Profits at the UK housebuilder Vistry Group have slumped by more than a third in what it described as a “disappointing year” but it is pinning hopes of a turnaround on the government’s promise this week to inject £2bn into affordable homes. After three profit warnings last year, Vistry suspended dividend payouts to shareholders on…
Britain’s main measure of wage growth may need to be revised after a large employer failed to supply earnings data on time, the country’s troubled statistics agency has warned. In the latest sign of its problems with collecting reliable economic figures that the government uses in economic policymaking, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) issued…
A former Liberal MP shaved 10 years off his age when he used a gay hook-up app to meet a 13-year-old boy who he then sexually abused, prosecutors have alleged. Roderick “Rory” Amon, 35, is accused of sexually assaulting the 13-year-old boy he knew on Sydney’s northern beaches in 2017. He was a 27-year-old local…
Non-monogamous people are just as happy in their love lives as those with only one partner but are not “significantly” more sexually satisfied than traditional couples, research suggests. Polyamory, open relationships and swinging are among the many forms of consensual non-monogamy. Polyamory has become increasingly mainstream, with a recent poll showing that one in 25…
Australia’s inflation rate has eased again, in data that will buoy Labor heading into an election and raise hopes for mortgage holders another interest rate cut is not far off. The headline inflation rate was 2.4% in the 12 months to February, a slight decrease on the previous month’s figure, according to consumer price index…
The prime minister is using phrases I don’t understand in parliament. On Wednesday, he said the Coalition were “delulu with no solulu”. What is going on? Catie, I am rapidly aging out of being cool and don’t understand the inner workings of the teenage mind. But I do know young people love TikTok, and politicians…
Heavy rainfall has closed nearly 200 roads and cut off multiple towns in Queensland as already saturated rivers risk more flooding. The Bureau of Meteorology issued a severe weather warning for heavy rainfall across normally dry inland areas of central west Queensland, including parts of the Northern Goldfields and Upper Flinders, North West, Channel Country,…
At least 18 people have died and another 19 injured as wildfires ravaged South Korea’s southern regions amid dry weather and strong winds, according to government officials. Han Duck-soo, South Korea’s prime minister and acting president, said five days of fires had caused “unprecedented damage” and asked agencies tackling the disaster to “assume the worst-case…
Israel’s attacks on Gaza are “unjustifiable” and “intolerable”, Wes Streeting has said, as the health secretary expressed discomfort at images of bombs shattering the region that has been under threat by the Israelis “for many years”. Streeting said he found Israel’s decision to break the Gaza ceasefire “soul-destroying”, and insisted the attacks do not “serve…
An Australian company will attempt to be the first to grow a crop of mushrooms in space, aboard SpaceX’s Fram2 mission set to launch in early April. In an experiment aboard Fram2, the first human spaceflight mission to orbit Earth’s polar regions, the Australian firm FOODiQ Global is aiming to grow oyster mushrooms in microgravity….
