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Major trade unions and the TUC have publicly rejected Nigel Farage's call for unions to affiliate with Reform UK, branding the party’s outreach as a superficial "cosplay" of workers’ advocacy. The backlash comes amid a poll that places Reform UK level with Labour for the union vote, highlighting a potential shift in the traditional labour‑politics landscape. The Union Front Against Farage’s Reform Appeal Farage urged unions to attend Reform’s September conference and apply for affiliation. Leaders from the TUC, GMB, Unison and Community condemned the move, calling Reform a party of "corporate interests". Key union figures – Paul Nowak (TUC), Andrea Egan (Unison), Gary Smith (GMB) and Alasdair McDiarmid (Community) – all issued statements denouncing the invitation. Polling Shows Reform UK Tied with Labour for Union Vote A JL Partners poll found 28% of union members would back Reform UK, matching Labour’s share. Support was strongest among members of Unite and GMB. The poll underscores growing curiosity about Reform’s platform despite union leadership’s opposition. Implications for the Labour‑Union Alliance and UK Politics The rebuff signals a reaffirmation of the historic Labour‑union bond, but the poll data suggests a fragmenting electorate. If Reform can convert curiosity into votes, it may force Labour to recalibrate its union‑focused messaging and policy priorities, especially around employment rights such as sick pay, fire‑and‑rehire protections, and zero‑hours contracts. What’s Next for Reform UK’s Union Strategy? Reform UK is likely to continue courting union members through targeted outreach and promises of "open doors" for workers in council‑run services. Union leaders have warned that any affiliation would require concrete commitments to protect and extend workers’ rights. Future negotiations may see the TUC leveraging its influence to extract policy concessions from both Labour and Reform ahead of the next general election.

The Rise of AI-Generated Scams The Bank of England has warned the public against falling for AI-generated scams after deepfake videos of Nigel Farage fighting its governor spread online. The Deepfake Videos Andrew Bailey, the head of the BoE, said AI-generated content related to central banks was spreading and urged people to be "vigilant". The governor spoke out after deepfake videos of the Reform UK leader and Bailey fighting on the set of BBC One's Question Time appeared on the social media platform X. The Impact of AI Scams Bailey urged the public to report the videos so they could be taken down. "Unfortunately, fake adverts impersonating the Bank of England and other central banks are on the rise," he said. "These scams are designed to criminally exploit the public, especially the vulnerable, when they are online. I would urge everyone to stay vigilant and report these scams. That way authorities can better root out digital deception like this and permanently remove the fraudsters responsible for what is a truly online scourge." The Future of AI Regulation The UK's online safety act contains provisions requiring tech platforms to tackle fraudulent advertising. However, those duties do not come into force until next year. X has been approached for comment. The platform, which is owned by Elon Musk, explicitly bars impersonation of individuals to "deceive others".

Leeds Rhinos End a Nine‑Year Home Drought Against St HelensLeeds Rhinos secured a hard‑won 20‑18 victory over long‑time rivals St Helens at Headingley, ending a home losing streak that stretched back to 2017 and extending their lead at the summit of the Super League. Match Narrative: From 16‑8 Half‑Time Deficit to a Two‑Point LeadThe Saints led 16‑8 at the break, putting Leeds on the brink of a 10th consecutive home loss to their rivals. A second‑half resurgence, sparked by half‑back Jake Connor, saw Leeds claw back into contention, with a crucial try assist to Chris Hankinson and a steady kicking game that kept them within striking distance.Connor’s early second‑half kick gave Leeds an 8‑6 lead.Harry Newman’s try and Connor’s two conversions leveled the scores by the 60‑minute mark.David Klemmer’s sin‑bin with seven minutes left shifted momentum.Maika Sivo scored the decisive try in the corner, converted by Connor to seal a 20‑18 win. Scoreline and Statistical SnapshotFinal Score: Leeds Rhinos 20 – St Helens 18Half‑time: Saints 16, Leeds 8Key Performers: Jake Connor (2 conversions, 1 try assist), Maika Sivo (try)Discipline: David Klemmer sin‑binned (7 minutes) Implications for the Super League Title RaceThe win pushes Leeds two points clear at the top of the table, reinforcing Brad Arthur’s side as the early‑season favorites. Saints, despite a strong first half, now face scrutiny over their spine selection, a concern echoed by coach Paul Rowley after the defeat. Looking Ahead: What the Victory Means for Leeds and SaintsLeeds will look to build on this momentum in upcoming fixtures against Warrington and Hull KR, while the Saints must regroup and address lineup uncertainties before the next round of matches. If Leeds maintain their form, they could solidify a championship run; conversely, a slip could see the title race tighten dramatically.

The Giants' Existential CrisisSaturday afternoon was meant to provide a glimpse into a different, more optimistic future for Huddersfield Giants. But in the end, it was another stark reminder of why rugby league in the West Yorkshire town is facing an existential fight. As the birthplace of rugby league in 1895, Huddersfield has seen better days, with the club struggling for much of the summer era and the past 18 months being particularly bleak.Stadium Uncertainty and Home Ground StrugglesSuper League has been thriving lately, but Huddersfield have long felt like second-class citizens at the Accu Stadium, their shared home with Huddersfield Town's footballers. With the ground unavailable, they were forced to relocate their home game against Toulouse to the neighboring town of Dewsbury, playing at the smaller 5,000-capacity Flair Stadium. This move only added further fuel to the belief that, with London Broncos set to join the Super League in 2027, Huddersfield are vulnerable.Performance Crisis and Fan DeclineBeaten 36-16 by a newly promoted Toulouse team, it was the meek manner of their display that would have caused the greatest alarm. Having already confirmed they will be forced into finding a new home venue outside the town for at least a season or two, Huddersfield are in limbo off the field, not just on it. They want to be in a new stadium in the town by 2030 but have still not found a suitable site. Time is ticking.Crowds have dwindled from about 7,500 to about 4,000, and results such as Saturday's—an 11th defeat in 13 league games—will do little to tempt lapsed fans to return. "The club has stood still for well over a decade now while other teams have driven forwards," says Daniel, a fan for more than 20 years. "We're existing solely on the owner's wealth, and if we don't get our act together soon I could understand why Super League would want rid of us. We bring nothing."New Leadership and Strategic ShiftThe man Huddersfield have turned to in order to deliver their 2030 vision insists all is not lost. The former Rugby Football League chief executive Ralph Rimmer has been brought in to deliver their stadium dream as well as halt their alarming slide on the field. "I found a club that was full of good people but had lost direction and had lost confidence," he says.Rimmer undertook a piece of consultancy work that presented a brutal truth to Huddersfield's longstanding owner, Ken Davy, who has invested tens of millions of his own fortune with little return. "Nobody pushed back at all when I explained where I thought the club was and the reasons it finds itself in this position," Rimmer states. "My analysis was harsh and raw. They realised they either had to grasp this opportunity or let the club drift away once and for all."The Path Forward: 2030 VisionInstead of aimlessly investing the owner's wealth into questionable recruitment as they have for most of the past decade, Huddersfield will soon open a purpose-built training facility in the town. The stadium dream, if realised, will also give them a home and a place to build around. "We're not Leeds or Wigan, and that's fine – we're going to try do things differently," Rimmer says. "We've got business plans around every year through to 2030."The prospect is growing of them playing in nearby Halifax next year without finalising plans for a return to Huddersfield. Is elite-level rugby league on the verge of disappearing in the place where it all began 131 years ago? Only time will tell if Huddersfield can grasp this opportunity and secure their future in the sport they helped create.

The Enigmatic Artist Steven Shearer is a quiet and elusive artist who has managed to keep a low profile despite his significant contributions to the art world. His work, which spans 40 years and multiple media, is characterized by its unique blend of teenage angst, heavy metal, and high art. The Artistic Journey Shearer's artistic journey began in Vancouver, where he grew up in a suburban area not far from the serial killer Robert Pickton. This dark backdrop had a profound impact on his work, which often explores themes of suburban loneliness and adolescent alienation. The Influence of Heavy Metal Shearer's work is heavily influenced by heavy metal music and its iconography. He draws inspiration from the imagery and aesthetics of the genre, often incorporating references to famous musicians and bands into his paintings. The Exhibition Shearer's latest exhibition at the David Zwirner Gallery in London showcases his latest works, which feature frail and aged figures, marking a departure from his earlier paintings of healthy and vibrant teenagers. The exhibition offers a glimpse into Shearer's unique artistic vision and his ability to capture the complexities of the human experience. The Artist's Perspective In an interview, Shearer revealed that he aims to create universal and timeless works of art that transcend specific references and allusions. He hopes that his paintings will continue to resonate with audiences in the future, long after the specific cultural references have faded away.

The Dark Side of the Plate: What It's Like to Be a Dictator's Personal Chef Kim Jong-il loved pepperoni pizza. Saddam Hussein couldn’t resist a fish barbecue. Idi Amin reportedly had the capacity for an entire roasted goat. The menus may have differed, but the appetite was the same. For history’s most notorious strongmen, the dining table doubled as a stage for power. For the cooks who served them, every meal came with extraordinary stakes. The Lives of Dictators' Chefs In his latest film, How to Feed a Dictator, which premieres at the Tribeca film festival, five private chefs recount their intimate experiences serving some of the world’s most feared dictators and the ever-present dangers that came with the job. Based on the 2020 book by the Polish journalist Witold Szabłowski, the 95-minute documentary probes the fraught terrain between morality and survival, asking viewers to consider the choices these chefs made – and the choices they never really had. The Moral Complexity Much like the menu on offer, the perspectives vary wildly. We meet Keo Samoun at the unkempt gravesite of her former boss, the Cambodian dictator Pol Pot, laying out a spread of fish, fruit and rice for a man she still regards almost as a god. Famed pizzaiolo Ermanno Furlanis, by contrast, recalls the terror of making pies for Kim Jong-il – his life under surveillance, his passport under guard, the state apparatchik who barged into his kitchen to ensure the olives on one pizza were spaced just so. The Price of Loyalty No chef is as tormented by their service as Ugandan Charles Otonde Odera. He describes his early days working for Ugandan despot Idi Amin as life-changing – a poor villager scraping by one day, and the next driving a Mercedes, supporting eight wives, and living in extraordinary comfort as Amin terrorized and brutalized the local masses. For all the chefs, comfort was the trade. By most measures, theirs was a great gig – logic that can excuse almost anything. The Future of Accountability The dissonance appears to bring Samoun to a breaking point. “Even though he made mistakes, it couldn’t all be bad,” she says, weeping. The film implicitly makes clear that the thought of playing the hero and poisoning a dictator never occurs to these chefs. Entry into a dictator’s inner circle requires a level of deep trust that also ensures distance from those on the outside.

The Galápagos: A Shark Sanctuary Under Threat The unmistakable fluted T-shape of a scalloped hammerhead shark slides by, followed by a diver holding his breath and a metal spear like an extra-long snooker cue. The spear hits the fish behind its dorsal fin and the 2-metre shark darts away, disgruntled but otherwise unharmed. This scene, captured by researchers from the Charles Darwin Foundation, represents one of the most important conservation efforts for a species that has declined by at least 80% globally due to overfishing. Innovative Research Methods in Shark Conservation Carlos Robalino, a marine biologist from the Galápagos Islands, is part of the foundation's research expedition to Darwin and Wolf, the most northerly islands in the Galápagos marine reserve. For three or four hours each morning and afternoon, Robalino is in the sea, honing his freediving skills so he can get close enough to the sharks to take samples of their skin. "Scalloped hammerheads are super-sensitive, very nervous," says Simon McKinley, an ecologist with the dive team. "The trick is to wait for the shark to pass by under me to the point where they can't possibly see me above them. Then I can dive down." The Unprecedented Abundance of Hammerheads in Galápagos Despite being critically endangered globally, the Galápagos hosts an extraordinary population of scalloped hammerheads. On most dives during the research trip, dozens of the sharks swim by. Later in the year, in the cold season when there is more food in the seas around Darwin and Wolf, more sharks migrate to the archipelago and the population quadruples. At its peak, about 150 lion-sized scalloped hammerheads roam each hectare of sea – roughly the area of London's Trafalgar Square. There can be so many they blot out the sun. Challenges in Protecting a Globally Endangered Species Despite their local abundance, studying scalloped hammerheads in Galápagos is not easy. Researchers cannot catch these sensitive sharks because the stress of being handled could kill them. The foundation team has developed less invasive techniques, including deploying underwater cameras to monitor shark numbers. Chemical analysis of skin biopsies shows, among other things, what the sharks are eating without needing to cut open their stomachs to see the contents. However, challenges remain: "Baby hammerheads, and even females when they go to give birth, are being caught... sold and consumed as ceviche," according to Pelayo Salinas de León. Tracking Shark Migrations Across the Pacific The research team is tracking where these sharks go after leaving Galápagos. Scalloped hammerheads are not resident here but set off on long migrations, and to learn about this part of their lives requires specialized diving techniques. Pelayo Salinas de León uses a closed-circuit rebreather, a device which recycles his exhalations, removes carbon dioxide and adds more oxygen as needed, so he can dive for hours in bubble-free tranquillity without scaring off the hammerheads. He attaches satellite transmitter tags worth close to $2,000 to track their movements across the Pacific Ocean. Future Conservation Challenges in a Changing Climate From twice-yearly visits to Darwin and Wolf, the team is building a long-term picture of the sharks' lives and how they are responding to changing conditions, including the heatwaves linked to El Niño, such as the big one forecast for 2026. These climate events could significantly impact the delicate marine ecosystem that supports the hammerhead population. The research being conducted in the Galápagos provides crucial data that will help conservationists develop strategies to protect these magnificent creatures both within the marine reserve and along their extensive migration routes.

The Lead: 100 Days of Conflict Beirut, Lebanon – Tuesday marks 100 days since the beginning of Israel's second military intensification against Lebanon in less than two years. Over the last 100 days, Israeli forces have destroyed dozens of villages in southern Lebanon. Despite rounds of direct diplomatic talks between Israel and Lebanon, multiple efforts to fully implement a ceasefire have fallen by the wayside. The Event Details: Escalating Violence Israel's latest war on Lebanon began on March 2, shortly after Hezbollah fired six rockets at Israel. Since then, Israel has killed more than 3,600 people in Lebanon, according to the country's Ministry of Public Health, including at least 245 children. Another 11,000 people have been wounded in Israeli attacks, among them at least 900 children. The Data Analysis: Humanitarian Crisis At least 1.2 million people have been forcibly displaced from their homes in southern Lebanon, eastern Lebanon's Bekaa Valley, and Beirut's southern suburbs. Many of them have been displaced more than once. Israel's military has also driven deeper into Lebanese territory – occupying about 2,000sq km (770sq miles) – than at any point since it occupied south Lebanon in 2000. The Impact Analysis: Regional Implications The conflict has drawn in regional powers, with Iran pledging to link the conflict to any ceasefire deal it makes with the United States and Israel. Hezbollah's main benefactor, Iran, has also tried to tie Lebanon to any ceasefire agreement between itself and Israel and the US. The Lebanese government is trying to impose its authority, and is under pressure from the US and Israel to crack down on Hezbollah. The Prediction: Uncertain Future Analysts believe Israel is not planning on withdrawing from Lebanon, with Israeli officials stating they will occupy up to the Litani River. The situation remains volatile, with no lasting ceasefire in sight. Hezbollah's secretary-general Naim Qassem labelled the latest ceasefire agreement a “shameless” attempt to annihilate part of the Lebanese people.

The Allegations Against David Sullivan David Sullivan, the 77-year-old former pornography billionaire and co-chair of West Ham United, has been accused of sexually exploitative and predatory behaviour against women over several decades. Seven women have come forward with allegations, including claims that Sullivan abused his power as the owner of the Sport newspapers to prey on them for sex. The Investigation and Regulator's Response The BBC and Times reported on the allegations, which Sullivan has denied through his lawyers. The Independent Football Regulator (IFR) has confirmed it is seeking further information from Sullivan relating to his suitability under the owners, directors and senior executives regime. The IFR has the power to expel any figures it considers unsuitable. The Potential Impact on Sullivan's Stake in West Ham Sullivan remains the largest shareholder at West Ham with 38.8%. It is unclear if he will try to hold on to his stake or sell up. A source close to Sullivan has indicated he is open to selling his stake. The potential forced sale of Sullivan's stake could have significant implications for the club's ownership structure and future. The Financial Situation at West Ham West Ham are in financial trouble after dropping into the Championship and posting a loss of £104.2m last year. Several executives have left the club in recent months, including Karren Brady, who stepped down as vice-chair in April. The Future Outlook The future of West Ham United and David Sullivan's involvement with the club remains uncertain. The IFR's investigation and potential actions will likely have a significant impact on the club's ownership and direction. It is unclear if Daniel Křetínský, a Czech billionaire who owns a 27% stake in the club, will look to increase his shareholding.