Row breaks out in Marnhull, inspiration for novelist’s fictional Marlott, over plans to build 120 homes

Thomas Hardy described his fictional village of Marlott as being in an “engirdled and secluded region, for the most part untrodden as yet by tourist or landscape-painter, though within a four hours’ journey from London”.

But the Victorian realist would now barely recognise Marnhull, the real-life village in Dorset upon which Marlott was based, and would likely be surprised to know his name is repeatedly invoked in official submissions arguing against its ongoing expansion.

Despite the food and scenery, on a visit home this year I was struck by the many drawbacks, from housing to transport

Whenever a Brit learns that I’m a New Zealander – grew up there, got the passport, only moved to the UK in 2017 – often their faces scrunch up with confusion: “Why would you live here when you could be living there ?”

It doesn’t seem to matter if they’ve been to New Zealand themselves or not. The implication is that I have known the Garden of Eden, even been granted a key, and responded by saying: “Actually, you know what? I’ll take Norwich instead.”

Elle Hunt is a freelance journalist

When Callum McGregor lifts the Premiership trophy on Saturday, it will be four decades since a team other than Celtic or Rangers won the top flight

This Scottish football season involved a debate surrounding the possibility of reconstruction. Would 10, 14 or 16 be the ideal number of Premiership sides, as opposed to the present dozen? There was, however, a tartan elephant in the room. Scotland has been operating a one, one-and-a-half or two-team league for far longer than is healthy. There is no indication that can change. Distress signals should have been raised long ago.

Celtic’s match against St Mirren on Saturday will precede receipt of the Premiership trophy. For Celtic, this is a 12th title in 13 seasons . The likely defeat of Aberdeen in the Scottish Cup final on Saturday week will secure a sixth domestic treble since 2016. Cliche suggests Celtic and Rangers joust for honours, and occasionally they do. This, however, is an unprecedented spell of Celtic dominance.

El Salvador’s Bukele has scored an Oval Office Trump meeting, nuclear deal and US prison support

US government records reveal Latin American leaders have spent millions hiring Washington’s top lobbyists to push for a laundry list of requests – from free-trade deals, security assistance and energy investments – heard by the Trump administration , according to an analysis by the Guardian and The Quincy Institute .

Since the lead-up to Donald Trump’s election as president in November 2024, Department of Justice records show that at least 10 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean have registered their top officials and envoys as foreign principals under the Foreign Agent Registration Act (Fara). Fara aims to promote transparency by requiring those working as foreign agents to disclose their activities and compensation.

Leroy Stelly Jr shot Richie Smith dead in 2023 but was never charged. Now Smith’s mother and father have unearthed Stelly’s brutal past and are asking police for justice

Over a roughly 14-year period beginning in 2009, Leroy Stelly Jr faced accusations of pepper-spraying two women whom he encountered on a sidewalk and insulted as “bitches”, slapping his future wife at a bar, and threatening to shoot a construction worker while pretending to be a cop.

He also called emergency operators and declared that he was “going to put a fucking .45”-caliber bullet in the head of someone who had banged on his door. He allegedly punched a guest he had over on Christmas Eve. He reportedly challenged people at a healthcare clinic with which he shares a fence “to meet [him] out on the street”.

Researchers call for investment in ‘circular solutions’ as consumption rises faster than growth in population

Global recycling rates are failing to keep pace with a culture focused on infinite economic growth and consumerism, with the proportion of recycled materials re-entering supply chains falling for the eighth year running, according to a new report.

Only 6.9% of the 106bn tonnes of materials used annually by the global economy came from recycled sources, a 2.2 percentage point drop since 2015, researchers from the Circle Economy thinktank found.

Collapse of their league title defence and an early European exit mean Manchester City’s season rests on beating Palace

The measure of Manchester City’s class is that they have a chance of claiming the FA Cup in Saturday’s Wembley showpiece despite a troubled campaign featuring serial injury , an insipid title defence, Champions League playoff stage elimination by Real Madrid and the mid-season departure of the captain, Kyle Walker, on loan.

Oliver Glasner’s in-form Crystal Palace , who have lost two of their past 14 games, are in their way but Pep Guardiola’s garlanded team are favourites, the wounded deposed champions intent on not ending empty-handed for the first time since the Catalan’s opening 2016-17 term.

Intense Israeli airstrikes continue to hit Gaza as US president completes final day of Gulf tour in Abu Dhabi

• Middle East crisis – live updates

Donald Trump has said people are starving in Gaza and the US would have the situation in the territory “taken care of”. Gaza has suffered a further wave of intense Israeli airstrikes overnight.

On the final day of his Gulf tour in Abu Dhabi, the US president told reporters: “We’re looking at Gaza. And we’re going to get that taken care of. A lot of people are starving.”

Struggling label produces upbeat parade of greatest hits on home turf while Demna completes stint at Balenciaga

If rebirth is what you want then Florence, home of the renaissance, is a good place to start.

Gucci, which has just switched designers after a period of plunging sales – 24% down in the last quarter of 2024, and 25% down in the first of 2025 – showed its latest collection in a catwalk pageant that began in the 15th-century Palazzo Settimanni, where the actors Paul Mescal, Viola Davis and Jeff Goldblum, a Florentine resident, had front row seats, and continued on the city street outside to where Gucci employees and local fashion fans, seated in bars and cafes, watched an alfresco lap of the show. If you hit the factory reset button in Florence, and make it glamorous, can you call it a renaissance button?