A staff exodus and a broken booking system are helping to cause huge jams in Britain’s driving test system

It has long been a stressful rite of passage for many young people but, in recent years, passing the actual driving test is the easy part. Now, many people seeking a test need to wake up early to snag a date before the bots do and, even then, they are looking at a long and arduous wait.

Despite moves from the government to address the issue, an audit report released this week found plans to cut the wait for a driving test to seven weeks by the end of the year would not be achieved until November 2027.

While many use our phones predominantly to doomscroll, smartphones have a range of little-known functions that could make life better and easier – from heart monitoring to even developing camera film

Our smartphones are magical things – far more than dopamine drip providers and a way to keep in touch with friends and family. Using the built-in features and easily available additional apps, there are plenty of clever things you can do with your smartphone.

Emulating the bike-friendly highways enjoyed by our continental neighbours will take a lot more money and political will

Ever since Team GB’s velodrome successes at the 2008 Olympics, campaigners and government ministers have confidently predicted that Britain is about to become a nation of cyclists. There is just one problem: for the most part, it has not happened.

Apart from a very concentrated spike in bike use during Covid, the level of cycle trips in England has stayed broadly static for years, and things do not appear to be changing.

A protest barring MPs from pubs is exposing deeper tensions between politicians and the communities they represent

Labour MPs heading back to their constituencies this weekend will do so with a sense of relief that another turbulent term in British politics is over. But those hoping to pitch up at their local pub for a restorative pint with colleagues and constituents may find festive cheer is in short supply. In fact, some may not be allowed through the door.

For the past few weeks, pubs across the country have been putting up signs declaring “No Labour MPs” in protest at changes to business rates announced by the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, in her latest budget.

The Irish singer-songwriter does what the best musicians do: perfectly crystallising their time while inspirationally taking a stand against it

What has it felt like to be alive in 2025? The basic answer probably touches on a few aspects of the 21st-century experience. One is the horror and conflict that seem to define the news almost every day. Another centres around the material pressures that increasingly grip supposedly peaceful countries: the never-ending cost of living crisis, and the impossibility for millions of people of a secure job, a dependable home and some halfway viable idea of the future.

Something else demands a mention: the all-pervading mixture of absurdity, nastiness and anger fostered by the internet. Bigotry runs rampant. What we still rather laughably call social media now seem to operate on the basis that the ideal story mixes wildly improbable elements with the kicking-up of moral outrage (witness that ghoulish “online content creator” Bonnie Blue, who, having claimed to have had sex with 1,057 men in 12 hours, ended the year by announcing her support for Nigel Farage). You can check your feed in a mood of mild curiosity, but find yourself instantly pulled into what this results in: great storms of mockery, loathing and polarised shouting.

John Harris is a Guardian columnist. His book Maybe I’m Amazed: A Story of Love and Connection in Ten Songs is available from the Guardian bookshop

So this is Christmas. And what have we done? The Ashes is over. With two Tests still to come

When the moment finally came the visuals were perfect: clean lines, neat angles, figures picked out in crisp afternoon sun against the almost satirical splendour of Adelaide Oval.

Scott Boland took the final wicket to seal Australia’s unassailable 3-0 Ashes series lead, the 74th time this moment has been played out down the centuries, and immediately the white shapes converged to form a bobbing huddle. England’s batters stood in an attitude of formal deflation. The umpires began their priestly last-things walk, framed against that huge, empty, lime-green field.

Exclusive: Warning from head of Social Mobility Commission comes after UK report found ‘entrenched disadvantages’

Keir Starmer has no “coherent” strategy to tackle entrenched inequalities harming the life chances of millions of people, the government’s social mobility commissioner has said.

A major official report warned last week that young adults in Britain’s former industrial heartlands were being left behind as a result of failed or abandoned promises by successive governments.

Exclusive: Scale of government’s anti-fraud fiasco is four times higher than previously admitted

More than 60% of parents who had their child benefit stopped by HMRC using incorrect Home Office travel data were not fraudulently claiming the support from abroad, it has emerged.

The scale of the government’s anti-fraud fiasco is four times higher than previously admitted, with 15,000 of the 23,500 parents targeted by HMRC now identified as legitimate beneficiaries living in the UK.

Maria Farmer, whose sister Annie was abused by Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, says Epstein ‘stole’ nude images

While Donald Trump’s justice department did not deliver on a legal requirement to disclose all Jeffrey Epstein-related files by Friday, one document in an otherwise underwhelming disclosure lifted the veil on authorities’ inaction – and its dire consequences for dozens of teen girls.

That document is an FBI report from Maria Farmer, a painter who worked for Epstein around 1996.

Fear that confrontation is on the cards as policing of ships becomes more aggressive and Russia challenges Europe

The “shadow fleet” used by Russia, Iran and Venezuela to avoid western sanctions and ship cargo to customers including China and India is “exploding” in its scale and scope, and there are concerns that efforts to counter it are drawing closer to dangerous military confrontations.

Complicating the issue is that Russia has begun putting its own flag on some former shadow fleet tankers, in an open challenge to Europe.