Hundreds of Christian clergy say proposal could ‘bring about the end of liberal democracy’

Cross-party group says people should be housed in community rather than ‘unacceptable’ camp in KentA cross-party group of parliamentarians has urged the home secretary to close a controversial military barracks being used to house asylum seekers with immediate effect, and instead house them in the community where they can receive appropriate support.Members of the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on immigration detention, which has more than 40 members, have written to Priti Patel to say they “entirely agree” with serious concerns aired by the then independent chief inspector of borders and immigration, David Bolt, about conditions at Napier barracks in Kent. Continue reading...

The author and journalist on the cold war, his Adam’s apple, and nearly being deportedBorn in England and raised in Canada, Malcolm Gladwell, 57, has written for the New Yorker since 1996. In 2000 he published The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make A Big Difference, the first of six bestsellers. His new book, The Bomber Mafia, is out on 27 April. He lives in New York with his partner.What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?

Two 15-minute meals that are perfect for WFH lunches: a quick-cook pasta with a zippy fusion sauce, and an all-day brunch of buttery asparagus and eggs on toastThe days are getting longer and our freedom to roam outside is getting greater. As a result, the amount of time we want to spend indoors cooking is perhaps getting smaller. But lunch hour continues, every day, for those still working from home. Eat we must, happily, so cook we must, too – we might just want to spend a bit less time doing it. So here are two 15-minute meals to help you cook, eat and then get outside. Continue reading...

The ceremony will reflect the duke’s military affiliations and personal elements of his lifePrince Philip’s funeral will take place on Saturday afternoon within the grounds of Windsor Castle, to avoid crowds gathering during the coronavirus pandemic, but will be televised to the nation.The congregation will wear masks and members of the royal family will be wearing morning coats with medals or day dress. Continue reading...

Bustle Digital Group, which bought Gawker in 2018, is to bring back the website with Leah Finnegan as editor. Will it work?For five years, the pioneering gossip website Gawker has lain dormant with a blunt message from co-founder Nick Denton: “It is the end of an era.”Now Gawker, which came to represent the freedoms and excesses of web-only publishing before it was closed down following a convoluted $140m libel case brought by the wrestler Hulk Hogan in 2016, is set to be rebirthed (again). Continue reading...

With mass events on the horizon, nightclubs are getting ready to welcome ravers again. But is there such a thing as a Covid-safe crowd – and will it be as fun?Robert remembers the first time he went to Fabric nightclub in London. “It was a few months after it opened, in 1999. I remember looking down from a balcony at the crowd below and being mesmerised by it all.” As the mass of people throbbed, he found “the darkness and that damp-earth smell of sweating bodies, skanking and grinding” completely intoxicating.The particular joy of big clubs, Robert argues, is that despite their size (Fabric can hold 1,600 people), they are made for close contact. “They are about as far from social distancing as we can get with our clothes on,” he says. Now 48, Robert used to go to Flesh, one of the UK’s first gay club nights, at the Haçienda in Manchester. “As a gay man in that period, you were hard pressed to find space and acceptance. I felt I could be myself on that dancefloor. Clubbing became a form of self-expression. It was about being close – physically and ideologically – to others who were having the same experience. I’ve missed that a lot,” he says. In recent years, clubbing has become a less frequent occurrence for him: “But before the pandemic I’d go out at least once a month.” Continue reading...

Instead of looking south, campaigners are looking north, to the egalitarian models of small Nordic nationsWhat kind of country should Scotland be and how can it prosper? Surprisingly, given the swell of Scottish opinion in favour of independence, these questions aren’t much discussed. A swirling mist obscures the road beyond the referendum, occasionally lit up by neon signs reading “green” and “fair” and “free”. Independence, like Brexit, is predicted by its supporters to have a galvanising effect. Few are as gung-ho as Alex Salmond, who estimates that Scotland is one of the world’s richest countries, the “Saudi Arabia of renewables”. Nonetheless, despite the contrary evidence of a recent economic forecast by the London School of Economics, a view prevails that any damage will be easily overcome. In the words of the scientist and engineer Hillary Sillitto, there has always been “lots of talk about a better, fairer society [and] none about where the wealth was going to come from to pay for it”.Last month Sillitto and two other Edinburgh-based writers – another reputable scientist, Ian Godden, and a nurse-turned-entrepreneur, Dorothy Godden – published an online edition of their book, Scotland 2070, which aims to rectify what the writers identify as “the poor quality and short-term perspective of Scotland’s political debate”. Avowedly detached from political parties, they warn against conventional solutions such as inward investment and low corporate taxes: the first is a poor substitute for the development of local industry, and the second is already well-catered for by Ireland. Continue reading...

It’s the song, not the album, that rules modern pop – but payment for writers is dysfunctional at best. We urgently need a new modelIn 1973, Abba were invited to submit a song as Sweden’s entry to the Eurovision song contest. We had a perfect song: it was called Hasta Mañana. It was a ballad, it was catchy, it sounded like the kind of thing that did well in the Eurovision song contest. So we didn’t enter it. We chose Waterloo instead, which sounded like nothing we had ever heard at Eurovision before. That was the point: I thought we might come sixth or seventh, but people who saw the show – people outside Sweden, who had never heard of Abba – would remember us. It was a huge, calculated risk, and it paid off in a way we could never have imagined.Related: Songwriters fight to be heard in streaming revenues debate Continue reading...

Lay member of synod says bishops should be ‘moved out of palaces’ and their salaries cut to match priestsChurch of England bishops should be forced to declare extra earnings and outside interests, according to radical proposals submitted to the church’s general assembly.The call for bishops to state any income on top of their salaries and membership of clubs, organisations and political parties on a register of interests comes amid growing concern over cronyism and conflicts of interest at the heart of government. Continue reading...

Men brought to Australia for medical care removed as Kangaroo Point hotel owners reclaim possessionNineteen asylum seekers brought to Australia from Nauru and Manus Island for medical care have been forcibly removed from the the Kangaroo Point Central Hotel and Apartments in Brisbane, which was used for their long-term detention, supporters say.It is understood they have been taken to the Brisbane Immigration Transit Accommodation Centre on the outskirts of the city, but it is unclear if the men will be held there long term or be moved to another centre or another state. Continue reading...

Boy, 2, suffers bites to leg, arm, neck and shoulder and lacerations on back of headA two-year-old boy was airlifted to hospital after being mauled by a dingo on Fraser Island when he wandered away from a house while his family was asleep on Saturday.The boy suffered wounds to his leg, arm, the base of his neck, his shoulder and also had a laceration at the base of his head, a Fraser Island paramedic said. Continue reading...

In his first in-person summit since taking office, the US president hosts Yoshihide Suga as part of efforts to face down BeijingJoe Biden has sought to present a united front with Japan’s prime minister, Yoshihide Suga, to counter an increasingly assertive China as the US president held his first face-to-face White House summit since taking office.Biden hosted Suga for talks on Friday that offered the Democratic president a chance to work further on his pledge to revitalise US alliances that frayed under his Republican predecessor, Donald Trump. Continue reading...

Italian restrictions to ease in many areas from 26 April; Latvia offers vaccinations following hesitancy in older population

The prime minister wanted politically friendly GPs and pharmacies in charge so he didn’t have to deal with potentially prickly state premiersIt’s not entirely clear how encouraging words cleared the gritted teeth of the New South Wales health minister, Brad Hazzard, this week, but he managed it.The precursor to Hazzard gritting his teeth was Scott Morrison dropping a statement to media outlets on Tuesday night declaring the national cabinet would resume meeting twice a week to deal with the mess of the vaccination rollout. Continue reading...

New measures to enforce stay-at-home order with hospitals ‘bursting at the seams’ but civil liberties campaigners cry foulOntario has announced sweeping new police powers to enforce an extended stay-at-home order, in the latest sign that officials in Canada’s most populous province have lost control of the rapidly spreading coronavirus.With a record number of new cases, there is growing worry among experts that the already-strained healthcare system is being further pushed to the brink. Continue reading...

His retirement means that Cubans will not have a Castro formally guiding their affairs for the first time in over six decades

The pandemic put everyone in limbo. For the first time, many Australians understood what it meant to be stranded, unable to cross borders, separated from loved ones. The federal government said we were ‘all in this together’ – but what about the refugees in Temporary? And what’s ahead for them? Sisonke Msimang interviews Sarah Dale, the director of the Refugee Advice and Casework Service, to find outTemporary is a project from the University of New South Wales Centre for Ideas and Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law in partnership with Guardian Australia, inspired by the book Refugee Rights and Policy Wrongs by Jane McAdam and Fiona Chong. Series artwork by Matt Huynh.You can find additional information, photography and artwork at the Kaldor Centre’s Temporary website. Continue reading...

Māori say European New Zealanders should come ‘from a place of respect’ towards a language their ancestors suppressedRosie Remmerswaal is used to people asking why she decided to learn the Māori language.

Exclusive: Transcripts of conversations between Italian officials and Libyan coastguard contained in leaked fileAt 8.18am on Friday 16 June 2017, the Libyan coastguard Col Massoud Abdalsamad received a long-distance phone call from an Italian coastguard official who told him that 10 migrant dinghies were in distress, many in Libyan territorial waters.“It’s a day off,” Abdalsamad told the official. “Perhaps we can be there tomorrow.” Continue reading...

Sneakers, which are Sotheby’s most expensive shoe listing ever, were designed by West and Nike’s Mark Smith in 2007Kanye West’s Air Yeezy sneakers are being auctioned for $1m, making them Sotheby’s most expensive shoe listing ever. They are expected to break the record set by a pair of Nike Air Jordan 1s worn by Michael Jordan, which sold for $615,000 last year.Related: Kid Cudi praised for wearing a dress but LGBTQ+ people see a double standard Continue reading...

Polished dark green carriage that he rode in his 90s will be on procession route at Windsor CastleRight into his 90s, the Duke of Edinburgh continued to drive his team of fell ponies around the royal estates from the box seat of a carriage he designed himself.He took up the sport of carriage driving in his 50s when what he called his “dodgy” arthritic wrist forced him to give up polo playing, and continued competing into his 80s. In more recent years he could still be seen driving, reins in hand, just for fun. Continue reading...

One man sentenced to 31 years and two others given 13 years in attack that echoed notorious 2016 Pamplona caseThree members of a gang that raped an 18-year-old woman in an abandoned industrial unit in the Catalan city of Sabadell two years ago have been handed sentences of between 13-and-a-half and 31 years.The attack had become known as the “Sabadell wolf pack case” in a reference to the notorious gang-rape that took place at the running of the bulls festival in Pamplona five years ago, and which caused an outcry across Spain and spurred calls for an overhaul of the country’s sexual offences legislation. Continue reading...

In 2000, the actor Helen McCrory, who has died aged 52, wrote for the Guardian about her role in Anna Karenina and modern life as a womanHow should a woman live her life? Survive to the age of 70, fearfully, being as everyone else instructs her to be? Or play the heroine, passionately, in the knowledge that trying and failing need not equal defeat?This is the timeless conundrum Tolstoy’s vivid heroine, Anna Karenina, took on, long before it became fashionable to discuss the conflict of desire and expectation in women’s lives. She was an original of her era, but what are the resonances of Anna’s story for the modern woman? Continue reading...

Actor was also known for her roles in the films The Queen and The Special Relationship

Analysis: Tycoon and pro-democracy activist’s 14-month jail sentence is only the start of his problems

Investigators have released floor plans and photos of expanded residence they say is Putin’s favourite

Seven staff at Muckamore Abbey psychiatric hospital will be charged with alleged ill-treatment and wilful neglectAuthorities in Northern Ireland are to prosecute seven people over the alleged abuse of patients at a psychiatric hospital. It is understood they are staff members of the psychiatric intensive care unit at Muckamore Abbey hospital, a facility outside Belfast in County Antrim.The Public Prosecution Service (PPS) said on Friday the seven people will be charged with offences including alleged ill-treatment and wilful neglect of patients contrary to the Mental Health (Northern Ireland) Order 1986. Continue reading...

NSW woman, 48, died this week after receiving vaccine on 8 April, federal health authorities sayAustralia’s drugs regulator has determined the death of a 48-year-old diabetic woman who developed blood clots after receiving the AstraZeneca vaccine was likely to be linked to the jab.Following a meeting of Australia’s Vaccine Safety Investigation Group on Friday, the Therapeutic Goods Administration said experts had concluded the case of the New South Wales woman, who died this week, “was consistent with causal association to immunisation”. Continue reading...

Media mogul Jimmy Lai and veteran activist Lee Cheuk-yan each sentenced to 12 months over protestsA court in Hong Kong has handed down a mixture of prison and suspended sentences to 10 of the territory’s most prominent pro-democracy figures, including reformers, politicians and a media mogul, some veterans of the transition from British rule in the 1990s.The prison sentences for organising or participating in an unauthorised assembly – traditionally a low-level offence attracting fines – are a highly symbolic blow to the pro-democracy movement, which has been targeted by authorities bent on removing all opposition to Beijing. Continue reading...

Forty-nine people died when train hit a railway maintenance vehicle that slid down an embankmentProsecutors in Taiwan have charged a truck driver with negligent homicide over his role in the island’s worst rail disaster in decades, which left 49 dead and more than 200 injured.The crash on 2 April was caused by a railway maintenance truck that slid down an embankment moments before a packed train came down the line in the eastern coastal city of Hualien. Continue reading...

Brexit minister David Frost says momentum has been established in efforts to ease tensionsTalks between the EU and UK to ease tensions in Northern Ireland have been described as “productive” and “constructive” with momentum now established to achieve a solution to the crisis, the Brexit minister, David Frost, has said.But the EU used the first face-to-face meeting since lockdown between Lord Frost and the European commission vice-president, Maroš Šefčovič, to warn that the outcome needed to be jointly agreed. Continue reading...

Highly transmissible variant and behavioural factors blamed as intensive care units fill with younger patients

New York bankruptcy court rules in favour of payout to 277 people who travelled to Bahamas for notorious ‘luxury’ eventA group of 277 attendees at the notorious Fyre festival are to receive settlement payouts of $7,220 (£5,240) each after the conclusion of a lawsuit against the organisers.The 2017 event drew global attention after the supposedly luxury music experience, promoted by supermodels and set to feature artists such as Major Lazer and Migos, turned out to resemble a disaster relief camp with windswept tents and decidedly non-gourmet food. Attendees had spent between $1,000 and $12,000 on tickets to the festival, which was cancelled on its opening day. Continue reading...

Those with no sick pay and fewer rights, such as many care workers and delivery drivers, at higher risk

General Angus Campbell says future of China and Taiwan must be resolved peacefullyThe outbreak of a war over Taiwan would be “disastrous” for the region, the chief of the Australian defence force has warned, as he indicated Australia would keep pushing for peaceful dialogue.General Angus Campbell urged countries to “all work to avoid” conflict over the future of Taiwan, speaking just weeks after an American diplomat revealed the US and Australia were planning how to respond to military scenarios in the region. Continue reading...

The country’s prosecutors had to previously prove that sex was non-consensual for a rape convictionThe French parliament has adopted legislation that characterises sex with a child under the age of 15 as rape and punishable by up to 20 years in jail, bringing its penal code closer in line with many other western nations.While the age of consent was previously 15, prosecutors in France used to be required to prove sex was non-consensual to obtain a rape conviction. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Parliamentary committee chaired by Liberal MP Lucy Wicks and with a majority of Coalition members urges more fundingScott Morrison has again been urged by members of his own government to give a budget boost to the auditor general, despite the prime minister brushing off a similar request last year.The joint committee of public accounts and audit, which is chaired by the Liberal MP Lucy Wicks and has a majority of Coalition members, has called for funding to reach a target of 48 performance audits a year and an extra $6-7m to test government entities’ claims about their achievements. Continue reading...

Public accounts committee points to ‘unusual’ meeting where special advisers were ‘running the shop’Fresh questions over checks and balances in government have been raised after political special advisers (spads) were accused of “running the shop” in a meeting with civil servants about handing out emergency pandemic cash to charities.MPs raised concerns about the process run by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) to decide how much money from a £750m pot should be given to other departments to then allocate to voluntary and community organisations last April. Continue reading...

Unseasonal frost is ‘agricultural disaster of 21st century’ as ice after warm weather decimates grape harvestsAt least a third of French wine production worth almost €2bn (£1.7bn) in sales will be lost this year after rare freezing temperatures devastated many vines and fruit crops across France, raising concerns over the climate crisis.“This is probably the greatest agricultural catastrophe of the beginning of the 21st century,” the French agriculture minister, Julien Denormandie, said this week as the government declared an “agricultural disaster” and began preparing emergency financial measures. Continue reading...

As Covid deaths reach 100,000 mark, French president says pandemic has shown people’s ‘capacity to unite’

Black hoodie from streetwear label Overpriced is part of growing NFT one-of-a-kind asset trend

Head of Robert Koch Institute says he supports plan for night-time curfew as some ICUs reach capacity

101 Doll Squadron dance group say they feel ‘threatened’ after footage they say was shot from a ‘creepy’ angle at HMAS Supply launchThe twerking dancing troupe who performed at the launch of the Australian navy’s newest ship have condemned the ABC claiming that the broadcaster’s video coverage of their performance contributed to the group feeling “threatened” and “exploited’ in the wake of intense media interest surrounding their performance.101 Doll Squadron released a statement saying they felt “unsafe” and personally attacked, blaming what they say was the ABC’s “deceptive editing” of a news clip, which appeared to show dignitaries present during their performance. Continue reading...

Taiwan eases restrictions on travellers after bookings fall into single digits and flight is cancelled

Three days after La Soufrière volcano began to erupt on St Vincent, the eastern Caribbean island remains under a shower of ash and subject to water restrictions as authorities grow concerned for the safety of those who did not evacuate. Continue reading...

Daren Buckley told armed police ‘somebody’s got to help’ people injured in Manchester Arena terror attackA man has described attempting to give first aid to victims of the Manchester Arena terror attack but was told to leave by armed police, the independent public inquiry into the attack has heard.Daren Buckley was leaving the Ariana Grande concert on 22 May 2017 with his son when the suicide bomb exploded, killing 22 people and injuring hundreds. Continue reading...

Linda Burney says federal leadership is needed to tackle root causes of crime and recidivismLabor says it will allocate more than $90m over four years for justice reforms to reduce the incarceration of Aboriginal people and the number of Aboriginal deaths in custody, if it wins government.On the 30th anniversary of the final report of the royal commission into Aboriginal deaths in custody, Labor’s Indigenous affairs spokesperson, Linda Burney, said federal leadership on justice reinvestment is needed to tackle the root causes of crime and recidivism. Continue reading...