The leftwing news site the Canary has announced that it is closing indefinitely. Earlier this year the media outlet was blocked from accessing funds and has faced allegations of internal turmoil.
The outlet, founded in 2015 at the height of support for the then Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, said in a social media post it would be closing “for the foreseeable future”.
Concerns financial contracts known as derivatives were incorrectly logged, potentially boosting Barclays’ profits
The Bank of England is reportedly looking into Barclays’ handling of loans linked to the embattled private credit sector.
The Bank’s regulatory arm, the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA), started reviewing the matter earlier this year after concerns were raised by a Barclays insider, according to the Financial Times.
Roaring exports lifted China’s economic growth in the third quarter of this year, with factory output growing much faster than consumer spending.
China’s GDP grew by 4.5% year-on-year between July and September, the National Bureau of Statistics of China reported on Monday. The figures were better than economists had expected and up from the second quarter’s growth rate of 4.3%.
Despite recent progress, almost a fifth of air travellers with disabilities are still dissatisfied with their experience
Disabled passengers will have better safeguards when flying, the government has pledged, including protection from damaged wheelchairs and support from trained staff.
A report from an industry-led accessibility group said there was “much more to be done” but progress was being made, a year after a review led by Tanni Grey-Thompson demanded action to improve air travel in response to numerous incidents in which passengers had been left stranded without assistance.
When we can’t even afford to rent or buy somewhere to live, we have to ask: did we give the financial sector too much power?
Leilani Farha is the former UN special rapporteur on adequate housing
In the summer of 2021, I visited a homeless community in a park in Toronto, Canada, and spoke to one of the residents. He was living in a tent in the shadow of brand new skyscrapers, and had been homeless for about five years. At one point he swivelled around, pointed up at a crane on the skyline, and said: “Who are they building those for? Definitely not for me.”
He was right. And he captured something experienced by ordinary people around the world: the growing conviction that the housing system is no longer tethered to their needs. What he was pointing at is not just a housing crisis. It is a crisis of democracy.
Leilani Farha is the 2026 CBC Massey lecturer. This piece is based on her new book: Housing Inc.: A Global Takeover and Our Fight for Home. She is the former UN special rapporteur on adequate housing and the global director of the international human rights organisation, The Shift
London-based property investors deny selling licences to casinos claiming to be based on Anjouan, a tiny Indian Ocean island
The island of Anjouan, rising out of the Indian Ocean between Mozambique and Madagascar, is a corner of the Earth that few people have heard of, let alone laid eyes on.
Known as Nzwani in the local language, this tiny volcanic island – one of a collection that make up the Union of Comoros – counts ylang-ylang oil and vanilla among its chief exports.
Consultancy says companies quoted on London stock market issued 65 in three months to end of September
The number of profit warnings from UK-listed companies has risen to the highest level in two years, as the war in the Middle East triggers a surge in costs for businesses before the budget.
With less than a fortnight before John Healey’s tax and spending statement to the Commons, the consultants EY-Parthenon said companies quoted on the London stock market had issued 65 warnings in the three months to the end of September.
Premium paid over French counterparts has risen to almost £30 a megawatt hour, analysis by lobby group finds
British steelmakers have been pushed further behind European rivals on electricity costs after the US-Israeli war on Iran caused a surge in global gas prices.
The premium paid by the British industry over its French counterpart has risen to almost £30 a megawatt hour (MWh), its highest level in three years, according to analysis by the lobby group UK Steel.
Development by UK firm Nscale heralded by ministers as largest of its kind in country loses anchor tenant
The development of a huge AI datacentre hailed by the UK government has received a fresh setback after Microsoft pulled out of the project over concerns about power supplies.
The development by the British company Nscale, heralded by ministers as the country’s largest AI datacentre when it was announced in 2025, was planned to open at Loughton in Essex next year.
Global cooperation seems unlikely despite AI increasing the risk of digital fraud and the need to protect the financial system
Rogue French fridges were an unlikely talking point for the world’s leading economists, central bankers and finance chiefs meeting in a sultry Bangkok last week – helping to underline the spiralling cost of cyber-attacks.
Kristalina Georgieva, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund, seized on news that supermarket chains across France had to chuck out piles of spoiled food after hackers accessed their fridge controls and turned up the temperature to 50C.
Bank’s chief knowledge officer says the tech could speed up economic development from centuries to decades
The World Bank is urging developing countries to kickstart the creation of “small AI” models, which can run on a mobile phone with low connectivity, to reap the full benefits of artificial intelligence.
While Silicon Valley big tech firms are focused on ever more sophisticated consumer products, Paschal Donohoe, the World Bank’s chief knowledge officer, said AI could also accelerate development for emerging economies – but only if it was adapted to local needs.
They’re healthy, versatile, sustainable and available. Yet pea consumption in the UK is at a 50-year low. Here are the curries, dips, pasta dishes and even cakes that could turn all that around
It’s not good news for the pea farmers: pea consumption in the UK has fallen to a 50-year low. According to data from Defra, the average Briton ate just 37g of peas per week in 2025, down from 144g per week in 1975.
Though a classic British staple, peas are not for everybody. Apparently only 22% of gen Z associate peas with Britain at all (which is patently ridiculous: 90% of the peas we consume in the UK are grown here, while we produce about 160,000 tonnes for freezing alone each year).
Magazine group points to restructuring bill but says it ‘remains profitable in the UK for another year’
Profits at Condé Nast’s UK arm slumped by more than a third last year, according to figures published shortly after the billionaire family that owns the luxury magazine group and titles from Vogue to GQ ruled out a sale.
The publisher, which enjoyed a bumper 2024 after booking £64m in proceeds from the sale of its UK headquarters Vogue House in London, saw pre-tax profits excluding exceptional items tumble 36% from £28m that year to nearly £18m last year.
Warm homes plan would create 50,000 jobs, compared with about 1,100 for Rosebank oilfield, thinktank finds
Insulating Britain’s homes and investing in heat pumps would do more to cut the cost of living, create jobs and boost the UK’s economy than drilling for new oil, research suggests.
The government’s £15bn warm homes plan, currently under threat of cuts as ministers seek budget savings, would slash £1bn a year from household energy bills across the UK, concentrated on those on low incomes, according to research by the thinktank E3G. It would also provide a £1.6bn yearly boost to the economy, and about 50,000 new jobs spread across thousands of small businesses.
In the west the technology comes with at least some effort to provide security and a benign intent – not so from China
There is much to fear from artificial intelligence developed in China and handed to businesses and governments in the west almost free of charge.
Every month Chinese AI developers such as DeepSeek and Xiaomi dispatch the latest versions of their “open-weight” models that allow users to take the core software and use it without paying an expensive ongoing licence.
They are the plaything of kings, presidents and A-listers, with Rolls-Royce enthusiasts ranging from the Sultan of Brunei to Rowan Atkinson, from King Charles III to Kermit the frog.
And at the carmaker’s factory in Goodwood, West Sussex, special requests from customers get more indulgent every year. An interior lined with 3,000 iridescent feathers, or a built-in champagne cooler, or a car built in homage to its owners’ dog, have all become part of the job.
Environmental watchdog Mighty Earth reveals two-year effort to postpone and weaken EU Deforestation Regulation
US corporate lobbyists launched a two-year “blitz” to postpone and weaken the world’s most progressive legislation to protect forests, according to a new investigation by the environmental watchdog Mighty Earth.
Major US firms and trade associations, including Cargill, Bunge, Mondelēz and the US Soybean Export Council, as well as numerous other US firms and organizations, sought to influence the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) in more than 350 meetings, the advocacy group found.
Sky-high oil prices and geopolitical turmoil have made less of a dent than feared … just don’t bank on it to last
Inside the vast, glass-walled Queen Sirikit conference centre in Bangkok, the air-conditioned atmosphere was calm as policymakers from more than 100 countries gathered this week for the International Monetary Fund’s annual meeting – and contemplated the surprising strength of the global economy.
A small army of smiling, uniformed Thai staff were on hand to explain the baffling geography of the heavily guarded building, where lunch options were as cosmopolitan as the delegates – including, improbably, a Burger King.
Owner and mechanics fear for their health and future of the Herne Hill shop with no date for fixing problem
The leafy south London neighbourhood of Herne Hill is a haven for cyclists who can often be seen lapping the local parks and refuelling at the many cafes that line the suburban streets. But there is something foul in the air of this corner of the capital – and for once it’s not the traffic fumes hitting bicycle riders.
A toxic stench thought to be caused by untreated sewage stuck in Thames Water drains has been emanating from the subterranean depths for months, most likely caused by the summer’s lack of rain.
Exclusive: Ministers considering overhaul of apprenticeship funding scheme to tackle youth jobs crisis
Employers in England are to be forced to pay more to train an older worker than a youth apprentice under plans being drawn up by the government to tackle the youth jobs crisis.
The Guardian understands ministers plan to overhaul Labour’s apprenticeship funding scheme to increase the cost of training by 25% for a worker over the age of 25 in order to encourage businesses to train young people instead.
Whether it was youngsters proving their skills or state sabotage, Europe’s most hacked country was left with a mountain of waste after food began cooking in freezers
Shortly before midnight last Sunday, the digital thermostats controlling hundreds of supermarket cold aisles across France began to flicker and rise.
In a “bizarre and unprecedented” cyber-attack, hackers had remotely overridden the temperature settings on thousands of freezers, fridges and chiller cabinets pushing them from as low as -27C (-16.6F) to well over 50C (122F).
Beijing warns against ‘discriminatory’ step after France drops opposition to British role in Made in Europe package
No 10 has left the door open to imposing tariffs on Chinese-made electric vehicles as part of the Made in Europe package, prompting a warning from Beijing that such a move would be “discriminatory”.
Financiers owe their windfalls and bonuses to higher interest rates. Britain should reclaim more for the public and resist City lobbying
John Healey is planning to tax British banks, the Guardian revealed, in the forthcoming budget. It’s about time for the chancellor to act. Banks have been raking it in. The campaign group Positive Money reported this summer that Britain’s four biggest banks made £29bn in the first half of this year, up a fifth on 2025. These windfalls owe more to higher interest rates than better products or services. Households and businesses pay more to borrow. Meanwhile, the Bank of England pays the banks tens of billions in interest on their reserves, with the Treasury footing the bill.
The chancellor is said to favour restoring the bank surcharge from 3% to 8%, which could raise around £2bn a year. This would recover a very modest share of the sector’s bonanza. Louis XIV’s finance minister, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, said that “the art of taxation consists in so plucking the goose as to obtain the largest possible amount of feathers with the smallest possible amount of hissing”. Britain’s banks have plenty of feathers. That hasn’t stopped them hissing. The banks say that they already face higher taxes than other companies, that they won’t be able to lend as much, and that their profits won’t last.
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Hot summer getaways are still popular – but tourism industry fears impact of rising jet fuel costs and squeezed household incomes
After a year marked by extreme heat and war sending fuel prices skywards, British travel executives hoped for solace in Madeira’s benign subtropical climate, separated by hundreds of miles of blue sea from the overtourism protests and six-hour EU-entry queues seen on the Portuguese mainland.
As bosses admitted, holidays will be ever less affordable, AI is coming for their jobs, and the visitable world is shrinking – not least those parts where tourists remain welcome.
The International Monetary Fund has urged John Healey to target savings on pensions and welfare, instead of taxing Britain’s banks at the budget later this month.
Guillaume Faury writes to Andy Burnham warning him against choosing US firm Lockheed Martin to build Skynet satellites
The boss of Airbus has told Andy Burnham that choosing its US rival Lockheed Martin to manufacture military satellites could cost the UK a key role in the European space industry, intensifying a last-minute lobbying effort for the £2.4bn contract.
It is understood that Guillaume Faury, the chief executive of France-headquartered Airbus, has written to the prime minister suggesting that the choice of provider of the Skynet system could have effects for decades to come on the UK’s strength in military satellites in Europe, in an effort to tip the contract away from its US rival.
Elsewhere in the markets today, South Korea’s Kospi share index has recorded its biggest weekly loss since October 2008, down 14.5% this week.
Although the Kospi did rise today (+2%), it was still a bad week for technology stocks – as investors worried about the borrowing, spending commitments and future profitability of AI companies.
The reality is that while companies embraced AI aggressively as it first emerged, now they are figuring out how to use it effectively while keeping AI costs under control. A slowing, more careful, path towards corporate adoption has been missed by the market which remained wildly frothy about valuations.
“A UK bank tax risk is now a base case. If it is confirmed on 28 October, it’ll be the size and timing that will be key.
If Healey does go ahead, shares of Lloyds and NatWest, which are almost entirely exposed to the UK, would likely be impacted most, and you are seeing this already in the share price reaction today. Barclays is partly exposed. HSBC is least exposed in the mix.”
NFU analysis of official data shows falls in exports to UK’s largest trading partner since 2019 include 70% for sugar and 74% for egg products
Exports of British food and drink to the EU have collapsed by more than a third since Brexit with eggs, chicken and potato producers badly hit, new figures show.
Analysis by the National Farmers’ Union (NFU) of HMRC data shows a sharp fall in exports in the year to July compared with the same period in 2019, with sugar dropping the most, down 70%.
The Tesla Roadster 2 drove up a curved ramp before using SpaceX rocket thrusters to fly, flip and land
Elon Musk has revealed Tesla’s latest model, which he claims will be the world’s first flying car, using technology from his aerospace company SpaceX to “basically fly like a rocket”.
The billionaire, who hosted a demonstration of the Tesla Roadster 2 at the SpaceX rocket development and testing facility in Texas, said the sports car could go from 0 to 60mph in a record time of less than a second and had thrusters.
An urn cost more than my rent. So I scattered my mother’s ashes at Yosemite from a Ziploc bag, without the federal permit I couldn’t afford to wait for
My mother is in a Ziploc bag on my lap, wedged between a half-eaten bag of trail mix and my purse.
My stomach is queasy from the switchbacks up to Yosemite, where I’ve come to spread her ashes, and I’m having an existential crisis.
Protest planned at Wayve HQ as Uber drivers fear for their future and city’s politicians demand TfL should have power over licences
For passengers in Britain who want to try the latest ride, robotaxis are eagerly awaited: more than 100,000 are on Uber’s waitlist in London after the first UK services started in September.
Others view them with trepidation. “I think we should all be worried,” said Florentina Ghiuzan, an Uber driver from Essex. “I was shocked TfL approved it so soon. I knew change would come. But I thought it would come with a solution for us.”
Regulator for Great Britain weighs up reintroducing market stabilisation charge to prevent firms going bust
Energy suppliers could be forced to pay a charge to rivals if they lure customers with cheaper deals, as the industry regulator for Great Britain attempts to prevent suppliers going bust this winter.
Ofgem has published a consultation on a proposal to reintroduce the market stabilisation charge (MSC), which aims to prevent suppliers failing if there is customer exodus, as it frets over the impact of sharp swings in energy prices linked to the conflict in the Middle East.
Mines in supply chains of western carmakers linked to widespread deforestation of primary rainforest in nickel-rich lands inhabited by Tolaki people in Indonesia
Volkswagen, Ford and Tesla are among the electric carmakers whose batteries may contain nickel mined in indigenous woodlands plagued by deforestation, an analysis has found, highlighting the struggle to make vehicles that are free from environmental destruction.
Corporate disclosures and trade flows from the last two years show mines in the battery supply chains of automotive giants are linked to the loss of trees in Sulawesi, a wildlife hotspot in Indonesia that houses the world’s largest nickel deposits. The metal is widely used in cathodes in car batteries because it boosts energy density and increases range.
Shevaun Haviland argues PM is right to revisit Labour’s EU red lines as current trading relationship is bad for business
Repairing the economic damage of Brexit should be the top priority for Andy Burnham as he reconsiders Labour’s red lines on EU membership, the head of one of Britain’s leading business groups has said.
Shevaun Haviland, the director general of the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC), said she welcomed the prime minister reopening the Brexit battle lines despite the uncertainty it could create, arguing that the UK’s current trading relationship with the EU was bad for business.
More than 11,400 drivers last year were fined for offences they did not recognise as RAC says system needs reform
The number of reported “cloned” vehicles involved in offences on UK roads has reached a record high, official data shows.
More than 11,400 drivers contacted the DVLA last year after being issued with fines for offences they said they did not recognise or accept responsibility for – most of which are believed to be down to cloning, where a number plate is copied fraudulently on similar vehicles to avoid enforcement cameras.
British government must however align with the European Union’s position over tariffs on Chinese EVs
France has dropped its opposition to the UK being included in the EU’s “Made in Europe” legislation as long as the British government aligns with the bloc’s position over tariffs on Chinese EVs.
In a breakthrough for Andy Burnham, France on Thursday came round to backing Germany, which has always supported the UK’s calls to be designated European for the purposes of the Industrial Accelerator Act. The legislation, which is in its draft stage, is designed to protect domestic manufacturing from cheap Chinese competition.
If ‘public control’ bit is delaying overhaul, that needs to be nailed down sharpish or continued uncertainty could be costly
It is strange now to recall that Thames Water had a prominent slot on what was known as “Sue’s shit list” – the internal Labour dossier, compiled by Keir Starmer’s first chief of staff, Sue Gray, of potential crises that could erupt at short notice and force the incoming administration to make some big decisions quickly.
That was July 2024. Here we are – more than two years later – and the Thames script has barely advanced. We’re still waiting to see if the financial crisis at the over-indebted, under-performing water company will be resolved by a creditor-led recapitalisation, special administration or something else.
Experts are warning that the UK is unprepared for crises. A refrigerator cyber-attack scare in France is the latest reminder of the risks
What’s worrying French supermarket bosses should be prompting British ministers to action. On Sunday, hackers forced up the temperatures of refrigerators in hundreds of food stores across France to as high as 50C, resulting in waste and fires. Beyond the immediate destruction and inconvenience, it raised the prospect of other malicious actors finding new ways to play havoc with the food chain.
Only weeks before, 150 experts together warned the British government that it does not have a plan to feed people in a crisis – and that the west is entering an era in which not only disruption but the weaponisation of food is a real possibility. “The public has been led to assume that food will simply be there,” they wrote. “It may not be.”
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Water company tells creditors it will not survive long enough to agree refinancing deal without more money
Thames Water has asked its creditors for another £2.4bn as the embattled water company comes close to running out of cash.
The UK’s largest water company said on Thursday it needed another short-term cash injection because it would be unable to reach a longer-term deal to sort out its giant debt pile before running out of cash by “the end of 2026 or the start of 2027”.
Exclusive: Chancellor to target sector in his first budget, to help offset Iran war’s damage to public finances
John Healey is poised to tax Britain’s banks in his 28 October budget, to help offset the damage inflicted on the public finances by war in the Middle East, the Guardian understands.
The chancellor is in Bangkok, where the International Monetary Fund has praised the UK’s progress towards balancing the books, urging him to “stay the course”.
Grid operator paying large sums to switch off windfarms in areas of excess electricity generation while turning on gas plants elsewhere
The cost of balancing Great Britain’s power grid has soared to near-record highs of almost £50m a day after windfarms were turned off because of bottlenecks in transmitting power around the country.
The grid operator paid £47.9m on Wednesday to turn windfarms off in areas with an oversupply of electricity and turn gas plants on in areas where supplies were tight.
The much-loved central London institution, which has been threatened with closure since January 2025, secures 25-year lease without break clause with current landlords
The celebrated Prince Charles repertory cinema in London’s Leicester Square has announced that the threat of closure has been staved off by signing a new 25-year lease with its landlords.
In a post on social media titled “You Saved the PCC”, the cinema said that “after 21 months of uncertainty, we’re delighted to have secured the future of the cinema” and that they had “signed a new 25-year lease with no break clause, ensuring our projectors will keep rolling for years to come”.
Move comes as Senator Elizabeth Warren condemns Barclays response to questions over ex-boss’s ties to sex offender
US lawmakers have unveiled a new bill to hold Wall Street’s “Epstein-connected” bosses to account for helping finance the late sex offender’s crimes.
It came as top Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren condemned the UK bank Barclays for “dodging responsibility” over its failure to vet former boss Jes Staley and his ties to the once well-connected billionaire.
It’s indisputable that the political polarization of our time has reduced (and confused) the influence of economic conditions on US elections.
In September of 2024, in the waning weeks of the Joe Biden presidency, 65% of Republicans believed the US economy was getting worse. About six months later, as Donald Trump launched a trade war on the rest of the world with his “liberation day” tariffs, the share of Republican pessimists had dropped to 33%.
John Healey has promised to use his first budget in a fortnight’s time to offer consumers and businesses a “breathing space” while sticking to Labour’s fiscal rules.
Speaking to journalists in Bangkok, where he has been attending the International Monetary Fund annual meetings, the chancellor said he was conscious of rising costs.
When it comes to food, Caroline Bauldree does not like to “deprive” herself of anything. She does not like to cook either, so that means a lot of food deliveries. “If I want sushi, I’m getting sushi,” said the 24-year-old nanny, who lives in Raleigh, North Carolina. “I’m definitely lazy in that regard.”
Bauldree got into the habit of near-daily DoorDashing back in college. “I could order whatever food from whatever restaurant and it showed up at my door – that’s the dream,” she said. “But then I just feel like crap about myself because I’m like, ‘wow, I’m a lazy piece of shit.’ Nine times out of 10, I feel bad about myself.”
The UK economy unexpectedly continued to grow in August despite a fall in consumer spending before John Healey’s first budget as chancellor.
Figures from the Office for National Statistics showed gross domestic product (GDP) rose by 0.1% last month, compared with 0.4% growth in July. That confounded a forecast by City economists of a 0.1% contraction.
Bank of America hired 1,000 outside contractors to help patch software vulnerabilities exposed by advanced AI models, including Anthropic's Mythos. The effort added hundreds of millions of dollars in third-quarter expenses. CNBC reports: In an interview after the bank's third-quarter earnings release, [CEO Brian Moynihan] said that earlier this year the company rushed to bolster a wide spectrum of its internal and vendor code using thousands of employees and outside personnel. "That risk is real risk, and that's why when the frontier-type models came out. ... A lot of us sat down and said, 'How do we figure out how to get through this quickly?'" Moynihan told CNBC's Leslie Picker.
"We put on 1,000 contractors to help us do the patching work in the second quarter, and those people remain here today, helping us, on top of the 3,000 people we have in that area," he said. The bank spent a "couple hundred million plus" on the software remediation and regulatory issues related to anti-money laundering compliance in the third quarter, Moynihan told analysts earlier Wednesday.
But it may encourage the Bank of England to raise interest rates as soon as its next meeting in November….
“While August’s unexpected uptick all but confirms that the OBR will raise its growth forecast for this year from 1.1% to 1.4%, the Chancellor still faces a major Budget headache, as elevated borrowing costs eat into fiscal headroom and increase pressure for tax rises.
“These unexpectedly upbeat figures will further embolden hawkish sentiment among policymakers by reinforcing the view that the economy is strong enough to withstand a rate rise, making a November hike look highly likely.”
“The latest GDP figures are encouraging, with the economy growing by 0.7% in the three months to August, its strongest growth rate since May. On its current trajectory, the UK is likely to record growth comfortably above 1% this year, which would probably be enough to make it the second-fastest-growing economy in the G7.
“The UK’s growth performance has been a bright spot amid a less impressive run of economic news following events in the Middle East. Business investment has been an important driver, particularly spending on ICT hardware, likely linked to the build-out of AI infrastructure. The UK still lags the US in both the scale of that investment and the boost it provides to growth, but it is making progress and remains ahead of many of its European peers.
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