s the Burnley businessman who made millions selling vans then took a stand against fatcat bankers by opening his own community bank, the Bank of Dave, in 2011. Now Kinnear is back for a sequel, this time taking on crooked payday lenders. Like the first film, Bank of Dave 2 is predictable and cliché-ridden but gets by on likable, heartfelt performances, and the knowledge that in real life some of this stuff actually happened.

The film picks up two years after the original. The “Bank of Dave” on the high street in Burnley is still going strong – lending to ordinary people who struggle to secure loans from bigger banks. Dave is outraged to discover the sharp practices of payday lenders targeting the vulnerable (in one case squeezing £3,000 out of a £600 loan). Rob Delaney does his best in a small role as the film’s one-note villain Carlo Mancini, the New Jersey owner of fictional payday lender Quick Dough, who has links to organised crime.

Strength training brings multiple benefits and anyone can do it – just as long as they start by getting their form right

Human beings have always been obsessed with picking up heavy things. Lifting a heavy rock was reportedly a test of manhood in prehistoric tribes. In cultures across the globe, stone lifting became a sport and ceremonial practice. Today, you can test your strength with Louis Vuitton dumbbells or a kettlebell shaped like Bigfoot’s head.

Lifting something heavy is satisfying. And as more and more research shows, it can also be a key component of health and longevity.

The environment secretary tried in vain to explain to protesters that they weren’t angry about tax, but Tory neglect

It’s an ill wind, and all that. For most of the last week, the political agenda has been hijacked by a billionaire coming down from a ketamine high who had just discovered a child sexual abuse case that had been widely reported in this country for the past 12 years. Cue rightwing politicians indulging in competitive brown-nosing as they pretended they had always been interested in grooming gangs while the government tried to point out there had already been an inquiry and it was probably better to implement its recommendations rather than waste time and money with another one.

This may have been an unwanted problem for Keir Starmer and the home secretary, who took the brunt of the unedifying shitshow, but for every other minister it came as something of a relief. They could all ease themselves back into the new year, secure in the knowledge that for once no one was paying them any attention. Their screw-ups and local difficulties could slide under the radar. In government, that is known as living the dream.

To mark his birthday this week, we celebrate his versatility from bumbling Mr Bean to his punctilious headteacher in The Secret Policeman’s Ball

Atkinson is the bumbling Father Gerald, who praises “the Holy Goat”, invites the happy couple to be “Johned in matrimony” and asks the groom to take his bride to be his “awful wedded wife”. Cutaways to the congregation’s reactions – Hugh Grant snickering, Simon Callow stifling a guffaw – do little to convince us that Richard Curtis’s script is top-tier stuff. At least Atkinson brings some typically subtle modulations, such as the vicar’s premature flickers of smugness when he wrongly believes his worst malapropisms to be behind him.

He was the brilliant yet alarming writer of the Futurist Manifesto, a bohemian poet jailed with Mussolini who helped forge the modern world. As a new show re-examines his troubling legacy, we explore the Italian troublemaker’s extraordinary life

Filippo Tommaso Marinetti was the Elon Musk of the early 20th century, combining a joy in technological innovation with an appetite for illiberal politics. Where Musk builds rockets, Marinetti celebrated those shiny new inventions, the aeroplane and the motor car. The Futurist Manifesto, which he wrote when the movement existed only in his head, begins with a rhapsodic account of a fast drive that ends in a crash, which delights him more than the Winged Victory of Samothrace, the famous Greek sculpture in the Louvre. Machines, he believes, make all previous art irrelevant. Futurism will hymn the hard new beauty.

Marinetti’s role in the making of the modern world is insufficiently recognised, presumably because he was so contentious and offensive to mainstream democratic values. Futurism is celebrated for the artists and architects it inspired, rather than its manifesto-issuing, speech-making, rabble-rousing leader. But an exhibition opening this month at London’s Estorick Collection draws attention to Marinetti’s own creative contribution to futurism. Entitled Breaking Lines, it centres on what Marinetti called “words in freedom”, the formless, collage-like experimental poetry he invented in his 1912-13 sound and concrete poem Zang Tumb Tuuum.

They may not have seen eye to eye on abortion and assisted dying, but could American politics unite them?

Allison, 63, Edinburgh

Occupation Former policy manager. Currently “economically inactive/domestic goddess”

At MSF’s pioneering centre in Amman, Jordan, the dedicated team deal with lives that have already been saved. Here they make those lives worth living

• As a sign of commitment to peace, help us support those affected by war | Kath Viner
• Donate to our charity appeal here

A girl slips through the corridors of the hospital’s fifth floor with her friend, the pair bright-eyed and shy. Today is her last chance to wear her sparkly new shoes, bought for a party last week. Tomorrow, the 12-year-old Iraqi will have a leg amputated.

The operation was due two weeks ago but the surgeon, who had tried not to weep as he broke the news that amputation was necessary, agreed to delay surgery. She wanted the chance to wear her new shoes to the party first.

War Child hopes to provide a million children in the strip with basic aid and educational and mental health support. It’s their biggest emergency appeal yet

• Donate to our charity appeal here

“They have many symptoms,” says Ibrahim, describing how trauma is manifesting daily in children in Gaza. “Being attached to their parents to the point that they don’t want to leave the place they are in – such as a tent. Severe anxiety and fear. Going to the toilet a lot – involuntary urination, basically.

“They don’t want to participate in activities. They can’t sleep, they’re having trouble eating. Sometimes it can escalate to the point where a child becomes catatonic. They can’t speak. They can’t connect to family members because of severe trauma. Some have become very angry, defensive, aggressive. Some also have speech impediments – they can’t talk; they stutter.”

Issues often deemed too controversial for the classroom are bread and butter for Parallel Histories, which teaches children to see hot-button topics from both sides

• Donate to our charity appeal here

It has dominated the news agenda for the past 14 months, but inside most British classrooms, it’s as if 7 October never happened. Half a million pupils studied history at GCSE or A-level last year, but just 2,000 tackled the origins of the Middle East’s most contentious war: why Israel was born, what that meant for the Palestinians, and the decades of occupation and violence that followed.

It’s not that children aren’t interested. They hear about it at home, in their communities and of course on social media, where a bitter and bloody 100-year-old schism is boiled down to 15-second clips. But inside school, it’s all just too difficult. Too dangerous, even.

Near the eastern city of Goma, charities such as MSF are reporting rising numbers of refugees experiencing rape and torture

• As a sign of commitment to peace, help us support those affected by war | Kath Viner
• Donate to our charity appeal here

They arrive every few minutes, survivors of the unrelenting sexual violence that defines one of the world’s most intractable conflicts. And among the first to assess the exhausted women after they reach the squalid camps on the outskirts of Goma, regional capital of the war-ravaged east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), is Irengue Trezor.

The 35-year-old works for Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), overseeing the charity’s sexual violence clinics within the sprawling camps of grubby white tents that are home to 650,000 people who have fled the fighting.

The language and style of British Conservatism is now taken directly from the fact-free world of online conspiracy

Things can only get worse, as Musk-Trumpery continues to invade British politics. The outrageous smears and falsehoods – Elon Musk posted 200 times on X about “grooming gangs” in three days – included the claim that Keir Starmer is “hiding terrible things”.

The era when the Conservatives were able to pass themselves off as the “respectable” party is thoroughly gone, banished along with its final upholders – former MPs such as Dominic Grieve and David Gauke. Back then, the ketamine-addled ravings of a foreign mega-billionaire might have been politely sidestepped, not eagerly echoed by the Tory leader who has now accused the prime minister of refusing another inquiry into sexual abuse gangs because he “doesn’t want questions asked of Labour politicians who may be complicit”. Remember, Kemi Badenoch last year called herself a “huge fan” of Musk. The factcheck-free world of Meta, Musk, Donald Trump and Nigel Farage is now the language of British Conservatism.

The former PM has sent a cease and desist letter to the current one. Will everyone who thinks she was useless get one next?

The problem with worrying about megalomaniacs on the web and wildfires in Los Angeles is that we have been distracted from the very real plight of Liz Truss.

She is the victim of a very special kind of injustice: people think she was a terrible prime minister, whose doings were disastrous for the economy, resulting in her defenestration by her own party – and what’s worse, people keep saying so.

Hugh Muir is the Guardian’s executive editor, Opinion

The current fires in Los Angeles are reminders of the costs of forgetting

The fires raging in and around Malibu are huge, and they’re terrible, and they’re also the latest in a series of catastrophic fires in Los Angeles county and the region, the latest consequence of heat and drought and wind that have long created the region’s volatile fire weather.

The climate crisis has made it hotter and drier and made wildfire worse here and across the west and around the world, but this region’s ecology has always been wedded to fire. Homes built in and around natural landscapes – canyons, chaparral coastal hills, forests, mountainsides – with a history of wildfire that are pretty much guaranteed to burn again sooner or later create the personal tragedies and losses and the pressure for fire crews to try to contain the blazes. But suppressing the blazes lets the fuel load build up, meaning that fire will be worse when it comes.

Rebecca Solnit is a Guardian US columnist. She is the author of Orwell’s Roses and co-editor with Thelma Young Lutunatabua of the climate anthology Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility

With 2024 set to go down as the hottest year on record, we know that what is coming is truly horrifying

The past 12 months have seen our world enter new territory. Last year will go down as the first time that the global average temperature exceeded 1.5C above preindustrial times over a calendar year. We could crash permanently through the 1.5C guardrail within the next five years, and shatter the 2C limit as soon as 2034. This will almost certainly result in the tipping points for collapse of the Greenland and west Antarctic ice sheets being crossed, committing us to the drowning of coastal towns and cities.

In years to come, we will look back at this time and ask the same question that future generations will ask: why didn’t we stop this catastrophe?

Bill McGuire is professor emeritus of geophysical and climate hazards at UCL and author of Hothouse Earth: an Inhabitant’s Guide

Roger Hallam is co-founder of Extinction Rebellion, Insulate Britain and Just Stop Oil

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.

A failure of justice, and draconian Tory law, put Gaie Delap in prison. A failure of government is keeping her there

Gaie Delap will turn 78 on Friday, in Eastwood Park prison, Gloucestershire. Sentenced to 20 months last August for climbing a gantry over the M25 for Just Stop Oil, she was released in November to serve the rest of her sentence on a home detention curfew. But the electronic tag that she was required to wear couldn’t go round her ankle because she has deep-vein thrombosis and it might have risked causing her a stroke. It couldn’t go round her wrist because they couldn’t find a tag small enough, which people keep saying is because she’s frail. Delap hates being called frail. Her wrist is a perfectly reasonable size, 14-and-a-half centimetres. It’s the wrist-tag design that’s wanting. The topsy-turvy world where a government contractor, Serco, can fail and fail again, while a citizen with a social purpose gets called back to prison five days before Christmas to atone for that failure, isn’t even the most absurd thing about this story.

Delap was engaged in direct action to raise awareness about the climate emergency, and the day citizens stop doing that is the day that progressive politics might as well give up and go home. Whatever pretzel twists Labour ministers have to perform to sound as if they’re on the side of the decent, honest commuter, while simultaneously signalling that they understand the scale of the climate crisis, they must surely remember this: the trade union movement, the peace movement, the suffragette movement, the civil rights movement, the climate justice movement; every known movement of change has relied on non-violent action to disrupt the status quo.

Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist

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.

In the hospitality sector, where labour costs are a bigger proportion of the overall base, employers have fewer options

If one looked solely at this week’s trading reports from the world of big retail – the likes of Marks & Spencer, Next and Tesco – you might wonder why Rachel Reeves’ increase in employers’ national insurance contributions (NICs) has caused such a fuss. It is obvious from the trio’s outlook statements that they will cope with the extra costs.

At Tesco, which faces a £250m extra from NICs and other budget changes, the chief executive, Ken Murphy, did not rule out price rises but said the group would do its “very best” to mitigate them; and, given Tesco’s expertise in grinding out efficiency gains, you would bet on it to succeed. In similar style, Stuart Machin at M&S noted the cost headwinds but said “there is much within our control”.

He wouldn’t sit down, wouldn’t get off, couldn’t or wouldn’t tell us what he wanted. What could we do?

I was part of a miserable incident on a bus. This was one evening just before Christmas and I had somewhere to be. As I got on, the driver was trying and failing to communicate with an old man holding a shopping trolley. “He says he wants to go to Enfield,” said the driver. The poor chap with the trolley looked at me and said nothing. His hands had a tremor about them. “Enfield?” I asked. He just stared at me. If he really had wanted to get to Enfield, far north London, by bus, from where we were in far west London, he was in for a very long night indeed.

Wondering if his English wasn’t good, I tried every other language I could muster. He said nothing, but when I tried Croatian on him, there seemed to be some reaction. A Polish woman pitched in but got no further. I had no clue what to do, where to take him or what anyone else could have done for him. We didn’t even know his name, and he was either unwilling or unable to tell us.

The response to the independent inquiry has been too slow. New policies to tackle all forms of abuse are needed urgently

Inquiries into institutional failures are a vital element in public life. These have three broad purposes, the first of which is finding out the truth. Closely linked to this is accountability, which means listening to victims as well as apportioning blame. The third is to influence policy and attitudes.

In recent days some victims of and campaigners against gang-based child sexual abuse and exploitation have argued that further investigation of this form of crime, and official failures in dealing with it, is needed. The appalling bullying of Jess Phillips by Elon Musk, and Kemi Badenoch’s cynical response, do not invalidate such arguments. While many members of the sex abuse gangs in Rochdale, Rotherham and elsewhere have been jailed, with further prosecutions in train, the impunity with which some operated remains disturbing.

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.

Five living presidents gathered at the service in Washington. They were a reminder of how much has changed in US politics

Heavy with honours, attended by all living US presidents, and swathed in public affection, Jimmy Carter received a solemn state funeral on Thursday on the kind of cold and crystalline January day at which Washington DC’s climate can excel. Within hours, though, the 39th US president’s remains were interred in a private ceremony alongside his wife Rosalynn, in the shadow of the modest house they built in 1961 in Plains, Georgia, where Mr Carter was born more than a century ago, and where he died at the end of December.

This sharp juxtapositions of Mr Carter’s final day in the world’s eye were somehow appropriate. He made his home in Washington for the four years of his presidency, but his roots and heart were always in Georgia. His manifest personal decency and lack of Beltway experience made him the “not-Nixon” that the US needed after Watergate. Yet after a presidency marked by spiralling oil prices and the Iran hostage debacle, America quickly turned to a “not-Carter” candidate in the shape of Ronald Reagan.

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.

Miguel Martinez Lucio, Dominic Crossley and Matthew Campbell respond to an article about the owner of X turning on Nigel Farage

Your article (Elon Musk turns on Nigel Farage and calls for new leader of Reform, 5 January) raises fascinating insights as to how international interests play an ever more direct role in the British political system. Discretion is not assured. What is becoming clear is that the likes of Nigel Farage seem to have dispensed with the illusion that Brexit was about political independence. Instead, the need to comply with far-right US agendas, the infantile inconsistencies of rogue James-Bond-type billionaires, and to accept millions of pounds in overseas income are openly accepted.

The positioning of Reform UK’s development in relation to overseas interests is at odds with the earlier rhetoric of national sovereignty. If ever there were a moment of amnesia in British politics, it is now. Given this focusing on the idiosyncratic turns of overseas business people, perhaps the government can seize the moment and complete an aspect of Brexit’s failed project that did have one moral feature: ensuring that it was the British people who should finance British politics.

If we are to take seriously the risk facing humanity, regulators need the power to ‘recall’ deployed models, as well as assess leading, not lagging, indicators of risk, writes Prof John McDermid

Re Geoffrey Hinton’s concerns about the perils of artificial intelligence (‘Godfather of AI’ shortens odds of the technology wiping out humanity over next 30 years, 27 December), I believe these concerns can best be mitigated through collaborative research on AI safety, with a role for regulators at the table.

Currently, frontier AI is tested post-development using “red teams” who try their best to elicit a negative outcome. This approach will never be enough; AI needs to be designed for safety and evaluation – something that can be done by drawing on expertise and experience in well-established safety-related industries.

• Dyche had been in charge of club since January 2023
• Baines and Coleman take team against Peterborough

Everton’s new owners are expected to offer David Moyes the chance to return to Goodison Park after ­sacking Sean Dyche hours before the FA Cup tie against Peterborough United. Moyes, who left Everton for ­Manchester United in 2013, has been out of work since leaving West Ham at the end of last season.

The Scot’s availability, vast experience of the Premier League and of Everton make him an attractive proposition for The Friedkin Group (TFG) as it considers candidates who could secure the club’s top-flight status this season. Its first ­managerial appointment as Everton owners could happen quickly. Talks with Moyes will advance on Friday.

Accrington face the ultimate test, long throws await Spurs and there’s a potential blockbuster in north London

“We’re aware we were once mentioned in a milk advert,” reads the bio on Accrington Stanley’s X page. “We hear ‘Who are they?’ and ‘Exactly’ a lot.” Don’t be misled by the weary tone regarding their mention in the famous 1989 Milk Marketing Board advertisement, for which the club received £10,000. The connection has always been embraced and never more so than in the buildup to their third round visit to Liverpool, the Premier League leaders. As the Accrington captain Seamus Conneely said: “We’ve made it to third and fourth rounds before, we’ve had League Cup runs and played in some great stadiums, but we’ve finally got that big one. Liverpool is going to top it all.” Accrington have sold their entire 4,700-ticket allocation and the tie is of huge significance to the striker Josh Woods, a boyhood Liverpool fan whose reaction to the draw went viral and prompted a reply from Ibrahima Konaté. Liam Coyle is another Red who started out in Liverpool’s academy, while the management team of John Doolan and Ged Brannan are also from Liverpool. This is an FA Cup moment to cherish. Andy Hunter

Liverpool v Accrington Stanley, Saturday 12.15pm (all times GMT)

Brentford v Plymouth Argyle, Saturday 3pm

Bristol City v Wolverhampton Wanderers, Saturday 12pm

Chelsea v Morecambe, Saturday 3pm

Leeds v Harrogate Town, Saturday 5.45pm

Manchester City v Salford City, Saturday 5.45pm

• 141 members demand SGM and no-confidence vote
• Rebellion follows outcry over top pay and redundancies

A grassroots rebellion has accused the Rugby Football Union of ­“postponing the inevitable” after the governing body rejected an attempt to force the removal of the chief executive, Bill Sweeney, amid the pay and bonuses scandal.

On another remarkable day at the RFU, a group of 141 members from across the country called for a special general meeting and a vote of no confidence in Sweeney, only for the union to declare the motion invalid on bureaucratic grounds.

The postseason kicks off on Saturday. Our writers pick the dark horses, players to watch and make their tips for the NFL’s championship game

Cincinnati Bengals. This is the obvious answer, as it’s a bummer when the team with one of the NFL’s best quarterbacks (Joe Burrow), the receiving triple crown winner (Ja’Marr Chase) and the NFL’s sack leader (Trey Hendrickson) are on the outside looking in. Plus, it would be fun to watch opposing offenses torch the Bengals’ iffy defense. As it is, we’ll have to wait until next season to know whether a defensive overhaul (including the firing of defensive coordinator Lou Anarumo) will bear any dividends. Doug Farrar

The former national rugby union captain has been spared jail for the domestic abuse of his estranged wife, Gill, after courts painted a grim picture of his off-pitch behaviour

Scotland has not always been blessed with rugby players of genuine world class but prime-time Stuart Hogg was a rare exception. At the height of his powers he was the Six Nations Player of the Year in successive seasons in 2016 and 2017, mixing acceleration and attacking intent with a just-try-and-stop-me attitude that set him apart from the average workaday pro.

The talented lad from Hawick was a big fish in a series of smallish pools – the Borders, Scottish rugby, Exeter – and grew accustomed to being hailed as king of his local oval-ball castle. While, behind closed doors, not being entirely the man his many fans thought him to be.

• Real Madrid 3-0 Mallorca
• Spanish champions set to face rivals Barcelona in Jeddah

Second-half goals from Jude Bellingham and Rodrygo helped Real Madrid to a 3-0 win over Mallorca in the Spanish Super Cup semi-finals and set up a showdown with Barcelona in Jeddah.

Bellingham broke the deadlock after the hour mark with a low drive following an excellent team move.

Tottenham manager is wondering why nobody else is standing up to increasing role of technology in game

In Ange Postecoglou’s words, uttered a few weeks back, he is not the Messiah, just a “naughty little boy”. It was actually not his own work, rather a riff on the famous line from Monty Python’s Life of Brian but the point was well made.

Despite his commitment to doing things differently on the tactical front, to providing exhilaration, even escapism, the Tottenham manager does not want to put himself on a higher plane; to be preachy, holier than thou.

• Interim head coach has overseen 10 wins from 11 matches
• Numerous coaches from around the world considered

Arsenal’s interim head coach, Renée Slegers, is among the candidates in the final round of interviews as the club’s recruitment of a permanent successor to Jonas Eidevall nears its conclusion.

The Dutchwoman has overseen 10 wins from 11 unbeaten matches since stepping into the role after Eidevall’s resignation on 15 October. According to multiple sources, Arsenal could conclude their recruitment process before their next Women’s Super League fixture, at home to Crystal Palace, a week on Sunday. Slegers is preparing the side to host Bristol City in the Women’s FA Cup fourth round this Sunday and has never ruled herself in or out when asked in press conferences.

The firefighters earn $5.80-$10.24 per day plus $1 an hour when responding to active emergencies, according to CDCR

• Californians: have you been affected by the wildfires?

Hundreds of incarcerated firefighters are helping battle the destructive blazes that are rapidly spreading across southern California as a powerful windstorm devastates the region.

The California department of corrections and rehabilitation (CDCR) said on Thursday that it had deployed 783 imprisoned firefighters while the county fights multiple out-of-control blazes fueled by extreme winds and dry conditions. The incarcerated crews are embedded with the California department of forestry and fire protection (Cal Fire) and its nearly 2,000 firefighters, who have been stretched thin from several simultaneous emergencies.

Exodus from target-setting group is attempt to head off ‘anti-woke’ attacks from rightwing politicians, say analysts

• Business live – latest updates

The six biggest banks in the US have all quit the global banking industry’s net zero target-setting group, with the imminent inauguration of Donald Trump as president expected to bring political backlash against climate action.

JP Morgan is the latest to withdraw from the UN-sponsored net zero banking alliance (NZBA), following Citigroup, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs. All six have left since the start of December.

Conditions for a January LA firestorm have not existed before now, writes a meteorologist and climate journalist

• California wildfires – live
• Californians: have you been affected by the wildfires?

An exceptional mix of environmental conditions has created an ongoing firestorm without known historical precedent across southern California this week.

The ingredients for these infernos in the Los Angeles area, near-hurricane strength winds and drought, foretell an emerging era of compound events – simultaneous types of historic weather conditions, happening at unusual times of the year, resulting in situations that overwhelm our ability to respond.

Global heating is supercharging storms, floods and droughts, affecting entire ecosystems and billions of people

The climate crisis is “wreaking havoc” on the planet’s water cycle, with ferocious floods and crippling droughts affecting billions of people, a report has found.

Water is people’s most vital natural resource but global heating is changing the way water moves around the Earth. The analysis of water disasters in 2024, which was the hottest year on record, found they had killed at least 8,700 people, driven 40 million from their homes and caused economic damage of more than $550bn (£445bn).

‘Cease and desist’ letter accuses PM of harming her reputation and contributing to her losing her seat

Liz Truss has sent a legal letter to Keir Starmer demanding he stops making “false and defamatory” claims that she crashed the economy.

The former prime minister sent a six-page “cease and desist” letter accusing Starmer of harming her reputation and contributing to her losing her South West Norfolk seat in the general election.

Labour’s description of 16,400 ‘immigration offenders and foreign criminals’ angers campaigners

Keir Starmer has boasted of deporting a record number of refused asylum seekers and overseas criminals since scrapping the Rwanda scheme, using language that has dismayed human rights campaigners.

The Home Office said on Thursday it had returned more than 16,400 “immigration offenders and foreign criminals” since the election in July, the highest six-month total since 2018.

Former health minister says medical examiners, who spot cases of intentional harm, could have been in place earlier

Jeremy Hunt has said ministers took “too long” to introduce medical examiners to investigate deaths in the NHS, as he apologised to the families of Lucy Letby’s victims.

Giving evidence at the Thirlwall inquiry on Thursday, the former health secretary said he had “ultimate responsibility” for the NHS at the time Letby committed her “appalling crime” of murdering babies at the Countess of Chester hospital in 2015 and 2016.

Panels installed on south quire roof expected to meet a third of church’s electricity needs

“And God said, Let there be light” – and on a witheringly cold winter morning there was light, as the Dean of York carried out a rooftop blessing for the minster’s 184 new solar panels.

The sky was blue and the sun shone when the Very Rev Dominic Barrington led the blessing ceremony as the panels were switched on for the first time. “They were absolutely gleaming,” said one witness.

Firebrand leader says he is proud union stood up to ‘wholesale attacks’ on rail industry by Conservative party

• UK politics live – latest updates
• Business live – latest updates

Mick Lynch has said he will retire as general secretary of the RMT union, after four years during which he became perhaps the most recognisable presence on picket lines amid the biggest rail and tube worker strikes for decades.

The National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) said it would appoint a new general secretary in the first week of May. Lynch, 63, would remain as general secretary until then.

YouTube channel apparently belonging to official at Clacton accommodation suggests support for EDL and Tommy Robinson

The head of security at accommodation for vulnerable disabled asylum seekers has been removed from his duties over concerns about his alleged support for the far-right English Defence League and Tommy Robinson, the Guardian has learned.

The asylum seekers, who have a range of disabilities, have been accommodated by the Home Office in a former care home in Nigel Farage’s Clacton constituency in an area where officials from the local Tendring district council have recorded the area’s highest level of hate crimes.

People told to attend A&E alone as acute trust cancels operations, declaring ‘critical incident’ amid rise in flu cases

An NHS trust is preparing to cancel operations, urgently discharge 140 patients and restrict admissions to help it cope with “extreme winter pressures”.

The Gloucestershire acute trust declared a “critical incident” on Wednesday as hospitals in England asked patients seeking medical help to come alone to reduce overcrowding in A&E.

Tower Hamlets will offer help up to £150 a child for households earning less than £50,350

A London council is likely to become the first in England to offer a “universal” payment towards school uniform costs to households on an income of less than £50,350.

MPs were this week debating government plans to ban schools in England from requiring parents to buy more than three branded uniform items, plus a tie – but Tower Hamlets council said that “simply isn’t enough to alleviate the burden” on struggling families, and that it intended to offer payments of up to £150 for each child.

This year sees the city celebrate its rich, diverse creativity. Magician Dynamo, AKA Steven Frayne, and director Kirsty Housley discuss collaborating to shine a light on the arts of their home city – and offer hints on what to expect

Slathered in mud, the magician formerly known as Dynamo emerged from a five-tonne mound of earth. It was 2022 and Steven Frayne had just buried himself alive, a magic trick that even Houdini never successfully performed. In the coffin-sized pit he dragged himself out of, Frayne left behind the weight of expectation that came with his alter ego, having spent two decades creating impossible, death-defying performances as Dynamo: floating above the Shard; walking across the Thames; levitating below Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro. Now working under his own name, Frayne’s latest project takes him out of the spotlight. “I’ve learned over the past few years to move from focusing on the magic in me,” he says, “to being a conduit to helping other people see magic in themselves.”

Bradford-born Frayne is working with acclaimed director Kirsty Housley on Rise, an enormous outdoor spectacle for the opening act of Bradford’s year as city of culture. Created with more than 100 collaborators, Rise is taking place in City Park with live music, poetry, aerial acrobatics and magic for two nights only. They’re rehearsing in a sports school hall, the only space large enough for them to fit. “The way I look at it,” Frayne grins, “this is Bradford’s equivalent of an Olympic opening ceremony.”

The wild cats were humanely trapped using cameras near baited traps and are in quarantine

Two lynx that were illegally released into the Scottish Highlands have been captured overnight and are said to be in good health.

Police had issued a warning to the public on Wednesday evening not to approach the wild cats, after several sightings in the Drumguish area, near Kingussie.

Physicians call Kennedy ‘dangerous’ and point to harmful conspiracy theories about vaccines and science

More than 15,000 doctors have signed a letter circulated by the Committee to Protect Health Care in opposition to Donald Trump’s nominee for secretary of health and human services, Robert F Kennedy Jr.

“As physicians who care deeply about the health and safety of our patients and communities, we are appalled by Donald Trump’s reckless decision to appoint Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS),” the letter states.

Lawsuit claims contractors and city failed to implement an effective system for deterring a known threat, the suit says

Six people who were injured and the father of a man who was killed in the New Year’s truck attack filed a lawsuit Thursday against the city of New Orleans and two contractors, claiming they failed to protect revelers from an army veteran who sped around a police blockade and raced down Bourbon Street, killing 14 people and injuring at least 30.

The attack by Shamsud-Din Jabbar was tragic but preventable, leaving the six victims with broken bones, physical suffering and mental anguish and killing Brandon Taylor, according to the lawsuit filed in Orleans parish civil district court by Matthew Hemmer with the Morris Bart law firm. Jabbar was killed in a shootout with police.

Service marks end of 39th president’s lying in state at ceremony attended by all five living presidents

• Jimmy Carter funeral – latest news

Jimmy Carter’s six-day farewell to the nation culminated on Thursday morning with a eulogy from Joe Biden on faith and character as the 39th president received a state funeral at Washington National Cathedral.

During the service, the US president said that he had been the first senator to endorse Carter’s presidential run – highlighting how his predecessor saw challenges “well into the future” and taught him the power of morality.

Bryant was Miss Oklahoma and Florida Citrus spokesperson before leading anti-LGBTQ+ ‘Save Our Children’ campaign

Anita Bryant, a multi-Grammy nominated singer and former Miss Oklahoma who later became a high-profile campaigner against gay rights in America, has died at the age of 84.

In an announcement on Thursday, Bryant’s family announced that Bryant died at her home in Edmond, Oklahoma, on 16 December 2024. “May Anita’s memory and her faith in eternal life through Christ comfort all who embraced her,” her family said.

During traffic stop, officers fire at Edgar Welch, 2016 shooter at eatery mistakenly thought to be center of pedophile ring

The gunman involved in the 2016 “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory attack on a Washington DC pizza restaurant that was mistakenly thought to be at the center of a pedophile ring has died after being shot by police in North Carolina during a traffic stop.

In a news release issued on Thursday, North Carolina’s Kannapolis police department announced that Edgar Maddison Welch died from his wounds caused by two police officers who fired at him after he pulled out a handgun during a traffic stop on Saturday.

Thierry Breton says EU is not trying to censor tech chief’s discussion with Alice Weidel of German far-right party

A former EU leader on tech has accused Elon Musk of “lying like hell” by claiming the bloc was trying to stop an interview the owner of X had set up with the co-leader of the German far-right party Alternative für Deutschland.

Thierry Breton, who quit as a European commissioner in September, having overseen the passage of ambitious legislation designed to regulate big tech, said Musk had been disingenuous in claiming the EU was trying to censor his discussion with Alice Weidel, which took place on Thursday evening.

Judge in Kentucky finds rules overstepped president’s authority and scraps entire 1,500-page regulation

The Biden administration’s Title IX rules expanding protections for LGBTQ+ students have been struck down nationwide after a federal judge in Kentucky found they overstepped the president’s authority.

In a decision issued on Thursday, US district judge Danny C Reeves scrapped the entire 1,500-page regulation after deciding it was “fatally” tainted by legal shortcomings. The rule had already been halted in 26 states after a wave of legal challenges by Republican states.

United Nations human rights committee says decision should serve as warning to other nations considering outsourcing asylum processing

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Australia violated the rights of asylum seekers arbitrarily detained on the island of Nauru, a UN watchdog has ruled, in a warning to other countries intent on outsourcing asylum processing.

The UN human rights committee published decisions in two cases involving 25 refugees and asylum seekers who endured years of arbitrary detention in the island nation.

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Pro-independence Múte Egede says Greenland must stay unified after becoming centre of US-Denmark spat

Greenland’s prime minister has called for unity, urging citizens not to panic, after being thrown into a geopolitical battle between the US and Denmark by Donald Trump’s interest in taking control of the territory.

Múte Egede said he understood people may be concerned after the incoming US president declined to rule out using military and economic force to gain control of Greenland, but called on his fellow citizens to “put aside differences and stand together”.

‘My cycle is over,’ says leftwinger, 89, who lives humbly and oversaw one of healthiest and most liberal democracies

José Mujica, the former guerrilla who became Uruguay’s president and a global progressive icon, has announced that the cancer in his oesophagus has spread to his liver, and that he has chosen to forgo further treatment.

In what Mujica said would be his last interview, he told Búsqueda, a weekly news magazine in Uruguay, that he was “doomed”.

A good pair of boots is essential in the colder months, and our expert has picked out the best ones for every occasion

• The best men’s coats for winter

Much like our bodies, our wardrobes need to acclimatise to winter. It’s time to unpack your chunky knitwear and arm yourself with a waterproof coat or an umbrella at all times. And you can shelve your shoes and switch to boots instead.

As with all types of footwear, it’s good to have a few pairs at your disposal so you’re covered no matter what you’ve got planned. Sophisticated brogues for a formal event. Hiking boots for outdoorsy activities. Boots with a fluffy lining for sub-zero temperatures. Or chelsea boots if you’re after versatility.

Whizzing up smoothies, soups and purees will be a breeze with our top-rated portable, jug and hand blenders

• The best food processors and mixers

January, with its triple threat of the dreary Ds: diets, dankness and darkness, can feel like it lasts for ever. Believe it or not, a decent blender can help offset the misery of two of those Ds, by blitzing up nutritious smoothies to keep you off the booze and wholesome soups that can help you eat more healthily without resorting to freezing-cold salads.

Unlike many other kitchen appliances, most blenders are incredibly economical to run – useful post-Christmas – while some can even heat your soup for tuppence. However, the difference in functions, versatility and maintenance can be startling. That is why I put nine blenders from some of the most well-known manufacturers through their paces to separate the smooth operators from the far-from-brilliant buys.

Best blender overall:
Braun PowerBlend 9 jug blender JB9040BK
_{£124 at Amazon}

Best budget blender:
Kenwood Blend-X Fresh blender BLP41.A0GO
_{£44.99 at Kenwood}

Best stick blender:
KitchenAid Go cordless hand blender
_{£219 at KitchenAid}

Best investment blender:
Vitamix Explorian E520
_{£444.46 at Donaghy Bros}

In this week’s newsletter: how you’re decluttering your cart for 2025, running shoes to hit your PBs and our beginner’s guide to veganism

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The start of a new year is the perfect time to take stock of our lives – our health, relationships, professional growth, finances. And the latter includes our shopping habits. If you put yours under the microscope, how do they shape up?

Do you visit certain supermarkets out of habit, maybe because they’re on the way home from work, when you could shop more wisely, and affordably, elsewhere? What do you comfort-buy? What could be cheaper on subscription? Do you waste too much food, or own too many clothes? Do you want to shop more sustainably – or curb an out-of-control Vinted habit?

The best electric toothbrushes: prioritise your pearly whites with our expert-tested picks, from Oral-B to Philips

From electric blankets to the cosiest coats: the cold weather essentials you need to beat the big freeze

The best running shoes to take you from trail to road to marathon, tried and tested by runners

January style essentials by Jess Cartner-Morley: from super scarves to all-weather leggings

What you need to buy to make sure your new year resolution of following a plant-based diet lasts beyond January

Whether you’re doing it for the animals, your health or environmental reasons, there’s never been a better time to go vegan. There’s meatless meat, dairy-free cheese, plant-based liqueurs and, well, anything else you can think of.

With more than a decade of veganism under my belt, I’ve tried pretty much every plant-based brand going. I was a full-blown omnivore until the age of 20 though, so I can tell straight away when a new vegan product hasn’t got it right. Below, I cover the must-buy alternatives, from cheese to meat, to the foods that would-be vegans fear they’d miss the most. I’ll also tell you what not to buy. Worried about what supplements you need to take? I spoke to a dietician to find out.

A​ Glastonbury duet with Chris Martin shot her skyward​. Now, the self-reflective singer’s debut album is a marvel of candid songwriting​ – too candid for some, she says

Like many people, Victoria Canal failed to score tickets to last year’s Glastonbury festival. But the singer-songwriter’s solution wasn’t quite so relatable: Coldplay were headlining, so she messaged Chris Martin to ask if he could get her in. It was 1am in London, and Canal was drinking with friends when Martin called to make a better offer: how about she join him on stage?

The next day, Canal thought she had “hallucinated” the entire conversation. “I have had many dreams like that before,” she says. But no. Come June, there she was: providing vocal and piano accompaniment to Paradise in front of an enraptured 100,000-strong crowd. In the footage, she seems to be in her element, completely unfazed by such a gargantuan gig. In reality, was she nervous? She pauses and gives me a strange look. “Of course! It was anything but chill – it was the biggest stage in the world, with the biggest band in the world!”

“Renzo never cavorts blindly in his art,” wrote Feliks Topolski of his friend and fellow artist, my father Renzo Galeotti, who has died aged 85. On paper, on canvas, and occasionally in sculpture, he was a creator who never saw any reason to disconnect his art from his politics and his wider sense of the world.

This was most evident in his cycles of studies of the Italian communist thinker Antonio Gramsci and the author Primo Levi, but was as true of his other works, from commissioned portraits to landscapes of his home town of Carrara, Tuscany, that charted the way the insatiable demand for local marble was devouring the Apuan Alps, towering over the town.

Singer and actor will step away from Miss Me? for a number of weeks as she says: ‘I’m really not in a good place’

Lily Allen has announced she is taking a break from her BBC podcast Miss Me?, citing poor mental health and a “tough period” in her life.

Speaking on a newly released episode, she said: “You’re not going to hear me for a few weeks, listeners.”

(City Slang)
Championed by Iggy Pop and riot grrrl royalty, the Brighton duo pile on the jagged riffs, scabrous humour and swearing for their politically charged debut

For the most part, Lambrini Girls’ debut album barrels along in roughly the style that’s hoisted the Brighton duo to cult success over the last few years. There are huge, distorted basslines courtesy of Lily Macieira and equally distorted guitar playing from Phoebe Lunny that flits between post-punk angularity and occasional bursts of poppier, Ramones-y chords. The rhythms are frantically paced, and there are lyrics that focus on societal ills, delivered in Lunny’s distinctive vocal style: she sings like someone angrily trying to make their point in a particularly noisy bar, as a bouncer struggles to usher them out of the door.

Combined, this music has drawn appreciative nods from a range of forebears including Iggy Pop, Kathleen Hanna and Sleater Kinney’s Corin Tucker and Carrie Brownstein. Iggy is so enamoured of the duo that he got them to collaborate on a version of Depeche Mode’s Personal Jesus that appeared alongside tracks by Andrea Corr and Rick Astley on a Trevor Horn-helmed covers album: improbable company in which to find a band whose first EP arrived in a sleeve featuring a pile of shit on fire.

PC; Tom van den Boogaart/Sokpop
Pleasant pottering tending the hedgerows turns into an eerie puzzler full of peril, delivering more than the rural idyll it first promises

It sounds like a delightful getaway. A week in a remote Dutch village tending to the garden of an absent homeowner; birds tweeting in the trees, a picturesque church just over the lane. But there’s something wrong in designer Tom van den Boogaart’s surreal and quietly eerie puzzle game. The tools are all missing, the villagers are weird and you’ve been warned not to go out at night. Plus, the sky is a hallucinogenic haze of red and orange and every once in a while you catch someone watching you from behind a door or through a window. What on earth is going on?

Grunn is somehow part gardening sim, part point-and-click adventure and part survival horror thriller. Once you find your shears and trowel you can spend time tidying the hedges and digging up mole hills, but you can also explore the tiny hamlet and its lonely haunted locations, often finding discarded Polaroid snaps which give you photographic clues to where the next tool, implement or puzzle item may be found. There’s a day-night cycle running in the background, and if you do venture out in the dark, odd glitches and ghostly beings are glimpsed at the edges of your vision. As you explore, there are perils to contend with that may well end up killing you – then you start again from scratch with only your memories and photos to guide you.

Explorer of the properties of film whose work was seen on Channel 4 and taken up by Tate Modern

In 1970 Malcolm Le Grice made the seven-minute film Berlin Horse. There is no narrative: original 8mm footage of a horse led around a yard in circles is looped and transformed by adding pure spectrum colour filters through the film step-printer in the London Film-makers’ Co-op (LFMC) workshop. It is accompanied by a soundtrack that Brian Eno had made from guitar chords, with a delay pattern that parallels the visual loops, echoing the use of loops by the US minimalist composers Philip Glass and Steve Reich.

Shown at LFMC screenings and film festivals, it went on to make a mark in popular culture through inspiring the look of, and being occasionally glimpsed in, the music video for Catch the Sun by the indie band Doves. Both can be found on YouTube.

‘The best £12 I ever spent’: real fitness starts with the right kit. Here’s the gear that helped these ordinary people get fit and stay motivated

If you’re anything like me, your social media feed will be awash with targeted ads for spurious fitness gizmos, questionable “supplements” and get-ripped-quick gadgets in January. “Get a rippling six-pack while you continue to rot on the sofa eating melted camembert,” they may as well say. Unfortunately, this is seldom the case.

The harsh reality is that there’s no shortcut to getting fit. But certain tools can help you get there … or at least make the process slightly less harrowing. With that in mind, we asked ordinary people who got themselves in shape about the kit they couldn’t have done without.

Lots include her trademark oversize glasses as well as outfits from Miu Miu, Dior and lifesize ostrich sculpture

Iris Apfel, perhaps the world’s first centenarian style icon, died last year at the age of 102. Now her clothes, art and furniture are set to be sold at Christie’s later this month in an online auction titled Unapologetically Iris.

Anyone familiar with Apfel and her “more is more” style would know that it began with her trademark owl-like glasses. There are 18 pairs for sale here, with square, round and sparkly designs included.

Resolutions are so last year. Instead, the latest fashion trends, life goals and dating rules are playing out on the battleground of viral listicles. Plus: your wardrobe dilemmas solved

Repeating outfits: in. People pleasing: out. Paying with cash: in. Photo dumps: out. A quick trawl through social media and it is evident that for 2025, traditional new year resolution lists are out and “ins and outs” lists are, er, in.

These listicles do exactly what their title suggests, demarcating everything from specific items of clothing to wider food trends and dating rules into two opposing grids. On TikTok the hashtag “ins and outs” has quickly acquired more than 44,000 posts. Unlike new year resolutions, which tend to be specific goals, “ins and outs” act as a barometer of cool.

Loosening the grip of a conspiracy theory is a complex task, writes advice columnist Eleanor Gordon-Smith. Aim to change the relationship with your friend, not their mind

• Read more Leading questions

My friend has started sending me lots of links and articles on UAPs [unidentified anomalous phenomena, also known as UFOs]. I’ve tried to gently assert that I don’t find the sources reliable or credible and that I do not believe respectable news outlets are conspiring to conceal the truth but they still persist. Should I ask them to stop? I think these conspiracy theories are really harmful.

Eleanor says: One question is: can you stop your friend believing these conspiracy theories? Regrettably, almost certainly not, at least not without a huge investment of time and patience. People are free to think whatever they want and some of us put that freedom to the weirdest uses. At least we can be thankful the conspiracies your friend has latched on to are about objects in the sky and not, say, which reptilian species is secretly controlling things.

Is it better to fail half the time than do nothing at all? Of course! Author and poet Leena Norms explains the fine art of being slapdash and happy

When my wife asked me what I was reading, I said: “It’s a new book about how to half-arse everything in your life.”

“Oh,” she said. “Did you write it?”

Questions on general knowledge and topical trivia, plus a few jokes, every Thursday. How will you fare?

Welcome once again to the Guardian Thursday quiz, a test of the little grey cells and how much useless information they have retained from the week’s news, as well as a smattering of general knowledge and pop culture questions. It is like a pub quiz, but without any feedback from the mic or drunk heckling about the answers in the background. Although we do sometimes get that in the comments. We hope you enjoy it – and let us know how you get on …

The Thursday quiz, No 192

We’d like to hear from patients in England about long waiting times and overstretched hospitals this winter

The rise in people with flu being admitted to hospital in England quadrupled last month with at least a dozen hospitals declaring critical incidents. Other pressures on the NHS include Covid, norovirus and chronic issues such as a lack of available beds.

Health services issue critical incident declarations when their services become so overwhelmed they struggle to deliver critical services, risking patient safety. Hospitals in Birmingham, Cornwall, Hampshire, Liverpool, Northamptonshire and Plymouth are among those affected.

We’d like to hear from people in Greenland on their thoughts about Trump’s ambitions to seize the autonomous territory of Denmark

During a press conference at Mar-a-Lago on Tuesday, the incoming US president Donald Trump refused to rule out using American military force to seize Greenland. He also threatened economic retaliation against Denmark, noting that if that country resisted his territorial ambitions for Greenland he “would tariff Denmark at a very high level”.

“I can’t assure you,” Trump said in response to a reporter’s question. “But I can say this, we need them [the Panama Canal and Greenland] for economic security.”

We want to hear about the TV shows that have forced you to switch off because they were too controversial

Some TV shows just go too far with some people refusing to watch them because they’re too “gut-wrenching”.

We want to hear about the programmes you’ve had to turn off because you felt they were too controversial. What moment in particular made you feel enough was enough? Have you tried to revisit the show again? If so, how did you feel about it?

We would like to hear about your favourite venues to meet with friends

Nightclubs ​have been closing at a rapid rate since the pandemic while music venu​es have declined, leaving the UK with fewer options for socialising.

With this in mind, we would like to hear from younger people in the UK about where you go to socialise. How often do you go out, and how much do you typically spend? Have your habits changed in recent years?

Firefighters said the destruction from the California fires was unlike any they had seen in their decades-long careers

• California wildfires – live

The sun glared red as it sank into the Pacific Ocean on Wednesday, casting an orange hue over the carnage smoldering on the southern Californian coast. It will be a day not soon forgotten in Los Angeles, which by evening was flanked by catastrophic wildfires in nearly all directions.

It’s too early to determine the full extent of the destruction caused by the blazes, but in the neighborhoods bordering the Palisades fire it was clear the impact was enormous.

Victor Pelevin made his name in 90s Russia with scathing satires of authoritarianism. But while his literary peers have faced censorship and fled the country, he still sells millions. Has he become a Kremlin apologist?

Fiction has a habit of coming to life in Russia. On the evening of 2 April 2023, the military blogger Vladlen Tatarsky appeared at an event in St Petersburg organised by Cyber Front Z, a group of semi-professional keyboard warriors who boost Kremlin war propaganda online. With more than half a million followers, Tatarsky was a mid-tier celebrity on Telegram, the social media app that has become a hub of Russian news and political debate.

As guests mingled, a young woman with long, salon-waved blond hair approached Tatarsky. She presented him with an unusual gift: a gold-painted statue of himself. About two minutes later, the statue exploded, killing Tatarsky and injuring 42 people. The blond woman – 26-year-old St Petersburg native Darya Trepova – was arrested the next day. She said she had believed the statue contained a listening device, not a bomb, and that she had acted on orders from a man in Ukraine she knew only as “Gestalt”.

Hollywood stars once came for the big-game fishing, but the return of a host of species to the depleted waters around Britain’s coast is a cause for quiet optimism

From the outside, the Tunny Club looks like any other seaside fish and chip shop. A short walk from Scarborough harbour, only the photos of John Wayne and Errol Flynn on the wall betray the shop’s fleeting history as a global centre for big-game fishing.

In the 1930s, film stars and the ultra-wealthy flocked to the Yorkshire seaside resort for their chance to catch the enormous bluefin tuna – known as “tunny” – lurking off the North Sea coast. In 1933, aristocrat Lorenzo Mitchell-Henry reeled in what remains the largest fish ever caught in British waters: a 386kg bluefin tuna.

In defending the militarist status quo, Democrats ceded the anti-war lane to Republicans. As they enter the political wilderness, it’s time to reckon with what they got so wrong

The most devastating appraisal of the 2024 Democratic national convention was delivered by the neoconservative doyen Bill Kristol: “Leon Panetta quoting Ronald Reagan! My kind of Democratic convention.” He meant it as praise.

Earlier in the day, rumors had been flying around Chicago about that evening’s possible surprise speakers. Who would it be? Beyoncé? Taylor Swift? Close! It turned out to be the 86-year-old former CIA director and secretary of defense who last served in government over a decade ago. In his speech, he cited Ronald Reagan to rail against “isolationism”, telling the assembled crowd: “Our warriors need a tough, cool-headed commander-in-chief to defend our democracy from tyrants and terrorists,” and declaring that Kamala Harris would be that leader.

Deaths from backstreet abortions have united pro-choice Christian and Muslim clerics around ending the strict ban

Throughout his ministry, the Rev Cliff Nyekanyeka has led funeral services for women who died after an illegal abortion in Malawi. He has visited hospitals where doctors have shown him the aftereffects of such procedures, including pictures of what he describes as “rotting uteruses”. And he has seen women struggling with unwanted pregnancies.

It is this lived experience that has led Nyekanyeka to advocate for a woman’s right to choose, and to campaign for change in a country with one of the world’s strictest abortion laws. In Malawi, women seeking an abortion can be imprisoned for up to seven years and anyone administering an abortion to a woman could face 14 years in prison; it is permitted only to save a woman’s life. The law was introduced by the British under colonial rule.

Meta’s rewritten policies mean different things may be allowed to pass on Facebook, Instagram and Threads

Meta’s rewritten policies on “hateful conduct” mean users will now be able to say different types of things on its platforms, Facebook, Instagram and Threads. After Mark Zuckerberg’s announcement of sweeping changes to oversight of content on its platforms, multiple edits have been made to its policies.

Among them are:

A specific injunction against calling transgender or non-binary people “it” has been deleted. A new section has been added making clear that “we do allow allegations of mental illness or abnormality when based on gender or sexual orientation”. It said this was a reflection of “political and religious discourse about transgenderism and homosexuality and common non-serious usage of words like ‘weird’”. It also says the policies are designed to allow room for types of speech including people calling “for exclusion or [using] insulting language in the context of discussing political or religious topics, such as when discussing transgender rights, immigration or homosexuality”.

Meta’s policies are unchanged in saying that users should not post content targeting a person or group of people on the basis of their protected characteristics or immigration status with dehumanising speech with comparisons to animals, pathogens or sub-human life forms such as cockroaches and locusts. But the changes suggest it may now be possible to compare women to household objects or property and to compare people to faeces, filth, bacteria, viruses, diseases and primitives.

It should also be possible now to say transgender people “do not exist”.

Meta has deleted warnings against self-admission of racism, homophobia and Islamophobia. It has also deleted warnings against expressions of hate, such as calling people “cunt”, “dick” and “asshole”.

The changes may also mean it is acceptable to post about the “China virus”, a term the US president-elect, Donald Trump, has frequently used in relation to coronavirus.

City minister under pressure to explain why she benefited from property paid for by people linked to regime of aunt Sheikh Hasina

Tulip Siddiq reacted with anger when she was confronted in 2017 by reporters from Channel 4 asking her to intervene in the case of Ahmad bin Quasem, a British-educated lawyer who had allegedly been abducted in Bangladesh by the regime of Siddiq’s aunt, Sheikh Hasina.

“Are you aware that I am a British MP and that I’m born in London?” she asked Alex Thomson, the channel’s chief correspondent. “Are you implying that I’m a Bangladeshi? Because I don’t think that’s the right thing to imply.”

We took thirsty chugs from the tall glasses. Surely this ‘water’ belonged in a biohazard chamber, not our mouths

• Read more in the kindness of strangers series

In July 2019 I travelled to Russia with my sister and a friend. As three bookish girls, our highlight would be a pilgrimage to Yasnaya Polyana, Leo Tolstoy’s country house.

The trip was already punctuated with comical mistakes and miscommunications. We couldn’t speak Russian, and it was our first experience in a country where no locals come to your aid to translate.

From opera singers to granola breakfasts, the reality TV smash hit sometimes feels like a Middle Englander’s fever dream. It’s only a matter of time before a task involves a dressage round

Out of the mouth of babes. Aged 20, Freddie Fraser might be the youngest player in The Traitors but he spoke an awkward truth about the hit BBC gameshow on the latest mission. Rowing a Viking longboat across a loch, Freddie sacrificed himself because he couldn’t get the knack. “I was struggling with the oar movement,” he admitted. “Like, I’m not that posh. I ain’t done rowing.”

Freddie made a fair point. Looking around at his shipmates, the politics student from Peterborough will have seen an interior designer, a business director, a doctor, a priest, a bank manager, two teachers and a retired opera singer. The interior designer, who took charge due to having the most rowing experience, happened to be named Francesca Rowan-Plowden. Not so much a cross-section of UK society as one of Nigella Lawson’s dinner parties.

A growing number of landholders are joining forces with right-to-roam campaigners to boost public access to the countryside

When Debra and Tom Willoughby first arrived at their tenant farm in Nottinghamshire, they tried to reroute a bridleway that runs through their farmyard. Now the organic farmers are relieved they were refused permission because of the benefits they have found from the connections they make with people who walk through their farm. They have since opened new permissive footpaths on their land.

Farmers are often cast as vociferous opponents of wider access to the countryside. But a growing band of access-friendly farmers has joined forces with the Right to Roam campaign and will discuss how to open up more land for public enjoyment at this week’s Oxford real farming conference.

Max Rushden, John Brewin, Chris Paouros and Ceylon Andi Hickman discuss Spurs taking a half-time lead over Liverpool in the Carabao Cup semis, and look ahead to the FA Cup third round

Rate, review, share on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Audioboom, Mixcloud, Acast and Stitcher, and join the conversation on Facebook, Twitter and email.

On the podcast today: Spurs beat Liverpool 1-0 in the Carabao Cup semi-final first leg. A big win on the elusive quest for silverware and possibly an even bigger one for Ange Postecoglou. The panel debate whether Lucas Bergvall should have been on the pitch to score the winner.

The Oxford English Dictionary announced its word of the year at the end of 2024: brain rot. The term relates to the supposedly negative effects of consuming social media content, but it struck a chord more widely with many of us who feel we just don’t have the mental capacity we once did. Gloria Mark, a professor of informatics at the University of California, Irvine, has been studying our waning attention spans for 20 years. She tells Madeleine Finlay why she believes our powers of concentration are not beyond rescue, and reveals her top tips for finding focus

Is modern life ruining our powers of concentration?

Support the Guardian: theguardian.com/sciencepod

Why is Elon Musk increasingly trying to influence UK politics?

“I’d imagine the other billionaires are quite cross with Elon. Usually you try and do your influencing behind the scenes.”

James Ball, journalist and author of The Other Pandemic: How QAnon Contaminated the World, speaks to Michael Safi about the political influence of Elon Musk. They discuss how Musk’s political views have developed, his support for Donald Trump, and his new role in the White House.

Max Rushden is joined by Nicky Bandini, Jonathan Fadugba and Sam Dalling as Newcastle win League Cup semi-final first leg at Arsenal

Rate, review, share on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Audioboom, Mixcloud, Acast and Stitcher, and join the conversation on Facebook, Twitter and email.

On the podcast today; Newcastle take a big step towards the Carabao Cup final and possibly their first major trophy since 1955 with a 2-0 semi-final first leg win over Arsenal. After so many missed chances, the panel have the inevitable ‘do the Gunners need another striker’ conversation, a chat made more relevant by Alexander Isak clinical finishing for Newcastle.

We are raiding the Guardian Long Read archives to bring you some classic pieces from years past, with new introductions from the authors.

This week, from 2021: After a painful breakup and the death of her father, one writer retreated to the coast of Brittany in winter where she tested the powerful effects of a daily swim in the icy sea. By Wendell Steavenson

After 30 years of relentless growth and capitalism, a new trend has emerged in China. The search for a simpler, calmer life is leading some Chinese people to seek a life abroad. The trend is so popular that it’s gained its own internet buzzword: the 'run philosophy'.

Chiang mai, in northern Thailand is the country’s second biggest city. It’s a tourist hotspot popular with backpackers but has recently become an unlikely second home for thousands of Chinese people seeking alternative lifestyles.

A new Syria is emerging from the shadow of the brutal Assad regime. The Guardian’s Bethan McKernan and Ayman Abu Ramouz meet people celebrating their hard-won freedom, but also those grappling with a traumatic past. The pair travel to the notorious Sednaya prison, where they meet a former prisoner who was liberated by his family just days before

• Resistance was not a choice’: how Syria’s unlikely rebel alliance took Aleppo

• 'The Syrian regime hit us with chemical weapons: only now can we speak out' – video

• Syria’s disappeared: one woman’s search for her missing father

Pharmaceutical corporations claim high prices are the cost of innovation, but the reality is far more complicated — and troubling. In 2030, the patents of some of the world’s best-selling drugs will expire, an event called the 'patent cliff', and companies are doubling down on tactics such as 'evergreening' patents and pay-for-delay deals to keep prices high and competition out.

In this video, Neelam Tailor uncovers the shocking strategies big pharma use to game the system, explaining how these moves protect profits but hurt patients

Using video analysis and satellite imagery, the Guardian has chronicled the destruction of the Jabaliya refugee camp through three offensives since October 2023. Repeated airstrikes and ground operations by Israel, which claims it is used as a Hamas base, have razed the camp to the ground and driven out most of the civilians. Observers have said the systematic destruction of entire neighbourhoods in northern Gaza is part a policy known as the 'generals’ plan', aimed at driving out civilians by declaring certain areas closed military zones

• Read more about the destruction of Jabaliya refugee camp

Style, with substance: what’s really trending this week, a roundup of the best fashion journalism and your wardrobe dilemmas solved, direct to your inbox every Thursday

Style, with substance: what’s really trending this week, a roundup of the best fashion journalism and your wardrobe dilemmas solved, delivered straight to your inbox every Thursday

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Be the first to see our latest thought-provoking films, bringing you bold and original storytelling from around the world

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From biking adventures to city breaks, get inspiration for your next break – whether in the UK or further afield – with twice-weekly emails from the Guardian’s travel editors. You’ll also receive handpicked offers from Guardian Holidays.

From biking adventures to city breaks, get inspiration for your next break – whether in the UK or further afield – with twice-weekly emails from the Guardian’s travel editors.

You’ll also receive handpicked offers from Guardian Holidays.

A weekly email from Yotam Ottolenghi, Meera Sodha, Felicity Cloake and Rachel Roddy, featuring the latest recipes and seasonal eating ideas

Each week we’ll send you an exclusive newsletter from our star food writers. We’ll also send you the latest recipes from Yotam Ottolenghi, Nigel Slater, Meera Sodha and all our star cooks, stand-out food features and seasonal eating inspiration, plus restaurant reviews from Grace Dent and Jay Rayner.

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The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

World leaders and luminaries were in Washington DC to pay respects to the former US president. After the state funeral, Carter’s remains will return to Plains, Georgia

Wildfires continued to burn across LA, with at least five people killed and more than 1,500 buildings destroyed. A new blaze broke out in the Hollywood Hills and evacuation orders were extended to Santa Monica. Winds had eased, but the danger was far from over

• California fires live: follow the latest news
• At least five dead as firefighters struggle to contain LA blazes

A toppled reindeer? A window of pink balloons? These images explore Dana Stirling’s depression - and remind us how ‘beauty and sorrow walk together’

From Black equestrians to wild swimmers and a giant onion, these photographs were selected by judges as representing the resilience, diversity and spirit of the UK

The Tan Hill Inn stands at 528 metres above sea level in the Yorkshire Dales and has a history of ‘snow-ins’ trapping customers during severe weather. Photographer Gary Calton bravely volunteered to investigate

• ‘It makes you feel like a kid again’: snowed in at Britain’s highest pub