The Guardian·2026-02-10
BBC World Service faces funding cliff edge in seven weeks, says Tim DavieThe BBC World Service will run out of funding in just seven weeks with no future deal with the government currently in place, the corporation’s director general, Tim Davie, has warned. In a last-minute pitch to the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), Davie said the uncertainty came as news organisations were cutting their international reporting and disinformation was “flooding the digital sphere at an incredible speed”. Davie has made securing a new deal for the World Service one of his final priorities before he leaves his role in April. He and other BBC leaders have been warning of the dangers of cutting back the service, with data suggesting trust in state broadcasters from Russia and China growing around the world. Speaking at an event on global media security, Davie
The Guardian·2026-02-10
‘PM comes out fighting’: what the UK papers say as Starmer battles onTuesday’s papers in the UK are dominated by Keir Starmer surviving a call for his resignation from a high-profile party figure, though his fate remains far from certain. The Scottish Labour leader, Anas Sarwar, on Monday urged the prime minister to step down amid the fallout from the Peter Mandelson scandal, which has already led to the departure of Starmer’s chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney. The Guardian’s front page led with “‘I’m not prepared to walk away,’ embattled Starmer tells MPs”, adding the prime minister had emerged “badly damaged” from a tumultuous 24 hours that “brought his premiership to the brink”. “Streeting accused of No10 coup” was the Telegraph lead story, referring to potential leadership rival Wes Streeting, reporting Starmer had clung on but that his prime ministershi
The Guardian·2026-02-10
Children in England ‘bombarded’ with online ads for harmful productsChildren are being “bombarded” with harmful products online, including weight-loss drugs, steroids and skin-whitening chemicals, a study has found. Research conducted for the children’s commissioner for England found that teenagers were routinely exposed to harmful products on social media, video games and apps. Among 13 to 17-year-olds, 41% said they had seen prescription-only weight-loss drugs, 27% had seen potentially toxic skin-whitening creams and 24% had seen steroids and other drugs claiming to build muscle mass. Young people reported seeing these harmful products in lifestyle influencer content on social media, in advertising from small-scale content creators and in gaming, despite many of these being banned for under-18s. The report comes as the government consults on a potential
The Guardian·2026-02-10
Paul Dacre says claims Mail broke law to target Doreen Lawrence ‘bitterly wounding’Paul Dacre, the longtime editor of the Daily Mail, has said it was “bitterly wounding” to face allegations that his journalists used criminal tactics to target the mother of a murdered teenager whose case he had championed. Giving evidence in the high court, Dacre, who edited the paper from 1992 to 2018, said the “grave and sometimes preposterous” claims from Doreen Lawrence and six other claimants had “astonished, appalled and – in the small hours of the night – reduced me to rage”. However, he said that given the 15-year campaign the paper had waged to bring the killers of Lawrence’s son Stephen to justice, he found her claims “especially bewildering and bitterly wounding to me personally”. Associated Newspapers Ltd (ANL), which publishes the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday, denies all
The Guardian·2026-02-10
Lenore Taylor resigns as Guardian Australia editor after 10 years of leadershipGuardian Australia’s editor, Lenore Taylor, has resigned after 10 years in the role. Taylor is credited with taking the fledgling news organisation from a tiny startup to the fourth most-read news website in the country. She joined the global media organisation Guardian News and Media in 2013 as founding political editor of the new Australian venture, rising to editor in 2016. A former Sydney Morning Herald political journalist, Taylor was hired by the then Guardian Australia editor, Katharine Viner, along with her press gallery colleague Katharine Murphy from the Age as deputy political editor. Viner, the Guardian’s global editor-in-chief, credited Taylor with making the Australian arm of the organisation “a force to be reckoned, sometimes through sheer strength of will”. Sign up: AU Brea
