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Plans involve dredging and expanding docks to allow larger cruise ships to visit with up to 200,000 passengers annually
Janavi Kramer had just enjoyed a swim with friends and was sitting on a bench taking in a wonderful Cornish view – headlands plunging into deep water, bobbing boats, a bustling harbour town.
“We’re lucky to have this space,” said Kramer, who is an artist and scientific illustrator. “We use it for work, recreation and pleasure and it’s so scary to think that this could all be harmed. I worry about what we may be living with soon and what we’ll be leaving for future generations.”
Continue reading...Thu, 06 Aug 2026 11:05:35 GMT
Yvette Cooper’s maternity reforms must change a system that too often fails women when they’re at their most vulnerable
On the third day of being in labour with my first child, I entered a new state of being. It was time to dig deep. This is what I had learned in all the childbirth classes. As long as I remained calm, breathed as instructed, moaned through the pain, things would happen as they were meant to. My body knew what it was doing. Only, it didn’t.
On the fourth day, I started to beg. This wasn’t right. Despite contraction after relentless contraction, I wasn’t dilating. I hadn’t slept, I couldn’t even sit down. I needed help. And still, they waited. For what, I never understood.
Natalie Morris is the author of Mixed/Other: Explorations of Multiraciality in Modern Britain
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Continue reading...Thu, 06 Aug 2026 15:00:03 GMT
As Stand By Me is re-released for its 40th anniversary, we look at the late actor’s most intense, enduring roles – from a goofball boffin to a narcoleptic hustler
Issue-of-the-week TV movie about elder abuse, with Tuesday Weld as a harried mum taking out her frustrations on her own ageing mother. Phoenix slaps on the hair gel as the essentially decent son who blasts his music too loud, lets his rowdy if unusually spiffy pals put their feet on the furniture and resents the new house guest: “Grandma is really getting on my nerves!”
Continue reading...Thu, 06 Aug 2026 14:35:22 GMT
A man who prized blunt speaking has been selectively eulogised. There’s a balance between decency and honesty: I’m sad he caused such harm
As tributes poured in for Rod Liddle, the Sunday Times and Sun columnist who has died at the age of 66, they were markedly coy and sanitised. Paradoxically, those were the exact deficiencies obituaries praised Liddle for avoiding – they said he shot from the hip and ruffled feathers, remorselessly attacked the liberal establishment and was ebullient. Michael Gove called him “special and brave”. But brave in the face of what? Attacked the liberal establishment how?
This delicacy was particularly noticeable in a segment on Radio 4’s Today programme, of which Liddle was editor in the 90s, between Justin Webb and Amol Rajan. “If there was a golden thread that connected the person you saw back then with the person of a few weeks ago,” Webb said, “it was a distrust of authority.” But Liddle’s targets as a columnist were not the authorities. Often they were Muslims and immigrants, transgender people and chronic illness sufferers, African-Caribbean men from Harlesden. He did not attack the establishment, he attacked the marginalised, constantly.
Continue reading...Thu, 06 Aug 2026 09:00:43 GMT
From mind-boggling murder investigations to decade-long scams, there’s no shortage of documentaries about real-life awfulness. We list the most incredible
Since the true-crime explosion a decade ago – kickstarted by Netflix’s Making a Murderer – audiences have been fed a steady small-screen diet of cold-case killings, catfishing scams and creepy cults. And, after years of varying results, Netflix’s latest show, A Toxic Love Story – which recounts how a California couple framed an innocent woman for stalking, intimidation and recruiting men from Craigslist to rape her ex’s new wife – is being billed as a return to true-crime form. But when it comes to similar shows worth your viewing time, what else is up there?
Here’s a selection of the genre’s 25 standout shows and where to watch them – which, let’s face it, is mainly Netflix. Let the boggle-eyed bingeing begin.
Continue reading...Thu, 06 Aug 2026 13:10:53 GMT
(Atlantic)
Evoking an astonishing range of artists, the US singer follows up her huge hit Love Me Not with stylistic diversity – and lyrics that defy her doubters
It sometimes seems like no musical success in the 2020s is allowed to pass without some degree of online controversy. There are accusations that the artist in question is an “industry plant” – a phrase which, as far as can be discerned, can basically be applied to anyone with a manager or a label deal – or that there’s something deceptive about the way in which they’ve been promoted, or that they’re possessed of some other form of moral bankruptcy that reflects not merely on the performer but the people who like them. Which brings us to Love Me Not, an ostensibly harmless 2024 track by Chicago singer-songwriter Ravyn Lenae.
After enjoying a burst of online virality, it became a huge hit single, making the Top 5 on both sides of the Atlantic. Taken from Bird’s Eye, an album that also featured collaborations with Childish Gambino and Ty Dolla $ign, its blend of retro-soul styling, distorted guitar arpeggios and infernally catchy chorus was noticeably poppier than Lenae’s previous work: it came with a remix that featured British bedroom-pop star Rex Orange County. You could understand why fans of the glitchy, abstract R&B found on 2015’s EP Moon Shoes, or of her more neo soul-flavoured debut album, 2022’s Hypnos, might consider it a straightforward bid for mainstream acceptance. But you’d argue against it necessitating an online interrogation that, Lenae has suggested, involved not just “picking apart what kind of music I make” but “questioning my identity and Blackness”.
Continue reading...Thu, 06 Aug 2026 11:00:49 GMT
Simon & Schuster still plans to publish book by Cambridge academic who resigned this week amid plagiarism claims
Jason Arday, the former Cambridge professor accused of plagiarism and embellishment, claimed he was paid “1.4 million” for his forthcoming memoir detailing his extraordinary backstory.
Arday was dogged by a growing series of questions over his academic work and credentials before he resigned on Wednesday night, saying the “relentless accusations, speculation and public commentary have taken a profound toll on me and on those I love”.
Continue reading...Thu, 06 Aug 2026 13:29:51 GMT
Exclusive: Louisiana firm awarded tender to build rudimentary outpost to house Moroccan troops
Donald Trump’s Board of Peace, which was set up in January to oversee the reconstruction of Gaza, has finally issued its first construction contract in the devastated territory: a project to build a rudimentary 150-person military outpost to house Moroccan troops, a source familiar with the matter told the Guardian.
The contract, which has not yet been finalised, was awarded to Arkel International, a Louisiana-based firm that has previously carried out work with the US government in countries such as Iraq.
Continue reading...Thu, 06 Aug 2026 12:00:47 GMT
Passengers awaiting Northern and TransPennine trains advised not to travel, with cancellations and other services delayed
Trains across parts of north-west England have ground to a halt after a power failure hit the signalling centre controlling the railway in the region.
Passengers awaiting Northern and TransPennine trains have been advised not to travel, with widespread cancellations and other services delayed by more than an hour already.
Continue reading...Thu, 06 Aug 2026 15:40:48 GMT
Government ‘urgently’ identifying men convicted in historical cases who could be freed in scheme loophole
Andy Burnham’s government is “urgently” identifying any grooming gang perpetrators who may still be eligible for early prison release after concerns were raised about a potential loophole in the system.
The prime minister has “personally intervened” after men convicted of assaulting children in Bradford were expected to be freed from prison early despite a promise earlier this week that they would remain behind bars.
Continue reading...Thu, 06 Aug 2026 15:32:04 GMT