25 m. ago Supermarket handed £17m tax bill over rotisserie chicken bags

The food giant believed that it was exempt from the tax

Economics

47 m. ago Interstellar comet 3I/Atlas will make its closest approach to Earth today

It’s just the third known interstellar object to cut through our solar system

Politics

1 hour ago Angela Rayner ‘to publish memoir’ amid growing speculation over leadership challenge

There has been growing speculation that Angela Rayner is preparing to challenge the prime minister, amid devastating approval ratings and growing concern over the direction of the Labour government

Politics

1 hour ago Stranded review – this Italian crime show is like Agatha Christie, Lost and The White Lotus all at once

A hotel’s worth of rich guests cut off by snow, a dead body, the mafia and some supernatural antics there’s a banquet of melodrama to feast on in this soapy foreign-language seriesThe snow is crisp and even, up in the Italian Alps: how lucky the protagonists in the new Walter Presents series Stranded are to be spending Christmas at a four-star spa resort in the beautiful Vanoi Valley! The welcome is warm, the hot chocolate is decadent and the hotel building, bedecked with giant baubles, looks like a greetings card painting. But wait! Threatening music? Characters staring anxiously into space, because they clearly have a big dark secret? A guest in a witness protection programme, and another who recognises her as the witness in the forthcoming trial of his secret mafia brother? Attenzione! This Italian-made Green, Red and White Lotus might not be such a paradise. Bad stuff is about to go down.Specifically, this is several thousand tons of snow and the side of a nearby mountain. One a...

Events

1 hour ago Hearts vs Rangers: Get £30 in free bets when you join Midnite and bet £10

HEARTS and Rangers collide in a huge clash at the top of the Premiership table. New Midnite punters can get a whopping £30 in free football bets when they sign up and stake just £10 on the Gorgie contest! Midnite's new customer offer Simply download Midnite app or create an account online using the Promo Code: BETGET30...

Economics

2 h. ago Man United's Adam Wharton transfer alternative emerges amid £65m Antoine Semenyo plan

Manchester United want to strengthen their squad in the January transfer window with Ruben Amorim's side eyeing up a central midfielder and a versatile forward

Economics

2 h. ago Making Mary Poppins by Todd James Pierce review – the musical brothers behind the movie magic

Bob and Dick Sherman take centre stage in this well-researched account of how Walt Disney created a classicLike many kids of the VHS generation, I must have watched my taped-off-the-telly copy of Disney’s Mary Poppins (1964) well over 100 times. I probably knew every frame as well as Walt Disney himself, who invested 20 years in bringing it to the screen.The culmination of his live action achievements, Mary Poppins remained the project Walt was most proud of. A sophisticated, multi-Oscar-winning musical that proved the House of Mouse was about more than just cartoons, its box office success enabled him to expand his Florida ambitions for Disney World resort and shore up the company’s financial future. Continue reading...

Culture

3 h. ago Deadly LA Palisades inferno took hold in area firefighters were restricted by woke laws protecting endangered plant species

Revealing texts sent by state park officials in California show they created avoidance areas that banned firefighters from where the devastating blaze ignited.

Events

3 h. ago Love is all around: Wet Wet Wet star and Kirk Moderator create Christmas song

Festive message in video and song is there’s always ‘room at the table’ - ‘and sometimes, we just have to make it’

Politics

4 h. ago West London neighbourhood where locals have 'construction fatigue' to see another 274 homes built

West London neighbourhood where locals have 'construction fatigue' to see another 274 homes built  My London

Society

4 h. ago Europe has lost all credibility in the Middle East. The way to regain it lies in Syria, Iraq and Lebanon | Nathalie Tocci

Sidelined by Trump, preoccupied with Ukraine and damaged by its immoral stance on Gaza, Europe can still help stabilise its eastern Mediterranean neighbours A year after the overthrow of Syria’s dictator, Bashar al-Assad, the former jihadi fighter turned Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa addressed the Doha Forum earlier this month, deftly parrying questions about his controversial past and outlining his country’s complex journey toward a participatory, rules-based system. As I listened, it struck me that, while Europe’s role in the Middle East has been severely damaged by its immoral stance on the Gaza war and its self-inflicted exclusion from Iran nuclear diplomacy, Europeans still have a role to play when it comes to its neighbours in the eastern Mediterranean.Europe’s world has been turned upside down by Washington’s alignment with Moscow in the Ukraine war and the transatlantic rift as the Trump administration treats Europe as an adversary. Another dimension of this upheaval is E...

Politics

4 h. ago Pep Guardiola might be considering Man City plan that has already backfired

Manchester City advanced to the semi-finals of the Carabao Cup on Wednesday thanks to a 2-0 victory over Brentford

Events

5 h. ago Monty Don says you must avoid these three plants in this type of garden

Monty Don urged gardening enthusiasts to focus on placing the right plant in the right spot, creating strong structure, and letting nature do its work when planting top-performers

Politics

6 h. ago Ukraine deal: EU leaders agree €90bn loan, but without use of frozen Russian assets

Two-year deal will cover most of Ukraine’s needs, but will be secured against EU borrowing rather than Russian assetsEuropean Union leaders have decided to provide a massive interest-free loan to Ukraine to meet its military and economic needs for the next two years, after failing to agree on using frozen Russian assets, diplomats said in the early hours of Friday.“We have a deal. Decision to provide €90bn ($106bn) of support to Ukraine for 2026-27 approved. We committed, we delivered,” EU Council president Antonio Costa said in a post on social media. Continue reading...

Politics

7 h. ago EU agrees €90bn loan to Ukraine after frozen Russian asset plan fails

Money to be borrowed against bloc’s budget after leaders fail to agree on proposal using Moscow’s funds

Events

7 h. ago RICHARD EDEN'S DIARY: Will rippling new Cameron win over his neighbours?

He has, it would appear, finally won his epic struggle to control his weight, shedding as much as 4st in the estimation of one chum, as I disclosed in September.

Politics

8 h. ago AI data centers may have created as much pollution as New York City and used a world’s supply of bottled water in just one year

Over the past few years, Silicon Valley's AI blitz has created skyrocketing demand for high-end computation in vast dedicated data centers

Politics

9 h. ago Majority say they plan to spend less on holiday gifts this year because of economic concerns

Americans plan to spend less on gifts this festive season as they continue to feel the pinch

Economics

9 h. ago Check in on neighbours plea with 1.8 million set to spend Christmas alone

A survey from YouGov of 4384 UK adults also revealed that nearly one in twelve had at some point gone more than a month without a face-to-face conversation with another adult

Economics

9 h. ago Black holes to be shown in action in first 3D movies created using AI

Experts in black hole astronomy and artificial intelligence will combine for the project at Heriot-Watt University.

Culture