In Paris, a group of those returned from UK as part of the immigration scheme say they feel frightened and hopeless

Afran, an Iranian asylum seeker, sits forlornly across the road from a Paris shelter, hemmed in between vast slabs of concrete and thundering trains above. He has been here before – seven weeks ago, to be precise. The second time, he says, is as terrifying as his first.

Afran – not his real name – hit the headlines when he became the first asylum seeker to return to the UK in a small boat after being removed to France under the controversial “one in, one out” scheme on 19 September. He was sent back to Paris for the second time on 5 November.

From Brienne of Tarth in Game of Thrones to the Hot Priest in Fleabag and of course Dr Frasier Crane, we salute the game-changers who boosted later seasons of our favourite series

Welcome. Nice of you to finally join us. Hope it was worth the wait. Yes, sometimes a late addition can improve a drama or comedy so much it becomes hard to imagine the show without them. Not every series gets the casting chemistry spot-on straight away. A select few of our favourite TV characters weren’t even on the show when it launched.

We’ve selected 18 characters whose gamechanging arrival in later seasons lifted the whole show and added to its legacy. Behold the super-subs who came off the TV bench and scored a winner …

Whether it’s a jacket to stay cosy in the cold or a clever multitool, our expert-selected gear means there’s something for everyone who loves life on their bike

• The best gifts for runners

As the proud daughter of the president of St Austell Wheelers cycle club in Cornwall, I know better than to wing it when it comes to giving gifts to a bike rider. That’s why we’ve asked so many people, from coaches to athletes, club riders to young cyclists, what they would like to receive.

Speaking of Dad, this year he has moved from his road bike to the world of gravel riding (check out Fairlight Cycles) and is loving it. He treated himself to a Cornish downpour-proof jacket and a set of panniers for a cycling trip to France – and highly recommends them (see below for details). Less so the bike bell someone told him “everyone” uses in France, only to get there and find not a single cyclist he saw had one.

His company is potentially creating the ultimate state surveillance tool, and Karp has recently been on a striking political and philosophical journey. His biographer reveals what makes him tick

In a recent interview, Alex Karp said that his company Palantir was “the most important software company in America and therefore in the world”. He may well be right. To some, Palantir is also the scariest company in the world, what with its involvement in the Trump administration’s authoritarian agenda. The potential end point of Palantir’s tech is an all-powerful government system amalgamating citizens’ tax records, biometric data and other personal information – the ultimate state surveillance tool. No wonder Palantir has been likened to George Orwell’s Big Brother, or Skynet from the Terminator movies.

Does this make Karp the scariest CEO in the world? There is some competition from Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and Palantir’s co-founder Peter Thiel. But 58-year-old Karp could give them all a run for their money in terms of influence, self-belief, ambition and – even in this gallery of oddballs – sheer eccentricity. In his increasingly frequent media appearances, Karp is a striking presence, with his cloud of unkempt grey hair, his 1.25x speed diction, and his mix of combative conviction and almost childish mannerisms. On CNBC’s Squawk Box, he shook both fists simultaneously as he railed against short sellers betting against Palantir, whose share price has climbed nearly 600% in the past year: “It’s super triggering,” he complained. “Why do they have to go after us?”

As GenAI becomes the primary way to find information, local and traditional wisdom is being lost. And we are only beginning to realise what we’re missing

• This article was originally published as ‘Holes in the web’ on Aeon.co

A few years back, my dad was diagnosed with a tumour on his tongue – which meant we had some choices to weigh up. My family has an interesting dynamic when it comes to medical decisions. While my older sister is a trained doctor in western allopathic medicine, my parents are big believers in traditional remedies. Having grown up in a small town in India, I am accustomed to rituals. My dad had a ritual, too. Every time we visited his home village in southern Tamil Nadu, he’d get a bottle of thick, pungent, herb-infused oil from a vaithiyar, a traditional doctor practising Siddha medicine. It was his way of maintaining his connection with the kind of medicine he had always known and trusted.

Dad’s tumour showed signs of being malignant, so the hospital doctors and my sister strongly recommended surgery. My parents were against the idea, worried it could affect my dad’s speech. This is usually where I come in, as the expert mediator in the family. Like any good millennial, I turned to the internet for help in guiding the decision. After days of thorough research, I (as usual) sided with my sister and pushed for surgery. The internet backed us up.

They can be garish and ostentatious, or a sign you are softer than you might first appear. From the catwalk to the high street to the big screen to the rugby pitch, you just can’t miss them right now

Wuthering Heights is a story about pain, revenge and the Yorkshire moors as a metaphor for bad life choices. But if Emerald Fennell’s forthcoming adaptation is anything to go by, it’s also about bows.

In the two-minute trailer for the film, Cathy wears red bows and black bows, navy bows and pink bows. There are bows around garden pots, and bows around “baddy” Edgar Linton’s throat. Some bows flutter in the fell wind, others are unlaced at speed. In one memorable shot straight from the Jilly Cooper precoital playbook, a pretty white bow is cut from Cathy’s bodice using a labourer’s knife, which would be unforgivable hamminess were it not incredibly hot. Never mind that Emily Brontë rarely mentions bows in the book; that one is an entire plot device.

Dan Jarvis, the security minister, says China is trying to contact MPs and peers to get sensitive information about parliament

Back at the Reform UK press conference, Zia Yusuf, the party’s head of policy, has just finished outlining his plan to cut spending on foreigners

As he finished, Yusuf claimed this was “treachery”.

Labour is making the conscious and deliberate decision to continue funding extortionate amounts to foreign nationals, to the detriment of British citizens.

And I don’t know what to call that. Frankly, in my view, it’s treachery. I think it’s appalling. British people are sick and tired of it.

Just a few months ago, Rachel Reeves was saying she couldn’t afford to scrap the two-child benefit cap. Now it looks like becoming her latest U-turn.

This isn’t because the economic circumstances have improved. Quite the opposite.

Exclusive: Experts urge water companies to update plants to avoid another catastrophe, as analysis reveals scale of use

At least 15 sewage plants on England’s south coast use the same contaminated plastic beads that were spilled in an environmental disaster in Camber Sands, Guardian analysis can reveal.

Environmental experts have urged water companies to update these old treatment plants to avoid another catastrophic spill, which can lead to plastic beads being permanently embedded in the environment and killing marine wildlife.

Journalist rebuts accusation of obtaining sexual images by deceit in documents submitted to high court

The journalist Dan Wootton has denied he catfished a man who claims to be a former colleague in documents submitted to the high court, it has been reported.

It is alleged that Wootton exchanged sexual messages in 2010 with the claimant – who cannot be identified for legal reasons – while pretending to be “Maria Joseph” and encouraging him to send explicit photographs and a video.

US company that defends millions of websites against malicious attacks suffers unidentified problem

• Cloudflare outage – live updates

A key piece of the internet’s usually hidden infrastructure suffered a global outage on Tuesday, causing error messages to flash up across websites.

Cloudflare, a US company whose services include defending millions of websites against malicious attacks, experienced an unidentified problem, which meant internet users could not access some of its customers’ websites.