The UK prime minister clearly still adores the band. Perhaps he’s attracted to songs about sham justice and murderous meat factories, shot through with nihilism and exquisite despair

As an origin story, Andy Burnham: Smiths Fan has a lot going for it. It’s plainly authentic: he can name the time he saw them live (Salford University, Queen Is Dead tour, 1986). A cynical young man in a hurry might fake that now, but not back when he first said it, in 2013. Asked by Labour Uncut for his desert island tracks during his 2010 leadership bid, three of the eight were sung by Morrissey (two Smiths singles and one off Viva Hate), which is superfan territory.

That’s a softball exercise to endear yourself to Labour members; you have eight chances to hit every base, and to blow three lives on an artist who had already, by then, been dabbling in nationalism for 18 years (we’ll come back to this) was dicey and brave. You’ll recall that Burnham did not win that election. If you were an enemy state, amassing this hinterland for an asset, you’d have basically done a really good job.

Nine people have died in events police are linking to organised crime in an area shaped by deprivation and fading opportunities, but there is light, say residents

“This place might look bad but it’s not, the people are good people,” said one woman before turning to her young daughter and asking: “Is this place bad?” The girl shakes her head vigorously.

It’s a difficult thing to say given the week’s events in Grangetown and South Bank on Teesside.

Their raucous pop music has made Katseye the biggest girl band in two decades. Can they weather toxic fandom, critical pans and a dwindling member count?

Before screenings of their new documentary, the members of Katseye appear in a video message to thank fans for their support. Their followers, Eyekons, have played a critical role in their rise to stardom, so it makes sense that Katseye: Wild Hearts, released in global theaters this month, takes a beat to shout out to them. Perhaps more than many other big music groups today, the group’s rise has depended on their relationship with their devotees who ensure that few corners of the world are safe from Katseye mania.

Katseye’s multinational members – Daniela, Lara, Manon, Megan, Sophia and Yoonchae – were selected through a combination of fan votes and judge scores on the 2023 YouTube reality competition The Debut: Dream Academy. The joint project between American record label Geffen Records and Korean entertainment company Hybe aimed to create a global girl group, with hopefuls participating in a rigorous bootcamp to test their singing and dancing skills. The following year, Netflix’s docu-series Pop Star Academy: Katseye – which documented the group’s nascent era, behind-the-scenes drama and all – catapulted them to a new level of visibility.

The star has long been French cinema’s favourite tousle-haired Adonis, which makes his latest performance – as a schlubby, stay-at-home dad – all the more surprising. ‘I appreciate people laughing at me,’ he says

‘Even though I’ve been working in film for over 20 years, I still have this desire to look beautiful on screen,” says Louis Garrel, on a video call from his bed inside a boat off the coast of Corsica. The French film star is lying on his stomach, occasionally kicking up his bare legs, ruffling his curls and running the nail of his thumb over his moustache. I think the person he sees on the laptop screen in front of him is me, but I am pretty certain he is flirting with his own reflection.

The attraction between the Paris-born 43-year-old and the camera tends to be reciprocal. Long of limb, tousled of hair and chiselled of nose, Garrel has spent a career on screen as French cinema’s favourite Adonis – the man film-makers turn to when they need an erotic wrecking ball to smash up bourgeois twosomes and turn them into quivering menages a trois.

The prime minister has lifted the spirits of the public and party members, and must use that goodwill to push through change

He bounded into the packed rally, a spring-heeled intruder whose very presence announced a coup at last year’s Labour conference. And so it was. Andy Burnham spoke with ebullient self-confidence, yet without aggression or a barrage of insults. They tried to stop him with a bogus constitutional fix barring him from standing in Gorton and Denton. But those Labour hierarchs lost it without him. His subsequent Makerfield victory proved their mistake and opened the door right into No 10 without dispute.

At that standing-room-only rally on proportional representation he made a pitch-perfect noteless speech of personal passion about the failure of politics to connect, the decline of Westminster, the public’s distrust and the risk of this lost public belief in democracy. His hands were clean, he never benefited from the monster majority that first past the post had delivered so unfairly to Labour MPs: he wasn’t there at the last two elections. He quit out of despair, returning to repair.

Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist

Other governments could seek similar concessions, while separate legal action is pending in places ranging from Kenya to the Netherlands

In October 2021, Abrham Meareg’s father, a professor of chemistry in Ethiopia’s northern town of Bahir Dar, was shot at close range and died outside his family home. This was in the middle of the country’s civil war.

For weeks, Facebook’s algorithm had actively promoted posts calling for the academic to be murdered, according to Meareg and Foxglove, a nonprofit organisation supporting Meareg’s lawsuit against the company in Kenya. These posts included photos of his father and his home address.

Desperate relatives trying to reach loved ones last seen in area where entire villages have been swept away

• Nepal-Tibet flash flood – latest updates

• Visual guide: how the deadly flooding unfolded

• Tell us: have you been affected by the flash floods?

Families are rushing to Nepal to search for the 33 British nationals who are still missing, as fears mount over the risk of a second wave of flooding in the region.

The catastrophic flash floods that hit Nepal and Tibet on Wednesday, thundering down valleys and sweeping away entire villages, have killed at least 538 people, while more than 1,500 remain missing.

Prosecutors allege men were deliberately targeting Jewish community when four vehicles were set ablaze in March

Four men have pleaded guilty to destroying four Jewish community ambulances in an arson attack causing about £1m of damage.

Hamza ⁠Iqbal, 20, Rehan Khan, 19, and Judex Atshatshi and Saif Ali, both 18, admitted to a charge of destroying or damaging property being reckless whether life would be endangered.

Exclusive: PM also warns his ministers against trying to influence vote when bill returns to Commons next month

Andy Burnham has told Labour MPs that he will not cast a vote when the assisted dying bill returns to the Commons next month to avoid influencing the debate.

While the move was welcomed by supporters of the measure, No 10 officials said the prime minister had no wish to affect the process in either direction, and was just doing what he thought was best to allow MPs to reach their own collective view.

Christian Drogan’s Invading Britain shows former builder turned journalist trying to travel from France to England in small boat

Rupert Murdoch’s online channel TalkTV is facing criticism after it did not disclose that a journalist who travelled to Britain in a small boat for a documentary was a Reform party member and activist.

The channel revealed the “world exclusive” this week, stating that the treacherous journey had made the former builder turned journalist Christian Drogan the first British man “to invade his own country”.