Exclusive: Concerns over effect on UKas finances lead officials to believe utility should be renationalised before general election

Senior Whitehall officials fear Thames Wateras financial collapse could trigger a rise in government borrowing costs not seen since the chaos of the Liz Truss mini-budget, the Guardian can reveal.

Such is their concern about the impact on wider borrowing costs for the UK, even beyond utilities and infrastructure, that they believe Thames should be renationalised before the general election.

Peter Smith is in intensive care after suffering damage to an arm, leg and hand and puncture wounds to abdomen

A British tourist who was seriously injured in a shark attack off a Caribbean island is aaware of what is happening and can communicatea in intensive care, his wife has said.

Peter Smith, 64, from Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire, was savaged 10 metres (33ft) off the shore near the Starfish hotel in Courland Bay on the north coast of Tobago on Friday morning.

Worried MPs have concocted five-point plan of quick measures aimed at showing that the party cares about publicas priorities

Rishi Sunak is braced for a bruising week as Tory rebels flaunted plans for a 100-day apolicy blitza to secure quick wins if the local election results prove disastrous for the party.

The prime minister said on Sunday that he was not adistracteda by his personal ratings lingering at record lows. He refused to rule out calling a July general election amid mounting rumours that unruly MPs will attempt to oust him if the West Midlands mayor, Andy Street, and the Tees Valley mayor, Ben Houchen, are defeated on Thursday.

An attempt to end the junior doctors pay dispute with a 10-12% offer.

Further cuts to legal migration numbers, with a curb on the number of foreign students staying in the UK.

Vow to increase defence spending to 3% of GDP by 2027.

Introduce measures to jail prolific offenders and build rapid detention cells to increase prison capacity.

Cut the benefits bill, with a target to reduce payments for depression and anxiety.

ABI reports annual jump of APS157 in first quarter of 2024 but says 1% increase on previous quarter indicates rises are easing

The average price paid for comprehensive motor insurance in the UK was about a third (33%) or APS157 higher in the first quarter of this year than a year earlier, according to figures from the Association of British Insurers (ABI).

Based on analysis of policies sold, the typical price paid in the first quarter of 2024 was APS635, marking a 1% increase on the previous quarter, the ABI said.

Exclusive: Operation comes weeks earlier than expected and is thought to have been timed to coincide with local elections

The Home Office will launch a major operation to detain asylum seekers across the UK on Monday, weeks earlier than expected, in preparation for their deportation to Rwanda, the Guardian can reveal.

Officials plan to hold refugees who turn up for routine meetings at immigration service offices or bail appointments and will also pick people up nationwide in a surprise two-week exercise.

Levy on oil and gas majors in richest countries would help worst-affected nations tackle climate crisis, says report

A new tax on fossil fuel companies based in the worldas richest countries could raise hundreds of billions of dollars to help the most vulnerable nations cope with the escalating climate crisis, according to a report.

The Climate Damages Tax report, published on Monday, calculates that an additional tax on fossil fuel majors based in the wealthiest Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries could raise $720bn (APS580bn) by the end of the decade.

Foreign secretaryas use of Embraer Lineage 1000 follows APS348,000 bill for James Cleverlyas eight-day trip in similar plane in 2023

David Cameron has been criticised for hiring a luxury jet worth an estimated APS42m for a recent tour of central Asia.

The foreign secretary travelled on the Embraer Lineage 1000 for a five-day visit to Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Mongolia last week, the Mirror reported.

Tim Loughton had sanctions imposed on him in 2021 by Beijing, which has close ties to east African country

A former government minister who has had sanctions imposed on him by China has said he was detained and deported by Djibouti as a adirect consequencea of the east African countryas close ties with Beijing.

Tim Loughton, the Conservative MP for East Worthing and Shoreham since 1997, said he was held for more than seven hours at the airport earlier this month, barred entry to Djibouti, and told he was being removed on the next available flight.

Police avery confidenta body parts in Salford belong to a man in his 60s whose torso was found on 4 April

More human remains have been found in two locations as part of a murder investigation that started when a manas torso was discovered in a nature reserve in Greater Manchester, police said.

Detectives believe the torso, found in Salford, belongs to a man in his 60s and they have informed his family. Formal identification of the remains has not yet taken place but should be completed by next week, Greater Manchester police (GMP) said.

Exclusive: Working-class people less likely to get jobs in charities than public and private sectors, EY Foundation report finds

Charities are hiring staff with aprivilege rather than potentiala, according to the author of a report highlighting the stark class divide in the sector.

Working-class people are less likely to be hired by charities than by employers in the public and private sectors, said the EY Foundation, which supports young people from low-income backgrounds to progress in professional roles.

Makers of phones, TVs and smart doorbells legally required to protect devices against access by cybercriminals

Tech that comes with weak passwords such as aadmina or a12345a will be banned in the UK under new laws dictating that all smart devices must meet minimum security standards.

Measures to protect consumers from hacking and cyber-attacks come into effect on Monday, the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology said.

aDifficult but not catastrophica situation as Russians press for gains before US resupply of Kyivas forces. What we know on day 796

• See all our Russia-Ukraine war coverage

Ukraineas troops have made a tactical retreat westwards from the villages of Berdychi, Semenivka and Novomykhailivka on the waras eastern front, according to Col Gen Oleksandr Syrskyi, Ukraineas military commander in chief. aThe most difficult situation is in the Pokrovsk and Kurakhove directions, where fierce battles continue,a Syrskyi said, referencing two Ukrainian-held cities in the Donetsk region. aThe enemy has engaged up to four brigades in these directions, is trying to develop an offensive west of Avdiivka and Marinka, making its way to Pokrovsk and Kurakhove,a Syrskyi said, adding the retreatas purpose was apreserving the lives and health of our defendersa.

Russiaas defence ministry on Sunday claimed its troops had captured the village of Novobakhmutivka in the eastern Donetsk region a about 10km (six miles) north of Avdiivka, which they seized in February. Syrsky said Ukraineas position on the battlefield had worsened. aIn some sectors the enemy had tactical success, and in some areas our troops managed to improve the tactical position.a

Russia has consolidated recent battlefield gains and is attempting to break through Ukrainian defensive lines before new US military assistance arrives, Luke Harding reports from Kyiv. Ukrainian security officials described the situation on the battlefront in the Donbas region as avery difficulta but anot critical or catastrophica.

North-west of Avdiivka, Russian brigades have come within about 30km (19 miles) of the city of Pokrovsk, a Ukrainian military hub, and farther north are assaulting the town of Chasiv Yar, near Bakhmut, using airdropped glide bombs.

There were unconfirmed reports that the Ukrainian military struck a Russian air defence unit at Cape Tarkhankut, on the western coast of occupied Crimea. Long-range Atacms missiles supplied this month by the US were used, Telegram channels said. Explosions were reported in the northern Crimean town of Dzhankoye after a previous attack there on an airfield and Russian missile launcher system.

Early on Sunday, Russian drones hit a hotel in the southern port city of Mykolaiv, said Vitaliy Kim, the regionas governor. A heat-generating plant was also damaged, he added.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Ukraineas president, said on Sunday: aWe are still waiting for the supplies Ukraine was promised. We are expecting those volumes and scope that can change the situation on the battlefield in Ukraineas interests.a

After speaking with the US House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, about American aid approved last week, Zelenskiy said: aIn my conversation with Mr Jeffries, I underscored that Patriot systems are needed, and as soon as possible.a

On entry to the European Union, Zelenskiy said Ukraine had met all conditions for accession talks to start, aand now the EU must meet its obligationsa. On entry to the Nato military alliance a which the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has said Ukraine will join eventually a Zelenskiy said that every country that shares common values and is ready to defend them adeserves an invitation to the alliancea.

Chris Webb is expected to win Blackpool South for Labour but eyes are on the fortunes of Mark Butcher, who works with the poor and insists he is anot a politiciana

Mark Butcher, Reform UKas candidate in Blackpool Southas byelection, watched as a carriage driver on the townas promenade plunged a fist into the manure-collecting bag behind his horse. Petty bureaucracy, both men furiously agreed, was stifling the resortas appeal.

aPeople came here because it was a magical place, but where have the donkey rides gone? Where are the ice-cream vendors?a asked Butcher, evoking a nostalgia for the townas glory days and reciting a mantra that Blackpool had long been ill-served by a Labour-controlled council and a when the ared walla crumbled in 2019 a a Conservative MP.

While some voters may want to send a message to Westminster, more local concerns will have an influence

This weekas local elections have been widely described as one of the toughest tests of Rishi Sunakas 18-month premiership, with Westminster-watchers considering the results as portents of his fate in the coming national poll a considered to be coming this autumn.

But while some voters in England may use their vote to bloody his nose this Thursday, a host of more local issues are also likely to influence the results.

As people play their hearts out on station platforms, this is undoubtedly stirring stuff a but thereas always been something terribly odd plaguing it too

The new series of The Piano confronts the obvious problem head on. aI thought we were one and done,a Claudia Winkleman says to the talent showas judges, Mika and Lang Lang, because everyone will know now that the pair are hidden away somewhere, assessing all the amateur musicians who step forward to take their place at the public pianos stationed at various a well, stations a and selecting the winner from each concourse, who will go on to perform in a special concert at the end of the series.

No matter, says Mika, wholly unconvincingly. It was the stories of the people that drove the series, not the big reveal. So, that apparently dealt with, on we go.

The two-decade transformation of the industrial site north of Kingas Cross station in London, once notorious, now a pleasant enclave of offices, homes, shops, bars and boulevards, is essentially complete. Itas a huge success a and yet is there something missing?

The near quarter-century, kilometre-long, 67-acre project to redevelop Kingas Cross in London is a monument of its age. It is the urban embodiment of the Blair era in which it was conceived, of the third way, of the idea that market forces, wisely guided by light-touch government, can be a power for good. It will get into the history books about cities (if such things are written in the future), representing its time in the same way that John Nashas Regentas Park represents the Regency and the Barbican represents the 1960s.

The architects of its masterplan, Allies and Morrison and Demetri Porphyrios, have now submitted it for this yearas RIBA awards programme, which could get it on to the shortlist for the Stirling prize. This means that, although there is construction still to be done, not least on the Google headquarters, they consider the essential concept of the masterplan complete. Cadence, a residential building by Alison Brooks Architects, which occupies a culminating point at one end of the site, is also, bar some snagging, finished. Somewhat shockingly, of more than 30 practices commissioned on the site, Brooks is the first one with a womanas name in its title.

With tourists struggling to access the two primary digital payment apps, Alipay and WeChat pay, Beijing has put measures in place to make cash payments easier

For 18 years, Liu Yau-li has been bringing tourists to China. In that time sheas seen the full evolution of Chinaas digital payment system. Twenty years ago, she says, everyone used cash. But today itas not unusual to find places that canat or wonat accept cash at all, particularly after the pandemic when much of the world grew wary of handling shared items.

If visitors want to enjoy convenient travel, she says, theyare better off downloading one of the major payment apps and hoping it works for them.

While a cast of literary heavyweights grace Laingas account of her garden restoration, the real joys lie in her detailed description of the pruning and the planting and the soothing effect on her state of mind

Olivia Laingas new book, The Garden Against Time, is as fragrantly replete as a long border at its peak. The word that comes to mind is spumy: a blossomy, brimful excess thatas almost too much at times. Here are hundreds of plants, exquisitely described; here is colour, energy and expertise. In a way, itas akin to a garden itself; a place, almost a park, in which the reader never quite knows whatas around the next corner. But while this is invigorating a my imagination whirred across the verdant expanses of its pages like some crazy, old-fashioned lawnmower a itas also tiring. Dizzy on its pollen, I often had to put it down. I began to think of the chapter breaks as conveniently placed benches on which I might for a while sit quietly, temporarily unassailed by endless common names, ongoing worries about honey fungus, and long disquisitions on privilege and exclusion.

Laing does two things at once. First and foremost, this book is a memoir, in which she describes her restoration of the garden attached to the house in Suffolk to which she moved in 2020, as Covid-19 raged on and so many of us sought respite in our backyards, balconies and window boxes (in the course of 2020, more than 3 million people in Britain began to garden for the first time, nearly half of them under 45). All her life, she has longed for a garden to call her own a one she would never have to give up on the whim of some landlord a and now, at last, she has one, bought with her husband, a retired Cambridge don. The work originally of a designer called Mark Rumary who liked hedges and ponds, this third of an acre cannot be seen in its entirety all at once, appearing instead as a series of secretive rooms; a beguiling prospect for a woman who read Frances Hodgson Burnettas marvellous novel The Secret Garden as a child.

Itas almost a century since the 1924 expedition ended in tragedy, yet the question of whether the climbers conquered the summit remains unanswered

On the morning of 6 June, 1924, George Mallory a one of the worldas greatest mountaineers a set off with his companion, Sandy Irvine, from a camp on the slopes of Mount Everest and headed for its summit.

A veteran of three British Everest expeditions, Mallory knew the worldas highest mountain better than any other climber at the time. He had come close to death there on three occasions.

The effectiveness of Tinder and Hinge is hard to judge without access to their data. But now researchers are creating a free alternative with full transparency

A class-action lawsuit filed in a US federal court last Valentineas Day accuses Match Group a the owners of Tinder, Hinge and OkCupid dating apps, among others a of using a apredatory business modela and of doing everything in its power to keep users hooked, in flagrant opposition to Hingeas claim that it is adesigned to be deleteda.

The lawsuit crystallised an ocean of dissatisfaction with the apps, and stimulated a new round of debate over their potential to harm mental health, but for scientists who study romantic relationships it sidestepped the central issue: do they work? Does using the apps increase your chances of finding your soulmate, or not? The answer is, nobody knows.

Authorities in Kigali say awe are readya to accommodate refugees as Rishi Sunakas plan moves closer

Daily interviews, an orientation session and football: this is what awaits refugees scheduled to land in Rwanda as part of the UKas migration plan.

Some asylum seekers will be taken to the Hope hostel a a 20-minute drive from Kigali international airport a where they will be fed, taught about the countryas history and be allowed to walk past the armed security guards to stretch their legs.

Families of two girls killed when a Land Rover ploughed into their school are still waiting for answers, 10 months later

The question awhat if?a plagues Smera Chohan and her husband, Sajjad Butt.

Last July, Chohan had just posed for a photograph with their eight-year-old daughter, Nuria, at her school picnic in Wimbledon when a Land Rover crashed through a fence and ploughed into them. Nuria Sajjad and her friend Selena Lau were ultimately killed by the collision while Chohan was left with 10 broken bones and the overwhelming grief of losing her only child.

German operated at his own pace in the north London noise, passing beautifully, holding the ball up and punishing Spurs

With 96 minutes gone in this agreeably fevered north London derby a small, stricken-looking man in a tracksuit could be seen leaping across the touchline at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, arms waving furiously, before being dragged back off the pitch by the fourth official.

Arsenalas Nicolas Jover has been a pioneer of the fashion for set-piece coaches to pop up at every designated opportunity and assume a look of urgent command, apparently convinced that their presence sightly closer to the pitch, their personal voodoo, their revolving index fingers, will somehow affect events on it.

• Champions respond to Arsenal win with victory at Forest
• Guardiola: aI donat think they are going to lose any pointsa

Pep Guardiola has warned Manchester City cannot drop any points if they are to secure a historic fourth successive Premier League as he expects Arsenal to win their remaining matches after proving their mettle by defeating Spurs on Sunday. Josko Gvardiol and Erling Haaland edged City past Nottingham Forest to leave them a point behind top spot but crucially with a game in hand.

aWe prefer they lose, we cannot control what they do,a Guardiola said of Arsenal. aThere are four games left, I donat think they are going to lose any points, so we know exactly what we have to do.a

World No 2 basically auditioning for acceptance to return to policy board is faintly ludicrous in increasingly fractured sport

The most unpalatable and unlikely scenario could be a necessary one. Rory McIlroy to LIV has been rumoured, slapped down, rumoured and slapped down. Yet as the PGA Tour procrastinates over completion of a deal with the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund, and even the formal involvement of McIlroy himself, one wonders if it may take something nuclear to allow golf to wake up to the haplessness of its present, fractured state. Should McIlroy sign for golfas rebel tour the establishment would be sent into a level of frenzy so serious that collaboration between the PGA Tour, LIV and the PIF would surely transpire in a heartbeat.

There is no suggestion this will happen. Still, Greg Norman knew precisely what he was doing in recent days. aIf Rory was willing to sit down and have a conversation with us, would we be happy to sit down with him?a Norman said. a100%.a McIlroy is not actually the PGA Touras main concern. The live prospect of LIV continuing a talent drain on established tours into 2025 should be the prime cause for fear. While not McIlroy, it could be Viktor Hovland. If not Hovland, it could be Tommy Fleetwood. The PGA Tour and its marquee events are being materially harmed by golfas lack of compatibility. This will continue to be the case while the PGA Tour wanders aimlessly on one path and LIV confidently on another.

• Bristol City 0-4 Manchester City
• Teenager Hobson stuns Arsenal with late leveller

Manchester City extended their lead at the top of the Womenas Super League to six points with a 4-0 win at Bristol City that relegated their hosts after only one season. Second-placed Chelsea can draw level at the summit by winning their two games in hand.

But Cityas win ended Arsenalas interest in the title race after the Gunners were held 1-1 by Everton earlier in the day.

• Nicky Hendersonas horse a double Cheltenham winner
• aHe was an absolute superstar, his CV is testament to thata

Shishkin, one of the most talented and popular steeplechasers of recent years, has died after suffering an injury at Nicky Hendersonas stable in Lambourn.

The 10-year-old was found to have suffered a fracture to a hind leg after being cast in his box on Sunday evening.

• Defender rues alack of tactical awarenessa in Barcelona defeat
• Chelsea resume WSL title bid against Liverpool on Wednesday

Jess Carter believes Chelsea have ano choicea but to regroup quickly after their Champions League semi-final heartbreak.

Emma Hayesas side suffered a 2-0 defeat at home to the holders, Barcelona, on Saturday, going out of the competition 2-1 on aggregate after claiming an impressive 1-0 first leg victory in Spain. Afterwards, the manager questioned the refereeing decisions that saw Kadeisha Buchanan sent off after two Ayellow cards and Barcelona awarded a Apenalty for a foul on Aitana BonmatA.

• Hogg has been charged by police over incident in Borders
• Former Lions tourist posted message on social media

Former Scotland captain Stuart Hogg has revealed spending time at a rehabilitation centre helped him areseta after being charged by police in connection with an incident in the Scottish Borders.

Hogg, Scotlandas all-time leading try scorer, retired from playing in 2023 prior to the start of the Rugby World Cup, announcing a desire for a new career following his time in the sport which also saw him go on three tours with the British and Irish Lions.

Lyon reached their 11th Womenas Champions League final and will hope to win a ninth European Cup in Bilbao after holding off Paris Saint-Germain by winning 2-1 at the Parc des Princes to complete a 5-3 aggregate win over their fellow French team. Melchie Dumournayas late goal confirmed progress to the Basque capital after PSG had been held at armas length for most of the second leg.

After defending champions Barcelona broke Chelsea hearts in Emma Hayesa final season, the club coached by Sonia Bompastor, widely linked with the vacant Chelsea vacancy, held off PSG with a combination of sharp finishing and steady defending.