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In this week’s newsletter: residents living near a chemical factory are the latest community concerned about the health and environmental impact of Pfas contamination

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Residents within a kilometre of the AGC Chemicals Europe factory in Thornton-Cleveleys in the north of England, have found themselves at the centre of what is quickly becoming a national scandal.

In 2024, the UK Environment Agency and the local authority initiated an investigation into historic emissions of Pfoa – a carcinogenic “forever chemical” that international research has linked to kidney cancer – from the factory. After environmental testing, people have been advised to wash and peel homegrown food and to avoid eating locally produced eggs, and two allotment sites near the factory have been closed.

May and June heatwaves killed about 2,700 people in England and Wales, data suggests

Inside the secret Laos shops selling pangolin scales, bear bile and tiger bones to tourists

Who is ‘stealing’ Bali’s water? How tourism siphoned off a prized resource

Sinister bogland discoveries haunt the intersecting lives of four characters in this meditative, exquisitely written tale

Almost 14% of Ireland is bog: vast swathes of moss-carpeted land, below which layers of ancient history have been compounded into mulch-black turf. Captivated by their otherworldly beauty, Seamus Heaney wrote some of his finest poetry about bogs – and the bodies discovered, perfectly preserved, in their eerie depths.

Sheila Armstrong’s exquisite second novel, The Red Mouth, also centres around two bog discoveries: the “monstrous, bog-black antler” of a great Irish elk, and the mutilated body of a girl who comes to be known as Belroe Woman. From here we follow the intersecting lives of those haunted, both literally and figuratively, by these excavations and the uncanny landscape that yielded them.

Using tinted tips and undercuts, footballers are rewriting what ‘professional’ looks like in elite sport in the process

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At the World Cup this summer locs, or what are commonly known as “dreadlocks”, have become as ubiquitous as free kicks. Defenders pin theirs back for clear sight-lines; forwards loosen and shape theirs for the cameras.

Antoine Semenyo of Ghana paired his with a sharp undercut. Spain’s Nico Williams bleaches his tips. Belgium winger Jeremy Doku has a mix of blond tinted tips, cornrowed. England’s Eberechi Eze has a variant styled into cornrows, while his former Crystal Palace teammate (and soon to be similarly gutted opponent in Saturday’s third-place “bronze” play-off) France’s Michael Olise opts for a slickly styled taper fade, a technique that emphasises the volume of the locs on top. Manu Koné, also of Les Bleus, has sported braided locs, while Switzerland’s attacking midfielder Johan Manzambi has gone for jumbo locs in combination with rope-like, protective Senegalese twists.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Thursday convened leaders from more than 60 countries to take part in the Trump administration's latest effort to quell what it calls "left wing" political terrorism.

(Image credit: Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

Banks and building societies have started relaxing affordability rules and becoming more creative with products

For many first-time buyers, getting their foot on the property ladder can feel like an impossible dream. However, the good news is that there are a growing number of mortgage deals that require only a small deposit, or no deposit at all.

Metro Bank is the latest high street lender to launch a deal that allows eligible first-timers to borrow up to 100% of the value of a property. Home loans that let people borrow 100% have been making a bit of a comeback – they were once fairly commonplace but were axed after the 2008 financial crisis.

Exclusive: Watchdog asked to look into how James Watt got data of ex-crowdfunders he invited to join buy-back bid

James Watt, the BrewDog founder who sold the debt-laden “punk” brewer earlier this year, is the subject of complaints to the UK’s data privacy watchdog linked to his surprise bid to buy the company back, the Guardian has learned.

BrewDog’s brand, intellectual property, UK breweries and 11 bars were sold to the US cannabis and drinks firm Tilray in March for £33m, in a deal that rendered the shares of more than 200,000 crowdfunding investors worthless.

In the second part of a two-part profile, Josh Halliday charts PM-in-waiting’s journey northward, where as mayor he revelled in his Covid-era popularity – and changed his approach to politics

• Part one: From Cambridge ‘impostor’ to New Labour star

Andy Burnham was a broken man. In a pub a short walk from parliament, which he had taken to calling “the madhouse”, he plotted his escape over beers with three trusted colleagues.

It was late March in 2016. Burnham, the MP for Leigh in Greater Manchester, had been in Westminster for 15 years but here, in a politico-free pub on Horseferry Road, his mood was dark.

The broadcaster’s tournament coverage was a mix of flat and fizz. It could also have been a long farewell with World Cup rights up for grabs

Goodbye, then, to Fox, to its band of upbeat Brits and grown men dressed in suits and sneakers. Goodbye to constant cutaways to Gianni Infantino in the stands, his eyebrows a mournful tipi, his nude head sprinkling under the summer sun. Goodbye to Landon Donovan and his special gift for announcing every celebrity sighting (“And there’s Javier Bardem and Penélope Cruz”) as if delivering the results of a colonoscopy. Goodbye to Rebecca Lowe saying “OK, OK” whenever she’s needed one of her on-set personalities to zip it so she can throw to a break. Goodbye to the momentum graph, which only flashed on screen when a match’s momentum needed no explanation; goodbye to “no golden goal” on the scorebug during extra time, referencing a rule that has not been in force at a World Cup for 24 years; goodbye to the connected ball, which never seemed connected when we needed connection most.

Goodbye to Geoff Shreeves, Fox’s middle-aged Oliver Twist chirruping on the sideline for the approval of his American masters. Goodbye to Tom Rinaldi, to his pocket squares and his “lyrical” meditations on balls and planets and stars or whatever. Goodbye to Chef Nick, now forced to rein in the extravagance of his early contributions (kangaroo corndogs, fufu chicken tikka masala) in the face of the tournament’s gastronomically subdued final four. And goodbye to Jameis Winston, the Fox fan correspondent, whose distressingly antic and sweaty stadium dispatches gave him the unvarying appearance of a man being electrocuted in the middle of a baptism.