Once a potent symbol of 1980s excess, the class A narcotic has become commonplace. So how do we curb its soaring use?Police had more than a passing interest in the Kahu when they pinpointed the former navy patrol boat floating off south Devon 10 days a…
Child poverty now costs Britain £38bn a year, says new independent report
Despite Conservative claims to have reduced childhood deprivation, the burden on taxpayers has soared over the past eight yearsThe cost of child poverty has soared over the past eight years under the Conservatives and has now reached £38bn a year, acco…
Noisy neighbours spark 67% rise in police complaints
Cash-strapped councils ‘struggling to deal’ with spike in anti-social behaviour reportsCoronavirus – latest updatesSee all our coronavirus coveragePolice forces across England faced a sharp increase in complaints about noisy neighbours during last year…
Making waves in the Pacific: how Boris Johnson’s Global Britain went rogue
Defence pact with Australia and the US increases chance of confrontation with China and spurs nuclear proliferationLife got a little more dangerous last week. It wasn’t due to the pandemic or the climate crisis. It was entirely the result of the consci…
That’s the trouble with Chequers: it makes you forget you might have some work to do | Catherine Bennett
It’s always party time at the grace-and-favour boltholes our top ministers call homeBefore he became boon companion to the now-disgraced financier, Lex Greensill, David Cameron devoted a chunk of his autobiography to justifying Chequers, first among th…
Can Boris Johnson’s new faces help him deliver on old promises?
The Tory leader’s reshuffle was ruthless but the challenge is to create a post-Covid recovery and prove ‘levelling up’ and ‘global Britain’ aren’t mere slogansFor ministers who trooped into Downing Street on Wednesday it was hardly the warmest of welc…
Huguenots, Jews, Bengalis … now developers size up London’s Brick Lane
Locals, hipsters and councillors are at odds over glossy plans to revamp the Truman Brewery in London’s East End enclaveFor more than 300 years, it was the industrial heart of Brick Lane in east London, a vast rat-ridden edifice in which thousands of w…
Universal credit cut will push 800,000 people into poverty, Boris Johnson warned
Senior Tories plot to force government U-turnBoris Johnson is warned today that more than 800,000 people risk being plunged into poverty as a result of an imminent cut to universal credit, amid a plot by senior Tories to force the government into a las…
The Observer view on the government’s flawed winter plan for Covid | Observer editorial
Measures taken now, such as mask wearing and better ventilation in schools, would help the NHS avoid further costly delays to non-Covid treatmentA small room, with the windows shut, packed tightly with more than 30 people, none wearing masks. This is t…
The kaiser and the paperweight: how Cecil Rhodes helped inspire the first world war
The German monarch’s imperial ambitions were fuelled by the British colonialist – as the story behind a recently discovered relic revealsIt was discovered, dusty and damaged, on a warehouse shelf.Recorded simply as a “paperweight” in the depot inventor…