Michael Christian, who made royal family-impersonating prank call with co-host to London hospital, alleges he was ‘fall guy’ for his employer’s risky behaviour

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A “shock jock” who made a prank call to a UK hospital caring for the Princess of Wales claims he was not supported by his employer in the fall-out of a nurse’s death by suicide.

Michael Christian and Mel Greig were presenting on 2Day FM on 4 December 2012 when they made the phone call to the King Edward VII hospital in London.

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An deep dive into the surprising uses and linguistic shortfalls of the ubiquitous symbols

In 2016, Apple announced that its gun emoji, previously a realistic grey-and-black revolver, would henceforth be a green water pistol. Gradually the other big tech companies followed suit, and now what is technically defined as the “pistol” emoji, supposed to represent a “handgun or revolver”, does not show either: instead you’ll get a water pistol or sci-fi raygun and be happy with it. No doubt this change contributed significantly to a suppression of gun crime around the world, and it remains only to ban the bomb, knife and sword emoji to wipe out violence altogether.

As Keith Houston’s fascinatingly geeky and witty history shows, emoji have always been political. Over the years, people have successfully lobbied the Unicode Consortium – the cabal of corporations that controls the character set, including Google, Microsoft, Meta and Apple – to include different skin colours and same-sex couples. It was easy to agree to add the face with one eyebrow raised, the guide dog and the egg. But not every request is granted. One demand for a “frowning poo emoji” elicited this splendid rant from an eminent Unicode contributor, Michael Everson: “Will we have a crying pile of poo next? Pile of poo with tongue sticking out? Pile of poo with question marks for eyes? Pile of poo with karaoke mic? Will we have to encode a neutral faceless pile of poo?”

Our research shows people are strongly in favour of measures to tackle the climate crisis. They just need to be listened to

• Rebecca Willis is professor of energy and climate governance at Lancaster University

There’s not much that unites our fractured House of Commons at the moment. But on one issue, politicians from all parties seem to agree: the great British public don’t really want ambitious action to meet net zero goals. They may concur on this – but they are wrong.

On the right of the spectrum, opposition politicians have been sounding a rapid retreat from the net zero target. In doing so, they are breaking with a strong Conservative tradition – it was Theresa May who signed the target into law in 2019, with cross-party support. Council elections this spring saw victories for Reform UK, which opposes most net zero policies outright, and argues for an economy based on fossil fuels. Meanwhile, the Labour government has net zero as one of its five missions, yet it, too, seems reluctant to make a positive case for action to tackle the climate crisis. It worries there won’t be enough support for policies such as replacing gas boilers or managing demand for flying, and it has been further cowed by unhelpful voices off from the former prime minister Tony Blair.

Rebecca Willis is professor of energy and climate governance at Lancaster University

Sammy Baloji’s experimental documentary juxtaposes observations from both sides of the divide in its exploration of European exploitation of the country’s natural resources

In his first solo directorial feature, photographer and visual artist Sammy Baloji excavates the colonial legacies in the Congo basin, the second largest tropical forest in the world. Building on a decades-spanning archive from the Yangambi National Institute of Agronomic Studies and Research, the film is loosely divided into three sections, each guided by a different voice that speaks to the complicated environmental history of the area. The first segment is informed by the journal entries of Congolese agronomist Paul Panda Farnana. Working both within and outside Belgium’s colonial control during the 1910s and 1920s, Farnana wrote of his frustration with the extractive regime, as well as meteorological statistics related to rainfall and temperature, which are narrated in voiceover. This is combined with largely static shots of present-day Congo, where vestiges of colonial buildings lie next to verdant fields, a haunting reminder from a dark past.

This cinematic link through time continues with the second narration, taken from the writing of Belgian colonial official Abiron Beirnaert. A stark contrast to Farnana’s clear-eyed, political perspective, Beirnaert’s contemplations luxuriate in boredom and jadedness. The images that accompany this section are also of sparsely attended archives and abandoned factories that do little to subvert Beirnaert’s imperialist outlook. The third voice, however, grants sentience to the ancient tree of the title, bearing witness to decades of Congolese history.

Young people living by the sea are often in some of the most deprived areas of the country, but they say they want the chance to thrive. The Guardian is embarking on a year-long series to tell their stories

• Young people in the UK: share your experiences of living in a coastal town

On the beach in Weston-super-Mare, on the south-west coast of England, there is a hint of a chilly breeze in the air but the sun is out and the clouds are faint, whispy streaks across a pleasantly blue canvas. A couple of fishing boats are tethered to the harbour wall and a lone man with a metal detector wanders slowly along the sand. A small shop selling ice-creams has a few takers, despite the nip in the air.

Yet behind its low-key but welcoming seafront lies the evidence of a cloudier, more complex reality.

Critics question pay rise for Thames Tideway project boss, which is drawn from mandatory add-ons to water bills

The chief executive of the London “super sewer” project has been awarded a £600,000 pay rise even as the firm revealed that the total cost had risen by £100m.

Andy Mitchell received pay of £2.5m for the year to March 2025, up from £1.9m the year before, according to accounts published by the Thames Tideway tunnel builder, Bazalgette Tunnel Limited.