É o que diz Leslie Fremar, apresentando-se como a inspiração da vida actual para Emily, a tensa primeira assistente da editora de revista de ficção Miranda Priestly. Emily é interpretada no filme “O Diabo Veste Prada” e sua nova sequência da atriz Emily Blunt.
Fremar deixou registrado em um podcast lançado na quarta-feira, conversando com Chloe Malle no Vogue’s “A passagem”pouco antes de “O Diabo Veste Prada 2” chegar aos cinemas.
Um nativo de Toronto que começou na Vogue e, ironicamente, trabalhou por um tempo como diretor de relações com celebridades na Prada, Fremar agora é estilista de celebridades como Charlize Theron, Jennifer Connelly e Julianne Moore. Mas em 1999, ela estava em seu primeiro emprego, auxiliando a editora-chefe da revista, Anna Wintour, e ajudando a treinar a mulher que acabaria por escrever o romance que se tornou o filme.
Não que ela pudesse bater um papo agradavelmente com Leslie Weisberger agora se o romancista de “O Diabo Veste Prada” entrasse na sala.
Contratada recém-saída da faculdade em 1999, Leslie Fremar – vista em 2016 – foi segunda assistente de Anna Wintour da Vogue e, ao se tornar primeira assistente, contratou a mulher que escreveria o livro “O Diabo Veste Prada”.
(Frederick M. Brown/Getty Photographs)
“Acho que seria muito estranho”, disse Fremar no podcast. “Quero dizer, não guardo rancor dela, mas é que se tornou algo que acho que ela não sabia que eu sabia. E então acho que seria apenas – não há nada a ser dito.”
Fremar, que ingressou no departamento de moda da revista depois de ser júnior e depois primeiro assistente de Wintour, descobriu o livro quando o editor-chefe a chamou ao escritório e perguntou: “Quem é Leslie Weisberger?” Fremar disse que lembrou a Wintour que Weisberger foi seu segundo assistente por cerca de oito meses.
Wintour respondeu: “Bem, ela escreveu um livro sobre nós e você é pior do que eu”.
A editora da Vogue – desde então, ela foi elevada a diretora de conteúdo da Condé Nast e diretora editorial world da Vogue – deu a prova, uma versão de pré-publicação do livro, para seu ex-assistente ler.
“Na verdade, foi muito merciless, a prova, e acho que obviamente um editor entrou [later] e realmente suavizou isso. … Parecia muito sombrio, lembro-me de ter pensado, e achei isso muito doloroso”, disse Fremar a Malle. “Acho que o que foi colocado no mundo é uma versão muito mais leve e agradável do que ela realmente escreveu. …Lembro-me de sentir que foi uma traição.”
Ai.
Mas Fremar assumiu seu papel na inspiração da personagem Emily, dizendo: “Acho que essa ideia de que a personagem Emily não é muito agradável ou authorized ou parece nervosa é porque eu provavelmente não period muito authorized. E provavelmente estava nervosa porque senti que estava tendo que fazer o trabalho dela também. Então, para mim, isso foi realmente frustrante.”
Fremar adivinhou que Weisberger, que deixou claro que queria ser escritora e que o RH da Condé Nast lhe disse para fazer um determinado curso de redação, “provavelmente estava apenas sentado ali escrevendo um livro e não necessariamente levando o trabalho tão a sério quanto eu. Ou, você sabe, cem milhões de garotas o fariam. Então, acho que isso provavelmente criou alguma tensão no escritório, onde talvez eu a atacasse. … Ela simplesmente não queria jogar o jogo”.
Quanto ao filme, Fremar disse que seu “elemento de fantasia” possibilitou que ela o apreciasse como entretenimento, e não como uma galera que lhe feria os sentimentos. Mas o tempo que passaram trabalhando juntos foi a vida actual.
“Acho que estava sempre tentando lembrá-la de que isso period algo para levar a sério ou eu levava a sério. E ela realmente não o fazia. Então isso realmente me frustrou”, disse Fremar. “Eu pensei, este é um grande negócio internacional. É como uma forma de arte para muitas pessoas. As pessoas se vestem todos os dias como uma expressão de quem elas são. Eu levei isso a sério, embora, você sabe, obviamente eu saiba que não estou curando nada. Period importante para mim. Não ser importante para ela apenas me irritou muito.”
Qualquer pessoa que não esteja vendo e ouvindo Emily Blunt em sua mente neste momento claramente não é fã de “Prada”. Embora o sotaque do estilista seja apenas ligeiramente canadense, nem um pouco britânico.
Fremar credita seu tempo trabalhando com Wintour pelo estabelecimento da carreira que ela tem desfrutado desde então, chamando o editor de seu “mentor por completo”.
“Aprendi tudo o que sei com Anna. Na verdade, daria a ela todo o crédito pela forma como minha vida acabou. E estou muito feliz com o resultado de minha vida. Por isso, sou muito grata a Anna”, disse ela. “Acho que a maneira como ela dirigia seu escritório sem parecer pessoal ainda faço isso até hoje.”
Além disso, Wintour a trouxe de volta à Vogue antes da administração Biden para estilizar sua primeira capa da revista nave-mãe, que apresentava Kamala Harris, então vice-presidente eleita, e fechou o círculo.
Mas a estilista tem os recibos que comprovam que ela é a Emily da Miranda de Wintour. Pedidos de coisas que não estavam disponíveis – digamos, um manuscrito inédito de “Harry Potter”, se o momento fosse certo – realmente aconteceram na Vogue nos anos 2000. Sim, Wintour comeu bife malpassado com batatas em um restaurante próximo. Sim, os assistentes cuidariam da lavagem a seco de Wintour. E sim, “foi um pânico” antes de ela chegar ao escritório. Mas não, nenhum dos assistentes acompanhou Wintour a Paris para a Style Week.
Anna sempre viajava sozinha, disse ela, e foi ajudada por uma mulher do escritório da revista em Paris quando chegou lá. “Fiona”, disse Malle, ainda está trabalhando na França.
E embora Wintour tenha tido muitos assistentes, Fremar disse que está se identificando publicamente como que assistente 20 anos após o lançamento do primeiro filme porque “há toda essa especulação, todo mundo gostou muito do filme, Anna está claramente abraçando-o. E então por que não? Você sabe, basta divulgá-lo.”
“Não estou realmente preocupado com as repercussões… Essas coisas realmente não me incomodam.”
Além disso, talvez, apenas talvez, seja uma oportunidade para ela reivindicar a autoria de uma das falas mais conhecidas do filme authentic.
“Eu definitivamente disse [Weisberger] um milhão de meninas matariam por causa do trabalho. … Essa foi definitivamente a minha opinião, porque eu realmente acreditei nisso”, disse Fremar.”E eu sabia que ela não queria necessariamente estar lá.”
More people in the UK are working into later life than ever before, with around 12 per cent of people aged 65+ working today, a record number that continues to rise.
With the current state pension age rising to 67, increased life expectancy and rising living costs mean that working beyond this age is becoming increasingly common.
For some, the decision to keep working can bring positive health, financial and wellbeing outcomes, but for others, it is challenging.
“Sizeable proportions of people experience ageism in the workplace and feel their age works against them when applying for jobs,” Dr Andrea Barry, deputy director for work at the Centre for Ageing Better, tells TheiPaper.
“With longer and increasingly varied working lives, skills, training and apprenticeships should be open to everyone, at all ages, to help make career changes possible.
“An estimated one million people aged 50 and over are either actively seeking work or would like to re-enter the workforce,” she said. “This is a similar figure to the number of NEETs (young people Not in Education, Employment, or Training) which has prompted the Government to launch their Youth Guarantee. We need something similar for 50+ workers.”
The iPaper spoke to three people who moved into a new career in their sixties.
Shorts – Quick stories
TECHNOLOGY
Training chatbots to sound friendlier ‘may cause more mistakes’
Caption: Businesswoman using technology smart chatbot AI Photographer: Krongkaew Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Training AI chatbots such as ChatGPT to sound friendlier may lead them to make more mistakes, a study suggests.
Platforms that prioritised warmth were also more likely to tell people what they wanted to hear, especially if users expressed sadness.
What you need to know
For the study, experts at the Oxford Internet Institute at the University of Oxford generated and analysed more than 400,000 responses from five platforms; Llama-8b, Mistral-Small, Qwen-32b, Llama-70b and GPT-4o.
Caption: Smartphone with a glass speech bubble with the chatbot symbol inside.Chatbot concept. open AI, Artificial Intelligence. Photographer: Francesco Carta fotografo Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF Copyright: Francesco Carta Caption: Illustration Photographer: Malorny Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Researchers used a training process similar to what developers may use to make their chatbots sound friendlier, and compared how the original and modified platforms responded.
A closer look at the detail
The study found that chatbots trained to sound warmer made between 10 per cent and 30 per cent more mistakes on topics such as medical advice and correcting conspiracy theories. They were also 40 per cent more likely to agree with a user’s false beliefs, particularly if the user expressed sadness or vulnerability.
Exclusive
5 min read
LIFESTYLE
4 min read
‘Warmth may come at cost of accuracy’
Researchers said the findings, published in Nature, suggest that training AI platforms to be warm “may come at a cost to accuracy, and that warmth and accuracy may not be independent by default”.
“As these systems are deployed at an unprecedented scale and take on intimate roles in people’s lives, this trade-off warrants attention from developers, policymakers and users alike,” they added.
SCIENCE
6 min read
Caption: Pigeons fly around a woman who is feeding birds at St George’s Park, Bristol, in cold, but sunny Spring weather. PA Photo. Picture date: Tuesday April 14, 2020. See PA story WEATHER Spring. Photo credit should read: Ben Birchall/PA Wire Photographer: Ben Birchall Provider: PA Source: PA
SCIENCE
Urban birds fear women more than men
Birds in urban areas are more scared of women than they are of men, scientists have discovered.
The findings have defied the expectations of researchers, who hypothesised that birds would perceive men as more threatening than women.
What methods did researchers use?
Caption: A pigeon drinks at a public fountain during a heatwave, in Mulhouse, eastern France, on August 22, 2023. (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON / AFP) (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON/AFP via Getty Images) Photographer: SEBASTIEN BOZON Provider: AFP via Getty Images Source: AFP
Men and women were paired monitored as they walked towards pigeons, starlings and other birds in green spaces.
Participants were matched according to their height and clothing, and hair was hidden if longer than a partner’s.
Caption: Close up of wild city pigeons in sunny day on asphalt. Photographer: Olena Ruban Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Researchers tested whether birds perceived female versus male observers differently in five European countries.
What did the study show?
The birds allowed men to get a metre closer than women in the study, only taking flight when male participants were 7.5 metres away. Birds were less tolerant of women across the five countries in the study: Czech Republic, Poland, Germany and Spain and France. And this behaviour was observed in all 37 bird species in the research.
LIFESTYLE
4 min read
HOMES AND GARDENS
2 min read
What did scientists conclude?
Researchers have described the findings as unexpected. Based on the results, one possible explanation is that in hunter-gatherer societies “women, if they hunted, could have focused more on smaller prey, while males hunted mainly larger prey”.
Caption: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – APRIL 18: A woman feeds birds under a tree at a park during warm weather in London, United Kingdom on April 18, 2026. (Photo by Rasid Necati Aslim/Anadolu via Getty Images) Photographer: Anadolu Provider: Anadolu via Getty Images Source: Anadolu Caption: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – APRIL 02: A view of ducklings at St. James Park in London, United Kingdom on April 02, 2026. (Photo by Rasid Necati Aslim/Anadolu via Getty Images) Photographer: Anadolu Provider: Anadolu via Getty Images Source: Anadolu
But they said further research is needed to understand the phenomenon.
HEALTH
Cancer rates in under-50s are rising – and no-one can be sure why
Bowel cancer has the steepest rise in early-onset cases (Photo: Sebastian Kaulitzki/Getty)
Clare Wilson
Science Writer
One of the most concerning trends in cancer is that rates of the disease in people under 50 are on the rise. And we don’t know why.
Now, a group of respected British researchers say that part of the explanation is that people are getting fatter. But other experts are sceptical.
What you need to know
Trend in early-onset cancer spans decades
50%
The rise is biggest in bowel cancer, with about a 50 per cent increase in under-50s since the 1990s in the UK. There are also smaller rises in this age group in tumours affecting over 20 other parts of the body.
9 in 10
It is especially puzzling because rates in the over-50s worldwide have been flat or even slightly declining for many tumour types, studies suggest.
Cancer is a disease that usually affects older people, with nine in 10 tumours arising in people over 50.
What did the study find?
The study looked at lifestyle factors known to raise cancer risk to see if any of these could be responsible for the 22 tumour sites where early-onset cancers are rising.
Eleven of these cancers have known behavioural risk factors. These are: obesity, smoking, drinking, lack of exercise, red and processed meat intake and lack of fibre in the diet.
Only one of these – obesity – has been increasing over the past few decades and could potentially explain the rise researchers said, whose study was published in the journal BMJ Oncology.
That’s what led the researchers to claim that excess weight is “the strongest clue to the rise in cancers in under-50s”.
But this study did not prove that the rise in obesity is causing the rise in early-onset cancers – only that the two trends have been happening at the same time.
The bigger picture
When researchers looked at how much the rise in early-onset cancer could be blamed on rising obesity, they found it varied on the tumour type, but obesity never accounted for more than 25 per cent of the extra cases.
Caption: EMBARGOED TO 2330 WEDNESDAY JANUARY 7
Picture posed by a model. File photo dated 03/03/14 of someone using a set of weighing scales. People on fat loss jabs need ongoing support, researchers have said, after a major study found they put all the weight back on much faster than traditional dieters. Researchers from the University of Oxford discovered that people on drugs including semaglutide (Wegovy) and tirzepatide (Mounjaro) lose weight during treatment but, on average, regain it within 20 months of stopping the jabs. Issue date: Wednesday January 7, 2026. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Chris Radburn/PA Wire Photographer: Chris Radburn Provider: Chris Radburn/PA Wire Source: PA Wire
Caption: Embargoed to 2330 Tuesday July 29
File photo dated 27/04/25 of a half-pounder burger and chips in a takeaway carton. Academics have found a link between consuming high levels of ultra processed foods (UPFs) and lung cancer. An international team of researchers tracked the health and food habits of more than 100,000 US adults, with an average age of 63. After an average of 12 years the team identified 1,706 cases of lung cancer. Issue date: Tuesday July 29, 2025. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Philip Toscano/PA Wire Photographer: Philip Toscano Provider: Philip Toscano/PA Wire Source: PA
“Body mass index only explains a small part of the increase,” Professor Montserrat García-Closas, a cancer expert at the Institute of Cancer Research in London, who led the research, said.
The hotspots where it’s most difficult to sell your home
The average length of time to sell a home is just a day longer than a year ago despite higher mortgages, although in London homes are taking nearly a week longer to be snapped up typically, according to a property website.
Caption: Estate agents ‘for sale’ and ‘let’ signs outside residential properties in Guildford, UK, on Monday, July 28, 2025. The number of UK home loans given the green light rose to a three-month high in June, as the housing market continued to shake off the impact of April’s tax hike.??Photographer: Jason Alden/Bloomberg via Getty Images Photographer: Bloomberg Provider: Bloomberg via Getty Images Source: Bloomberg Copyright: ? 2025 Bloomberg Finance LP
A closer look at the figures
33 days
Across the UK, the average time to sell a home is 33 days, just one day longer than last year.
6 days
The London area stands out as being particularly affected by recent events, with the average home there taking six days longer to sell than a year ago, the report found.
The locations on the list of hotspots
Here is how long on average it takes to sell a home, according to Zoopla analysis of the seven weeks to 17 April, 2025 and the seven weeks to 17 April, 2026:
Scotland – 15, 15
North East – 28, 28
Yorkshire and the Humber – 31, 31
North West – 28, 31
Wales – 34, 34
West Midlands – 33, 34
South West – 36, 35
East Midlands – 37, 37
East of England – 35, 38
South East – 37, 39
London – 35, 41
Caption: LONDON, ENGLAND – OCTOBER 30: People lok at houses for sale in an estate agents window in Mayfair on October 30, 2025 in London, United Kingdom. (Photo by John Keeble/Getty Images) Photographer: John Keeble Provider: Getty Images Source: Getty Images Europe Copyright: 2025 John Keeble
What do experts say?
Mortgage rates are drifting lower and there is greater choice of homes for sale
The best-value homes are moving quickly, particularly in northern cities and Scotland, whereas the room for negotiation is greater across southern regions,” Richard Donnell, executive director of Zoopla said.
Can you learn to love pigeons? A much-unloved animal in the UK
Features writer Kasia Delgado went on a safari to see if she could look past their rat-like nature
The tour guide
People think pigeons are stupid but lots of studies have shown them to have amazing memories, that they can identify people by their facial features, and they have an extraordinary sense of direction.
Florence Wilkinson, author of Wild City: Encounters with Urban Wildlife, took Kasia on a tour.
Positives of pigeons
War heroes
During the Second World War, carrier pigeons were routinely used to send messages, and they saved thousands of lives.
Homing ability
Scientists have put them in blacked-out vans and put miniature goggles on them to blur their vision and still the pigeons manage to return home.
The Dove family
We think of them as all grey, but they vary in shades, and some of them are quite amazingly coloured, says Florence.
Kasia’s feeding test
As I gingerly chuck some seed, wincing slightly, 15 or so flap their wings at me. I wouldn’t say I feel content or relaxed but I don’t hate it as much as I thought I would. I can see they’re not going to do me harm and after all, they’re just enjoying some free food.
A common myth?
Disease carriers
Research has found that between 1941 and 2004, there were only 207 reports worldwide of pathogens transmitted from pigeons to humans.
Not all walks are created equal
Read on to find out how to supercharge yours into an unbeatable health-builder
How to supercharge your walk
Get a bit breathless
All walking paces are linked with a lower risk of cardiovascular disease but there are additional gains made by those who walk at a moderate-to-vigorous intensity.
Walk uphill
Try to find varying inclines to increase energy and muscle burn.
Add weights
The extra resistance challenges your heart to work harder, increasing cardiovascular fitness.
How to supercharge your walk
Uneven ground
Mountainous and uneven terrain work your stabilising muscles harder, increasing the difficulty and output from your walk.
Go Nordic
Using poles engages the arms as well as the legs and core, turning walking into a full-body workout.
A walk is beneficial at any time of day, but after eating could be best. Research has found that 10- to 30-minute walks taken 10 to 30 minutes after a meal can reduce the peak blood-sugar measurements reached.
Slower and lower blood sugar throughout the day reduces the risk of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
How to supercharge your walk
Go green
Walking in nature has more psychological benefits than concrete. It’s shown to significantly reduce anxiety and depression.
Improve your posture
Staying tall through the spine, open your chest and keep your eyes forward (not leaning over on your phone..).
Meet outside
Walking is a good time to have conversations, whether with your boss or a friend.
Mistakes to avoid
1Focusing on step count – most research suggests that benefits plateau at 7,000 steps a day.
2Using ankle weights – they can tug at the hip flexors and the knees.
3 Doing one-and-done – just hiking for three hours on the weekend, and nothing throughout the week, means you’re missing out on benefits.
4Thinking it’s not a workout – walking packs in cardio and brain-boosting effects without the recovery time of intense exercise.
Eight million people in the UK are living with heart or circulatory disease
And while chest pain is a well-known symptom, there are more subtle signs you should be aware of too.
Overlooked signs of heart disease
Dizziness and fainting
An abnormal heart rhythm can cause a dizzy feeling. While much dizziness is not serious, it can be associated with life-threatening complications.
Increased breathlessness
This breathlessness could be due to blockages and reduced blood flow in the arteries.
Swollen ankles
Unusual swelling can indicate a problem with the body’s circulatory system and kidneys.
Worsening fatigue
Ongoing and worsening fatigue can indicate an underlying health issue, and it could be a sign that your heart isn’t working as effectively as it should be. If persistent fatigue is impacting you day-to-day, the best thing to do is speak with your doctor.
Ruth Goss, senior cardiac nurse at the British Heart Foundation
Overlooked signs of heart disease
Indigestion-type symptoms Discomfort in the stomach, chest and ribs, or a burning sensation in the chest area, could all be symptoms of heart disease.
Erectile dysfunction If it’s an ongoing issue, there could be an underlying health problem, including atherosclerosis (narrowing of the arteries), diabetes or high blood pressure.
Emotional detachment is a key life skill
Read on to find out how to embrace it, from GP Dr Radha
Healthy detachment
[Detachment] is not selfish – we can still care and empathise. We don’t avoid, we just balance and respond rather than react because we are not too invested in the outcome. This is very different from emotional numbing, which often happens after trauma.
dr Radha Modgil
When we need detachment
Toxic friendships
When you feel that an interaction brings out the worst in you, or that you are having to watch everything you say or do.
Dysfunctional families
Healthy detachment is helpful when we become overly invested in trying to control or fix someone.
Work issues
It’s helpful in situations you are not in control of and helps you leave work behind at 5pm.
How to start it
Examine your beliefs
You may have been conditioned to think that it is your responsibility to fix everything. Is this a fact or based on old patterns?
Look at the impact
Consider what negative impact your “fixing” has; it can keep situations stuck, or infantilise others from growing up.
Which problems are in your control?
Understanding what problems are ours to hold and which aren’t can help avoid emotional burnout.
How to maintain it
Firm boundaries
This means understanding your sense of self, what is yours and what is not and sticking to it.
Self-care
Recognise and look after your own energy levels, mental health and your need to live your own life.
Be objective
Try to have a factual, calm, rational attitude in moments of conflict. This includes trying to release the need to control.
‘I wasn’t ready to work in a charity shop’
Judith Buck, 70, West Yorkshire
Judith Buck graduated with a degree in chemistry in the 1970s, becoming one of the early women IT pioneers helping bring companies into the computer age. But she found the big multinational company she was working for in her mid-60s to be ageist. “I was getting signals that they wanted me out,” she says. “I think they thought I was blocking other people’s’ promotions – and I suppose I was – but I did enjoy my job. I wasn’t looking for a way out until they started pushing me.”
Buck had been coaching young swimmers for many years on a voluntary basis and had enjoyed it. Teaching in a more formal capacity was always at the back of her mind. “I really enjoyed working with young people,” she says.
During Covid, she began exploring what a teaching career might involve, eventually applying for training through Now Teach. “When they accepted me, I thought ‘my goodness – this might actually happen rather than just being a pipe dream’.”
As part of her teacher training, Buck was assigned a mentor through Now Teach and offered support with job applications. “There’s a tendency to think that a trainee teacher will be a young teacher,” she says.
While her first year was “a learning curve”, she states that “the kids get you through it”. She says: “A good piece of advice I got was when you go into that first classroom, the children will expect you to be an experienced teacher [because you are older], so live up to that.”
Despite teaching being a notoriously demanding career, Buck took to it easily. “It was exciting because they seemed to really value me,” she recalls. “My previous employer had wanted to get rid of me, but here people were saying, ‘You’re doing a great job’. And the kids were just fantastic.”
Buck started her first year as a qualified teacher at the age of 67 and is now in her third year of teaching on a part-time basis. Life experience also means she handles stress and pressure differently than earlier in her career. “I don’t let it get to me,” she says. “And I’m not too proud to ask for help.”
On the subject of whether older people are underestimated in society, Buck replies: “I think people in their 60s and 70s sometimes underestimate themselves. I applied for four jobs and got the fourth one. Some parts of society haven’t got the vision to see through the age barrier – but look at Sir David Attenborough!”
She continues: “I think generally people see us as expensive, but I’m at the bottom of the pay scale. “A lot of people I know of who are my age don’t really want to work anymore. But I didn’t want to sit at home – and I wasn’t ready to work in a charity shop just yet. I want to be around younger people, because I want to see where they’re going and hear their ideas.”
She encourages anyone older considering a career change to go for it, adding: “Grab the opportunity because you may not get it again.”
‘It looked easy – but it turned out to be a completely new career for me’
Bob Lawrence, 73, Derbyshire
Bob Lawrence has been working for B&Q as a showroom customer adviser for the past nine years after a long career as an operations manager in the construction industry ended abruptly. Aged 63, he attempted to find another job. “I must have done at least 35 applications a month and in 12 months, I only got two interviews,” he said.
With years of experience under his belt, it was something he struggled with. “I accept not getting a job when you’ve been interviewed, but to not even get shortlisted… age was clearly an issue. Generally speaking, once you get into your fifties and sixties, there’s a feeling that employers prefer younger people.”
Bob Lawrence now works in B&Q (Photo: Provided)
Being more financially stable was Lawrence’s primary motivation for finding another job. While he had “a few private pensions and the state pension”, it wasn’t sufficient for him to give up work entirely.
“That was my only objective,” he says. “I was still job-hunting and saw the job at B&Q and thought ‘that’ll do’. After a pressured management position, it looked like a nice, easy job. I honestly expected to just roll up, put on the old orange apron, stack shelves and for it to just prop up my pension. But it turned out to be a completely new career for me.”
B&Q has built an enviable reputation for staff training and for employing older workers, with around a third of its workforce aged 50+. It’s something that Lawrence has personally benefited from. He said: “When I arrived, I wasn’t stacking shelves – I was working on the showroom team on the design of kitchens and bathrooms.”
As part of his role, he also took an apprenticeship to help him transition into a retail environment, which involved sitting City & Guilds exams in maths and English. “I flew through maths, but I struggled with English – and doing the apprenticeship enabled me to get to grips with what was once my Achilles heel.”
Lawrence said he was accepted in his new job easily. “One of the things I love about B&Q is it’s so inclusive,” he says. “I’ve never felt my age.”
As well as advising customers looking for a new kitchen, he fields questions about DIY matters. “I’m an avid DIY-er and that’s one of the things that attracted me to B&Q,” he says.
Now, he works 30 hours over five days a week. “I love it. And I’ve made some really good friends. It wasn’t one I was expecting, but it’s been a good career change. I’m 74 this year and I don’t feel it.”
And for anyone in a similar position to him, his advice is to go for it. “You need to have the confidence to not write yourself off, because somebody will give you a chance – you’ve just got to find that chance.”
He adds: “Some of the old-timers that were here when I arrived have retired now. I’ll do that one day – but I’m not ready for it yet.”
‘I feel very blessed to be able to finish my career in a job that I love’
Kerry Wiggins, 69, Hampshire
Kerry Wiggins has been in her job as a senior membership services coordinator at the Chartered Institute for Archaeologists for nine years and lives on the border of Hampshire and Berkshire.
She graduated with a degree in archaeology in 1978 and worked as a field archaeologist for five years. After that, she had a “varied” career which included the third sector, supporting unemployed people, working for the National Careers Service and being a dog walker.
A negative experience with a former employer prompted her to look for another job. “I started Googling jobs near me and it [her current role] popped up. Absolute serendipity! It was so exciting, but I didn’t think I stood a chance.”
Wiggins drew on the career guidance she had once issued to job seekers in a previous role, however. “I thought ‘apply and they can only turn you down’. I submitted an application and the rest is history. I started work two weeks before my 60th birthday.”
At the end of her interview, Wiggins said: ‘I’m approaching 60. Why did you interview me?’ “The CEO looked at me and said, ‘Because you were the most suitable candidate’.” She smiles.
Wiggins’s varied career has also given her lots of transferable skills. “When I started the job, I was absolutely floored because I’d been out of archaeology for a long time and it’s very different,” she recalls. “But in terms of being organised, having structures, working with members, communication and developing empathy, that was all absolutely second nature.”
Most of her team are in their forties and fifties, but Wiggins works with members of all ages. “All through my working life, I’ve worked with people a lot older than me. And when I ran a Youth Training Scheme, I worked mainly with 16-year-old boys. I’ve learned from just about everyone. I’m still 25 in my head.”
When asked if her job has changed how she feels about ageing, she says: “I’ve never really thought about ageing – I’ve never been sorry about a birthday.”
Despite her enthusiasm, Wiggins agrees that society underestimates older people. “When I was a careers adviser, I was constantly seeing talented, qualified people in their fifties being turned down for jobs,” she says. “I spoke to recruitment agents who said they knew of organisations that refused to take on anyone aged over 50.”
She continues: “I think there’s an unfair assumption that older people will be more difficult to work with because they’ll expect more money and responsibility and will tell other colleagues how to do their job. For the most part, I don’t think this is the case.
“The people I worked with understood they would need to change and were prepared to step into a new arena and offer their expertise without expecting it to be taken.”
Her advice for anyone older seeking a new job is to get some solid advice. “What gets in the way of most people moving on professionally is a rubbish CV and rubbish interview techniques,” she says. “You can blag your way through a lot with good products.”
Working within a supportive, professional organisation has been life-changing for Wiggins. “It’s absolutely wonderful. I feel very blessed to be able to finish my career in a job I love with a team I absolutely adore.”
Para combater o crescente domínio do Linux em dispositivos portáteis de jogos, a Microsoft apresentou o modo Xbox, uma versão do Home windows mais leve e focada em jogos. No mês passado, a Microsoft surpreendeu agradavelmente os usuários do Home windows ao anunciar que o modo Xbox também chegaria aos PCs e laptops com Home windows.
E esse dia está aqui. O modo Xbox está finalmente sendo implementado em PCs com Home windows 11, incluindo laptops, desktops e tablets. Se você sempre quis que seu PC se parecesse mais com um console, esta é a atualização que você estava esperando.
O que torna o modo Xbox tão emocionante?
O modo Xbox é uma experiência em tela inteira otimizada para controle, desenvolvida para jogos. Pense nele como um iniciador estilo console localizado em cima do Home windows 11. Ele traz sua biblioteca de jogos para frente e para o centro, reduz as distrações de fundo e permite que você entre em seus jogos sem se atrapalhar na interface do Home windows.
Você pode navegar e iniciar jogos usando um controlador, voltar para a área de trabalho do Home windows sempre que precisar e acessar todos os seus jogos em um só lugar, incluindo o catálogo completo do Xbox Sport Move e jogos de outras lojas de PC.
O modo Xbox foi projetado para oferecer uma experiência de jogo unificada em todos os seus dispositivos. Não é um substituto do Home windows, mas outra forma de usar o seu PC. Se você prefere a abertura e flexibilidade dos jogos de PC, mas deseja a simplicidade de uma interface de console, o modo Xbox oferece ambos.
Como você obtém o modo Xbox no seu PC?
A implementação é gradual, portanto nem todos receberão ao mesmo tempo. Para obtê-lo assim que chegar ao seu dispositivo, abra Configurações, vá para o Home windows Replace e ative “Obtenha as atualizações mais recentes assim que estiverem disponíveis”.
Depois de obter a atualização, você pode ir direto para o modo Xbox no seu PC. Microsoft diz ele continuará melhorando o modo Xbox com base no suggestions do usuário, então a experiência só vai melhorar a partir daqui.
Siga ZDNET: Adicione-nos como fonte preferencial no Google.
A Siri normalmente funciona como meu assistente de voz quando estou dirigindo e meu iPhone está conectado through Apple CarPlay. E isso é ótimo para tarefas interativas, como tocar música, obter instruções de direção, definir um lembrete e ligar ou enviar mensagens de texto para alguém. Mas a Siri muitas vezes se depara com perguntas mais complexas ou desafiadoras, do tipo que você normalmente faria a uma IA.
Com o novo suporte CarPlay da Apple para assistentes de voz de terceiros, você pode falar diretamente e sem usar as mãos com aplicativos populares de IA. Até agora, você pode conversar por voz no carro com ChatGPT e Perplexity AI da mesma forma que faria em casa ou em outro lugar. Isso significa que você pode fazer perguntas, fazer solicitações e participar de conversas.
Além disso: Google Maps x Waze: comparei os dois melhores aplicativos de navegação e este é melhor
Há uma barreira aqui. O assistente de voz ChatGPT funciona com CarPlay, independentemente do tipo de conta – grátis, Go, Plus ou Professional. A perplexidade, porém, é outra história. Para isso, você precisa da versão Professional, que normalmente custa US$ 20 por mês. Mas existem alguns truques para ganhar um ano grátis de Perplexity Professional, conforme descrito neste artigo do meu colega escritor do ZDNET, Artie Beaty.
(Divulgação: Ziff Davis, empresa controladora da ZDNET, entrou com uma ação judicial em abril de 2025 contra a OpenAI, alegando que ela violou os direitos autorais de Ziff Davis no treinamento e operação de seus sistemas de IA.)
Antes de começarmos, aqui estão algumas preliminares.
O que você precisa para começar
Primeiro, você naturalmente precisa de um iPhone e de um veículo compatível com CarPlay. Meu Toyota Camry 2025 veio com CarPlay, então estou pronto para ir. Caso contrário, a parte inferior Página CarPlay da Apple revela os carros e modelos de iPhone que suportam CarPlay.
Segundo, você deve ter as versões mais recentes do Aplicativo ChatGPT e o Aplicativo de perplexidade no seu iPhone. Se você já usa os aplicativos, toque no ícone do seu perfil no aplicativo App Retailer, escolha Atualizações de aplicativos, deslize para baixo na tela para atualizá-la e baixe as versões mais recentes de ambos, se necessário.
Além disso: deixei o agente de IA do Chrome comprar, pesquisar e enviar e-mails para mim. Veja como foi
Terceiro, seu iPhone deve estar executando iOS 26.4 ou posterior. Esta versão adicionou suporte CarPlay para chatbots de IA de terceiros, como ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google Gemini e Claude. As empresas por trás de cada IA precisam aproveitar esse novo suporte, com OpenAI e Perplexity liderando o caminho.
Supondo que você atenda a todos os critérios, ligue o carro e certifique-se de que o iPhone esteja conectado, sem fio ou through Bluetooth. Meu Camry vem com carregamento e sincronização sem fio, então não preciso conectá-lo a uma porta USB como fiz com meu veículo anterior.
Depois que seu telefone estiver conectado, você deverá ver ícones para ChatGPT e Perplexity na tela do painel do CarPlay. Caso contrário, vá para Ajustes no seu iPhone, selecione Geral e toque em CarPlay. Selecione seu carro e toque em Aplicativos. Você verá uma lista de todos os aplicativos compatíveis com CarPlay. Entre eles devem estar ChatGPT e Perplexity.
A partir daí, você pode mover os dois aplicativos para cima ou para baixo na lista, arrastando-os pelo ícone de hambúrguer de três linhas. Movi os dois aplicativos para cima na lista para que pudessem ser acessados na tela principal.
Para usar o ChatGPT, toque no ícone na tela do CarPlay e escolha “Novo bate-papo por voz”. Aguarde até que a conexão seja iniciada, pois o texto no show muda de Conectando para Ouvindo. Você pode então iniciar a conversa e o ChatGPT responderá normalmente.
Além disso: Quer Perplexity Professional de graça? 4 maneiras de obter um ano de acesso por US$ 0 (um valor de US$ 200)
Para Perplexity AI, toque no ícone na tela e toque em Conectar. Quando a tela convidar você a “perguntar qualquer coisa”, você poderá começar a conversar.
Com tudo configurado do meu lado, experimentei recentemente o ChatGPT e o Perplexity para ver o desempenho de cada um. Fiz perguntas e solicitações semelhantes a cada um para ver se poderia declarar um vencedor. Aqui estão as tarefas que atribuí a eles e como eles lidaram com cada uma delas.
Normalmente peço instruções de direção ao Siri, mas queria ver se o ChatGPT ou o Perplexity também poderiam fornecê-las. O ChatGPT não pode fornecer rotas porque não consegue ver minha localização. A perplexidade, porém, pode resolver essa tarefa. Nesse caso, pedi instruções de direção para Faneuil Corridor em Boston. Depois de solicitar acesso à minha localização, o Perplexity me levou ao Apple Maps com um mapa e as etapas passo a passo necessárias.
Vencedor: Perplexidade
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Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
Em seguida, pedi a cada um que recomendasse um restaurante mexicano native. Novamente, o ChatGPT não pôde ajudar porque não consegue visualizar minha localização. Perplexidade citou vários restaurantes próximos e me perguntou qual eu preferia. Depois de escolher o que queria, a IA exibiu as instruções through Apple Maps.
Vencedor: Perplexidade
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Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
Além disso: experimentei a nova integração CarPlay do ChatGPT: agora é minha escolha para as perguntas que o Siri não consegue responder
Solicitar música é outra tarefa que reservo para o Siri. E essa ainda é a melhor opção. O ChatGPT não consegue reproduzir música de nenhum serviço porque não tem acesso ao meu iPhone. Supõe-se que o Perplexity seja capaz de tocar músicas do Apple Music e do Spotify. Fora do carro e do CarPlay, usei o aplicativo Perplexity para tocar músicas específicas do Spotify, que funcionou bem. No entanto, a IA falhou quando pedi para tocar uma música do Spotify no carro through CarPlay. A música apareceu no aplicativo Spotify do meu iPhone, mas tive que iniciá-la manualmente, anulando todo o propósito de uma abordagem viva-voz.
Vencedor: Nenhum
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Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
Com o ChatGPT e o Perplexity, tentei fazer uma ligação, enviar uma mensagem de texto e um e-mail. Nenhum dos dois conseguiu realizar essas tarefas devido a restrições de acesso às informações pessoais do meu telefone. Portanto, ficarei com o Siri para essas solicitações.
Vencedor: Nenhum
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Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
Aqui, os resultados foram diferentes. Como eu esperava, o ChatGPT não conseguiu acessar minha agenda para visualizar ou marcar compromissos. No entanto, o Perplexity conseguiu ler meus compromissos e adicionar novos.
Vencedor: Perplexidade
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Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
Os resultados aqui foram os mesmos. O ChatGPT não conseguiu adicionar um lembrete ao meu iPhone, mas o Perplexity conseguiu configurar um.
Vencedor: Perplexidade
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Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
Aqui, pedi a ambas as IAs que me contassem como a Guerra Civil Americana começou. Ambos ofereceram explicações válidas e sucintas que responderam à minha pergunta.
Vencedor: Empate
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Além disso: Os melhores telefones through satélite: testados e revisados por especialistas
Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
Pedi a ambos os serviços que recomendassem alguns grandes romances de ficção científica da década de 1960. Ambos me deram cerca de quatro títulos para começar. A perplexidade até sugeriu alguns livros adicionais. Mas o ChatGPT adicionou mais talento e personalidade à sua resposta, descrevendo os livros em uma linguagem colorida. A Perplexidade simplesmente listou os títulos e autores sem maiores detalhes.
Vencedor: ChatGPT
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Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
Pedi a ambas as IAs que me contassem uma história sobre meu gato, Sr. Giggles, pousando na lua. ChatGPT contou uma história divertida e criativa sobre a viagem do Sr. Giggles da Terra à lua. A perplexidade foi mais literal, primeiro me dizendo que um gato não poderia realmente viajar para a lua. A história recitada também carecia da imaginação e do talento que o ChatGPT fornecia.
Vencedor: ChatGPT
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Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
Além disso: criei um aplicativo iOS em apenas dois dias apenas com minha voz – e foi eletrizante
Com vontade de jogar um jogo interativo, pedi ao ChatGPT e ao Perplexity que me desafiassem com um quiz de curiosidades. Ambos responderam a várias perguntas excelentes sobre tópicos gerais e específicos.
Vencedor: Empate
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Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
Com uma viagem planejada para a Itália no próximo ano, pedi às duas IAs que me ajudassem a aprender italiano. Ambos me perguntaram que tipos de frases eu gostaria de aprender. Depois de lhes dizer que queria praticar frases gerais, cada um começou com palavras e termos comuns, pronunciando-os em italiano e explicando o que significavam em inglês. Ambos me corrigiam se eu pronunciasse alguma palavra incorretamente, mas me parabenizavam quando acertava.
Vencedor: Empate
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Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
Por fim, disse aos dois serviços que estava ficando entediado e cansado de dirigir e que queria conversar com eles para passar o tempo. Eles me perguntaram o que eu queria discutir e sugeri algo incomum. ChatGPT incentivou uma verdadeira conversa de ida e volta para me manter engajado e interessado. A perplexidade recitava principalmente informações e não me envolvia tanto.
Vencedor: ChatGPT
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Captura de tela de Lance Whitney/ZDNET
OK, então quem foi o vencedor remaining? Isso depende em parte de como você usaria a IA. O Perplexity obteve pontos importantes porque foi capaz de fornecer instruções de direção e acessar meu calendário e lembretes. Mas sempre posso usar o Siri para esse tipo de tarefa.
Além disso: meu carregador de carro MagSafe favorito lida facilmente com estradas esburacadas (e está à venda)
O verdadeiro valor de uma IA de terceiros usando o CarPlay é lidar com coisas que você não pode fazer com o Siri – responder perguntas, contar histórias e conversar. E aqui, o ChatGPT superou a concorrência.
Claro, você não precisa escolher um em vez de outro. Você pode experimentar os dois. Mas da próxima vez que eu estiver dirigindo sozinho e precisar de alguém (ou algo) para passar o tempo, é mais provável que eu recorra ao ChatGPT para um bate-papo interessante.
The “horrific” abuse of disabled drivers over blue badge use must stop, say campaigners appalled by threats, insults and physical attacks.
More than one in five motorists with Multiple Sclerosis (MS) has been challenged or abused while using a blue badge, a new MS Society survey has found.
Some have been harassed and spat at despite displaying their permit, which lets people park in accessible bays.
Shorts – Quick stories
‘Wise’ bull named after Attenborough to mark 100th birthday
BBC nature broadcaster Sir David Attenborough has had a “wise” bull named after him by animal charity Peta to celebrate his 100th birthday.
Caption: Frozen Planet S2,11-09-2022,Generics,Sir David Attenborough filming for Frozen Planet II,BBC Studios,Alex Board
TV Still
BBC Photographer: Alex Board Provider: BBC Studios/Alex Board
What you need to know
The bull, named Sir Attenbullock to celebrate his birthday on 8 May, will be mentioned in a letter sent to Attenborough by Peta founder Ingrid Newkirk, which will tell him the animal was among the first rescued through Peta India’s Delhi mechanisation project.
Caption: David Attenbullock spent years hauling heavy carts through the chaotic, crowded markets of Delhi, streets familiar to Sir David, weaving through dense traffic and enduring long hours in the heat and dust, often without rest or water. He endured exhaustion, injury, and strain, but today, like Sir David, he has an important educational role, accompanying sanctuary visitors through a birdsong-filled orchard in northern India, allowing people to appreciate nature and get to know the lives and habits of the rescued animals there.
https://www.peta.org.uk/news/bull-sir-david-attenborough/ Copyright: PETA India
Caption: LONDON, ENGLAND – OCTOBER 12: Sir David Attenborough attends the Global Launch of BBC Studios’ “Planet Earth III” at Frameless on October 12, 2023 in London, England. (Photo by Dave Benett/Getty Images) Photographer: Dave Benett Provider: Dave Benett/Getty Images Source: Dave Benett Collection Copyright: 2023 Dave Benett
The initiative aims to replace animal-drawn carts with electric vehicles so the overworked animals can retire.
A closer look at the detail
In her letter, Newkirk writes that Sir Attenbullock is “strong, yet gentle”, which she says he shares with Attenborough, and adds that he also “quietly inspires others to appreciate the richness of the natural world”.
Secret World of Sound with David Attenborough (Photo: Humble Bee Sounds/Sky UK)
TELEVISION
3 min read
UK POLITICS
Everything to know about the May local elections
Caption: EMBARGOED TO 0001 MONDAY APRIL 20
File photo dated 06/05/10 of a voter placing a ballot paper in a ballot box at a polling station. Unionist parties could hold the majority in Holyrood after May 7, a poll has suggested, but more than half of constituencies are considered marginal. The survey, carried out for More in Common and seen exclusively by the Press Association, found the SNP will continue to be the largest party, but John Swinney’s party and the Greens – the other independence-supporting party – would fall one seat short of a majority. Issue date: Monday April 20, 2026. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Rui Vieira/PA Wire Photographer: Rui Vieira Provider: Rui Vieira/PA Wire Source: PA
Your guide to the local elections next week, including where they are happening, timings and what could happen at the ballots.
What you need to know
Elections are being held across Scotland, Wales and many parts of England on 7 May.
Voters in Scotland will elect MSPs to the 129-seat parliament at Holyrood.
In Wales, voters will choose members of the Senedd (Welsh parliament), which has been expanded from 60 seats to 96 for the first time.
Meanwhile, in England 136 local authorities will hold elections on the same date. This includes all 32 London boroughs, 48 district councils and 18 unitary authorities.
There are also local mayoral elections happening in: Croydon, Hackney, Lewisham, Newham, Tower Hamlets and Watford.
How will the results unfold?
Polling stations open at 7am on Thursday 7 May. Voters in England will need to show a photo ID to be able to cast a vote.
Thousands of people will take to the polls before they close at 10pm.
In England, 46 of the local authorities will count and declare overnight, with results expected between 1am and 6am on 8 May.
Ballot papers in Scotland and Wales will be counted during the day on 8 May, with the first results expected in the afternoon and the final declarations in the evening.
The majority of the remaining English authorities will not begin counting until 9am on 8 May and are likely to start declaring results late in the morning and continue through to the evening.
Labour on course for disaster
Caption: NEWMARKET, ENGLAND – APRIL 29: A man holds a placard as Reform UK Treasury Spokesperson, Robert Jenrick, campaigns for Reform UK in Norfolk on April 29, 2026 in Newmarket, England. For the local elections on 7 May 2026, Reform UK is projected to make historic gains in Norfolk, with some polls predicting they could take overall control of Norfolk County Council. (Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images) Photographer: Leon Neal Provider: Getty Images Source: Getty Images Europe Copyright: 2026 Getty Images
One poll by Lord Robert Hayward predicted Labour will suffer devastating losses of more than 75 per cent of the council seats the party is defending across England.
Reform UK is expected to be the main beneficiary, projected to gain roughly 1,550 seats from both Labour and the Conservatives.
Big Read
4 min read
TECHNOLOGY
Training chatbots to sound friendlier ‘may cause more mistakes’
Caption: Businesswoman using technology smart chatbot AI Photographer: Krongkaew Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Training AI chatbots such as ChatGPT to sound friendlier may lead them to make more mistakes, a study suggests.
Platforms that prioritised warmth were also more likely to tell people what they wanted to hear, especially if users expressed sadness.
What you need to know
For the study, experts at the Oxford Internet Institute at the University of Oxford generated and analysed more than 400,000 responses from five platforms; Llama-8b, Mistral-Small, Qwen-32b, Llama-70b and GPT-4o.
Caption: Smartphone with a glass speech bubble with the chatbot symbol inside.Chatbot concept. open AI, Artificial Intelligence. Photographer: Francesco Carta fotografo Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF Copyright: Francesco Carta Caption: Illustration Photographer: Malorny Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Researchers used a training process similar to what developers may use to make their chatbots sound friendlier, and compared how the original and modified platforms responded.
A closer look at the detail
The study found that chatbots trained to sound warmer made between 10 per cent and 30 per cent more mistakes on topics such as medical advice and correcting conspiracy theories. They were also 40 per cent more likely to agree with a user’s false beliefs, particularly if the user expressed sadness or vulnerability.
Exclusive
5 min read
LIFESTYLE
4 min read
‘Warmth may come at cost of accuracy’
Researchers said the findings, published in Nature, suggest that training AI platforms to be warm “may come at a cost to accuracy, and that warmth and accuracy may not be independent by default”.
“As these systems are deployed at an unprecedented scale and take on intimate roles in people’s lives, this trade-off warrants attention from developers, policymakers and users alike,” they added.
SCIENCE
6 min read
Caption: Pigeons fly around a woman who is feeding birds at St George’s Park, Bristol, in cold, but sunny Spring weather. PA Photo. Picture date: Tuesday April 14, 2020. See PA story WEATHER Spring. Photo credit should read: Ben Birchall/PA Wire Photographer: Ben Birchall Provider: PA Source: PA
SCIENCE
Urban birds fear women more than men
Birds in urban areas are more scared of women than they are of men, scientists have discovered.
The findings have defied the expectations of researchers, who hypothesised that birds would perceive men as more threatening than women.
What methods did researchers use?
Caption: A pigeon drinks at a public fountain during a heatwave, in Mulhouse, eastern France, on August 22, 2023. (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON / AFP) (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON/AFP via Getty Images) Photographer: SEBASTIEN BOZON Provider: AFP via Getty Images Source: AFP
Men and women were paired monitored as they walked towards pigeons, starlings and other birds in green spaces.
Participants were matched according to their height and clothing, and hair was hidden if longer than a partner’s.
Caption: Close up of wild city pigeons in sunny day on asphalt. Photographer: Olena Ruban Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Researchers tested whether birds perceived female versus male observers differently in five European countries.
What did the study show?
The birds allowed men to get a metre closer than women in the study, only taking flight when male participants were 7.5 metres away. Birds were less tolerant of women across the five countries in the study: Czech Republic, Poland, Germany and Spain and France. And this behaviour was observed in all 37 bird species in the research.
LIFESTYLE
4 min read
HOMES AND GARDENS
2 min read
What did scientists conclude?
Researchers have described the findings as unexpected. Based on the results, one possible explanation is that in hunter-gatherer societies “women, if they hunted, could have focused more on smaller prey, while males hunted mainly larger prey”.
Caption: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – APRIL 18: A woman feeds birds under a tree at a park during warm weather in London, United Kingdom on April 18, 2026. (Photo by Rasid Necati Aslim/Anadolu via Getty Images) Photographer: Anadolu Provider: Anadolu via Getty Images Source: Anadolu Caption: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – APRIL 02: A view of ducklings at St. James Park in London, United Kingdom on April 02, 2026. (Photo by Rasid Necati Aslim/Anadolu via Getty Images) Photographer: Anadolu Provider: Anadolu via Getty Images Source: Anadolu
But they said further research is needed to understand the phenomenon.
HEALTH
Cancer rates in under-50s are rising – and no-one can be sure why
Bowel cancer has the steepest rise in early-onset cases (Photo: Sebastian Kaulitzki/Getty)
Clare Wilson
Science Writer
One of the most concerning trends in cancer is that rates of the disease in people under 50 are on the rise. And we don’t know why.
Now, a group of respected British researchers say that part of the explanation is that people are getting fatter. But other experts are sceptical.
What you need to know
Trend in early-onset cancer spans decades
50%
The rise is biggest in bowel cancer, with about a 50 per cent increase in under-50s since the 1990s in the UK. There are also smaller rises in this age group in tumours affecting over 20 other parts of the body.
9 in 10
It is especially puzzling because rates in the over-50s worldwide have been flat or even slightly declining for many tumour types, studies suggest.
Cancer is a disease that usually affects older people, with nine in 10 tumours arising in people over 50.
What did the study find?
The study looked at lifestyle factors known to raise cancer risk to see if any of these could be responsible for the 22 tumour sites where early-onset cancers are rising.
Eleven of these cancers have known behavioural risk factors. These are: obesity, smoking, drinking, lack of exercise, red and processed meat intake and lack of fibre in the diet.
Only one of these – obesity – has been increasing over the past few decades and could potentially explain the rise researchers said, whose study was published in the journal BMJ Oncology.
That’s what led the researchers to claim that excess weight is “the strongest clue to the rise in cancers in under-50s”.
But this study did not prove that the rise in obesity is causing the rise in early-onset cancers – only that the two trends have been happening at the same time.
The bigger picture
When researchers looked at how much the rise in early-onset cancer could be blamed on rising obesity, they found it varied on the tumour type, but obesity never accounted for more than 25 per cent of the extra cases.
Caption: EMBARGOED TO 2330 WEDNESDAY JANUARY 7
Picture posed by a model. File photo dated 03/03/14 of someone using a set of weighing scales. People on fat loss jabs need ongoing support, researchers have said, after a major study found they put all the weight back on much faster than traditional dieters. Researchers from the University of Oxford discovered that people on drugs including semaglutide (Wegovy) and tirzepatide (Mounjaro) lose weight during treatment but, on average, regain it within 20 months of stopping the jabs. Issue date: Wednesday January 7, 2026. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Chris Radburn/PA Wire Photographer: Chris Radburn Provider: Chris Radburn/PA Wire Source: PA Wire
Caption: Embargoed to 2330 Tuesday July 29
File photo dated 27/04/25 of a half-pounder burger and chips in a takeaway carton. Academics have found a link between consuming high levels of ultra processed foods (UPFs) and lung cancer. An international team of researchers tracked the health and food habits of more than 100,000 US adults, with an average age of 63. After an average of 12 years the team identified 1,706 cases of lung cancer. Issue date: Tuesday July 29, 2025. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Philip Toscano/PA Wire Photographer: Philip Toscano Provider: Philip Toscano/PA Wire Source: PA
“Body mass index only explains a small part of the increase,” Professor Montserrat García-Closas, a cancer expert at the Institute of Cancer Research in London, who led the research, said.
The hotspots where it’s most difficult to sell your home
The average length of time to sell a home is just a day longer than a year ago despite higher mortgages, although in London homes are taking nearly a week longer to be snapped up typically, according to a property website.
Caption: Estate agents ‘for sale’ and ‘let’ signs outside residential properties in Guildford, UK, on Monday, July 28, 2025. The number of UK home loans given the green light rose to a three-month high in June, as the housing market continued to shake off the impact of April’s tax hike.??Photographer: Jason Alden/Bloomberg via Getty Images Photographer: Bloomberg Provider: Bloomberg via Getty Images Source: Bloomberg Copyright: ? 2025 Bloomberg Finance LP
A closer look at the figures
33 days
Across the UK, the average time to sell a home is 33 days, just one day longer than last year.
6 days
The London area stands out as being particularly affected by recent events, with the average home there taking six days longer to sell than a year ago, the report found.
The locations on the list of hotspots
Here is how long on average it takes to sell a home, according to Zoopla analysis of the seven weeks to 17 April, 2025 and the seven weeks to 17 April, 2026:
Scotland – 15, 15
North East – 28, 28
Yorkshire and the Humber – 31, 31
North West – 28, 31
Wales – 34, 34
West Midlands – 33, 34
South West – 36, 35
East Midlands – 37, 37
East of England – 35, 38
South East – 37, 39
London – 35, 41
Caption: LONDON, ENGLAND – OCTOBER 30: People lok at houses for sale in an estate agents window in Mayfair on October 30, 2025 in London, United Kingdom. (Photo by John Keeble/Getty Images) Photographer: John Keeble Provider: Getty Images Source: Getty Images Europe Copyright: 2025 John Keeble
What do experts say?
Mortgage rates are drifting lower and there is greater choice of homes for sale
The best-value homes are moving quickly, particularly in northern cities and Scotland, whereas the room for negotiation is greater across southern regions,” Richard Donnell, executive director of Zoopla said.
Previous research shows how disabled drivers are being treated with open hostility in car parks – with some shouting “scrounger” or “fake” at them.
‘People assume you are cheating the system’
Farah Black, a 50-year-old disabled motorist, said she had experienced people “shouting and swearing – accusing me of not looking disabled” while parking.
“You either get dirty looks or people tell you to f**k off,” she told The i Paper. “They can be so quick to jump to the idea of people cheating the system in some way. It’s very upsetting.”
Black, who lives in Northern Ireland and drives a Motability scheme car, lost their leg after undergoing amputations in 2016 and 2019 following a serious fall.
She said the verbal abuse often only stops when she gets out the car and her amputation and her wheelchair becomes visible.
Black at a Northern Ireland Assembly event on accessible transport (Photo: Michael Cooper/NIA)
Black recalled one incident at a car park in Shropshire when a man shouted “horrific” abuse at her and banged on her car window.
She told The i Paper: “He told me he couldn’t get a f**king parking spot and I shouldn’t be taking a disabled one. I was worried he was going to punch me through my half-open window. He actually hit the glass.
“He was so aggressive – even when I pointed out my blue badge and said I was in a wheelchair. When he saw my amputation, he finally backed off. He called me a f**king bitch and walked off.”
‘I’ve been spat at by a person in a wheelchair’
Black said recent rhetoric around the Motability scheme being “out of control” had increased scepticism and abuse of disabled drivers.
Criticism of the scheme – which leases cars in exchange for upfront payments and the personal independence payment (PIP) benefit – led the Government to remove “luxury” car models and the scheme’s tax breaks at the Budget.
“You can be made to feel like you’re taking something from someone else – it shouldn’t feel like that,” said Black. “We need to do more to make sure disabled people get an equal quality of life.”
The MS Society and other charities have called for more understanding of “invisible” conditions, which are not always obvious to fellow drivers in car parks.
Antje Ronneberger, a 57-year-old from Devon, was diagnosed with relapsing MS in 2019. Her symptoms include balance problems, fatigue and bladder issues.
Antje Ronneberger, who has MS, has been challenged over her use of a blue badge (Photo: Supplied)
“I’ve felt judgement,” Ronneberger said. “My walking distance is limited and I have trouble getting out of a car in a normal space. I’ve had people come up to me and ask, ‘Why are you using a blue badge?’.
“I’ve even been spat at by a person in a wheelchair because they did not think I should be using my blue badge,” she added.
Nick Moberly, chief executive of the MS Society, encouraged people to “listen, learn, and understand” before “saying something that could hurt or offend”.
Why action on fraud could help build trust
Campaigners have also called for a crackdown on blue badge fraud – warning that lack of enforcement by local authorities was undermining trust in the entire scheme.
Black said there was “weak” enforcement of the rules by councils of blue badge misuse – leading to more scepticism and abuse of genuine disabled drivers. “More enforcement would help build trust,” she said.
A disabled badge holder shows their parking permit (Photo: Matt Cardy/Getty Images)
The i Paper has previously reported on the rise in fake and stolen blue badges being sold on the black market – with some people also misusing family members’ permits.
We have also investigated the “postcode lottery” when it comes to the blue badge scheme, run by each local authority in very different ways.
Eligibility, parking rules and the number of disabled bays vary depending on the area, with some cash-strapped councils cutting back on access.
A spokesperson for the Local Government Association (LGA) said councils had only “limited resources” to take action against blue badge fraud and theft.
They encouraged people to report people they suspect are illegally using a badge – but also warned residents to keep “bearing in mind people’s need for a badge might not be obvious”.
The Department for Transport (DfT) was contacted for comment.
A tripulação do Artemis II, após seu retorno à Terra após um sobrevôo lunar histórico de 10 dias, conversou com o embaixador dos EUA nas Nações Unidas, Mike Waltz, descrevendo a missão como uma experiência “gloriosa”.
A tripulação – Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch e Jeremy Hansen – retornou à Terra em 10 de abril, caindo na costa de San Diego após sua viagem ao redor da Lua, durante a qual estabeleceram um novo recorde para a maior distância percorrida por humanos no espaço, superando a marca estabelecida pela Apollo 13 em 1970.
Waltz presenteou a tripulação com chapéus “MUNGA”, ou “Make the UN Nice Once more”, inspirados no slogan “Make America Nice Once more” do presidente Donald Trump.
Waltz perguntou à tripulação o que eles pensavam ao olharem para a Terra do espaço.
O PILOTO VICTOR GLOVER DA ARTEMIS II LOUVA A DEUS APÓS O RETORNO, DIZ QUE A MISSÃO ERA ‘GRANDE DEMAIS PARA ESTAR EM UM SÓ CORPO’
A tripulação do Artemis II se abraça durante a cerimônia de boas-vindas em 11 de abril de 2026.(KRIV)
“Como tripulação, queríamos ir por todos”, disse Wiseman na sede da ONU em Nova Iorque. “E queríamos preparar o terreno para Artemis III. Queríamos preparar esta agência espacial neste mundo para Artemis III e IV. Mas, no last, queríamos realmente conectar-nos com a humanidade. Queríamos que a humanidade fizesse uma pausa por um segundo e visse que este mundo ainda pode fazer algo excepcionalmente bem quando se dedica a isso.”
Espera-se que o Artemis III seja lançado no próximo ano e o Artemis IV esteja previsto para o ano seguinte.
“Você perguntou como foi, e não foi o mesmo sentimento durante toda a missão”, disse Glover a Waltz. “O que vimos pela janela estava mudando, e essa é uma das coisas únicas… Sempre senti a necessidade de ser grato pelo que estávamos vendo e de ser grato pelo que eventualmente voltaríamos. E a outra coisa foi o quão abençoados somos por ter isso.”
Koch disse que quando olhou para a Terra, a escuridão circundante fez o planeta parecer “ainda mais especial do que nunca”.
O comandante do Artemis II, Reid Wiseman, a especialista em missão do Artemis II, Christina Koch, o piloto do Artemis II, Victor Glover, e o especialista em missão do Artemis II, Jeremy Hansen, olham para o Nasdaq MarketSite na Occasions Sq., na cidade de Nova York.(Adam GREY/AFP through Getty Photographs)
“Em vez deste pano de fundo absoluto que existe em todos os lugares para nós, porque é tudo o que temos, faz com que as linhas que redesenhamos pareçam grandes e importantes”, disse ela. “Você percebe que, na verdade, não há nada absoluto ou garantido sobre isso, e que, na verdade, existe uma escala international. E esta é a primeira vez que digo isso na ONU, mas a verdade é que a escala international é o nosso mundo. E o que fazemos com ela é a nossa escolha.”
Hansen descreveu a experiência de ver a vastidão do espaço e sentir-se pequeno como indivíduo e fortalecido pelo que a humanidade pode realizar em conjunto.
“Period uma coisa estranha onde, como as estrelas, algumas estrelas parecem mais próximas em nossa galáxia do que outras. E isso continuou chamando minha atenção, e continuou me fazendo sentir muito pequeno, muito pequeno como indivíduo. Mas então, ao mesmo tempo, eu estava lá fora, vivenciando isso, e isso me fez sentir muito poderoso como raça humana. O que podemos fazer juntos, o fato de estarmos lá fora e algo que tem sido realmente emocionante desde que voltamos à Terra e começamos a ver quantas pessoas pararam para assistir a missão e ressoa com isso”, disse ele.
Glover também relembrou as muitas emoções ligadas à missão, incluindo o “momento glorioso” do retorno à Terra.
ASTRONAUTAS ARTEMIS II ENFRENTAM PROBLEMAS NO BANHEIRO ENQUANTO SE DIRIGEM EM DIREÇÃO À LUA
Os astronautas do Artemis II, Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch e Jeremy Hansen flanqueiam o presidente Donald Trump no Salão Oval da Casa Branca.(REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein)
CLIQUE AQUI PARA BAIXAR O APLICATIVO FOX NEWS
Durante a visita à ONU, o administrador da NASA, Jared Isaacman, quis reservar um momento para avaliar até onde tinham chegado, observando que não faz muito tempo que Trump estabeleceu o programa Artemis que levou à missão Artemis II.
“Na verdade, apenas em 2020, o Presidente Trump estabeleceu os Acordos Artemis. Agora, o quadro inicial foi um acordo de princípios entre os Estados Unidos e sete outros países com ideias semelhantes sobre a exploração responsável do espaço”, disse ele.
A visita da tripulação à ONU ocorre depois de se encontrarem com Trump na Casa Branca na quarta-feira. Trump também conversou com a tripulação enquanto eles orbitavam a lua no início de abril.
A terrorist attack in the UK is judged highly likely, prompting the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre (JTAC) to raise the threat level to “severe” for the first time since November 2021.
The Government has also announced an additional £25m funding for protective security, bringing the total to £58m this year.
The move follows a wider intelligence assessment of rising threats, including state-linked concerns connected to foreign governments encouraging violence against the Jewish community.
Shorts – Quick stories
‘Wise’ bull named after Attenborough to mark 100th birthday
BBC nature broadcaster Sir David Attenborough has had a “wise” bull named after him by animal charity Peta to celebrate his 100th birthday.
Caption: Frozen Planet S2,11-09-2022,Generics,Sir David Attenborough filming for Frozen Planet II,BBC Studios,Alex Board
TV Still
BBC Photographer: Alex Board Provider: BBC Studios/Alex Board
What you need to know
The bull, named Sir Attenbullock to celebrate his birthday on 8 May, will be mentioned in a letter sent to Attenborough by Peta founder Ingrid Newkirk, which will tell him the animal was among the first rescued through Peta India’s Delhi mechanisation project.
Caption: David Attenbullock spent years hauling heavy carts through the chaotic, crowded markets of Delhi, streets familiar to Sir David, weaving through dense traffic and enduring long hours in the heat and dust, often without rest or water. He endured exhaustion, injury, and strain, but today, like Sir David, he has an important educational role, accompanying sanctuary visitors through a birdsong-filled orchard in northern India, allowing people to appreciate nature and get to know the lives and habits of the rescued animals there.
https://www.peta.org.uk/news/bull-sir-david-attenborough/ Copyright: PETA India
Caption: LONDON, ENGLAND – OCTOBER 12: Sir David Attenborough attends the Global Launch of BBC Studios’ “Planet Earth III” at Frameless on October 12, 2023 in London, England. (Photo by Dave Benett/Getty Images) Photographer: Dave Benett Provider: Dave Benett/Getty Images Source: Dave Benett Collection Copyright: 2023 Dave Benett
The initiative aims to replace animal-drawn carts with electric vehicles so the overworked animals can retire.
A closer look at the detail
In her letter, Newkirk writes that Sir Attenbullock is “strong, yet gentle”, which she says he shares with Attenborough, and adds that he also “quietly inspires others to appreciate the richness of the natural world”.
Secret World of Sound with David Attenborough (Photo: Humble Bee Sounds/Sky UK)
TELEVISION
3 min read
UK POLITICS
Everything to know about the May local elections
Caption: EMBARGOED TO 0001 MONDAY APRIL 20
File photo dated 06/05/10 of a voter placing a ballot paper in a ballot box at a polling station. Unionist parties could hold the majority in Holyrood after May 7, a poll has suggested, but more than half of constituencies are considered marginal. The survey, carried out for More in Common and seen exclusively by the Press Association, found the SNP will continue to be the largest party, but John Swinney’s party and the Greens – the other independence-supporting party – would fall one seat short of a majority. Issue date: Monday April 20, 2026. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Rui Vieira/PA Wire Photographer: Rui Vieira Provider: Rui Vieira/PA Wire Source: PA
Your guide to the local elections next week, including where they are happening, timings and what could happen at the ballots.
What you need to know
Elections are being held across Scotland, Wales and many parts of England on 7 May.
Voters in Scotland will elect MSPs to the 129-seat parliament at Holyrood.
In Wales, voters will choose members of the Senedd (Welsh parliament), which has been expanded from 60 seats to 96 for the first time.
Meanwhile, in England 136 local authorities will hold elections on the same date. This includes all 32 London boroughs, 48 district councils and 18 unitary authorities.
There are also local mayoral elections happening in: Croydon, Hackney, Lewisham, Newham, Tower Hamlets and Watford.
How will the results unfold?
Polling stations open at 7am on Thursday 7 May. Voters in England will need to show a photo ID to be able to cast a vote.
Thousands of people will take to the polls before they close at 10pm.
In England, 46 of the local authorities will count and declare overnight, with results expected between 1am and 6am on 8 May.
Ballot papers in Scotland and Wales will be counted during the day on 8 May, with the first results expected in the afternoon and the final declarations in the evening.
The majority of the remaining English authorities will not begin counting until 9am on 8 May and are likely to start declaring results late in the morning and continue through to the evening.
Labour on course for disaster
Caption: NEWMARKET, ENGLAND – APRIL 29: A man holds a placard as Reform UK Treasury Spokesperson, Robert Jenrick, campaigns for Reform UK in Norfolk on April 29, 2026 in Newmarket, England. For the local elections on 7 May 2026, Reform UK is projected to make historic gains in Norfolk, with some polls predicting they could take overall control of Norfolk County Council. (Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images) Photographer: Leon Neal Provider: Getty Images Source: Getty Images Europe Copyright: 2026 Getty Images
One poll by Lord Robert Hayward predicted Labour will suffer devastating losses of more than 75 per cent of the council seats the party is defending across England.
Reform UK is expected to be the main beneficiary, projected to gain roughly 1,550 seats from both Labour and the Conservatives.
Big Read
4 min read
TECHNOLOGY
Training chatbots to sound friendlier ‘may cause more mistakes’
Caption: Businesswoman using technology smart chatbot AI Photographer: Krongkaew Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Training AI chatbots such as ChatGPT to sound friendlier may lead them to make more mistakes, a study suggests.
Platforms that prioritised warmth were also more likely to tell people what they wanted to hear, especially if users expressed sadness.
What you need to know
For the study, experts at the Oxford Internet Institute at the University of Oxford generated and analysed more than 400,000 responses from five platforms; Llama-8b, Mistral-Small, Qwen-32b, Llama-70b and GPT-4o.
Caption: Smartphone with a glass speech bubble with the chatbot symbol inside.Chatbot concept. open AI, Artificial Intelligence. Photographer: Francesco Carta fotografo Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF Copyright: Francesco Carta Caption: Illustration Photographer: Malorny Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Researchers used a training process similar to what developers may use to make their chatbots sound friendlier, and compared how the original and modified platforms responded.
A closer look at the detail
The study found that chatbots trained to sound warmer made between 10 per cent and 30 per cent more mistakes on topics such as medical advice and correcting conspiracy theories. They were also 40 per cent more likely to agree with a user’s false beliefs, particularly if the user expressed sadness or vulnerability.
Exclusive
5 min read
LIFESTYLE
4 min read
‘Warmth may come at cost of accuracy’
Researchers said the findings, published in Nature, suggest that training AI platforms to be warm “may come at a cost to accuracy, and that warmth and accuracy may not be independent by default”.
“As these systems are deployed at an unprecedented scale and take on intimate roles in people’s lives, this trade-off warrants attention from developers, policymakers and users alike,” they added.
SCIENCE
6 min read
Caption: Pigeons fly around a woman who is feeding birds at St George’s Park, Bristol, in cold, but sunny Spring weather. PA Photo. Picture date: Tuesday April 14, 2020. See PA story WEATHER Spring. Photo credit should read: Ben Birchall/PA Wire Photographer: Ben Birchall Provider: PA Source: PA
SCIENCE
Urban birds fear women more than men
Birds in urban areas are more scared of women than they are of men, scientists have discovered.
The findings have defied the expectations of researchers, who hypothesised that birds would perceive men as more threatening than women.
What methods did researchers use?
Caption: A pigeon drinks at a public fountain during a heatwave, in Mulhouse, eastern France, on August 22, 2023. (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON / AFP) (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON/AFP via Getty Images) Photographer: SEBASTIEN BOZON Provider: AFP via Getty Images Source: AFP
Men and women were paired monitored as they walked towards pigeons, starlings and other birds in green spaces.
Participants were matched according to their height and clothing, and hair was hidden if longer than a partner’s.
Caption: Close up of wild city pigeons in sunny day on asphalt. Photographer: Olena Ruban Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Researchers tested whether birds perceived female versus male observers differently in five European countries.
What did the study show?
The birds allowed men to get a metre closer than women in the study, only taking flight when male participants were 7.5 metres away. Birds were less tolerant of women across the five countries in the study: Czech Republic, Poland, Germany and Spain and France. And this behaviour was observed in all 37 bird species in the research.
LIFESTYLE
4 min read
HOMES AND GARDENS
2 min read
What did scientists conclude?
Researchers have described the findings as unexpected. Based on the results, one possible explanation is that in hunter-gatherer societies “women, if they hunted, could have focused more on smaller prey, while males hunted mainly larger prey”.
Caption: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – APRIL 18: A woman feeds birds under a tree at a park during warm weather in London, United Kingdom on April 18, 2026. (Photo by Rasid Necati Aslim/Anadolu via Getty Images) Photographer: Anadolu Provider: Anadolu via Getty Images Source: Anadolu Caption: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – APRIL 02: A view of ducklings at St. James Park in London, United Kingdom on April 02, 2026. (Photo by Rasid Necati Aslim/Anadolu via Getty Images) Photographer: Anadolu Provider: Anadolu via Getty Images Source: Anadolu
But they said further research is needed to understand the phenomenon.
HEALTH
Cancer rates in under-50s are rising – and no-one can be sure why
Bowel cancer has the steepest rise in early-onset cases (Photo: Sebastian Kaulitzki/Getty)
Clare Wilson
Science Writer
One of the most concerning trends in cancer is that rates of the disease in people under 50 are on the rise. And we don’t know why.
Now, a group of respected British researchers say that part of the explanation is that people are getting fatter. But other experts are sceptical.
What you need to know
Trend in early-onset cancer spans decades
50%
The rise is biggest in bowel cancer, with about a 50 per cent increase in under-50s since the 1990s in the UK. There are also smaller rises in this age group in tumours affecting over 20 other parts of the body.
9 in 10
It is especially puzzling because rates in the over-50s worldwide have been flat or even slightly declining for many tumour types, studies suggest.
Cancer is a disease that usually affects older people, with nine in 10 tumours arising in people over 50.
What did the study find?
The study looked at lifestyle factors known to raise cancer risk to see if any of these could be responsible for the 22 tumour sites where early-onset cancers are rising.
Eleven of these cancers have known behavioural risk factors. These are: obesity, smoking, drinking, lack of exercise, red and processed meat intake and lack of fibre in the diet.
Only one of these – obesity – has been increasing over the past few decades and could potentially explain the rise researchers said, whose study was published in the journal BMJ Oncology.
That’s what led the researchers to claim that excess weight is “the strongest clue to the rise in cancers in under-50s”.
But this study did not prove that the rise in obesity is causing the rise in early-onset cancers – only that the two trends have been happening at the same time.
The bigger picture
When researchers looked at how much the rise in early-onset cancer could be blamed on rising obesity, they found it varied on the tumour type, but obesity never accounted for more than 25 per cent of the extra cases.
Caption: EMBARGOED TO 2330 WEDNESDAY JANUARY 7
Picture posed by a model. File photo dated 03/03/14 of someone using a set of weighing scales. People on fat loss jabs need ongoing support, researchers have said, after a major study found they put all the weight back on much faster than traditional dieters. Researchers from the University of Oxford discovered that people on drugs including semaglutide (Wegovy) and tirzepatide (Mounjaro) lose weight during treatment but, on average, regain it within 20 months of stopping the jabs. Issue date: Wednesday January 7, 2026. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Chris Radburn/PA Wire Photographer: Chris Radburn Provider: Chris Radburn/PA Wire Source: PA Wire
Caption: Embargoed to 2330 Tuesday July 29
File photo dated 27/04/25 of a half-pounder burger and chips in a takeaway carton. Academics have found a link between consuming high levels of ultra processed foods (UPFs) and lung cancer. An international team of researchers tracked the health and food habits of more than 100,000 US adults, with an average age of 63. After an average of 12 years the team identified 1,706 cases of lung cancer. Issue date: Tuesday July 29, 2025. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Philip Toscano/PA Wire Photographer: Philip Toscano Provider: Philip Toscano/PA Wire Source: PA
“Body mass index only explains a small part of the increase,” Professor Montserrat García-Closas, a cancer expert at the Institute of Cancer Research in London, who led the research, said.
The hotspots where it’s most difficult to sell your home
The average length of time to sell a home is just a day longer than a year ago despite higher mortgages, although in London homes are taking nearly a week longer to be snapped up typically, according to a property website.
Caption: Estate agents ‘for sale’ and ‘let’ signs outside residential properties in Guildford, UK, on Monday, July 28, 2025. The number of UK home loans given the green light rose to a three-month high in June, as the housing market continued to shake off the impact of April’s tax hike.??Photographer: Jason Alden/Bloomberg via Getty Images Photographer: Bloomberg Provider: Bloomberg via Getty Images Source: Bloomberg Copyright: ? 2025 Bloomberg Finance LP
A closer look at the figures
33 days
Across the UK, the average time to sell a home is 33 days, just one day longer than last year.
6 days
The London area stands out as being particularly affected by recent events, with the average home there taking six days longer to sell than a year ago, the report found.
The locations on the list of hotspots
Here is how long on average it takes to sell a home, according to Zoopla analysis of the seven weeks to 17 April, 2025 and the seven weeks to 17 April, 2026:
Scotland – 15, 15
North East – 28, 28
Yorkshire and the Humber – 31, 31
North West – 28, 31
Wales – 34, 34
West Midlands – 33, 34
South West – 36, 35
East Midlands – 37, 37
East of England – 35, 38
South East – 37, 39
London – 35, 41
Caption: LONDON, ENGLAND – OCTOBER 30: People lok at houses for sale in an estate agents window in Mayfair on October 30, 2025 in London, United Kingdom. (Photo by John Keeble/Getty Images) Photographer: John Keeble Provider: Getty Images Source: Getty Images Europe Copyright: 2025 John Keeble
What do experts say?
Mortgage rates are drifting lower and there is greater choice of homes for sale
The best-value homes are moving quickly, particularly in northern cities and Scotland, whereas the room for negotiation is greater across southern regions,” Richard Donnell, executive director of Zoopla said.
The funding will support increased police patrols in communities and enhanced security at synagogues, schools, and community centres.
It will also expand Project Servator, which deploys uniformed and plain-clothes officers in the community, trained to detect suspicious activity and disrupt individuals preparing to commit serious crimes.
People urged to ‘be vigilant’ going about daily lives
The Golders Green stabbing was not the sole trigger for the move to “severe” with the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre drawing on intelligence from MI5, GCHQ and Counter Terrorism Policing.
Announcing the decision, Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, said the attack was “a vile act of terrorism” and described it as “an abhorrent, antisemitic attack.
“I know this will be a source of concern to many, particularly amongst our Jewish community, who have suffered so much,” she said.
“As the threat level rises, I urge everyone to be vigilant as they go about their daily lives, and report any concerns to the police,” she said.
She added: “I can assure everyone that our world-class security services and the police are working day and night to keep our country safe.”
New powers to ban activities of state-backed organisations
The Government has announced legislation will be fast tracked in the coming weeks to clamp down on individuals and groups carrying out hostile activity for foreign states, including those who act as their proxies.
The Home Secretary will be given new proscription-like powers to ban the activities of state-backed organisations who pose a threat to the UK’s national security.
Police and intelligence agencies will receive stronger tools under the National Security Act to disrupt the activities of anyone acting on behalf of state-backed organisations.
Report suspicious behaviour – don’t investigate it yourself
If something feels wrong, it is important to report it to police – do not confront.
The advice is to tell event security, or staff on the site, or call 101 for non-emergency, or 999 if there is immediate danger or an emergency. Use official reporting tools like “See it. Say it. Sorted.” on public transport.
During high-profile incidents or heightened threat levels rely on police, government, or organiser updates – not rumours. Avoid spreading unverified claims on social media. Check official channels if there is disruption or evacuation advice.
Expect more security at large events
At a “severe” threat level, the police presence may be higher, especially in cities and at events. Most people will notice little or no change in daily life.
The key takeaway is being aware, staying calm, and reporting concerns through the right channels.
People are advised to know where exits are in case you need to leave quickly, notice unattended bags or items that seem out of place and be alert to unusual behaviour, such as someone trying to access restricted areas without reason.
At large events or protests extra practical steps include arriving early to allow time for security checks, following instructions from stewards’ or police, avoid leaving your belongings unattended and keep group plans such as meeting points simple in case of disruption.
Find out more about how the threat level is set
The UK terror threat level was last at “severe” in November 2021, following the Liverpool Women’s Hospital bombing and murder of Sir David Amess, before being lowered to “substantial” in February 2022.
More information about how the threat levels is set and what it means can be found by visiting the Security Service webpage
O governo também planeia reclassificar rapidamente a marijuana de forma ampla, um benefício potencial para as empresas que vendem para uso recreativo e que têm enfrentado um fraco clima de gastos dos consumidores e a concorrência de vendedores ilegais. Arquivo. | Crédito da foto: Reuters
As empresas que desenvolvem medicamentos à base de hashish dizem que as medidas dos EUA para afrouxar as restrições à droga poderiam desbloquear o financiamento privado e os mercados públicos, proporcionando uma tábua de salvação para a indústria da hashish em dificuldades.
O Departamento de Justiça dos EUA reprogramou na semana passada medicamentos aprovados pela FDA e produtos de maconha medicinal regulamentados pelo estado, tornando mais fácil para as empresas depositarem e receberem créditos e deduções fiscais.
The “unaffordable” state pension should be scrapped along with the triple lock and replaced by a new fund which pays out early if people need it for ill health, unemployment or caring reasons, Sir Tony Blair’s think-tank says today.
A report by the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change (TBI) says the current state pension is “outdated, increasingly unaffordable and too rigid for the way people live and work” and that the UK’s ageing population means reform is unavoidable.
Due to the triple lock, funding of the state pension – which sees it increase by the higher of inflation, wages or 2.5 per cent each year – is one of the biggest areas of government expenditure, costing around £146bn a year, equivalent to 5 per cent of GDP.
Shorts – Quick stories
‘Wise’ bull named after Attenborough to mark 100th birthday
BBC nature broadcaster Sir David Attenborough has had a “wise” bull named after him by animal charity Peta to celebrate his 100th birthday.
Caption: Frozen Planet S2,11-09-2022,Generics,Sir David Attenborough filming for Frozen Planet II,BBC Studios,Alex Board
TV Still
BBC Photographer: Alex Board Provider: BBC Studios/Alex Board
What you need to know
The bull, named Sir Attenbullock to celebrate his birthday on 8 May, will be mentioned in a letter sent to Attenborough by Peta founder Ingrid Newkirk, which will tell him the animal was among the first rescued through Peta India’s Delhi mechanisation project.
Caption: David Attenbullock spent years hauling heavy carts through the chaotic, crowded markets of Delhi, streets familiar to Sir David, weaving through dense traffic and enduring long hours in the heat and dust, often without rest or water. He endured exhaustion, injury, and strain, but today, like Sir David, he has an important educational role, accompanying sanctuary visitors through a birdsong-filled orchard in northern India, allowing people to appreciate nature and get to know the lives and habits of the rescued animals there.
https://www.peta.org.uk/news/bull-sir-david-attenborough/ Copyright: PETA India
Caption: LONDON, ENGLAND – OCTOBER 12: Sir David Attenborough attends the Global Launch of BBC Studios’ “Planet Earth III” at Frameless on October 12, 2023 in London, England. (Photo by Dave Benett/Getty Images) Photographer: Dave Benett Provider: Dave Benett/Getty Images Source: Dave Benett Collection Copyright: 2023 Dave Benett
The initiative aims to replace animal-drawn carts with electric vehicles so the overworked animals can retire.
A closer look at the detail
In her letter, Newkirk writes that Sir Attenbullock is “strong, yet gentle”, which she says he shares with Attenborough, and adds that he also “quietly inspires others to appreciate the richness of the natural world”.
Secret World of Sound with David Attenborough (Photo: Humble Bee Sounds/Sky UK)
TELEVISION
3 min read
UK POLITICS
Everything to know about the May local elections
Caption: EMBARGOED TO 0001 MONDAY APRIL 20
File photo dated 06/05/10 of a voter placing a ballot paper in a ballot box at a polling station. Unionist parties could hold the majority in Holyrood after May 7, a poll has suggested, but more than half of constituencies are considered marginal. The survey, carried out for More in Common and seen exclusively by the Press Association, found the SNP will continue to be the largest party, but John Swinney’s party and the Greens – the other independence-supporting party – would fall one seat short of a majority. Issue date: Monday April 20, 2026. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Rui Vieira/PA Wire Photographer: Rui Vieira Provider: Rui Vieira/PA Wire Source: PA
Your guide to the local elections next week, including where they are happening, timings and what could happen at the ballots.
What you need to know
Elections are being held across Scotland, Wales and many parts of England on 7 May.
Voters in Scotland will elect MSPs to the 129-seat parliament at Holyrood.
In Wales, voters will choose members of the Senedd (Welsh parliament), which has been expanded from 60 seats to 96 for the first time.
Meanwhile, in England 136 local authorities will hold elections on the same date. This includes all 32 London boroughs, 48 district councils and 18 unitary authorities.
There are also local mayoral elections happening in: Croydon, Hackney, Lewisham, Newham, Tower Hamlets and Watford.
How will the results unfold?
Polling stations open at 7am on Thursday 7 May. Voters in England will need to show a photo ID to be able to cast a vote.
Thousands of people will take to the polls before they close at 10pm.
In England, 46 of the local authorities will count and declare overnight, with results expected between 1am and 6am on 8 May.
Ballot papers in Scotland and Wales will be counted during the day on 8 May, with the first results expected in the afternoon and the final declarations in the evening.
The majority of the remaining English authorities will not begin counting until 9am on 8 May and are likely to start declaring results late in the morning and continue through to the evening.
Labour on course for disaster
Caption: NEWMARKET, ENGLAND – APRIL 29: A man holds a placard as Reform UK Treasury Spokesperson, Robert Jenrick, campaigns for Reform UK in Norfolk on April 29, 2026 in Newmarket, England. For the local elections on 7 May 2026, Reform UK is projected to make historic gains in Norfolk, with some polls predicting they could take overall control of Norfolk County Council. (Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images) Photographer: Leon Neal Provider: Getty Images Source: Getty Images Europe Copyright: 2026 Getty Images
One poll by Lord Robert Hayward predicted Labour will suffer devastating losses of more than 75 per cent of the council seats the party is defending across England.
Reform UK is expected to be the main beneficiary, projected to gain roughly 1,550 seats from both Labour and the Conservatives.
Big Read
4 min read
UK politics
Who is in and who is out in Cabinet reshuffle
Sir Keir Starmer is rumoured to be considering another Cabinet reshuffle – perhaps as early as in the days after next week’s local elections.
The party is expecting a difficult set of results and the beleaguered PM could use a rejig of his top team to try to shore up his authority.
Rayner’s return?
Angela Rayner is being talked up by some MPs as a challenger to take over from Keir Starmer as Labour leader and Prime Minister (Photo by Thomas Krych/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Starmer has long contemplated how and when Angela Rayner could return to the fold. It is understood he wants to try and find a way to bring her back in an attempt to ensure her loyalty, for now.
Labour sources speculate that she would want to return as housing secretary – currently held by Steve Reed.
Analysis
3 min read
Who else is in?
The return of Rayner could mean the promotion of her allies. Lucy Powell replaced her as deputy Labour leader but does not currently have a Cabinet role. She is considered to be on the hook for a promotion if the reshuffle goes ahead.
Deputy Labour leader Lucy Powell speaking at the Fabian Society conference (Photo: James Manning/PA)(Photo: Wiktor Szymanowicz/Future Publishing via Getty).
Former ministers Louise Haigh and Vicky Foxcroft are among other names. Both are supporters of Rayner.
And who’s out?
Liz Kendall
The Science and Technology Secretary has been mentioned as at risk of demotion.
Science, Innovation and Technology Secretary Liz Kendall has been speaking about children’s safety online this morning (Photo: Hannah McKay/Reuters)
Caption: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – MARCH 31, 2026: Secretary of State for Business and Trade and President of the Board of Trade Peter Kyle arrives at the Cabinet Office to attend the COBRA crisis committee session amid the economic impact of the Iran conflict in London, United Kingdom on March 31, 2026. (Photo credit should read Wiktor Szymanowicz/Future Publishing via Getty Images) Photographer: Wiktor Szymanowicz Provider: Wiktor Szymanowicz/Future Publis Source: Future Publishing Copyright: ? 2026 Wiktor Szymanowicz
Peter Kyle
The Business and Trade Secretary has been privately criticised by some for having been ineffective in the role.
Shabana Mahmood
The Home Secretary’s tough leave-to-remain proposals mean she has become a controversial figure.
The Home Secretary Shabhana Mahmood is facing a possible rebellion over her immigration reforms. (Photo Wiktor Szymanowicz/Future Publishing via Getty)
TECHNOLOGY
Training chatbots to sound friendlier ‘may cause more mistakes’
Caption: Businesswoman using technology smart chatbot AI Photographer: Krongkaew Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Training AI chatbots such as ChatGPT to sound friendlier may lead them to make more mistakes, a study suggests.
Platforms that prioritised warmth were also more likely to tell people what they wanted to hear, especially if users expressed sadness.
What you need to know
For the study, experts at the Oxford Internet Institute at the University of Oxford generated and analysed more than 400,000 responses from five platforms; Llama-8b, Mistral-Small, Qwen-32b, Llama-70b and GPT-4o.
Caption: Smartphone with a glass speech bubble with the chatbot symbol inside.Chatbot concept. open AI, Artificial Intelligence. Photographer: Francesco Carta fotografo Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF Copyright: Francesco Carta Caption: Illustration Photographer: Malorny Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Researchers used a training process similar to what developers may use to make their chatbots sound friendlier, and compared how the original and modified platforms responded.
A closer look at the detail
The study found that chatbots trained to sound warmer made between 10 per cent and 30 per cent more mistakes on topics such as medical advice and correcting conspiracy theories. They were also 40 per cent more likely to agree with a user’s false beliefs, particularly if the user expressed sadness or vulnerability.
Exclusive
5 min read
LIFESTYLE
4 min read
‘Warmth may come at cost of accuracy’
Researchers said the findings, published in Nature, suggest that training AI platforms to be warm “may come at a cost to accuracy, and that warmth and accuracy may not be independent by default”.
“As these systems are deployed at an unprecedented scale and take on intimate roles in people’s lives, this trade-off warrants attention from developers, policymakers and users alike,” they added.
SCIENCE
6 min read
Caption: Pigeons fly around a woman who is feeding birds at St George’s Park, Bristol, in cold, but sunny Spring weather. PA Photo. Picture date: Tuesday April 14, 2020. See PA story WEATHER Spring. Photo credit should read: Ben Birchall/PA Wire Photographer: Ben Birchall Provider: PA Source: PA
SCIENCE
Urban birds fear women more than men
Birds in urban areas are more scared of women than they are of men, scientists have discovered.
The findings have defied the expectations of researchers, who hypothesised that birds would perceive men as more threatening than women.
What methods did researchers use?
Caption: A pigeon drinks at a public fountain during a heatwave, in Mulhouse, eastern France, on August 22, 2023. (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON / AFP) (Photo by SEBASTIEN BOZON/AFP via Getty Images) Photographer: SEBASTIEN BOZON Provider: AFP via Getty Images Source: AFP
Men and women were paired monitored as they walked towards pigeons, starlings and other birds in green spaces.
Participants were matched according to their height and clothing, and hair was hidden if longer than a partner’s.
Caption: Close up of wild city pigeons in sunny day on asphalt. Photographer: Olena Ruban Provider: Getty Images Source: Moment RF
Researchers tested whether birds perceived female versus male observers differently in five European countries.
What did the study show?
The birds allowed men to get a metre closer than women in the study, only taking flight when male participants were 7.5 metres away. Birds were less tolerant of women across the five countries in the study: Czech Republic, Poland, Germany and Spain and France. And this behaviour was observed in all 37 bird species in the research.
LIFESTYLE
4 min read
HOMES AND GARDENS
2 min read
What did scientists conclude?
Researchers have described the findings as unexpected. Based on the results, one possible explanation is that in hunter-gatherer societies “women, if they hunted, could have focused more on smaller prey, while males hunted mainly larger prey”.
Caption: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – APRIL 18: A woman feeds birds under a tree at a park during warm weather in London, United Kingdom on April 18, 2026. (Photo by Rasid Necati Aslim/Anadolu via Getty Images) Photographer: Anadolu Provider: Anadolu via Getty Images Source: Anadolu Caption: LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – APRIL 02: A view of ducklings at St. James Park in London, United Kingdom on April 02, 2026. (Photo by Rasid Necati Aslim/Anadolu via Getty Images) Photographer: Anadolu Provider: Anadolu via Getty Images Source: Anadolu
But they said further research is needed to understand the phenomenon.
HEALTH
Cancer rates in under-50s are rising – and no-one can be sure why
Bowel cancer has the steepest rise in early-onset cases (Photo: Sebastian Kaulitzki/Getty)
Clare Wilson
Science Writer
One of the most concerning trends in cancer is that rates of the disease in people under 50 are on the rise. And we don’t know why.
Now, a group of respected British researchers say that part of the explanation is that people are getting fatter. But other experts are sceptical.
What you need to know
Trend in early-onset cancer spans decades
50%
The rise is biggest in bowel cancer, with about a 50 per cent increase in under-50s since the 1990s in the UK. There are also smaller rises in this age group in tumours affecting over 20 other parts of the body.
9 in 10
It is especially puzzling because rates in the over-50s worldwide have been flat or even slightly declining for many tumour types, studies suggest.
Cancer is a disease that usually affects older people, with nine in 10 tumours arising in people over 50.
What did the study find?
The study looked at lifestyle factors known to raise cancer risk to see if any of these could be responsible for the 22 tumour sites where early-onset cancers are rising.
Eleven of these cancers have known behavioural risk factors. These are: obesity, smoking, drinking, lack of exercise, red and processed meat intake and lack of fibre in the diet.
Only one of these – obesity – has been increasing over the past few decades and could potentially explain the rise researchers said, whose study was published in the journal BMJ Oncology.
That’s what led the researchers to claim that excess weight is “the strongest clue to the rise in cancers in under-50s”.
But this study did not prove that the rise in obesity is causing the rise in early-onset cancers – only that the two trends have been happening at the same time.
The bigger picture
When researchers looked at how much the rise in early-onset cancer could be blamed on rising obesity, they found it varied on the tumour type, but obesity never accounted for more than 25 per cent of the extra cases.
Caption: EMBARGOED TO 2330 WEDNESDAY JANUARY 7
Picture posed by a model. File photo dated 03/03/14 of someone using a set of weighing scales. People on fat loss jabs need ongoing support, researchers have said, after a major study found they put all the weight back on much faster than traditional dieters. Researchers from the University of Oxford discovered that people on drugs including semaglutide (Wegovy) and tirzepatide (Mounjaro) lose weight during treatment but, on average, regain it within 20 months of stopping the jabs. Issue date: Wednesday January 7, 2026. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Chris Radburn/PA Wire Photographer: Chris Radburn Provider: Chris Radburn/PA Wire Source: PA Wire
Caption: Embargoed to 2330 Tuesday July 29
File photo dated 27/04/25 of a half-pounder burger and chips in a takeaway carton. Academics have found a link between consuming high levels of ultra processed foods (UPFs) and lung cancer. An international team of researchers tracked the health and food habits of more than 100,000 US adults, with an average age of 63. After an average of 12 years the team identified 1,706 cases of lung cancer. Issue date: Tuesday July 29, 2025. PA Photo. Photo credit should read: Philip Toscano/PA Wire Photographer: Philip Toscano Provider: Philip Toscano/PA Wire Source: PA
“Body mass index only explains a small part of the increase,” Professor Montserrat García-Closas, a cancer expert at the Institute of Cancer Research in London, who led the research, said.
The hotspots where it’s most difficult to sell your home
The average length of time to sell a home is just a day longer than a year ago despite higher mortgages, although in London homes are taking nearly a week longer to be snapped up typically, according to a property website.
Caption: Estate agents ‘for sale’ and ‘let’ signs outside residential properties in Guildford, UK, on Monday, July 28, 2025. The number of UK home loans given the green light rose to a three-month high in June, as the housing market continued to shake off the impact of April’s tax hike.??Photographer: Jason Alden/Bloomberg via Getty Images Photographer: Bloomberg Provider: Bloomberg via Getty Images Source: Bloomberg Copyright: ? 2025 Bloomberg Finance LP
A closer look at the figures
33 days
Across the UK, the average time to sell a home is 33 days, just one day longer than last year.
6 days
The London area stands out as being particularly affected by recent events, with the average home there taking six days longer to sell than a year ago, the report found.
The locations on the list of hotspots
Here is how long on average it takes to sell a home, according to Zoopla analysis of the seven weeks to 17 April, 2025 and the seven weeks to 17 April, 2026:
Scotland – 15, 15
North East – 28, 28
Yorkshire and the Humber – 31, 31
North West – 28, 31
Wales – 34, 34
West Midlands – 33, 34
South West – 36, 35
East Midlands – 37, 37
East of England – 35, 38
South East – 37, 39
London – 35, 41
Caption: LONDON, ENGLAND – OCTOBER 30: People lok at houses for sale in an estate agents window in Mayfair on October 30, 2025 in London, United Kingdom. (Photo by John Keeble/Getty Images) Photographer: John Keeble Provider: Getty Images Source: Getty Images Europe Copyright: 2025 John Keeble
What do experts say?
Mortgage rates are drifting lower and there is greater choice of homes for sale
The best-value homes are moving quickly, particularly in northern cities and Scotland, whereas the room for negotiation is greater across southern regions,” Richard Donnell, executive director of Zoopla said.
Can you learn to love pigeons? A much-unloved animal in the UK
Features writer Kasia Delgado went on a safari to see if she could look past their rat-like nature
The tour guide
People think pigeons are stupid but lots of studies have shown them to have amazing memories, that they can identify people by their facial features, and they have an extraordinary sense of direction.
Florence Wilkinson, author of Wild City: Encounters with Urban Wildlife, took Kasia on a tour.
Positives of pigeons
War heroes
During the Second World War, carrier pigeons were routinely used to send messages, and they saved thousands of lives.
Homing ability
Scientists have put them in blacked-out vans and put miniature goggles on them to blur their vision and still the pigeons manage to return home.
The Dove family
We think of them as all grey, but they vary in shades, and some of them are quite amazingly coloured, says Florence.
Kasia’s feeding test
As I gingerly chuck some seed, wincing slightly, 15 or so flap their wings at me. I wouldn’t say I feel content or relaxed but I don’t hate it as much as I thought I would. I can see they’re not going to do me harm and after all, they’re just enjoying some free food.
A common myth?
Disease carriers
Research has found that between 1941 and 2004, there were only 207 reports worldwide of pathogens transmitted from pigeons to humans.
The TBI report says this outlay will rise to 7.8 per cent of GDP by 2070, or an extra £85bn a year in today’s terms, because the number of pensioners is expected to rise from 12.6m now to nearly 19m in 45 years – meaning higher taxes and greater pressure on public services.
Triple lock backed by all parties
Replacing the state pension would be the biggest overhaul in government support for retirement since its launch in 1948.
The reforms proposed by the former Labour prime minister’s think-tank would keep state pension spending at around 5.5 per cent of GDP and save the government £66bn in additional costs by 2070.
The TBI says as a first step towards reform, the triple lock should be scrapped in 2030 and state pension increases linked only to rises in earnings.
All the main UK political parties except the Greens have pledged to keep the triple lock for at least the rest of this Parliament and scrapping it is seen as a vote-loser.
The intervention by the TBI will put the spotlight back on the debate over its long-term future, however, particularly among some in government.
The TBI did not deny that the measures had been discussed with officials or ministers in government, but said the report was independent and intended to contribute to the public and political debate.
The Department for Work and Pensions said the triple lock was guaranteed for the rest of this Parliament and did not endorse the TBI plans.
‘Lifespan Fund’ would replace pension under proposals
Under the proposals, the state pension would then be replaced by a new “Lifespan Fund”, which would be accessible if people needed it earlier for ill health, retraining, career changes or caring roles, rather than only at retirement.
People would build up their entitlement to the Lifespan Fund through contributions throughout their lives, including through work, caring, study or other recognised activity.
Each year of contribution would provide up to 20 years of state-backed support at the level of today’s state pension.
If someone became unemployed and wanted extra funding beyond benefits, or needed money to retrain or support caring responsibilities, they could draw on their Lifespan Fund early.
There would be safeguards for those who wanted to access their fund early, including minimum balances which would rise with age.
However, people would be penalised for withdrawing money early as they would then be automatically enrolled into higher National Insurance contributions when they returned to work.
And the plans would also be controversial because the annual amount paid into their Lifespan Fund would be adjusted to reflect their age and health, linked to their medical records. It would pay less due to people’s current health such as pre-existing medical conditions, BMI and “lifestyle choices” such as smoking.
The TBI says this would be a fairer system because the current state pension age penalises those in poorer health, who are often those on lower incomes and with shorter life expectancy.
Plans are ‘fiendishly complex’
But pensions expert Steve Webb warned linking state pension support to someone’s health and lifestyles was “deeply troubling” and that life expectancy did not always reflect a person’s medical history.
Report author Tom Smith, director of economic policy at the TBI, said: “Britain’s state pension system was built for a different era. We can’t keep pouring money into a system that is increasingly unaffordable.
“Pension spending must be contained, and that means the triple lock cannot continue after the next election.
“Ending it will require political leadership from all parties – but that should only be the first step. Real reform must also build a better system: one that is fairer, more flexible, and designed for how people live today.”
Webb, a former pensions minister and partner at pension consultants LCP, said: “The idea of linking state pension payments to individual health records and individual life expectancy is deeply troubling.
“Leaving aside issues of confidentiality and data quality, it is very hard to make a precise leap from health records to life expectancy.
“The report says that they would not want to pay higher pensions to those who had poorer health because of lifestyle choices such as smoking, but it is very hard to see how they would exclude the impact of smoking on someone’s overall health.”
He said the current state pension system was relatively simple and warned it would be a “huge backward step to replace it with something fiendishly complex and highly intrusive, and which would take many decades to implement in full”.
‘People have no idea how long they’ll live’
Tom Selby, director of public policy at AJ Bell, said: “Being able to access your state pension earlier at a reduced rate could benefit some, particularly those with lower life expectancy.
“But most people simply have no idea how long they might live for and if large numbers of people go down that road, it could exacerbate retirement income challenges later in life.
“Moreover, moving from a single-tier benefit to a flexible benefit would create fiendish complexity, both for people engaging with the new system and in transitioning from the current framework.
“The report is absolutely right that the triple lock will need to be scrapped at some point, but it also opens up a debate on whether the state pension itself should be a stable foundation or a more flexible income people can tailor to their needs.”
Jonathan Cribb, deputy director and head of retirement, savings and ageing at the IFS, said: “Any increase in flexibility here needs to be balanced against the increasing complexity of the system – and indeed this move would be in the opposite direction to reforms that have simplified the state pension system in recent decades.”
A DWP spokesperson said: “Supporting pensioners is a priority and our commitment to the triple lock for the rest of this Parliament means millions of pensioners will see their yearly state pension rise by up to £2,100.
“The Pensions Commission is already examining how we can ensure secure retirements for tomorrow’s pensioners and for those that have not reached state pension age but need extra support, a range of options such as universal credit and other means-tested and disability-related benefits are available.”
O próximo serviço de robotáxi de luxo da Uber com Lucid Motors e Nuro está ganhando um quarto parceiro: Hertz.
As empresas anunciado Quinta-feira, a Hertz fornecerá “gerenciamento diário de ativos de veículos, incluindo cobrança, manutenção, reparos, limpeza e pessoal de depósito”. O serviço, anunciado no ano passado, deve ser lançado até o remaining de 2026 na área da baía de São Francisco, usando os SUVs Gravity da Lucid e a tecnologia de direção autônoma da Nuro.
A Hertz está cuidando desse trabalho por meio de uma afiliada recém-criada chamada Oro Mobility, que a locadora afirma “fornecer soluções integradas de gerenciamento de frota em uma variedade de segmentos de mobilidade”.
“À medida que a indústria faz a transição de veículos de propriedade pessoal para frotas autônomas e dirigidas por motoristas operadas comercialmente, a Oro pretende preencher uma lacuna crítica de orquestração e operações”, diz o comunicado de imprensa da Hertz.
Esta não é a primeira vez que a Hertz, que passou por um processo de reestruturação falimentar em 2020, segue as novas tendências de mobilidade.
A empresa causou grande impacto em 2021 quando anunciou que estava comprando 100.000 EVs da Tesla, notícia que ajudou a empresa automobilística de Elon Musk a atingir uma avaliação de US$ 1 trilhão pela primeira vez (e ajudou a imagem da Hertz ao sair da falência). A Hertz também anunciou planos em 2022 para comprar até 175.000 EVs da General Motorse outros 65.000 da Polestar.
Nenhum desses negócios foi totalmente concretizado e a Hertz iniciou uma venda imediata dos EVs que tive comprado no início de 2024. Fez isso em parte devido aos custos de manutenção superiores ao esperado devido aos motoristas do Uber alugarem os EVs, e porque a Tesla reduziu os preços para evitar a concorrência e aumentar as vendas.
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No entanto, iniciar um braço de gestão e operações de frotas deveria estar mais próximo das principais competências da Hertz como gigante do aluguer de automóveis. Concorrentes como a Avis já estão fazendo esse tipo de trabalho para a Waymo. E com as empresas de robotáxi aparentemente interessadas em usar terceiros para gerenciar essa peça do quebra-cabeça, a Hertz poderia construir um negócio decente com a Oro.
A saber, Hertz e Uber disseram na quinta-feira que “explorarão oportunidades de expansão em 2027”. A Uber tem acordos com dezenas de empresas de veículos autônomos em todo o mundo e tem planos de encomendar pelo menos 35.000 veículos prontos para táxi-robô somente da Lucid Motors nos próximos anos. Está começando com 10.000 SUVs Gravity e anunciou recentemente planos para encomendar outros 25.000 EVs da Lucid Motors que serão baseados em sua próxima plataforma de médio porte. (A Uber também possui agora mais de 11% da Lucid Motors como parte dos investimentos que fez juntamente com os pedidos de veículos.)
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