Ivor Manley

1 week ago | theguardian.com | Helen Pidd |Zoe Williams |Ivor Manley |Sami Kent

On Friday it was announced that David Beckham was to receive his knighthood – the fruits of a campaign for the honour that started more than a decade ago. So why now? And what does it say about the UK’s honours system – and its class system – that it took so long?

1 week ago | theguardian.com | Helen Pidd |Zoe Williams |Ivor Manley |Sami Kent

“England trail by two goals to one. Beckham could raise the roof here with a goal,” goes the commentary, as David Beckham lines up a free-kick against Greece, shortly before whipping it into the top corner. “I don’t believe it! David Beckham scores the goal to take England all the way to the World Cup finals! Give that man a knighthood!”The year was 2001, and the ultimate honour seemed close for England’s biggest football player – and perhaps the most famous living Briton, full stop.

2 weeks ago | theguardian.com | Helen Pidd |Heather Stewart |Lucy Hough |Ivor Manley |Joel Cox |Sami Kent

The last few weeks have proved difficult for Rachel Reeves. In public, the news has been dominated by Labour’s U-turn on the winter fuel allowance. In private, the Treasury has been caught up in wrangle after wrangle with ministers, all negotiating what their departments would receive in the spending review. Reeves’ speech to parliament on Wednesday announcing the review was a chance to tell a more positive story – particularly for a government accused of lacking direction and ambition.

2 weeks ago | theguardian.com | Michael Safi |Patrick Wintour |Natalie Ktena |Ivor Manley |Joel Cox |Courtney Yusuf

Laila Soueif, 69, has been on hunger strike in London for more than 250 days in an effort to secure the release of her son, the activist Alaa Abd el-Fattah, from jail in Egypt. As diplomatic pressure mounts, she is now in a critical condition. Alaa’s sister Mona Seif describes to Michael Safi the toll that imprisonment has taken on her brother, her mother’s determination to do whatever she can to secure his release, and the difficulty of coming to terms with her mother’s decision to risk her life.

3 weeks ago | theguardian.com | Michael Safi |Hattie Moir |Ivor Manley |Sami Kent

In 2019, before most of the world had heard of the company, the technology journalist Karen Hao spent three days embedded in the offices of OpenAI. What she saw, she tells Michael Safi, was a company vastly at odds with its public image: that of a transparent non-profit developing artificial intelligence technology purely for the benefit of humanity. ‘They said that they were transparent. They said that they were collaborative. They were actually very secretive,’ she says.