Can you beat a traditional spiced yeast bun at Easter? There’s only one way to find out. Bring on the rhubarb and custard version, the red velvet, the chocolate and fudge, the tiramisu …

Hot cross buns, the Easter treat traditionally eaten on Good Friday, now appear in our shops as early as January. And it’s not just the spiced ones packed with dried fruit that you’ll find on supermarket shelves: it seems that any enriched-dough creation can be described as a hot cross bun, so long as a flour cross has been slapped on top.

Step into a Marks & Spencer food hall and you will be greeted with displays full of garish pink “red velvet” hot cross buns, while Tesco has more than 10 varieties available this year, as well as a tear-and-share brioche. Purists may turn up their noses, but Becca Stock, who reviews food on TikTok and Instagram as @beccaeatseverything, says that, to enjoy a non-traditional bun, you have to view it as a separate product. “For me, they sit in different categories,” she says.

The actor is horribly convincing in this ripped-from-the-headlines drama about the newsreader’s grooming scandal. You might not even be able to stomach it

When future generations look back at all the trends and micro-trends that shaped television over the years, you have to assume they’ll be quite surprised when they arrive at the glut of dramatisations that have been made about famous men caught up in sex scandals.

Suddenly they are everywhere. Jimmy Savile got one, with Steve Coogan playing him in The Reckoning. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor got two, with Michael Sheen and Rufus Sewell playing him in A Very Royal Scandal and Scoop respectively. And now, with almost crushing inevitability, comes the turn of Huw Edwards, the subject of Channel 5’s Power: The Downfall of Huw Edwards.

V&A South Kensington, London
The Italian designer loved to shock and this dazzling show is like sashaying through a party in 1930s Paris with Schiap and her darling friends Cocteau and Dalí

Naked mermaids and prancing horses, silk carrots and unshelled peanuts, gilded elephant trunks, drums and masks – and those are just a few of the buttons. The V&A’s lavish spring show is a weird and wonderful tumble down the rabbit hole that is Schiaparelli, fashion’s house of surrealism.

Elsa Schiaparelli designed clothes to be witty, not just pretty, and that lively spirit runs through this show. A shoe becomes a hat, bones grow on the outside of a dress, a telephone dial becomes a compact mirror. A stroll through the galleries feels less like admiring a beauty pageant lineup of frocks, and more like taking a turn through a 1930s Paris cocktail party with Schiaparelli and her friends Salvador Dalí and Jean Cocteau: bracingly avant garde, mildly unsettling, all visual puns and in-jokes and never a dull moment. Turn a corner from a Man Ray painting of a lit candle wearing a harlequin coat and you encounter a mannequin perched on a ledge, wearing a jacket that sprouts gold palm trees at the shoulders. It is wild, and it works.

Ahmed superbly tackles race and identity in his hilarious new show Bait, proving the British-Asian actor truly is the best of this country. I’m happy for him, I swear!

Conflicted feelings for me this week, watching Bait, the new comedy created by Riz Ahmed. I started a career in acting shortly after Ahmed, you see. For a decade, I lost every good job going to him. What made it worse was watching all of those projects and realising exactly how good he was. Anyway, I’m going to try to write the rest of this while suppressing Salieri levels of malcontent. Wish me luck.

Bait is the story of an Asian actor, Shah Latif, who finds himself lined up to be the next James Bond. The series covers the internet’s toxic response to the rumours, using it to dive deep into a conversation about racial palatability, Britishness, ambition and authenticity. It’s funny, surreal, provocative and boasts an incredible array of hot young British-Asian actors. Which reminds me, I must rewatch Sliding Doors.

The chancellor was meant to set out her contingency plans but it was an announcement without any announcements in it

You have to feel a bit sorry for the chancellor. Roughly four weeks ago, Rachel Reeves had come to the Commons to deliver her spring statement. A moderately upbeat picture of the nation’s finances that didn’t necessarily coincide with people’s lived experience. Still, it more or less did the trick. Bought her another six months until the autumn budget. Or so she thought.

Now, thanks to the orange manchild sociopath in the White House, her forecasts are in tatters. And Reeves can’t even begin to assess the damage because there is no end to the war in sight. In the best-case scenario, the economy might just be in intensive care. The worst doesn’t bear thinking about. A full-scale financial meltdown. There again, we don’t even know what the world will look like in the next few weeks, let alone the next six months.

Always wondered what everyday stuff celebrities buy, where they shop for food and the basic they scrimp on? Henry Holland talks Labubus, vintage Prada and swapping Calvins for Skims with the Filter

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Henry Holland rose to prominence in 2006 with his collection of “fashion groupie” T-shirts, displaying rhyming slogans referencing fashion icons (such as “I’ll Show You Who’s Boss Kate Moss”), and founded his own brand, House of Holland, in 2008.

He discovered a passion for ceramics during the pandemic, and in 2021 launched the lifestyle brand Henry Holland Studio, selling handmade ceramics and homeware.

Iran Guards said they fired missiles at Israel and US forces in bases in Kuwait, Jordan and Bahrain; crude oil prices fall sharply in early trading

• Trump’s rehashed 15-point Iran plan unlikely to appease Tehran

Indonesia is considering cutting the distribution of free student meals from six days a week to five, in a bid to save its budget amid the the Middle East conflict, Reuters reports.

The finance minister, Purbaya Yudhi Sadewa, said on Wednesday the measure could save 40tn rupiah ($2.37bn).

Defence chiefs have been discussing how to unblock the conduit for about a fifth of the world’s oil supplies

The UK has offered to host an international security summit to draw up a “viable, collective plan” to reopen the strait of Hormuz as economic fallout from the Iran conflict continues.

Defence chiefs have been discussing how they could unblock the vital shipping lane, through which about 20% of global oil supplies usually pass, amid the Middle East crisis unleashed by the US and Israel.

Diplomats say US president’s latest claimed plan probably based on now outdated framework put forward in May 2025

• Middle East crisis – live updates

The 15-point framework plan for peace with Iran that Donald Trump has said is being discussed is based on a proposal put forward by his negotiating team during nuclear talks almost a year ago, diplomats with knowledge of the talks believe.

That original 15-point plan was the basis for negotiations in late May 2025, shortly before the talks collapsed due to Israeli airstrikes on Iran’s nuclear programme.

Wes Streeting set to hail result as proof of progress, but Britons remain frustrated with long waits for GP hospital care

Public satisfaction with the NHS has risen for the first time since 2019, but people remain deeply frustrated with stubbornly long waits to receive GP, A&E or hospital care.

The proportion of voters in Britain satisfied with the way the NHS runs has increased from the record low of 21% seen last year to 26%. At the same time dissatisfaction with the health service fell 8% – the biggest drop since 1998 – although it remains high at 51%.

Only 22% are satisfied with A&E and dentistry.

GP services and hospital care score better, but only 36% and 37% are satisfied with them.

Just 50% are satisfied with the quality of care the NHS provides and just 16% think it will improve over the next five years.

Satisfaction with social care is just 14%.