Alison Rourke

Commercial-income losses put jobs and services at risk … Poland election cliffhanger … Naomi Klein on how the pandemic should change us

Top scientist says ‘greater transparency’ needed over virus response … Microsoft pursues deal with TikTok … Jamie Oliver on fame and failure

UK’s most senior scientists to make TV appeal over Covid … Emmys leave British actors empty handed … and, is there more to tantra than marathon sex?

PM to announce curfew for pubs, bars, restaurants ... Starmer to ask voters to ‘take another look’ at Labour … and Ron Howard on movies, wildfires and Covid

People choosing not to visit hospitals in Covid … US protests after Breonna Taylor officers not charged ... and BLM’s co-founder on why critics get it wrong

Moldova, Morocco, Papua New Guinea floated as locations … the deadly cost of untreated illnesses during Covid … and the man who helped desegregate Britain

Diagnosis follows presidential aide Hope Hicks testing positive... calls for Margaret Ferrier to resign ... and asylum seekers moved despite Covid self-isolation orders

UK at ‘critical juncture’ as PM prepares to announce new virus rules … Trump claims he’s ‘immune’ ahead of rallies … and Piers Morgan on ‘wokery’

Funding crisis threatens winter preparations … special forces take control of oil tanker … Olivia Newton-John on cancer, cannabis and Karen Carpenter

UK and EU positions ‘remain far apart’ after leaders’ dinner … SpaceX’s fireball landing … the multi-billion dollar ice cube industry

Author of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy dies at 89 … Brexit talks to go ‘extra mile’ … Cher on ‘toxic’ Trump and the ‘happiness of a thing called Joe’

Author of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy dies at 89 … Brexit talks to go ‘extra mile’ … Cher on ‘toxic’ Trump and the ‘happiness of a thing called Joe’

Regulator refuses approval of daily tests in blow to PM’s plans … Biden unveils stimulus package … Marianne Faithfull on Covid, singing and miracles

Spain closes hotels; Portugal declares state of emergency; worldwide cases pass 200,000. This blog is now closed.

Sixth day of unrest condemned as Stormont recalled … under-30s to be offered alternative to Oxford jab … and Ted Brown on the fight for gay rights

All-party group warns over importing variants … Briton named among Israel festival dead … sexual exploitation of minors is ‘everywhere’, says Billie Eilish

Woman only 29 weeks pregnant delivers son on flight between Salt Lake City and Honolulu after appeal for a doctor on board

Long March 5B is doing 27,600km/h in failing orbit, with eventual crash site unknown, after launching space station hub

A simple fish pie has held the stories of my family for nearly 50 years and the care and connection of recipes handed down from one generation to the next

Braving board burn and wipeouts, Alison Rourke fulfilled a lifelong dream and learned to surf – between two cyclones and the remnants of a tsunami