The triple lock guarantees that state pension payments go up by 2.5 per cent, the rate of inflation or average earnings, whichever is highest. But as the government scrambles to fill a multi-billion black hole in the public finances, has it become too expensive to sustain? We seek opposing views Tom McPhail from The Lang…
Brianna Ghey’s mother has met the mother of her daughter’s killer to discuss working together. She said afterwards: “Tragedies have far-reaching ripples.” Esther Ghey sat down last week in their home town of Warrington with Emma Sutton, 49, a former teacher whose daughter Scarlett Jenkinson, 16, was convicted of stabbing the trans teenager. Jenkinson’s uncle…
At Britain’s largest electric vehicle charging hub, drivers use the forecourt wi-fi while they power up their batteries or pass time in the on-site Starbucks. Another customer, new to ultra-fast charging, seeks help to work the machine. Some of the low-charge parking spaces have been rented for the day. Located at Birmingham’s National Exhibition Centre,…
A British semiconductor business more than doubled in value on Thursday after a report that it was used to make Elon Musk’s Neuralink brain implant. Shares in Sondrel, a Berkshire-based company that designs and manages the supply of sophisticated microchips for companies such as Apple and Tesla, surged 6¼p, or 105.8 per cent, to close…
Music from some of the top artists in the world, including Taylor Swift, Adele and Drake, is set to be pulled from TikTok tomorrow amid a bitter dispute over royalties. Year-long talks between Universal Music Group (UMG), which handles the artists, and TikTok broke down yesterday, with both companies engaging in public mudslinging. UMG accused…
Mobile phones will be banned in schools in England under guidance issued to head teachers today in an attempt to minimise disruption and improve behaviour in classrooms. The nationwide rules will give backing to teachers in prohibiting the use of mobile phones throughout the school day, including at break times. Pupils who breach the ban…
The greatest art heist in history is happening right in front of us, and we are being gaslit by its perpetrators. Generative AI systems such as ChatGPT have exploded into the public consciousness, racking up hundreds of millions of users and bringing billion-dollar valuations for their creators. They can generate photorealistic images, produce entire songs…
This is an important moment for artificial intelligence. Not only will we be on the lookout for AI-generated deepfakes in this year’s many elections, but somebody is bound to declare 2024 the “year of AI” — just as many did in 2022 and, even more so, in 2023. They all have a point. AI became…
Twenty years ago next month, a loveless coder called Mark Zuckerberg spun up a “hot or not” website to rate the looks of his female classmates at Harvard. Today, he is one of the richest men on earth, lords over an empire of nearly four billion people and recently unveiled a stunningly ambitious plan to…