51 m. ago ‘Exploited’ migrant farm workers in UK paid for picks, not hours

Call for investigation into unfair payment for labourers on seasonal visa scheme When 26-year-old Ben* boarded a flight in Uzbekistan in June, he was looking forward to more than just a summer job picking fruit and vegetables on a British farm.“I wanted to see new places, cities I’ve never seen before,” he said. “I wanted to make friends, exchange ideas and make new memories.” Continue reading...

Events

51 m. ago Creative industries are among the UK’s crown jewels – and AI is out to steal them | John Naughton

The tech firms’ efforts to change copyright laws and gain free access to intellectual property is patently wrongThere are decades when nothing happens (as Lenin is – wrongly – supposed to have said) and weeks when decades happen. We’ve just lived through a few weeks like that. We’ve known for decades that some American tech companies were problematic for democracy because they were fragmenting the public sphere and fostering polarisation. They were a worrying nuisance, to be sure, but not central to the polity.And then, suddenly, those corporations were inextricably bound into government, and their narrow sectional interests became the national interest of the US. Which means that any foreign government with ideas about regulating, say, hate speech on X, may have to deal with the intemperate wrath of Donald Trump or the more coherent abuse of JD Vance. Continue reading...

Events

71 m. ago ‘My paedophile letters’: French surgeon to stand trial accused of abusing 299 patients, mostly children

Joël Le Scouarnec’s ‘black books’ of handwritten notes in which alleged sexual abuse was recorded are at the heart of case against himWhen two gendarmes knocked on her door in 2019, Marie had no idea that she was about to find herself at the dark heart of one of the world’s biggest child abuse cases.The French mother of three, now 38, was shocked when the officers told her she had been the victim of Joël Le Scouarnec, a surgeon and an alleged serial paedophile accused of raping and sexually abusing hundreds of children. Continue reading...

Science

2 h. ago Is this the world's 'wokest' football club? Meet the German top

Located just outside Hamburg's notorious red-light district known as the Reeperbahn, FC St Pauli are not your average football club.

Politics

2 h. ago The Instagram fitness craze that can have VERY harmful effects: Hot yoga can place 'extreme stress' on cardiovascular system 

Hot yoga, otherwise known as Bikram yoga, sees health-conscious participants across the globe exercising via poses akin to traditional yoga but in balmy temperatures.

Politics

2 h. ago Detached home on sale for over £1million called 'awful' and a 'f****** mess'... but can YOU spot why?

Described as an 'ideal family home', the six-bedroom property is set on one of the picturesque town of North Berwick's 'most sought-after streets'.

Economics

2 h. ago Landlady who replaced the rotting windows of her listed pub with double glazing left with £70,000 bill after council demanded she rip them out

Owners of the Botanic Hotel in Hull, Kerry and Shaun Fitzgerald have been hit with a £70,000 bill for replacing the 172-year-old windows with modern double-glazing.

Economics

3 h. ago Labour told to ‘deliver fast’ or risk losing support to Farage’s Reform UK

Roz Foyer, the general secretary of the Scottish Trades Union Congress, said voters are losing faith in traditional parties.

Events

3 h. ago England set Australia 352 to win Champions Trophy opener after Duckett hits 165 – live

Over-by-over updates from Group B game (9am GMT)Get in touch with Tanya here | Sign up to the SpinOH MY GOOD GOLLY WHAT A CATCH! Alex Carey has pulled off a blinder to get rid of Phil Salt!1st over: England 12-0 (Salt 10, Duckett 0) Yep the wicket and outfield look like the sort a batter would drool over. England get twelve off the first over as Salt bunts down the ground for four and then flicks off his pads in real style for SIX! Flamboyant from the opener. Continue reading...

Events

4 h. ago Moment bungling raider gets STUCK lowering himself into Sainsbury's

Staff at a Sainsbury's Local in Nottingham frantically called 999 after they saw a pair of legs dangling from a hole in the store ceiling just after 6am yesterday morning.

Politics

4 h. ago New tax in England could end UK tourism, warns industry boss

The idea of an England-wise levy that would act as a tourism tax have ben slammed as the CEO of UK Hospitality says the already struggling industry is being 'taxed out of existence'

Events

4 h. ago Glazed pigs’ cheeks and celeriac and potato gratin: Josh Eggleton’s recipes for a winter feast

Comfort food par excellence, and ideal for making ahead, all ready to reheat and impressToday’s meal is all about earthy winter comfort food at its best. A lot of the ingredients may well be in your cupboard already, so possibly just a trip to the butcher will be required a few days before you want to make it and ask them to order some pig cheeks for you. This indulgent plateful is a real favourite in our house, and will both please the family and impress guests. Continue reading...

Politics

5 h. ago Why Wales and Ireland are BANNED from wearing traditional kit for Six Nations clash

Wales and Ireland will wear alternative colours for their Six Nations clash at the Principality Stadium on Saturday, with the WRU confirming a new approach to kit clashes

Events

6 h. ago Great British stag and hen do almost unrecognisable as youngsters ditch booze

Gone are the days when a traditional pre-wedding shindig would start with a pub crawl and might end in a kebab shop at 4am, with youngsters now packing it all in for a quieter night

Politics

6 h. ago Billionaire brothers who 'invented Facebook' pay £3.5m to be owners of Non

Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, who claim to have come up with the idea for Facebook and have made billions in cryptocurrency, have become co-owners of eighth-tier side Real Bedford

Economics

6 h. ago I tried Boots' viral £18 product on my dead hair to see if it actually works

With over a million views on TikTok, 206K followers on Instagram, and hundreds of five-star reviews, this brand's products have received some high acclaim for helping put the va-va-voom back into tired curls and waves

Economics

7 h. ago Culture wars: Trump’s takeover of arts is straight from the dictator playbook

US president’s attempt to control or dismantle cultural institutions plays into a long history of authoritarians using arts to push their agendaIn 1937, leaders of Germany’s Third Reich hosted two simultaneous art exhibitions in Munich. One, titled the Great German Art Exhibition, featured art viewed by the regime as appropriate and aspirational for the ideal Aryan society – orderly and triumphant, with mostly blond people in heroic poses amid pastoral German landscapes. The other showcased what Adolf Hitler and his followers deemed “degenerate art” (“Entartete Kunst”). The works, chaotically displayed and saddled with commentary disparaging “the sick brains of those who wielded the brush or pencil”, were abstract, profane, modernist and produced by the proclaimed enemies of the Reich – Jewish people, communists or those suspected of being either.The Degenerate Art exhibition, which later toured the country, opened a day after Hitler declared “merciless war” on cultural disintegrati...

Politics

8 h. ago Liverpool and Manchester City renew rivalry in a much more vulnerable era | Jonathan Wilson

Sunday’s clash between declining champions and their likely successors is a far cry from recent title battlesThere has been something pleasingly old-fashioned about the Premier League title race this season. It may be a modern phenomenon that the side top of the table have lost only one of 26 games, and that the side in second have lost two, but after the years of champions habitually racking up 90 points and more, the general fallibility has been refreshing.Liverpool are still on course for 89 points but they are not implacable, remorseless winners in the way Manchester City so often were. They reached a peak in their 2-0 home win over Real Madrid at the end of November and, although they were comfortable winners over City the following Sunday, there has been a sense since of a side, if not quite clinging on to the mountain top, then at the very least not striding quite so confidently along the ridge. Continue reading...

Politics

8 h. ago Berlin film festival 2025 roundup – a new boss, a flawless fairytale and Ethan Hawke’s finest hour

At a snowy Berlinale, against a backdrop of political divisions, this year’s standouts include Lucile Hadžihalilović’s The Ice Tower, Richard Linklater’s Broadway biopic of Lorenz Hart, and intensely sexual romance starring Jessica ChastainBerlin can be a touch inhospitable in February; this year was no exception, with visitors to the film festival enduring heavy snow, treacherous pavements and a two-day, city-wide transport strike. But the Berlinale itself is contending with a frosty climate. Traditionally a hub for film-makers of forthright, oppositional persuasions, it must now attempt to flourish in the face of Europe’s swing to the right, with Germany’s elections imminent and the troubling rise of the extremist AfD party.Every new festival head faces the challenge of reinventing the event they have inherited, and in the Berlinale’s 75th year, the bar was set especially high given the scrutiny the festival has received. Last year’s closing night brought controversy, with some Ge...

Society

8 h. ago Tesco worker reveals the one item you didn't know you could get in a meal deal

Tesco TikTokker Nathan Lorenzo has blown the collective minds of the British people by divulging some vital in-store intel to do with the traditional meal deal and what you can get

Economics