Branch Hill pond dried up in the 1880s. Now it will teem with wildlife again, as it did in the artist’s heydayIt was a view that John Constable sketched and painted dozens of times. From the top of Hampstead Heath, London’s highest point at 134 metres (440ft), the artist would look west and north towards today’s suburbs of Willesden, Edgware and Harrow. About 100 metres away, down below, was a beautiful natural pond.But in the 1880s, Branch Hill pond dried up. Now, nearly two centuries after Constable immortalised on canvas his favourite landscape in the capital, the pond has been recreated. Continue reading...
City authorities hope to soothe those who are ‘deeply shocked’ by the comic-strip trail of Belgium’s rich historyIn the centre of Brussels, close to the monumental Palais de Justice, is a brightly coloured cartoon painted down a strip of a scruffy four-storey building. Playing on the stories of crime and judgment unfolding in the nearby courtrooms, the mural shows heaven and hell. In the blue skies, a caricatured police officer flies over a topless woman sunbathing, while a white officer eyes a black man; down below, the red-tailed devil looks grumpy.The work, from a popular cartoon that first appeared in the 1980s, is just one of 68 murals celebrating Belgium’s rich history of comic strips, or bandes dessinées, including figures such as Tintin, Lucky Luke and the Smurfs. Continue reading...
Ali, a Kurd who fled Iran, may also be offered a university place after he told of the tedium of 500 days in limboAn asylum seeker who has spent almost 500 days stranded in a Berkshire hotel has thanked Observer readers for their generosity after he was inundated with books.Last week Ali featured in an article articulating life in limbo for the 37,000 asylum seekers living in hotels, with the Kurdish Iranian lamenting that the one thing he craved to relieve the tedium was a book to read. Continue reading...
Chefs are hoping the concept will tempt diners to spend a little more and fight the cost-of-living crisisLinden Stores, in the Cheshire village of Audlem, has started a whole sharing menu of modern British food, with two people sharing seven dishes including charred pepper and Cornish Quartz cheddar croquettes, hake wrapped in wild boar pancetta and chocolate and peanut butter tart.Laura Christie and her partner, Chris Boustead, relocated the restaurant to the village from London in 2020. She has been surprised by the reaction. Continue reading...
Ukraine’s step towards victory presents challenges, but demonstrates what can be done with a steady supply of western supportThe Russian decision to withdraw from the Ukrainian city of Kherson to defensive positions on the left bank of the Dnipro River was driven by sound military logic. Russian control of the city could only be maintained at a steep price in troops and materiel. Operationally, the withdrawal should help the Russians stabilise their defensive positions over the winter. Strategically, the withdrawal is an unambiguous Russian defeat.When Ukraine launched its counteroffensive against Kherson at the end of August its military knew it lacked the combat power to storm the city. However, strikes on the bridges over the Dnipro limited Russia’s ability to supply its troops with heavy equipment, while the river protected Ukrainian forces from counterattack. This favourable battlefield geometry allowed Ukraine to create a killing area in which its artillery could inflict heavy casualties on Russia’s most motivated and competent units. Continue reading...
Revolt over ‘levelling up’ label on Arts Council cash for established institutions, while projects for disadvantaged children are cutA Tory revolt has emerged over “patronising” claims that funding for established cultural institutions contributes to the government’s levelling up pledge, amid concerns from ministers and MPs that “real levelling up” projects for the underprivileged have been slashed.Rishi Sunak is expected to be confronted this week over the issue during prime minister’s questions. Continue reading...
Government focus on homes at higher ‘affordable’ rent helps fuel drastic shortage with demand poised to surgeForty councils in England saw no social rent housing built in five years in the wake of government funding cuts, according to official figures analysed by the Observer.In 2010 the Conservative-led coalition slashed funding for subsidised housing by 60% and redirected the remaining money away from social rent and towards more expensive “affordable rent” housing. Continue reading...
New book by Nick Lowles of Hope not Hate claims ex-MI5 informer who bombed for the Republicans is extremist’s ‘surveillance officer’A notorious former MI5 informant linked to a series of terrorist murders is working for far-right activist Tommy Robinson to spy on his opponents, including some of the UK’s most prominent anti-fascists, a new book claims.Peter Keeley, who operated as a mole in the IRA for the UK security services under the name Kevin Fulton, has been working for the former leader of the English Defence League as “surveillance officer” since 2020, covertly following and recording people of interest, including Nick Lowles, chief executive of anti-fascist campaign group Hope not Hate. Continue reading...
by Graham Readfearn (now) and Royce Kurmelovs (earlie on (#65RS5)
Victorian opposition vows to restrict gas produced in the state from being exported in a bid to reduce household bills; Anthony Albanese speaks to Chinese premier Li Keqiang at East Asia Summit gala dinner. This blog is now closed
Nepali workers who quit jobs and borrowed cash to come to UK are out of work just weeks after arrivingNepali workers hired to pick fruit on British farms say they have been left thousands of pounds in debt after being sent home only weeks after they arrived.The fruit pickers were recruited under the government’s seasonal worker scheme and say they were offered work for six months. But less than two months after arriving, they were told they were no longer needed and instructed to book flights home. Continue reading...
Patients will have no say over records going to Palantir, the software giant run by billionaire Republican backerAn NHS project to incorporate tens of millions of personal digital medical records into one of the biggest health data platforms in the world is to be launched without seeking new patient consent.Health officials confirmed this weekend the proposed £360m new data platform for England will incorporate the NHS shared care records that track patients across the health and care system. Continue reading...
Anti-mafia journalist to appear in court in Rome over comments made about policy towards migrants drowning in MediterraneanItaly’s new far-right prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, is suing one of the world’s best-known journalists, the anti-mafia and human rights campaigner Roberto Saviano, for criminal defamation, over remarks he made regarding her policy towards migrants drowning in the Mediterranean sea.This is the second time in just under four years that senior government ministers have targeted Saviano, 43, with criminal proceedings, despite a duty to protect him after the Neapolitan Camorra issued a death threat following publication of his book Gomorrah in 2006. Continue reading...
Inquiry will hear new evidence of fatal gene mutation that may be to blameIn 2003 Kathleen Folbigg was convicted of smothering and killing her four young children, Caleb, Patrick, Sarah and Laura. She was given a prison sentence of 40 years and dubbed Australia’s worst female serial killer.Folbigg had to be kept in protective custody to prevent violence from other inmates but has steadfastly maintained her innocence, a claim that has slowly gathered support over the years. Scientists, including several Nobel prize winners, have since argued that a mutant gene was responsible for the children’s deaths. Continue reading...
Region is in the grip of a severe crisis due to a lack of food and medicine after a two-year conflictEthiopia’s government and Tigrayan rebels have agreed to facilitate immediate humanitarian access to “all in need” in war-ravaged Tigray and neighbouring regions.The agreement followed talks in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi this week on the full implementation of a deal signed between the warring sides 10 days ago to end the brutal two-year conflict in northern Ethiopia. Continue reading...
Steve Barclay adds he is ‘saddened’ by the RCN’s proposed industrial action, saying it is in ‘nobody’s best interests’Pay demands from unions representing nurses are “neither reasonable nor affordable”, the health secretary has said after their members voted to go on strike.Steve Barclay said he was saddened by the proposed industrial action by the Royal College of Nursing (RCN), which he said was in “nobody’s best interests”. Continue reading...
Rights groups say whatever the outcome of election, no real change will follow despite record number of female candidatesBahrainis headed to the polls on Saturday but a ban on opposition candidates meant the election will bring no meaningful change despite a record number of people vying for seats, rights groups said.More than 330 candidates, including a record 73 women, are competing to join the 40-seat council of representatives – the lower house of parliament that advises King Hamad, who has ruled since his father died in March 1999. Continue reading...
Ex-health secretary pelted with messy substances while competing in a quiz based on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?Matt Hancock was covered in slime and pelted with feathers and custard as he took part in his fourth challenge on I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!After a public vote, the former health secretary, 44, and his 23-year-old campmate Owen Warner, known as Romeo Nightingale in Hollyoaks, were chosen for Friday’s trial. Continue reading...
Firms should be ‘legally required’ to publish their class pay gaps, says thinktank, after it found salary differences of up to £10,000People from working-class families earn several thousands of pounds a year less on average for doing the same jobs as their more privileged peers, according to a landmark study of the class pay gap.Professionals from working-class backgrounds earn £6,718 less on average, while women and most ethnic minorities face a double disadvantage, according to the Social Mobility Foundation (SMF), which conducted the research. Working-class professional women earn £9,450 less than men, while working-class Bangladeshi professionals earn £10,432 less than their white counterparts in the same jobs. Continue reading...
Two women arrested after defacing statue of Arthur Balfour who as foreign secretary pledged support in 1917 for a Jewish homelandTwo women have been arrested after protesters pretending to be tourists squirted tomato ketchup on to a statue in the Houses of Parliament.Members of Palestine Action used tourist passes to enter the members’ lobby of the House of Commons. Continue reading...
by Michael Savage, Pippa Crerarand Toby Helm on (#65RMZ)
‘Formal expression of concern’ about Tory MP’s behaviour was sent to cabinet office in 2018Concerns over Dominic Raab’s behaviour towards officials were raised inside Whitehall during his time as Brexit secretary in 2018, the Observer has been told.In the latest allegation against Raab over his conduct in government, a senior source said that a document outlining a “formal expression of concern” was dispatched to the Cabinet Office by a prominent official in the Brexit department. Continue reading...
Innovative post-punk musician was an original member of the Clash before founding PiL with John Lydon and Jah WobbleKeith Levene, the innovative guitarist who was a founder member of both the Clash and Public Image Ltd, has died at the age of 65.Levene, who had liver cancer, died at his home in Norfolk , leaving a lasting legacy of influence on British rock music. Continue reading...
Former party leader’s Islington North constituency riven by tensions over whether to support incumbent or find new candidateIt is hard to find a more Labour-dominated part of the country than the London seat of Islington North. Yet should you ask Labour members which candidate they will be backing at the next election, there is nervousness, hesitation and hushed tones.Jeremy Corbyn, the local MP in the seat for the last 39 years, is currently an independent MP having been stripped of the Labour party whip. He retains significant local support, but should he decide to run as an independent candidate at the next election, every Labour member in the seat will face a choice – campaign for the party’s candidate, or campaign for Corbyn and risk expulsion. Continue reading...
The 82-year-old monarch rode in a carriage through Copenhagen and was joined by her family, despite recent public row with sonDenmark’s Queen Margrethe II rounded off celebrations marking her 50th year on the throne on Saturday, and was joined by her family despite a recent public row with her youngest son.The 82-year-old monarch took a carriage ride through Copenhagen and attended a ceremony at city hall. Continue reading...
Lille resident was returning home about 3am when he saw cracks appearing in a four-storey building and alerted emergency servicesA four-storey building has collapsed in the northern French city of Lille but no deaths have been reported so far, thanks to a resident’s advance warning, French authorities said.Lille firefighters said they rescued one person from the rubble with only light injuries. The search for any others possibly trapped in the rubble was continuing before an investigation begins into why the building collapsed on Saturday morning. Continue reading...
by Vanessa Thorpe, Arts and Media correspondent on (#65RET)
Xander Parish, who fled St Petersburg in March, talks about his performance this weekend with Russian and Ukrainian artistesWhen the dancer Xander Parish made his return to the London stage in Swan Lake, visiting Covent Garden five years ago as a member of a renowned Russian ballet company, it was a moment of triumph. The Yorkshire-born star was, after all, the first Brit to have been accepted by the Mariinsky Ballet – known as the Kirov in Soviet times. And after the curtain came down the company promoted Parish to the status of principal dancer.How times change. This March Parish turned his back on his new home in St Petersburg. He and his Russian wife, the dancer Anastasia Demidova, fled the country in protest at the invasion of Ukraine in February. On 12 November, Parish was due to take a further stand. Continue reading...
Olaf Scholz says responsibility for violence lies solely with regime and pledges new sanctionsThe German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has strongly criticised the Iranian government for its brutal crackdown on protests and said Germany stood “shoulder to shoulder with the Iranian people”.Scholz said the protests sparked by the death on 16 September of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini after her detention by Iran’s morality police were no longer “merely a question of dress codes” but had evolved into a fight for freedom and justice. Continue reading...
Vehicle carrying 35 people came off road and fell into canal in Aga, 70 miles north of CairoNineteen people were killed and six others were injured when a bus drove into a canal in northern Egypt on Saturday, the country’s health ministry said.The bus was carrying 35 people when it came off a highway and fell into Mansoura canal in Aga, in the northern Dakahlia region, according to security sources. Continue reading...
Sector hit by staff and funding shortages warns against giving residents legal right to see guestsCare homes face being “vilified” if they are forced to allow in visitors under new plans being considered by the government, ministers have been told.The care minister Helen Whately said stopping relatives from visiting loved ones in care homes as a precaution against the spread of Covid-19 showed “a lack of humanity”. Legislation is being planned to give care home residents and hospital patients the legal right to see guests, according to the Times, prompting fury from the care sector. Continue reading...
As abortion rights are rolled back, more citizens seeking access to reproductive healthcare may face similar treatmentThree women who peacefully protested against restrictions on abortion rights in the US supreme court were mistreated and detained in “inhumane” conditions after their arrest, they say.Their experience shows unsettling treatment in a landscape where pregnant people, medical providers and others increasingly face criminalization after the Dobbs decision on reproductive care. Continue reading...
Course thought to be world first agreed after university bowed to pressure from seven-day End Fossil protestAll students at the University of Barcelona will have to take a mandatory course on the climate crisis after the establishment agreed to meet the demands of activists conducting a sit-in occupation.In a move thought to be a world first, all 10,000 graduate and postgraduate students will have to take the course from the 2024 academic year. It will also devise a training programme on climate issues for its 6,000 academic staff. Continue reading...
by Lisa O'Carroll Brexit correspondent on (#65R8H)
Academics with settled status had to leave four-month-old with family in India due to Home Office waitA German biophysicist and his neurophysicist wife have told how they were separated from their newborn baby amid Home Office delays processing a post-Brexit residency application for their little girl.Darius, an associate professor at a Russell Group university in England, and his Indian wife, Sunaina, arrived in the UK before Brexit and had settled status – entitling them and their direct family members to reside in the country. Continue reading...
The singer will release a recording of her recent appearance at Newport Folk festival, her first full performance in 20 yearsJoni Mitchell has announced a new live album of her recent surprise Newport Folk festival performance. Speaking to Elton John on his Apple Music radio show Rocket Hour in a rare, wide-ranging interview, Mitchell confirmed that she and her team are “trying to” release an album of the show, a collaborative performance with US Americana singer Brandi Carlile which featured guests including Blake Mills, Marcus Mumford, Wynonna Judd and more. It was Mitchell’s first full performance in more than 20 years, and found the iconic folk artist singing from an onstage throne; at one point, during Just Like This Train, she stood to perform a guitar solo. “I couldn’t sing the key, I’ve become an alto, I’m not a soprano any more,” Mitchell told John of the rendition. “I thought people might feel lighted if I just played the guitar part … it was very well received, much to my delight.”Elsewhere in the interview, which airs in full at 5pm today (12 November), Mitchell discusses the original reception to much of her work, which she says “made people nervous”: “People thought it was too intimate. It was almost like Dylan going electric. I think it upset the male singer-songwriters … It took to this generation, they seem to be able to face those emotions more easily than my generation.” She also expresses her “outrage” at wars (“I guess it’s an old hippy thought like make love, not war … you’d think we’d wise up and take care of the ecology situation instead of starting wars”) and describes Chuck Berry as the “goat”, an acronym for greatest of all time. Continue reading...
by Jessica Elgot Deputy political editor on (#65R7K)
PM’s stance on global issues not fully known but he will be keen for Russia not to be seen as calling the shotsWhen Rishi Sunak steps off the plane in Bali for what will be his first major diplomatic test as prime minister, there is a forecast for heavy rain on the Indonesian island paradise and a veil of gloom over the prospects for any agreement between G20 leaders.The longest shadow has been cast by Russia – and that country’s membership of the G20 means that British officials acknowledge it will be nearly impossible for the leaders to agree a communique at all. Continue reading...
Exclusive: request to train more than 500 personnel raises tensions between Home Office and MoDThe army is expected to begin training on 21 November to replace striking Border Force officers at ports and airports, Home Office staff have been told.The Guardian understands that more than 500 military personnel are expected to each receive five days of training before being asked to work in frontline jobs. The first are supposed to arrive for training a week on Monday, Home Office staff have been told. Continue reading...
by Aubrey Allegretti and Jessica Murray on (#65R7N)
Exclusive: Complaints include that too many turned a ‘blind eye’ to racist slurs and issue was not taken seriouslyOne of Labour’s biggest local branches has been plunged into a racism storm, with minority ethnic councillors claiming there is a “toxic culture” designed to keep them “in their place, which is at the bottom”.Leaders of the Labour group on Birmingham city council were accused of “not taking racism and discrimination seriously”, and criticised for a “frankly appalling” lack of representation of black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) politicians in senior roles. Continue reading...
The much-anticipated release of the Marvel sequel is set to be one of the year’s biggest hits, but it arrives with a swell of sadnessThis time around, there were no filmgoers in brightly colored kente cloth outfits or other African garb waiting to greet the coming of the Black Panthers.Where the first film was a celebration of Black excellence, the sequel, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is an elegy for the late Chadwick Boseman. The mood was somber at theaters in Atlanta, the closest place America has to a Wakanda on Earth (like the original, it was partly filmed here). Continue reading...
Councillors in the largest town in the former health secretary’s West Suffolk constituency have already called for his resignationIf he harboured any doubts about his decision, Matt Hancock gave little hint this week when challenged by a fellow I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here! contestant about his decision to abandon his duties as an MP.“Rishi’s great. We’ll be fine,” came the breezy reply from the former Health Secretary as he reclined on the jungle set ahead of being covered in slurry and insects during the first of the show’s bushtucker trials. Continue reading...
The potential impact of the chancellor’s various options and which ones we think he will pursueWhen he was chancellor, Rishi Sunak’s Treasury would routinely leak many elements of his budgets in advance, and there has been a similar wealth of informed speculation about how, as prime minister, he can fill the estimated £60bn gap in the UK’s public finances in next week’s autumn statement.With much fiscal misery expected, there is a benefit for Sunak and his chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, in floating possible options to gauge the reaction – and it is likely that some ideas mentioned in newspapers never make the cut. But here are some of the ideas on the table, in terms of tax rises and spending cuts, and the likelihood of them being implemented. Continue reading...
by Harry Taylor (now); Ben Quinn and Samantha Lock (e on (#65PZ7)
This live blog has now closed, you can read more on Ukraine’s recapture of Kherson hereThe absence of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, in connection with announcements about his forces’ retreat from key areas of Ukraine is being discussed by commentators.The distance has been deliberate, writes New York Times national correspondent Neil MacFarquhar, who adds:With each new pronounced setback in Ukraine, however, it is getting harder for Mr. Putin to separate himself from the whiff of failure, which is gradually eroding his image as a decisive, indomitable leader.There is a withdrawal of Russian troops to more fortified positions. But there were still populated points where we saw battles.They withdraw because they suffer losses, very heavy losses. What’s more, they don’t even take the bodies of their soldiers and leave the wounded behind. Continue reading...
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