Past traumas processed through investigative journalism and drama; a truly moving and surprising documentary; laugh-out-loud indie comedy; and Lauren Laverne’s return

Lucky Boy (Tortoise Media)
Moorgate (Radio 4/BBC Sounds)
Thirty Eulogies (Radio 4/BBC Sounds)
Harford: An Oral History (Dan Hooper)
Lauren Laverne (Radio 6 Music/BBC Sounds)

“In that summer, it was me and her against the world. We were powerful, right?” On Tortoise Media’s new four-part podcast, Lucky Boy, Gareth (not his real name) is remembering his first love. He was 14 then, bright but a “misfit”, having a secret relationship. She was 27 and a teacher. Lucky Boy is how Gareth thought of himself at the time; nearly 40 years later, he thinks the opposite.

Trump and Vance, I think, never really intended to have a conversation with Zelenskky. Instead, they wanted to look tough on TV

The last time Donald Trump did this, it was in secret, and he got impeached over it. In 2019, Donald Trump, on a phone call with Volodymyr Zelenskyy, demanded that the Ukrainian president produce – or fabricate – evidence of wrongdoing by Hunter Biden, the son of Trump’s eventual opponent in the 2020 election, in exchange for continued US military aide.

At the time, Russia had already seized control of the Ukrainian region of Crimea, and was funding violent insurgent groups in the country’s east; it was increasingly clear that a full-scale Russian invasion was coming, as it finally did in 2022. Since the end of second world war, it has been America that checks Russian expansionist ambitions in Europe – America that provided the backstop to the Nato alliance, America that secured the independence of eastern Europe. Trump wanted to condition that longstanding role on Zelenskyy doing him a personal political favor. The international order could be ended, he suggested, if those who depended on him didn’t do enough to indulge his vanity, self-interest and impulsive whims.

Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist

• Ifab announces law change for next season
• ‘It could be one of those very effective deterrents’

Goalkeepers who waste time by holding on to the ball are to be penalised with the award of a corner, the law-making International Football Association Board (Ifab) has confirmed.

The new law, which will be introduced this summer, will mean goalkeepers have eight seconds to claim and redistribute the ball before they are penalised, with the referee giving a five-second countdown to warn them of incoming punishment. This will replace the current system whereby a keeper has six seconds to move the ball on and is punished with an indirect free-kick if they do not.

Although better known for his sprawling Romantic novels The Hunchback of Notre-Dame and Les Misérables, celebrated French author Victor Hugo spent much of his time drawing. A collection of about 70 of his sketches will soon be on display at the Royal Academy in London, in an exhibition bringing together caricatures, travel drawings and landscapes. Several of the drawings feature castles and ruins. “Hugo was inspired by ‘burgs’ – castles, fortresses or walled towns – that he saw when travelling along the Rhine, but he often drew fantastical castles that fuse memory and imagination,” says the exhibition’s curator Sarah Lea. “Hugo’s castle drawings range in tone from sinister and sublime to highly romantic and exquisitely detailed.”

• Astonishing Things: The Drawings of Victor Hugo is at the Royal Academy of Arts, London W1, 21 March to 29 June

‘Affordable housing’ home owners complain of paying high charges for facilities mainly used by better-off residents

• Residents trapped with service charges of up to £8,000 a year

Marco Scalvini was thrilled to move into a shared ownership flat on a stylish development in south London. “I felt like I had won the lottery. The apartment was beautiful. It was central and near to the university [where I work]. The price was affordable … compared with the private market,” he says.

Scalvini, a lecturer, met the criteria for affordable housing: he was a first-time buyer and had been priced out of the capital’s housing market. But in the past year, his dream has turned into a nightmare. Peabody – the housing association managing the affordable flats in the development – has increased his service charge by 77%: he has gone from paying about £4,500 in 2023/24 to about £8,000 in 2024/25.

Owners of homes marketed by housing associations as ‘affordable’ are planning a challenge as service costs spiral

• ‘There is no way I can pay’: residents despair of steep costs and ‘poor door’

Residents trapped in properties marketed as “affordable” are planning legal action against the government after being hit with service charges of up to £8,000 a year.

Shared-ownership homes are designed to allow people to get on the property ladder, with residents taking a mortgage on a share and paying subsidised rent on the rest. However, there are also service charges, which can initially be £250 to £350 a month. Once sold, some residents discover these charges can rise to £600 a month or more.