Breaking Waves: Ocean News

Reporting from some of the poorest seaside towns revealed how young people have been left isolated – but remain resilient and full of hope If you were asked to summon up images of the coastline of England and Wales, you might think of sunny days, buckets, spades and carefree holidays. But for many young people growing up by the sea, decades of evidence tell a very different story. For them, rather than a picture-perfect horizon full of hope, the sea has become a boundary that swallows up opportunity. With a 73% decline in funding for youth services in England over the past 12 years, and a lack of opportunities that has led to nearly 1 million 16- to 24-year-oldsnot in work, education or training (Neet), the situation for young people, especially in places of deprivation, has never seemed more desperate. Continue reading...

Digital billboards from environmental groups, targeting Labor MPs attending national conference, cancelled with airport stating they are ‘too political’ Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast Conservation groups have questioned why their advertisements targeting Labor politicians were pulled by Adelaide airport for breaking rules on political advertising while others promoting gas and mining kept running. Labor politicians including the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, have been arriving through the airport for this week’s ALP national conference from Thursday to Saturday. Continue reading...

‘Ratepayer Protection Pledge’ president has touted is non-binding as people continue to struggle with rising bills Donald Trump has announced that about 200 entities have signed on to his non-binding “Ratepayer Protection Pledge”, expanding a voluntary commitment which claims to ensure US consumers will not bear the cost of the AI datacenter build-out. Trump delivered remarks on Thursday at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) headquarters, alongside Lee Zeldin, the agency’s administrator, and Chris Wright, the energy secretary. Other attenders included governors who signed on to the pledge, including Brian Kemp of Georgia, Mike DeWine of Ohio, Spencer Cox of Utah and Jeff Landry of Louisiana. Continue reading...

Sadiq Khan’s heat-ready plan for London is a sensible strategy for adaptation that should provide a roadmap for other cities “Our ability to trust that our homes will keep us safe from the outside is under threat,” the geographer Sam Johnson-Schlee writes in Hot House, his recent book on how heat has transformed domestic life. This summer, high temperatures have become inescapable. People have coped with makeshift solutions: keeping curtains drawn, placing foil over windows or – for those who can afford one – plugging in an air-conditioning unit. Planning experts warn that, with only about half of councils requiring new buildings to include cooling strategies, many homes will become “death traps” as temperatures rise. Britain’s homes weren’t built to cope with this. The country’s historically mild climate allowed developers to build houses without insulation, while industrialisation supplied plentiful coal to burn when temperatures dropped. Many homes are consequently drafty in winter and sweltering in summer. Unlike those in Mediterranean climates, British homes lack shutters and shaded communal spaces. While Ildefons Cerdà, Barcelona’s masterplanner, was designing housing blocks with cool courtyards and chamfered edges to allow breezes to flow, Britain’s Victorian builders were throwing up rows of terrace houses – many without cross-ventilation – and giving little thought to the movement of the sun. Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...