自工党在 2024. 年 9 月采取紧急措施解决过度拥挤问题以来，已有超过 70,000 人获释。截至 6 月底，英格兰和威尔士共有 85,858 人在押。监狱系统的实际运行能力约为 89,500 人。
司法部此前预测，除非提前释放 6,000 名囚犯，否则监狱床位将在 11 月耗尽。
奥利弗·赖特 (Oliver Wright) 政策编辑 黛西·伊斯特莱克 (Daisy Eastlake) 政治记者 杰西卡·沙基 (Jessica Sharkey) 犯罪记者
在旨在解决监狱过度拥挤的计划被削弱后，被判定犯有强奸、诱导犯罪和儿童性侵罪的罪犯将不再具备提前释放的资格。
安迪·伯纳姆表示，他是在回应公众对该提案的“愤怒、焦虑和痛苦”。根据原提案，被判定犯有某些最严重罪行的人在仅服刑一半后即可获释——而目前的要求是三分之二。
凯米·巴登诺克表示，伯纳姆想要“因为同意不释放强奸犯和儿童性侵犯而获得一轮掌声。但他得不到。”
这位托利党 / 保守党领导人补充道：“由于工党的提前释放计划，杀人犯、暴力犯罪者、恐怖恐吓其伴侣的男性以及更多人，都将在 10 月走出监狱。”
首相承认他无法在限制措施上“走得更远”，并表示被判定犯有过失杀人和严重家庭虐待的人仍可能获释，以防止监狱系统“达到上限并崩溃”。
家庭虐待专员妮可·雅各布斯女爵表示：“不将家庭虐待实施者排除在该计划之外的决定是错误的，这使受害者的生命处于危险之中。正如我上周告诉大法官的那样，实施者给受害者带来的危险不应被低估。这些人执迷于其受害者，为了控制和伤害将不择手段。”
由于未能将过失杀人犯排除在外，这意味着两名杀害安德鲁·哈珀警员的凶手将在 1 月具备获释资格。
2019, 年在出警处理犯罪现场时被杀的警员遗孀利西·哈珀表示，她“愤怒至极。这传递了多么令人厌恶的信息？部长们怎敢说杀害一名警员还不算足够‘令人作呕的罪行’，不值得受到最严厉的惩罚？”
她表示，这次释放将是“对正义的冒犯。政府和司法系统不仅让我失望……而且是在伤口上撒盐。他们本应站在我们这边。这是彻头彻尾的背叛——是我无法原谅或忘记的。”
伯纳姆在两周前进入第 10 号首相府后，宣布对提前释放计划进行审查。
大约 5,000 名囚犯预计从下个月起具备获释资格，其中包括被判定犯有强奸、过失杀人和儿童性侵的人。司法部无法说明这 5,000 名囚犯中有多少人将因为此次变更而不再获释。
罗德·利德尔在 66 岁去世后，人们对他表达了哀悼。他曾为《星期日泰晤士报》和《太阳报》撰写定期专栏，并为 Times Radio 主持每周节目。
一名剑桥学院院长撤回了对剑桥教授杰森·阿尔代的支持，此前后者似乎承认其博士论文部分内容存在剽窃。
26 岁的阿富汗拳击手夏里夫·艾哈迈德扎伊因涉嫌谋杀 38 岁的伊丽莎白-简·罗斯 (Elisabeth-Jane Ross) 并将尸体弃置于行李箱中而被逮捕。
英格兰和威尔士经历了自 1836, 年开始记录以来最干燥的 7 月，导致农作物受损并引发山火。约 23 million 人受到软管禁令的限制。
在广岛遭受原子弹轰炸 81 年后，日本现在正公开讨论该国是否需要在国防计划中将核武器纳入其中。
£450 的海鲈鱼，给狗准备的牛排
Rhys Blakely 科学编辑
英国该领域的一位顶尖专家警告称，自闭症已成为一种“概括性诊断”，被应用于太多人，以至于面临几乎失效的风险。
目前，每一起自闭症病例都被归入同一个临床标签：自闭症谱系障碍 (ASD)。然而，乌塔·弗里思教授女爵表示，该诊断被应用于生活状况和需求截然不同的人群，从需要终身照顾的严重残疾儿童，到症状轻微且独立生活的成年人。
弗里思在《心理医学》期刊上撰文，呼吁将该谱系分为更清晰的组别。她认为，这可以在防止误诊的同时，结束对那些最严重残疾者的“悲剧性忽视”。
她说：“自闭症并非一直这样定义——一种针对极多种状况的概括性诊断。在 20 世纪 40 年代首次被认定的时候，它指的是一小群在社交互动、沟通和行为方面有严重困难的孩子。随着时间的推移，定义扩大了，将那些具有较轻特质且没有语言或学习问题的人也涵盖在内。”
她补充道：“过去，我和我的同事们很有信心在第一印象时就能认出自闭症。但今天就不能这样了。”
弗里思是伦敦大学学院 (UCL) 的认知发展荣休教授。她的研究有助于建立具有影响力的理论，探讨自闭症患者如何理解他人的思想，以及他们如何处理细节和上下文。
被诊断为自闭症的人数大幅增加，但由于诊断标准发生了剧烈变化，不同时期的数字并不具有直接可比性。一项 1966, 年发表的英国研究显示，每 10,000. 名儿童中约有 4 名自闭症患者。近期的研究显示，有记录诊断的学龄儿童比例约为 1 / 57 —— 增长了 44 倍。
另一项针对英国初级医疗记录的研究发现，有 1.2% 的成年人被诊断为自闭症，高于 2000 年的 0.1%。
由于投资者对阿斯特拉捷尼卡探讨与一家美国竞争对手合并交易的报道反应冷淡，该公司市值蒸发了近 £18 亿。
艾玛·拉杜卡努因右小腿下方压力性骨折将缺席美国公开赛。这位英国 1 号选手此前因伤在最后时刻退出了温布尔登网球锦标赛。
司法大臣 Alex Norris
[图注] 下方是昆虫学家 Dino Martins，他致力于改变我们对寄生虫的看法
历史学家 AN Wilson 回顾政治协议的历史
剑桥郡和彼得伯勒市市长 Paul Bristow
安全专家 Frank Gardner 讨论他的最新小说《Ballistic》
欧盟历史上规模最大的一次单一非法越境事件于上周发生在塞乌塔。但为什么移民会如此集中地涌入？是因为西班牙的法律变更，还是外国势力对西班牙宽松的移民政策感到不满？
Laurence Sleator 交通特派员
政府将扩大一项使用GPS追踪铁路乘客位置的数字票务应用程序，将其作为打击逃票行动的一部分。在铁路全面国有化之前，政府正在东米德兰兹（East Midlands）和约克郡（Yorkshire）的部分路线上测试数字随用随付（pay-as-you-go）票务技术。该应用程序通过监控乘客位置，在行程的起点和终点为其办理签入，即便车站没有检票闸机。行程费用经计算后将直接从乘客的银行卡中扣除。费用设有上限，设计者表示，该应用程序能让乘客更容易找到最便宜的票。覆盖路线包括经德比（Derby）从莱斯特（Leicester）到诺丁汉（Nottingham）、哈罗盖特（Harrogate）到利兹（Leeds），以及谢菲尔德（Sheffield）到唐卡斯特（Doncaster）。
人们希望通过查看乘客在何处上车和下车，来帮助制止逃票手段，例如“短途票”（short faring）——即客户仅购买行程最后一段的数字票；以及“甜甜圈票”（doughnutting）——即购买了行程开头和结尾段的票，但未购买中间部分的票。该应用程序还设有保障措施，包括工作人员在行程结束后进行“手动检查审查”以标记任何可疑情况，以及监控用户的手机电量，以确认是否存在真正的误操作。如果用户在旅途中频繁断开连接或关闭手机，他们将收到电子邮件提醒其义务，或被收取最高票价，或被禁止使用该应用程序。
此前试验仅向少数选定乘客开放，但现在不限人数可报名参加。在评估试验结果并决定是否在全国推广该技术之前，纸质票和常规数字票仍将可用。如果检票员想要在车上查票，或者乘客被困在检票闸机前，该应用程序将生成一个显示行程起点的QR码。
交通大臣海蒂·亚历山大（Heidi Alexander）表示：“逃票是违法且自私的行为。我们致力于打击票务欺诈，而将数字票务应用程序扩展到试验区域的更多人群，正是预期收益之一。”
协助运行该试验的Trainline未来票务项目负责人詹·富尔福德（Jen Fulford）表示：“数字随用随付是一项极佳的技术，得到了东米德兰兹地区超过 1,500 名试验者的热烈欢迎，并有助于铁路实现部分关键目标。”
“GPS技术既能防止人们不诚实地买错票，也能确保人们不会在旅途中意外支付过高费用。”据估计，逃票每年给该行业造成 4 亿英镑（£400 million）的损失。政府正发布一系列旨在解决此问题的公告。
“在建立大不列颠铁路（Great British Railways）之际，这项票务开发仅仅是我们如何实现铁路现代化并坚持乘客至上的一个例子，旨在让旅程变得更简单、更便捷。”这还包括投入 33 百万英镑（£33 million）在逃票热点地区安装肩高检票闸机以防止翻越，以及在获得任何折扣前，在网上、自动售票机和售票窗口增加“铁路卡验证步骤”。
马克·塞尔曼 (Mark Sellman)，技术记者
苹果公司与政府在警方及安全部门试图访问该公司持有的英国公民数据问题上，正走向一场法律之争。内政部正寻求强制苹果公司在数据被加密的情况下也允许访问，但苹果公司目前已采取法律行动予以阻止。这一争端威胁到将重新引发一场跨大西洋的争议，该问题在去年部长们尝试采取类似步骤时曾一度激化。在那个案例中，政府希望访问苹果公司持有的关于所有人的数据，而不仅仅是英国公民，这导致了特朗普政府的强烈反对。英国当时似乎做出了让步，但现在修改了请求，将重点放在英国数据上。这场法律斗争在调查权力法庭（Investigatory Powers Tribunal）进行，该法庭负责处理被戏称为“窥探者宪章”的《调查权力法》（Investigatory Powers Act）。该法案允许执法部门调查恐怖主义、国家安全和严重犯罪。科技行业和活动人士反对政府任何削弱加密技术的尝试，他们认为加密对于隐私和安全至关重要。辩论的核心是端到端加密，这意味着数据只能由预期用户或其信任的设备解密。苹果公司已将更多存储数据迁移到这种方法，而政府希望该公司创建一个可以被访问的系统，活动人士将其称为“后门”。苹果公司表示，此次提起诉讼的是该公司而非国际隐私组织（Privacy International），并引用了之前的声明，其中提到：“我们从未在任何产品或服务中建立后门或主密钥，而且永远不会。”美国参议院情报委员会成员、参议员罗恩·怀登（Ron Wyden）告诉《泰晤士报》：“如果苹果公司被强迫削弱其安全性，每一个拥有iCloud账户的英国人都将更容易受到罪犯和掠夺者的威胁。”一名政府发言人表示：“英国支持强大的加密和稳健的隐私保护，但执法部门在必要时能够访问通信……以保护公众，这一点同样至关重要。”
乔治·格里尔斯（George Grylls），华盛顿
据消息人士透露，吉安尼·因凡蒂诺（Gianni Infantino）在为保住国际足联（Fifa）主席职位而奋斗之际，多次尝试给特朗普总统打电话。 据《纽约邮报》报道，自周五以来，这位瑞士-意大利籍足球行政官一直向总统寻求帮助，当时他被迫放弃了向私人投资者出售世界杯 20% 股份的计划。国际足联和白宫尚未对这些说法发表评论。 因凡蒂诺将总统描述为“非常亲密的朋友”，并在去年授予他首届国际足联和平奖。在锦标赛之前，他在特朗普大厦开设了国际足联的美国办事处。 在要求他辞职的呼声日益高涨之际，有报道称因凡蒂诺希望在昨天会见国务卿马可·鲁比奥（Marco Rubio）进行谈话。然而，国际足联和国务院否认举行了会议。 另一名人士表示：“他正在寻找知名的盟友在公开场合支持他。” 特朗普政府与席卷国际足联的危机保持距离。上周，总统否认自己讨论过因凡蒂诺的计划，该计划最早由《泰晤士报》披露，旨在向投资者出售世界杯股份，包括由特朗普女婿贾里德·库什纳（Jared Kushner）的兄弟约书亚·库什纳（Joshua Kushner）经营的一家风险投资基金。 一名内部人士告诉《纽约邮报》：“他想与国务卿在线沟通，探讨足球如何成为美国的一种软实力形式。但我们都知道，这关乎保住工作。在现阶段，除此之外没有其他目的。” 安迪·伯纳姆已要求因凡蒂诺下台，英格兰足球协会（Football Association）也撤回了对这位国际足联主席连任竞选的支持。
劳伦斯·斯莱特（Laurence Sleator），詹妮弗·周（Jennifer Zhou）
部长们将自动驾驶出租车誉为“交通的未来”，承诺随着行业的增长，将减少碰撞事故并提供数十亿英镑的经济增长。 然而，一份报告称，将这些车辆引入伦敦可能会产生一些意外后果，包括更严重的拥堵和污染。 专注于推广共享交通的慈善机构 CoMoUK 发布了一份白皮书，重点介绍了来自美国的各项研究，美国已使用无人驾驶出租车多年。研究表明，这些车辆在行驶过程中，有高达三分之二的时间处于空车状态。 在 Waymo 于加利福尼亚州开展商业服务的第一个月里，出租车空车时间占 64 %，不过随着车队规模的扩大以及人们对该服务的认知度提高，这一数字缓慢下降。 报告指出，尽管大多数无人驾驶汽车是电动车，但它们造成的严重拥堵可能会增加污染，因为其他非电动车辆将被迫处于怠速状态，从而排放更多尾气。
7am 10. 12. 1. 3.
作者：Lowri Lewis
畅销犯罪小说作家琳达·拉·普兰特（Lynda La Plante）在流泪告诉法院此类禁令将终结她的职业生涯后，被判取消驾驶资格。这位 83 岁的作家也是电视剧《首席嫌疑人》（Prime Suspect）的创作者，她表示，如果不能开车带她心爱的护卫犬西奥（Theo）进行每日散步，她将完全停止写作。她告诉法院，如果无法开车带狗散步，她认为可能不得不为爱犬寻找新家，并表示：“我认为那带来的情感动荡将真正毁掉我的作家生涯。写作是非常孤独的，而且我工作极其刻苦，（如果那样的话）我将直接停止写作。”
拉·普兰特还表示，她需要汽车去接触犯罪分子和信息源，以便为下一部小说进行研究。她告诉伦敦的薰衣草山（Lavender Hill）治安法院，她不想雇佣司机，因为她不希望在从信息源处返回的途中被司机“询问问题”。该作家表示，如果实施禁驾，她将关闭她的公司，导致四名员工失业。
然而，治安法官认定，她未能证明禁驾会给她带来“极度困难”——并判处她禁驾六个月。拉·普兰特在 20 世纪 80 年代创作了热门抢劫剧集《寡妇》（Widows），并于 1991 年将由海伦·米伦（Helen Mirren）主演的《首席嫌疑人》搬上荧屏。她昨天承认，在 2025 年 11 月至今年 4 月之间，她在泰晤士河畔金斯顿（Kingston-upon-Thames）住所附近五次违反了 20 英里 / 小时的限速规定。该作家承认，在带她的 18 个月大的狗进行每日散步时，曾两次以 24 英里 / 小时的速度行驶，此外还有 25 英里 / 小时、26 英里 / 小时和 27 英里 / 小时的超速记录。
检察官卡里·威廉姆森（Kari Williamson）表示，拉·普兰特因 2023 年至 2025 年间犯下的三次超速违章，驾驶执照上已有 9 个记分。她的律师尼克·弗里曼（Nick Freeman）被誉为“漏洞先生”（Mr Loophole），曾代表一系列名人客户，他敦促治安法官免除她的禁驾处罚。
琳达·拉·普兰特表示，上方照片中她的爱尔兰猎狼犬雨果（Hugo）的去世对她影响很大。她需要开车带上方的宠物狗西奥（Theo）散步，并为了研究而与犯罪分子交谈。
当被问及为什么不能像过去在参加“演艺活动”时那样付费雇佣司机时，拉·普兰特表示，在会完信息源后她需要“独处时间”。在作证时，她说：“我不想坐在后座，听着司机不停地问问题。”拉·普兰特说她有四本书正在创作中，并主张她需要开车进行研究访谈，因为像“犯罪分子”这类人群对于“地点的选择非常挑剔”。
拉·普兰特说，她开车带西奥在从罗汉普顿（Roehampton）到温布尔登（Wimbledon）的路上接受训练。她说，附近的里士满公园（Richmond Park）不合适，因为那里“到处是慢跑者”以及鹿，而她正试图训练西奥不要追逐行人。在作证时，拉·普兰特提到，在经历此前宠物雨果不幸早逝的打击后，她养了新狗西奥，而雨果当时正处于“生命的巅峰期”。“我不想让这听起来很琐碎——一个女人和她的狗——但我无法向你们描述那只巨大且美丽的猎狼犬是怎样的。我不知道它是怎么做到的。它会走进我的办公室，就像在对我说‘停下来’。它知道我已经连续工作了五个小时，然后这只爪子就会伸过来——咚的一声。”
她强忍泪水说，当雨果去世时她“崩溃了”，且“不知道该如何面对生活”。她曾抱怨泰晤士河畔金斯顿 A308 公路上的路标“非常令人困惑”。弗里曼暗示，她在专注于安全驾驶时无意中违反了限速规定。她说新狗帮她度过了悲痛期。“我爱它，就这么简单，但与此同时，它也成为了我巨大的慰藉，”她说道。
治安法官对该作者处以总计 £3,330 的罚款，并对其处以六个月的禁驾令。她的扣分总数增加至 24 分，并被命令支付 £130 的诉讼费用和 £1,332 的受害者附加费。在出庭聆讯之前，La Plante 的驾照上已经有九个扣分，因此如果她的特殊理由申请在 10 月的聆讯中被驳回，她可能会被取消驾驶资格。
在 2023, 全球影院狂揽 14 亿美元 billion 的《芭比》在三年内已开出六次报价，试图说服主演们回归。在《芭比》与《奥本海默》这两部大片的对决高峰期，有一件事是肯定的——可能只有一部会有续集。片方否认了关于首席执行官大卫·扎斯拉夫“对已与主演达成的条款犹豫不决”的报道。一名发言人补充道：“从未出现过一个经过批准随后又被撤回的约定框架。代表们拒绝了最近的一次报价，而这次报价是华纳兄弟为一部电影开出的最高金额之列。迄今为止尚未收到反向报价。”
但现在，《芭比》 2 回归并扩大其对克里斯托弗·诺兰传记电影票房领先优势的前景已陷入危机。制片人一直在努力与好莱坞演员玛格特·罗比和瑞恩·高斯林达成协议，让他们重新饰演芭比和肯。在好莱坞，续集谈判通常不会如此困难，因为制片厂和主演通常会在任何潜在系列电影的第一部上映前就商定好条款。
据《纽约时报》报道，高斯林 45, 要求续集的片酬为 $20 million。这部大片背后的制片厂华纳兄弟探索频道（Warner Bros Discovery）由华纳兄弟影业集团联席主席兼首席执行官帕姆·阿比和迈克尔·德卢卡证实，在与两位主演达成协议之前。时间在流逝——华纳兄弟探索频道与《芭比》版权持有方美泰（Mattel）的协议将于12月到期。如果截止日期前无法达成条款，版权将回归至该玩具品牌，后者可能会用不同的概念重新开发该系列。
僵局在 2024 年仍在继续，罗比似乎对《芭比》续集的前景反应冷淡。她在接受《综艺》（Variety）采访时表示：“很有趣，在这个时代，大家的下意识反应就是立刻询问是否有续集。我不认为 20 年前是这样的。我们希望拍更多能产生像《芭比》那样影响力的电影。”
[图注] 玛格特·罗比和瑞恩·高斯林在 2023 年的热门电影中
第三代汉沃斯子爵大卫·斯蒂芬·杰弗里·波洛克因在伦敦一个限速 20 mph 的区域内以 27mph 超速被抓，现计划提出特殊理由以试图避免被禁驾。这位前工党世袭贵族 80, 在 2 月于威斯敏斯特治安法院承认在伊斯灵顿超速，这可能导致他的驾照被记 3 分并被处以罚款。
亚历克斯·法伯 媒体记者
在 11 或 12, 岁时开设第一个个人社交媒体账户，与另一组等到 14 或 15. 岁才开户的人群进行对比。里斯·布莱克利 科学编辑 一项针对 5,000 名以上学生的研究发现，在中学开始时就开设社交媒体账户与学生在 16, 岁时的数学成绩落后约六个月相关。每位早期使用者在对比组中都被匹配了一个“统计学双胞胎”——即一名家庭背景相似、父母受教育程度相近且童年早期测试结果相当的学生。当这些学生在 15 或 16 岁参加国家测试时，较早加入社交媒体的学生在数学和意大利语方面的得分明显较低。这一差距大致相当于一名孩子缺课六个月所导致的结果。研究结果表明，频繁检查手机会干扰家庭作业和注意力，从而导致考试成绩不理想。
分数。这些结果公布之际，政府正准备禁止16岁以下青少年使用Instagram和TikTok等服务，因为人们日益担心这会对心理健康、睡眠和学业成绩产生影响。领导这项研究的米兰比可卡大学教授马尔科·圭（Marco Gui）表示：“虽然大多数关于社交媒体和未成年人的研究将心理健康视为结果，但我们关注的是学业表现，并且我们发现了这种负面影响更明显的迹象。”根据媒体监管机构Ofcom的数据，83 per cent 的英国 11-yearolds 拥有智能手机。升入中学是一个转折点，许多孩子在此阶段收到他们的第一部设备。这项新研究对比了一组来自意大利北部的“早期采用者”学生，他们已经开启了
他支持更严格的年龄限制，并表示：“这是一个紧急时刻，我认为实施禁令是正确的选择。”这项发表在《自然-人类行为》（Nature Human Behaviour）杂志上的研究无法证明社交媒体导致了成绩下滑。然而，研究人员表示，习惯性地查看手机似乎是最合理的解释之一。早期采用者更有可能报告在做作业、在学校、睡前和醒后查看手机，这可能会干扰注意力并影响睡眠。伦敦玛丽女王大学教授丹尼斯·奥格林（Dennis Ougrin）未参与此项研究，他表示：“这项研究增加了越来越多的证据，表明年轻人首次接触社交媒体的年龄可能对其教育发展至关重要。虽然研究结果不能证明社交媒体是导致学业成绩不佳的唯一原因，但它们表明，较早且在很大程度上缺乏监督的使用与后来的成绩差异相关，特别是——
自闭症的“概括性”诊断可能会变得毫无意义 可能拥有平均或高智商，以及焦虑症、抑郁症、创伤后应激障碍或注意缺陷多动障碍等情况。一些研究还发现了与这两组人相关的遗传模式差异。弗里思认为，这两组人可能如此迥异，以至于“我们再也找不到共同点”。目前没有血液检测、扫描或其他
4 Tuesday August 4 2026 / the times 新闻 搞定了！ 孩子们在里彭赛马场举办的“勺子与马鞍”家庭日（Scoops and Saddles family day）期间，品尝北约克郡冰淇淋锦标赛提供的美食。 儿童早期使用社交媒体与成绩较低相关 通过单一诊断将各种问题归类。她问道：“对包容性的追求最终是否导致了过度包容？”记录显示，1998 和 2018. 之间，新记录病例的率增加了近九倍。这并不意味着自闭症本身以同样的速度增加。对该病症意识的提高、污名化的减少以及对女性和成年人自闭症更好的认可，可能解释了增长的大部分原因。弗里思最近强调了童年时期确诊者与青少年或成年期确诊者之间显著差异的证据。童年确诊者更有可能出现明显的发育、语言或学习困难。较晚确诊的人则更
根据弗里思的说法，努力识别那些曾经被忽视的人，也可能会将太多不同的
TIMES PHOTOGRAPHER JAMES GLOSSOP Quintagram® No 2637 仅使用下方每个字母一次，解决所有五个简洁的线索 1 强有力的击打 (4) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 2 车辆 immobiliser (5) 3 短时间的高强度活动 (6) 4 更苗条的 (7) 5 礼貌的
问候或评论 (10) A A A B C E E F I L L L L L M M M N O P P R R R R S S T U W Y Y 答案见 T2 MindGames 第14页 隐晦线索 T2 MindGames 第15页
泰特美术馆“替罪羊”出院 一名七年前从泰特现代美术馆十楼被扔下的男孩已经出院，其家属表示。这名法国儿童在 2019. 8月遭到琼蒂·布雷弗里（Jonty Bravery）袭击时年仅六岁。该儿童在1月接受了脑部手术，并于上月出院。布雷弗里承认企图谋杀，并于 2020 年被判处至少 15 年监禁。
商店盗窃技术助力成功 数据显示，由于一个允许零售商在几分钟内将犯罪监控视频发送给警方的在线平台，伦敦被绳之以法的商店盗窃者数量增加了四倍。该平台的案件获得积极结果（如起诉或警告）的概率为 29.4%，而引入该平台前仅为 7.3%。
“失控”司机 一名向警方谎称其捷豹 I-Pace 电动汽车失控并自动加速的男子被判处四年三个月监禁。内森·欧文，33, 在利物浦刑事法院承认欺诈和危险驾驶，他在试图逃避支付汽车贷款时以 86 英里 / 小时的时速行驶，并 31 次与警车碰撞。
在数学和语言方面。研究还指出了一些可能的机制，例如频繁检查手机和注意力下降，而不仅仅是屏幕使用时间本身。”
今年 6 月，政府宣布将禁止社交媒体公司向 16. 岁以下儿童提供服务。计划中的限制预计将包括 TikTok、Instagram、Snapchat、Facebook、X 和 YouTube，而 WhatsApp 和 Signal 等即时通讯服务不在此列。首批法规预计将于今年年底前提交议会，禁令预计于春季生效。
音乐教授被判无罪 皇家音乐学院的一名小提琴教授被判定未对一名 18 岁学生实施袭击，他在南华克刑事法院表示，他当时是在课上纠正该学生的姿势。扬·雷普科，68, 在南华克刑事法院经过重新审理后，被判定性侵犯和通过穿透方式袭击罪名不成立。他称这些指控“荒谬”。
部长们在 7 月宣布了针对 16 和 17 岁青少年的进一步保护措施。社交媒体应用程序将被要求实施默认的深夜宵禁，时间为午夜至凌晨 6 点，并自动禁用旨在诱导青少年持续刷屏的功能。这些措施包括对自动播放内容的限制。
早餐时间：6am 至 10am 我们的免费广播电台每天早晨提供最新的头条新闻、采访和辩论。一周七天持续播出。可通过 DAB、应用程序、网站和智能扬声器收听。
能够确认自闭症的生物标记物。诊断依赖于患者的病史、其陈述以及临床工作人员的观察和判断。弗里思补充说，她担心“掩饰”（masking），这指的是一些人为了融入环境而掩盖其自闭症特征。“如果‘掩饰’可以用来解释症状的完全缺失，”她写道，“那么从理论上讲，这可能会将诊断阈值降低到零。”
JOHN LAWRENCE / SHUTTERSTOCK
亚历克斯·法伯（Alex Farber）写道，去世年仅 66 岁的罗德·利德尔（Rod Liddle）将深邃的才智与犀利的幽默感结合在了一起。
[图注] 罗德·利德尔曾为《星期日泰晤士报》- The Sunday Times、《太阳报》- The Sun 和《旁观者》- The Spectator 撰写专栏。上方照片中，他与第二任妻子艾丽西亚·蒙克顿（Alicia Monckton）在起。
弗雷泽·尼尔森 (Fraser Nelson)
记者兼播音员罗德·利德尔 (Rod Liddle) 周日晚在米德尔斯堡的詹姆斯·库克大学医院因病突然去世。他曾为《星期日泰晤士报》和《太阳报》撰写专栏，并为泰晤士广播电台主持每周节目。他的子女怀尔德 (Wilder)、泰勒 (Tyler) 和艾米 (Emmy) 在一份声明中表示：“我们对这位优秀的父亲的突然离世感到非常悲痛和震惊。他引导我们成长，正如你们所想象的那样，让我们保持好奇心、勇敢且始终幽默。”
“即便是在过去几周住院期间，他依然掌控着全场的氛围，从未让糟糕的处境显露出来。他留下的遗产令我们所有人感到无比自豪，他将永远指引我们如何过一种非凡的生活。”
新闻集团 (News Corp) 首席执行官、2002年至2007年期间的《泰晤士报》编辑罗伯特·汤姆森 (Robert Thomson) 表示：“罗德既有顽童般的深邃，也深具顽童之风。早在2003年，我们就决定让他将他的知识能量和发散性机智带到《泰晤士报》，自此，他的智慧与古灵精怪在我们的公司以及整个世界中回响。罗德产生的共鸣定将在未来的许多许多年里持续回荡。”
News UK 首席执行官丽贝卡·布鲁克斯 (Rebekah Brooks) 表示，读者、听众和观众将深切地想念他。“罗德是一个无可替代的新闻力量——才华横溢、极具挑衅性且天赋极高——他犀利的机智和绝不妥协的声量在数十年的时间里装点了我们的版面和电波，”布鲁克斯说。“无论是在为《星期日泰晤士报》和《太阳报》撰稿，还是在泰晤士广播电台播音，他都挑战了传统思维，在英国新闻界留下了不可磨灭的印记。”
利德尔曾任 BBC Radio 4 的《今日》(Today) 节目编辑，在被时任《泰晤士报》周六版编辑的迈克尔·戈夫 (Michael Gove) 从《卫报》挖走后，于2003年开始为《泰晤士报》撰文。
现任《旁观者》(The Spectator) 编辑的戈夫表示：“他拥有独特的声音，我很庆幸这种声音在我们的版面上得到了充分发挥。他还拥有另一种大多数专栏作家梦寐以求的特质——他敢于直言。”
随后，他开始为《星期日泰晤士报》和《太阳报》撰写每周文章，并于去年开始在泰晤士广播电台主持周六早间节目。
BBC 主席萨米尔·沙阿 (Samir Shah) 将利德尔描述为“独一无二”且“有点像个职业格格不入的人”。
“罗德是个多才多艺的人——包括是一名一流的厨师。去他家吃晚餐与去一家米其林星级餐厅相差无几。谁能想到呢？但最重要的是，他是一个热心且慷慨的人。”
《星期日泰晤士报》编辑本·泰勒 (Ben Taylor) 表示，人们将极其想念他。“罗德·利德尔有着绝佳的文字掌控力，并利用其独特的天赋为读者发声，揭示困扰现代生活的伪善与荒诞，”泰勒说。“他也极其幽默，多年来，他的专栏是许多人每个周日首先阅读的内容。”
在离开 BBC 后，利德尔开始为《旁观者》撰稿。他在6月份发表的最后篇文章标题为《凯米给了我希望》，体现了他辛辣的幽默感。“前几天我产生了一个想法，也许我对这个转瞬即逝的世界还能提供更多。一种感觉，既然生活对我相对宽容，也许我可以回馈一些东西，”他写道。“我大约每个月会有一次这样的想法——而且通常会被随之摒弃，因为它们要么不切实际，要么具有杀意。”
《太阳报》总编辑维多利亚·牛顿 (Victoria Newton) 将利德尔描述为一位才华横溢、无所畏惧的专栏作家。“作为新闻自由的捍卫者，没有任何话题是禁区，他的文字——既幽默又辛辣——简直出类拔萃，”牛顿说。“他是一位对政治阶层弱点有极佳洞察力的观察者，人们将记住他如剃刀般犀利的机智和巨大的才识。”
《星期日泰晤士报》的专栏作家卡米拉·隆（Camilla Long）表示，利德尔是一位才华横溢、才智过人的作家，她将非常想念他。“他对每件事都有自己的见解，”她补充道，“他可以写得很幽默，但同时也是一位非常严肃的作家。他深切地关心中我们，这个国家以及这里发生的一切。”
凯米·巴登诺克表示，最近几周她一直很想念利德尔在《旁观者》（Spectator）的专栏及其在广播中的声音，对他去世感到震惊。“我无法用言语表达这对新闻业、对他读者，尤其是对他朋友和家人来说是多么令人悲痛，”她说道。
没有人能像罗德·利德尔那样写好开篇第一句。当我担任他的编辑时，我将其称为“可卡因式开场白”：只要一句，你就被勾住了。它可能会让你发笑、目瞪口呆，或者让你好奇这次他是否真的要走得太远。通常这三种感觉并存。但他的笔触最终总会引导向一个微妙、严肃且原创的论点——一个没有人想到，或者没人敢于提出的论点。其结果成了我们这个时代最伟大的讽刺文学。
我一直觉得很奇怪，这样一个极具天赋的作家竟然几乎是偶然开始写作的。他加入了BBC，并升任Radio 4的《今日》（Today）节目编辑。他偶尔撰写的专栏原本只是兼职。但这些文章引起了轰动，引发了一连串的“受控爆炸”。他很享受这一点，但BBC并不认同，并给了他一个选择：要么从事广播，要么从事出版。接下来的故事就成为了历史。
因为他认为自己属于左翼，所以他不介意对他认为的“自己这一方”进行嘲讽。但对方并不总能领会其中的笑点。但他拒绝被党派政治定型，攻击目标涵盖所有人。他的偏好在于那些最危险的议题，在他人恐惧涉足的地方浇油。他这样做并非通过论战或谩骂，而是通过幽默。刺破虚荣，嘲弄自大，屠宰神圣的牛。
在一个审查严苛的时代，他是可靠且快乐地逾矩。2009年我成为《旁观者》编辑并尽可能广泛地征求读者意见时，我听到的一个请求比其他所有请求加起来都多：不要削弱罗德的风格。对于许多读者来说，这本杂志的开始和结束就取决于他要说什么。
我还看到他的写作是多么自然、多么完美。如果我们下午2点讨论他的专栏主题，稿件在90分钟后就会送达。他写媒体、体育、政治、人口统计，甚至接手了一个音乐专栏，展示了他对作曲的知识。尽管他绝不会这样描述。
在现实生活中，他充满了生活之乐（joie de vivre）——从不乖戾、傲慢、愤怒或敏感。他热爱与读者见面。第一次在读者的圣诞颂歌音乐会上见到他时，他拿着一个装有桑赛尔白葡萄酒（Sancerre）的品脱杯，正与他们交流心得（和笑话）：他们就是他的同类。他爱他们，正如他们爱他一样。他很少出席名流权贵的活动，但绝不会错过与订阅者的见面机会，因为在他看来，他正是为这些人工作。
当“取消文化”出现时，罗德·利德尔成了第一个敢于对抗的目标。当时流行一种游戏：在技术细节上抓住把柄。如果他们引用一个略有偏差的统计数据，你就要求更正。如果给了更正，瞧！作者就“被迫修正其文章”。这样，新闻监管机构Ipso就可以被说服裁定其不准确。随后就可以要求解雇或惩戒该作者。
罗德对此深有体会。我认为我的职责是帮他抵御这些攻击，尽管并非次次成功。在我因他的一篇（非常出色且完全准确的）文章而陷入诉讼后，我成立了一个团队，在新的取消文化 era. 中为作家辩护。举个例子，罗德曾写过约克郡的一个地方，萨维尔镇（Savile Town）是“98 per cent 穆斯林”。显然这是一个比喻：一个典型的陷阱。于是团队去核实实际数字。答案是：98 per cent。他完全正确——正如他几乎在所有时候都正确的一样。他的天赋、他的幽默和他的俏皮，都建立在他不希望被世人知晓的严谨之上。正是这种结合，赋予了他的文字力量。
有许多作家旨在制造冲击力，有许多作家风趣幽默；但能兼而有之的人极少。而让罗德脱颖而出的是，他将这些特质与判断力、自律以及直击问题核心的能力融合在一起。曾经有，且永远不会再有像他这样的人。
奥利弗·赖特 (Oliver Wright) 政策编辑
法国警告称，随着奈杰尔·法拉格提出了一个被称为“自第二次世界大战以来英吉利海峡规模最大的军事行动”的方案，改革英国党（Reform UK）计划由皇家海军拦截并遣返小船的行为将是非法的。去年 8 月，奈杰尔·法拉格在讲台上承诺通过大规模驱逐来解决小船危机。今年 8 月，他再次如此，揭晓了“堡垒行动”（Operation Fortress）——承诺部署海军拦截每一次跨境尝试，并将移民遣返回法国或比利时，改革英国党称这是自二战以来在海峡采取的最大规模军事行动（奥利弗·赖特报道）。
法拉格在昨天的发布会上承诺，如果该党在下次选举中获胜，将派遣海军进入海峡拦截所有移民船。在所谓的“堡垒行动”下，移民将被拘留，在提供食物和水后，由海军舰艇“护送”遣返回法国或比利时。
法国内政部表示：“这将是对法国主权的侵犯，同时也是对海法和国际法的违背。此外，作为与英国共同实施的措施以及在地方层面部署的安排的一部分，内政部声明，2026 年的跨境人数有所下降。”
一个显而易见的问题是，为何在上次计划出台仅 12 个月后，又出现另一个宏大计划？一个解释是政治势头。在过去的 18 个月的大部分时间里，该党经历了看似不可阻挡的崛起。但近几周，随着标准调查的增加和对捐款的质疑增加，这种势头有所放缓，法拉格的个人支持率也在下降。
改革英国党回应称：“无论埃马纽埃尔·马克龙（法国总统）是否喜欢，我们将始终维护英国利益并保护我们的人民。人道主义任务并不违反海法或国际法。”
与此同时，鲁珀特·洛（Rupert Lowe）领导的“恢复党”（Restore）在梅克菲尔德（Makerfield）和大曼彻斯特市长的补选中表现良好，在这两场选举中都分走了右翼的选票。洛曾是改革英国党的国会议员，在与法拉格激烈决裂后创立了这家竞争政党；他在周末公开表示愿意与改革英国党合作——前提是后者接受一系列“恢复党”的政策。
法拉格在发布会上还表示，对于与鲁珀特·洛就统一英国政治中“爱国右翼”的协议进行谈判，他持有“开放心态”，但驳回了对方的一项关键要求。法拉格表示，他已建议给洛打电话，而洛在周末敦促两人共同工作。洛作为前改革英国党议员，在去年 3 月因涉嫌欺凌和威胁行为而激烈地离开了该党。这位百万富翁随后创立了自己的政党“恢复党”，削弱了改革英国党的得票份额。
法拉格称自己“心态开放”，并承认“恢复党”可能会给他的政党带来“巨大损害”。与此同时，上周出现了数万名移民从摩洛哥跨境进入西班牙北非领土塞乌塔的画面。在英国，尽管累计到达人数仍比 2025 年同期低 42%，但海峡跨境人数在 7 月 29 日达到了全年的日最高点。正是在这种背景下，改革英国党选择采取行动。
在上周的大曼彻斯特市长选举中，“恢复党”以 9% 的第一志愿票数排名第四，领先于保守党和自由民主党。洛在 X 平台上发布消息称，如果法拉格同意一系列要求，他愿意与改革英国党达成协议。这些要求包括将禁止布卡（burqa）面纱和清真肉类定为改革英国党的政策，并排除任何前保守党部长进入未来的内阁。
在改革党需要政治上稳住阵脚的时刻，法拉格再次祭出他职业生涯中一直信赖的手段，试图按照自己的条件重启辩论。法拉格表示，他“没有欲望”满足劳（Lowe）政策“购物清单”中的某些项目，并暗示对方对待这项协议并不认真。“如果你想与某人达成政治交易，你知道，你会私下联系他们，而不是拍一段 12 分钟的视频，”他说。“话虽如此，我昨天确实联系了……他。我说过，‘听着，我们要通个电话吗？’我还没有收到回复，所以我不知道这事的诚意如何。”
法拉格承认，Restore 可能会通过蚕食核心选票来损害改革党。“你可以预见这样一种情况：Restore 在除了格レート雅茅斯（Great Yarmouth）之外没有任何获胜希望的情况下——我的意思是，在全国范围内确实没有任何赢得一个席位的希望——可能会给我们带来巨大的伤害，”他说。“我认为在网上你会看到很多 Restore 的潜在选民现在开始担心这可能产生的影响。”他补充道：“我不会抛弃我的朋友。我不会抛弃我的盟友，无论那是苏埃拉·布拉夫曼（Suella Braverman）还是‘精致的’乔治 [科特雷尔]（Posh George [Cottrell]）。你知道我不会因为别人想让我这么做就抛弃人们。”
劳是在 2024 年大选中赢得格レート雅茅斯席位而被选入西敏斯特的第一批改革党议员之一。这位前南安普顿足球俱乐部主席此前曾与法拉格一起在欧洲议会的脱欧党中任职。“最后我想说，如果这真的是一份交易报价，那它是以一种非常不寻常的方式提出的。我已经对此做出了回应，可能，你知道，是带着开放的心态，就像我一直做的那样，但我绝对不会抛弃那些我认为是盟友和重要资产的人。”
然而，在当选进入西敏斯特不到一年后，他因被指控存在欺凌和威胁行为，被当时的改革英国党主席齐亚·尤素福（Zia Yusuf）举报给警方。他还因欺凌指控接受了党内的调查。
劳随后在 X 上发帖称法拉格是个“骗子”，并对法拉格描述的事件经过提出质疑，但表示该提议对他以及改革英国党仍然有效。他在周日表示，双方有可能达成和解。“我坚信，我们的两个运动之间应该有足够的共同点，可以共同合作 [以] 摧毁即将到来的左翼联盟，该联盟将”
另外，法拉格承认在 2024 年选举前讨论过重返政坛的“负债”问题，但他坚持认为当时他“没有意图”这么做。《The Sunday Times》报道称，法拉格在 2024, 3月和4月与当时的党魁理查德·泰斯（Richard Tice）协商了一项协议，由他回归担任领导人。根据该协议，一旦法拉格成为领导人，改革党将偿还或核销从泰斯公司获得的超过 £1 million 的未偿贷款。
法拉格承认他在 2024 年春天与泰斯讨论过如果他回来领导政党会发生什么。他说：“如果你接手一份工作而不去了解潜在的负债情况，那你有点像个傻瓜，不是吗，而且那些负债相当可观。”他说这“不是一项交易，不是一份协议，而是取决于我是否回来”。
议会贪腐监督机构还开始调查泰斯是否未能申报一项利益关系。泰斯在 X 的帖子中表示，议会标准专员丹尼尔·格林伯格（Daniel Greenberg）的调查是关于他在西敏斯特大厅的一次辩论发言中，涉嫌未能申报在以色列的利益关系。尽管专员在其网站上确认了调查，但泰斯称这是“媒体在造谣”。
[图注] 改革英国党领导人奈杰尔·法拉格在伦敦就小船危机发表讲话，其副手理查德·泰斯以及高级人员陪同。
此前已有近 70,000 名被判定犯有较轻罪行的罪犯被提前释放。但今年夏天，司法部长大卫·拉米宣布，该计划将扩大到涵盖更严重的罪行。他表示，如果不进行扩大，“我们将回到监狱容量在 99% 甚至接近 100% 的状态”。
部长们还将针对更严重罪犯的提前释放扩展计划推迟一个月，从 9 月延至 10 月，以便监管人员有时间为释放做计划，且受害者能够就对罪犯采取的限制措施发表意见。
伯纳姆表示：“我想诚实地说——我希望采取更进一步的措施，因为我知道人们对于其他罪犯刑期被缩短仍会有担忧。但如果监狱系统不达到容量上限并崩溃，这就不可能实现，而崩溃将使公共安全面临更大的风险。”
代表儿童性侵受害者的律师艾米·克劳里（Amy Clowrey）表示，她的七名客户在 6 月份收到信函，通知他们相关加害者可能符合提前释放的条件，这造成了“巨大的痛苦”。克劳里表示，她“非常高兴政府听取了一直为此而奋斗的幸存者的声音”，但补充说所有性犯罪者和暴力加害者都应被排除在该计划之外。
该提前释放计划于 2024 年在官员警告监狱服务即将崩溃后宣布。自那时起
伯纳姆所做改变的结果，但坚称其能够应对监狱设施所承受的额外压力。
他说：“……将这个国家仅存的希望彻底摧毁。”
是筹款“财团”的一部分，而非独自完成，且他在 12 天内跑了 600 英里，而不是 6 天。阿尔代告诉《泰晤士报》：“我承认，在纠正那种叙述时，我本可以表达得非常、非常明确。”他表示：“我对所犯的错误负责。我要求自己负责，其他人也应该要求我负责。我们这里讨论的是学术问题。我没有杀人。我认为我所经历的残酷对待，以及将我定位成这种谎言之徒和幻想家的做法是完全不可接受的。”
艾玛·尤曼斯 (Emma Yeomans)
一名剑桥大学学院的院长在一名剑桥教授杰森·阿尔代（Jason Arday）似乎承认剽窃其博士论文部分内容后，撤回了对他的支持。纳米科学家兼沃尔夫森学院（Wolfson College）院长的伊杰奥玛·乌切古教授女爵（Professor Dame Ijeoma Uchegbu）此前签署了一封由“良好法律项目”（Good Law Project）传阅的公开信，以支持阿尔代。阿尔代是该大学任命的最年轻的黑人教授，他被指控剽窃以及夸大其在体育和筹款方面的成就。其他学者表示，涉嫌剽窃和学术不端行为需要进行严肃调查。牛津大学社会学系主任科林·米尔斯（Colin Mills）教授在 X 上写道：“我不希望我的学科、我的部门、我那些勤奋且学术诚实的同事，或者我自己，因为与学术欺诈、低学术标准以及那些本应更懂行但身处权威地位的人所发表的小丑般言论产生间接关联而名誉受损。”该信函还由霍默顿学院（Homerton College）院长伍德福德的伍利勋爵（Lord Woolley of Woodford）、阿尔代担任研究员的耶稣学院（Jesus College）院长索尼塔·艾莱恩（Sonita Alleyne），以及包括扎克·波兰斯基（Zack Polanski）和约翰·麦克唐纳（John McDonnell）在内的政治人物签署。然而，乌切古的名字已在周末被删除，不再出现在该网站上。除了担任沃尔夫森学院院长外，乌切古还是医学科学院院士、皇家化学学会荣誉院士以及 Wellcome Trust 的理事。
昨晚，WaterAid 慈善机构对阿尔代关于在南美洲和西非“安装水点”的说法表示怀疑，称其从未向海外派遣志愿者。教育社会学教授阿尔代被指剽窃其博士论文及其发表的学术研究部分内容。他还被指控在生活经历中撒谎或夸大，包括声称在六天内跑了 600 英里，以及为慈善机构筹集了超过 £5 百万资金。据《每日电报》（The Daily Telegraph）报道，阿尔代在其演说经纪公司 Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau 网站上的个人简介中直到最近还写道：“他还与 WaterAid 合作，在南美洲和西非从事并完成了救灾工作，安装了提供饮用和清洁水的水点。”他否认编造关于马拉松跑步和筹集数百万慈善资金的故事，尽管他承认他
[图注] GUY BELL / ALAMY LIVE NEWS
Jonathan Ames 法律编辑
一条六英寸宽的土地地带和一个装饰性松鼠触发了长达 14 年的法律之战，其中涉及侮辱性的在线歌曲，以及超过 £150,000 的赔偿金和诉讼费用。纽（New）在他的 YouTube 频道上表示，他创作了 25 首以上的歌曲，其中一些是由人工智能生成的女性声音演唱的。虽然这些歌曲已被删除，但纽在该平台上承认，他创作了关于其邻居的内容，其他主题还包括“焦虑、孤独、童话以及利用福利制度”。菲利普·纽（Philip New）及其妻子丹尼斯（Denise）在 2012 年因埃塞克斯郡本弗利特（Benfleet）附近两家花园之间篱笆的位置发生争执后，首次起诉了他们的邻居史蒂夫·吉布森（Steve Gibson）和卡伦·吉布森（Karen Gibson）。最初的一场小口角在吉布森夫妇得知邻居从两家之间的柱子上移走了一个“具有情感价值”的松鼠装饰品而感到崩溃后，升级为一场法庭斗争。这场纠纷始于 2012 年，当时纽夫妇更换了一些篱笆板，导致邻居投诉该结构位置错误且不在一条直线上。吉布森先生在得知喜剧歌曲作曲家菲利普·纽在 YouTube 上创作并发布了关于这场法律纠纷的贬义小曲后感到震惊。其中一首歌曲就如何应对坏邻居提供了强硬的建议，歌词包括：“往他们的窗户扔屎，往门上扔屎 / 骂他是废物，骂她是荡妇。”
2015 年，一名独立测量员被任命以确定边界，但纽夫妇不同意该判定，并寻求另一名测量员的第二意见，这导致吉布森夫妇在 2018 年提起诉讼并引发法庭对峙。在绍森德（Southend）郡法院的一名法官于 2022 年做出不利于纽夫妇的裁决后，他们于去年被命令向邻居支付 £13,305 的赔偿金及利息，并承担估计约 £120,000 的律师费。Georgia Lambert 但在纽夫妇针对赔偿金额向高等法院提起上诉，辩称金额过高且成本账单应被推翻后，诉讼当事人于上个月再次回到法庭。汤普塞尔法官（Mr Justice Thompsell）将赔偿金减少了 £700，但向纽夫妇开出了 £19,000 的邻居诉讼费账单。他表示，他们提起上诉的动机是为了争取足够大幅度的赔偿减免，以便让自己也能避免支付邻居的费用。该裁决意味着纽夫妇将不得不向邻居支付 £12,600 的赔偿金、£19,000 的上诉律师费，以及估计约 £120,000 的郡法院诉讼费用。
一些为一家著名私立学校的夏季项目支付了数千英镑学费的家长被告知，在课程被临时取消后，他们将无法获得退款。有疑问的家长被引导至与该校合作的重组公司 Kroll Advisory。该课程的住宿名额费用为两周 £3,940，包括学费、住宿、餐饮和活动。非住宿名额费用为 £1,550。位于伦敦西区的独立学校肯辛顿公园学校 (Kensington Park School) 由一家中国公司——星教育投资有限公司 (Star Education Investment Limited) 拥有，该校针对国内学生的学费每年 £29,850 起。肯辛顿公园学校于 7 月 30 日致信家长和海外代理人，告知他们原定于 8 月 2 日开始的夏季学校最后两周课程将不再进行。Kroll 告知一名家长，该校正“经历一段严重的财务困境期”，无法提供夏季学校课程。其代表表示：“关于应付的退款或补偿，遗憾地通知您，学校目前在财务上无法履行退款。”在《泰晤士报》看到的一封电子邮件中，学校称取消课程是“由于学校无法控制的情况”，且学校正在经历重组过程，该过程“无法在夏季课程开始前完成”。肯辛顿公园学校和 Kroll 已被请求就此发表评论。这家男女同校的日间及寄宿-
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乔纳森·艾姆斯 法律编辑
一名外科医生因手术失误导致一名男患者的肠道内容物进入胃部，险些导致其死亡，现已被除名。法庭听证会获悉，亚瑟·阿卜杜勒·拉赫曼（Yasser Abdel Rahman）在为一名患者进行紧急手术时，将该男子小肠的错误部分与胃部连接在一起。此举被定性为严重的医疗失误，且属于一次“完全不符合常规的操作”。法庭表示，拉赫曼的低级错误意味着患者的肠道内容物“除了以循环方式回流到胃部之外，无处可去”。结果，该患者三周内未能排便，若非另一名外科医生进行第二次手术修复损伤，他将会死亡。
拉赫曼于 1993 年在开罗获得医生资格，据称他从未道歉，也未承认自己犯过错。这名自称是“政治迫害（witch hunt）”受害者的外科医生，因其错误被判定为“极其严重”，被医疗执业法庭服务处（Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service）以严重专业不当行为为由除名。在 2020 年进行该手术时，拉赫曼在大曼彻斯特地区的皇家奥尔德姆医院（Royal Oldham Hospital）担任顾问普通外科及结直肠外科医生。他当时是一名临时医生，在为一名患有穿孔小肠肿瘤的男子进行紧急手术前，仅在该医院工作了几天。
拉赫曼进行了一场时长五小时的手术，期间他切断了小肠，留下了“两个末端”。他在一份声明中表示，他与一名血管外科医生决定将肠道与胃连接，以便“维持消化 / 肠道连续性”。他告诉患者家属手术很成功，尽管该男子仍处于“无法控制”的疼痛中，且“所有迹象”都表明他的肠道很快就会恢复功能。他表示已进行测试，以确保没有“会阻碍消化-肠道连续性的梗阻”。但法庭指出，手术后，该未具名患者报告出现“无法控制”的疼痛、呕吐以及无法排便，这表明“手术并未成功”。
几天后，在患者家属和护理人员提出担忧后，该医院的顾问普通外科及结直肠外科医生安东尼·雷特（Anthony Rate）接管了该患者的治疗。随后的第二次紧急手术揭示了拉赫曼犯下了“严重的”手术错误。据称，雷特挽救了患者的部分肠道。一名护士指出，对于患者数周无法排便的担忧，拉赫曼的态度是“不屑一顾”的。法庭获悉，拉赫曼此前在执业能力上已被施加限制，法庭最终认定其执业资格因专业不当行为而受损，将其从注册名单中除名。拉赫曼曾告诉患者的父母，一旦疼痛得到控制，他就会让该男子回家。
[图注] 夏里夫·艾哈迈德扎伊于 2023 年与阿拉娜·霍尔结婚，他被指控杀害了伊丽莎白-简·罗斯。下方为嫌疑人的闭路电视画面。
乔治·奥德林 雅典报道
一名家人被塔利班屠杀殆尽的阿富汗冠军拳击手，因涉嫌在雅典谋杀一名英国女性而被捕。26 岁的夏里夫·艾哈迈德扎伊被指控杀害了 38 岁的伊丽莎白-简·罗斯，将其尸体丢弃在废弃建筑的一个行李箱中，并使用她的银行卡提取了数千欧元。据称，在罗斯死亡后的几天里，他还使用她的手机向其亲友发送信息。警方表示，初步医疗报告显示，这名来自爱丁堡的受害者死于窒息，但他们仍在等待毒理学报告。
据了解，艾哈迈德扎伊来自美国佐治亚州的妻子阿拉娜·霍尔在怀疑丈夫涉入罗斯之死后，向警方提供了针对丈夫的关键证据。这对夫妇的网站显示，他的父亲曾是喀布尔的一名军事指挥官，在经历了六次暗杀企图后幸存，但在艾哈迈德扎伊四岁时被塔利班伏击枪杀。五年后，他的哥哥被塔利班绑架；当他 15 岁时，他的母亲、哥哥和姐姐在一场自杀式汽车炸弹袭击中丧生。艾哈迈德扎伊当时不得不亲自确认其兄妹的遗骸。
2016 年，艾哈迈德扎伊雇佣了一名偷渡客，旨在抵达其姨妈居住的英国。在第三次尝试中，他经过巴基斯坦、伊朗和土耳其，最后乘坐一艘小船抵达希腊莱斯博斯岛。他写了一本关于这段经历的书，名为《从地狱到家园》(From Hell to Home)。艾哈迈德扎伊在莱斯博斯岛的莫里亚移民营参与志愿服务时结识了虔诚的基督徒霍尔。他在 2017 年皈依基督教，并向当时还是朋友的霍尔发送了一段洗礼视频。霍尔在网上写道，两人在雅典建立了深厚感情并于 2021 年开始约会。“我看到了他的成长以及他对主的热忱，这对我非常有吸引力，”她写道。两人于 2023 年 4 月结婚，并在雅典成立了一个名为“热爱每个民族”(Love Every Nation) 的帮助难民的传教机构。他们的儿子于 4 月出生。
据了解，这对夫妇通过工作结识了同样是基督徒志愿者的罗斯。警方消息人士称，受害者居住的雅典公寓与该机构有关联。艾哈迈德扎伊及其妻子拥有该物业的进入权限。法律文件显示，霍尔在 7 月 16 日清晨醒来发现丈夫失踪后开始起疑，随后通过“查找好友”(Find My Friends) 应用程序追踪到他出现在罗斯的住所。一名希腊警方消息人士表示：“妻子的证词至关重要……如果没有她和闭路电视证据，我们将无法找到此人。”
昨晚，希腊媒体公布了闭路电视画面，显示一名与艾哈迈德扎伊描述相符的男子在基普塞利的一条路上推着一个行李箱。根据新闻网站 The Toc 的报道，大约 13 分钟后，该男子被看到在没有行李箱的情况下返回。艾哈迈德扎伊 5 月在 Instagram 账号上发布的一张照片显示，他穿着与视频中男子相同的短裤。一份泄露的警方犯罪报告揭示，警员据称已获取他在抛尸街道上行走的安全监控录像。希腊警方表示，嫌疑人已承认抛弃罗斯的尸体，但坚称他是在浴室里发现她死亡的。他被指控谋杀、抢劫和非法持有武器，预计将于明天在雅典出庭。
[图注] 斯科特·奇尔顿在一次不当行为调查期间辞去汉普郡警察局局长一职
汉普郡警察局前局长被指控在值勤期间发生性行为，在被曝出处于调查之中而辞职后，获得了超过 £55,000 的款项。斯科特·奇尔顿在服务 33 年后于去年辞职，此前一名警察监管机构宣布，他因涉及与两名警员发生性关系的严重不当行为指控而接受调查。他被指控在担任局长期间与一名职级较低的警员维持性关系，并在其职业生涯早期的值勤期间与一名初级警员发生性行为。
奇尔顿在立即辞职后获得了 £55,154 的“就业损失补偿金”。据了解，这与替代其履行通知期的款项有关。他预计将于 10 月出席不当行为听证会，届时将审理针对他的指控。不当行为通知书指称，他滥用“其职权以达到性目的，在担任局长期间与一名警员维持性关系，且未申报该关系”。奇尔顿还被指控在申请成为局长的过程中，未能“披露此前与另一名警员的性关系”。据称，他在接受警察与犯罪专员办公室高级官员质询时，“反复且不诚实地”否认相关指控。
汉普郡警察与犯罪专员唐娜·琼斯于 2024 年 11 月在她的家中与奇尔顿会面，讨论其未来问题。两人于去年 2 月 12 日在警察总部再次会面，两周后她向警察行为独立监督办公室提交了呈报。关于奇尔顿辞职后为何收到这笔巨款，一名警察发言人表示：“在奇尔顿先生辞职时，他收到了 £55,154 的代通知金（而非履行其合同中三个月的工作期限）。”前侦探奇尔顿于 2023, 2 月起任最高领导职务，此前他在多塞特郡担任局长后转回汉普郡。亚历克西斯·布恩已接替奇尔顿担任汉普郡警局局长。
位于基普塞里的俱乐部，就在发现罗斯遗体地点的对面。
艾哈迈德扎伊是一名竞技拳击手，他在 3 月赢得了一个希腊超轻量级冠军，并开设课程为该非政府组织筹款。他在 Panellinios 拳击馆训练。
詹姆斯·比尔 (James Beal) 调查编辑 尚蒂·达斯 (Shanti Das) 资深调查记者
西汉姆联共同所有者被七名女性指控存在性剥削和掠夺行为。他否认了这些指控。
主持人托尼·利夫塞 (Tony Livesey) 已从 BBC Radio 5 Live 离职，就在此前几周，《泰晤士报》与《全景》(Panorama) 开展的一项关于其前上司大卫·萨利文 (David Sullivan) 的联合调查将其点名。
其中一名指称的受害者表示，她在违背意愿的情况下被强迫与萨利文发生性关系。她声称，1999 年利夫塞还在担任《体育报》(The Sport) 编辑时将其介绍给了萨利文。
62 岁的利夫塞在 5 Live 工作了 16 年，主持晚上 10 点至凌晨 1 点的时段。昨天宣布，他“决定离开主持岗位”。
利夫塞表示，他对该女性表示“巨大的同情”，但“不记得”曾将她介绍给萨利文。
今年 6 月，在有关其在萨利文领导下担任《体育报》编辑期间的指控出现后，利夫塞请求退出主持工作。他表示，向萨利文介绍女性“并非”其职责的一部分，且他与出现在报纸上的任何人“几乎没有任何”接触。
77 岁的萨利文于 6 月辞去西汉姆联董事及共同主席一职，此前不久，《泰晤士报》和 BBC《全景》发布了关于萨利文相关指控的调查报告。
在披露利夫塞离职的内部声明中，5 Live 控制官海蒂·道森 (Heidi Dawson) 表示，在他们从位于索尔福德的新总部启动广播时，他是“我们首个在空中发声的声音”。
利夫塞在担任《每日体育报》(Daily Sport) 和《星期日体育报》(Sunday Sport) 总编辑近 18 年后，于 2006 年离职。同年，他加入 BBC 兰开夏电台 (BBC Radio Lancashire)，随后成为 5 Live 深夜节目的主持人。
在他 1998 年出版的《宝贝、酒精、狂欢与外星人》(Babes, Booze, Orgies and Aliens) 一书中，利夫塞写道，他与萨利文策划了《体育报》的“16 岁倒计时”专题，该专题记录了几名女孩距离 16 岁生日还有多少天，之后便会刊登她们的裸胸照片。他随后表示，“书中的大部分内容是虚构的”，且让模特在 16 岁时出现在报纸上“绝对不是我的主意”。
道森补充道：“托尼建立了一批忠实的深夜观众群体，我们深感怀念的同事瑞秋·布兰德 (Rachael Bland) 经常在他身边。随后他担任了我们标志性 Drive 节目十年的主持人，在该期间他是我们报道脱欧事件的核心人物。在 5 Live 的最后一次 Lates 节目中，托尼再次提高了观众人数。”
“托尼请我向 5 Live 那些多年来有幸共事的优秀同事们转达他诚挚的感谢。我知道你们中的许多人也非常享受与托尼共事，我们祝愿他在未来的所有努力中一切顺利。”
利夫塞在昨天被要求就此发表评论。
声明中未提及相关指控。
[图注] 左侧为托尼·利夫塞，与大卫·萨利文在《每日体育报》编辑部内
该剧组一名代表向英国 l Press Association 发布的声明中表示：“原定于 10 月 19 日开始的《Trainspotting: The Musical》（Trainspotting 音乐剧）英国巡演现已取消。”
“我们非常感谢演员、剧组人员和创意团队对本剧的奉献，但当前的经济气候导致门票销售量低于预期。持票者将由其购买渠道联系，并获得全额退款详情。对于由此带来的任何不便和失望，我们深表歉意。”
这部剧作改编自欧文·威尔士 1993 年的同名小说，讲述了一名爱丁堡的海洛因成瘾者与其功能失调的同伴一起，在贫困、友谊和成瘾中挣扎的故事。
屡获殊荣的《Trainspotting》系列此前曾被改编为舞台剧，但这次西区演出标志着其首次作为音乐剧在世界首演。最受欢迎的改编作品之一是 1996 年的热门电影，由伊万·麦格雷戈、乔尼·李·米勒和罗伯特·卡莱尔主演。
这部邪典经典作品在 2017 年还推出了续集——《T2 Trainspotting》，讲述了马克·伦顿在 20 年后重返爱丁堡的故事。
该音乐剧上个月在西区首演，原计划于秋季启动英国巡演，并计划在爱丁堡、谢菲尔德、曼彻斯特和约克等主要城市演出。
穿着盛装的狂欢者参加里彭的圣威尔弗里德游行，该活动据信可追溯至 1108 年，旨在庆祝这座约克郡城市的主保圣人。 TIMES 摄影师 JAMES GLOSSOP
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More than 70,000 people have been freed since Labour brought in emergency measures to tackle overcrowding in September 2024. At the end of June, 85,858 people were in custody in England and Wales. The prison estate has an operational capacity of about 89,500.
The Ministry of Justice previously predicted it would run out of prison places in November unless 6,000 prisoners were freed early.
Oliver Wright Policy Editor Daisy Eastlake Political Reporter Jessica Sharkey Crime Correspondent
Criminals convicted of rape, grooming offences and child sexual assault will no longer be eligible for early release after plans to tackle prison overcrowding were watered down.
Andy Burnham said he was responding to public “anger, anxiety and distress” at the proposals, under which people convicted of some of the most serious offences could have been freed after serving only half of their sentences — down from two thirds at present.
Kemi Badenoch said Burnham wanted a “round of applause for agreeing not to release rapists and child sex offenders. He’s not getting one.”
The Tory leader added: “Killers, violent offenders, men who have terrorised their partners and more will all still walk out of prison in October thanks to Labour’s early release scheme.”
The prime minister admitted he had not been able to “go further” with the restrictions and said people serving time for manslaughter and serious domestic abuse could still be freed to prevent the prison system “reaching capacity and collapsing”.
Dame Nicole Jacobs, the domestic abuse commissioner, said: “The decision to not exclude domestic abuse perpetrators from this scheme is wrong and puts victims’ lives at risk. As I told the lord chancellor just last week, the danger perpetrators pose to their victims should not be underestimated. These are individuals who are fixated on their victim and will stop at nothing to control and cause harm.”
The failure to exclude those convicted of manslaughter means two of the killers of PC Andrew Harper will be eligible for release in January.
Lissie Harper, the widow of the police officer who was killed while responding to a crime in 2019, said she was “bristling with anger. What abhorrent message does this send? How dare ministers say the killing of a police officer is not enough of a ‘sickening crime’ that deserves the stiffest of punishments?”
She said the release would be “an affront to justice. The government and the justice system have not just let me down … they have added insult to injury. They are meant to be on our side. This is an utter betrayal — and it’s one I will not be able to forgive or forget.”
Burnham announced a review of the early release programme after entering No 10 two weeks ago.
About 5,000 prisoners were due to become eligible for release from next month, including those convicted of rape, manslaughter and child sexual assault. The Ministry of Justice could not say how many of those 5,000 inmates would no longer be released as a result of the changes.
Tributes have been paid to Rod Liddle, who wrote regular columns for The Sunday Times and The Sun and presented a weekly show for Times Radio, after his death aged 66.
The president of a Cambridge college has withdrawn her support for the Cambridge professor Jason Arday after he appeared to admit plagiarising parts of his PhD thesis.
Sharif Ahmadzai, 26, an Afghan boxer, has been arrested on suspicion of murdering Elisabeth-Jane Ross, 38, and disposing of her remains in a suitcase.
England and Wales had their driest July since records began in 1836, damaging crops and causing wildfires. About 23 million people are subject to a hosepipe ban.
Eighty-one years after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Japan is now openly debating whether the country needs to include nuclear weapons in its defence plans.
£450 sea bass, steak for the dog
Rhys Blakely Science Editor
Autism has become a “catch-all diagnosis” that is applied to so many people that it risks being almost useless, one of Britain’s leading experts on the condition has warned.
Every case of autism now falls under a single clinical label: autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, Professor Dame Uta Frith said the diagnosis was being applied to people whose lives and needs had little resemblance to one another, from children with profound disabilities who require lifelong care to adults with subtle symptoms who live independently.
Writing in the journal Psychological Medicine, Frith called for the spectrum to be split into clearer groups. This could prevent misdiagnoses while ending the “tragic neglect” of those with the most severe disabilities, she argued.
“Autism wasn’t always defined this way — a sort of catch-all diagnosis for a huge variety of conditions,” she said. “When it was first identified in the 1940s, it referred to a small group of children with severe difficulties in social interaction, communication and behaviour. Over time, the definition has widened to include people with milder traits and no language or learning problems.”
She added: “In the past, my colleagues and I felt confident that we could recognise autism at first impression. But this would not be true today.”
Frith is the emeritus professor of cognitive development at University College London. Her work helped to establish influential theories about how autistic people understand the minds of others and how they process detail and context.
The number of people being diagnosed with autism has soared, though figures from different periods are not directly comparable because the criteria have changed dramatically. A British study, published in 1966, identified about four autistic children in every 10,000. Recent research has put the proportion of schoolchildren with a recorded diagnosis at about one in 57 — a 44-fold increase.
A separate study of UK primary-care records found that 1.2 per cent of adults had been diagnosed with autism, up from 0.1 per cent in 2000.
Almost £18 billion was wiped off the value of AstraZeneca as investors delivered a frosty response to reports it was exploring a deal to combine with a US rival.
Emma Raducanu will miss the US Open because of a stress fracture in her lower right leg. The British No 1 had pulled out of Wimbledon at the 11th hour due to the injury.
Alex Norris, the justice secretary
[图注] The entomologist Dino Martins, below, on his mission to change how we think about parasites
AN Wilson, the historian, looks back at the history of political pacts
Paul Bristow, the mayor of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough
The security expert Frank Gardner discusses his latest novel, Ballistic
The largest single illegal border crossing in the history of the EU took place last week in Ceuta. But why did the migrants all come at once? Was a Spanish legal change to blame, or foreign actors annoyed at Spain’s lenient migration policy?
Laurence Sleator Transport Correspondent
A digital ticketing app that uses GPS to track a rail passenger’s location is to be expanded by the government as part of a drive against fare evasion. Before the full nationalisation of the railways the government is testing digital pay-as-you-go ticket technology for some routes in the East Midlands and Yorkshire. The app monitors a passenger’s location and checks them in at the start and end of a journey, even if there are no barriers at a station. The cost of the journey is calculated and charged to the passenger’s bank card. Fees are capped and designers say that the app makes it easier for passengers to find the cheapest tickets. Routes covered include Leicester to Nottingham via Derby, Harrogate to Leeds, and Sheffield to Doncaster. It is hoped that being able to see where a passenger got on and off a train will help stop evasion techniques such as “short faring”, where customers buy a digital ticket for only the last part of their journey, and “doughnutting”, when tickets for the start and end portions of a journey are bought but not for the section in between. The app also has safeguards. These include staff conducting post-journey “manual inspection reviews” to flag anything suspicious and monitoring a user’s phone battery life so it can confirm any genuine mistakes. Should a user consistently disconnect or turn their phone off during travel they will be emailed to remind them of their obligations, be charged a maximum fare or be blocked from the app. The trials were open only to a select number of passengers but now an unlimited number can sign up. Paper and normal digital tickets will still be available while the trial results are assessed before any decision on introducing the technology nationwide. If an inspector wants to check tickets on the train or a passenger finds themselves stuck at a ticket barrier, the app produces a QR code showing where the journey started. “Fare evasion is illegal and selfish,” said Heidi Alexander, the transport secretary. “We are committed to tackling ticket cheats, and that’s one of the expected benefits of expanding our digital ticketing app to more people across the trial areas. Jen Fulford, in charge of future ticketing programmes at Trainline, which is helping to run the trial, said: “Digital pay as you go is a fantastic technology that has been warmly welcomed by over 1,500 triallists in the East Midlands and helps the railway achieve some of its key goals.” “The GPS technology both prevents people dishonestly buying the wrong ticket, and makes sure people aren’t accidentally overpaying for their journey either. Fare evasion is estimated to cost the industry £400 million a year. The government is making a series of announcements designed to tackle it. “This ticketing development is just one example of how we’re modernising our railways and putting passengers first as we set up Great British Railways, making journeys easier and more convenient.” This has included £33 million to install shoulder-high ticket barriers at fare-dodging hotspots to prevent the barriers being jumped and a “railcard verification step” online, at ticket machines and at the ticket office before any discount can be obtained.
Mark Sellman Technology Correspondent
Apple and the government are on course for a legal battle over an attempt by the police and security services to access data of British citizens held by the tech company. The Home Office is seeking to force Apple to allow access to the data even when it is encrypted but Apple has now taken legal action to block this. The row threatens to reignite a transatlantic row over the issue that flared when ministers tried a similar step last year. In that case the government wanted to access data being held by Apple relating to everyone, not just British citizens, which led to a backlash from the Trump administration. The UK appeared to back down but has now modified its request to focus on British data. The legal fight is being conducted at the Investigatory Powers Tribunal, which handles the Investigatory Powers Act, dubbed the “snoopers charter”. The act enables law enforcement to investigate terrorism, national security and serious crime. The tech industry and campaigners have opposed any attempts by the government to undermine encryption, which they view as fundamental to privacy and security. At the heart of the debate is end-to-end encryption, which means that data can be decrypted only by the intended users or their trusted devices. Apple has moved more of its stored data to this method and the government wants it to create a system where it can be accessed, which campaigners call a “backdoor”. Apple said it had filed the lawsuit rather than Privacy International and referred to a previous statement in which it said: “We have never built a backdoor or master key to any of our products or services and we never will.” Ron Wyden, a US senator who sits on the Senate intelligence committee, told The Times: “Every Englishman with an iCloud account will be less safe from criminals and predators if Apple is forced to weaken its security.” A government spokesperson said: “The UK supports strong encryption and robust privacy protections, but it is also vital that law enforcement can access communications when necessary ... to protect the public.”
George Grylls Washington
Gianni Infantino has repeatedly tried to call President Trump as he battles to save his job as head of Fifa, according to sources. The Swiss-Italian football administrator has been appealing to the president for help since Friday, when he was forced to abandon plans to sell a 20 per cent stake in the World Cup to private investors, according to the New York Post. Fifa and the White House have yet to comment on the claims. Infantino has described the president as a “really close friend” and awarded him the inaugural Fifa Peace Prize last year. He opened Fifa’s US office in Trump Tower before the tournament. Amid mounting calls for his resignation it was reported that Infantino was hoping to meet Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, for talks yesterday. However, Fifa and the State Department denied that a meeting was taking place. “He is looking for allies of note to publicly support him,” another said. The Trump administration has kept its distance from the crisis engulfing Fifa and last week the president denied that he had discussed Infantino’s plan, first revealed by The Times, to sell a stake in the World Cup to investors including a venture capital fund run by Joshua Kushner, the brother of Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner. “He wanted to get online with the secretary and talk about how soccer can be a form of soft power for America,” one insider told the New York Post. “But we all know that it is about job protection. It is not about anything else at this point.” Andy Burnham has called for Infantino to step down and the Football Association has withdrawn its support for the Fifa president’s re-election bid.
Laurence Sleator, Jennifer Zhou
Self-driving taxis have been heralded by ministers as the “future of transport”, with the promise of reducing collisions and providing billions of pounds in economic growth as the industry grows. However, their introduction to London may produce some unintended consequences, including greater congestion and pollution, a report has said. CoMoUK, a charity focusing on promoting shared transport, has published a white paper that highlights studies from the United States, where driverless taxis have been used for years. They show the vehicles can be empty for up to two thirds of the time spent on the road. In the first month of Waymo’s commercial service in California, taxis were empty for 64 per cent of the time, although this figure slowly came down as the fleet size increased and people became more aware of the service. The report said that, although most driverless cars are electric, the greater congestion they cause could increase pollution as other non-electric vehicles are forced to stand idle, emitting more exhaust emissions.
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writes Lowri Lewis
Lynda La Plante, the bestselling crime author, has been disqualified from driving after she tearfully told a court that such a ban would end her career. The writer, 83, who is also behind the TV show Prime Suspect, said she would be unable to drive her beloved guard dog, Theo, for a daily walk, leading her to stopping writing altogether. She told the court that she believed she would have to have her dog re-homed if she was unable to drive him to his walks, saying: “I think the emotional turmoil of that would truly damn my career as a writer. It’s very, very solitary, and I work exceptionally hard, and I would just stop.”
La Plante also said that she needed her car to meet criminals and sources for research to write her next works of fiction. She told Lavender Hill magistrates’ court in London that she did not want to pay for a driver because she would not want them “asking questions” while she travelled back from meeting her sources. The writer said that she would close her company if a ban was put in place, putting four employees out of work.
However, magistrates concluded that she had not proved a ban would cause her “exceptional hardship” — and handed her a six-month disqualification. La Plante, who created the hit robbery TV series Widows in the 1980s and brought Prime Suspect, which starred Helen Mirren, to the screen in 1991, pleaded guilty yesterday to breaking the 20mph speed limit five times near her home in Kingston-upon-Thames between November 2025 and April this year. The writer admitted driving at 24mph twice, 25mph, 26mph and 27mph when she was taking her 18-month-old dog for his daily walk.
Kari Williamson, prosecuting, said that La Plante already had nine points on her licence for three speeding offences committed between 2023 and 2025. Her lawyer, Nick Freeman, who is known as “Mr Loophole” and has represented a string of celebrity clients, urged magistrates to spare her a ban.
[图注] Lynda La Plante said the death of her wolfhound Hugo, top, had badly affected her. She needed to drive to walk her new dog, Theo, above, and to talk to criminals for research
Asked why she could not just pay for a driver as she had in the past for “showbusiness functions”, La Plante said that she needed “solitary time” after meeting her sources. Giving evidence, she said: “I don’t want to sit in the back with a driver asking questions.” La Plante said that she had four books in the works and argued that she needed to drive to conduct research interviews as “forms of criminality” like to be “very choosy of the location”.
La Plante said she drove Theo to be trained on the walk from Roehampton to Wimbledon. She said Richmond Park, which is nearby, was unsuitable because it was “alive with joggers”, as well as deer, and she was trying to train Theo not to chase people. Giving evidence, La Plante said she got her new dog, Theo, after suffering the devastation of the untimely death of her previous pet, Hugo, who had been “in the prime of his life”. “I don’t want it to sound trivial — this woman and her dog — but I can’t tell you what it was like with this enormous, beautiful wolfhound. I don’t know how he did it. He would come up into my office, it was as if he said ‘stop’. He knew I had been working for five solid hours, and this paw would come up — bang.”
Fighting back tears, she said she “lost it” when Hugo died and she “didn’t know what to do with my life”. She had complained about “very confusing” road signs on the A308 in Kingston-upon-Thames. Freeman suggested she had inadvertently broken the speed limit while concentrating on driving safely. She said her new dog had helped her through the grieving process. “I love him, it’s as simple as that, but at the same time he has become a great comfort to me,” she said.
The magistrates imposed fines totalling £3,330 on the author and handed her a six-month ban. Her points total rose to 24, and she was ordered to pay £130 costs and a £1,332 victim surcharge. Before her court hearing, La Plante had already nine points on her licence, so she may be disqualified if her special reasons application is thrown out at a hearing in October.
Barbie, that took $1.4 billion at cinemas in 2023, has made six offers in three years to convince the stars to return. At the height of the blockbuster battle between Barbie and Oppenheimer one thing was certain — only one was likely to have a sequel. It rejected reports that David Zaslav, its chief executive, had “baulked at terms agreed to” with the stars. “There was never an agreed upon framework that was approved and pulled back,” a spokesperson added. “Reps declined the most recent offer, which is among the biggest Warner Bros has made for a film. No counter has been made to date.”
But now the prospect of a Barbie 2 returning to extend its box office lead over Christopher Nolan’s biopic is in jeopardy. Producers have been struggling to strike deals with the Hollywood actors Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling to reprise their roles as Barbie and Ken. Negotiations for sequels do not often prove problematic in Hollywood because studios and stars tend to agree terms before the first film in any potential franchise.
According to The New York Times, Gosling, 45, is asking to be paid $20 million for a sequel. Warner Bros Discovery, the studio behind the blockbuster, confirmed by Pam Abdy and Michael De Luca, the Warner Bros Pictures Group co-chairs and chief executives, until they have clinched a deal with the co-stars. And the clock is ticking — Warner Bros Discovery’s deal with the Barbie rights holder Mattel is due to expire in December. If terms cannot be agreed before the deadline, the rights will revert to the toy brand which could redevelop the franchise with a different concept.
The stalemate was conIn 2024 Robbie appeared to be lukewarm about the prospect of a Barbie sequel. “It’s funny, that knee-jerk reaction in this day and age for everyone to immediately ask about a sequel,” she told Variety. “I don’t think it was like that 20 years ago. We want to make more films that have the effect that Barbie has.”
[图注] Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling in the 2023 hit
The 3rd Viscount Hanworth, David Stephen Geoffrey Pollock, is due to argue special reasons to try to avoid a driving ban after he was caught speeding at 27mph in a 20mph zone, also in London. The former Labour hereditary peer, 80, pleaded guilty to speeding in Islington in February at Westminster magistrates’ court, which could result in three points being put on his licence as well as a fine.
Alex Farber Media Correspondent
first personal social media account at the age of 11 or 12, with a second group who waited until they were 14 or 15. Rhys Blakely Science Editor Opening a social media account at the start of secondary school was linked to children being about six months behind in maths by the age of 16, a study of more than 5,000 pupils has found. Each early adopter was matched with a kind of “statistical twin” in the comparison group — a pupil with a similar family background, similarly educated parents and comparable test results earlier in childhood. When the pupils sat national tests at the age of 15 or 16, those who had joined social media earlier scored significantly lower in maths and Italian. The gap was roughly equivalent to that expected from a child missing six months of schooling. The findings suggest that frequent phone-checking disrupts homework and concentration, leading to poorer exam scores. They were published as the government prepares to ban under- 16s from using services such as Instagram and TikTok amid growing concerns over the impact on mental health, sleep and academic attainment. Marco Gui, a professor at the University of Milano-Bicocca, who led the study, said: “While most research on social media and minors has looked at mental health as an outcome, we looked at academic performance and we found clearer signs of this negative effect.” According to the media regulator Ofcom, 83 per cent of British 11-yearolds own a smartphone. The move to secondary school marked a tipping point at which many children receive their first device. The new study compared a group of “early adopter” pupils from schools in northern Italy, who had opened their He backed tougher age restrictions, saying: “It’s an emergency moment problems under a single diagnosis. “Has the desire for inclusiveness eventually led to overinclusion?” she asked. records found a nearly ninefold increase in the rate of newly recorded cases between 1998 and 2018. This does not mean autism itself increased at the same rate. Greater awareness of the condition, less stigma and better recognition of autism in women and adults are likely to explain much of the rise. Frith has recently highlighted evidence of marked differences between people diagnosed in childhood and those identified in adolescence or adulthood. Those diagnosed as children are more likely to have obvious developmental, language or learning difficulties. Those diagnosed later are more According to Frith, efforts to recognise people who were once overlooked may also be pulling too many different 4 Tuesday August 4 2026 | the times News We’ve got it licked Children sample the goodies on offer during the North Yorkshire Ice Cream Championships at Ripon racecourse’s Scoops and Saddles family day Early social media use among children linked to lower grades where bans are a correct choice, in my personal opinion.” The study, which was published in the journal Nature Human Behaviour, cannot prove that social media caused the poorer results. However, the researchers said habitual phone-checking appeared to be one of the most plausible explanations. Early adopters were more likely to report checking their phones during homework, at school, before bed and after waking, potentially disrupting concentration and sleep. Dennis Ougrin, a professor at Queen Mary University of London, who was not involved in the research, said: “The study adds to growing evidence that the age at which young people first engage with social media may matter for their educational development. While the findings do not prove that social media alone causes poorer academic performance, they suggest that earlier, largely unsupervised use is associated with differences in later attainment, particu- ‘Catch-all’ diagnosis for autism may become worthless likely to have average or high intelligence and conditions such as anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Some research has also found differences in the genetic patterns linked to the two groups. Frith argues that they may be so distinct that “we can no longer see a common denominator”. There is no blood test, scan or other TIMES PHOTOGRAPHER JAMES GLOSSOP Quintagram® No 2637 Solve all five concise clues using each letter underneath once only 1 Forceful punch (4)
2 Vehicle immobiliser (5) 3 Brief period of intense activity (6) 4 More slender (7) 5 Polite greeting or remark (10) A A A B C E E F I L L L L L M M M N O P P R R R R S S T U W Y Y Solutions see T2 MindGames p14 Cryptic clues T2 MindGames p15 Tate fall boy discharged A boy who was thrown off the tenth floor of Tate Modern seven years ago has been discharged from hospital, his family said. The French child was six when Jonty Bravery attacked him in August 2019. The child had brain surgery in January and was discharged last month. Bravery admitted attempted murder and was jailed in 2020 for at least 15 years. Shoplift tech success The number of shoplifters being brought to justice in London has quadrupled thanks to an online platform that lets retailers send camera footage of crimes to police in minutes, figures suggest. Cases from the platform saw a positive outcome, such as a charge or caution, 29.4 per cent of the time, compared with 7.3 per cent before its introduction. ‘Out of control’ driver larly in mathematics and language. The study also points towards plausible mechanisms, such as frequent phone checking and reduced attention, rather than simply screen time itself.” A man who lied to police that his electric Jaguar I-Pace was out of control and accelerating on its own has been jailed for four years and three months. Nathan Owen, 33, admitted fraud and dangerous driving at Liverpool crown court after driving at 86mph and colliding with a police car 31 times in an attempt to avoid paying his car finance. In June, the government announced that social media companies would be banned from offering their services to children under 16. The planned restrictions are expected to include TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, X and YouTube, while messaging services such as WhatsApp and Signal are not intended to be covered. The first regulations are due to be put before parliament by the end of this year and the ban is expected to take effect in the spring. Music professor cleared A violin professor at the Royal College of Music has been cleared of assaulting an 18-year-old student, telling Southwark crown court that he had been correcting her posture during a lesson. Jan Repko, 68, was acquitted of sexual assault and assault by penetration after a retrial at Southwark crown court. He had called the allegations “absurd”. Ministers announced further protections for 16 and 17-year-olds in July. Social media apps will be required to apply a default overnight curfew from midnight until 6am and automatically disable features designed to keep teenagers scrolling. The measures include restrictions on auto-playing content. Breakfast: 6am to 10am Our free radio station has all the latest headlines, interviews and debates every morning Listen seven days a week On DAB, app, website and smart speaker biological marker that can confirm autism. Diagnosis depends on a patient’s history, their words and the observations and judgments of clinical staff. Frith added that she was concerned about “masking”, which refers to the idea that some people conceal their autistic traits to fit in. “If masking can be used to explain the total absence of symptoms,” she wrote, “then, in theory, this could lower the diagnostic threshold to zero.”
JOHN LAWRENCE/SHUTTERSTOCK
Rod Liddle, who has died aged 66, combined a serious intellect with razor-sharp wit, writes Alex Farber
[图注] Rod Liddle wrote columns for The Sunday Times, The Sun and The Spectator. Top, with his second wife, Alicia Monckton
Fraser Nelson
The journalist and broadcaster Rod Liddle, who wrote columns for The Sunday Times and The Sun and presented a weekly show for Times Radio, died suddenly on Sunday evening at James Cook University Hospital in Middlesbrough after a short illness. His children, Wilder, Tyler and Emmy, said in a statement: “We’re all very saddened and shocked at the sudden passing of our wonderful father. He raised us much as you might imagine, to be inquisitive, brave and always humorous.
“Even in hospital in the last few weeks, he consistently held the room and never let the awful situation show. He has left a legacy that we are all incredibly proud of, he will always be our guide on how to live an extraordinary life.”
Robert Thomson, chief executive of News Corp and editor of The Times from 2002 to 2007, said: “Rod was puckishly profound and profoundly puckish. We were determined back in 2003 that he should bring his intellectual energy and lateral wit to The Times, and his wisdom and whimsy have echoed around our company and the world ever since. Rod’s resonance will surely echo for many, many years to come.”
Rebekah Brooks, chief executive of News UK, said he would be greatly missed by readers, listeners and viewers. “Rod was an inimitable journalistic force — brilliant, provocative and immensely talented — whose sharp wit and uncompromising voice graced our pages and airwaves for decades,” Brooks said. “Whether writing for The Sunday Times and The Sun or broadcasting on Times Radio, he challenged conventional thinking and left an indelible mark on British journalism.”
Liddle, a former editor of BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, started writing for The Times in 2003 after being poached from The Guardian by Michael Gove, who was the Times’s Saturday editor.
Gove, now editor of The Spectator, said: “He had a unique voice and I’m glad it came into its own on our pages. He had another quality most columnists would kill for — he wasn’t afraid to say it.”
He went on to write weekly pieces for The Sunday Times and The Sun and began presenting a Saturday morning on Times Radio show last year.
Samir Shah, the BBC chair, described Liddle as a “one-off” and a “bit of a professional curmudgeon”.
“Rod was a man of many talents — including being a first-class chef. Going to dinner at his place was not that far removed from going to a Michelin-starred restaurant. Who’d have thunk it? But most of all he was a warm-hearted and generous fellow.”
Ben Taylor, editor of The Sunday Times, said that he would be desperately missed. “Rod Liddle had a wonderful way with words and used his unique talent to speak for the readers, highlighting the cant and absurdity that bedevils modern life,” Taylor said. “He was also supremely entertaining and for years his column was the first that many turned to every Sunday.”
After leaving the BBC Liddle started writing for The Spectator. His final piece, in June, headlined “Kemi gives me hope”, typified his acerbic sense of humour. “I had a notion the other day that there was possibly more I could offer to this fleeting world. A feeling that with life having been comparatively kind to me, perhaps there is something I could put back,” he wrote. “I have these thoughts about once every month — and usually they are idly dismissed because they are either unrealistic or homicidal.”
Victoria Newton, editor-in-chief of The Sun, described Liddle as a brilliant, fearless columnist. “A champion of press freedom, no topic was off-limits, and his writing — as funny as it was excoriating — was simply exceptional,” Newton said. “A terrific observer of the frailties of our political class, he will be remembered for his razor-sharp wit and for his huge intellect.”
Camilla Long, the Sunday Times columnist, said Liddle was a brilliant writer with a fine intellect and she would miss him. “He knew what he thought on everything,” she added. “He could be funny, but he was also a very serious writer. He cared deeply about us, this country and everything that went on in it.”
Kemi Badenoch said she had missed Liddle’s Spectator column and voice on the radio in recent weeks and was shocked by his death. “I don’t have the words to express how sad this is for journalism, for his readers and most of all his friends and family,” she said.
No one could write an opening sentence as well as Rod Liddle. When I was his editor, I called it the “cocaine intro”: one sentence and you were hooked. It might make you laugh, gawp or wonder whether this time he really was about to go too far. Usually all three. But his trail always led to a subtle, serious and original argument — one nobody else had thought, or would think, to make or dare to do so. The result was the greatest satirical writing of our times.
I always thought it odd that such a wildly gifted writer ended up writing almost by accident. He joined the BBC and rose to become editor of Radio 4’s Today programme. His occasional columns were a side hustle. But they were sensational, causing a succession of controlled explosions. He quite enjoyed this. The BBC did not and presented him with a choice: broadcasting or print. The rest was history.
Because he regarded himself as being of the left he didn’t mind holding what he saw as his own side up to ridicule. They didn’t always see the joke. But he defied party-political pigeonholing, taking aim at everyone. His bias was towards the most dangerous issues, to pour petrol where others feared to tread. He did so not with polemic or invective, but humour. Puncturing egos, mocking pomposity, slaughtering sacred cows.
In a censorious age he was reliably, joyfully transgressive. When I became editor of The Spectator in 2009 and canvassed as much readers’ opinion as I could, I heard one request more than all others combined: don’t tone down Rod. For many readers, the magazine started and ended with what he had to say.
I also saw how naturally, how perfectly he would write. If we discussed his column theme at 2pm, the copy arrived 90 minutes later. He’d write about the media, sport, politics, demographics and even took on a music column, showcasing his knowledge about composition. Not that he’d ever describe it as such.
In person, he was full of joie de vivre — never grumpy, grand, angry or touchy. He loved meeting readers. The first time I saw him at a readers’ carol concert, with Sancerre in a pint glass, he was comparing notes (and jokes) with them: they were his people. He loved them as they did him. He seldom turned out for events with the great and the good, but he never missed a chance to meet the subscribers who, as he saw it, he worked for.
When cancel culture came along Rod Liddle was the first, defiant target. There was a game: get them on a technicality. If they quote a statistic that’s just a bit off, then you demand a correction. If one is given: behold! The writer has “been forced to correct his article”. Ipso, the press regulator, can be prevailed upon to rule it inaccurate. Demands can be made to sack or discipline the writer.
Rod had his fair share. I saw it as my job to fight them off: not always successfully. After I ended up in court for one of his (very good and entirely accurate) articles, I set up a team to defend writers in the new cancel culture era. Once, for example, Rod wrote about a place in Yorkshire, Savile Town, that was “98 per cent Muslim”. Obviously a figure of speech: a classic trap. So the team would work out what the actual number was. The answer: 98 per cent. He was exactly right — as he was almost all of the time. His flair, his jokes, his playfulness were built on top of a rigour that he’d hate to be known for. This combination is what gave his writing its power.
There are many writers who aim to be shocking, many who are funny; a very small number who can be both. But what made Rod stand out was the fusion of those qualities with judgment, discipline and an ability to cut to the heart of the matter. There was, and never will be, anyone quite like him.
Oliver Wright Policy Editor
France has warned that Reform UK’s plan for the Royal Navy to turn back small boats would be illegal after Nigel Farage set out proposals for the “largest military operation in the English Channel since World War Two”. Last August Nigel Farage stood at a podium and promised mass deportations would sort the small boats crisis. This August he did it again, unveiling Operation Fortress — a pledge to deploy the navy to intercept every crossing and return migrants to France or Belgium in what Reform UK called the largest military operation in the Channel since the Second World War (Oliver Wright writes).
Farage used a press conference yesterday to pledge to send the navy into the Channel to intercept all migrant boats should the party win power at the next election. Under so-called Operation Fortress, migrants would be detained, given food and water before being returned “under escort” on naval vessels to France or Belgium.
France’s interior ministry said: “This would be a violation of French sovereignty as well as a violation of maritime law and international law. Separately, as part of the measures put in place with the UK and the arrangements deployed at the local level, the interior ministry states that the number of crossings is down in 2026.”
The obvious question was why another grand plan, just 12 months after the last? One explanation is political momentum. For much of the past 18 months the party has enjoyed a seemingly unstoppable rise. But in recent weeks that has slowed as standards investigations and questions over donations mounted, with Farage’s personal ratings also dropping.
Reform UK said in response: “We will always stand up for British interests and protect our people, whether Emmanuel Macron [the French president] likes it or not. Humanitarian missions do not violate maritime or international law.”
Meanwhile Rupert Lowe’s Restore has performed well in the Makerfield and Greater Manchester mayoral by-elections, splitting the vote on the right in both cases. Lowe, a former Reform MP who founded the rival party after his acrimonious split with Farage, at the weekend publicly offered co-operation with Reform — if it embraced a string of Restore policies.
Farage also told the press conference that he was “open-minded” about talks with Rupert Lowe about a pact to reunite the “patriotic right” of British politics, but dismissed one of his key demands. Farage said he had suggested a call to Lowe, who at the weekend urged the two to work together. Lowe, a former Reform MP, acrimoniously left the party in March last year amid claims of bullying and threatening behaviour. The multimillionaire went on to found his own party called Restore that has eaten into Reform’s vote share.
Farage said he was “open-minded” and admitted Restore could do his party “great harm”. Then there were the images of the tens of thousands of migrants crossing from Morocco into Spain’s North African territory of Ceuta last week. In Britain, Channel crossings reached their highest daily total of the year on July 29, even though the cumulative number of arrivals remained 42 per cent lower than at the same point in 2025. It was against this backdrop Reform chose to strike.
Last week in the Greater Manchester mayoral election, Restore came fourth with 9 per cent of first-preference votes, ahead of both the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats. Lowe had posted on X that he was open to a deal with Reform if Farage would agree to a number of demands. This included making it Reform’s policy to ban the burqa and halal meat and rule out any former Conservative ministers in future cabinets.
At a moment when Reform needed to steady itself politically, Farage reached once again for the issue he has trusted throughout his career to reset the debate on his own terms. Farage said that he had “no desire” to meet some of the items on Lowe’s policy “shopping list” and suggested that he was not serious about a deal. “If you want to do a political deal with somebody, you know, you would contact them privately and not do a 12-minute video,” he said. “That said, I did actually reach out ... yesterday to him. I did say, ‘Look, should we have a call?’ I haven’t heard back yet, so I don’t know what the sincerity of this is.”
Farage admitted that Restore could damage Reform by eating into its core vote. “You could see a situation where Restore, without the hope of winning anything outside Great Yarmouth — I mean literally without hope of winning a single seat in the country — could do us great harm,” he said. “I think online you will see a lot of Restore potential voters now beginning to worry about the impact that might have. He added: “I don’t ditch my friends. I don’t ditch my allies, whether that’s Suella Braverman or Posh George [Cottrell]. You know I do not ditch people because somebody else wants me to.”
Lowe was one of the first Reform MPs elected to Westminster in the 2024 general election when he won in his Great Yarmouth seat. The former chair of Southampton FC had previously served alongside Farage in the Brexit Party in the European parliament. “I finalise that by saying if it was the offer of a deal, it came in a very unusual way. I have responded to it potentially, you know, with an open mind, as I would, but I’m certainly not going to be ditching people who I view to be allies and a great asset.”
However, less than a year after being elected to Westminster, he was reported to police by Reform UK’s then chairman, Zia Yusuf, over accusations of bullying and threatening behaviour. He was also investigated by the party over bullying claims.
Lowe later posted on X that Farage was a “liar” and disputed his version of events, but said the offer was still open to him and Reform UK. Speaking on Sunday, he said that there could be a reconciliation. “I truly believe there could be sufficient common ground for our two movements to co-operate collectively [to] destroy the looming left-wing alliance that will
Separately, Farage admitted discussing the “liabilities” of returning to politics before the 2024 election but insisted he had “no intention” of doing so at the time. The Sunday Times reported that Farage had negotiated a deal with Richard Tice, who was then party chief, in March and April 2024, to return as leader. Under that deal, once Farage became leader, Reform would repay or write off more than £1 million in outstanding loans it had received from Tice’s company.
Farage admitted he had spoken to Tice in spring 2024 about what would happen if he returned to lead the party. He said: “You’d be a bit of a mug, wouldn’t you, to walk into a job and not find out what the potential liabilities were, and they were substantial.” He said it “wasn’t a deal, it wasn’t an agreement, it was subject to if I came back”.
The parliamentary sleaze watchdog has also started an investigation into whether Tice failed to declare an interest. Tice said in a post on X that the investigation by Daniel Greenberg, the parliamentary commissioner for standards, was over an alleged failure to declare an interest in Israel when speaking in a debate at Westminster Hall. Despite the commissioner confirming the investigation on his website, Tice said it was “garbage in [the] media”.
[图注] Nigel Farage, the leader of Reform UK, spoke in London about the small boats crisis joined by his deputy Richard Tice, top
then nearly 70,000 criminals convicted of less serious offences have been released early. But this summer David Lammy, the justice secretary, announced that the scheme would be extended to include more serious offences. He said that, without the extension, “we would get back to a situation where we were running, at 99, nearly 100 per cent” in prison capacity.
Ministers are also delaying the extension of early release to more serious criminals by a month, from September until October, so probation staff have time to plan for releases and victims can have a say in the restrictions placed on offenders.
Burnham said: “I want to be honest — I wanted to go even further as I know there will still be concerns about other offenders having their sentence shortened. But it’s not possible without the prison system reaching capacity and collapsing, which would put public safety at much greater risk.”
Amy Clowrey, a solicitor representing child sexual abuse victims, said seven of her clients received letters in June informing them their perpetrators could be eligible for early release, causing “significant distress”. Clowrey said she was “incredibly pleased that the government has listened to the voices of survivors who have been campaigning for this”, but added that all sex offenders and violent perpetrators should be excluded from the scheme.
The early release scheme was announced in 2024 after warnings from officials that the prison service was on the verge of being overwhelmed. Since
result of Burnham’s changes, but insisted it would be able to cope with the extra pressure on the prison estate.
finish off what hope remains for this country,” he said.
was part of a fundraising “syndicate” rather than doing it all himself, and that he had run 600 miles in 12 days, not six. Arday told The Times: “I accept responsibility that I could have been really, really explicit” in correcting that narrative. He said: “I am accountable for the mistakes I’ve made. I hold myself accountable and other people should hold me accountable. We’re talking about academia here. I didn’t murder somebody. I think the cruelty that I’ve experienced and the positioning of me as this kind of liar and fantasist is totally unacceptable.”
Emma Yeomans
The president of a Cambridge college has withdrawn her support for the Cambridge professor Jason Arday after he appeared to admit plagiarising parts of his PhD thesis. Professor Dame Ijeoma Uchegbu, a nanoscientist and the head of Wolfson College, had previously signed an open letter in support of Arday that was circulated by the Good Law Project. Arday, who was the youngest black professor to be appointed by the university, has been accused of plagiarism and exaggerating his sporting and fundraising achievements. Other academics have said the alleged plagiarism and academic misconduct require serious investigation. Professor Colin Mills, the head of Oxford’s sociology department, wrote on X: “I do not want the reputation of my discipline, my department, my hard-working and intellectually honest colleagues, or myself smeared by indirect association with academic fraud, low academic standards, and clownish statements from people in positions of authority who should know better.” The letter was also signed by Lord Woolley of Woodford, the principal of Homerton College; Sonita Alleyne, the master of Jesus College, where Arday is a fellow; and politicians including Zack Polanski and John McDonnell. However, Uchegbu’s name no longer appears on the site, having been removed over the weekend. In addition to being Wolfson president, Uchegbu is a fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, an honorary fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, and a Wellcome Trust governor.
Last night the WaterAid charity cast doubt on claims Arday had made about “installing water points” in South America and west Africa, saying that it never sent volunteers abroad. Arday, a professor of sociology of education, is alleged to have plagiarised his PhD thesis and parts of his published academic research. He has also been accused of lying about or exaggerating parts of his life, including claims to have run 600 miles in six days, and raising more than £5 million for charity. According to The Daily Telegraph, Arday’s biography on the website of his speakers’ agency, the Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau, stated until recently: “He has also undertaken and completed relief work in South America and west Africa with WaterAid installing water points, which provide drinkable and clean water.” He denied fabricating stories about marathon running and raising millions for charity, although he conceded he
[图注] GUY BELL/ALAMY LIVE NEWS
Jonathan Ames Legal Editor
A six-inch strip of land and an ornamental squirrel triggered a 14-year legal battle featuring derogatory online songs and more than £150,000 in damages and costs. On his YouTube channel, New says that he has written more than 25 songs and some are sung by an artificial intelligence-generated female voice. The songs have been removed, but New has acknowledged on the platform that he has written about his neighbours, among other topics ranging from “anxiety, loneliness, fairytales and exploiting the benefit system”. Philip New and his wife, Denise, first sued their neighbours, Steve and Karen Gibson, after a row broke out in 2012 over the position of a fence between their gardens near Benfleet in Essex. What was initially a minor spat escalated into a court battle after the Gibsons were said to have been devastated when their neighbours removed a “sentimentally valuable” squirrel ornament from a post between the houses. The dispute began in 2012 when the News replaced some fence panels, prompting their neighbours to complain that the structure was in the wrong place and not in a straight line. Mr Gibson was also shocked to learn that Philip New, a composer of comedy songs, had written and published derogatory ditties about the legal tussle on YouTube. One offered robust advice on how to deal with bad neighbours, including the lyrics: “Throw shit at their window, shit at the door/ Call him a wanker, call her a whore.”
An independent surveyor was appointed to determine the boundary in 2015, but the News disagreed with that determination and sought a second opinion by another surveyor, which led to a court battle when the Gibsons sued in 2018. After a judge at Southend county court ruled against the News in 2022, they were ordered last year to pay their neighbours £13,305 in damages and interest and handed lawyers’ bills estimated at about £120,000. Georgia Lambert But the litigants were back in court last month after the News launched a High Court appeal against the damages sum, arguing it was too high and that the costs bill should also be overturned. Mr Justice Thompsell reduced the damages by £700, but handed the News a £19,000 bill for their neighbours’ costs. He said that their motivation for appealing had been to secure a big enough reduction in damages to allow them also to avoid having to pay their neighbours’ costs. The ruling means the News will have to pay their neighbours £12,600 in damages, £19,000 to cover lawyers’ bills for the appeal, and the proceedings at the county court, estimated at about £120,000.
Parents who paid thousands of pounds for places on a prestigious private school’s summer programme have been told they will not receive refunds after the course was cancelled at late notice. Parents with questions were directed to Kroll Advisory, the restructuring firm working with the school. Residential places on the course cost £3,940 for two weeks, including tuition, accommodation, meals and activities. Non-residential places cost £1,550. Kensington Park School, an independent school in west London, where fees start from £29,850 a year for domestic students, is owned by Star Education Investment Limited, a Chinese company. Kensington Park School wrote to parents and overseas agents on July 30 informing them that the last two weeks of its summer school, due to start on August 2, would no longer go ahead. Kroll told one parent that the school was “experiencing a period of significant financial distress” and was unable to deliver the summer school. Its representative said: “In respect of refunds or compensation due, regrettably we advise the school is not in a financial position to honour refunds at this stage.” In the email, seen by The Times, the school said the cancellation was “due to circumstances outside the school’s control” and that it was undergoing a restructuring process that “will not be concluded in time for the summer course to take place”. Kensington Park School and Kroll were approached for comment. The co-educational day and board-
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Jonathan Ames Legal Editor
A surgeon has been struck off after nearly killing a patient through a botched operation that resulted in the contents of a man’s bowels passing into his stomach. Yasser Abdel Rahman was performing emergency surgery on a patient when he connected the wrong part of the man’s small intestine to his stomach, a tribunal heard. It was branded a significant surgical error and part of a “totally unconventional operation”. Rahman’s blunder meant the patient’s bowel contents had “nowhere to go apart from back into the stomach in a circular fashion”, the tribunal said. As a result, the patient did not have a bowel movement for three weeks and he would have died if a different surgeon had not performed a second operation to repair the damage.
Rahman — who qualified as a doctor in Cairo in 1993 — was said never to have apologised or admitted he had made a mistake. The surgeon, who said that he was the victim of a “witch hunt”, was struck off by the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service for serious professional misconduct after his mistake was judged to be “as bad as it gets”. At the time of the operation in 2020, Rahman was working at the Royal Oldham Hospital in Greater Manchester as a consultant general and colorectal surgeon. He was a locum and had only worked there for a few days before performing an emergency operation on a man who was suffering from a tumour in his perforated small bowel.
Rahman performed a five-hour operation in which he cut the small bowel, leaving “two ends”. In a statement, he said that he and a vascular surgeon decided to connect the intestine to the stomach so the “digestive/bowel continuity is maintained”. He told the patient’s family that the procedure had been successful, despite the man being left in “uncontrollable” pain, and that “all the signs” indicated that his bowels would work soon. He said a test was done to make sure there were no “obstructions that would prevent digestive-bowel continuity”. But after the surgery, the patient, who has not been identified, reported “uncontrollable” pain, vomiting and an inability to have bowel movements — which indicated “the procedure was not a success”, the tribunal said.
Several days later, Anthony Rate, a consultant general and colorectal surgeon at the hospital, took over the patient’s care after his family and nursing staff raised concerns. A second emergency operation then revealed Rahman had made “grave” surgical errors. Rate was said to have salvaged some of the patient’s bowel. A nurse noted that Rahman was “dismissive” of her concern that the patient had no bowel movements for weeks. The tribunal was told that Rahman already had conditions placed on his ability to practise and concluded his fitness to practise was impaired by misconduct, and struck him off the register. Rahman told the patient’s parents that he would send the man home once the pain was under control.
[图注] Sharif Ahmadzai, who married Alaina Hall in 2023, is accused of killing Elisabeth-Jane Ross. Below, CCTV of the suspect
George Odling Athens
An Afghan champion boxer whose family were wiped out by the Taliban has been arrested over the alleged murder of a British woman in Athens. Sharif Ahmadzai, 26, is accused of killing Elisabeth-Jane Ross, 38, dumping her body in a suitcase in a derelict building and using her bank cards to withdraw thousands of euros. He also allegedly used Ross’s mobile phone to send messages to friends and family for days after her death. Police said initial medical reports suggested that the victim, from Edinburgh, died from asphyxiation, but they are awaiting toxicology reports.
Ahmadzai’s wife, Alaina Hall, from Georgia in the United States, is understood to have given key evidence to police against her husband when she became suspicious he was involved in Ross’s death. The couple’s website states that his father, a military commander in Kabul, survived six assassination attempts but was shot dead in a Taliban ambush when Ahmadzai was four. Five years later, his older brother was kidnapped by the Taliban and, when he was 15, his mother, brother and sister were killed in a suicide car bomb. Ahmadzai had to identify the remains of his siblings.
In 2016, Ahmadzai hired a people smuggler with the aim of reaching Britain, where his aunt lives. He travelled through Pakistan, Iran and Turkey before arriving on the Greek island of Lesbos on a small boat on his third attempt. He has written a book about his experiences titled From Hell to Home. Ahmadzai met Hall, a devout Christian, while she was volunteering at the Moria migrant camp on Lesbos. He converted to Christianity in 2017 and sent Hall, who was a friend at the time, a video of his baptism. Hall wrote online that the pair bonded in Athens and began dating in 2021. “I had seen his growth and his heart for the Lord and it was so attractive to me,” she wrote. The couple married in April 2023 and set up a ministry helping refugees in Athens named Love Every Nation. Their son was born in April.
The couple are understood to have met Ross, also a Christian volunteer, through their work and police sources said the Athens flat where the victim was living was linked to the organisation. Ahmadzai and his wife had access to the property. Legal papers state Hall became suspicious of her husband when she woke early on July 16 to find that he was gone, then traced him to Ross’s accommodation via the Find My Friends app. A Greek police source said: “The testimony of the wife has been crucial ... Without her and CCTV evidence, we would not have been able to find this man.”
Last night, Greek media published CCTV footage showing a man matching Ahmadzai’s description wheeling a suitcase down a road in Kypseli. About 13 minutes later, according to The Toc, a news website, the man was seen returning without the suitcase. A photo posted on Ahmadzai’s Instagram account in May shows him wearing the same shorts as the man in the footage, and a leaked police crime report revealed officers had allegedly obtained security footage of him walking on the street where the body was dumped. Greek police said the suspect had confessed to dumping Ross’s body but insisted that he had found her dead in her bathroom. He was charged with murder, robbery and illegal possession of a weapon, and is expected to appear at court in Athens tomorrow.
[图注] Scott Chilton quit as chief constable of Hampshire police during a misconduct inquiry
The former chief constable of Hampshire police, accused of having sex while on duty, was paid more than £55,000 after he quit when it emerged that he was under investigation. Scott Chilton resigned last year following 33 years of service after a police watchdog announced he was being investigated over claims of gross misconduct relating to sexual relationships with two officers. He is accused of having had a sexual relationship with a more junior officer while serving as chief constable, and having sex with a junior officer while on duty earlier in his career.
Chilton was paid £55,154 as “compensation for loss of employment” after he quit with immediate effect. It is understood to relate to a payment in lieu of working his notice period. He is due to appear at a misconduct hearing in October, when the allegations against him will be considered. The misconduct notice alleges that he abused “his position for a sexual purpose having a sexual relationship with an officer while chief constable and failed to declare this relationship”. Chilton is also accused of failing to “disclose a previous sexual relationship with another officer during the application process to become chief constable”. It is alleged that he “repeatedly and dishonestly” denied allegations when questioned by senior figures in the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner.
Hampshire police and crime commissioner Donna Jones met Chilton at her home in November 2024 to discuss his future. They met again at police headquarters on February 12 last year and she made a referral to the Independent Office for Police Conduct two weeks later. On why Chilton received the large sum after he quit, a police spokesperson said: “On Mr Chilton’s resignation, he received £55,154 as pay in lieu of notice (as opposed to him working the three month period in his contract).” Former detective Chilton started in the top job in February 2023, having transferred back to Hampshire after serving as chief constable in Dorset. Alexis Boon has replaced Chilton as chief constable of the Hampshire force.
ing club in Kypseli, across the road from where Ross’s body was discovered.
Ahmadzai, a competitive boxer, won a Greek super lightweight title in March and ran classes to raise money for the NGO. He trains at the Panellinios box-
James Beal Investigations Editor Shanti Das Senior Investigations Reporter
West Ham co-owner, was accused of sexually exploitative and predatory behaviour by seven women. He has denied the allegations.
The presenter Tony Livesey has quit BBC Radio 5 Live weeks after being named in a joint Times and Panorama investigation about his former boss David Sullivan.
One of the alleged victims said that she felt forced to have sex with Sullivan when she did not want to. She claimed she had been introduced to him by Livesey in 1999 when he was still editing the Sport.
Livesey, 62, who worked for 5 Live for 16 years and fronted the 10pm to 1am slot, “has decided to leave his presenting role”, it was announced yesterday.
Livesey said that he had “huge sympathy” for the woman but had “no recollection” of introducing her to Sullivan.
In June, Livesey asked to step back from his hosting duties after allegations were made about his time editing the Sport newspapers under Sullivan. He said it was “not part” of his role to introduce women to Sullivan and that he had “practically zero” contact with anyone appearing in the paper.
Sullivan, 77, resigned as director and co-chair of West Ham United in June, shortly before the publication of The Times and BBC Panorama investigation into allegations involving Sullivan.
In an internal statement revealing Livesey’s departure, Heidi Dawson, the controller of 5 Live, said he was “the first voice for us on air as we launched from our new home in Salford”.
Livesey left his job as editor-in-chief at the Daily Sport and Sunday Sport in 2006 after almost 18 years. He joined BBC Radio Lancashire the same year before becoming a presenter of the 5 Live late-night show.
In his 1998 book Babes, Booze, Orgies and Aliens, Livesey wrote that he and Sullivan hatched a plan for the Sport’s “Countdown to 16” feature, which charted the days until the 16th birthday of a number of girls, after which it would print topless photos of them. He has since said “large parts of his book were fictionalised” and having a model appear in the paper at the age of 16 “was categorically not my idea”.
Dawson added: “Tony built a loyal late night audience, often with our greatly missed colleague, Rachael Bland, at his side. He went on to be the voice of our iconic Drive show for ten years where he was at the heart of our coverage of Brexit. With his final Lates show at 5 Live, Tony grew audience figures once again.
“Tony has asked me to pass on his heartfelt thanks to the brilliant colleagues at 5 Live who he has had the pleasure of working with over the years. I know many of you have also really enjoyed working with Tony, and we wish him well for all his future endeavours.”
Livesey was approached for comment yesterday.
There was no mention of the allegations in the statement.
[图注] Tony Livesey, left, with David Sullivan in the Daily Sport newspaper offices
A statement to the Press Association from a representative for the production said: “The forthcoming UK tour of Trainspotting: The Musical, which was due to begin on October 19, has been cancelled.
“We are very grateful to our cast, crew and creative team for their dedication to the production, but the current economic climate has resulted in lower than expected ticket sales. Ticketholders will be contacted by their point of purchase with full refund details. We apologise for any inconvenience and disappointment this may cause.”
The theatrical production is an adaptation of Irvine Welsh’s 1993 novel of the same name, which follows a heroin addict in Edinburgh navigating poverty, friendship and addiction alongside his dysfunctional peers.
The award-winning Trainspotting franchise has previously been adapted for the stage, but the West End production marked its world debut as a musical. One of the most popular adaptations is the 1996 hit film, which stars Ewan McGregor, Jonny Lee Miller and Robert Carlyle.
The cult classic also received a 2017 sequel — T2 Trainspotting — which sees Mark Renton return to Edinburgh 20 years on.
The musical had its West End debut last month and was due to kick off its UK tour in autumn — with shows planned in major cities such as Edinburgh, Sheffield, Manchester and York.
[图注] Holy horseman Costumed revellers take part in St Wilfrid’s Procession in Ripon, an event thought to date to 1108 celebrating the Yorkshire city’s patron saint TIMES PHOTOGRAPHER JAMES GLOSSOP
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Playful, Andrew Harper, Andy Burnham, Ariana Grande, Brexit Party, Can Roberto Mancini, Christopher Nolan - WARNING: source dates, money, or percentage tokens may be missing
结论： 存在部分关键缺陷（主要为数字错误、残留英文和标点不规范），虽无严重截断，但需修正细节以达到出版标准。
About 23 million people，译文将其写为 约 23 million 人（未翻译单位，且数字与单位混杂）。2024. 年 9 月、2019, 年、1836, 年、1966, 年、2023, 2 月。这属于明显的格式缺陷，应为“2024年9月”等。23 million 人 (应为 2300 万人)。l Press Association：多了一个无意义的字母 l。era.：在“取消文化 era.”中直接保留了英文单词且带有句点。per cent：在“98 per cent”中未翻译为“百分比/百分之”。托利党 / 保守党。虽然事实正确，但原文仅为 Tory，添加斜杠解释属于非必要修改。2019, 年）干扰了阅读流畅度。[图注] 等内部标注，根据指令，这被视为交付缺陷 (Delivery Defect)。The Spectator 在文中被翻译为《旁观者》，但在部分段落中仍保留英文，缺乏统一性。被判定犯有强奸、诱导犯罪... 句式略显冗长，但意思准确。待修复清单 (Action Items):
- [ ] 修正所有日期中的异常逗号/句点（例如 2024. 年 $\rightarrow$ 2024年）。
- [ ] 将 23 million 统一翻译为中文数字 2300万。
- [ ] 移除所有 [图注] 标签。
- [ ] 修正 era. 和 per cent 等残留英文。
- [ ] 清理 l Press Association 中的杂质字符。