Sky has acknowledged that some of its customers are experiencing slow internet speeds as a consequence of it signing up new subscribers.

Article: "I'd so much rather talk about this than about politics."
This, from a thinker most famous as a fearless firebrand, sounds rather incongruous. But as Prof Dawkins hunches over his laptop to dig up examples of biomorphs - the computer-generated "creatures" he conceived in the 1980s to illustrate artificial selection - it is transparently, genuinely felt.
Later, we touch on the fact that he sees public debate as a scientist's responsibility. Right now, he wants to talk about molluscs.
Pretend molluscs.
"I don't know whether you know the classic book by D'Arcy Thompson, On Growth and Form? He showed that all mollusc shells are a tube, which is enlarging as it coils around. You only need three numbers to specify a mollusc shell."
Those three numbers can be plotted inside a cube, Prof Dawkins explains. "Evolution is then just a walk through this cube of all possible shells."
In a computerised game he wrote in 1996, people could construct their own such walk by choosing for themselves which offspring would "breed" in successive generations of shells.
This game has now been resurrected online to mark the 20th anniversary of the book it arose from, Climbing Mount Improbable.
Its mollusc shells are presented alongside an ancestral explanatory exercise: the biomorphs. These were first programmed 10 years earlier, when Dawkins wrote The Blind Watchmaker. He clearly remembers getting lost in the work.
"When I discovered that I could actually start getting something that looked like an insect, I got really obsessed with the idea of breeding insects."
As the biomorphs grow from simple, branching stick-shrubs into more elaborate and occasionally familiar shapes, they make an important point - and one that is better grasped by being involved than by hearing it explained.
"You get much more of an idea of what it's like to breed dogs from wolves, or to breed cauliflower from wild cabbage," Prof Dawkins says, clearly enjoying the sight of the spindly shapes evolving again on his screen.
Like Darwin long before him, Dawkins...

Summary: As The Selfish Gene notches up 40 years in print, BBC News asked Richard Dawkins whether his most famous book is relevant today (answer: yes), whether he has any regrets about public spats over religion (no), and whether he is quitting Twitter (sort of).
###
Article: Cancer charities argued the drug adds an average of six months to the lives of some women whose breast cancer has become inoperable.
Women in England, Wales and Ireland have already been refused access to the drug on cost grounds.
The Scottish Medicines Consortium also had concerns about cost effectiveness.
The SMC said it had to consider value for money and take account of the needs of all patients who need treatment, not just those affected by this medicine.
Earlier this year the SMC was reformed to give patients and clinicians a greater say on which new medicines are approved.
The drug approval body for England and Wales, NICE, ruled in August that Kadcyla was still too expensive to be approved for routine NHS use.
It led to claims by the manufacturer Roche that the system was "broken".
NICE generally approves treatments which cost no more than Â£30,000 per year of better-quality life.
In the case of Kadcyla, NICE said the quality-to-cost ratio had been calculated at Â£166,000.
The Irish equivalent of NICE and the SMC, the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics, has also ruled that Kadcyla is not cost-effective.
The only way women will be able to access it will be through a new Peer Approved Clinical System (PACS).
They will need the support of their consultant to argue that the drug offers them particular benefit over and above what has already been considered by the SMC.
Prof Jonathan Fox, chairman of the SMC, said the organisation was "disappointed" not to have been able to recommend Kadcyla, which is also known as trastuzumab emtansine.
He said it had "taken on board" the drug's effectiveness and applied as much "flexibility" as possible in its considerations. Ultimately, however, "the committee felt unable to accept it."
He said: "While the PACE process is a determining factor when we consider medicines like this, and was designed to increase access to such medicines, that access cannot come at any price - we have to consider value for money and take account of the needs of all patients who need...

Summary: The organisation which decides which medicines should be routinely available on the NHS in Scotland has decided not to approve breast cancer drug Kadcyla.
###
Article: A first independent craft beer festival in Cardiff is bringing together 25 brewers this weekend, while more are being showcased at another event in London in September.
Craft beer, real ale and beer made from bacon.
If you are not quite sure what it all means or where to start, we asked Buster Grant, chairman of Drinks Wales and managing director of Brecon Brewery, to provide some answers.
What is the difference between real ale and the average pint of beer?
Real ale is a beer that has fermented in the vessel from which it is served and the carbonation is entirely natural, not forced.
Most real ale is served from a cask via a hand pump in the pub. A well kept pint of real ale - and this is a skill - will have all of the flavours that the brewer intended, unlike other beers which lose something through filtration, carbonation or, worst of all, pasteurisation.
And now there is craft ale - what is that?
Ah, now there's a question! The Americans define a craft brewer as one that produces less than six million barrels of beer a year - that equates to some 1,700 million pints - more than produced in total in Wales each year!
'Craft keg' is a term used to describe the full-flavoured beers served under pressure from kegs rather than casks.
However, many brewers use the term 'craft' to describe a modern style of beer, be it in cask, keg or bottle. I leave it up to the individual to make the distinction for themselves - I prefer 'good beer'!
You seem to see it available in more pubs now, why is that?
Craft beer is becoming more and more widely available. Cardiff is becoming a Welsh hub for craft beer bars.
My view is that people are being more adventurous with what they're drinking and more discerning. They're also willing to pay more for an unusual beer and to seek out these beers.
I view it as a small but growing and important part of the beer market.
'I am usually a lager drinker - what tipple do you suggest I start with?'
I reckon I can usually find a beer from whatever range I'm working with that someone will...

Summary: The number of Welsh breweries could hit the 100 mark within two years, if the rate of growth continues.
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Article: The firm said that it was working to boost capacity at telephone exchanges in the worst hit areas.
The news coincided with the launch of Sky Go Extra - a service allowing users to download movies and TV shows so they can be watched offline.
One expert said the product might add to the strain.
Sky Go Extra still works at slow internet speeds - however, Sky's other streaming services rely on the user having a 2 megabit per second connection. Some subscribers have complained their download speeds have fallen below this level at peak times.
A Sky spokeswoman apologised for the problems.
"Following a combination of an underlying increase in network traffic as well as a high rate of new customer additions, we are aware of capacity issues in a small number of exchanges," she said.
"We are working on adding new capacity to those exchanges as quickly as we can. We apologise to all customers who have been impacted by this issue."
She confirmed a report by The Register that users in Doncaster, North Wales and Bristol were among those affected, but declined to be more specific or name other locations.
However, the firm has provided an online postcode checking facility for its subscribers to check if their local exchange has been flagged as having an issue.
Sky also indicated that less than 5% of its broadband customer base used the affected exchanges.
Andrew Ferguson, editor of the Thinkbroadband news site noted that Sky had recently run a major promotion highlighting the fact it did not place "fair use" caps on the amount of data its customers use.
As a result, he said, the firm had probably attracted subscribers who downloaded significantly more than the average 23 gigabytes per month consumed by the average UK broadband user.
"Sky had this problem last year in some of its exchanges, and it's definitely not the only service provider to have experienced this problem," he told the BBC.
"It's very much related to the firms' promotional activities. Sky has also been pushing its fibre products recently - they offer higher...

Summary:


The Colombian government and the Farc rebels have agreed to a ceasefire and disarmament.
The two sides have agreed to a ceasefire and disarmament.
The two sides have agreed to a ceasefire and disarmament.
The two sides have agreed to a ceasefire and disarmament.
The two sides have agreed to a

The Colombian government and the left-wing Farc rebel movement have both asked the UN for a mission to oversee the end of their decades-long conflict.

Article: But what might this mean for Qatar's economy and people doing business there?
With a population of about 2.7 million people, this tiny nation on the north-east coast of the Arabian Peninsula is trying to punch above its weight.
People know about it thanks in part to its national airline (Qatar Airways), its international news station (Al Jazeera) and through sport (notably winning the right to host the 2022 football World Cup and being a former sponsor of perhaps the world's most famous club, Barcelona).
And with a distinctive skyline in the capital Doha, it has succeeded in attracting multinationals to open offices there.
So these latest developments mean there's a lot at stake.
Abu Dhabi's Etihad Airways and Dubai's Emirates are suspending all flights to and from Doha, starting from Tuesday morning. Both carriers operate four daily return flights to Doha.
Budget carriers FlyDubai and Air Arabia are also cancelling routes to Doha, with other airlines, including Bahrain's Gulf Air and Egyptair expected to follow suit.
It comes after Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt all said they would stop flights in and out of Qatar, and close their airspace to the country's airline, Qatar Airways.
And it is Qatar's flag carrier that risks being the biggest loser. Its flights to places like Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Riyadh and Cairo will stop. That is dozens of flights a day.
Qatar Airways has already said it is cancelling its services to Saudi. It said: "All customers booked on affected flights to and from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will be provided with alternative options, including the option of a full refund on any unused tickets and free rebooking to the nearest alternative Qatar Airways network destination."
But being banned from large chunks of airspace in the region would also cause a major problem, forcing it to alter flight paths, inevitably adding time to some flights.
And as well as cranking up fuel bills, that could annoy passengers.
Qatar Airways' growth has come through positioning itself as a hub airline,...

Summary: Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Libya, Yemen and the Maldives have cut diplomatic ties with Qatar.
###
Article: Some 40 participants are registered for three days of public hearings in Whitehorse in Canada's Yukon territory.
The inquiry is focusing on the systemic causes of violence against indigenous women as well as on prevention.
A number of families have come out in recent weeks expressing concerns over the inquiry's delays and lack of transparency.
Chief commissioner Marion Buller said the inquiry is listening for both details from families about lost loved ones as well as any patterns or trends that emerge from all the stories.
On Tuesday, the inquiry heard the first of many harrowing and tearful testimonies from families who have lost relatives to violence.
Ms Buller said she hopes the families "gain some closure" by sharing their stories. The community hearings are open to the public unless relatives or other witnesses request privacy.
The federal government has said that some 1,200 aboriginal women have been murdered or gone missing in Canada since 1980, though some estimates put that number as high as 4,000.
Michèle Audette, another of the inquiry's five commissioners, said that "the eyes of the country and the world are watching. History will remember this moment".
Last week, Assembly of First Nations National Chief Perry Bellegarde raised issues with the lack of communication with families and First Nations in general by the inquiry.
Families, especially in remote communities, have complained it is difficult to get in contact with the inquiry.
Bill Wilson, a hereditary First Nations chief in British Columbia and the father of federal Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould, called the inquiry a "bloody farce" in a Facebook post and said it had "failed miserably" even before public hearings began.
Inquiry commissioners have said they are aware of the concerns and are working on improving communications and re-evaluating the inquiry's timelines.
"I'm interested always in constructive criticism, of ways of doing our work better," Ms Buller said.
The inquiry will last at least two years and cost up to $53.8m...

Summary: Canada's inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women is hearing from its first witnesses.
###
Article: The Golden Jubilee National Hospital in Clydebank is currently the only heart transplant unit in the UK which cannot also offer lung replacement surgery.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said ministers were investigating whether the proposal could go ahead.
The Golden Jubilee is celebrating 25 years since its first heart transplant.
A decision on lung transplants is expected be made next year.
Ms Sturgeon said: "There's a scoping exercise being undertaken right now that will report in the first half of next year and then decisions will be made on the strength of the evidence that is available.
"What the exercise is looking at is the feasibility of carrying out lung transplants here as well.
"I completely understand the desire of clinicians who feel they have the capability, and also of patients who would prefer their operations here in Scotland rather than having to go to Newcastle which has been the case traditionally, but we've got to make sure we take these decisions based on the best possible evidence."
Prof Nawwar Al-Attar, Director of Scottish National Advanced Heart Failure Service, said surgeons were keen, and ready to be able to take on the extra work.
He appealed for more donors to come forward to enable the transplant programme to expand.
"Glasgow is the only transplant centre in the UK that only offers heart transplantation," he said.
"We are very keen on offering lung transplants to patients with advanced respiratory and lung disease."
"We are very much looking forward to coming up with recommendations to support our request to have lung transplantations."
Since the programme began in 1991, 367 heart transplants have been carried out with the longest surviving patient receiving his heart 24 years ago.
Chief executive of the Golden Jubilee National Hospital, Jill Young, said: "Each year we hold an event dedicated to bringing together patients and families who have been treated by the service, letting them share their experiences and see that they are not alone.
"This year, however, is a very special...

Summary: A request from surgeons to be allowed to carry out lung transplants in Scotland for the first time is being considered by the Scottish government.
###
Article: Negotiators for the two sides at peace talks in Cuba said they would ask the UN to send a 12-month mission to oversee any ceasefire.
The UN has yet to agree to the proposal. The two sides have been holding peace talks for three years.
Both sides say they hope to reach a final peace deal by March 2016.
The BBC's Colombia correspondent Natalio Cosoy says the mechanism would only start to work once a final deal is agreed.
However both sides have insisted the announcement is more than a mere formality, suggesting it should be read as a signal that a definite deal is close, our correspondent adds.
"We have decided to ask the UN Security Council to create (a mission) of unarmed observers for a period of 12 months," the two sides said in a joint statement at peace talks in the Cuban capital, Havana, on Tuesday.
They said the mission would guarantee that any ceasefire and disarmament would be genuine and permanent, reports say.
Humberto de la Calle, the government's lead negotiator, described the announcement as a "transcendental" moment.
He said it was an "unequivocal demonstration of our desire to end confrontation", according to the Associated Press.
The joint announcement in Havana is a clear indication that the Colombian peace process is moving towards its final phase.
Since the negotiations were launched in November 2012, the Farc has announced several unilateral ceasefires and urged the government to do the same.
But even though the government has scaled down military operations recently, it has refused to join the Farc in a bilateral ceasefire.
President Juan Manuel Santos has said repeatedly that the rebels must first agree to lay down their weapons and give up their armed struggle.
Government and negotiators have now invited the UN Security Council to join them as an honest, reliable broker and oversee the end of the conflict.
The two sides have invested too much politically to let more than three years of negotiations fail at such a late stage, when difficult issues such as justice for the victims have...

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The results of a survey of staff at Queen's University have revealed that the majority of staff are proud to work for the university.
The results of the survey, carried out by the university's staff association, were published in the university's annual report.
The survey, which was carried out in April, asked staff

Fewer than a third of staff at Queen's University believe it is being led effectively, according to a survey conducted by the university itself.

Article: The valleys, channels and deltas viewed from orbit have long been thought to be the work of water erosion, but it is Nasa's latest rover, Curiosity, that has provided the "ground truth".
Researchers report its observations of rounded pebbles on the floor of the Red Planet's 150km-wide Gale Crater.
Their smooth appearance is identical to gravels found in rivers on Earth.
Rock fragments that bounce along the bottom of a stream of water will have their edges knocked off, and when these pebbles finally come to rest they will often align in a characteristic overlapping fashion.
Curiosity has pictured these features in a number of rock outcrops at the base of Gale Crater.
It is confirmation that water has played its part in sculpting not only this huge equatorial bowl but by implication many of the other landforms seen on the planet.
"For decades, we have speculated and hypothesised that the surface of Mars was carved by water, but this is the first time where you can see the remnants of stream flow with what are absolutely tell-tale signs," Dr Rebecca Williams from the Planetary Science Institute, US, told BBC News.
The American space agency first announced the discovery of the pebbles in September last year, barely seven weeks after Curiosity had landed in Gale.
Researchers have since been studying the robot's pictures in more detail and have now written up a report for Science magazine - the first scholarly paper from the surface mission to make it into print; and the study reinforces the initial interpretation.
It describes the nature of the outcrops, and estimates the probable conditions in which their sediments were laid down.
The pebbles range in size from about two to 40mm in diameter - too big to have been blown along by the wind.
These clasts, as scientists will often call them, are cemented together in a sandy matrix to make a rock type referred to as a conglomerate.
In many places, the clasts are touching each other, and the pictures show examples of so-called imbrication - an arrangement where...

Summary: Scientists now have definitive proof that many of the landscapes seen on Mars were indeed cut by flowing water.
###
Article: They have confirmed that resistant strains of the malaria parasite on the border between Thailand and Burma, 500 miles (800km) away from previous sites.
Researchers say that the rise of resistance means the effort to eliminate malaria is "seriously compromised".
The details have beenpublished in The Lancetmedical journal.
For many years now the most effective drugs against malaria have been derived from the Chinese plant,Artemisia annua. It is also known as sweet wormwood.
In 2009 researchers found that the most deadly species of malaria parasites, spread by mosquitoes, were becoming more resistant to these drugs in parts of western Cambodia.
This new data confirms that these Plasmodium falciparum parasites that are infecting patients more than 500 miles away on the border between Thailand and Burma are growing steadily more resistant.
The researchers from the Shoklo Malaria Research Unit measured the time it took the artemisinin drugs to clear parasites from the bloodstreams of more than 3,000 patients. Over the nine years between 2001 and 2010, they found that drugs became less effective and the number of patients showing resistance rose to 20%.
Prof Francois Nosten, who is part of the research team that has carried out the latest work, says the development is very serious.
"It would certainly compromise the idea of eliminating malaria that's for sure and will probably translate into a resurgence of malaria in many places," he said.
Another scientist involved with the study is Dr Standwell Nkhoma from the Texas Biomedical Research Institute.
"Spread of drug-resistant malaria parasites within South East Asia and overspill into sub-Saharan Africa, where most malaria deaths occur, would be a public health disaster resulting in millions of deaths."
The scientists cannot tell if the resistance has moved because mosquitoes carrying the resistant parasites have moved to the Burmese border or if it has arisen spontaneously among the population there. Either way the researchers involved say it raises the spectre of...

Summary: Scientists have found new evidence that resistance to the front-line treatments for malaria is increasing.
###
Article: It means that 99.9% of parents who applied on behalf of their children have secured a funded nursery place, with just 16 applicants still waiting.
In April, the BBC reported that almost 800 applicants were waiting to find out if they had been successful.
The new education minister, Peter Weir, said he was "delighted" by the update.
"The department and the Education Authority have worked hard to meet demand for pre-school places, including approving or funding additional places across both voluntary and statutory settings," the minister said.
"Pre-school places remain available across Northern Ireland and the Education Authority will continue to work with those parents who have been unsuccessful in securing a pre-school place."
Letters on the outcome of the second stage of the application process were issued to parents on Friday.
Demand for funded pre-school places has risen in recent years and there are a number of criteria to help schools decide which children to admit.
Legislation requires providers to give preference to children from socially-disadvantaged backgrounds, whose parents are in receipt of Income Support or Jobseeker's Allowance.
Further criteria can include whether a child has had a sibling at the school, or how far away they live from the building.

Summary: Almost 23,000 children in Northern Ireland have been offered a pre-school nursery education place from September, funded by the Department of Education.
###
Article: The BBC has obtained details of the major survey.
Almost 70% - 2,479 - of the university's 3,600 staff took part in the survey earlier this year.
Only 29% of staff who responded agreed senior leaders provided "effective leadership". One in five said the university managed change effectively.
Fewer than a third gave positive responses to questions about leadership and direction.
Queen's recently introduced major changes to some faculties and more than 140 staff left under a voluntary redundancy process in 2015-16.
However, staff were more positive about other aspects of the university, with two-thirds saying they were proud to work there.
Almost nine in 10 who responded said Queen's had a high standing in Northern Ireland, while two-thirds would recommend it as a "great place to study".
The vast majority of respondents - 89% - said that they found their work interesting.
While only a quarter of staff agreed that "Queen's works as one university", more than three-quarters said it was "committed to world class research".
However, fewer than a third of staff believed any action would be taken as a result of the survey.
In a statement, a Queen's spokesperson said the university was committed to "staff engagement and a positive work environment".
"The positive results highlight a number of key strengths, including staff respect, interesting work and a sense of personal accomplishment.
"The university is now working in partnership with staff in the development of action plans in response to the results.
"This process will enable staff to initiate change in those areas highlighted as challenges and to build on the strengths identified in the survey."
The survey was carried out in April, but the results have just been circulated.

Summary:


Ms Duffy, who is currently suspended from UKIP, said she would "very much like" to run but a "handful of people at the top" had ensured she could not.
Ms Duffy, who is currently suspended from the party, said she would back councillor Lisa Duffy to succeed Nigel Farage.
Ms Duffy

UKIP ex-deputy chairwoman Suzanne Evans says she has given up hope of becoming the party's next leader - but insists she will not "give up" on UKIP.

Article: Changes will include an end to major government reforms being introduced during the academic year, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and Education Secretary Nicky Morgan said.
The pledge follows the biggest survey of teachers undertaken in 10 years.
The National Union of Teachers said the measures were "simply insufficient".
Almost 44,000 people - the majority of them classroom teachers - responded to the Department of Education's Workload Challenge survey.
They cited excessive amounts of time spent recording data and dealing with bureaucracy as factors which contributed to "unnecessary" or "unproductive" workloads.
Other reasons included unrealistic deadlines and excessive marking - with some saying they marked up to 120 books a day.
Teachers had been left feeling "browbeaten and undervalued", said Mr Clegg as he announced the series of commitments alongside the education secretary.
They include:
Ms Morgan said the changes would tackle the root causes of excessive workloads.
"It is no secret that we have made some very important changes in schools - changes that we know have increased the pressure on many teachers," she said.
"We know there is no quick fix but we hope the commitments we have outlined today will support and empower the profession, and free up teachers to focus on what matters most in their jobs."
However, the National Union of Teachers said teachers would be "bitterly disappointed" by the measures.
"At a time when the number of teachers leaving this proud profession is at a 10-year high, this announcement on workload is simply insufficient," said general secretary Christine Blower.
She said the government should immediately tackle its "out-of-control accountability system", which had "Ofsted at its centre".
More than half of respondents said the perceived pressures of Ofsted inspections contributed to unnecessary workloads.
HM Chief Inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw said Ofsted was working to "dispel some of the myths that may have led to unnecessary workloads".
"It is very important that schools...

Summary: "Unnecessary and unproductive" teacher workload will be reduced with a series of "decisive measures" to be introduced in England, ministers have announced.
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Article: Official figures for the year to September 2014 showed spending rose by 3% to £756m with trip numbers up 2% to 4.3m.
However, when trips and spending by NI residents were stripped out there was no significant growth.
Spending by non-NI residents actually slipped slightly from £521m to £519m over the year.
The Stormont Executive has targeted tourism as a growth industry that should be delivering £1bn a year to the economy by 2020.
The numbers of trips and spending has been on an upward trend since 2011.
The overall rise in the year to September was driven by a 21% increase in the number of people taking holidays in Northern Ireland, rather than visiting relatives or making business trips.
The figures also showed a continuing trend of a growing number of visitors from outside the UK, but a steep fall in total visitors from the Republic of Ireland.
Total overnight trips from Great Britain and other countries was up 3% but overnight trips from the Republic of Ireland were down by 13%.

Summary: Northern Ireland's tourism industry saw a rise in visitors and spending during the period that covered last summer.
###
Article: The amount spent per head was £1,400 per person higher than the UK figure, according to the Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland (GERS) bulletin for 2014-15.
The deficit ran to almost 10% of Scotland's output - nearly double the level for the UK as a whole.
Ministers insisted the foundations of the Scottish economy remained strong.
The figures reflect a sharp drop in the calculation of oil and gas tax revenues that might have been credited to Scottish government income.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said: "Taken in the context of the wider economic environment, which has been impacted by muted global demand, falling oil prices and more difficult conditions for manufacturers, the economy has remained resilient with record levels of employment, positive economic growth and growing exports.
"This shows the foundations of Scotland's economy are strong and that we have a strong base to build our future progress upon."
The Scotland Office Minister Andrew Dunlop said: "These figures show that Scotland is facing challenging economic times, in particular because of the drop in oil price, and demonstrate the value of the broad shoulders of the United Kingdom.
"The UK and Scottish governments both have a responsibility to work hard and support the Scottish economy in difficult global conditions, and that is exactly what we will continue to do."
£68bn
Total expenditure
£11.5bn Health
£7.6bn Education and training
£2.8bn Policing
£2.7bn Transport
The annual GERS figures, which are produced by Scottish government economists, independently of ministers, also showed;
The GERS figures are widely used to inform the debate about Scotland's potential for independence or for the full range of tax-raising powers.
They looked much more positive when oil and gas tax revenue was in the billions. But with the fall in the price of oil and gas, as well as high levels of investment, producer profits have plummeted, and taxes with them.
Excluding North Sea revenue, the deficit ran to £16.7bn, or 11.9% of Gross Domestic Product...

Summary: Scotland's public spending was almost £15bn more than its tax revenue in the last financial year, new figures show.
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Article: Ms Evans, who is currently suspended from UKIP, said she would "very much like" to run but a "handful of people at the top" had ensured she could not.
Ms Evans' six-month ban for bringing the party into disrepute - claims she has dismissed - means she cannot stand.
She said she would back councillor Lisa Duffy to succeed Nigel Farage.
Ms Evans said UKIP needed to "break free of its hard-right image and set itself firmly in the common sense centre-ground" and also conduct some "internal reform".
The leadership contest has been prompted by Mr Farage's decision to stand down following the UK's vote to leave the European Union, saying his "political ambition has been achieved".
In a statement in Westminster, Ms Evans, who had been touted as a possible successor, said: "I'd very much like to run in that election.
"Unfortunately there are a handful of people at the top of UKIP who, for whatever personal reasons of their own, have made quite sure I can't."
She claimed the party rulebook had been "abused" to suspend her to prevent her from representing the party in May's London Assembly elections and the upcoming leadership contest.
Her six-month suspension handed down in March came after an internal disciplinary meeting found she had publicly criticised a fellow candidate and held herself out as a party spokeswoman without authority.
Ms Evans - who has always rejected the claims against her - lost a High Court bid to overturn the decision.
In the statement, she said: "I have to face up to reality, there's no way they're going to allow me to put my name on the ballot paper... I've now given up hope of becoming the next leader of UKIP."
Ms Evans said she had questioned whether to stay on in a party that "allows, and arguably encourages senior figures to behave like this", but she said the support from members had made her "more determined ever not to give up on UKIP".
She also said that with the right leader, the "sky was the limit for the party".
Endorsing Lisa Duffy, a district councillor for Ramsey in...

Summary:


The UK's first ever national minimum wage will be introduced in April.
The new rate will be set at £7.20 an hour, up from the current rate of £6.50.
The new rate will apply to all workers aged between 16 and 24, and will be the same for all workers,

The Italian parliament has approved a long-debated and extensive electoral reform that aims to give the country more political stability.

Article: Met Office statistics show that an average of 760mm (2.5ft) of rain fell across the country in December, January and February.
This resulted in a spate of floods which inundated homes and caused chaos on the roads and railways.
December was the wettest month recorded while January and February saw much higher rainfalls than normal. Argyll was the wettest area.
It had 1,055.7mm (3.5ft) of rain over the three months.
"It's been a truly remarkable winter in Scotland," said a Met Office spokeswoman.
"Winter was the second-wettest across the UK as a whole and it turned out to be the warmest on record for England and Wales.
"But Scotland endured the worst rain it has ever seen - and these records go back to 1910."
Scotland's two wettest winters have happened in the last three years. The rainfall total of 756mm (2.5ft) for 2015/16 exceeded the previous record for winter 2013 /14 of 744mm (2ft).
More than 100 homes were evacuated in Hawick, Roxburghshire, on 5 December as torrential rain swept in ahead of Storm Desmond.
Tayside and Perthshire also endured flooding events, with the River Tay peaking at levels not seen for a decade.
In the new year, Storm Frank resulted in bridge pillars on the West Coast Rail Line being almost washed away. The damage took almost two months to repair.
February's rainfall total of 147.2mm (6in) was 13% up on normal. January's figure of 257.5mm (10in) showed a rise of 45% of the average for the month while December's 351.4mm (14in) was more than double the amount usually experienced that month.
The Met Office spokeswoman added: "While the three-month period was remarkable for its rainfall, it must be remembered that it followed on from a very wet November as well.
"Winter also brought less sunshine in each of the three months we call winter. In January, Scotland got just 63% of the sunshine hours it would normally expect."
The coldest temperature of winter was Minus 14.1 Celsius (6.6F) recorded at Braemar, Aberdeenshire, on the morning of 14 February.
There is also a risk of snow and...

Summary: This winter was the wettest recorded in Scotland since records began in 1910.
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Article: Minuscule sensors have been glued to the backs of 10,000 healthy honey bees around the world to help understand why huge numbers of bees are dying.
Like electronic tags that track the movement of cars through toll roads, these tiny trackers send information back to receivers half the size of a credit card that are strategically placed at bee hives.
Australian researchers involved in the global research project compare the sensor to an adult carrying a backpack, weighing about a third of what a honey bee can carry.
But unlike the average backpacker, this extra load will remain in place for the rest of the bee's life.
The microscopic technology has been developed in Tasmania by Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) over the past two years as part of an international research project investigating bee health.
Around the world, wild bee populations have plummeted thanks to habitat loss, pesticides and diseases, say scientists.
That puts crops that need to be pollinated at risk, says CSIRO Science Leader Professor Paulo de Souza.
"In some parts of the world, a healthy hive of bees can be like clockwork one day, and then every single bee is dead the very next day, and we have no idea why," Prof. de Souza told the BBC.
"It's happening so frequently that it's now a syndrome called colony collapse disorder, and no scientist working alone would be able to solve this," he says.
A predatory mite called the Varroa destructor has killed many colonies over the past decade.
Australian honey bees have so far remained immune to the devastating mite, putting Australia in an ideal position to coordinate a global research effort, says the CSIRO team.
The tiny sensors they have developed weigh just 5.4 milligrams. They contain a battery that generates energy by vibration, and record a bee's time away from the hive and the distance each bee travels.
Each sensor will record a bee's exposure to pesticides, air pollution and water contamination, as well as taking note of the insect's diet and...

Summary: An international group of scientists, beekeepers, farmers and technology companies is using cutting-edge technology to help find out why honey bee populations around the world are crashing.
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Article: The marriage allowance, unveiled by David Cameron in 2013, could reduce a couple's annual tax bill by up to ??212.
It only applies to couples with one basic rate taxpayer and the other earning less than the personal allowance.
David Cameron said marriage should be recognised in the tax system, because families are the "bedrock" of society.
He also said the measure would help families with the cost of living.
Tax breaks for married couples were promised by Mr Cameron when he ran for the leadership of his party in 2005, and it also featured in the Conservatives' 2010 election manifesto.
Labour has pledged to scrap the allowance, which it says will not apply to most married couples, and use the money to introduce a 10p starting rate of tax.
The allowance - which will enable one spouse or civil partner to transfer some of their tax-free personal allowance to the other - will come into effect on 6 April 2015.
The Conservatives have said stay-at-home parents and people who worked part-time would be the main winners from the move.
Under the policy, if a spouse or civil partner's income is less than ??10,600 - including pensions, savings and investments - they will be able to share up to ??1,060 of their personal allowance with their partner, provided the recipient does not earn more than ??42,385 a year.
Couples born on or after 6 April 1935 can register online to receive their interest to receive the allowance.
From April, HM Revenue & Customs will contact those who have registered their interest, and invite them to apply.
The idea of a marriage tax break has been opposed by the Conservatives' coalition partners, the Liberal Democrats, who say it will penalise unmarried couples.

Summary: A scheme to offer tax breaks to some married couples and civil partners has opened for registration.
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Article: The measure guarantees a majority of seats to the party that wins the most votes in an election.
It is a key element of a package of reforms promised by Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi.
The law seeks to end Italy's post-war era of revolving governments, political horse-trading and unstable coalitions.
The lower house of parliament gave final approval to the bill by 334 votes to 61.
The proportional election system awards 340 out of 630 seats to any party that wins more than 40% of the national vote.
If no party reaches that threshold, there is a second-round run-off between the two parties with the most votes.
The electoral reform is expected to come into force next year.
After the vote, Mr Renzi said: "Commitment achieved, promise respected. Italy needs people who don't always say no."
Critics have accused the 40-year-old former mayor of Florence who became prime minster last year of trying to consolidate his grip on power.
They complain that the law awards too much power to single parties, gives party bosses too much scope to select candidates, and denies voters the chance to directly choose representatives. Opposition parties boycotted Monday's vote.
Renato Brunetta, parliamentary head of centre-right opposition party Forza Italia, said afterwards that it was "a very ugly day for our country's democracy".
Mr Renzi wants to further transform the Italian system by abolishing the Senate and replacing it with a non-elected body with lesser powers.
Currently, legislation is often held up because identical versions of bills have to be approved by both houses.

Summary:


The European Union has launched a new website to help people find out more about the bloc.
The site, which is being launched in the run-up to the European elections in May, is the first of its kind and aims to provide a single point of access to information about the EU.
It is being launched

Splits within the EU on the relocation of 120,000 migrants have been further exposed as leaders hold an emergency meeting in Brussels.

Article: A driver took the fawn's injured mother to Fenland Animal Rescue after finding her at the roadside in Cambridgeshire.
A scan found the doe was heavily pregnant, and she gave birth at the centre last Sunday, staff said.
The fawn died on Friday from a brain injury most likely caused by the accident, a vet told rescuers.
Read more animal stories from the BBC on Pinterest
Fenland Animal Rescue's founder Joshua Flanagan said the baby's death was "a sad day for everyone".
"But this is, unfortunately, the harsh reality of wildlife rehabilitation for ourselves," he added.
Mr Flanagan had previously said deer were difficult to treat and often had to be put down as human contact causes them too much stress.
But the mother was "still doing fine", he said.
He added: "She went a little funny after [the fawn] passed, but due to her being so young she never really understood what was happening anyway.
"She is now back to her full self and eating fine."
The centre is set to release the doe back into the wild on Christmas Eve - earlier than initially planned.

Summary: A fawn born after its mother was hit by a car has died from a brain injury, animal rescuers have said.
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Article: The first phase of the Inventory of Historic Battlefields contains a total of 17 different locations.
It includes sites in the Borders, Aberdeenshire, the Highlands, North Lanarkshire, Stirling and East Lothian.
The inventory aims to highlight the historic significance of the areas to planning authorities making decisions which could affect their landscape.
Historic Scotland said the list included the nation's "most significant and iconic battlefields".
UK Battlefields Resource Centre
It also provides information to aid their protection, management, interpretation and promotion.
The public has until 11 February next year to comment on the inventory.
Culture Minister Fiona Hyslop said:  "Many legendary battles took place in Scotland and the famous figures who fought in them, such as Robert the Bruce at Bannockburn and Bonnie Prince Charlie at Culloden, are known around the world.
"The Inventory of Historic Battlefields will help increase general awareness of historic battlefields throughout Scotland and the contribution they make to understanding our history and landscape."
She said the sites made a "distinctive contribution" to the "sense of place and history, both locally and nationally".
"They are a wonderful resource for education, helping us understand why significant events in our history unfolded as they did and provide a tangible link to some of the key figures of Scottish history," she added.
"Not only do battlefields form an important part of our sense of identity, they also have enormous potential for attracting tourists, as well as for general recreation, allowing visitors to experience the site of a dramatic historical event for themselves.
"We want to make sure that these important battlefields are looked after now and for future generations. "
Dr Tony Pollard, director of the centre for battlefield archaeology at Glasgow University, said compiling the inventory had been a "challenging but incredibly rewarding project".
"We have an incredible wealth of battlefields in Scotland and it is vital...

Summary: Historic Scotland has issued a list of the most important battle sites located around the country.
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Article: Matthew Sampson was notified by Royal Mail last week of a "potential hazard" at his home in Patchway near Bristol which was "affecting deliveries".
According to Royal Mail, Bella the cat is a "threat" to staff and has been putting "fingers at risk of injury".
But owner Matthew Sampson, said he was "shocked" by the notice as he has "never seen her get aggressive".
In the letter, Royal Mail states it has been "experiencing difficulties in delivering mail" to Mr Sampson's address "because of the actions of a cat".
It said the couple's postman had reported that when he pushes mail through their letterbox their cat "snatches the mail and put his fingers at risk of injury".
They have been advised to "restrain their cat at all times" or provide an alternative "safe" post box or their post would be suspended.
Mr Sampson said he "understands where the postman is coming from" but had found the letter "really funny".
"We've noticed over the last couple of days that the postman is very hesitant at putting the letters in and Bella thinks it's a game that he's trying to play," he said.
"I haven't seen her put her paws all the way through but I think it's fair what they're saying - it's just how they're worded the letter.
"As to restraining the cat - I'd no way dare."

Summary: A couple have been told to restrain their cat or face having their mail deliveries suspended.
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Article: Slovakia is launching a legal challenge to mandatory quotas that were passed in a majority vote on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Hungary's prime minister has proposed a radical budgetary revamp to raise funds.
The summit will focus on tightening EU borders and aiding neighbours of Syria, from where many migrants come.
The talks were continuing well into the night, having started just after 19:00 Brussels time (17:00 GMT).
Draft proposals seen by the BBC, that are being discussed at the summit, include:
European Council President Donald Tusk called for "a concrete plan" to secure the EU's external borders, "in place of the arguments and the chaos we have witnessed in the past weeks".
As she arrived at the summit, Lithuania's President Dalia Grybauskaite said it was "not a lack of European unity, but a lack of European wisdom" that had led to this point.
On arriving, British Prime Minister David Cameron said the UK would be giving another £100m ($152m) to help Syrian refugees, including £40m towards the World Food Programme.
"We need to do more to stabilise the countries and the regions from which these people are coming," he said.
The UK has opted against taking part in the relocation scheme and has its own plan to resettle migrants directly from Syrian refugee camps.
The scale of the problem was highlighted again on Wednesday when Croatia revealed that 44,000 migrants - including 8,750 on Tuesday - had arrived there since Hungary completed a fence along its border with Serbia last week.
Analysis: Chris Morris, BBC Europe correspondent
As thousands of people continue to arrive on European shores, EU leaders are trying to focus on longer term solutions, to try to stem the flow.
The EU can't ignore the divisions and disagreements that have emerged in the last few weeks between member states that have different ideas about how this crisis should be confronted.
One EU official said there was a need to clean up the bad blood around the table.
Progress may be made this evening, but it will take years of political engagement...

Summary:


The UK government has announced a new £1.5m fund to help victims of modern slavery.
The fund, which will be run by the National Crime Agency, will be used to help victims of modern slavery, including those who have been trafficked, forced into prostitution or forced into domestic servitude.
The

Clamping down on the problem of Nigerians being trafficked to the UK is a main priority, the first independent anti-slavery commissioner says.

Article: Dolphins are one of Aberdeen's biggest tourist attractions, with the city regarded as being among the best places in Europe to spot them.
Volunteers from RSPB Scotland's Dolphinwatch expect thousands of visitors to try to catch a glimpse of the spectacular sea antics over the summer.
The Dolphinwatch project was pioneered in 2013.
The team will be at Torry Battery from 11:00 to 18:00 every Thursday to Sunday until 16 August.
Dolphinwatch team member Helen Hiley said: "Aberdeen is such a fantastic place to see dolphins and it's amazing to have a wildlife spectacle like this so close to a city centre.
"You often get great views of them feeding and playing at the harbour entrance."
Amateur photographer David McCulloch, who took a recent dramatic shot which has proved popular on social media, described the experience of capturing the image as "out of this world".

Summary: Aberdeen's annual Dolphinwatch project is getting under way.
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Article: A souvenir edition has been published which includes the original front page and a letter of congratulations from The Queen.
The issue also marks the start of year-long multi-platform project called 200 voices.
It will feature columns from 200 "remarkable people who have played a major role in the nation".
Award-winning poet William Letford has also produced a special work to mark the 200th anniversary.
The first edition of the paper was published on 25 January 1817.
It was founded by lawyer William Ritchie and customs official Charles MacLaren.
The paper's original premises were at 257 High Street on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh. It now has its headquarters on Queensferry Road in the capital.
In a letter to the Scotsman, The Queen writes: "Please convey my congratulations to all those on the newspaper's staff and my good wishes to your readers in Scotland, and elsewhere, as you mark this significant anniversary."
Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has also sent her congratulations, writing: "The Scotsman occupies a special place in Scottish journalism, and I commend its staff, past and present, for all the work they have done in ensuring its success over so many years."
The newspaper's owners, Johnston Press, said the special edition marked the start of a year-long calendar of celebrations "showcasing both the paper's rich heritage and looking ahead to the publication's future, shining a light on the digital innovations across the brand's platforms".
Ian Stewart, editor at The Scotsman, said: "For two centuries The Scotsman has been at the heart of Scotland as a nation, covering the breaking news stories that have shaped our past and influenced our future; and we're incredibly proud to be part of that story.
"The celebrations that have kicked off today are just the beginning, with various events and editorial initiatives still to come throughout 2017.
"We very much look forward to taking our readers on this journey with us, as we take our step together into the third century of The Scotsman as...

Summary: The Scotsman newspaper is marking exactly 200 years since the publication of its first edition.
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Article: During the committee stage of the Referendum Bill, Foreign Office Minister David Lidington said the amendment did "not make sense."
The Conservative politician said it was about the UK's membership so it should be about all of the UK taking a view.
The UK government will hold an in/out referendum before the end of 2017.
The SNP's  foreign affairs spokesman, Alex Salmond, moved the amendment on the so-called "quadruple lock" .
He said: "In America, 14 states can block a constitutional amendment, even if they comprise only 5% of the population.
"Even the prime minister, and many of his MPs, would concede Scotland is a nation. The United Kingdom is a multi-national state."
Mr Salmond added that the matter was about more than a "simple majority across the UK" and the outcome needed to be respectful of the results in the "component nations".
However, Mr Lidington rejected Mr Salmond's argument.
Meanwhile, ministers have confirmed that the poll would not be held on 5 May 2016, the same day as elections to devolved parliaments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
They will also amend planned changes to "purdah" rules, which limit government announcements in the run-up to polls.
Ministers said voters must be assured the referendum would be a "fair fight".
David Cameron is starting renegotiation of the terms of Britain's EU membership ahead of a referendum. Here is some further reading on what it all means:
Q&A: The UK's planned EU referendum
UK and the EU: Better off out or in?
What Britain wants from Europe
Timeline: EU referendum debate

Summary: An SNP bid to make sure Britain's exit from the EU was dependant on all four nations voting for it in the referendum has been rejected.
###
Article: Kevin Hyland told the BBC it was "deeply concerning" that hundreds of Nigerians were brought in every year for prostitution or forced labour.
Mr Hyland said the problem of such exploitation was "enormous".
The Home Office said it was "committed to tackling modern slavery" and was addressing specific issues in Nigeria.
The commissioner, who has only been in post for six months, says he can't think of anything more worrying than women and children being raped and forced into domestic servitude.
Latest figures from the National Crime Agency show that more than 2,000 potential trafficking victims were referred to the authorities in 2014 - 244 of whom were from Nigeria, a 31 per cent increase from the previous year. The highest number of potential victims were identified as being from Albania.
Campaigners believe the real figure of potential trafficking victims from Nigeria could be much higher, however.
Mr Hyland, the former head of the Metropolitan Police's human trafficking unit, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "I am extremely concerned about this. And we're talking about several hundred every year.
"This isn't just a one-off - it's continuous - so the treatment of these people, what they go through, is actually a very serious crime, so for me it's a big problem.
"But also I think the fact that there is a demand for this kind of exploitation in the United Kingdom really concerns me, that there are people who will want to buy sex, will want to exploit, will want to have children as what are current-day slaves, so that is a really serious problem."
Research published by the Home Office in December estimates that there are between 10,000 and 13,000 potential victims of slavery in the UK.  Home Secretary Theresa May, speaking last year, described the scale of abuse as "shocking".
Melissa (not her real name), who is in her 20s, was trafficked to the UK to work for a Nigerian woman in London as a domestic slave.
From the age of 10, she was made to clean the kitchen, sell food on a market, feed and bathe other...

Summary:


The UK government has announced a new £1.5m fund to help the UK's most deprived communities.
The fund, which is part of the government's Big Society Capital Fund, will be used to help communities in the North West and the North East to develop their own community-led projects.
The fund

A motoring festival which has been running for 30 years is to be cancelled, organisers have said.

Article: Lottery organisers Camelot said the window for claiming the Euromillions winnings closed at 23:00 BST on Sunday.
Camelot said unclaimed money would be added to the money in the National Lottery Good Causes fund.
Leicester's lord mayor Abdul Osman started a countdown timer to the deadline near the Haymarket clock tower last week but the prize went unclaimed.
A spokesman for Camelot said: "Unfortunately, I can confirm that the ticket-holder did not come forward within the deadline to claim their prize and has now sadly missed out on this substantial amount of money.
"I would urge all National Lottery players to check their tickets on a regular basis."

Summary: A lottery player who won £1m on a ticket bought in Leicester has failed to claim their prize.
###
Article: But did any of these high-profile, slickly-produced photo calls and big-name speeches have the intended effect - and did they make the slightest bit of difference?
Here's a look at a few of the main ones.
An independent Scotland would have continued to use the pound under a currency union with the remainder of the UK, or so went the Scottish government's argument.
In the wake of the Scottish government's independence White Paper, put out at the end of 2013, UK Chancellor George Osborne made a flying visit north of the border to announce there would be no such deal, declaring: "If Scotland walks away from the UK, it walks away from the UK pound."
Prof John Curtice, of Strathclyde University, said: "The 'No' side was convinced that, because a majority of Scots said they wanted to keep the pound, if they were told they couldn't have it, the uncertainties in their mind that would flow from that would lead them back towards the 'No' side.
"The difficulty they had is that what they were saying to the people of Scotland was, 'vote for us on the grounds that we wish to deny you what you would like to happen if Scotland became independent.'
Prof Curtice said of Mr Osborne: "Unfortunately for him, the opinion polls, which had already began to narrow in the wake of the publication of the White Paper, continued to narrow in the weeks thereafter.
"It is not clear that it had the intended effect."
Edinburgh University's Prof James Mitchell argued the problem may have been the messenger, saying: "To have George Osborne leading on this was probably a big mistake.
"While the argument itself - if it had been articulated by someone else - might have had an impact I think, because of the unpopularity of the Chancellor, it simply didn't have that."
History professor Ewen Cameron, of Edinburgh University, said of the chancellor's declaration: "At the time, I thought, 'wow, that's a huge error on the part of the UK government'.
"But then when Cameron came out immediately after the referendum and talked about English votes for...

Summary: Last year's Scottish independence referendum campaign, as well the as buzz of day-to-day campaigning, was known for a series of key, headline-grabbing events.
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Article: The vessels involved include Dutch and Danish ships lost in Shetland's Out Skerries in the 1600s.
Also listed are what may be the 17th Century Scottish warship the Swan, off Mull, and a boat used to attack Lochaber's Mingary Castle in 1644.
The Scottish government has proposed making the sites Historic Marine Protected Areas (MPAs).
The sites are currently safeguarded by the Protection of Wrecks Act 1973.
Under the government's plans the wrecks' protection would transfer to the Marine (Scotland) Act 2010. It would be the first time the MPA powers of this Act have been used.
The protection afforded by the Historic MPA designation can be used to safeguard individual wrecks of national importance, or a group of sites such as an important fleet anchorage or a battle site.
Historic Scotland and Marine Scotland worked with other organisations to draw up the list of seven sites.
Public views have now been sought on the proposals which involve the following wrecks:
Culture and External Affairs Secretary Fiona Hyslop said the new protection could help people learn more about the wrecks.
She said: "It is important to safeguard our most important underwater heritage sites in the seas around Scotland so that they can be valued and enjoyed and I am pleased to announce our first Historic MPAs as a first step to achieving that aim.
"Historic MPAs provide protection based on the principle of sustainable use.
"We hope that visitors will have more opportunities to enjoy these sites on a 'look but don't touch' basis, and will also gain a better understanding of the importance of our marine heritage."

Summary: Seven sites of historic shipwrecks off Scotland could be given new protected status.
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Article: The Coventry Festival of Motoring, which attracted 40,000 visitors in 2014, has had ??20,000 of funding withdrawn by the city council.
However, organisers Culture Coventry said the funding withdrawal was "not the only reason" they had made the decision to cancel the event.
It said events planned for 2015 and 2016 have been axed.
Organisers said they had not ruled out reviving the festival, but it would remain on hold indefinitely.
The free heritage event, which features classic cars, was due to take place in August at Stoneleigh Park.
It is organised by Culture Coventry, a trust set up to manage four of the city's visitor attractions.
Chief executive Gary Hall said he had just found out about the council's funding withdrawal.
"I have to look at the ongoing viability of the show and with cuts coming from the city council and other sponsors, we would not be able to grow it as we have in recent years," he said.
"It is a lot of money and, as a charity running four attractions in the city, we have to look at what benefits we are getting."
He said the charity was reopening Coventry's Transport Museum in June following a ??9m redevelopment.
"Unfortunately, we have to put all of our resources into promoting the museum," he said.
Mr Hall said the charity would run "a number of events" throughout 2015 to bring classic car owners into Coventry.
Coventry MotoFest, a more recent addition to the city's festival calendar, which features car races and displays, will go ahead in May, as planned.

Summary:


A new study has found that the number of people who have been diagnosed with depression has increased by more than a third in the last decade.
The study, published in the journal JAMA Psychiatry, found that the number of people with depression has increased by about 1.5 million people in the US since 1999.

Australian laws forbidding people working in the country's detention centres from speaking out about what they see have raised grave concerns in the medical community.

Article: There are some 85,000 boxes - the classic pillars and others mounted on walls or posts - across England, and about 115,300 in the UK.
Royal Mail has pledged to conserve them in their existing locations.
Forensic tags are invisible markers, usually liquids, which show up under ultra-violet light in cases of theft.
The new commitments are contained in a joint policy document between Royal Mail and Historic England.
They update the original policy document from 2002 to recognise changes in legislation and allow for recent developments, such as painting 110 post boxes gold to celebrate London 2012 British Olympic and Paralympic champions.
New measures in the document include the use of forensic tags, permanent metal marking and electronic tracking to discourage the theft and damage of boxes.
Permanent metal marking and forensic tagging allows police to identify the origin of a post box if it sold as metal or as a post box.
The Royal Mail said the prevention of crime would "always be the primary objective" and it said every opportunity should be taken to identify areas potentially at high risk of crime and implement the new technology.
Historic England has also renewed its commitment to work with Royal Mail using heritage protection measures to ensure that post boxes are kept and well cared for wherever possible, the organisations said.
The agreement serves as a code and guide for Royal Mail staff responsible for managing the stock of post boxes.
It will be adapted to reflect the individualities of post boxes around the UK, Royal Mail said, with equivalent policies with heritage agencies in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
The Royal Mail already has a rolling maintenance programme of its post boxes to repair those which have fallen into disrepair or become shabby.
The post boxes tend to be repainted, on average, every few years, but this can change depending on if they are near to areas with more corrosive air, such as those near the sea.
The roadside post box was introduced in Britain following the 1840...

Summary: Forensic tags and electronic tracking are among proposals set out by the Royal Mail and Historic England to preserve the country's post boxes.
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Article: The city council said the new two-week October half-term, to begin in 2017, would help families spend time together without children missing school.
It said the break, from 14 to 29 October, had been designed to give families more flexibility to go away outside the peak summer holiday period.
It follows consultation with parents and carers earlier this year.
Brighton and Hove City Council said it was also responding to national guidelines to head teachers, introduced in 2013, which did not allow them to grant any absence by pupils during term time without "exceptional circumstances".
Councillor Tom Bewick said: "Modern families come in all shapes and sizes and the reduction in the discretion available to head teachers is damaging.
"The introduction of a new week's holiday in term time is a positive step and I hope addresses the behaviour of travel companies who whack up prices."
The changes in school holidays have been made by adjusting the start and finish dates of the three main terms at all primary and secondary schools which come under the authority.
The council, which sets academic year dates for community, voluntary-controlled and community special schools, said it did not reduce the number of teaching days to achieve the change.
The new term dates will be reviewed after a two-year trial period.

Summary: Schools in Brighton and Hove are set to have a new two-week break to allow parents to buy cheaper holidays.
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Article: US researchers studied the sleeping patterns of traditional societies in Africa and South America, whose lifestyles closely resemble ancient hunter gatherers.
They monitored 98 people for 1,165 nights, and found that they slept for an average of 6.5 hours per night.
By comparison, the scientists said that most people in the US get about seven hours, according to a large sleep poll.
The new study, published in the journal Current Biology, also finds that temperature played a greater role than light in shaping sleeping patterns.
Prof Jerome Siegel, from the University of California, Los Angeles, said: "The issue is: what is the data on how sleep has changed?
"And it occurred to me that these groups, which are rapidly disappearing, give the last opportunity to really know what human sleep was like before we all created our various civilisations.
"What is absolutely clear is that they don't sleep more than we do."
No naps
From artificial lights, to late night TV, and now the ever-present glow of our smart phones, modern life is often blamed for ruining our sleep.
To put this to the test, the researchers studied the Hadza of Tanzania, the San of Namibia and the Tsimane of Bolivia, fitting their volunteers with wristwatches that monitor sleep.
"All three groups have pretty much the same sleep duration and pretty much the same timing of sleep," said Prof Siegel.
"This gives me reasonable confidence that they reflect the common human biology and they are not a function of their particular situations, which are different."
As well as discovering that the average sleep duration was six hours and 25 minutes, the researchers also found the participants very rarely took naps.
While some European documents suggested that people used to wake up for a while during the night, sleeping in two shifts, the researchers found this was not the case with the hunter gatherers.
Surprisingly, natural light did not have as big an influence as was thought.
Most people fell asleep on average 3.3 hours after sunset.
However, temperature...

Summary: Our ancestors may have got less sleep than we do, a study suggests.
###
Article: When Peter Young was in charge of mental health services at Australia's refugee detention centres, he says it became increasingly clear that authorities wanted to "keep the lid" on health issues that asylum seekers were experiencing.
The senior Australian psychiatrist says immigration authorities wanted details about the high rates of mental illness among children at the centres to be removed from his official reports.
He was asked to delete clinical opinions that made a direct link between prolonged detention and mental health problems.
Dr Young was director of International Health and Medical Services (IHMS) - a private health service contracted by Australia's Department of Immigration and Border Protection (DIBP) to provide health care to detention centres - a role he held for three years.
Its services covered the country's controversial offshore facilities on the Pacific island of Nauru and Papua New Guinea's Manus Island, where all asylum seekers who try to reach Australia by boat are sent - never to be resettled in Australia even if their refugee claims are proven.
In advising on treatment, Dr Young argued with authorities who considered acts of self-harm by detainees as "a type of bad behaviour, rather than a manifestation of people in extreme states of hopelessness".
He says he was later refused permission to use data he had collected about health issues in detention centres in presentations or publications.
"They made it very clear this type of information should never get into the public domain," he told the BBC.
Now there is fear that health workers could go to prison for such revelations under new Border Force laws that threaten "entrusted people" with up to two years in prison if they reveal protected information about Australia's detention facilities.
In recent months, hundreds of doctors and nurses have staged public protests in cities across Australia, posing with their hands over their mouths to highlight the risk of being silenced.
Their concerns are shared by Australia's 13 peak medical...

Summary:


couple are in the country to mark the centenary of the end of the First World War.
The couple are in Poland to mark the centenary of the end of the First World War.
The

The Duchess of Cambridge tried her hand at conducting a prestigious symphony orchestra on the final day of the royal tour of Germany.

Article: Coed Felinrhyd is a place where geography and legend meet, and was named in the 12th Century Mabinogion Welsh myths.
Much of the woodland dates from the last Ice Age.
Now the Royal Geographical Society (RGS) has created a trail through one of the UK's "most magical" ecosystems.
Hidden off a lay-by near the picturesque village of Maentwrog, this 221-acre pristine woodland is home to flora and fauna scarcely seen elsewhere, including otters, bats, and rare birds.
"You'd associate most rainforest with central or south America - but this wood has a lot of similar processes going on," explains Jo Kemp, project officer with the RGS's Discovering Britain project.
The wood's sheltered gorge setting, together with the streams and waterfalls that cross the landscape, have created an ecosystem where plant life thrives.
"There's an oak tree canopy which maintains the moist humidity you can really feel here, and it remains sheltered from the hard frosts of Snowdonia and the strong winds of the coastline," Jo says.
"There are elements of this wood that potentially remain untouched since the last Ice Age, 10,000 years ago - which makes it particularly unique not only in Wales, but in the whole of Britain."
As soon as you enter the rainforest, it immediately looks different to any other Welsh woodland.
The oak at the walk's entrance is covered in tree lungwort, a lichen now limited to only a few wild areas of Britain.
"It only likes less acidic bark," Jo explains. "As oak trees get older, their bark becomes less acidic.
"So its presence tells us that this bit of woodland is quite special and particularly ancient."
A rare Ice Age species of lichen was identified in Wales for the first time at Coed Felinrhyd in 2015, evidence that the forest dates back to a time when trees first re-colonised the country.
As we move further through the woodland, Jo points out the filmy fern plant growing from a tree base. "It's just one cell thick - and it's really quite scarce," she says.
"The fact it is here demonstrates just how unique an...

Summary: There may not be monkeys swinging from the canopy - but Snowdonia's 10,000-year-old Celtic rainforest shares other links to its Amazonian cousins.
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Article: Cecil's head and skin were removed, according to the Zimbabwe Conservation Task Force (ZCTF), a local charity.
Walter Palmer, the US dentist who shot the animal, believed the hunt was legal but could still face charges.
The removal of the head of a hunted animal is not unusual - one wildlife charity says 665 lions are killed as trophies in South Africa alone every year.
In the last day, three US airlines - Delta, United and American Airlines - have said they will no longer transport the trophies of big-game animals such as buffalo, elephants, leopards, lions and rhinos.
All of which leads to one question: how can the remains of some of the world's most valuable animals end up being transported on commercial airlines?
Not so fast - that should become more clear later.
No - as long as it was not killed illegally, as Cecil allegedly was.
Hunting trophy animals is not illegal in many African countries. In Zimbabwe and South Africa, hunting is regulated, and hunters must obtain permits to kill certain animals in certain places.
Erica Kock, of Trophy Service Tannery in Pretoria, said export of trophy animals was tightly controlled in South Africa.
All legal hunters and hunting farms are registered, and anyone wishing to export a trophy animal needs to submit an export application via the taxidermist to the government.
"If we don't produce all the required documentation, we can't export - it's that simple," Ms Kock said.
The UK and the US, for example, demand import licences on top of export permits issued by the countries where hunting takes place.
In the UK, all applications must be made to the Animal and Plant Health Agency (Apha)  - who can still refuse the application.
A spokesman for Apha said licences to import trophies had been issued to 61 people in the year up to 30 July. Only 16 of those have so far been used, the spokesman said.
But if the animal is classed as endangered, extra permission has to be given by the origin country.
Endangered animals such as some tigers and elephants are listed under Appendix...

Summary: When news emerged of the illegal killing of Cecil the lion in Zimbabwe on 1 July, one detail stood out for many online commentators.
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Article: Lord Macdonald QC said it was of "great regret" that regional Crown Prosecution Service lawyers had failed to refer the case to him in 2007.
He said he would have given the allegations his "close attention".
Cardiff-born peer Lord Janner, 86, has always denied any wrongdoing.
The abuse allegations against the Labour peer relate to children's homes in Leicestershire in the 1970s and 80s.
On Thursday, current Director of Public Prosecutions Alison Saunders announced that there was enough evidence to bring charges against Lord Janner but that this would not happen because he was now too sick to stand trial. He was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in 2009.
Ms Saunders also said the CPS had been "wrong" not to prosecute following investigations in 1991 and 2007.
On Saturday, speaking to the BBC on a visit to North Cornwall, Home Secretary Theresa May, said she was "very concerned" over the decision not to prosecute the former Labour MP.
She said: "It's not my decision, it's an entirely independent decision for the director of public prosecutions.
"I've been very clear, in everything I've said so far about the child sex abuse issue... that I expect to see justice done."
Speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Saturday, Lord Macdonald said he had never been notified about the 2007 police investigation, for reasons which he "did not understand".
"It was apparently a serious police investigation, and it should have been absolutely clear to the lawyers in Leicestershire that this case should have been sent to London.
"I would have undoubtedly taken a look at it personally, and would have undoubtedly myself have considered the question as to whether or not Lord Janner should be charged, and I very much regret that that didn't happen."
The decision on whether or not Lord Janner should now face charges was "reasonably finely balanced", he said, adding: "I think you could justify a decision going either way frankly."
He said he had not seen all the material relating to the case, but that "in the light of the obvious...

Summary: A former director of public prosecutions has said he was "never informed" about an investigation into historical child sex allegations against former Labour MP Lord Janner.
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Article: Her Royal Highness took the baton at the Hamburg Symphony Orchestra's new home, the Elbphilharmonie concert hall.
It was part of an event where 250 schoolchildren were introduced to music in front of the Duke and Duchess.
The Royal party are due back in the UK on Friday evening, after a five-day tour that began in Poland on Monday.
On the last day of the tour, the Duchess, who comes from a musical family and played the flute at school, took the musicians through the first notes of Beethoven's fifth symphony.
The royal couple then listened to a performance of a symphony especially adapted for young people, and then went on stage to learn more about the orchestra.
Earlier, Catherine and William walked around the stage accompanying six children trying out different instruments, including a violin, flute, timpani [kettle drums] and trombone.
Later the Duke of Cambridge gave Prince George and Princess Charlotte a guided tour of a helicopter at the Airbus factory in Hamburg.
Prince George tried on a pilot's helmet while Princess Charlotte played with buttons in the cockpit.
The Duke flew helicopters when he was an air ambulance pilot.
Antoine van Gent, head of flight testing at Airbus, said: "The Duke was very relaxed showing his children the professional aircraft he uses.
"George was excited, with the first helicopter he wanted to sit in the cockpit and then he wanted to sit in the next one, he already knew there was a difference between them."
Charlotte was less impressed after taking a tumble on the concrete after leaving the aircraft but Mr van Gent said she enjoyed playing in the pilot's seat.

Summary:


A man has been charged with the murder of a woman who was found dead in a flat in the city centre.
The body of the woman, who has not been named, was found in a flat in the city centre on Monday.
Police Scotland said the woman, who is in her 40s, was found

A man has been jailed for eight-and-a-half years after being convicted of "a horrendous catalogue" of abuse against a woman for more than a decade.

Article: And when it is in a cutting edge sport like Formula 1, then teams such as Williams Martini have to make sure every penny they spend is put to best inventive use.
The UK-based team's IT director Graeme Hackland says they spend about Â£100m ($154m) a year in F1, compared with what he says is Mercedes' outlay of Â£300-350m, and Ferrari's of Â£250-300m.
But despite the spending disparity, the UK-based team, which has won the constructor's table nine times, hopes that technology, rather than splashing cash, can help them close the gap.
"We believe we can take them on," the 48-year-old South African, who has worked in F1 for 18 years, tells the BBC.
"We can't follow what Mercedes do. We want to beat people who are out-speeding us.  If you can innovate, and not just follow what other people out there are doing, then you give yourself a chance."
And Mr Hackland, who is in his second year at Williams, says that he has seen an improvement over the past 18 months, as the team has cut the lap time difference between itself and Mercedes from 1.6 seconds, to 0.8 seconds.
The team - preparing for this Sunday's US Grand Prix - now has hopes of halving that figure again, and believes the power of technology, including working with outside experts, can help shave off further tenths of seconds.
"The challenge is finding partners - those that have digital technologies that will help us get back to the front of the grid - to come and work with us," Mr Hackland says.
Whereas at one time an F1 team's mechanics were armed with nothing more than a bag of spanners and an oily rag, nowadays there are dozens of team technicians, all keenly looking at banks of screens churning out a stream of race and car data.
There are 200 sensors on the Williams F1 cars, pouring out information on things like fuel levels, oil, water, exhaust and tyre temperatures, as well as speed, engine revs per minute (RPM), clutch fluid pressure, and G-force.
However, F1 regulations mean that there can only be a certain number of team members at race trackside, so...

Summary: When your closest sporting rivals are running a business with an annual team budget worth more than three times your own, then you need to be innovative in sustaining a challenge.
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Article: If all goes as planned, the hope is it will usher in a second industrial revolution - and hundreds of new jobs.
In a high-ceilinged atrium, a faded banner cheerily welcomes visitors "to our grand opening" while signs in bright shades of lime green and purple proclaim "the future is now".
It's a clean, quiet, and largely vacant 94,000-sq-ft (8,700-sq-m) space - not unlike the factory of the future, according to its tenants, the University of Illinois Labs' Digital Manufacturing and Design Innovation Institute (DMDII).
"It's not going to be a dark and dingy shop floor," Jason Harris, DMDII's director of communications, tells me as he gestures towards half a dozen machines that have been donated by the Institute's corporate partners, including large firms like General Electric and Lockheed Martin.
With a mix of $70m (Â£46m) in federal funds and over $200m in private investment, the goal of DMDII is to apply research from the consortium's university lab partners in real-world factory settings in order to create a series of software programs and private networks that will usher US manufacturing into the digital age.
The question is whether this initiative, and others like it, will one day lead to the creation of the 200-plus jobs that were lost after Republic Windows drew down the shutters - or whether the factory of the future will be spotless, advanced - and empty.
Unveiled last month, DMDII is just one of a planned network of 15 manufacturing hubs championed by US President Barack Obama as part of his National Network for Manufacturing Innovation (NNMI).
The idea is that by investing in research into applied technologies, the US can give American manufacturers a competitive edge, which will lead to more demand for goods - and more jobs.
"Our first priority is making America a magnet for new jobs and manufacturing," he said in his State of the Union speech in 2013.
That's crucial, as US manufacturing jobs tend to be higher paying and have a "multiplier" effect. This means that the economic impact of each...

Summary: Nestled in the cavernous former site of Republic Windows, where over 200 workers staged a sit-down strike in 2008 to protest against the window manufacturer's decision to shut the plant, around three dozen people are working on an initiative that could transform the future of US manufacturing.
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Article: PC Jamie Wallis, of Dorset Police, was charged with common assault after allegedly attacking a 30-year-old man at Bournemouth Police Station in April.
Bournemouth Magistrates' Court heard the case against the 40-year-old officer had since been discontinued.
The officer was removed from front-line duties during proceedings and this will now be reviewed, the force said.
A spokesman for Crime Prosecution Service (CPS) Wessex said it had concluded there was "insufficient evidence to have a realistic prospect of conviction".
Supt Pete Windle, head of professional standards at Dorset Police, said: "Dorset Police expects the highest standards of professionalism and integrity from its staff.
"We have a duty to thoroughly investigate criminal allegations against our staff, as we have done in this case, the details of which were then passed to the Crown Prosecution Service for their consideration and decision."
PC Wallis, who is based at Winton Police Station, had been due to appear before the court on Friday.

Summary: A case against a police officer who was charged with assaulting a man at a police station has been dropped.
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Article: Michael Pepper, 67, from Glasgow, raped the woman on various occasions between 1986 and 2001.
He also hit her with a baseball bat and bottle, cut off her clothes, struck her with a knife, kicked her on the body and caused her to fall downstairs.
Pepper was also placed on the sex offenders register.
Jailing him at the High Court in Glasgow, judge Johanna Johnston QC told Pepper: "Your actions blighted this woman's life. You now accept your guilty, albeit at a late stage.
"However, this woman had to come to court and give evidence of a very private nature.
"This was a horrendous catalogue of offending."

Summary:


The UK government has announced a new £8m fund to help schools and colleges improve their energy efficiency.
The fund will be available to schools and colleges in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
The government said the money would be available to help schools and colleges improve their energy efficiency.
It will be available to

The SNP will chair two House of Commons select committees at Westminster, it has been announced.

Article: The European Commission said Britain had agreed to "modify significantly" the financing for the project, reducing the burden on British taxpayers.
In total 16 commissioners voted in favour of the project, just ahead of the 15 votes needed for approval.
EDF Energy is due to build the plant, the first in the UK in almost 20 years.
The Commission had been examining whether the funding for the project broke state aid rules.
However, it said the changes agreed by the British authorities would cut the subsidy by more than £1bn, meaning that state aid would remain "proportionate to the objective pursued, avoiding any undue distortions of competition".
The Commission said these changes made meant gains generated by the project would be better shared with UK consumers.
It estimated the project would now cost £24.5bn to build. The updated figure, much higher than the government and EDF's original £16bn forecast, includes the impact of inflation as well as interest costs for the 10 year construction period.
This is the first time that the European Commission has approved significant state aid for a new nuclear power plant - and as such, it is a big step forward for the European nuclear industry.
The decision will serve as a precedent for other countries, such as Poland and the Czech Republic, that want to know how much public money they can offer to companies as they look to expand their nuclear industries.
But the legal fight over the funding for Hinkley Point C is almost certainly not over. The European Court of Justice will be asked for an opinion.
Austria says the Commission's decision is supported by neither economic nor ecological sense.
And other member states are concerned that it flies in the face of the EU's stated aim of promoting renewable energy sources, such as wind and solar.
The government had already agreed that French firm EDF will be paid a so-called "strike price" of £92.50 for every megawatt hour of energy Hinkley C generates. This is almost twice the current wholesale cost of electricity, but this...

Summary: A new £24.5bn nuclear power station at Hinkley Point in Somerset is to go ahead after it received final approval from European Union regulators.
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Article: When the camera is disabled via the Nest smartphone app, the device's light-emitting diode (LED) turns off but the camera continues to function.
The discovery was made following analysis of the camera's power consumption.
Nest Labs said no video data was transmitted when the camera was off.
A team at ABI Research found that even when in "off" mode, the camera on the Nest Cam continued to draw a current of 340 mA, indicating that it was, in fact, still operational.
"When a device goes to power down mode, you expect the current drain to drop quite a bit," said Jim Mielke, a senior analyst at ABI Research.
"In this case, the current drain only changed slightly when given the turn off command, reducing from 370 mA to 340 mA. Typically, a shutdown or standby mode would reduce current by as much as 10 to 100 times."
The Nest Cam is the latest product from Google-owned Nest Labs. It allows users to see a live video feed of their home remotely, via their smartphone.
The device also has automatic motion and audio sensors, which can detect unusual activity and then alert the user via a notification.
"When Nest Cam is turned off from the user interface (UI), it does not fully power down, as we expect the camera to be turned on again at any point in time," said Nest Labs in a statement.
"With that said, when Nest Cam is turned off, it completely stops transmitting video to the cloud, meaning it no longer observes its surroundings."
The statement added that the Nest Cam used 128-bit secure sockets layer (SSL) encryption, perfect forward secrecy and a 2,048-bit RSA key unique to each camera - security measures intended to ensure that video data is not accessible, even over the local wi-fi network.

Summary: Researchers have discovered the camera in the Nest Cam security device is always operating - even when turned off by the user.
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Article: The Investing in the Teaching Workforce programme aims to allow some teachers over the age of 55 to retire early.
Teachers who have qualified since 2012 will then be eligible to apply for the jobs their retirements create.
It will cost £8m, which is being made available through the public sector transformation fund.
It was originally announced last December by Mr Weir's predecessor John O'Dowd, who wanted to spend £33m to enable 500 teachers to retire and be replaced.
But the scheme was delayed due to lack of agreement over some of the criteria, including the definition of the term newly-qualified - and it has also been scaled back.
The scheme will initially run on a pilot basis for the 2016-17 academic year, but may be renewed in 2017-18 if funding is available.
A number of experienced teachers in temporary posts had expressed concern they would not be eligible to apply for the jobs.
Mr Weir said he was aware some teachers who did not meet the criteria would be disappointed.
"However I must stress that without this scheme these employment opportunities would not exist," he said.
"As well as helping to refresh the teaching workforce, it will provide up to 120 job opportunities for recently qualified teachers who have been unable to obtain permanent teaching posts."
The Department of Education (DE) said that any jobs created under the scheme are unlikely to be advertised until 2017.
The move was welcomed by Irish National Teachers' Organisation Northern Secretary Gerry Murphy.
"INTO recognises the pilot scheme falls short of what many teachers not in permanent posts would have wanted," he said.
"However, as a teacher's union, we welcome any move that secures full time, meaningful employment for teachers."

Summary: A scheme to replace 120 older teaching staff with newly-qualified teachers has been launched by Education Minister Peter Weir.
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Article: Nationalist MPs will take control of the UK Parliament's energy and climate change select committee and Scottish affairs select committee.
The SNP won 56 of the 59 Westminster constituencies at the general election two weeks ago.
That resulted in the party being the third largest, behind the Conservatives and Labour.
Parliamentary convention dictates that the official third largest party at Westminster gets to chair a number of select committees.
SNP chief whip Mike Weir said both committees were especially important to Scotland in this parliament.
He said: "We will be seeing one of the major bills coming forward in the Scotland Bill on more powers for Scotland, and of course the energy and climate change committee is of particular importance with our oil and gas sector and renewables industry.
"The SNP chairing these committees will allow us to make progress on these important issues, and will help us get the best deal for Scotland."

Summary: