Rachel Reeves denies lying to public in run-up to budget
Posted on Sunday November 30, 2025

Chancellor accused of misleading public about reasons for tax rises, with opposition MPs calling for her to resignUK politics live – latest updatesRachel Reeves has denied lying to the public in the buildup to last week’s budget, insisting that she needed to raise taxes to a record level to ensure economic stability.The chancellor said on Sunday she had announced £26bn-worth of tax rises on Wednesday in part to build a buffer against her fiscal rules and reduce the risk of further tax increases in the future, and in part to protect public spending. Continue reading...

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England’s water industry issued £10.5bn in ‘green bonds’ despite pollution record
Posted on Sunday November 30, 2025

River Action says use of issuance tied to environmental benefits is ‘corporate greenwash on steroids’Water companies have issued a fifth of the UK’s “green bonds” since 2017, despite a consistently poor record of sewage pollution during that time, research has shown.Privately owned water companies in England have together issued £10.5bn in bonds tied to projects that offer “environmental benefits”, according to analysis of financial market data by Unearthed, which is part of Greenpeace UK. Continue reading...

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Is gen Z’s love of fried chicken pushing Britain to ‘peak pizza’?
Posted on Sunday November 30, 2025

Competition intensifies as former chief of Domino’s says days of ‘massive growth’ are overPizza has become ubiquitous on British dinner plates, with chains such as Pizza Express, Franco Manca, Domino’s and Goodfella’s dominating the market – but is its popularity starting to cool?Domino’s Pizza Group announced this week that its chief executive of two years had stepped down with immediate effect, less than two weeks after he appeared to suggest the UK may be approaching “peak pizza”. Continue reading...

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More than 1,000 Amazon workers warn rapid AI rollout threatens jobs and climate
Posted on Friday November 28, 2025

Workers say the firm’s ‘warp-speed’ approach fuels pressure, layoffs and rising emissionsMore than 1,000 Amazon employees have signed an open letter expressing “serious concerns” about AI development, saying that the company’s “all-costs justified, warp speed” approach to the powerful technology will cause damage to “democracy, to our jobs, and to the earth.”The letter, published on Wednesday, was signed by the Amazon workers anonymously, and comes a month after Amazon announced mass layoff plans as it increases adoption of AI in its operations. Continue reading...

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AI’s safety features can be circumvented with poetry, research finds
Posted on Sunday November 30, 2025

Poems containing prompts for harmful content prove effective at duping large language modelsPoetry can be linguistically and structurally unpredictable – and that’s part of its joy. But one man’s joy, it turns out, can be a nightmare for AI models.Those are the recent findings of researchers out of Italy’s Icaro Lab, an initiative from a small ethical AI company called DexAI. In an experiment designed to test the efficacy of guardrails put on artificial intelligence models, the researchers wrote 20 poems in Italian and English that all ended with an explicit request to produce harmful content such as hate speech or self-harm. Continue reading...

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Max Verstappen beats Piastri to take F1 title race to Abu Dhabi GP as Norris falters
Posted on Sunday November 30, 2025

Norris only fourth in Qatar, making Abu Dhabi decisiveMcLaren failure to pit on safety car costs their driversMax Verstappen believed he had long since “checked out” from being able to defend his world championship. Yet the Dutchman, while down, was far from out and has, with victory in the Qatar Grand Prix, battled and bludgeoned his way back into contention just as McLaren have somehow contrived to leave Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri vulnerable to his late charge, as Verstappen forced the title race to the wire at the final round next weekend in Abu Dhabi.With Lando Norris, the title leader, fourth and his teammate Oscar Piastri second in Doha, after McLaren made an egregious strategy error, there will now be a three-way fight to the finish at the season finale, with 16 points separating all three drivers. Verstappen is 12 points back from Norris, with Piastri a further four worse off. It is a scenario that was all but unthinkable when Verstappen was 104 points behind Piastri after the Dutch Grand Prix on 31 August and he had in effect written off his championship ambitions. Continue reading...

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Arsenal held by 10-man Chelsea in feisty draw after Moisés Caicedo gets VAR red
Posted on Sunday November 30, 2025

Arsenal would surely have taken a draw beforehand, against a Chelsea team that have emerged as surprise title rivals in recent weeks – and especially when they realised they had to play without William Saliba, who injured himself in training on Saturday.It was a different story when, in the 38th minute, Chelsea were reduced to 10 men after Moisés Caicedo’s X-rated challenge on Mikel Merino. It was one of those that made you wince upon each replay, the stand-in Arsenal striker fortunate to emerge unscathed. Continue reading...

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