Water customers are not a ‘blank cheque’, Burnham warns suppliers
Posted on Thursday August 13, 2026

Firms in England and Wales given green light for extra spending that will add billions to bills

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Andy Burnham has accused water companies of treating their customers “as a bottomless source of funding” for the industry’s failings, after proposals that will push households bills even higher were approved.

Millions of households in England and Wales will face higher bills after water companies were given the green light to spend £3.4bn more than planned, including to support new homes and datacentres.

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Sports Direct owner Mike Ashley buys Harvey Nichols
Posted on Thursday August 13, 2026

Frasers Group acquires majority of upmarket retailer’s sites from the administrators

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The owner of Sports Direct has bought Harvey Nichols out of administration after the upmarket department store chain warned it could run out of money if it did not find new funding.

Mike Ashley’s Frasers Group said on Thursday it had bought the chain, which is headquartered at its store in Knightsbridge, for an undisclosed sum on the day it was put into administration. Harvey Nichols has 1,200 employees and 13 stores.

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UK economic growth slows down as Iran war pushes up energy prices
Posted on Thursday August 13, 2026

GDP expanded by 0.4% in three months to June, but analysts warn growth is ‘likely to fade’

• UK economy shows surprising resilience

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Economic growth slowed in the second quarter of the year, as the disruption unleashed by the Iran war began to take its toll, official figures show.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said GDP expanded by 0.4% in the three months to June, down from 0.6% in the first quarter, in line with City economists’ expectations.

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India fuels worldwide jump in planned coal production
Posted on Thursday August 13, 2026

Rise in new mine proposals, mainly in states of Odisha and Jharkhand, comes despite plateau in global demand

Enough new coalmining projects were proposed last year to increase global supplies by 2.5bn tonnes a year, an increase of 11% from the year before, even as demand for coal plateaus, according to a new report.

Global Energy Monitor, an NGO, found that India ignited a rise in new coalmine proposals in 2025 despite a global slowdown in the number of mine openings because of falling demand for the fossil fuel.

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AI agents aren’t legally responsible for any harm that they cause, experts say. So who is?
Posted on Wednesday August 12, 2026

After Australia’s first reported automated hacking accident, experts warn deployers – and possibly developers – of AI agents could be held liable for the actions of their bots

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The law is clear, says Prof Jeannie Paterson. “If I deploy an AI agent and it causes harm to someone else, I am responsible for that harm.

“Even if I didn’t intend for that to happen, it was foreseeable, and I should be taking responsibility.”

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Taiwan says it was hit by ‘abnormal’ AI-assisted cyber-attack
Posted on Thursday August 13, 2026

Taiwan’s statement comes a day after reports that suspected China-linked hackers had carried out a first-of-a-kind breach

Taiwan says it detected AI-assisted cyber-attacks on government agencies that came from overseas last month, a new kind of threat that has been reported as “first-of-a-kind breach”.

The Ministry of Digital Affairs (MDA) said its cybersecurity monitoring units ‌detected the “abnormal attack” targeting government agencies, which began on 20 July. The National Institute of Cyber Security issued a series of warning alerts while it investigated.

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Hodgkinson’s key rival Werro reinstated after shock fall to set up dream Euro 800m final
Posted on Thursday August 13, 2026

• Werro advanced after review reveals accidental trip

• Hodgkinson and Broeders-Bol ease into final together

Keely Hodgkinson’s biggest rival for European 800m gold has been dramatically put through into Friday’s final after being tripped and sent sprawling during Thursday’s first semi-final.

It means that the hugely anticipated showdown is still on between Hodgkinson, the Olympic gold medallist; Audrey Werro, the 22-year-old Swiss superstar who ran the third fastest time in history in June; and the Netherlands’ Femke Broeders-Bol, the 400m hurdles world champion who has moved up this season.

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‘At any moment I might fade out’: archives reveal fearless era of land speed record breakers
Posted on Thursday August 13, 2026

Unseen material gives insight into how death-defying attempts by drivers made impact on public imagination

With the Bonneville salt flats in Utah echoing to the sound of a new land speed record achieved by a British team, the timing could not be more apposite. The historical legacy of the challenge of pushing the envelope of pace is being dusted down and made public in the form of an extraordinary archive from more than a century of record-breaking machines and their singularly driven pilots.

On Tuesday JCB’s Hydromax car took the hydrogen-powered International Automobile Federation (FIA) land speed record, reaching 406.320mph at Bonneville. Appropriately the car was driven by Andy Green, the former RAF wing commander who holds the current outright land speed record of 763.035mph, set in 1997 in the ThrustSSC car in which he also became the only person to have broken the sound barrier on land.

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