Both first and second class mail lag behind Ofcom’s target in quarterly update after EP Group’s takeoverRoyal Mail missed its targets by delivering nearly a quarter of first class mail late in the first update since its parent company was bought by a Czech billionaire, figures show.The company said on Friday it had delivered 75.9% of first class mail within one working day of collection in the three months to 29 June, up from 74.2% the previous quarter but well behind the 93% target set by the regulator, Ofcom. Continue reading…

This week’s collapse of tycoon’s Yorkshire operations brought relief for some and echoes insolvency steps at 15 of his companiesGovernment takes over Liberty Steel’s South Yorkshire plants to protect 1,450 jobsA disparate collection of steelworks in Australia, the UK, Romania and the Czech Republic at the start of the year had two things in common: they were part of the metals empire of Sanjeev Gupta, and they had fallen silent.The idling plants were emblematic of the tycoon’s struggles. Born in India before starting a commodities trading business at university, Gupta was once nicknamed the “saviour of steel” for his plans to turn around struggling plants. Yet things looked very different this week, as he finally lost control of one of his key UK businesses. Continue reading…

People with temporary protected status face possible deportation even though their home countries – including Afghanistan and Haiti – remain unsafeMany thousands of immigrants living in the US who came from certain countries regarded as risky or dangerous are at the mercy of US judges and the Trump administration’s agenda to slash their work authorization and protection from deportation.Since taking office, the Trump administration has announced the termination of temporary protected status (TPS) for citizens of seven of the 15 countries previously designated for shelter under this legal umbrella – with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) controversially citing improved conditions in some of those places. Continue reading…

Podcast host Joshua Haymes voices range of extreme views and says liberalism a greater threat to US than neo-NazismThe US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, has repeatedly endorsed the Reformation Red Pill podcast, and has appeared on four episodes. But the former pastor who hosts the show, and who attends Hegseth’s theocratic church, has voiced a range of extreme positions in recent months on issues including Ice raids, capital punishment, the racist “great replacement” theory, adultery and neo-Nazism.The revelations come on top of recent media reports focused on Hegseth also boosting a video of Douglas Wilson and other Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches (CREC) pastors arguing that women should lose the vote in the United States. They also follow previous revelations about Hegseth’s links to or apparent sympathies for Christian nationalist positions. Continue reading…

Unions receive assurances after state takes control of Liberty Steel plants that were put into administrationWorkers at the UK’s third-largest steelworks, in South Yorkshire, have been assured that they will receive their pay for August as well as unpaid pension contributions after a government-appointed special manager took over the collapsed company.Liberty Steel’s main British business, Speciality Steel UK (SSUK), was put into administration on Thursday afternoon after a high court judge ruled that it was insolvent and that its owner, the metals tycoon Sanjeev Gupta, had no prospects of repaying debts of several hundred million pounds. Continue reading…

Assembly Roxy, EdinburghThere’s a hint of Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet in the cocksure, poppy aesthetic of this charismatic display of acrobatics, tumbling and clowningIt wouldn’t be the Edinburgh fringe without at least one new spin on Hamlet. This spunky 60-minute version created by Sam Landa and Emma Owens combines a radically trimmed text with aerial acrobatics, tumbling and clowning. Sensitively delivering Shakespearean verse and executing sophisticated circus requires a niche skill-set; some lines fall flat but Landa and Danielle Diniz’s choreography often deepens a story limited to the personal not the political. The enterprise is executed with panache by a charismatic cast of 10.Who’s there? A ghost in white, twisting and turning to the song Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood, later returning to use an aerial pyramid. The show casts Old Hamlet (Arthur Morel Van Hyfte) and Hamlet (Maddox Morfit-Tighe) at a similar age, which movingly emphasises how they see themselves in each other, although the ghost’s recurrent “remember me” voiceover sounds more horror movie than tragedy. Continue reading…

With a pair of secateurs and some compost, you can quickly and easily replenish your garden for freeWhen we moved into our home, there was a rosemary plant in the bed by the back door. It hadn’t been pruned for some time, so was all legs with a short, dark green hairdo, and after our first winter it promptly died. Fast-forward to around this time last year, when I was searching for my dog after she’d run off into the woods. As I was stomping around, yelling her name, I chanced upon a luscious, hefty rosemary bush. I carry secateurs on dog walks to clear the paths of wandering brambles, so I snipped off a few sprigs and tucked them in my pocket.The cuttings I took would be described as semi-hardwood or semi-ripe – woodier at the base, with fresh growth at the top – which are ideal for starting new plants. Now is the time to do this with rosemary as well as sage, lavender, thyme and a host of ornamental shrubs and plants. Continue reading…

(Tan Cressida/Warner Records)With a sunlit disposition and paeans to his daughter, the mood turns lighter on the US MC’s sixth album – but the glitching, crashing beats are as esoteric as everThe launch party for Earl Sweatshirt’s sixth album was, by all accounts, a confounding affair. Some attenders came away convinced that Live Laugh Love contained guest appearances not merely by Vince Staples, but actor/rapper Donald Glover and comedian Dave Chappelle (it doesn’t, although all three contributed to a fanzine produced for the event). At one juncture, the DJ announced the arrival of “my brother, Earl Sweatshirt” before the appearance of someone who was visibly not Earl Sweatshirt – he was Asian, and apparently goes under the winning stage name Gary Underpants – performing a succession of Earl Sweatshirt songs. In the aftermath, at least one online music title didn’t seem sure whether it actually was a launch party for a new album or “an elaborate prank”: would a man whose grim worldview seemed summed up by the title of 2015’s I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Go Outside really release something called Live Laugh Love?Of course, Earl Sweatshirt has form when it comes to confounding album launches: Sweatshirt’s last album, 2023’s Voir Dire, was secretly available on YouTube under a fake name for at least three years before it was officially released, according to its producer the Alchemist. And more broadly, this kind of thing fits with Earl Sweatshirt’s idiosyncratic approach to his career. Continue reading…