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35,984,991 | The PM said the government was "not neutral" in the referendum and the cost was "money well spent".
The 16-page leaflets will be sent to 27 million UK homes from next week.
UKIP Leader Nigel Farage said it was "outrageous" to spend taxpayers' money "to tell us how we should think and how we should vote".
Leave campaigners complained that the promotional campaign was costing more than the £7m each side will be allowed to spend by law, once the official campaign period starts next week.
The UK's EU vote: All you need to know
EU for beginners: A guide
UK and the EU: Better off out or in?
"I would have thought one of the very reasons for the establishment of an Electoral Commission was that the ground rules in this referendum were supposed to be free and fair," Mr Farage said.
But in a speech to students and young people in Exeter, Mr Cameron said: "I make no apology for the fact that we are sending to every household in this country this leaflet, which sets out what the government's view is and why we come to that view.
"We're not neutral in this. We think it would be a bad decision to leave - for the economy, jobs, investment, family finances and universities."
Challenged over whether he thought the campaign was "undemocratic", the PM said: "I absolutely don't think it is."
He said the official Leave and Remain camps would each be entitled to spend £7m and receive a free postal leaflet in the formal campaign period running up to polling day, adding: "There's nothing to stop the government from setting out its views in advance of the campaign."
Mr Cameron said he wanted every voter to have "all the information at their fingertips" when they go to vote: "I think that is money well spent. It is not... just legal, it is necessary and right."
Justice Secretary Michael Gove - one of a group of cabinet ministers backing EU exit - said it was wrong to spend taxpayers' money on "a one-sided piece of propaganda", saying the money should have gone on public services instead.
Eurosceptic MPs have long feared that ministers would try to sway the outcome of Britain's referendum on EU membership, on 23 June, by using the full weight of the civil service machine to push the case for staying in.
They had managed to get ministers to agree to limiting government propaganda in the weeks running up to the polling day.
But the leaflets, bearing the official HM government stamp but not the face of David Cameron or any other ministers, are due to start landing on doormats in England next week, with the rest of the UK to follow.
The leaflet claims that a vote to leave the EU would cause an economic shock that "would risk higher prices of some household goods and damage living standards".
It further claims that the only way to "protect jobs, provide security, and strengthen the UK's economy" is by staying in the EU, arguing that leaving would create risk and uncertainty.
Reality Check: Checking claims in the government leaflet
Labour MP Gisela Stuart, who chairs pro-exit campaign group Vote Leave, said: "This is not the facts, it is a misleading government propaganda campaign paid for by hard-working taxpayers who would rather see their money spent on their priorities."
She said the public wanted "an honest debate" not "an attempt by the prime minister to buy the referendum result" with taxpayers' money.
London Mayor Boris Johnson - a prominent figure in the exit campaign - claimed it showed the government did not want "a fair fight" while the Conservative former minister Liam Fox, who plans to launch an online petition to secure a debate in Parliament on the issue, said the government was effectively "doubling the funding for one side - ie the Remain campaign."
Defending the leaflet, Defence Secretary Michael Fallon said: "We're entitled as the democratically elected government to set out our view, as government have done in every referendum we've had going all the away back to the original Europe referendum back in 1975."
He said 80% of the British public wanted more information about the referendum and the government was "giving the facts and the government's judgement to go with these facts".
Royal Mail will start delivering the leaflets - entitled Why the Government Believes That Voting to Remain in the EU is the Best Decision for the UK - to households in England next week and in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland after the 5 May devolved elections.
A digital version is being advertised on social media and on a new website. The government says the campaign will cost £9.3m, or about 34p per household.
Households have also been receiving leaflets from EU exit campaigners which also purport to set out the facts of the referendum debate, although these are paid for by the campaigns themselves, rather than taxpayers' money.
Although the internet and social media are tools widely used by both sides of the referendum to spread their message, traditional methods - such as delivering leaflets to homes - still play a key role in the campaigns. | David Cameron has defended a government pro-EU membership campaign, amid criticism that £9m of public money is being spent on "one-sided propaganda". |
34,742,874 | James Craig, from Dunragit near Stranraer, is accused of tweeting false news designed to make share prices fall, so he could buy and resell shares for profit.
Fraudulent tweets were allegedly made about two firms by Mr Craig in 2013.
Prosecutors claim shareholders lost more than £1m as a result of his alleged tweets.
The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced it had filed securities fraud charges against Mr Craig in a federal court in California.
The tweets were about two companies, Audience and Sarepta Therapuetics.
Several tweets, suggesting Audience was under federal investigation, were said to cause the share price of the mobile audio company to fall 28% before the Nasdaq temporarily halted trading.
Further alleged tweets that claimed Sarepta Therapuetics was also subject to an investigation sent stock in the drug firm tumbling by 16%.
Prosecutors claimed shareholders had lost more than $1.6m (£1.05m).
Jina Choi, director of the SEC's San Francisco regional office, said the fraudulent tweets "disrupted the markets for two public companies and caused significant financial losses for their investors." | A 62-year-old Scottish trader has been charged in San Francisco with defrauding the US stock market. |
38,973,005 | 14 February 2017 Last updated at 17:00 GMT
Thomas Howard and his wife Irene, now aged in their 90s, first met as children living on the same Lancashire street in 1931, and married after World War Two. | A couple who first met as children have shared their Valentine's Day relationship tips after more than seven decades of marriage. |
34,546,461 | The Scottish veterans were presented with the Legion d'Honneur, on board a French naval destroyer berthed in Leith.
The award honoured them for the role they played in liberating France during the war.
Many of those being honoured took part in the D-Day landings in June 1944.
The ceremony was the latest in a series that have taken place throughout the UK since the 70th anniversary of D-Day in June 2014, when President Francois Hollande pledged to honour all surviving British veterans who fought in France during the war.
About 3,000 applications were received in the space of a few months, with hundreds of medals awarded so far.
The latest medals were presented on board the destroyer Aquitan by Emmanuel Cocher, the French consul general in Scotland, and Rear Admiral Patrick Chevallereau, the French embassy's defence attaché.
Among those receiving the honour were 95-year-old Hugh Maguire from Armadale in West Lothian, who fought with the Royal Ulster Rifles and took part in the D-Day landings.
The others were Thomas Cave, Cyril Deas, Anthony Delahoy, Alexander Govan, John Greig, William Pritchard, Walter Sharp and Aidan Sprot.
A spokeswoman for the consul general said: "France will never forget the gallantry and bravery they showed in taking part in the liberation of France 70 years ago.
"The actions and sacrifice of these men, and that of so many who fell on the battlefield, was instrumental in bringing back freedom and peace in France and across Europe." | Nine World War Two veterans have received France's highest honour for bravery, in a special ceremony in Edinburgh. |
39,407,039 | David Davis said a "sustainable" system would take into account the needs of the NHS and different industries.
He also said the government had a "huge contingency plan" for the UK leaving the EU without a deal.
Mr Davis was speaking on a special edition of BBC Question Time ahead of Wednesday's formal Brexit notification.
The government has yet to specify how the UK's immigration system will work once it is no longer bound by EU free movement rules, but has promised to restore "control" to borders with new curbs in place.
Mr Davis said the new system would be "properly managed".
It would be for the home secretary to decide the system to be used, he said, but added: "I cannot imagine that the policy will be anything other than that which is in the national interest.
"Which means that from time to time we will need more, from time to time we will need less.
"That is how it will no doubt work and that will be in everybody's interests - the migrants and the citizens of the UK."
The Brexit secretary was urged by a German NHS worker in the audience to "do the decent thing" and guarantee EU nationals the right to stay in the UK.
He promised the issue would be a priority when talks begin.
On Wednesday Prime Minister Theresa May will invoke Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty, which begins the negotiation process.
During the Britain after Brexit debate the panellists, who included former Scottish first minister Alex Salmond and Labour Brexit spokesman Sir Keir Starmer, were asked what would happen if no deal was reached.
Mr Davis said the government had spent the nine months since June's Brexit vote preparing a plan.
He said it was not a scenario the government wanted to see, but added: "We have got a huge contingency plan, exercised across all of these issues, every department of government."
Mr Salmond said the government's view that no deal is better than a bad deal was "nonsensical".
But UKIP's Suzanne Evans criticised "hyperbole" about "crashing out" of the EU.
Mr Davis also said the UK would abide by its obligations when it comes to settling outstanding liabilities with the EU, but played down claims these could amount to £50bn.
Former Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg said the EU was "simply going to ask us to settle the tab before we leave", and Mr Starmer said the UK had to honour its debts "otherwise no country is going to want to deal with us" in future trade negotiations.
But a man in the audience compared the EU's demands with "the bully in the playground taking our lunch money".
On Wednesday, the prime minister will send a letter to the president of the European Council telling him officially that the UK wants to leave.
Triggering Article 50, the letter will set in motion a two-year process in which the terms of the UK's departure from the EU will be hammered out, as will the outline of the UK's future relationship with the remaining 27 EU members.
As things stand, the UK is set to leave the EU on 29 March 2019 although this deadline could be extended if both sides agree.
More than 33.5 million people voted in a referendum last June on the UK's future in the EU. They voted to leave by a margin of 51.9% to 48.1%. | Immigration should rise and fall depending on the UK's needs after it has left the EU, the Brexit secretary says. |
37,556,523 | And if their chatter is being obscured, it could hamper their ability to breed.
Steve Simpson and colleagues are testing the idea by dragging hydrophones through coastal waters to record the marine soundscape.
It has long been recognised that large marine mammals are susceptible to noise pollution - as are coral reef fish.
But the new study intends to understand the impacts on some more familiar UK fish species.
"Cod particularly have very elaborate calls compared with many fish," the University of Exeter professor told BBC News.
"They vibrate their swim bladder - their balloon inside them - to make sound.
"They can create a whole range of different pops, grunts and rumblings."
The animals vocalise at the point of spawning: the male sings and the female then assesses whether the male is any good before she releases her eggs.
Cod also use sound to navigate, establish territories and warn their group of an immediate threat.
These are all activities that could be compromised if the din from shipping, oil and gas exploration and other human-produced noise sources become intolerable.
To date, very little work has been done to map the UK marine soundscape, says Prof Simpson.
His team aims to change that by deploying kayak-drawn underwater microphones, or hydrophones, in a number of localities right around the British Isles.
One aspect to be investigated is whether regional fish populations all vocalise slightly differently - the possibility that their sounds may exhibit something akin to an accent.
Such “dialects†| The seas around Britain may be getting so noisy that fish species like cod and haddock now have some difficulty communicating with each other. |
32,236,909 | Michael Spalding, 39, known as Spud, from Ladywood, Birmingham, was discovered by men working near Icknield Port Road on 12 May, police said.
Lorenzo Joshua Simon, 34, was convicted of murder after a five-week trial at Birmingham Crown Court.
His co-defendant Michelle Bird, 35, was cleared of the same charge.
She had previously admitted assisting an offender.
The pair, both of Oxford Road, Smethwick, are due to be sentenced next week.
West Midlands Police said Mr Spalding was believed to have been killed 16 days before the suitcase containing his body parts was found by a Canal & River Trust contractor.
A police search later discovered a hacksaw and a second suitcase, also containing body parts, on the canal bed.
The post-mortem examination was unable to confirm the precise cause of death, but officers said they suspected Mr Spalding died from a stab wound to the neck, "evidence of which was subsequently destroyed when the body was beheaded".
West Midlands Police said a number of weapons were used to dismember the body, including knives, a saw and possibly an axe.
The force said Mr Spalding had initially been staying with Simon in return for helping to renovate his flat in Smethwick.
However, officers said Simon and Bird had used Mr Spalding like "slave labour", and their treatment had led him to "break" and complain.
Det Insp Harry Harrison said this, combined with an argument over damage caused to Simon's car, led to the fatal attack.
"Simon said he hit Michael in the back, that he fell to the floor dead within seconds, and claimed to have disposed of the body in panic," he said.
"Bird said she was on an errand to buy alcohol at the time of the killing but later admitted helping her boyfriend in the aftermath."
"However, we were able to provide compelling evidence to the jury that this was a vicious murder and Simon went to considerable lengths to try and cover his tracks."
Police said neighbours had seen a bonfire in the rear garden following Mr Spalding's disappearance and a forensic examination of an oil drum found debris from his humerus , or upper arm, bone.
Thanks to support from the University of Warwick, police said 3D scanning technology revealed "a perfect jigsaw fit" between the bone and a severed limb found in one of the suitcases, as well as links between the hacksaw and marks found on other bones.
Officers said a black suitcase was first spotted by a narrow boat owner floating near Pope Bridge on 5 May.
Other canal users also reported the case, before a contractor, suspecting it contained a dead animal, towed it to Icknield Port yard a week later. | A killer who dismembered his tenant's body before stuffing it into a suitcase which he dumped into a canal has been found guilty of murder. |
30,624,523 | Cabinet Chief Jorge Capitanich said the president would suspend all international travel until February.
He said Ms Fernandez had slipped on a liquid spilled on the floor of her home in Patagonia, in southern Argentina.
The president has had a series of health problems, some of which have forced her to cancel official trips.
Ms Fernandez was due to travel to Brazil for the inauguration on 1 January of President Dilma Rousseff, who has been elected to a second term in office.
She will also miss a trip to the Vatican alongside the Chilean President, Michelle Bachelet.
In November, Ms Fernandez had to cancel her attendance at a commemoration of the 30th anniversary of the signing of a peace treaty with Chile, which Ms Bachelet was also due to attend.
At the time, the Argentine leader was suffering from a sigmoiditis, an inflammation or infection of the sigmoid colon.
Last year, she had to rest for a month after undergoing surgery to treat bleeding on the brain.
President Fernandez, of the left-wing Front for Victory party, was first elected in 2007 and then returned to power by a comfortable majority in 2011. | Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner has cancelled her planned trips to Brazil and the Vatican after breaking her ankle on Friday. |
30,776,745 | Trials with 216 babies up to 12 months old indicated they were unable to remember new tasks if they did not have a lengthy sleep soon afterwards.
The University of Sheffield team suggested the best time to learn may be just before sleep and emphasised the importance of reading at bedtime.
Experts said sleep may be much more important in early years than at other ages.
People spend more of their time asleep as babies than at any other point in their lives.
Yet the researchers, in Sheffield and Ruhr University Bochum, in Germany, say "strikingly little is known" about the role of sleep in the first year of life.
They taught six- to 12-month-olds three new tasks involving playing with hand puppets.
Half the babies slept within four hours of learning, while the rest either had no sleep or napped for fewer than 30 minutes.
The next day, the babies were encouraged to repeat what they had been taught.
The results, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, showed "sleeping like a baby" was vital for learning.
On average one-and-a-half tasks could be repeated after having a substantial nap.
Yet zero tasks could be repeated if there was little sleep time.
Dr Jane Herbert, from the department of psychology at the University of Sheffield, told the BBC News website: "Those who sleep after learning learn well, those not sleeping don't learn at all."
She said it had been assumed that "wide-awake was best" for learning, but instead it "may be the events just before sleep that are most important".
And that the findings showed "just how valuable" reading books with children before sleep could be.
Dr Herbert added: "Parents get loads of advice, some saying fixed sleep, some flexible, these findings suggest some flexibility would be useful, but they don't say what parents should do."
A study last year uncovered the mechanisms of memory in sleep. It showed how new connections between brain cells formed during sleep.
Prof Derk-Jan Dijk, a sleep scientists at the University of Surrey, said: "It may be that sleep is much more important at some ages than others, but that remains to be firmly established."
He said babies "should definitely get enough sleep" to encourage learning, but concentrating learning just before bedtime may not be best.
"What the data show is sleeping after training is positive, it does not show that being sleepy during training is positive."
There is also growing interest in sleep and memory at the other end of life.
The two go hand in hand in your twilight years, particularly with underlying neurodegenerative disorders such as dementia.
It is hoped that boosting sleep would "slow the rot" of memory function. | The key to learning and memory in early life is a lengthy nap, say scientists. |
27,142,836 | Written by Pat Mills and illustrated by the late Joe Colquhoun, it follows young Londoner Charley Bourne's fight to survive in the trenches of the Western Front.
After starting his career with Dundee-based publisher DC Thomson, Mills co-created Battle with fellow comic book writer John Wagner and also launched British science-fiction/fantasy comic 2000AD.
Here Mills gives an insight into writing Charley's War and why he believes how mechanised warfare - machine guns, zeppelins and planes - made WW1 the world's first science-fiction war.
"John Wagner and I did not want Battle to glorify war, and Charley's War is an anti-war story," said Mills. "I think that in the 1970s and 80s it was legitimate, more so than it is today, to describe the Great War as a tragedy, a mistake and criticise the incompetence of generals. In 2014, revisionists have been trying to improve the image of the generals."
Mills' research drew on books, war-time poetry, soldiers' letters, archive photographs and satirical postcards, and some inspiration from 1969 film Oh! What a Lovely War. War-time letters were a major influence and correspondence between Charley and his mum, a munitions worker back home in Bethnal Green, was used as a plot device in the early strips.
"To write the story I had to understand the complexities of the trenches. It was a learning curve. I owe a lot to Charley's War because it made me a better writer," said Mills.
Artist Colquhoun had served as a sailor during World War Two. Before illustrating Charley's War, he had provided the artwork for another Battle comic story, Johnny Red. Set in WW2, its hero is a British pilot fighting for the Russians. Mills said Colquhoun was a hugely talented but modest man. "Joe had this great imagination. Other artists have told of him being able to imagine something, like a tank for example, from different angles. In Johnny Red, he created this amazing street scene of Stalingrad," said Mills.
Mills and Colquhoun were determined to root Charley's War in fact. The Battle of the Somme was among the battles featured.
But young Charley's face-off with an armour-clad German sniper proved controversial. Mills said: "Some people did not think this was based in fact. A relative of mine who had served in World War Two also questioned the use of armour. But I had seen a photograph of armour made for use in World War One. It looked medieval."
Photographs from Getty Image's archives show US-designed armour, left, and also protection that would not look out of place in the pages of 2000AD.
"I didn't want Charley's War to be a story of derring-do and have Charley charging across different theatres of the conflict," said Mills. "But sometimes it was necessary for him to leave the trenches to make a dramatic point, such as showing one of the last cavalry charges of the war. It looks so ludicrous, like something from the Battle of Balaclava, but a charge against machine guns."
"To me, the First World War was the world's first science-fiction war. It saw the first use of tanks, which terrified some of the Germans in their trenches when they first saw these machines." Mills and Colquhoun also featured Zeppelin airship bombing raids on London, aerial dogfights above the trenches and later heavily armed, armoured trains in the stories.
Mills said: "We often imagine that Armageddon is a horror that awaits us sometime in the future. But Armageddon has already happened. It was World War One." | Charley's War was a comic strip set in World War One that ran for many years in Battle, a British comic published in the 1970s until the late 80s. |
39,733,500 | But how does it work? Here is a quick guide from BBC Sport…
The first round of deals is due to take place from about 1am on Friday, 21 April, from outside the Philadelphia Museum of Art, close to the steps featured in the 1976 hit boxing film Rocky.
A further six draft rounds will then take place up until Saturday with a total of 253 selections due to be taken.
Each NFL team has one choice per round. The order is based on how the teams finished last year. To help even up the league, the worst performing side receives the first pick - so, in theory, can gain the brightest prospect from the college system.
This year, that is set to be the Cleveland Browns, who finished last season with just one victory. The Super Bowl winners - New England Patriots - would have been the 32nd pick out of the 32 teams, but they traded their spot to the New Orleans Saints.
There are no transfer fees in NFL but teams can trade picks - so do not be surprised to find orders can change. Each team has 10 minutes "on the clock" to make their pick in the first round.
Once the choice is made, the player is usually paraded on stage and introduced by the league's commissioner Roger Goodell.
The Jacksonville Jaguars, who will be playing one game each year at Wembley until at least 2020, is to announce two of its picks from a London studio. The fifth and seventh picks are to be announced by fan Charlotte Johnson, from Lincoln.
To be suitable for the draft, players must have spent enough time in US college education to be deemed eligible by the NFL. That means some players can enter the Draft before they finish their degree. Players must also have been out of the US high school for at least three years.
Players usually show off their speed and skills across various tests before team representatives at the NFL's annual scouting combine, this year's took place between 28 February and 6 March.
The money seems to be on Texas A&M defensive end Myles Garrett being snapped up pretty quickly in this year's draft. He is tall at 6ft 4in and weighs 270lbs - but he can run 40 yards in just 4.64 seconds.
Beyond that, there is no real agreement among the experts - names include Stanford defensive end Solomon Thomas, Louisiana State running back Leonard Fournette and Ohio State cornerback Marshon Lattimore. The top tip for a quarterback seems to be Mitchell Trubisky of North Carolina - but also keep an eye out for Deshaun Watson, who led Clemson to the US college football national title.
Jermaine Eluemunor, a 22-year-old Londoner, is also hoping to be chosen as an offensive tackle in the Draft. As this video shows, his unusual path to the NFL began when he watched the Dolphins play the Giants at Wembley on TV back in 2007.
More than eight million viewers are expected to tune in to watch the event in the US - not bad for a group of people talking and not a single touchdown being thrown.
Media playback is not supported on this device
There are usually plenty of talking points after the event as fans and pundits work out which teams landed a star and who were left with the also-rans. | The NFL's 32 teams are gathering in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to choose the best of the best from American college football teams to become potential stars for their sides. |
34,390,820 | "It is painful when things get said that you don't believe," he said.
Just weeks after Damon had to explain his comments on diversity, an interview with The Observer sparked backlash.
"You're a better actor the less people know about you period. Sexuality is a huge part of that," he told the paper.
"Whether you're straight or gay, people shouldn't know anything about your sexuality because that's one of the mysteries that you should be able to play," he told the British newspaper.
Damon had been addressing rumours he and Ben Affleck were gay, which he said surfaced as they tried to get their 1997 Oscar-winning film Good Will Hunting made.
"It's just like any piece of gossip, and it put us in a weird position of having to answer, you know what I mean?" he told the paper.
"Which was then really deeply offensive. I don't want to, like [imply] it's some sort of disease - then it's like I'm throwing my friends under the bus.
"But at the time, I remember thinking and saying, Rupert Everett was openly gay and this guy - more handsome than anybody, a classically trained actor - it's tough to make the argument that he didn't take a hit for being out."
Damon later addressed his comments during a pre-taped interview on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, which is due to air on Tuesday.
"I was just trying to say actors are more effective when they're a mystery, right?" he told DeGeneres, "and somebody picked it up and said I said 'gay actors should get back in the closet'.
"Which is like, I mean it's stupid, but it is painful when things get said that you don't believe. You know what I mean? And then it gets represented that that's what you believe."
He went on to comment on internet journalists fuelling the backlash.
"In the blogosphere there's no real penalty for just taking the ball and running with it," he said, "You know what I mean? You're just trying to click on your thing."
DeGeneres, who is openly gay, told Damon: "I know you and I know you're not that guy."
Damon was also recently forced to apologise for comments on diversity in film while judging on his HBO reality show Project Greenlight. | Actor Matt Damon has told Ellen DeGeneres that comments he made in a recent interview, saying gay actors should keep their sexuality a secret, were taken out of context. |
34,608,224 | None of the students at Hermitage Academy in Helensburgh sits exams in their fourth year.
The school argues students have a better chance of success if they spend two years studying towards their Highers instead.
But hundreds of parents say the system is not working and have signed a petition calling for an urgent rethink.
They claim the system at Hermitage is disadvantaging students and argue more are now failing exams or even leaving school with no qualifications.
Councillors say they have noted the concerns and a review of the system is under way.
The new National 4 and 5 qualifications replaced Standard Grades across Scotland two years ago.
At most schools, academically able students spend S4 studying for National 5 qualifications while others do a mix of National 4 and 5 qualifications.
Pupils with National 5s can then go on to study for their Highers.
But Hermitage Academy has adopted an unusual approach.
At the end of S3, all students - regardless of academic ability- choose the six subjects they would eventually like to achieve a Higher in. For some, inevitably, this may prove more of an aspiration than a likely outcome.
There are no exams in S4 but at the end of S5 students sit exams for the qualification they have they best chance of getting at that point. For some this may be a Higher, for others it may be a National 5.
The risk is that if a candidate fails, they may end up with no qualification at all in that subject although they can choose to retake a course in S6.
Some parents claim Hermitage is using their children as guinea pigs and argue the school's unusual approach is not working out.
They have formed a campaign group, Parents for Change, and want Hermitage to move to the more conventional system used at most other schools. Hundreds have also signed a petition.
Spokesman Kevin Middleton said some able pupils may not do as well as they might have in their Highers if that was their first experience of an exam. He argued sitting National 5 exams in fourth year could prove good practice for them.
Concerns have also been raised locally by teachers' unions.
A spokesman for Argyll and Bute Council said Hermitage had originally developed its model in consultation with parents but acknowledged there were concerns.
He said: "Following receipt of examination results, it is appropriate that all schools review their curriculum and the review of Hermitage Academy's curricular model began following the summer recess.
"These reviews underpin our commitment to providing the very best education experience for each individual pupil.
"As we progress with the review of Hermitage Academy's curricular model, parents, pupils, staff and members will be involved.
"It is expected that the review report will be completed by the end of November, in the meantime, should any parent have a specific concern they wish to discuss regarding their child's progress, we would encourage them to make contact with the school to discuss the position and the supports in place."
The concerns have already reached the council chamber.
On Thursday, councillors rejected a motion which would have seen Hermitage start to give S4 students the chance to sit up to eight National 5 qualifications.
But they backed a detailed amendment which noted the concerns that had been expressed.
The amendment also noted that the council's education service had started a review of the curricular model at Hermitage in conjunction with the school's management team.
The changes to the exam system across Scotland started to be introduced during the school year 2013-14.
Standard Grades were scrapped - the National 5 qualification is broadly equivalent to a Credit pass in a Standard Grade.
Overall, the aim now is to concentrate on what qualifications a youngster has obtained by the time they leave school - not what they have achieved by a particular stage or the total number of exam passes.
For many academically-able youngsters, a National 5 qualification is merely a stepping stone on the way to a Higher just as an O Grade or Standard Grade used to be. The question is whether gaining the lower qualification first is actually any help.
Although Hermitage's approach is unusual, a number of schools now offer able students the chance to bypass National 5s on a subject-by-subject basis so they can spend two years studying towards Highers. Advocates of the concept say this minimises exam stress and maximises the candidate's chance of a good grade.
Spreading the course over two years can help avoid the sudden increase in workload and expectation which can hit students at the start of a Higher course in S5 - the so-called "two-term dash". | A row has erupted over the unusual way new qualifications have been introduced at a school in Argyll and Bute. |
29,343,784 | Over six decades, his distinctive voice and towering presence saw him much in demand for a variety of roles.
He successfully combined classical theatre with television and Hollywood blockbusters.
The death of his character in the film Alien has often been voted as one of cinema's most memorable moments.
John Vincent Hurt was born on 22 January 1940 in the town of Chesterfield in Derbyshire.
His father, originally a mathematician, had taken holy orders and when Hurt was five, became parish priest at Woodville on the Derbyshire-Leicestershire border.
His parents were reluctant to let him mix with local children, thinking them common, and although the family lived close to a cinema he was not allowed to go to see films.
His first taste of acting came at his prep school in Kent, an establishment Hurt later described as "so high Anglo-Catholic it was flying".
He played the part of a girl in a production of Maeterlinck's The Blue Bird, a tale of two children seeking happiness with the aid of a fairy.
"I felt an extraordinary feeling that I was in the place that I was meant to be," he recalled.
Hurt later revealed that he had been sexually abused by the school's headmaster.
When he was 12 his father was appointed to a church in Grimsby, and the family moved to Lincolnshire.
His parents, keen to see him in what they considered a respectable job, suggested he become an art teacher and he spent a short time at St Martin's School of Art in London
Money was a constant problem and on occasion, he persuaded some of his friends to pose nude and sold the portraits.
One of his subjects, then completely unknown to him, was Quentin Crisp, whom Hurt would later portray.
In 1960 he gained a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, a move that finally won his parents round and set him off on an acting career.
He fell in love with French cinema while studying in London, once going to see Jules et Jim every Sunday for seven weeks.
His somewhat bohemian existence persuaded him to become an agnostic, something that shocked his parents.
However, his brother's almost simultaneous announcement that he was becoming a Catholic rather took the sting from his parents' concerns over Hurt's lack of belief.
"That was the blackest day in the family history ever; that was my brother joining the antichrist."
When he finally graduated, he walked straight into a small role in a 1962 film, The Wild and the Willing, which earned him the princely sum of £75 a week.
Hurt began performing on the London stage and married actress Annette Robertson, although the union lasted less than two years.
His first significant film role was as Richard Rich in A Man for All Seasons, Fred Zinneman's biopic of Thomas More, based on the play by Robert Bolt.
While the part of Rich was not a major one, the success of the film - it won six Oscars - pushed him into the spotlight.
Five years later he was nominated for a Bafta, as Timothy Evans in 10 Rillington Place, the true story of one of the greatest miscarriages of justice in British legal history.
Evans, wrongly hanged for the murder of his daughter, was the sort of vulnerable character that would become something of a speciality for Hurt.
For a time he gained something of a reputation as one of acting's hellraisers, mixing with Peter O'Toole and Richard Harris.
He finally won a Bafta in 1975 for his portrayal of Quentin Crisp, in The Naked Civil Servant, an ITV adaptation of Crisp's autobiography,
His depiction of the colourful Crisp, who flaunted his homosexuality at a time when gay sex between men was illegal, won much praise.
"It changed the business's perception of me as a performer," he later said. "I was warned not to do it - they said you'll never work again, it was such a dodgy subject at the time."
Crisp himself expressed delight at Hurt's performance. "I told Mr Hurt it was difficult for actors to play victims, but he has specialised in victims."
He went on to reprise the role in 2009 in a dramatisation of Crisp's second autobiography, An Englishman in New York.
Other impressive performances followed. He played the tyrannical Roman emperor Caligula in the BBC adaptation of I, Claudius.
And in 1978 he narrowly missed out on an Oscar for his role as heroin addict Max in Alan Parker's controversial film, Midnight Express.
A year later he played a crew member in Alien, becoming a host for the eponymous creature.
The scene where the tiny creature bursts out of his chest has often topped the polls of the scariest moments in film.
In what many consider his greatest role, he played the hideously deformed Joseph Merrick in the film The Elephant Man.
Wearing prosthetic make-up that took eight hours to apply, Hurt excelled in the heartbreaking role of an intelligent man imprisoned in a body that repelled other people.
"Merrick was made into a freak," Hurt said. "A lot of my career is tied up with victims, people who are ostracised."
Tragedy struck in 1983 when his partner of 16 years, Marie-Lise Volpeliere-Pierrot, died after a horse-riding accident.
The following year, Hurt married American actress Donna Peacock.
That year Hurt again played a victim, this time Winston Smith in a film adaptation of George Orwell's 1984.
Critics were almost unanimous in their praise, with Roger Ebert declaring: "John Hurt, with his scrawny body and lined and weary face, makes the perfect Winston Smith."
Over the following decades Hurt's workload remained prodigious, although he played fewer leading roles.
He was a convincing Alan Clark in a BBC adaptation of the philandering politician's diaries, and a memorable Control in the film version of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.
His distinctive voice, "alternately honey and acid and sometimes a mixture of the two", as one critic put it, was much in demand.
Among the characters he voiced were the rabbit, Hazel, in Watership Down, and the Great Dragon in the BBC children's programme Merlin.
In 2013 he appeared in Doctor Who as the War Doctor, a hitherto unseen incarnation of the character.
Hurt's career saw him appear in more than 120 films as well as numerous stage and television roles. He was as much at home in the theatre as he was in front of a camera.
While many of his contemporaries picked and chose the roles they would play, Hurt cheerfully took anything that came along, no matter how small.
The film critic and historian Geoff Andrew asked Hurt how he managed to regularly turn in such memorable performances.
"The only way I can describe it is that I put everything I can into the mulberry of my mind and hope that it is going to ferment and make a decent wine.
"How that process happens, I'm sorry to tell you I can't describe."
Hurt is survived by his two sons and his fourth wife, of 12 years, Anwen Rees-Myers, a former actress and classical pianist. | Sir John Hurt was one of Britain's best-known and most versatile actors. |
16,465,556 | People living near Willow Tree Family Farm, in Shirebrook, said the chickens were kicked around the town like footballs then thrown in a pond.
Police increased patrols around the farm after two rabbits and a goose were brutally killed there in 2010.
They are now trying to find the people responsible for the latest killings.
David Taylor from the farm said: "We had a lot of things planned for this year but if things are going to happen like this what else is going to happen next?
"If we get something else on site what else is going to go missing? What else are they going to take?"
On 13 December 2010 the farm's owners found a decapitated goose.
Two rabbits were killed at the farm later the same week. One had been decapitated and the other appeared to have been stamped on.
The latest killings were reported to police on 6 January.
Councillor Marion Stockdale, who represents Shirebrook and Pleasley for Derbyshire County Council, said: "It's deplorable. It doesn't matter what sort of creature it is. For them to be tortured and victimised that way, I find it's just unforgivable."
Willow Tree Family Farm is managed by volunteers from the local area.
It also supports disadvantaged adults and children by giving them the chance to help at the farm and gain skills.
One of the farm's aims is to support community regeneration, but staff and volunteers are worried the killings give the area a bad name. | Two chickens were tortured and killed after being stolen from a community farm in Derbyshire which has been hit by a series of animal killings. |
36,961,498 | The tax reform has been labelled a landmark and India's biggest tax reform since independence.
The changes aim to streamline India's fragmented tax system with a single levy.
Indian businesses have been lobbying for the single tax rate as it would reduce costs, particularly for shipping goods across state borders.
What promises to one of the world's most complex tax reforms is expected to be serviced by state-of-the-art technology.
Indian software giant Infosys is building a gigantic electronic infrastructure - a GST portal - where taxpayers can register, make payments and file returns.
Some 7.5 million businesses will be covered by the tax. Clearly, a successful GST in India will be a minor miracle.
Read more from Soutik
The goal is to create one single market. Currently, everything sold in India is subject to a multitude of taxes varying from state to state.
This is a bureaucratic burden, with a lot of money lost in a fragmented market. With every state deciding its own taxes it also encourages local protectionism.
The new efficiency aims to boost growth, with optimistic estimates suggesting more than 2% of added economic growth. India already has overtaken China as the world's fastest growing economy.
The Goods and Services Tax will replace that confusing jumble of existing taxes - ranging from lottery and entertainment tax to VAT, sales tax or luxury tax - with one single tax.
There also will be no more taxes at the different state borders within the country.
Currently, goods brought for example from the northern city of Haryana to Chennai are taxed in six different states.
The individual states fear they will lose money. They will now be compensated for their lost revenue over the next five years. Another compromise is that the lucrative businesses of fuel and alcohol have been entirely left out of the new tax for now.
The bill has been a key goal of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and easily passed the lower house, but was long held up in the upper house where Mr Modi's BJP party does not have a majority.
Although the vote in the upper house is labelled a breakthrough, the actual tax is still quite some time off. First, at least half of the country's 29 states will have to approve the bill before it can become law. Then, the actual tax will need to be decided. A government panel has suggested a rate of 17-18%.
The government target for the tax coming into effect is April 2017 but many doubt it will be in place by then. It's to be an electronic tax with no more manual filing - the massive IT infrastructure will be an added challenge on the way to India's tax miracle. | India's parliament has passed the much-awaited Goods and Services Tax (GST) bill. |
24,072,307 | Although the author has written lots of books before this will be her first time writing a film script.
The first film of the series will be titled Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them.
Rowling said: "I always said that I would only revisit the wizarding world if I had an idea that I was really excited about and this is it."
The new film will feature Newt Scamander, the fictional author of the textbook Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them, owned and read by students at Hogwarts school.
Rowling said: "Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them is neither a prequel nor a sequel to the Harry Potter series, but an extension of the wizarding world."
Warner Bros, the film company that made the Harry Potter movies, does not know yet when the new film will be made. | JK Rowling is to write a series of films featuring popular characters from the world of Harry Potter. |
35,206,711 | Emanuel Lutchman, 25, from Rochester, was charged on plotting to kill people at a restaurant on New Year's Eve.
Mr Lutchman told an FBI informant he would use a machete and knives in the attack, officials say.
Before his arrest, he made a video pledging allegiance to IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the FBI said.
Mr Lutchman came to the attention of authorities after he began expressing support for IS online.
"I will take a life, I don't have a problem with that," Mr Lutchman is quoting as saying in court documents.
A convert to Islam, he has a history of mental illness and lengthy criminal record, officials said.
Authorities in major US cities such as New York and Los Angeles are on high alert for an attack during well-attended New Year's Eve festivities.
New York has deployed about 6,000 police officers to patrol Times Square, which is expected to draw about a million people. | US authorities have arrested a man described as a supporter of so-called Islamic State (IS) and accused him of planning an attack in New York State. |
36,014,639 | 11 April 2016 Last updated at 14:57 BST
The service, a private enterprise known as Petit Train, will operate in May in St Peter Port.
The island had a tram service between St Peter Port and St Sampson from 1879 until it closed in 1934, after passenger numbers fell.
A light railway was later constructed by the German occupying forces in the Channel Islands during World War Two. | The first passenger train service to operate on Guernsey's roads since the 1930s has been trialled. |
33,815,476 | The sharp drop came one day after the struggling smartphone maker reported a record quarterly loss.
For the three months to June, losses hit 8bn Taiwanese dollars (£163m; $253m) from Tw$2.26bn a year earlier.
A pioneer of early Android smartphones, HTC is struggling with competition from Apple, Samsung and Chinese rivals.
The company also said the outlook was weak for the next quarter with revenues expected to fall.
Friday's shares tumble saw the company stocks fall by 10%, which is the maximum allowed on one day. Shares fell to their lowest since February 2005.
The disappointing results were triggered by "weaker than expected demand at the high end along with weak sales in China", the firm said in a statement.
The company also said it would cut jobs and discontinue some of its models to focus more on high-end devices.
"HTC has begun to implement company-wide efficiency measures to reduce operating costs across the organisation and ensure resources are appropriately allocated to future growth," the statement said.
The smartphone maker has been losing market share over the past years, hit by strong competition at the top-end of the market from the likes of Apple and Samsung, while cheaper Chinese rivals have affected HTC's low-cost offerings. | Taiwan's smartphone maker HTC saw its shares fall 10%, the daily trading limit, in the wake of poor earnings and a weak outlook. |
34,556,364 | A softly spoken man, Salman does not exude the charisma of outgoing Fifa president Sepp Blatter or Michel Platini, Uefa's head and a vice-president of football's world governing body - both, of course, currently suspended.
Yet he has forged a seemingly impregnable position at the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) and could be months away from leading the global game.
The 49-year-old, a Manchester United fan and an avid hunter of wild boar, is a cousin of the King of Bahrain and has been at the heart of his country's football since the early 1990s.
During his presidency of the Bahrain Football Association, the national team came to within a match of qualifying for both the 2006 and 2010 World Cups, and finished fourth at the 2004 Asian Cup. Not bad for a country with a population of just over 500,000 people.
One of the recurring questions that dogged his AFC campaign and his successful election concerned his alleged role in human rights violations while head of Bahrain's football federation.
During the series of pro-democracy uprisings referred to as the Arab Spring, a number of Bahraini athletes, including some of the best players from the national football team, were arrested for taking part in protests.
Striker Ala'a Hubail, who was top-scorer at the 2004 Asian Cup, said athletes were tortured before being released without charge.
But Salman's answer was unequivocal: "The question is, do you have proof that the Bahrain FA, under my presidency, took part in non-football activities?"
Nobody did.
But that question has been be resurrected as he hits the Fifa presidential campaign trail.
Since joining Fifa's top table, Salman has quietly grown in stature - and in Blatter's favour.
He chaired the committee that settled the question of when the 2022 World Cup in Qatar should take place.
And he is a voice on the taskforce that is seeking to untangle the football-political dispute between Israel and the Palestinians.
His ideas for Fifa are still unknown, but when he became the head of Asian football, he targeted match-fixing, grassroots development and increasing the number of women players.
Last month, the AFC became the first confederation to hold a women's futsal championship, won by Iran.
But his appreciation of football from a fan's perspective remains open to question.
He did not attend either the opening match or the final of the 2014 World Cup in Brazil and, back in 2013, seemed rather confused when I asked him how his presidency of the AFC would benefit fans.
"I don't know what you mean," he said.
"Will there be a tangible impact for fans at clubs, now that you're here?" I asked.
"I still don't understand your question," he insisted.
Eventually, he said it was down to individual federations to look after the fans.
In the race for Fifa's top job, Salman will face Prince Ali bin al-Hussain of Jordan, a former supporter.
The pair became rivals in 2014 when Salman wrested Asia's much-coveted Fifa vice-presidency away from Ali, leaving the latter furious.
That outmanoeuvring, as well as his election success, was masterminded by yet another Arab royal, Sheikh Ahmad of Kuwait, whose patronage is likely to be decisive once again.
Ahmad is a key player among national Olympic associations and therefore wields extraordinary influence.
In this year's Fifa election, Salman instructed Asia's voters to back Blatter and not Ali who, after all, was one of their own.
When Platini said that he would run in next year's election, Salman backed him, once again ignoring Ali's candidacy.
He should be able to count on most of Asia supporting him and, if Platini - currently suspended for 90 days - is not allowed to run, much of Europe as well.
With Sheikh Ahmad's help in mopping up the other votes he needs, Salman is likely to be a formidable candidate. | I first met Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim al-Khalifa when he became the head of Asian football in May 2013 with a landslide majority. |
27,957,448 | Campaigners have also organised a Save Our Swimming gala taking place later at the Fairfax Street sport centre - home to the Olympic-size pool.
Coventry City Council is proposing closing it and building a new leisure centre with a 25m pool and water park.
The authority said it was currently reviewing the responses from a public consultation into its plans.
Jo Deakin, from Coventry Swimming Club, said the gala was being staged to show the council the benefits of having a 50m pool in the city.
She said: "We are aware of the economics of the situation and that the centre can't go on as it currently is but we want to show this pool is needed not just for us as a club but for the whole city.
"We're not anti-water park but we're saying to the council it shouldn't be instead of an Olympic-sized pool, it should be there to complement it."
A spokesman for the council said: "We are working through the responses to our consultation and carrying out feasibility studies on various options.
"One of those studies is whether it is possible to have a 50m pool at the new proposed site." | More than 6,000 people have signed a petition to save the only 50m swimming pool in the Midlands. |
35,101,502 | Fresh turkey and Brussels sprouts are the cheapest they've been since 2011. Stuffing, Christmas pudding and mince pies are all selling, on average, for less this year than last.
So consumers can feel a little less guilty for having an extra helping this Christmas.
The findings, from price comparison site MySupermarket, are based on average prices across branded and unbranded goods in the major food retailers in the UK.
The comparison site believes it is competition between these major retailers that is pushing prices lower.
"There is a price war going on - with the big five supermarkets fighting to get customers into their stores," says Kim Ludlow, managing director of MySupermarket.
But their research also reveals the benefits of shopping around, with some of the most popular items - like puddings or turkeys - being discounted in a store. But those savings can then often be cancelled out with other items becoming more expensive.
"The supermarkets are shouting so much about being the cheapest, that it is becoming white noise - some consumers simply do not believe it any more, and they want to check it out for themselves," Mr Ludlow adds.
The supermarkets' ability to cut costs are down to fundamentals.
Some of the key ingredients in shoppers' trolleys have been coming down in price. A dozen eggs will cost an average of £2.74 today compared with £3.00 in 2011.
Butter is down from £1.54 to £1.49 over the same period of time. Milk is selling at cheaper prices this Christmas than last year.
And this ties in to a wider global picture.
Food, like other commodities such as oil or gold, is traded around the world, and prices are governed by supply and demand.
A current over-supply in the dairy industry has pushed milk prices down by more than 60% in the past two years.
China's appetite for dairy products is not what many in the industry expected, and there is also the effect of sanctions imposed by Russia against EU imports. It means there's more milk, and its by-products, sloshing around than required.
That has a knock-on effect too. A slice of festive Stilton cheese is a pinch cheaper this year.
"The price of milk is important to us, and we have to buy a lot of milk to make our cheese," says Robin Skailes, from Cropwell Bishop Creamery.
"So the prices are bearing on our costs, plus the labour costs. Stilton is a hand-made cheese - there's a lot of work that goes into it and so that does form quite a high proportion of our costs."
So, even though the costs of production are increasing, the retail price is coming down.
Mr Skailes says 98% of cheese is sold in supermarkets and that there are price wars going on at the moment.
He says that with Stilton "being a favourite Christmas product", it might be used by supermarkets to entice people into stores.
The current environment is not just affecting dairy. Anyone wanting an extra couple of pigs-in-blankets shouldn't feel the squeeze - in their wallet anyway.
Global pork prices are the lowest they've been since 2008.
Meanwhile, the weather can also have an impact.
"We've had a bumper year this year," says David Read of food research firm Prestige Purchasing.
"The weather has been not too hot, not too cold. It's been not too wet and not too dry. And so farmers have found themselves with yields that are 10% to 15% higher."
But he says that current conditions are also to do with a favourable pound to euro exchange rate - meaning UK importers of meat and fish can get more for their buck on the continental mainland.
"I think we can be pretty confident that we're going to have low food inflation for at least the next year," he adds.
Anyone looking for a frugal Christmas, it seems, should load up on meat and sugar, and leave the vegetables alone. Potatoes have almost doubled in price at retailers since 2011.
But it is not all good news for shoppers. Some items are more expensive.
Sparkling wine is up to an average of £9.82 a bottle - more than £1 up on 2011. And Christmas pudding prices have risen steadily over the years - although on average they should cost you a little less this Christmas than last. | Cooking up a festive feast is going to be cheaper this year, and many of the key ingredients are selling at the lowest prices seen for years. |
36,397,472 | Ryan Morse, from Brynithel, Blaenau Gwent, died on 8 December 2012 from Addison's disease.
The jury at Cardiff Crown Court was dismissed and the judge acquitted Dr Joanne Rudling, 46, of Cardiff, of manslaughter on Friday.
Dr Lindsey Thomas, 42, from Tredegar, was cleared of manslaughter by gross negligence on 27 May.
A new trial with a new jury will consider a second charge against Dr Rudling of perverting the course of public justice.
The doctors had been accused of not asking enough questions about Ryan's condition before he died. Both had denied the charges.
The court has previously heard Ryan's death could have been prevented if he had been examined at any point up until a couple of hours before it happened.
Mrs Justice Nicola Davies ruled there was insufficient evidence.
She said: "I had decided that there was no case upon which a properly directed jury could convict Dr Rudling." | The second of two GPs accused of unlawfully killing a 12-year-old boy has been cleared. |
35,756,883 | About half of them on a good day, he replied.
While the worlds of comedy and business may not initially appear to have much in common, a growing number of firms are in fact turning to comedians to help them boost staff communication, performance, and creativity. And to enable senior bosses to improve their public speaking and presentation skills.
For businesses who want their workers to be as happy and productive as possible, it is no laughing matter. Except when it is.
Companies that are now using comedians include internet giant Google; social media firm Twitter; soft drinks business Red Bull; and German engineering group Siemens. And if those four firms ever walked into a bar together, Red Bull would be the best mixer...
At Quebec's National Comedy School in Montreal, Canada, its team of comedians has been offering training courses to businesses since 2009. It currently has 30 clients on its books, including insurance group Sun Life and Siemens' Canadian division.
Rather that teaching people to tell jokes, the visiting workers are typically asked to put on red noses and behave like clowns.
They are asked to practise pratfalls, pretend to bump into things, and even mock-slap their colleagues in the face.
"These kind of games are childish and make people lose their grounding," says Louise Richer, the founder of the comedy school.
"They allow creating safety zones, where people can say whatever they want without the fear of being judged, and where they can interact with their colleagues differently."
According to the 63-year-old, most people are unaware of their comedic potential, and have forgotten that they have imagination, two characteristics which can greatly benefit the typical workplace.
She adds: "What we do is take the same humour processes and tools that comedians use, to help businesses and employees increase their creativity, facilitate communication, think outside the box, and break some old habits."
While Ms Richer admits that she continues to face scepticism from some business quarters, a growing body of research is highlighting the importance of humour in the workplace, including reports from Harvard University in the US, and UK business psychology firm, Robertson Cooper.
Professor Eric Romero, a US-based leadership expert, says: "Humour is very useful to create group cohesiveness, and increase communication."
In the north-eastern US city of Boston, comedy group Improv Asylum uses similar techniques to Quebec's National Comedy School to help companies improve their productivity and creativity.
Its corporate training division, IA Innovation, advises Google, Twitter and Red Bull, to name but three household names.
Chet Harding, who founded Improv Asylum in 1998 after a decade working in advertising says: "The original idea [for the training courses] came from the communication problems I observed when I was working in advertising agencies.
"It was clear to me that the skill sets we use when we do improvisation on stage could be used by businesses to increase their communication and creativity."
The 45-year-old adds: "By using humour, we allow great ideas to come from anywhere. Humour breaks down barriers, and people end up having really creative ideas."
One business that recently used IA Innovation was Virgin Pulse, the maker of a health tracking mobile phone app.
John Sutliffe, vice president of sales at Virgin Pulse, says: "We were looking for something unique... a different twist on corporate training.
"It was the highlight of our sales kick off! Very different from your more traditional corporate training workshops... It was a rousing success."
However, before every company rushes to hire a comedian, the use of comedy in a corporate setting can easily backfire.
Back in 2014, research showed - perhaps unsurprisingly - that if a manager tells bad jokes all the time, it can significantly damage staff morale.
The study by Gang Zhang, a postgraduate student at London Business School, warned that if a boss wanted to tell jokes, he or she had better be sure they had the talent to do so effectively.
Meanwhile, John Nicholson, founder and chairman of Europe's first business psychology firm, Nicholson McBride, says: "It's only safe to use humour in business when you understand your audience well enough to know what tickles them.
"Provided you do, humour allows you to deliver tough but necessary messages, because it keeps people listening to unwelcome news instead of switching off. It just takes the edge off the situation."
Back at Quebec's National Comedy School, Ms Richer says she has been fighting for comedy to be taken seriously in the business community for almost 30 years.
"We still face resistance, and people still tell us what we do is stupid, but we are evangelical." | Did you hear the one about the boss who was asked how many people work in his company? |
36,355,493 | Woakes, who was called up to replace Ben Stokes for the second Test against Sri Lanka on Friday, went for 17 runs with no reward off his first six overs.
He then took nine wickets in 14 overs for 19 runs as Durham, although saving the follow-on, were bowled out for 190.
The Bears, who totalled 313 in their first innings, then closed on 15-2.
Woakes was due to travel to Chester-le-Street straight after the end of day two, to be replaced for the rest of the Divison One game by leg-spinner Josh Poysden, with the approval of both Durham and the ECB.
He therefore came in to open when Warwickshire's second innings began, but he was one of two quick victims for former England seamer Graham Onions, who also bowled nightwatchman Chris Wright.
Wright had more success in his time at the crease earlier in the day when he extended his ninth-wicket stand to 52 with Jeetan Patel, helping the Bears add a further 40 runs to their overnight 273-8.
In reply, Durham made a sound start as openers Mark Stoneman (36) and Keaton Jennings (29) put on 61 for the first wicket, only to cave in alarmingly once Woakes had made the breakthrough.
Woakes' bowling figures were the best by a Bears player since the late Jack Bannister took 10-41 against the Combined Services at the old Mitchell & Butler ground in 1959. Eric Hollies also took all 10 for Warwickshire in a Championship game in 1946.
Woakes' nine wickets, four of them caught behind and two clean bowled, are the eighth-best figures in first-class cricket for Warwickshire. His own previous career-best was 7-20 against Hampshire, also at Edgbaston in 2011.
He is the first Bears player to take eight wickets or more since Imran Tahir in 2010 - and the first to take nine in an innings in English cricket since James Harris took 9-34, also against Durham for Middlesex a year ago.
The 27-year-old, who won the last of his six England caps in January in South Africa, has taken eight Test wickets at 63.75 and made 129 runs at 21.50.
But he has started the 2016 season well, having now taken 21 County Championship wickets, as well as hitting a century when captaining the county in Ian Bell's absence in last week's win against Nottinghamshire.
Warwickshire all-rounder Chris Woakes told BBC WM:
"I just hit my rhythm. I got the wicket of Mark Stoneman and after that felt really good. I probably felt as good as I have all year so it's nice to be in that rhythm going into a Test squad.
"To get a five-for was nice but then to finish it off with nine was pretty special. But there was some really good work done at the other end. It just happened to be my day to take the wickets.
"It just clicked from that end after lunch. I didn't try to do anything different to what I normally do but it was fortunately just my day. The ball swung all day which was nice.
"Yesterday we were 200-2 and that was a position we definitely didn't expect to be in because the wicket did a bit but Andy Umeed got a great hundred."
Durham batsman Mark Stoneman:
"Woakesie was pretty impressive. He extracted more than anyone else out of the surface and was pretty relentless in doing so.
"They kept it tight at the other end so the pressure kept building as the scoreboard didn't move and he put enough balls in a good area to take wickets.
"Credit goes to Woakeie. He's going to get the headlines but I imagine they will be pretty happy with the way they bowled as a unit.
"We tried as best we could to stick it out but it seemed every time he was about to take a break he took a wicket." | Warwickshire's Chris Woakes took a stunning career-best 9-36 at Edgbaston as he warmed up for a possible England Test recall by bowling out Durham. |
26,727,829 | John Leonard Scollay, 40, who was known as Leonard, from Lerwick, was killed when the Diamond went down.
Shetland Coastguard received a Mayday call from the boat at about 02:55, reporting that it had hit rocks on the approach to West Burrafirth Pier.
A local boat, Diana Maxwell, recovered one man from the water. A second was recovered by the Aith RNLI lifeboat.
Both men were airlifted to Gilbert Bain Hospital.
The other crew member was said to be in a "stable" condition.
A report will be submitted to the procurator fiscal. | A fisherman has died after a scallop boat sank after hitting rocks off Shetland. |
38,166,600 | The rate of new cases of HIV in Northern Ireland increased by 81% in the 10 years to 2015.
During the same time, rates of new HIV cases fell across the UK as a whole by 23%.
Speaking on World Aids Day, Jacquie Richardson of charity Positive Life, said attitudes in NI were not helping.
"That this is a gay men's disease, that you can catch it from sitting beside someone and holding their hand or from sharing crockery or using the same toilet facilities," she said.
"Some of those myths are still very, very much out there."
The Public Health Agency (PHA) has said that HIV prevalence in Northern Ireland remains lower than in the other UK countries.
However, the percentage increase in annual new diagnoses in NI between 2005 and 2015 is highest of UK countries.
"I've been living with HIV now for seven years and the first couple of years I would have said the virus affected me - living with HIV was difficult.
"But actually, what really affects me now, more than anything, is other people's views and opinions of HIV and me living with HIV.
"I've had people who have completely cut me out of their lives - friends, after my diagnosis, who I have never spoken to again because they were worried to be seen with me or to be friends with me because of it.
"I've got really horrendous abuse on social media, where I've had death threats.
"I've had to get the police involved, because I've had a man who said he wanted to come and stamp on my chest because he thought he would do the world a favour by killing me before AIDS killed me.
"Within Northern Ireland, we have a complete lack of awareness and a complete lack of education around HIV."
During 2015, 103 new cases of HIV were diagnosed in Northern Ireland.
The key routes of transmission remain sexual contact involving men who have sex with men (58%) and sexual contact between men and women (34%).
Dr Neil Irvine of the the PHA said that many people who are living with HIV have no obvious signs or symptoms.
"The only way of knowing if you have the virus is by taking a HIV test. It is important not to delay seeking advice and taking this test if you feel you have been at risk," he said.
"The earlier the condition is diagnosed the more successful treatment is likely to be.
"People with HIV have a near-normal life expectancy if diagnosed early and treated promptly. It is estimated that the majority of onward transmission is from those with undiagnosed HIV." | A charity which supports people with HIV and Aids has said myths about the virus persist in Northern Ireland. |
40,415,425 | Up to 14 people, many of whom are homeless, were seen barbecuing in St John's in Devizes at the weekend.
They claim they had permission from the church and were not being disrespectful as it was not a "recent grave".
But Revd Canon Paul Richardson, said permission was "categorically" not given and it was "disgraceful" graves were "being shown such disrespect".
On Saturday night the group used the top of a tombstone in the Wiltshire churchyard to cook sausages on two disposable barbecues.
When details of the graveyard barbecue appeared on social media, opinions were divided.
One person said: "I'm so shocked, it makes me sad. I really don't understand how anybody has the audacity to do this".
Another said: "I know this is an old grave but this is still someone's resting place - it's so disrespectful."
By contrast, another posted on Facebook that she would be "quite happy to think someone was having a party on my grave one day".
The individuals involved in the barbecue said the churchyard was "where we live" and they would be doing it again.
"Pretty much everyone who was down here at the time was homeless," they said.
"Where else are we going to have a barbecue, it don't burn the graves and no way is it disrespectful because nobody has visited this grave."
But Revd Canon Richardson, said the individuals "do not have permission to be in the churchyard".
"It is disgraceful that the graves of our local ancestors are being shown such disrespect," he said.
"The church has been active in working with Wiltshire Council in trying to home the individuals involved but we are told that they have been reluctant to accept any provision offered." | The vicar of a church where a 200-year-old tombstone was used for a barbecue has called it "disgraceful". |
31,770,510 | It feels like an open-air concert - men, women and children are cheering and trying to get the best vantage point to watch the performance.
The two girls they want to see are 15-year-old Saania and 13-year-old Muqqadas Tabaydar, also known as 'Justin Bibis'.
The teenage sisters became an internet sensation when a video of them singing Justin Bieber's song Baby, with their mother doing background beats on a pot, went viral.
People in Pakistan took to social media. Some announced that Bieber had "competition" in these two girls.
"Pakistan's got talent" was another popular comment about the sisters.
"We've been singing since we were very young - many members of our family sing too. We know all sorts of Pakistani and Bollywood songs," said Saania.
"But we especially love Justin Bieber songs because they touch our hearts.
"When we heard Baby, we started dancing and jumping around and we just lost ourselves to it," she added.
Her sister Muqqadas said they have both listened to the song about 70 times.
"When I heard the song I forgot to eat or drink. I was just listening. I kept practising and practising until I learned it by heart.
"This song has been really lucky for us because we've now become famous!"
Saania and Muqqadas come from a very poor family and dropped out of education after primary school.
They do not speak much English so to learn the song they sounded out the words and transcribed them into Urdu.
They coached each other on the lyrics and the melodies.
They were soon picked up by local television channels who invited them to perform live.
The new-found fame is a big shift from their daily life.
"We really didn't expect all of this to happen to us, to be famous like this. Because of this video we got on a plane for the first time and we've been on TV. That's always been our dream.
"We had our hair and make-up done. We'd never been to a beauty parlour before. All of it was like magic so who knows what will happen next," said Saania smiling.
Their mother Shahnaz Tabaydar said she was also a big fan of Justin Bieber.
"I still can't believe all of this happened to my daughters, all thanks to Justin Bieber. I like him a lot. I feel he's like my son.
"I wish that my girls could one day become professional singers in Pakistan and India. I hope they get the support they need."
Mrs Tabaydar said the girls were taken out of school because the family was too poor. "But I really want them to go back," she said.
Their father said he was proud of his daughters.
Pakistan is a religiously conservative country and girls singing in public is frowned upon. But their father says they have not received any criticism.
"My daughters do something not many others girls can do. They sing English songs which are very hard for them, but they manage it."
Saania and Muqqadas say they want to travel the world.
"Our biggest wish, though, is to meet Justin Bieber and to sing with him." | Neighbours gather at windows and on rooftops surrounding the Tabaydar house in a very poor neighbourhood on the outskirts of Lahore. |
33,540,242 | Teachers will encourage students to use "mind exercises" that train their attention on the present, such as deep breathing, in the Wellcome Trust study.
Scientists say there is limited research to show mindfulness works.
The study will see teenagers fill in questionnaires about their mood to see if it does have an effect.
Mindfulness is already taught in some schools, but in this first large-scale trial, researchers want to find out whether introducing mindfulness to teenagers early on could help build their psychological resilience.
They suggest that, just as going for a run can help protect and improve physical health, mind exercises could be linked to better mental fitness and less mental illness overall.
Sessions include a practice known as "thought buses", where children are encouraged to think of their thoughts as buses that they can choose to board or let pass by.
Others focus on deep breathing - for example, counting in for seven seconds and breathing out for 11.
In each case the aim is to focus attention on the here and now, to make students aware of impulsive behaviour, and - over time - improve their ability to solve problems when under stress.
Researchers plan to recruit about 6,000 children aged 11 to 14 in 76 schools.
Half will be given 10 mindfulness sessions over a school term. The others, for comparison, will attend personal and social education classes as usual.
Throughout the study, students will fill in questionnaires assessing their mood and risk of developing depression.
Teachers will also be asked about the students' wellbeing and any positive or negative effects they notice.
A separate, smaller group will have laboratory-based tests and brain scans.
But schools will have to decide how to juggle the sessions with the rest of the school day and teachers need four days of training before they begin.
The trial, expected to begin late next year, will run for five years, including a follow-up period of two years for each student.
Haroon, a student at UCL Academy in London, says without mindfulness he would probably be much more rowdy in class.
He told the BBC: "Children our age might think it is just a waste of time, just sitting there.
"But I don't agree. For example, certain thoughts might hold you back but just thinking about them and reflecting on them might help you think about them in different ways."
The £6.4m programme will be carried out by teams at the University of Oxford, University College London and Medical Research Council over seven years.
William Kukyen, a professor of psychology at Oxford, says they are approaching the trial with an open mind.
But he argues that adolescence could be a key time to intervene - research increasingly suggests mental illness often takes root before before the age of 15 and that the brain goes through an intense period of development during teenage years. | Thousands of teenagers across the UK will have school lessons in mindfulness in an experiment designed to see if it can protect against mental illness. |
38,742,690 | They said 43 others, including seven journalists, were injured after bombs exploded at the Dayah hotel - although there have been no official numbers.
Somali security minister Abdirizak Omar Mohamed earlier said four attackers had been killed by security forces.
The Islamist militant group al-Shabab has said it carried out the attack.
Eyewitnesses said the attackers used a vehicle laden with explosives to blast their way into the hotel, where members of parliament were believed to be staying.
Shortly after the first blast, another vehicle exploded, killing and wounding more people who had gathered in the area.
Survivors described how hotel residents hid under beds and others jumped out of windows to escape from the attackers.
Hassan Nur told the AP news agency: "They [the gunman] kicked down room doors and at some point posed themselves as rescue teams by telling those inside to come out, (only) to kill them.''
Police officer Colonel Abdiqadir Hussein told Reuters that security forces had later managed to secure the building.
"We have rescued the people and concluded the operation at Dayah hotel," he said.
"The security forces are now inside the hotel."
The hotel is located less than a mile from Somalia's presidential palace and is popular with dignitaries.
The attack comes at a time when the country is preparing for indirect elections where MPs are set to choose a president. | Ambulance workers in the Somali capital Mogadishu have told the BBC they have counted 28 dead bodies at a hotel following a bomb attack by militants. |
38,827,601 | The Championship side also strengthened their grip on third place with a 1-0 win at Birmingham City on Tuesday.
"We needed to have extra bodies in the squad when you look at the number of games towards the end of the season," Stam told BBC Radio Berkshire.
"Maybe we will have injuries and suspensions that will stretch us."
Bournemouth striker Grabban, 29, West Ham defender Oxford, 18, and Crystal Palace midfielder Mutch, 25, have all joined on loan until the end of the season.
"We're always looking for quality players in the squad and I think every manager wants that," Stam said.
"Reece Oxford gives us an extra defender in the squad, he's a young and very talented player and he has the quality that we need in how we play.
"He's highly-rated and everyone is happy to have him in the squad. Jordan Mutch has the experience that maybe other players in the squad don't have.
"Maybe that will make my life more difficult or perhaps easier in terms of making selection choices." | Reading manager Jaap Stam believes his three deadline day signings, Lewis Grabban, Reece Oxford and Jordan Mutch, will add "quality and experience". |
37,274,601 | City lost 6-0 to East Thurrock United on Saturday to drop to fourth-from-bottom in National League South.
"I'm looking for leaders and at the moment no-one seems to want to be a leader out there," Hodges said.
"I can hear myself on the sidelines screaming and shouting, but I can't hear too many others doing that."
The loss was Truro's worst since a 6-0 defeat by Oxford City in August 2015, which preceded a run of just two losses in their next 28 league and cup games.
But Hodges says he is worried that there did not seem to be the right reaction in the dressing room after their latest heavy loss, which came after conceding four first-half goals - including three in the space of eight minutes.
"That's what happens with a group of lads that don't have that fight about them at the moment," he told BBC Radio Cornwall.
"They're all just sitting in there looking around at each other, when you want people in there having their say.
"But no-one seems to be saying anything at the moment, there's just one voice and that's me at the moment who is trying to kick every ball and tackle every ball at the same time." | Truro City's lack of leadership on the pitch was exposed as they suffered their biggest home loss for a year, according to manager Lee Hodges. |
35,154,681 | Lawyers in the case said the boy's parents had sought a second opinion.
In October, a High Court judge, heard the Polish boy had vanished and made a written order stating efforts should be made to find him.
Mr Justice Mostyn granted an application, made by an NHS trust, allowing doctors to perform surgery.
He had urged the boy's parents to co-operate with doctors.
Doctors said the boy's parents preferred to treat their son with "Chinese medicine".
Specialists said the boy would die a "brutal and agonising death" within six months to a year if a tumour was not removed "very soon".
He was told there was evidence the boy, who cannot be identified, had left his home in England with his mother and that his father had boarded a ferry bound for France.
At the latest hearing, lawyers told another judge at the Family Division of the High Court in London that the boy had been traced to an address in Poland.
They told Mr Justice MacDonald that the boy was with his mother and that his father had returned to England.
Lawyers said the plan was for mother and child to return to England by Christmas.
Mr Justice MacDonald heard submissions from lawyers representing the hospital, the boy's father and from Cafcass - a Government-funded social work organisation which reviews local authority plans for children.
The case is due to be re-analysed at a further family court hearing in January. | A 10-year-old boy, who needs urgent surgery for jaw cancer, is in Poland and could be back in the UK by Christmas, a family court has heard. |
36,901,113 | Mr Macri said every 37 hours a woman was attacked in Argentina and that education was the key to ending deeply rooted cultural patterns of violence.
The plan, due to start next year, includes creating a network of women's refuges, and money for the electronic tagging of violent men.
Last year 235 women were killed in gender violence incidents in Argentina.
The government's National Plan for the Eradication of Violence against Women is putting into force a 2009 law.
Brazil's new femicide law
Argentine women hit back
Presenting the plan President Macri said: "We all need to commit ourselves. This is not only the job of government it is for society too."
Maria Fabiana Tunez, the president of the National Council of Women, a government agency, said the plan would last three years and include introducing gender violence awareness into the school curriculum. Staffing at a telephone helpline for women will also be increased.
The national plan comes after a series of rallies and demonstrations in several cities last year.
The initial demonstration last year followed the murder of a 14-year-old pregnant schoolgirl, Chiara Paez, who was found buried in her boyfriend's garden three days after being reported missing in the town of Rufino in central Santa Fe province.
In the past year there have been protests elsewhere in Latin America against gender violence, in countries including Mexico, Bolivia, Colombia and Brazil. | The Argentine President, Mauricio Macri, has announced a national plan to fight violence against women. |
38,510,141 | "We look forward to welcoming Dean to the club," Inverness tweeted.
The 22-year-old was previously with Shamrock Rovers and most recently with Bluebell United in the Leinster Senior League.
He has also featured in the League of Ireland for Longford Town and Athlone Town.
Like the other 11 Scottish Premiership clubs, bottom side Caley Thistle are currently on their winter break and return to action when they visit Elgin City in the Scottish Cup on 21 January. | Inverness Caledonian Thistle have agreed terms with Irish forward Dean Ebbe on a deal subject to international clearance. |
32,066,762 | It followed reports of problems at Bilston Glen, which previously handled calls from the Lothians and Borders.
Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie said the control room in Midlothian was struggling to cope following the closure of the Glenrothes control room in Fife on 17 March.
He told Holyrood more than 1,000 calls were lost in one day, and non-emergency calls took 40 minutes to answer.
The Glenrothes control room is one of five across Scotland scheduled to be closed as part of the reorganisation of the Scottish Police Service.
Dumfries and Stirling closed earlier, with Glasgow city, Inverness and Aberdeen to be shut later in 2015.
Police Scotland said the rationalisation, reducing the number of control rooms from 11 to four, would save £6m annually.
Speaking at First Minister's Questions, Mr Rennie said: "The closure of Dumfries last year was described as shambolic.
"Stirling was closed, and only weeks later had to re-open in an emergency, and Aberdeen and Inverness are still to come.
"I am alarmed that the first minister seems to be unaware of the problems because earlier this month there was almost a critical incident because staff levels were so low."
He called on the government to halt further closures.
Police Scotland has disputed the detail of the claims made by Mr Rennie.
Ch Supt Val Thomson said: "It does not take callers 58 minutes to get through when they call Police Scotland using 101 or 999.
"The average time taken for connecting a 101 non-emergency call is one minute, with many calls being answered in less. The average response for a 999 call to be answered is nine seconds.
"When you dial the 101 non-emergency number, callers have a menu of options that is intended to prioritise those calls that have an incident or crime to report."
Ch Supt Thomson added: "On Saturday 21 March 2015 there was an issue with one call received by the Bilston Glen Service Centre where the caller chose an option which is treated as a lower priority. This call stayed in the queue longer than expected. Action has been taken to stop this happening again.
"We do not recognise the claims made by Mr Rennie about the Stirling Centre opening in an emergency. There remained a presence in Stirling when the workload transferred to Bilston Glen, in the form of a Police Assistance Desk (a facility where police officers take crime reports over the phone and provide advice and guidance to members of the public)."
Nicola Sturgeon said she would raise the matter with the justice secretary and Police Scotland.
"People have the right to get a high-quality service from the police and where for any reason that is falling short then we will ensure that action is taken to rectify that," she said.
The matter was raised again in a member's debate initiated by Labour's justice spokesman Hugh Henry.
He said the experience of the two-year period since Police Scotland was established had given "grave concern".
Mr Henry said he was not criticising individual officers or non-uniformed staff.
But he criticised the force's watchdog body, the Scottish Police Authority (SPA), which he characterised as a "toothless tiger".
Mr Henry told MSPs: "It is largely ineffective and comes to the game after the event rather than setting out its policies and expectations in advance."
The debate followed criticism of Police Scotland over the way it has implemented controversial policies including stop and search, arming officers on routine duties and the closure of police station public counters. | Police Scotland has been urged to halt its programme of control room closures. |
31,469,401 | Firearms officer Carol Howard, 35, was "singled out and targeted" for nearly a year, a panel ruled last year. She has now decided to leave the police.
The Met said it "deeply regrets" the impact of the discrimination.
Ms Howard, of Purley, south London, brought a claim of discrimination at the Central London Employment Tribunal in 2014.
Her lawyer Kiran Daurka, of Slater and Gordon, said: "Carol is sad to leave the Metropolitan Police but her legacy to fellow officers is that her case has now led to a serious and thorough review of the way in which the MPS deals with discrimination complaints from officers."
In a statement, the Met said it "deeply regrets the impact the discriminatory conduct had on PC Howard, and wants to stress there is no room in the MPS for racism and sexism or victimisation".
The Met said it had agreed a final settlement against the officer's existing legal claims.
The force added that in September 2014 it said it would fully support Ms Howard's return to work, but after recent discussions it became clear she did not wish to continue her career with the Met.
The Met said: "The MPS respects PC Howard's decision and wishes her well in the future."
During the hearing last year, the panel was told that an internal report had been deliberately rewritten ahead of the tribunal.
An officer was asked to delete references in the report into discrimination related to race or sex, the panel said.
A judgement issued by the panel which heard the case said the Met "directly discriminated" against Ms Howard "on the grounds of sex and race" between 31 January and 29 October 2012.
A number of Ms Howard's complaints of "victimisation" were "well-founded", the tribunal added.
The 35-year-old had worked in the Diplomatic Protection Group (DPG), which provides protection for foreign embassies and missions in London.
Her superior, acting Insp Dave Kelly, subjected her to "a course of conduct which was detrimental to her", the panel said.
The panel also found that the Met also tried to "deflect" negative press by releasing information about Ms Howard.
While the force did not name PC Howard in a press statement, a draft version was altered to include more detail about her three arrests linked to a domestic dispute with her estranged husband.
After the tribunal last September Ms Howard received £37,000. | The Metropolitan Police has agreed a final settlement with an officer it discriminated against. |
36,295,095 | The 28-year-old Argentine surpassed Gunnar Nordahl's record of 35, which had stood since 1949-50.
Higuain struck twice in 17 minutes after the break before netting with a bicycle kick from the edge of the area.
Victory secured second place - and a spot in next season's Champions League group stage - for Napoli.
They finished two points above Roma, who beat AC Milan 3-1 and will go into the Champions League play-offs.
Juventus, who sealed a fifth successive title in April, finished ninth points clear of Napoli.
Check out Serie A's top scorers here
Match ends, Napoli 4, Frosinone 0.
Second Half ends, Napoli 4, Frosinone 0.
Attempt saved. Dries Mertens (Napoli) header from the centre of the box is saved in the centre of the goal. Assisted by Elseid Hysaj with a cross.
Corner, Napoli. Conceded by Matteo Ciofani.
Attempt blocked. Faouzi Ghoulam (Napoli) left footed shot from the left side of the box is blocked. Assisted by Gonzalo Higuaín.
Foul by Vlad Chiriches (Napoli).
Daniel Ciofani (Frosinone) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Corner, Napoli. Conceded by Massimo Zappino.
Attempt saved. Lorenzo Insigne (Napoli) right footed shot from outside the box is saved in the bottom right corner. Assisted by Dries Mertens.
Substitution, Napoli. David López replaces Marek Hamsik.
Attempt missed. Marek Hamsik (Napoli) left footed shot from the centre of the box misses to the left. Assisted by Lorenzo Insigne.
Attempt missed. Daniel Ciofani (Frosinone) right footed shot from the right side of the six yard box is too high.
Attempt saved. Daniel Ciofani (Frosinone) right footed shot from the centre of the box is saved in the centre of the goal.
Corner, Napoli. Conceded by Matteo Ciofani.
Offside, Frosinone. Paolo Sammarco tries a through ball, but Massimiliano Carlini is caught offside.
Attempt blocked. Daniel Ciofani (Frosinone) right footed shot from outside the box is blocked. Assisted by Robert Gucher.
Substitution, Frosinone. Danilo Soddimo replaces Alessandro Frara.
Substitution, Napoli. Vasco Regini replaces Kalidou Koulibaly.
Foul by Vlad Chiriches (Napoli).
Massimiliano Carlini (Frosinone) wins a free kick in the attacking half.
Offside, Frosinone. Matteo Ciofani tries a through ball, but Daniel Ciofani is caught offside.
Goal! Napoli 4, Frosinone 0. Gonzalo Higuaín (Napoli) right footed shot from the centre of the box to the high centre of the goal. Assisted by Dries Mertens.
Attempt missed. Marek Hamsik (Napoli) right footed shot from outside the box is too high. Assisted by Dries Mertens.
Offside, Frosinone. Daniel Ciofani tries a through ball, but Massimiliano Carlini is caught offside.
Attempt saved. Faouzi Ghoulam (Napoli) left footed shot from the centre of the box is saved in the centre of the goal. Assisted by Dries Mertens.
Attempt blocked. Marek Hamsik (Napoli) left footed shot from outside the box is blocked. Assisted by Allan.
Substitution, Frosinone. Robert Gucher replaces Federico Dionisi.
Substitution, Frosinone. Massimiliano Carlini replaces Oliver Kragl.
Attempt missed. Daniel Ciofani (Frosinone) right footed shot from the centre of the box misses to the right following a set piece situation.
Oliver Kragl (Frosinone) hits the bar with a left footed shot from outside the box from a direct free kick.
Foul by Allan (Napoli).
Daniel Ciofani (Frosinone) wins a free kick in the attacking half.
Foul by Dries Mertens (Napoli).
Adriano Russo (Frosinone) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Substitution, Napoli. Dries Mertens replaces José Callejón.
Allan (Napoli) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Foul by Paolo Sammarco (Frosinone).
Goal! Napoli 3, Frosinone 0. Gonzalo Higuaín (Napoli) right footed shot from the right side of the six yard box to the bottom left corner. Assisted by Elseid Hysaj with a cross.
Attempt missed. Lorenzo Insigne (Napoli) right footed shot from outside the box misses to the right. Assisted by Marek Hamsik.
Attempt missed. Oliver Kragl (Frosinone) left footed shot from outside the box misses to the right. Assisted by Paolo Sammarco. | Gonzalo Higuain broke the record for goals in a Serie A season, scoring a hat-trick to take his total to 36 as Napoli thrashed Frosinone. |
22,374,473 | His selection as Wales' representative for the Venice Biennale this year has already proved popular with the critics - the London broadsheets have dispatched their finest to the Welsh countryside to peer inside his office, and hear a hint of what he has planned.
Only a large telescope, set up next to his computer, offers a clue as to the theme of his Venice exhibition.
It's the concept of the amateur astronomer that's inspired the work that will fill six rooms of a former convent later this month.
"There are obvious links between Venice and astronomy - Galileo unveiled his telescope there - but it's the amateur astronomer that I've focused on," he said.
"Of all the amateur pastimes, astronomy is the one where the practitioners have an active part in the progression of that field. People at home spot comets, moons and planets."
Williams wants to celebrate the amateurs who spend their lives looking out into space.
At least one of the rooms in his exhibition will contain an observatory, while ideas of size and distance are explored with giant everyday objects in the style of Alice in Wonderland.
The world's press will get a first glimpse of his work at the end of May, before the six-month exhibition opens to the public at the beginning of June.
It's costing around £400,000 to have a Wales exhibit at this year's Biennale. The bill is being picked up by the Arts Council of Wales and the Welsh government.
Williams thinks it's right for Wales to attend.
"It's kind of like the art Olympics, but without the bad dress sense," he said.
"All the other countries of the world are there as well, so it makes sense for Wales to be there.
"I think we have a tendency to be an inward-looking outfit as a country, and maybe in a way although this exhibition has no Welsh content - no red dragons or sheep - that idea of looking in and looking out is something that Welsh people ought to think about."
The artist Osi Rhys Osmond chaired the committee that selected Williams for this year's Biennale.
"In choosing an artist like Bedwyr, who is at the cutting edge of contemporary practice, we are showing the world that we are a modern mature country, that we can deal with the latest ideas, that we have people who are on a par with anyone across the international stage," he said.
"And it's a moment that Wales needs to take particular pride in.
"We are there among the best and we are showing work that will be among the most talked about work in Venice this year and, I believe, for years to come."
Bedwyr Williams And The Starry Messenger opens at the 55th Venice Biennale from June to November 2013. | Bedwyr Williams works from a new tin shed in the garden of his home in Rhostryfan, a one-road village near Caernarfon, Gwynedd. |
30,376,995 | Sheeran, who is an ambassador for East Anglia's Children's Hospices (EACH), donated 21 items for the £10m appeal to build a new hospice in Norfolk.
The highest-valued item was a camouflage hoodie which fetched £990.
Earlier this year, other items of Sheeran's clothing raised thousands of pounds for several charities in Suffolk.
Sheeran, from Framlingham, Suffolk, has just returned to the top of the UK singles chart with Thinking Out Loud, while his latest album X has sold over a million copies in the UK.
EACH began the Nook Appeal earlier this year to build a new centre at Framingham Earl to replace the one at Quidenham in Norfolk.
Sheeran posted a message about the latest auction to his millions of followers on Twitter on 28 November.
He wrote: "I donated all my favourite clothes to @EACH_hospices including all my hoodies."
Also sold on eBay, alongside four hoodies, were a "previously-owned" T-shirt featuring Boba Fett from Star Wars, which fetched £251, and a pair of Adidas trainers, which raised £275.
Simon Hempsall, marketing manager for EACH, said: "We're extremely grateful to Ed for this fairly unique fundraising opportunity for the Nook Appeal and have been blown away by the response to the auction - helped in no small way by him tweeting it to his 11.4 million followers." | Clothes owned by singer Ed Sheeran have been sold for £7,500 to raise money for a children's hospice. |
32,864,082 | Emma Caldwell, a 27-year-old heroin addict who had been working as a prostitute, was discovered dead in woods near Biggar in May 2005.
The Lord Advocate has given the instructions to Police Scotland after the most senior officers in the Crown Office considered the case.
Ms Caldwell's family have been informed of the developments.
It follows a BBC File on Four investigation into the police inquiry, in which a local suspect was dropped in favour of prosecuting four Turkish men.
The programme revealed that officers who wanted to charge the local man, one of Emma's clients, were stopped by senior detectives investigating the Turkish suspects.
One of the Turkish men, who was charged with murdering Ms Caldwell, was awarded an out-of-court settlement after suing police for false arrest.
Ms Caldwell was last seen alive in the Govanhill area of Glasgow in April 2005. Her family said she turned to drugs, then prostitution to feed her habit, following the death of her sister.
A Crown Office spokesperson said: "The Lord Advocate has instructed Police Scotland to carry out a reinvestigation into the murder of Emma Caldwell.
"The decision to reinvestigate followed careful consideration of the case by Crown Counsel - the most senior lawyers in Crown Office.
"Unresolved homicides are never closed. COPFS maintains a database of all cold case homicides and cases to which the Double Jeopardy (Scotland) Act may apply.
"The Cold Case Unit works closely with Police Scotland to review these cases to ascertain if there are any new evidential developments, including advances in forensic techniques, which would assist in providing a basis for criminal proceedings."
Police Scotland said they would meet with Ms Caldwell's family to explain their plans.
Assistant Chief Constable Malcolm Graham said: "Police Scotland is at an advanced stage in its preparations to undertake a reinvestigation into the murder of Emma Caldwell.
"All necessary resources with the appropriate skills and experience will be deployed to ensure a thorough reinvestigation takes place.
"Senior officers from Police Scotland will be meeting with the family to outline the plans already in place and provide further information on the areas to be explored in an attempt to identify new evidential opportunities.
"Detectives will be using the most up-to-date investigative techniques, particularly those in forensics, within which there has been significant advances in recent years. It is hoped these advances will assist officers in the reinvestigation of the case." | Police have been told to reinvestigate the unsolved murder of a woman killed in South Lanarkshire 10 years ago. |
35,503,542 | 5 February 2016 Last updated at 12:39 GMT
The smoke lit up the sky with bolts of lightning, caused by tiny pieces of rock, ash and ice rubbing together and making static electricity.
Sakurajima's last major eruption was in September. This area of the country sits on the Pacific "Ring of fire" and has more than 100 volcanoes.
The Ring of Fire is an area where earthquakes and volcanic eruptions happen a lot.
There have been no reports of anyone having been hurt by Sakurajima's eruption so far.
If you want to learn more then check out Newsround's guide to what causes volcanoes. | The Sakurajima volcano, on the island of Kyushu in Japan, has started erupting throwing lava and ash in to the air in spectacular style. |
40,765,726 | Sanchez was set to report back for pre-season on Sunday after his summer break, but has stayed away because of illness.
"He has flu, yes. I had him on text yesterday," said Wenger after Saturday's 5-2 win over Benfica.
"There's no development - he is staying, of course."
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The striker posted a picture on Instagram on Friday with the one word caption 'sick.' He had been given permission to return to pre-season training late after helping Chile to the Confederations Cup final in Russia.
Sanchez, 28, is entering the final year of his Arsenal contract, as are Mesut Ozil, Kieran Gibbs, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Jack Wilshere.
But Wenger, who signed a new two-year deal of his own in May, does not believe that uncertainty over their futures will have a negative impact on the squad.
"The players who have one year of their contract have to respect their contract and play out their contract," Wenger said.
"For a manager, it's a bit different because it concerns more what is the future of the club.
"The players were thinking, 'What's going on and what's happening?', so it creates uncertainty [with my contract] because it's a global policy.
"I am responsible for the global policy of the club but for the players it is different."
Arsenal impressed as they beat Benfica, with Theo Walcott scoring twice and Olivier Giroud and Alex Iwobi also on target while Lisandro Lopez scored an own goal. | Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger expects Alexis Sanchez to return to training on Tuesday after repeating his belief that the forward will stay at the club. |
30,325,418 | The BBC survey suggests the average spend in the county is expected to be £433.16 - £30 less than the average across the areas surveyed.
The figures suggest 52% of people in Lincolnshire are worried about Christmas spending, the joint highest.
However, only 7% of people said they may resort to borrowing.
People in North Yorkshire are expected to spend the most at £508.82 while the average spend across Yorkshire, North Derbyshire and Lincolnshire is expected to be £463.83.
Across Yorkshire, North Derbyshire and Lincolnshire 50% of people surveyed for the BBC said they were concerned about their festive spending.
Concern is highest amongst those aged 18-34 and those with children under 18.
Jane Symonds, money expert at the Money Advice Service, said: "Christmas can be an expensive time of year, but it's important to know that you don't have to live beyond your means to make it a fun time. A big financial hangover is the last thing anyone wants to start the new year with.
"Planning ahead by looking carefully at costs will help you to take control of your spending and reduce some of the pressure. It's best to avoid credit if you can, but if you need to borrow there are more options if you think ahead."
Across the areas surveyed those planning to borrow 68% said they would use their credit card, 18% plan to ask friends and family for help, 18% will use their overdraft, six percent will go to a pay day lender, six percent will take out a loan, and two percent say they will go to a credit union.
On average people said they expected to borrow about £180.
Men said they were likely to borrow on average £214.76, while women said they expected to borrow about £146.36.
More than half of all borrowers said it would take them between a few weeks to a year to repay their debt.
Kevin Peachey, personal finance reporter, BBC News
Financial advisers say it is never too late to draw up a budget for your Christmas spending.
Those who get into trouble often forget to factor in those little extras that add to the festive bill.
So, as well as presents, food and travel, advisers urge families not to ignore the cost of replacing decorations, calling relatives and even taking the children to Santa's grotto.
They suggest shopping around on the internet for all these things to get the best deal.
Those who turn to credit may be deferring the pain, but missing repayments in the new year could start or continue a debt spiral that may be difficult to pull out of.
Instead, advisers say, keep things under control this year, and start saving now to bring some Christmas 2015 cheer to your family and your finances.
Market research agency ComRes interviewed 1,270 people across Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, of which 501 were in West Yorkshire, 305 were in South Yorkshire and North Derbyshire, 335 in North Yorkshire, 179 in East Yorkshire and northern Lincolnshire and 189 in Lincolnshire.
The online survey was carried out for BBC Radio Lincolnshire between 27 November and 1 December. | People in Lincolnshire have come bottom of a Christmas spending league following a survey of more than 1,200 people across the county and Yorkshire. |
34,323,782 | The statistics are contained in the Scottish Health Survey for 2014.
They suggest a 1% decrease for adults and just a 1% increase for children meeting the government's recommended guidelines for exercise.
Only 4% of those questioned said they were thinking about doing more sport as a result of the Glasgow Games.
Low activity is the second biggest cause of mortality in Scotland and contributes to about 2,500 deaths each year.
The 2014 Commonwealth Games were held in Glasgow last summer with much made of the legacy and lasting impact the event would have on people across Scotland.
It was one of the key promises made by organisers - that Glasgow 2014 would inspire the nation to become more active.
The Scottish Health Survey - an annual snapshot of the nation's state of health - asked those taking part about the impact of the Games on their attitudes to sport and exercise.
About one in 20 adults (6%) said that they were more interested in sport and physical activity as a result of the Games, with 4% saying they were thinking about doing more physical activity.
The survey found that in 2014, 63% of adults took part in the recommended 150 minutes of moderate activity each week, compared with 64% the previous year.
Just over three quarters (76%) of children met the guidelines of 60 minutes of activity each day (that included school-based activities).
The health survey looked at what people see as being the main barriers to playing more sport.
Those who had not played sport in the last month gave reasons including poor health (35%), lack of time (32%), and a lack of interest (17%).
Diarmid Campbell-Jack, research director at ScotCen Social Research which carried out the survey, said: "We have only seen very small proportions of adults in Scotland claiming that the Commonwealth Games had influenced, changed their attitudes to, or increased their participation in, sport.
"We know from elsewhere in the Scottish Health Survey that poor health, a lack of time, and lack of interest are the main barriers people mention when asked why they hadn't taken part in sport recently - this suggests a wide range of issues need to continue to be considered when addressing this issue."
Prof Nanette Mutrie, director of physical activity for the Health Research Centre at Edinburgh University, said the figures were "disappointing" but that it was maybe too early to judge the impact of the Games.
She said: "We thought Scotland's approach of having a legacy at the forefront of the Commonwealth Games would have made a difference, but no country has seen an upturn in participation levels on the back of a major sporting event.
"We do have a long-term strategy in Scotland that has been in place since 2003, we have a national walking strategy and almost 100% of schools now have two hours of PE and so we may not see the benefits for the next five years." | There has been almost no change in levels of physical activity in Scotland since the Commonwealth Games, according to new figures. |
38,497,997 | China Railway already runs services between China and other European cities, including Madrid and Hamburg.
The train will take about two weeks to cover the 12,000 mile journey and is carrying a cargo of clothes, bags and other household items.
It has the advantage of being cheaper than air freight and faster than sea.
The proliferation of routes linking China and Europe is part of a strategy launched in 2013 aimed at boosting infrastructure links with Europe along the former Silk Road trading routes.
London will become the 15th European city to join what the Chinese government calls the New Silk Route.
The service will pass through Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus, Poland, Germany Belgium and France before arriving at Barking Rail Freight Terminal in East London, which is directly connected to the High Speed 1 rail line to the European mainland.
Because of the different railway gauges involved, a single train cannot travel the whole route and the containers need to be reloaded at various points.
The Chinese government is keen to boost its economy in the face of slowing export and economic growth. | China has launched a direct rail freight service to London, as part of its drive to develop trade and investment ties with Europe. |
36,264,229 | Temp worker Nicola Thorp, 27, from Hackney, arrived at finance company PwC to be told she had to wear shoes with a "2in to 4in heel".
When she refused and complained male colleagues were not asked to do the same, she was sent home without pay.
Outsourcing firm Portico said Ms Thorp had "signed the appearance guidelines" but it would now review them.
More on this story and other news from London
High heels and flip-flops: Work dress code victims
PwC said the dress code was "not a PwC policy".
Ms Thorp said she would have struggled to work a full day in high heels and had asked to wear the smart flat shoes she had worn to the office in Embankment.
But instead she was was told she should go and buy a pair of heels on her first day, back in December.
"I said 'if you can give me a reason as to why wearing flats would impair me to do my job today, then fair enough', but they couldn't," Ms Thorp told BBC Radio London.
"I was expected to do a nine-hour shift on my feet escorting clients to meeting rooms. I said 'I just won't be able to do that in heels'."
Ms Thorp said she asked if a man would be expected to do the same shift in heels, and was laughed at.
She then spoke to friends about what had happened, and after posting on Facebook realised that other women had found themselves in the same position.
"I was a bit scared about speaking up about it in case there was a negative backlash," she said. "But I realised I needed to put a voice to this as it is a much bigger issue."
She has since set up a petition calling for the law to be changed so women cannot be forced to wear high heels to work. It has had more than 10,000 signatures, so the government will now have to respond.
As the law stands, employers can dismiss staff who fail to live up to "reasonable" dress code demands, as long as they've been given enough time to buy the right shoes and clothes.
They can set up different codes for men and women, as long as there's an "equivalent level of smartness".
Read more here.
"I don't hold anything against the company necessarily because they are acting within their rights as employers to have a formal dress code, and as it stands, part of that for a woman is to wear high heels," Ms Thorp said.
"I think dress codes should reflect society and nowadays women can be smart and formal and wear flat shoes.
"Aside from the debilitating factor, it's the sexism issue. I think companies shouldn't be forcing that on their female employees."
Simon Pratt, managing director at Portico, said it was "common practice within the service sector to have appearance guidelines", which Ms Thorp had agreed to.
"These policies ensure customer-facing staff are consistently well presented and positively represent a client's brand and image."
However, he said the firm had "taken on board the comments regarding footwear and will be reviewing our guidelines".
A PwC spokesman said the company was in discussions with Portico about its policy.
"PwC outsources its front of house and reception services to a third party supplier. We first became aware of this matter on 10 May, some five months after the issue arose," the spokesman said.
"PwC does not have specific dress guidelines for male or female employees." | A London receptionist was sent home from work after refusing to wear high heels, it has emerged. |
34,049,869 | The man, from County Galway, was taken to Letterkenny General Hospital but died at about 22:30 local time.
Another fisherman, a 46-year-old from the Philippines, who was also on the boat, is in a critical condition in hospital.
It is believed the men were cleaning tanks in a refrigeration unit on the boat in Killybegs. | A 27-year-old fisherman has died after being overcome by fumes while working on a trawler in County Donegal. |
38,787,708 | Holgate Windmill in York reopened in 2012 following a £500,000 restoration project.
The 18th century Grade II-listed building currently produces about 50kg (8st) of flour a week which is sold to restaurants and individuals.
The money raised is used to help maintain the building.
The Holgate Windmill Preservation Society said training more volunteers would help increase the amount of stone-ground flour produced.
Steve Potts, chairman of the society and one of three trained millers, said the ancient skill only takes a couple of months to learn.
"It's not a reading skill, it's a doing and learning by experience skill," he said.
"We started off reasonably gradually because we're a volunteer group and it's supposed to be fun but we are trying to make more money out of the milling."
The windmill originally produced flour from the 1770s to the 1930s but fell into disrepair until the society began work to restore it in 2001. | A community group which restored one of the oldest surviving five-sailed windmills in the country is seeking volunteers to train as millers. |
39,139,535 | At the close of trade on Thursday, shares were $24.48 each, up from their opening offer price of $17 a share.
It left Snap valued at almost $30bn, although it has never made a profit.
The firm's initial public offering is the biggest for a US tech firm since Facebook in 2012 and will turn the company's founders, Evan Spiegel and Bobby Murphy, into multi-billionaires.
Snapchat, which is especially popular with teenagers, allows users to send images and messages which then vanish.
The company's losses widened last year, and user growth is slowing down in the face of intense competition from larger rivals such as Facebook.
Despite the challenges in converting "cool" into cash, Snap's valuation is the richest for a US tech flotation since Facebook in 2012.
At the beginning of February Snap's formal announcement to regulators of its plans revealed that the company had revenue of $404m last year, but made a loss of $515m.
Unlike in most listed companies, people who buy the floated shares in Snap will not get any voting rights.
Some analysts argued the company was overvalued.
"Snap is a promising early stage company with significant opportunity ahead of itself.
"Unfortunately, it is significantly overvalued given the likely scale of its long-term opportunity and the risks associated with executing against that opportunity," wrote analyst Brian Wieser from Pivotal Research in a note. He gave it a "sell" rating.
Others were more positive.
Before the trading debut, Jordan Hiscott, chief trader at Ayondo Markets, said: "What sets it apart from other messaging apps like WhatsApp for me is the innovative features built into the app's interface, such as the lenses function.
"A pertinent point in the company's S1 filing for the IPO is that it doesn't call itself a messaging service, but a camera company."
"This seems to be an intentional move to differentiate it from Facebook and Twitter and the success and failure of their respective IPOs, which in my view, is very clever." | Shares in Snap, owner of messaging app Snapchat, rose 44% in their first day of trading on the US stock market. |
39,911,569 | They say they would make it easier for councils to purchase derelict land for new rented housing projects.
Their plans involve offering "fixed term" council houses to be sold off after 10 to 15 years, with any proceeds reinvested in social housing.
Labour said the plans were "political spin, with no substance".
"There's no commitment on the number of new affordable homes or on new funding," said the party's housing spokesman, John Healey.
Labour has promised to build a minimum of one million new homes over the next five years, with at least half to be council or housing association properties.
The Tories said they expected "thousands" of homes to be built each year with "hundreds of millions" of pounds invested over the course of the next parliament, without giving precise figures.
Under their proposals, the government would "strike deals" with councils and housing associations, offering direct funding to enable them to build more homes and make it easier for them to acquire land for development.
This would include changing the compulsory purchase rules so councils could buy derelict brownfield land at below market value.
In return, some of the homes would have to have a fixed-term social rent - typically 10 or 15 years - after which they would be sold, with the tenant being given the first option to buy.
The Conservatives said this would allow increases in land and property values over that period to be reinvested in social housing.
Prime Minister Theresa May said the housing market was "broken" and vowed to fix it.
Mrs May said: "Giving tenants a new right to buy these homes when they go on the market will help thousands of people get on the first rung of the housing ladder, and fixed terms will make sure money is reinvested so we have a constant supply of new homes for social rent."
BBC political correspondent Iain Watson says the policy is aimed at voters who might not be traditionally Conservative supporters, including some of the million people on housing waiting lists.
Anne Baxendale, acting director of communications for housing charity Shelter, welcomed the proposals.
She tweeted: "Reports of pledge for new council housing v exciting & testament to how far we've come that this is now x-party consensus."
In February, the government set out a string of measures aimed at increasing the number of affordable homes in its housing white paper, including giving councils the power to pressurise developments to start building on land they own.
Labour has put housing at the forefront of its election campaign, promising 100,000 new social homes a year with investment from a new national infrastructure fund.
Mr Healey said: "Under Theresa May and the Tories we've seen seven years of failure on housing, with the level of new affordable housebuilding now at a 24-year low."
Mrs May could not "sidestep her share of the blame for the Tory housing crisis", he added.
In other general election news, Jeremy Corbyn's party said it would impose a tax on financial transactions to raise billions of pounds for public services.
The Lib Dems, meanwhile, are offering a cash incentive to engineering and technology graduates who sign up for the armed forces.
Party leader Tim Farron said the £10,000 "golden handshake" would help address a "critical skills shortfall" in the services.
It would be paid to recruits who committed to serve for five years. | The Conservatives are promising a "new generation" of social housing will be built in England if they win the general election. |
39,097,043 | The VF-17 follows the team's debut, the VF-16, which took Haas to an eighth-place finish in their maiden season.
It features many of the elements seen on other cars following new regulations aimed at making the cars faster and more demanding.
"It is very different from last year's car," said team principal Guenther Steiner.
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"You always try to make a faster car, which is normally a lighter car. Now we can put on more ballast and get better weight distribution. The aero is completely new, as are the tyres, so we needed to have some built-in adjustability.
"Aesthetically, the car has a more aggressive look. It's lighter and more aerodynamically efficient. Everything we learned from our first car has been applied to our new car."
Kevin Magnussen will partner Romain Grosjean after leaving Renault in November.
Grosjean tweeted: "Looking sharp and fast, isn't it?"
The VF17 will make its track debut on Monday for the first day of pre-season testing at Circuit de Barcelona - Catalunya.
Analysis
BBC Sport chief F1 writer Andrew Benson
The key issue for Haas in 2017 is not to fall prey to 'second season syndrome'.
Their debut in 2016 was impressive in parts - but so it should have been with a car that was effectively a mildly tweaked Ferrari.
A sophomore year, when a new team races a car they had to design while competing with their first one, is traditionally much more difficult.
Haas' business plan is to buy as many parts off the shelf from Ferrari as possible - which basically means everything bar the monocoque and aerodynamic surfaces. So, unsurprisingly, Ferrari influences are visible again.
In truth, a consolidation of last year's eighth place in the championship would be a decent effort. | Haas have launched their new car for the 2017 season ahead of pre-season testing in Barcelona. |
34,518,634 | The design contract, worth between £40m and £50m, covers about 29 miles of the road's western section, east of Auldearn to east of Fochabers.
Earlier this year a £30m contract was awarded to design 19 miles of dual carriageway between Inverness and Nairn.
Ministers said the contract marked "a further milestone" in the project.
The work to upgrade the latest section of A96 forms part of a wider project to build 88 miles of dual carriageway between Inverness and Aberdeen.
The latest design contract is expected to be awarded early next year,
Infrastructure Secretary Keith Brown said: "The publication of this contract notice marks another significant milestone in a dualling programme that will deliver a number of benefits when completed, including improved journey time and reliability, improved connectivity and improved road safety for all those who use this key artery connecting two of Scotland's economic hubs.
"With the Scottish government making major infrastructure investment in projects like the A9, new Queensferry Crossing and recently completed Borders Railway, this contract for the A96 further underlines the significant investment we are making in our transport network across Scotland." | Companies have been invited to submit designs for the latest stretch of dual carriageway planned for the A96. |
35,013,101 | The deal followed talks between the EU and Norway.
It was agreed that the total allowable catch (TAC) for cod can increase by 15% and North Sea herring by 16%.
Haddock catches have been given a 30% boost with an extra 17% for vessels affected by the discard ban, taking the total increase to 47%.
Scottish Fisheries Secretary Richard Lochhead said: "These significant increases for both haddock and cod, in line with scientific advice, are good news for the fishing industry.
"Following a year which saw landings up by nearly a fifth and revenues worth over £500m these increases in quota mean fishermen can further boost catch and profits and could be worth over £15m.
"This will also help the fleet manage the discard ban, which will stop dead haddock being thrown back into the sea, which will in turn improve the stocks of fish."
Conservative MEP for Scotland Ian Duncan said decisions for every species have yet to be taken, but he voiced his delight with the outcome reached on Friday.
He said: "Let me be clear, on the whole this is a fantastic result for the Scottish fishing industry and I pay tribute to them and all the hard work and pain they have endured over the last decade or so to be in a position today that sees cod TAC increase by 15% to 27,930 tonnes in EU waters.
"Considering where we were not that long ago, this in itself would be incredible.
"But the news for haddock; an increase of almost 50% and north sea herring; an increase of 16% on top of the cod figures leaves the industry in very good heart this evening."
Bertie Armstrong, chief executive of the Scottish Fishermen's Federation, said: "This agreement reflects the healthy nature of our stocks and will bring some welcome relief to our hardworking fishermen who are committed to a sustainable future.
"Challenges remain, and while the quota uplift for haddock and other stocks to cope with the discard ban will be welcomed, only time and a great deal of effort from fisheries managers, the Scottish fleet and the supply chain as whole will help ensure the discard ban scheme works when it is phased in from 1 January 2016." | Significant increases in fishing quotas for Scottish fishermen have been agreed for key stocks next year, according to ministers. |
36,083,676 | Eric Appleby, an engineering student from Liverpool, joined the British Army when war broke out in 1914 and was sent to pre-partition Ireland for training.
He met his sweetheart, Phyllis Kelly, at a dance in her home town of Athlone, County Westmeath, and quickly fell in love.
Their brief courtship was interrupted when Eric was sent to the Front in March 1915 to fight with the Royal Field Artillery.
The couple continued their wartime romance in a series of intense love letters, which became increasingly dramatic and disturbing as Eric struggled to stay alive on the killing fields of France.
Their story - familiar to hundreds of thousands of couples separated by one of the most bloody conflicts in human history - was uncovered in Belfast by chance.
A BBC producer found a collection of their love letters on a dusty shelf in the Linen Hall library and decided to bring the couple's love story back to life a century later.
"In amongst all the World War One books I came across the book 'Love Letters from the Front'," producer Ian Dougan recalls.
"I got this down and was amazed to find that it had never been read, and there were over 200 letters - beautiful letters - that I just felt had to be made into something."
The book was the work of Jean Kelly, who is married to one of Phyllis's nephews, and has now been developed into a landmark, 137-part series starting on Thursday on BBC Radio Ulster.
Two Belfast actors, Ruairi Tohill and Roisin Gallagher, were cast in the roles of Eric and Phyllis and have recorded extracts of the 200 love letters in five-minute instalments.
The instalments will be broadcast just before noon every weekday on BBC Radio Ulster from now until October.
"The letters begin gently as love letters and then become almost a pattern of how World War One panned out," Mr Dougan says.
"From the 'love days' as they called them - boat-rides and sweetheart moments - to the atrocities that Eric witnessed."
In one letter, the frightened soldier describes the terrible scenes unfolding around him as he writes: "Sweetheart, forgive me for not having written, it is impossible to find a moment.
"We are really in it now. There is a fearful din going on at present and shells are falling all around us.
"Quite close to our guns, about 30 yards behind, there is an enormous 17in shell hole - 40ft in diameter and 20 to 30ft deep. Really, it is appalling to look at."
Towards the end of the series, the letters are even more potent, according to the producer, as the shell-shocked soldier's correspondence transports some of the grisly reality of the battlefield back to Athlone.
"Eric's right at the front with the rats and the dead and he's gone slightly mad. He takes the gun out at night with a knife and is cutting off souvenirs off the corpses," Mr Dougan says.
"Phyllis is totally unable to conceive why through the post she's found herself receiving a dead German's lapels.
"She knows by now, because she can follow it in code, where he is and she knows he's right at the front."
The producer believes the pair's love story is symbolic of the war as a whole - from the innocence of its early days to the "midway madness" of the Somme offensive in 1916.
"Not only do you get an insight into this young couple but you also get an insight into the horrors of war."
Love Letters from the Front will be broadcast at 11:55 BST each weekday on BBC Radio Ulster from Thursday 21 April, and will be repeated each weeknight at 23:50 BST. | The real-life love story of an English soldier and the Irishwoman he met during World War One has been dramatised by the BBC using the love letters they exchanged while he fought for his life on the Western Front. |
39,464,056 | Both sides spurned chances early on but it was the Minstermen who took a 25th-minute lead thanks to Vadaine Oliver, who collected possession from Amari Morgan-Smith's through ball before slotting home.
Elliott Durrell went through on goal but was denied by York goalkeeper Scott Loach while at the other end Jon Parkin's long-range effort struck the inside of the post before bouncing clear.
Either side of half-time, Lynch expertly saved twice from Morgan-Smith, who struck the post on the hour mark, but the visitors guaranteed victory 15 minutes from time courtesy of Danny Holmes' half-volley.
York move up to 19th in the table and a point above the bottom four after Torquay and Woking were held to draws at Aldershot and Barrow respectively while Braintree were beaten at home to Dover.
Report supplied by the Press Association.
Match ends, Chester FC 0, York City 2.
Second Half ends, Chester FC 0, York City 2.
Substitution, York City. Adriano Moke replaces Amari Morgan-Smith.
Goal! Chester FC 0, York City 2. Danny Holmes (York City).
Tom Shaw (Chester FC) is shown the yellow card.
Amari Morgan-Smith (York City) is shown the yellow card.
Substitution, Chester FC. Luke George replaces Blaine Hudson.
Substitution, Chester FC. Theo Vassell replaces Johnny Hunt.
Substitution, Chester FC. Kane Richards replaces Lucas Dawson.
Second Half begins Chester FC 0, York City 1.
First Half ends, Chester FC 0, York City 1.
Lucas Dawson (Chester FC) is shown the yellow card.
Goal! Chester FC 0, York City 1. Vadaine Oliver (York City).
First Half begins.
Lineups are announced and players are warming up. | York climbed out of the National League relegation zone after a 2-0 win at mid-table Chester. |
22,167,294 | Media playback is not supported on this device
The club, now owned by the Pompey Supporters' Trust (PST) had been in administration since 17 February 2012 and were close to being liquidated.
I would like to pay tribute to Portsmouth supporters for giving their financial backing to the Trust's rescue plan and for turning out in force throughout the administration as it has kept the club in business
But an out-of-court settlement between the former owners and administrators for ownership of Fratton Park allowed a takeover to be completed.
They had already been relegated from League One.
It was speculated Portsmouth's points deduction would be carried into next season but the Football League announced on Saturday the punishment would come into effect straight away.
As well as the 10-point deduction the league have also imposed a number of conditions on the club such as restrictions on playing budgets, future borrowing and loan repayments for the next five seasons.
"I would like to welcome the Pompey Supporters' Trust to the Football League and pay tribute to their efforts to save their club," said Football League chairman Greg Clarke.
"They have galvanised the Club's fans and the City of Portsmouth behind their cause and ensured that it continues to have a professional football club.
"However, the hard work is only just beginning and we will continue working with the new owners to help them establish a sustainable future for Portsmouth Football Club, so that it can put its long running financial troubles behind it for good.
"This has been an extremely challenging situation for the Football League, given the level of debt, the length of the administration and the issues surrounding the ownership of Fratton Park. I take my hat off to everyone involved, as it has taken significant amounts of hard work, clear thinking and resolve to achieve this outcome.
"Finally, I would like to pay tribute to Portsmouth supporters for giving their financial backing to the Trust's rescue plan and for turning out in force throughout the administration as it has kept the club in business. Hopefully, this marks the start of a better future."
In the time that Pompey have been in administration, every senior player has left the club.
For the club to exit administration, settlements had to be reached with secured creditors as well as former owners Portpin.
Potential buyers included former owner Sulaiman Al Fahim, disgraced former Watford owner Laurence Bassini and Keith Harris, former head of failed investment bank Seymour Pearce.
But, as prospective owners came and went, the bid from the supporter-led consortium remained throughout.
Backed by several wealthy investors, including local businessman Iain McInnes, ordinary fans pledged £1,000 each to be part of the Trust.
Together, they raised nearly £3m, which was added to by a £1.45m bridging loan, as well as investment from their property partner Stuart Robinson.
The Trust has now taken control of the club, along with Fratton Park and the land surrounding the ground.
"What a momentous day!" said Ashley Brown, the PST chairman. "Once again Pompey fans have shown why they are some of the best in the land. We now have a club owned by people who truly love it, its fans. That's how football is supposed to be."
Trevor Birch, joint administrator of Portsmouth Football Club (2010) Ltd and partner at BDO LLP, said: "We have cleared the final hurdle: all of the paperwork has now been signed and the sale concluded.
"It has taken more than 14 months of hard work from all concerned to get here and there were many times over that period when I didn't think we would make it; but we have, and Portsmouth Football Club can once again look forward to the future with optimism.
"The PST has shown what can be achieved when fans unite together for the good of their community. The club has been through considerable turmoil over the last few years, and I hope it can now enjoy a period of stability and the chance to build solid foundations for a sustainable future based on hard work and honest endeavour."
McInnes, chairman of Portsmouth Community Football Club, said: "It has been a very difficult journey to get to this point but in the end we have achieved the right result. Now is the time for Pompey fans to get behind the club and we are looking forward to celebrating becoming a community club at Fratton Park this Saturday afternoon."
Portsmouth, two points off the bottom of League One and eight points adrift of safety with only two games left prior to their 10-point deduction, will play in League Two next season.
They face Sheffield United on Saturday and will announce a new management team on Monday. | Portsmouth's 10-point deduction will be imposed this season, after coming out of administration on Friday. |
19,464,638 | Corby Borough Council said in a report on the £12m overspend that firm Hawkins Brown did not stick to its brief.
Hawkins Brown withdrew the legal threat but wrote to every councillor in Corby in August, asking them for a chance to defend itself.
However, councillors have been told not to respond "for legal reasons".
The Cube houses council offices, a library, theatre and register office. It cost £47.5m and opened in November 2010.
In the letter to councillors, Roger Hawkins from Hawkins Brown said: "We are concerned that the Public Report of Scrutiny Review into the Cube, Parklands Gateway is unfairly critical of work carried out by ourselves and the whole design team."
The company said the report contained a number of false statements and inaccuracies.
Norman Stronach, acting chief executive of Corby Borough Council, said: "Whilst Corby Borough Council takes the letter into consideration we have advised that councillors do not respond directly for legal reasons.
"The council is planning on reconvening the Scrutiny Panel which undertook the Cube report to take into account the comments made in the letter and decide if it makes any alteration to the recommendations given."
The report also criticised the board that oversaw the construction of the building, describing it as "ineffective in controlling or giving direction to the project".
Corby Borough Council said it was also awaiting the Audit Commission's independent report. | The firm of architects which helped to design the Corby Cube has withdrawn its threat of legal action against the borough council. |
40,855,911 | Ms Swift, 27, accuses broadcaster David Mueller of slipping his hand under her dress while they posed backstage together at one of her 2013 concerts.
Her lawyer said in his opening statement at the court in Denver, Colorado, that Mr Mueller had "grabbed her rear end".
Mr Mueller sued the singer in September 2015, calling her allegation false.
He said she had cost him his $150,000-a-year job as a host at country station KYGO-FM.
Ms Swift - who was in court on Tuesday - countersued a month later, saying what occurred at the city's Pepsi Center was assault and battery.
On Tuesday, jurors were shown a photograph of the alleged assault at a VIP room meet-and-great before the gig on 2 June 2013.
In the picture, Mr Mueller and his then-girlfriend, Shannon Melcher, stand with Ms Swift in the middle.
All are smiling, and Mr Mueller's right hand is hidden behind the Shake it Off singer.
Mr Mueller's lawyer, David McFarland, said in his opening statement the image shows his client's hand "is not underneath Miss Swift's skirt, and her skirt is not rumpled in any fashion".
"David Mueller unequivocally denies he touched her inappropriately in anyway," Mr McFarland said as his client looked on in court.
"Falsely accusing someone of inappropriate touching is equally offensive, equally wrong and should not be tolerated."
In his opening statement, Mr Mueller said he had only sued "to clear his name and for lost earnings", denying reports that he was seeking $3m in damages from the radio promotions director of his former station.
But Ms Swift's attorney, Douglas Baldridge, said Mr Mueller had given seven accounts of what happened.
He had also destroyed taped conversations about the incident with his bosses, said the lawyer.
Mr Baldridge told the eight jurors: "What's wrong with this picture? A woman gets assaulted, a woman reports it, and she gets sued."
He added: "It's not inappropriate touching. It's assault."
On 3 June, Mr Mueller met his bosses. He was fired the next day on the basis he had violated a "morals clause", according to Mr McFarland.
Ms Swift, who was 23 at the time of the incident, is suing Mr Mueller for the symbolic amount of $1.
She was accompanied in court by her mother Andrea.
Ms Swift also attended jury selection on Monday.
Her fans, known as Swifties, waited outside court from the early hours for a chance to get one of the court's 32 public seats. | Pop star Taylor Swift is "absolutely certain" she was groped by a Colorado radio DJ, a court has heard. |
35,047,596 | The magazine said it had found the mysterious "Satoshi Nakamoto", the man whose name has been linked with the creation of the currency.
That "scoop" apparently proved false - Dorian Nakamoto (birth name Satoshi) ended up suing Newsweek after he said his life was turned completely upside down.
And so it is with that rigmarole still fresh in our minds that I tentatively offer this article from Wired which says Bitcoin creator "Satoshi Nakamoto" is a pseudonym used by a 44-year-old Australian cryptologist named Craig Steven Wright.
"Either Wright invented bitcoin," Wired's Andy Greenberg and Gwen Branwen write, "Or he's a brilliant hoaxer who very badly wants us to believe he did."
Bitcoin is a virtual currency built around a complicated cryptographic protocol and a global network of computers that oversees and verifies which coins have been spent by whom. Its anonymous nature means it is a popular choice for criminal activity as it is extremely difficult to trace who is spending Bitcoin.
The currency's creator (or creators, perhaps) is proving just as difficult to trace.
Wired cite leaked documents it says shows communication between Dr Wright and his lawyers in which he is reported to have said: "I did my best to try and hide the fact that I've been running Bitcoin since 2009.
"By the end of this I think half the world is going to bloody know."
I've tried to reach Dr Wright, but to no avail. His blog was taken offline shortly after Wired published its report, while Dr Wright's Twitter account went from being protected to being deleted altogether.
According to the online profiles that remain online, he runs DeMorgan Ltd, a Sydney-based company that looks at "alternative currency".
For the full break down of Wired's body of research into Dr Wright, I urge you to read their full article. But it can be summed up as:
- Blog posts apparently published well before the launch of Bitcoin sharing and seeking expertise on creating cryptocurrencies.
- A request for people to email him details by using an encrypted key previously linked to someone identifying themselves as being Satoshi Nakamoto.
- A post announcing the launch of Bitcoin that was later deleted and replaced with a note saying "the best way to hide is right in the open".
Furthermore, leaked emails and transcripts back up what the magazine says - pointing to Dr Wright having huge stashes of Bitcoins, which he among other things used to invest in setting up a Bitcoin bank.
But, and it's a big but, Wired is quick to pre-emptively point out the potential holes in its theory - saying it could be a very elaborate hoax.
"The unverified leaked documents could have been faked in whole or in part," the magazine said.
But later adds: "But this much is clear: If Wright is seeking to fake his Nakamoto connection, his hoax would be practically as ambitious as bitcoin itself."
The body of evidence presented is certainly compelling, and fills in many of the holes not covered by other supposed outings of the mysterious Satoshi Nakamoto, who is fast becoming something of a Lord Lucan for the digital world.
Follow Dave Lee on Twitter @DaveLeeBBC | You may remember Newsweek creating headlines around the world when it "outed" the creator of digital currency Bitcoin as being a 64-year-old Japanese American living near Los Angeles. |
35,150,054 | Reports say the business, which began 92 years ago and was once a major focus for betting, may fetch up to £100m.
Sportech combined the pools brands by buying Littlewoods Gaming in 2000, Zetters in 2002 and Vernons in 2007.
The pools are now played by about 300,000 people, though at their height 10 million players took part.
Players pick up to 12 games that they predict will finish in a draw, with each team scoring at least two goals.
Famous winners include West Yorkshire factory worker Viv Nicholson who scooped £152,319 in 1961, the equivalent of £3.1m today, and vowed to "spend, spend, spend" her winnings.
Trading in Netplay shares on Aim, the stock exchange index for smaller, fast-growing companies, was suspended after it confirmed it was in talks with Sportech. | The Football Pools could be about to change hands after Netplay TV said it was in talks to buy the business from current owner Sportech. |
38,314,493 | The suspects are thought to have used fake accounts to join the scheme. They then disabled the cars' GPS-trackers and sold the cars for parts.
Police were alerted when car-sharing service Enjoy said 100 of its red Fiat 500s had been stolen in six months.
The service's owner ENI said it had lost €1.5m (£1.25m; $1.6m).
According to police, the thieves, based around Naples, joined the car-sharing scheme by creating fake accounts using stolen identities and credit card details.
They would then take the train to Rome, take as many as three of the distinctive red cars at a time and disable their GPS trackers before driving back at high speed by motorway to Naples. At that point the cars were dismantled and their parts sold off.
After police began investigating the gang, a second GPS tracker was installed in the cars which helped lead investigators to the suspects.
However, the gang soon spotted the second device and threw it into the street.
Police said their breakthrough finally came when they raided a house belonging to two of the suspects where they found credit cards, ID cards, phone Sim cards and social security numbers, all in other people's names.
Many of the details had been used to create car-sharing accounts, police said. The three suspects were detained on allegations including aggravated theft and unauthorised use of a credit card. | Three people have been arrested in Italy on suspicion of stealing more than 100 Fiat 500 cars from a car-sharing company in Rome. |
40,568,609 | The notes, written in 1975 to a professor who had been hired to read to Mao, were sold at Sotheby's in London for £704,750 ($910,000).
The auction house said the manuscripts were of the "utmost rarity".
The notes relate to classical Chinese literature and poetry, something the Chinese leader was known to enjoy.
They were written the year before Mao died, as his health deteriorated.
His sight was failing and he struggled to read, so requested the presence of a literary expert to read to him.
A scholar, Di Lu, was found, and the two began meeting. But because Mao was having trouble articulating words, she asked him to write his thoughts down on a notepad to ease communication.
The notes were the product of these meetings and offered, Sotheby's said, "numerous valuable insights into Mao's thinking on literature".
Mao Zedong led the Chinese Communist Party, which defeated the Kuomintang in 1949 and founded the People's Republic of China.
As a young man he worked in Peking University Library and was known throughout his life as a keen reader and writer of classical literature, despite his revolutionary political values.
Sotheby's said the notes had been bought by a Chinese collector, after attracting interest from around the world.
Gabriel Heaton, a books and manuscripts specialist from the auction house, said they gave "an indication of Mao's cultural hinterland, of his interests far beyond politics and his deep knowledge of classical Chinese literature".
Asked why they had gone for a much higher price than the £60,000-80,000 estimate, he said manuscripts written by Mao were "exceptionally rare on the market, which makes it very difficult for us to estimate them in the first place".
Interest in items linked to Mao was strong, particularly in Asia and China, he said.
Earlier this year, a silkscreen portrait of him by Andy Warhol fetched $11m at auction in Hong Kong. | A collection of handwritten notes by Mao Zedong, the founder of modern China, has been sold at auction for 10 times its estimated price. |
34,774,577 | After rising at first, the FTSE 100 index fell 21.17 points to 6,273.99.
Anglo American was down 5.4% and other mining shares were lower after metals prices dropped, with copper near a six-year low.
Shares in credit data company Experian rose 6.5% after the company said it was increasing its half-year dividend and extending a share buyback by $200m.
National Grid shares rose 2.2% after it said it would sell a majority stake in its gas distribution business and posted a 15% rise in half-year profits.
Shares in Vodafone climbed 4.4% after it said revenue growth had picked up in the second quarter.
The latest update from broadcaster ITV helped to push its shares up 0.9%. It reported a 13% rise in revenues for the nine months to the end of September, helped by strong advertising sales during the Rugby World Cup.
On the currency markets, the pound slipped 0.1% against the dollar to $1.5101, and was flat against the euro at €1.4059. | (Morning): The FTSE 100 fell after a decline in mining shares offset the impact of a bunch of upbeat results. |
40,432,509 | The 23-year-old has been with the Robins since January 2016, having previously played for clubs including Notts County and Wolves.
He made 46 appearances in all competitions for Cheltenham in the 2016-17 season.
"He's got a lot of potential and is one of our best athletes," manager Gary Johnson told the club website. | Cheltenham Town defender Jordan Cranston has signed an extended one-year deal with the League Two club. |
40,990,937 | The church said the 84-year-old's health had taken a "defining turn".
Cardinal Cormac became the tenth Archbishop of Westminster in March 2000, was made Cardinal in 2001 by Pope John Paul II, before retiring from his role as archbishop in 2009.
As archbishop, he was the leader of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales.
Cardinal Vincent Nichols, the current Archbishop of Westminster, has asked for prayers.
In a statement on the diocese of Arundel and Brighton website, where Cardinal Murphy-O'Connor used to be bishop, Cardinal Nichols said "these loving prayers are a source of great strength and comfort as he calmly ponders on all that lies ahead".
Cormac Murphy-O'Connor was born on 24 August 1932 in Reading, Berkshire, as one of six children. Three of his five brothers became priests and another played rugby for Ireland.
He was ordained priest in Rome in October 1956.
During an appearance on Desert Island Discs, he admitted that during his time training for the priesthood at the English College in Rome, he learned how to make a good Martini cocktail.
He returned to the college as rector from 1971-77 and on leaving was appointed as Bishop of Arundel and Brighton before taking up his role at Westminster Cathedral. | The former Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, is seriously ill in hospital. |
33,750,502 | Keeper Petr Cech misjudged Dimitri Payet's free-kick to allow Cheikhou Kouyate to nod in the Hammers' first.
After the break, Mauro Zarate finished from 20 yards after being gifted the ball by the Gunners defence.
Arsenal had 62% of possession, but put just six of 22 shots on target as Aaron Ramsey's first-half effort against the bar was the closest they came.
Gunners fans, who left the Emirates Stadium in large numbers before the final whistle, will feel like they have seen all this before, not just in the way their side performed, but also in the familiarity of their starting line-up.
Cech's arrival from Chelsea has been Wenger's only summer signing since last term's third-place finish, and it was an uncharacteristic display from the experienced keeper.
The 33-year-old was not only at fault for West Ham's opener, but was wrong-footed by Zarate's strike, although he received little help from his defence as Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Francis Coquelin gave the ball away on the edge of their own area.
Olivier Giroud frequently looked isolated up front, which will no doubt increase the hope among Arsenal supporters that a reported deal for Real Madrid forward Karim Benzema can be completed.
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Bilic, 46, replaced Sam Allardyce this summer and was handed a remit of getting the east London club playing 'the West Ham way' - a brand of football based around an attacking and entertaining approach.
But the Hammers showed the battling qualities Bilic was renowned for during his spell as a defender with the club from 1996 to 1997.
Reece Oxford, who became his side's youngest-ever Premier League player at the age of 16 years and 237 days, epitomised West Ham's fighting spirit, screening his defence superbly from midfield.
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Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger: "We were not convincing offensively or defensively. I knew it it could be a tricky game, if you can't win the game, make sure you don't lose it.
"The players were maybe too nervous and put too much pressure on themselves.
"Today we have been hurt mentally and it is a good opportunity to respond."
West Ham manager Slaven Bilic on Reece Oxford: "People were asking: 'Are you sure he is 16?'
"It was going to be a risk but he has got something. I thought we needed someone to sit in front of the defence who is cool and can be a third defender, but who can also play on the ball. I am very proud of him.
"Only on paper he is 16. He is a part of this new generation. Put it this way, if Lionel Messi was in front of me, I would be more fazed than Reece.
"I know we have a good team and I know we have that in ourselves but I wasn't sure how we were going to show it."
Match ends, Arsenal 0, West Ham United 2.
Second Half ends, Arsenal 0, West Ham United 2.
Attempt saved. Alexis Sánchez (Arsenal) right footed shot from the left side of the box is saved in the bottom right corner. Assisted by Mesut Özil.
Laurent Koscielny (Arsenal) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Foul by Modibo Maiga (West Ham United).
Attempt saved. Alexis Sánchez (Arsenal) right footed shot from the centre of the box is saved in the bottom right corner. Assisted by Mesut Özil.
Attempt saved. Modibo Maiga (West Ham United) left footed shot from outside the box is saved in the centre of the goal. Assisted by James Tomkins.
Substitution, West Ham United. Modibo Maiga replaces Diafra Sakho.
Attempt missed. Olivier Giroud (Arsenal) right footed shot from the right side of the six yard box is high and wide to the right. Assisted by Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain with a cross.
Corner, West Ham United. Conceded by Laurent Koscielny.
Corner, West Ham United. Conceded by Laurent Koscielny.
Foul by Mesut Özil (Arsenal).
Mark Noble (West Ham United) wins a free kick in the attacking half.
Attempt saved. Santiago Cazorla (Arsenal) left footed shot from outside the box is saved in the centre of the goal.
Foul by Alexis Sánchez (Arsenal).
Mark Noble (West Ham United) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Attempt missed. Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain (Arsenal) right footed shot from the right side of the box is close, but misses to the right. Assisted by Aaron Ramsey.
Attempt blocked. Theo Walcott (Arsenal) right footed shot from the centre of the box is blocked.
Attempt saved. Diafra Sakho (West Ham United) right footed shot from the right side of the box is saved in the bottom left corner. Assisted by Cheikhou Kouyaté.
Substitution, West Ham United. Kevin Nolan replaces Reece Oxford.
Delay over. They are ready to continue.
Delay in match Olivier Giroud (Arsenal) because of an injury.
Delay in match James Tomkins (West Ham United) because of an injury.
Attempt blocked. Alexis Sánchez (Arsenal) right footed shot from the left side of the box is blocked. Assisted by Santiago Cazorla.
Foul by Alexis Sánchez (Arsenal).
James Tomkins (West Ham United) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Corner, Arsenal. Conceded by Reece Oxford.
Attempt blocked. Theo Walcott (Arsenal) right footed shot from outside the box is blocked. Assisted by Santiago Cazorla.
Delay over. They are ready to continue.
Delay in match Mark Noble (West Ham United) because of an injury.
Nacho Monreal (Arsenal) is shown the yellow card for a bad foul.
Foul by Nacho Monreal (Arsenal).
Mark Noble (West Ham United) wins a free kick in the attacking half.
Substitution, Arsenal. Alexis Sánchez replaces Mathieu Debuchy.
Foul by Aaron Ramsey (Arsenal).
Mark Noble (West Ham United) wins a free kick in the defensive half.
Attempt saved. Olivier Giroud (Arsenal) header from the centre of the box is saved in the centre of the goal. Assisted by Santiago Cazorla with a cross.
Nacho Monreal (Arsenal) wins a free kick on the left wing.
Foul by Matthew Jarvis (West Ham United).
Substitution, West Ham United. Matthew Jarvis replaces Mauro Zárate. | Arsenal's season started with defeat as West Ham won their first Premier League game under manager Slaven Bilic. |
36,341,839 | The challenge was brought by World War Two veteran Harry Shindler, 94, who lives in Italy, and lawyer and Belgian resident Jacquelyn MacLennan, 54.
Under law, UK citizens who have lived abroad for more than 15 years cannot vote.
The pair took the case to the Court of Appeal after losing their application for a judicial review last month.
Mr Shindler and Ms MacLennan had argued the in-out vote on EU membership, on 23 June, directly affected them and brought the test case on behalf of others in their situation.
In April, they asked High Court judges to declare that section two of the EU Referendum Act 2015, which established "the 15-year rule", unlawfully acted as a penalty for their having exercised their rights to free movement.
But the judges ruled that the section did not restrict their rights and rejected their application for judicial review.
They then took the case to the Court of Appeal, where a one-day hearing took place earlier this month.
Three appeal judges - Lord Dyson, Master of the Rolls, sitting with Lord Justice Elias and Lady Justice King - upheld the High Court decision on Friday, declaring the rule did not unlawfully interfere with the right of expats to freedom of movement within the European Union.
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Lord Dyson said: "The claimants say that their exclusion from the franchise is an unjustified restriction on their EU right - EU law right - of free movement and contrary to their constitutional, common law right to vote.
"The appeals against the dismissal of their claims is dismissed. The court holds first that the 2015 Act does not fall within the scope of EU law at all, so that the claim fails at the first hurdle."
He added that "the common law right to vote does not take precedence over an Act of Parliament" and refused permission to appeal to the Supreme Court.
The expats still have the right to ask Supreme Court judges to consider the case, however.
Their lawyers said a hearing had been listed for Tuesday, at which permission to appeal - as well as the substance of the appeal itself - would be considered.
Those eligible can register to vote here.
The non-Britons who get an EU vote
Ms McLennan, who is originally from Inverness but has lived in Brussels since 1987, told the BBC's Victoria Derbyshire programme: "The refusal to allow me and others in my situation to vote is an infringement of my EU rights."
She added that the result of the vote "would have a huge impact" on both her personal and professional life, and that she often returned to the UK to visit her parents and children, and for work.
"I feel very strongly that I ought to have a fundamental democratic right to vote in my country of citizenship," said Ms McLennan.
Mr Shindler, appointed an MBE for Anglo-Italian relations in 2014, has been told he has "diminished or diluted" links to the UK after living abroad for so long. He has lived in Italy for 35 years.
The UK passport holder, originally from London, said: "The fact that we don't live there doesn't alter that fact, we were born British and we will remain that way.
"If we go and live somewhere else, it doesn't make us anything else. They work out here. People don't know who these expats are you know, think they're all on holiday."
He also said the government had agreed to scrap the 15-year rule before the referendum bill was passed.
Law firm Leigh Day, which represents the pair, argued that up to two million British citizens were being unlawfully denied the right to vote on membership of the EU. | Two Britons living abroad have lost their Court of Appeal battle over the right to vote in June's EU referendum. |
39,095,302 | Glenridding Beck, in the Lake District, burst its banks three times during storms in December 2015.
More than 14,000 tonnes of gravel was removed from the river in a bid to reduce the risk of further flooding.
The material has been stored on Jenkin's Field, next to Ullswater, and the Environment Agency will start taking it away Monday.
Andy Brown, from the agency, said: "We would like to apologise to the community and visitors to Glenridding for the noise and increased traffic which will be caused by the work to remove the gravel from Jenkin's Field.
"We are doing everything possible to minimise the disruption and complete the clearance as prompt and efficiently as possible to minimise the impact." | The removal of thousands of tonnes of gravel dredged from a flooded river more than a year ago is set to begin. |
39,106,820 | Every school will be allocated funds to help with facilities for mental health as well as physical exercise.
But schools, which have been warning of cash shortages, will not be able to use the fizzy drink levy to pay for staff.
Ms Greening said that such "health and wellbeing benefits can last a lifetime".
The soft drinks industry levy, announced in last year's Budget, is going to provide £415m for schools in 2018-19 to promote healthier lifestyles.
The idea was to tackle childhood obesity by applying a levy that increased according to the amount of sugar in drinks - with the money being spent on improving health in schools.
The government forecast it would raise £520m in 2018-19 - and expected that it would be an incentive for the food and drinks industry to cut levels of sugar.
The levy provides capital funding to support facilities for sports, after-school activities and to encourage healthy eating - but it will not pay for PE teachers or other staff.
All state-funded primary and secondary schools and sixth forms will receive a slice of the sports levy, but there will also be a bidding process for funding for specific projects.
"Schools can really help our children get a healthy start in life from exercise and sport, and also from knowing what a healthy diet means," said Ms Greening.
"It's not only good for them while they're in education, but the health and wellbeing benefits can last a lifetime."
But Gavin Partington, director general of the British Soft Drinks Association, said it was "odd to hinge this investment on a punitive tax against the soft drinks sector which has led the way in helping consumers reduce sugar intake - down nearly 18% since 2012".
"There is no evidence from around the world that a tax of this sort has reduced levels of obesity," said Mr Partington. | The levy on sugary drinks will provide £415m for sports and healthy eating in England's schools, says Education Secretary Justine Greening. |
38,517,348 | Muir broke the British indoor record over 5,000m in Glasgow on Wednesday night and will enter the mixed 4x1km race at Holyrood.
In 2016, the Dundee Hawkhill athlete finished seventh in the 1500m Olympic final, broke the British 1500m record twice and won the Diamond League title.
"To captain a British Athletics team is a great honour," she said.
"We've fantastic cross country runners in both senior and younger age groups."
Team leader Spencer Duval added: "Laura enjoyed a terrific 2016 in the sport, and as both an Olympic and World Championships finalist in the last two years she now holds a level of experience that will allow her to lead the team by example."
Sir Mo Farah competes for Britain in the men's 8km race and Gemma Steel and Steph Twell take part in the women's event over 6km.
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British team
Senior Men
Ben Connor (coached by Spencer Duval)
Ellis Cross (Mick Woods)
Sir Mo Farah (Alberto Salazar)
Alex George (Paul de-Camps)
Dewi Griffiths (Kevin Evans)
Callum Hawkins (Robert Hawkins)
Charlie Hulson (Steve Vernon)
Mahamed Mahamed (Peter Haynes)
*Jack Martin (David Turnbull)
*Graham Rush
Jonny Taylor (Gordon Surtees)
Andy Vernon (Nic Bideau)
*Replacements for Ross Millington (illness) and Adam Hickey (injury)
Senior Women
Charlotte Arter (James Thie)
Lauren Deadman (Bill Foster)
Claire Duck (Mike Baxter)
Rachel Felton (Christopher Frapwell)
Emily Hosker-Thornhill (Mick Woods)
Jessica Judd (Mick Judd)
Rebecca Murray (Alex Stanton)
Georgina Outten (Andrew Walling)
Beth Potter (Mick Woods)
Gemma Steel (Rob Denmark)
Steph Twell (Mick Woods)
Pippa Woolven (Luke Gunn)
Junior Men
Scott Beattie (Mike Bateman)
Hugo Milner (Chris Woodhouse)
Jonathan Shields
Sam Stevens (Alan Maddocks)
Sol Sweeney (Catriona Helen Tavendale)
Alex Yee (Kenneth Pike)
Junior Women
Phoebe Barker (Richard Owen)
Cari Hughes (Andrew Walling)
Harriet Knowles-Jones (Paul Roden)
Amelia Quirk (Beverly Kitching)
Erin Wallace (Dudley Walker)
Victoria Weir (Simon Anderson)
Mixed 4x1km Relay
James Bowness (William Parker)
Laura Muir (Andy Young)
Charlene Thomas (Aaron Thomas)
James West (George Gandy) | Laura Muir will captain the British team at Saturday's Great Edinburgh International Cross Country. |
34,946,630 | The council granted honorary freedom to the troop, which was previously known as the Isle of Wight Rifles, for its "distinguished record".
It is part of the 266 Port Squadron, of 165 Port and Maritime Regiment, Royal Logistic Corps (RLC).
A ceremony was held in St Thomas Square, Newport, followed by a parade around the town.
The honour was approved by Isle of Wight Council on Wednesday and acknowledged the "bond of friendship" between the soldiers and the people of the Island.
With the freedom, the troop is awarded the right to march "through the streets of the island on all ceremonial occasions with swords drawn, bayonets fixed, drums beating, bands playing and colours flying".
Members of the Rifles took part in the Gallipoli campaign, which took place 100 years ago last April. | A parade has taken place to mark the Isle of Wight Troop being awarded the freedom of the island. |
28,154,836 | The pair said they could not find new partners to help run St Martin's surgery in Knowle and have told the NHS they will leave in three months.
One of those, Dr Holly Hardy, said they made a "difficult decision" to ensure "patient safety in the long term".
NHS England has until September to find replacements but said the surgery would not necessarily close.
"We will be seeking a provider for an interim GP service whilst options for the long term future of the surgery are considered," the NHS said in a statement.
Dr Hardy added: "We have reached the end of a line. We've been working, and our staff, exceptionally hard, for the last six months to keep the practice going.
"We've reached the point that we can't go on any longer."
Local MP, Labour's Dawn Primarolo, said: "Inevitably there's a danger that patients won't be able to get the access they need.
"I have asked NHS England to call an emergency meeting of all the GP practices in the area so we can sit down and work out how I can make sure... my constituents get access to their GP."
Dr Beth McCarron-Nash from the British Medical Association said it was "something we're hearing about across the country".
"It's something we've raised with the government and NHS England as a matter of urgency," she added. | A surgery in Bristol may have to close after two doctors resigned saying they could not cope with the workload. |
37,173,931 | The 20-year-old started each of Boro's first four games this season and appeared as a substitute in Saturday's 2-1 win against the Hatters.
Conlon made 35 appearances in all competitions for the club last season, scoring two goals.
Stevenage next face Grimsby Town in the league away on Saturday. | Stevenage midfielder Tom Conlon could be out for up to nine months after suffering a cruciate knee ligament injury against Luton Town. |
35,867,511 | Swan, ranked more than 400 places below her opponent who is the world number 102, came back to win 1-6 6-4 6-2.
Naomi Broady also reached final qualifying with a 6-4 6-3 win over Turkey's Cagla Buyukakcay.
In the men's draw, James Ward beat Japan's Yuichi Sugita 3-6 6-0 6-3 and will meet American Bjorn Fratangelo. | British teenager Katie Swan recorded a career-best win with victory over American Lauren Davis to reach the Miami Open final qualifying round. |
33,645,488 | Media playback is not supported on this device
The Jets begin their 50-over campaign with a trip to Northants on Saturday, having won the trophy against Warwickshire at Lord's last September.
It was the second success at the famous old ground for Durham, who won the Friends Provident Trophy in 2007.
"We've a similar squad, if we can build momentum we'll be unstoppable," Stoneman told BBC Look North.
Durham have struggled with their batting in the four-day game. They have picked up just 19 batting bonus points from 11 County Championship matches - the third lowest total in Division One.
"We haven't been on fire with the bat," Stoneman added.
"Hopefully once we get settled into the One-Day Cup, we can put some big scores on the board and look to defend that with the ball.
"It's something that has worked well for us in the past and we hope we will be doing that again this year."
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Success in the competition last year was particularly special for veteran Paul Collingwood who, since retiring from England duty in 2013, has been involved in winning a County Championship title and one-day silverware.
The 39-year-old - who captained England to victory in the 2010 Twenty20 World Cup - said that Durham's One-Day Cup success is among his greatest achievements.
"It was certainly right up there," he said.
"Just getting to a Lord's final and all the atmosphere and occasion, it was great to be back."
Reaching the final again is the target for Collingwood.
"We've got the skill levels, and the team has a lot of all-rounders and we can adapt to situations," he added.
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One of the stars of Durham's cup run last year was Australian all-rounder John Hastings, but he missed the final because he was committed to playing for Chennai Super Kings in the T20 Champions League.
Hastings, 29, rejoined Jon Lewis' side for the 2015 season and can play in the final of they make it this time.
"I was very proud of the way the lads went about it last year," he said. "It was a tight and tough tussle with overhead conditions and rain about but the boys got the job done.
"I did ask my franchise if I could do it, but they declined.
"I hope that this year we can get there. I will be available for the final this year so I hope we can do it." | One-day captain Mark Stoneman believes Durham can be "unstoppable" in their defence of the One-Day Cup trophy. |
17,584,776 | It will replace the temporary portable building which has been operating as an exhibition centre and shop.
A spokesman for the trustees said they wanted to encourage visitors to find out more about Isambard Kingdom Brunel who designed the bridge.
It is hoped the centre will be open by December 2014 - the 150th anniversary of the opening of the bridge.
"The existing temporary facility has welcomed an average of 57,000 visitors annually - including tourists from more than 100 countries - but we are keen to encourage more of the people who come to look at the bridge to visit the centre as well," said the spokesman.
Trustees have been given £36,400 from the Heritage Lottery Fund to help them progress their plans to apply for a full grant later this year. | A new visitor centre is to be built for Brunel's iconic Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol. |
38,857,974 | The trio were all on the orthopaedic surgery ward and were screened after another patient there had the bacteria, called carbapenemase-producing Enterobacteriaceae (CPE).
The first patient did not require treatment for it and was discharged.
The ward has been closed to admissions "as a precaution", the hospital said.
Read more stories from the Black Country and Birmingham
Enterobacteriaceae are sometimes harmless and live in the gut.
CPE is another type of the same group of bacteria that have become resistant to strong antibiotics called carbapenems which are used to treat the most serious infections, the NHS choices website said - a so-called superbug.
The hospital said none of the three patients found to have the organism from their latest screening were unwell with it and "no specific treatment was required or being given".
A hospital spokesman said "this type of very resistant bacteria was becoming more common across the UK and around the world.... because of the overuse of antibiotics."
He said washing hands regularly was the "best defence". | Three patients have been diagnosed with a "very resistant strain of bacteria" prompting a ward closure at Wolverhampton's New Cross Hospital. |
23,408,073 | The Iter project at Cadarache in Provence is receiving the first of about one million components for its experimental reactor.
Dogged by massive cost rises and long delays, building work is currently nearly two years behind schedule.
The construction of the key building has even been altered to allow for the late delivery of key components.
"We're not hiding anything - it's incredibly frustrating," David Campbell, a deputy director, told BBC News.
"Now we're doing everything we can to recover as much time as possible.
"The project is inspiring enough to give you the energy to carry on - we'd all like to see fusion energy as soon as possible."
After initial design problems and early difficulties co-ordinating this unique international project, there is now more confidence about the timetable.
Since the 1950s, fusion has offered the dream of almost limitless energy - copying the fireball process that powers the Sun - fuelled by two readily available forms of hydrogen.
The attraction is a combination of cheap fuel, relatively little radioactive waste and no emissions of greenhouse gases.
But the technical challenges of not only handling such an extreme process but also designing ways of extracting energy from it have always been immense.
In fact, fusion has long been described as so difficult to achieve that it's always been touted as being "30 years away".
Now the Iter reactor will put that to the test. Known as a "tokamak", it is based on the design of Jet, a European pilot project at Culham in Oxfordshire.
It will involve creating a plasma of superheated gas reaching temperatures of more than 200 million C - conditions hot enough to force deuterium and tritium atoms to fuse together and release energy.
The whole process will take place inside a giant magnetic field in the shape of a ring - the only way such extreme heat can be contained.
The plant at JET has managed to achieve fusion reactions in very short bursts but required the use of more power than it was able to produce.
The reactor at Iter is on a much larger scale and is designed to generate 10 times more power - 500 MW - than it will consume.
Iter brings together the scientific and political weight of governments representing more than half the world's population - including the European Union, which is supporting nearly half the cost of the project, together with China, India, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States.
Contributions are mainly "in kind" rather than in cash with, for example, the EU providing all the buildings and infrastructure - which is why an exact figure for cost is not available. The rough overall budget is described as £13bn or 15bn euros.
But the novel structure of Iter has itself caused friction and delays, especially in the early days.
Each partner first had to set up a domestic "agency" to handle the procurement of components within each member country, and there have been complications with import duties and taxes.
Further delay crept in with disputes over access to manufacturing sites in partner countries. Because each part has to meet extremely high specifications, inspectors from Iter and the French nuclear authorities have had to negotiate visits to companies not used to outside scrutiny.
The result is that although a timeline for the delivery of the key elements has been agreed, there's a recognition that more hold-ups are almost inevitable.
The main building to house the tokamak has been adjusted to leave gaps in its sides so that late components can be added without too much disruption.
The route from the ports to the construction site has had to be improved to handle huge components weighing up to 600 tonnes, but this work too has been slower than hoped. A trial convoy originally scheduled for last January has slipped to this coming September.
Under an initial plan, it had once been hoped to achieve the first plasma by the middle of the last decade.
Then, after a redesign, a new deadline of November 2020 was set but that too is now in doubt. Managers say they are doubling shifts to accelerate the pace of construction. It's thought that even a start date during 2021 may be challenging.
The man in charge of coordinating the assembly of the reactor is Ken Blackler.
"We've now started for real," he told me. "Industrial manufacturing is now under way so the timescale is much more certain - many technical challenges have been solved.
"But Iter is incredibly complicated. The pieces are being made all around the world - they'll be shipped here.
"We'll have to orchestrate their arrival and build them step by step so everything will have to arrive in the right order - it's really a critical point."
While one major concern is the arrival sequence of major components, another is that the components themselves are of sufficiently high quality for the system to function.
The 28 magnets that will create the field containing the plasma have to be machined to a very demanding level of accuracy. And each part must be structurally sound and then welded together to ensure a totally tight vacuum - without which the plasma cannot be maintained. A single fault or weakness could jeopardise the entire project.
Assuming Iter does succeed in proving that fusion can produce more power than it consumes, the next step will be for the international partners to follow up with a technology demonstration project - a test-bed for the components and systems needed for a commercial reactor.
Ironically, the greater the progress, the more apparent becomes the scale of the challenge of devising a fusion reactor that will be ready for market.
At a conference in Belgium last September, I asked a panel of experts when the first commercially-available fusion reactor might generate power for the grid.
A few said that could happen within 40 years but most said it would take another 50 or even 60 years. The fusion dream has never been worked on so vigorously. But turning it into reality is much more than 30 years away. | The world's largest bid to harness the power of fusion has entered a "critical" phase in southern France. |
40,336,800 | To focus minds, the government gave the parties a discussion paper setting out key areas for agreement.
They were given until lunchtime on Tuesday to respond to the draft paper.
It includes changes to the petition of concern, equality and respect around the Irish language, Ulster Scots and an armed forces covenant.
It also suggests a public consultation on plans to deal with the legacy of the Troubles, and details ways of making Northern Ireland's government more accountable. Details of the paper were published by journalist Brian Rowan.
Shadow secretary of state Owen Smith has said the government still has to convince the Stormont parties it will be impartial in the talks.
"I've not yet had that reassurance from [secretary of state] James Brokenshire or heard it from the other parties," said Mr Smith.
"In the conversations I had with parties last week when I took on the post, they were still concerned that it would be difficult for the British government to illustrate impartiality and I still think they've got a job of work to do persuade people of that."
Northern Ireland has been without a power-sharing executive since March and without a first and deputy first minister since January.
The institutions collapsed amid a bitter row between the DUP and Sinn Féin about a botched green energy scheme.
The late deputy first minister, Martin McGuinness, stood down, in a move that triggered a snap election.
The parties have until 29 June to reach agreement and have been warned that if they cannot, direct rule could follow.
The deadline was set by Secretary of State James Brokenshire.
Speaking at a press conference at midday on Tuesday, Sinn Féin's Gerry Kelly said it was Sinn Féin's intention to re-establish the institutions but that "that has to be on the basis of integrity and respect and a number of outstanding issues."
"This is about implementation of previous talks," he added.
He said that the continuing talks between the DUP and the Conservatives in London "could have an impact" on the talks at Stormont.
"Of course, what happens in Britain, and the DUP are hitching their wagon to the Tory government, will have on impact on what's happening here, we just don't know what it is yet," he said.
Mr Kelly also made it clear that Sinn Féin was not prepared to drop its demand that DUP leader Arlene Foster cannot become first minister while the inquiry into the RHI scandal continues.
Meanwhile, the DUP will resume negotiations with the Conservative Party in London on supporting a Tory minority government.
The party has been locked in negotiations with the Tories for more than week but it is still not clear when they might sign off on a deal.
It was thought an agreement might be reached before the Queen's Speech on Wednesday, but the parties have refused to be drawn on a timeframe. | Talks to restore Northern Ireland's power-sharing institutions are continuing, with just nine days left before the government's deadline. |
38,149,577 | Data company Inrix monitored traffic on every road in 123 cities, including London, Cardiff, Paris and Hamburg.
It found more than 20,300 so-called "traffic hotspots" in UK cities - well over double the number in Germany and twice that of France.
The government recently pledged to spend an extra £1.3bn on targeting congestion on roads.
In Inrix's analysis, a road becomes a "traffic hotspot" once congestion forces drivers to drop their speed by 65% for at least two minutes.
Inrix collected traffic information from car sat-navs, mobile phones and road sensors throughout September 2016.
It covered individual cities with populations of 250,000 or more, rather than whole countries, but found pinch points in:
Researchers suggested that the worst stretch of road overall is Junction 29 of Hamburg's A7 motorway in Germany.
In the UK, drivers on the M25 or the A720 Edinburgh bypass are those most likely to reach gridlock.
"It's the unfortunate reality of a densely populated and global city," said Graham Cookson, Inrix's chief economist, author of the research.
"A quarter of a million of us drive on the M25 every day."
Source: Inrix
But there is hope for drivers dreading the commute from hell, Mr Cookson adds.
An extra £1.3bn will be spent on improving Britain's roads, the Chancellor Philip Hammond announced in the Autumn Statement on 23 November.
The roads investment will include £220m to tackle "pinch-points" on Highways England roads.
"Money is coming in for the first time in a while, hopefully this will be used to alleviate the worst areas," Mr Cookson said.
Transport Secretary Chris Grayling said the government was investing "record amounts" into improving roads.
"This investment is over and above the £23bn we are spending to get motorists to their destinations quickly, more easily and safely," he said.
He said the government schemes that have been announced were "focused on relieving congestion and providing important upgrades to ensure our roads are fit for the future". | British roads are the most congested in Europe, a study of traffic in more than 100 EU cities suggests. |
18,889,900 | The PCS said 57.2% of those who voted backed strike action - the turnout was 20%.
Although dates have not been set, there is the prospect of strikes affecting the London 2012 Olympic Games because Border Agency staff are involved.
Immigration Minister Damian Green said a strike was "completely unacceptable".
Details of strike dates and what form the industrial action will take are expected on Thursday. Just over 75% of members who voted were in favour of action short of strike action.
The union said it was in dispute over longstanding issues with the Home Office, including cuts to UK Border Agency staff.
About 16,000 union members were balloted across the Home Office, including in the Border Agency, the Identity and Passport Service and the Criminal Records Bureau.
The PCS said the cuts at the UK Border Agency were continuing "to cause chaos at the borders and queues at airports".
PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said: "We believe [ministers] have acted recklessly and irresponsibly in cutting so many jobs and, in the case of UKBA, they have simply tried to paper over the cracks by deploying severely undertrained staff at our borders.
"If these issues are not resolved, they threaten to seriously undermine the Home Office's ability to provide vital public services, and we cannot sit back and allow that to happen."
This week the National Audit Office said the UK Border Agency had laid off 1,000 more staff than intended and was having to hire extra people and increase overtime to meet its workload.
The union said for its members the wider issues under dispute were: job losses, particularly compulsory redundancies; pay and conditions such as government plans to cap pay increases at 1% for the next two years; and privatisation, such as using private companies to clear up a backlog of immigration and asylum casework in the Border Agency.
Mr Green warned the union that he did not believe the public would support any disruption, and called on it to reconsider.
He said: "Only about one in 10 PCS members voted for strike action. The union leadership has no authority to call disruptive strikes on that basis and should think again.
"The security of the UK border is of the utmost importance and we will use our trained pool of contingency staff to ensure we minimise any disruption caused by planned union action.
"Any action that disrupts the Olympics will be completely unacceptable and the public will not support it."
The PCS is one of the largest unions in the UK with around 250,000 public sector members.
PCS members at the Department for Transport have been taking industrial action over the past few weeks, while staff in other departments, including the ministries of defence and justice, are set to vote shortly on how to campaign against cuts. | Thousands of members of the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union at the Home Office are set to go on strike over jobs, pay and other issues. |
32,896,921 | Downing Street said that measures in the Investigatory Powers Bill would provide the authorities "with the tools to keep you and your family safe".
It will "address gaps" in intelligence gathering and access to communications data which is putting "lives at risk".
But civil liberties campaigners claim it will pave the way for mass surveillance of UK citizens.
Home Secretary Theresa May's efforts to introduce a similar bill in 2012, dubbed the "snooper's charter" by critics, were blocked by the Liberal Democrats.
The new bill is designed to "maintain the ability of intelligence agencies and law enforcement to target the online communications of terrorists, paedophiles and other serious criminals".
Details of how it will work will be published in the next few days.
It is thought likely to require internet service providers and mobile operators to log much more data about what their customers are doing, including data on who people call, text, tweet and instant message, what games they play, when they post on social networks and who they send webmails.
The government has come under growing pressure to do more to respond to the fallout from the conflicts in Iraq and Syria and, specifically, the threat posed by British jihadists returning to the UK after fighting in the two countries.
The police have long argued that their ability to track the online communications of potential suspects is heavily circumscribed and the the law is not keeping pace with advances in technology.
But civil liberties campaigners fear it will lead to mass surveillance.
Essentially the government wants to upgrade the law so that is can do all the things it used to do with the post and telephones with all the plethora of online communications that now exist.
A review by the "Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation" David Anderson QC will feed into this.
The Bill will be very controversial. It is strongly opposed by many Liberals, and civil liberties groups, and the idea became even more controversial after the Edward Snowden revelations.
Jim Killock, executive director of The Open Rights Group, said: "The government is signalling that it wants to press ahead with increased powers of data collection and retention for the police and GCHQ, spying on everyone, whether suspected of a crime or not.
"This is the return of the 'snooper's charter', even as the ability to collect and retain data gets less and less workable.
"We should expect attacks on encryption, which protects all our security. Data collection will create vast and unnecessary expense."
Renate Samson, chief executive of Big Brother Watch, said: "Whilst the title may have changed from a Communications Data Bill to an Investigatory Powers Bill it will be interesting to see whether the content has radically changed.
"We have yet to see real evidence that there is a gap in the capability of law enforcement or the agencies' ability to gain access to our communications data."
The Investigatory Powers Bill is one of 26 proposed laws included in the first all-Conservative Queen's Speech since 1996.
The Conservatives are also proposing new steps to tackle extremism, including giving the home secretary new powers to ban extremist groups and allowing the authorities to close down premises being used to "support extremism".
It will also include more powers for watchdog Ofcom to take action against TV channels that "broadcast extremist content".
Downing Street said there would be "appropriate safeguards and oversight arrangements" and it would take into account a yet unpublished review of existing counter-terrorism legislation undertaken by the independent reviewer David Anderson. | New laws to give police and spies greater powers to monitor internet and phone use are in the Queen's Speech. |
39,350,150 | Motorist John Place had been told to stop driving weeks before he struck Poppy-Arabella Clarke, three, as she used a pedestrian crossing.
The family, from Sutton Coldfield, want medical experts to alert the DVLA to people who should not be driving.
Solicitors are contacting MPs on their behalf in an attempt to gain government interest.
Poppy-Arabella was killed at a pedestrian crossing on Chester Road in Sutton Coldfield, last July. Her mother, Rachel Clarke, was crossing with her at the time and suffered a broken pelvis.
Place, 72, was jailed for four years on Monday for causing death by dangerous driving.
He told police he was not wearing his glasses and that he had not seen the red light or the crossing itself. Two optometrists had told him his eyesight, even with glasses, fell below the required standard set by the DVLA.
More stories from Birmingham and the Black Country here
Speaking to the BBC Mrs Clarke said of Poppy-Arabella: "She's everything you could wish for in a little girl. She was always dancing and singing, she lived her life like she was in a musical."
Richard Langton from Slater and Gordon, representing the family, told the BBC the current legal position on reporting people not fit to drive is a "grey area."
"Medical professionals tell people they are not fit to drive, but whether that person actually notifies the DVLA is really up to them," he said.
The obligation to inform the relevant body should be with medical professionals, he said.
As well as GPs and medical experts, Mrs Clarke and her husband say family members could also take some responsibility to stop people declared unfit to drive from getting behind a wheel. | The family of a girl killed by a driver with poor eyesight are contacting MPs in a bid to change the law. |
38,962,399 | Police said they were alerted to the incident in Prestonpans on 23 January.
The 12-year-old has since been reported to the Children's Reporter. | A 12-year-old boy has been reported following an alleged sexual assault on a six-year-old girl in East Lothian. |
18,026,538 | The Royal College of Nursing says feedback from more than 1,200 staff paints a "worrying picture", with patients regularly being in ambulances or held in a queue.
The union warned the NHS risked going backwards unless ministers got a grip.
The government said there were enough beds for this not to be happening.
Of the 1,246 nurses and healthcare assistants who replied to an RCN request for feedback, a fifth said providing care in corridors had become a daily occurrence.
Half said they had encountered patients facing long waits on trolleys - with some aware of people being left for 24 hours without a bed.
The RCN said that was putting patients at risk by potentially leaving them without access to essential equipment such as oxygen supplies and heart monitoring equipment as well as compromising their privacy and dignity.
Other problems highlighted included ambulances being forced to queue outside A&E units and patients being put in unsuitable wards.
The RCN said the crisis was being caused by a combination of staff shortages, the long-standing drive to reduce the number of beds in hospitals and the rise in A&E admissions.
The union said as a first step the government should call a halt to the reduction in beds. Over the last 10 years, the number of acute and general beds available has fallen by a fifth to just over 100,000.
This has been partly done because of advances in medicine which means patients need to spend less time recovering in hospital and can get a wider range of treatments in the community.
RCN general secretary Peter Carter said frontline staff were being placed under "huge stress", adding the NHS was at risk of going "backwards".
"Treating patients on corridors and areas not designed for care is a high-risk strategy, which can have a serious impact on patient care.
"Patients need to be able to interact with staff, to be able to reach call bells and to know they are visible."
Mike Farrar, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, which represents hospitals, said the problems identified should not be happening.
But he added hospitals were facing a struggle because of "growing financial pressure and significant structural upheaval".
Health minister Simon Burns said: "There is no excuse for patients to be left waiting on trolleys.
"The NHS has beds free and available, and hospitals should be supporting their nurses to ensure that patients are admitted to them quickly. We will not hesitate to take action where we find hospitals failing to do so." | Patients are being left stranded on trolleys for hours and forced to have treatment in corridors due in part to the loss of hospital beds, nurses say. |
39,346,213 | Crane, 20, became the first overseas player to represent the Australian state side since Imran Khan in 1985.
He followed it up with an impressive couple of displays in the North v South series in UAE as the South won 3-0.
"It's a very different pressure being an overseas player in Australia than a local one that's for sure," Crane said.
He found himself called into the New South Wales set-up after impressing during his winter placement in Sydney grade cricket for Gordon CC.
Former Australia leg-spinner Stuart MacGill was instrumental in his inclusion for the game against South Australia earlier this month and became Crane's mentor down under.
"He really helped me through the nerves and the pressure on the first day of that game," Crane told Test Match Special.
"He presented me with my cap and you really feel the history of it when you play for a team like NSW and 742 is the number on your cap.
"A fair few people have donned that blue cap and it was an amazing experience and an absolute honour."
Crane produced match figures of 5-116, but had little time to bask in his achievement as he headed straight to UAE for the 50-over North v South series.
A 3-0 whitewash alongside Hampshire team-mates James Vince, Liam Dawson and Tom Alsop saw Crane take the headlines in Tuesday's final game in Abu Dhabi with four wickets for one run in the space of 10 balls.
But, despite a headline-grabbing few weeks, the young spinner is staying level-headed ahead of the new domestic season.
"I've got to understand I'm still quite young and a long way down the pecking order," he said. "I'll just keep doing my stuff for Hampshire and hope this year I can go on from there.
Crane's next game will be for MCC in Abu Dhabi against county champions Middlesex from Sunday. | Hampshire leg-spinner Mason Crane admitted he was "extremely proud" to play Sheffield Shield cricket for New South Wales during an eventful winter. |
34,379,031 | Police said a number of pupils may have witnessed the man being shot as he collected a child from St Helen's Primary in Bishopbriggs on Thursday.
East Dunbartonshire Council said help would be provided to pupils who wanted it after they returned from the September weekend break on Tuesday.
A 33-year-old man was injured in the shooting. Police inquiries are ongoing.
Armed officers were called to the scene of the shooting, which happened in Dornoch Place at about 15:10, as pupils were leaving at the end of the school day.
Police said the gunman approached the victim, shot him and then ran off towards Ronaldsay Drive.
The suspect was holding a silver-coloured gun and wearing a high-visibility reflective yellow jacket with the hood pulled up.
He was described as being in his mid-40s, between 5ft 10in and 6ft tall and of heavy build.
Detectives said they were following a number of lines of inquiry.
They were keen to hear from anyone with information about a burnt-out grey Volkswagen Golf - registration FR12 PYB - found nearby in Wood Lane which is believed to have been involved in the incident. It was reported stolen in March. | Counselling is to be offered to pupils at an East Dunbartonshire primary after a man was shot outside their school. |
34,474,234 | The Screen Actors Guild - American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (Sag-Aftra) now want more talks to try to resolve the dispute.
Actors want royalties for games - some of which sell millions of copies.
They also want stunt co-ordinators for motion-capture shoots and stunt pay for "vocally stressful" recording sessions.
Sag-Aftra had needed more than 75% of members to agree before it could authorise a strike.
"It is important to note that the referendum result does not mean that members are on strike, rather, it gives the National Board the authority to declare a strike," the union said in a statement.
"With this result in hand, the Negotiating Committee will seek to return to the bargaining table and continue to press for a fair resolution on behalf of performers working in video games."
Actors have complained that sessions for games such as Call of Duty, which require a lot of vocally stressful sessions, often go on for hours. The union has called for such sessions to be limited to two hours, with actors receiving higher pay for them.
The union also wants actors to be given more information about the roles that they are auditioning for and what they will be required to do, after reports that voice actors were also be asked to perform motion-capture work. | Video games makers may soon find a shortage of actors to voice their characters after 96% of union members voted in favour of strike action. |
34,821,905 | A spokesman said it would mean some delays in getting through arrival points and the measures were likely to be in place until early next week.
The French flag at Victor Hugo's House and the French Consulate at Hauteville House is flying at half mast.
Nearly 130 people died in gun and bomb attacks in Paris on Friday night.
Guernsey's Chief Minister Jonathan Le Tocq tweeted: "Our thoughts are heading to the bereaved families & all our French friends." | Guernsey Border Agency staff are carrying out "heightened checks" of incoming passengers following the attacks in Paris. |
36,916,745 | The victim was the only person on board the plane, which came down at Turweston Aerodrome, Buckinghamshire, on Thursday.
A Thames Valley Police spokesman said the force was called at about 11:30 BST.
He added: "Sadly, the pilot of the aircraft was pronounced dead at the scene. The death is not believed to be suspicious."
The Air Accidents Investigation Branch dispatched a team to the crash site. | A light aircraft pilot was killed after crashing at an airfield, police said. |
39,829,001 | Media playback is not supported on this device
Ryan Hall opened the scoring for his 34th try in 34 Tests and Stefan Ratchford added another before the break as England led 14-0 at half-time.
Samoa threatened after with tries from Joey Leilua and Anthony Milford.
But scores from Josh Hodgson, James Graham and Jermaine McGillvary ensured an easy win for Wayne Bennett's team.
A crowd of just over 18,000, containing largely Samoa supporters, watched the Islanders go behind early.
Bennett's side were in control from the third minute when Leeds wing Hall picked up a looping pass from skipper Sean O'Loughlin to go over in the left corner.
A penalty from Castleford's Luke Gale, who converted all but the last of his side's tries, gave England an 8-0 lead before Warrington full-back Ratchford spotted a hole in the Samoan line to go over.
Samoa were a far more lively attacking proposition in the second period and reduced the deficit when centre Leilua showed great strength to plant the ball with five England defenders grappling. Milford converted.
The teams exchanged tries as Canberra Raiders hooker Hodgson burst through to score before Milford exposed the English defence for his side's second try.
However, England halted Samoa's fightback in the final six minutes as Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs prop Graham barged through a couple of Samoan defenders to touch down before a late fifth try from Huddersfield's McGillvary.
BBC rugby league correspondent Dave Woods
A very satisfying night for England.
Not the perfect performance, but more than enough for them to look forward to the World Cup with plenty of confidence.
Big raps to Kevin Brown. He may have been a late call-up, but he took his chance superbly with three try-scoring assists in the second half.
Ratchford was also an eye-catcher with his fine individual try-scoring effort in the first half.
Samoa had more possession in the second half and managed to cross through their headline acts - Leilua and Milford. But generally England looked solid in defending their own line. | England recorded a comfortable 30-10 win over Samoa in their final warm-up match before the Rugby League World Cup, which begins in October. |
33,587,687 | The German rider held off countryman John Degenkolb and Norwegian Alexander Kristoff on the line in a bunch sprint.
Briton Mark Cavendish was not involved in the sprint on Stage 15 as he was dropped on the first climb of the day.
It was a quiet day for Froome who still leads Colombian Nairo Quintana by three minutes 10 seconds with a week to go.
A nine-man breakaway was caught with 40km to go, and while Italian Matteo Trentin and Canadian Ryder Hesjedal attempted a further break, the peloton swallowed them up 10km further down the road.
Czech Zdenek Stybar - winner of stage six - broke away with three kilometres to go but ran out of steam and was caught inside the final kilometre as Greipel sprinted to victory.
Shortly after Saturday's stage finished in Mende, Froome revealed that a fan had thrown a cup of urine at him and called him a doper. It came a day after Team Sky team-mate Richie Porte said he was punched while on the road.
An eventful Saturday also saw Froome extend his lead and Colombian Nairo Quintana leapfrog Tejay van Garderen to take second place in the general classification.
There was almost nothing of note on Sunday as far as Froome and the battle for the yellow jersey was concerned. The main contenders remained tucked safely away in the main group all day and, with a bunch sprint at the finish, there were no attacks towards the end by Froome's rivals.
"It was a good day out there, there was a great atmosphere on the road and no unfortunate incidents today," said Froome.
"We have got five real racing stages left and we are into the tail-end of the race now. There are some tired bodies out there on the road but we are in an extremely fortunate position in that we have got nine riders left who are still fit and healthy."
After Sunday's stage, Froome was again asked about the suspicions over doping.
Reporter: "Chris, you have been saying that you're the first, you're in the yellow jersey because you've worked extremely hard for that. We know this but what is troublesome is that all those who preceded you were saying the same. Lance Armstrong would keep telling us that he was the first because he was working more than the others. Can you understand that the wording and the explanation that you give revive bad memories?"
Froome: "Times have changed, everyone knows that, times have changed. This isn't the Wild West that it was 10-15 years ago. Of course there are always going to be riders who take risks in this day and age but they are the minority. It was all the other way around 10-15 years ago. There is no reason for that suspicion to continue."
German Greipel was understudy to Cavendish at HTC-Columbia. When it was suggested to Cavendish that Greipel would ride the 2010 Tour with him, Cavendish said: "There's no chance he's coming to a bike race that I'm in. Me on bad form is still better than him."
It has been a different story this year.
Greipel - known as the Gorilla - defeated a host of rivals including Cavendish to win stage two and beat his former HTC-Columbia team-mate to claim another victory on stage five.
The pair hardly went head-to-head on Sunday as Cavendish - who is reportedly unwell - had been left behind on the climb out of Mende at the start of the day and rolled home in a group of 23 riders more than 14 minutes behind the winner.
And after the ninth Tour stage victory of his career, Greipel said: "The team supported me from kilometre zero, they kept me out of the wind and in the front group.
"At the end we made it perfectly to keep in a good position for the sprint and I went full gas and kept it to the line."
BBC Sport's Matt Slater in France: "First, the good news, from a British perspective anyway: Sunday's stage was a much happier one for Chris Froome and Team Sky than the urine-soaked slog of Saturday.
"The race leader and his team-mates reported no new outrages, and they have been heartened by messages of support from rival riders and team managers.
"The news was less good, however, for Cavendish, who has been struggling with stomach problems and was dropped on the day's first climb.
"This meant he missed out on the fourth of five clear-cut chances for the sprinters and now trails his German rival Andre Greipel 3-1 in this race. Out of contract at the end of the season, and desperate to reclaim his status as cycling's fastest man, Cavendish will not lack for motivation to get to the fifth and final sprinters' stage in Paris."
1. Andre Greipel (Ger) Lotto) 3hrs 56mins 35secs
2. John Degenkolb (Ger) Giant same time
3. Alexander Kristoff (Nor) Katusha
4. Peter Sagan (Svk) Tinkoff-Saxo)
5. Edvald Boasson Hagen (Nor) Team MTN
6. Ramunas Navardauskas (Lit) Cannondale
7. Christophe Laporte (Fra) Cofidis
8. Michael Matthews (Aus) Orica
9. Davide Cimolai (Ita) Lampre
10. Florian Vachon (Fra) Bretagne
1. Chris Froome (GB) Team Sky 59hrs 58mins 54secs
2. Nairo Quintana (Col) Movistar) +3mins 10secs
3. Tejay van Garderen (US) BMC Racing +3mins 32secs
4. Alejandro Valverde (Spa) Movistar +4mins 2secs
5. Alberto Contador (Spa) Tinkoff-Saxo +4mins 23secs
6. Geraint Thomas (GB) Team Sky +4mins 54secs
7. Robert Gesink (Ned) Lotto +6mins 23secs
8. Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Astana +8mins 17secs
9. Tony Gallopin (Fra) Lotto +8mins 23secs
10. Bauke Mollema (Ned) Trek +8mins 53secs | Andre Greipel sprinted to his third stage win of this year's Tour de France in Valence as Britain's Chris Froome comfortably kept his overall lead. |
33,960,532 | Amelia Kallman and Norman Gosney opened the first cabaret nightclub of its kind in Shanghai in 2010.
And the story of their rise and fall is now a stage show at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
"It's a cautionary tale" says Kallman. "And a love story".
She and her impresario husband and fellow performer Gosney, originally from Bristol, left New York where they had had success with a speakeasy and burlesque club to chase their fortunes in China in 2007.
"We saw China as the next big super-power and Shanghai was the next big city. We wanted to be the ice-breaker, to be the first to do this in Asia."
A former Japanese Buddhist temple built in 1931 became their three-floor venue and a chorus line of six women hired to perform a combination of burlesque, Moulin Rouge and vaudeville referencing the city's reputation as the Paris of the East in the 1920s and 1930s.
At first, the authorities were fully supportive of the endeavour, says Kallman.
"They wanted us to do it, to bring business to the district, to bring more foreigners."
There were certain hurdles to overcome first.
Shanghai already had clubs where you could find scantily-clad dancers, and officials needed assurance the dancers would comply with China's rules against public nudity.
"We were always very aware we had to respect the rules and culture.
"Everything was classy and sophisticated," adds Kallman.
Then there was the cleansing ceremony to ensure the spirits of the dead were not displeased with the former temple becoming an entertainment venue.
A plush renovation was also needed.
After two years, the club called Chinatown opened to much fanfare and officials endorsed it by bringing their friends, says Kallman.
Fridays and Saturdays were popular with foreigners and they adapted mid-week shows to particularly appeal to a Chinese audience with "half the show in Mandarin and more pratfalls," explains Gosney.
The club went on to have full houses, appeared in a programme with Piers Morgan and won an award for best new nightclub. But it was soon after that that things changed, says Kallman.
Shanghai's Cultural Department said it received a complaint.
"They sent five people one night to look at the show."
At the end of the performance, it was a section featuring Sid Vicious in homage to Malcolm McLaren who had recently died, that rankled with a female official, perhaps fearing a subversive subtext.
"The acts hadn't been previously translated and videotaped so in her eyes they were illegal because not approved by the Chinese government."
It is a requirement that has beset the top performers in the world when performing in China, including the Rolling Stones.
Kallman and Gosney found themselves having to submit translations of the lyrics of every number they were going to sing two weeks prior to show night. With new shows each week it was an arduous task.
Soon, there were arguments over the amount of midriff on show.
"We had an act with a wonderful guy in drag trying to emulate the girls. It was full of double entendres. At the end of it they [the officials] said they wanted to ban the midriff, and especially his midriff.
"It was so obviously comedic," says Gosney.
"Problems arose because we are foreigners used to saying what we think and we have art so we can express ourselves. Our freedom is ingrained in us.
"They saw that as a challenge, says Kallman.
Gosney claims bribes became commonplace, government-run banks would remove the business's credit and that charges were made up against them.
"It was the death of a thousand cuts. It became aggressive and scary," reflects Kallman.
Eventually, they say, they were tipped off that manufactured bribery charges were going to be brought against them.
"We found out they'd frozen our bank accounts. We took the money from the till and went to Bali. They raided our home, our office and the club," says Kallman.
She says they were warned they must not return to China. Back in the UK, she wrote a book about the experience, Diary of a Shanghai Showgirl - there has never been any comment on these claims.
Ultimately, Gosney thinks China has a long way to go in terms of creativity.
"If you are making toilet fittings you have to go to Shanghai but if you are doing something new they don't see how to make money out of it."
He advises anyone with similar ambitions to go to Detroit instead where they will have a fairer chance, but he concedes, "We did brilliant work there. We loved our time." | If the strangeness of opening a burlesque club in China had not occurred to them as a Buddhist cleansing ceremony took place in their future venue, it certainly did when they found themselves submitting Frank Sinatra lyrics to be vetted by the local cultural department. |
35,622,428 | BBC Sport brings you the five things you may have missed from another the thrill-a-minute Saturday in the Football League.
Some say 2-0 is the most dangerous scoreline in football - a lead big enough to prompt relaxation, but far from insurmountable - and Colchester fans will probably agree.
Going into their trip to Bury, the U's had not won a league game since 20 October, a run of 17 games.
So when they went 2-0 up inside the first 20 minutes, thanks to goals from Chris Porter and Gavin Massey, it looked as though they might be starting to claw their way back from the foot of League One.
But Tom Eastman was sent off for two bookings, and the floodgates did not just open, they were blown off their hinges.
Ryan Lowe pulled one back immediately after the red card before the Shakers hit four goals in 11 second-half minutes, including a hat-trick for Andrew Tutte, as the gap between Colchester and League One safety increased to 10 points.
"I'm sure they [the young players] will be better for the experience, even though it's a tough one to learn from," Colchester boss Kevin Keen, whose only win as boss came against Charlton in the FA Cup, told BBC Essex.
"I can't feel sorry for myself, I'll just keep working hard. It's about the club and the players."
It might be all going wrong at Colchester, but the team directly below them in the Football League standings cannot do anything wrong.
After being endorsed by basketball legend Shaquille O'Neill this week, Northampton Town now boast a 10-point lead at the top of League Two following a club record ninth-successive league win.
Danny Rose netted his first goal for the Cobblers since a deadline-day move from Oxford United to seal victory against notoriously hard-to-beat Wycombe.
Surely promotion is a slam dunk now for Northampton?
Lloyd Doyley. He's not really a household name outside Hertfordshire, but after spending 14 years at Watford, he left the Hornets in the summer.
It took the 33-year-old until this week to find a new club, when Neil Warnock brought him and fellow free agent Paddy Kenny to Rotherham United.
Kenny was on the bench for the 2-0 loss at Burnley, and Doyley might have wished he was sat next to him as the Jamaica international gave away a penalty 27 minutes into his debut.
The Millers went on to lose 2-0, meaning Warnock is still looking for his first win since replacing Neil Redfearn as manager earlier this month.
A new boss who was smiling was Derby County's Darren Wassall.
After Paul Clement was surprisingly sacked earlier this month, 47-year-old Wassall was thrust into the limelight from the relative obscurity of the Rams' academy.
He lost his first game in charge during the week when Championship promotion hopefuls Derby went down 1-0 at home to relegation-threatened MK Dons.
It looked like he might lose his second as well, but his men scored three times in the final 10 minutes to win 3-1 at Brentford and chalk up Derby's first victory since Boxing Day to lift them to fifth.
Until this week the closest Bristol Rovers had been associated with Jordan was when Katie Price drove out of town on the M32.
But this week the men from the Mem were watched by the man from Amman for the first time, as new club's new Jordanian President Wael Al-Qadi cast his eye over his new acquisition.
His family have taken a 92% stake in the Pirates, with hopes of building a new ground and finally leaving the Memorial Stadium.
And he will no doubt have been pleased with what he saw, as Rovers came from a goal down to beat Morecambe 2-1 and move into the League Two play-off places.
Rovers had won just one of their previous five league games, so perhaps their new owner is a lucky omen. | The Football League's least in-form team throwing away a two-goal lead, a new set of foreign owners seeing their club play for the first time and the worst possible way to make your debut. |
35,539,462 | Dan Mulhall was giving evidence on a so-called Brexit to the Northern Ireland Affairs Select Committee.
Mr Mulhall is the Irish ambassador in London.
He said a UK withdrawal could led to "some kind of customs controls which would be a negative development for both populations and economies."
Mr Mulhall told MPs that the Republic of Ireland wanted to "preserve the advantages" of its existing trade relationship with the UK, which he said was worth 65bn euros (£50.3m) last year and supported 200,000 jobs in each of the two countries.
"We have a very good set-up, never better than it is today, and we do not want to see anything cut across that," he said
He told MPs that Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny does not believe a Brexit poses a threat to the peace process.
"He was talking about improved British-Irish relations which have developed. If you remove Northern Ireland from the EU it does make a difference," he said. | A UK exit from the EU would create uncertainty about the open border between Northern Ireland and the Republic, an Irish diplomat has said. |
37,028,733 | Margetson, 44, was part of Wales manager Chris Coleman's backroom staff at the 2016 European Championship and worked with England boss Sam Allardyce at West Ham.
He will combine his international duties with his role as goalkeeping coach at Cardiff City.
"This is a great opportunity and I am excited to be working alongside Sam again," he said.
"I know what he can bring to a squad and also to the coaching staff."
Margetson takes over from Dave Watson as Allardyce reshuffles his backroom staff. | Martyn Margetson has been appointed England goalkeeping coach. |
40,608,795 | Government figures show there are expected to be around half a million more secondary age children by 2026.
The increase is being fuelled by the baby boom of the early 2000s, which means growing numbers of pupils moving through the school system
Overall pupil numbers are expected to increase by 654,000 (or 8.7%) to around 8.1m by 2026.
In secondary schools alone, the overall population is projected to reach around 3.3m in 2026, a 19.1% increase or around 534,000 more pupils.
This is the second year running that secondary school numbers have risen, the government report said.
It added: "This is primarily because increased births from 2002 onwards means there are now larger numbers entering secondary schools at age 11 than are leaving them at age 16."
Primary school numbers are projected to be around 100,000 higher in 2026.
"Direct immigration of pupils born outside the UK has a very small effect on the school age population," the Department for Education report says.
"However, the birth rate, which has a much larger effect, is in turn affected by any increase in the number of children born to non-UK born women (who overall tend to have higher fertility rates)."
Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said the pressure on secondary school places would be intense going forward.
He added this meant decisions on new school building and expansions needed to be taken carefully and with local knowledge.
He said: "There's huge urgency to this and we are all watching it closely." | The number of pupils in England's secondary schools is set to rise by almost a fifth within the next decade. |
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