Some victims of disgraced undertaker Robert Bush have not been refunded for fake funeral plans he sold to them, a court has heard.

The 48-year-old defrauded 172 people over 11 years to the tune of £562,000, Hull Crown Court was told.

He previously admitted 67 offences in relation to his business, Legacy Independent Funeral Directors in Hull, including failing to bury and cremate people, theft from 12 charities, fraudulent trading in funeral plans, and fraud.

On the fourth day of his sentencing hearing, one woman said her parents, who paid £2,649 each for funeral plans, were not alive “to see the justice they deserved”. Another said she had not been refunded £5,000 for two policies.

This story contains details some might find distressing.

Wiping her eyes with a tissue, Maxine Hill told Mr Justice Hilliard the bank refused to refund the money fraudulently taken by Bush, whom she knew personally.

Bush visited both her parents, Margaret and John, in their own home and issued a handwritten receipt to her mother who paid him in cash.

The bank initially refunded the amount paid by Hill’s father but 90 days later, the bank took the money back saying “there was no evidence that he hadn’t received a product”, the court heard.

Both have since died – Margaret in May 2024 and John in June 2025.

If you’re looking for a curve-friendly wedding guest dress, Alison Hammond has answered with her latest This Morning outfit – a £65 polka dot maxi dress that ‘feels luxurious’

The search for a great wedding guest dress can be a tricky one, especially if you fall into the plus size category, but more high street brands are now expanding their sizing range to be inclusive. A perfect example is Next, which now offers most of its clothes in sizing ranging from six to 26.

But Alison Hammond has answered the question of what to wear for a wedding with her latest This Morning outfit. On Wednesday’s episode, Alison wore the Chocolate Brown Spot Satin Maxi Dress which is just £65 and works for multiple special occasions.

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The Next Satin Maxi Dress is available in sizes six to 26, as well as sizes 10-20 in the tall range – although some sizes are selling out quickly. As well as Alison’s chocolate brown polka dot print, it also comes in champagne, navy blue and dark green, and it’s just the right combination of luxurious and elegant without being too extravagant.

To make the dress more daytime TV-friendly, Alison paired her dress with a pair of chocolate brown and bronze Anais Pointed T-Bar Flats from Air & Grace, but for evening events and formal occasions, a pair of metallic heels and a statement clutch bag would instantly elevate it. You could even pack it for your next holiday, styling it with some gladiator sandals and a statement necklace for evenings out.

It comes in a lightweight satin material with a hammered finish, which gives it a luxe-look, and features a ruched knot detail around the waist which creates a flattering silhouette. The Next Satin Maxi Dress also has wide, flared sleeves for some added drama, and a rounded neckline.

There are some other beautiful occasion dresses to shop right now too, including this £129 Green Diamond Print Toria Dress from Never Fully Dressed which is available in sizes six to 28, with a gathered front and draped sleeves. Alternatively, ASOS’ Draped Long Sleeve Cross Front High Neck Satin Maxi Dress which comes in a beautiful green shade for £65, with cape-style sleeves and a draped column silhouette.

However Alison’s Chocolate Brown Spot Satin Maxi Dress is a hit with shoppers, with one person saying: “Gorgeous dress, feels very luxurious and will be perfect for the wedding I’m attending this autumn.”

Another agreed: “The style is very flattering to the “fuller figure”, whilst a third added: “I bought this dress to attend an awards dinner & ceremony and it was great. A lovely rich colour and very flattering and elegant.”

One Next shopper did say, however: “This is a beautiful dress, but really quite heavy weight. More suitable for a autumn/ winter party, not 30 degrees plus summer evening, so regretfully returned.”

And another complained: “Very disappointed for a dress of this price I would have expected better. The design was large polka dots but the were not matched properly and this was very noticeable at the front.”

However, others loved it, saying: “These dresses are beautiful, flattering, drape beautifully, lovely material, lovely colour (navy) and best of all a really good price, look far more expensive than they are.”

A drone strike ignited a fire that engulfed two gas vessels at Egypt’s Mediterranean port of Damietta, the Egyptian cabinet confirmed on Thursday, stating the blaze was the result of an attack rather than an accident.

The incident, which occurred near the strategically vital Suez Canal – a crucial evacuation route for Saudi oil to global markets – has yet to be claimed by any party.

Authorities have launched an investigation and are implementing measures to safeguard Egypt’s national security. British maritime security firm Ambrey had initially assessed on Wednesday that a drone struck a US-owned gas storage tanker at the port, raising concerns about a potential escalation of conflict across the Middle East.

Trading sources familiar with the event identified the affected vessels as the floating storage tanker Energos Winter and the Gaslog Salem, with the fire reportedly starting on the starboard side of the Energos Winter before spreading.

The drone attack unfolded shortly after Iran launched a missile strike against US forces in Jordan, and following retaliatory actions by Washington and Saudi Arabia against Iran-backed paramilitary groups in Iraq.

US president Donald Trump had threatened retaliation against Iran, while Yemen’s Houthi group declared a naval blockade on Saudi Arabia, indicating a widening of the conflict since the US and Israel began bombing Iran in February.

Egypt’s petroleum ministry confirmed on Wednesday that the fires were swiftly brought under control by firefighting and security teams, with no injuries or fatalities reported. Petroleum Minister Karim Badawi visited the site to oversee the response efforts.

The Energos Winter, a floating storage and regasification unit, is owned by US-based Energos Infrastructure and managed by Wilhelmsen Ship Management, a Singapore-based subsidiary of Norway’s Wilhelmsen Group.

The incident arrives at a sensitive juncture for Egypt’s gas market. Having become an LNG exporter following the development of the giant Zohr offshore gas field, Egypt has recently reverted to being a significant LNG buyer due to declining domestic production and surging demand. Any prolonged disruption could significantly impact LNG traders, affecting demand and spot prices.

Sources indicate that the vessels are expected to remain out of service for an extended period, with one reporting a breach in a tank on the Energos Winter, potentially prolonging repair work.

The Energos Winter possesses a regasification capacity of approximately 450 million cubic feet per day, which accounts for roughly 7 per cent of Egypt’s daily gas consumption and 16 per cent of its total LNG receiving and regasification capacity, according to Egyptian consultancy ElAdl Studies.

While the outage is not anticipated to create an immediate supply gap, given Egypt’s alternative import facilities and fuel options, it will reduce spare capacity during a period of peak summer demand.

Potential mitigation strategies include maximising other regasification units, increasing the use of fuel oil as a backup, tapping into renewable energy capacity, and, as a last resort, temporarily reducing gas supplies to certain industrial sectors.

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Malaysia has started documenting and screening thousands of detained Myanmar nationals as part of a repatriation program agreed with Myanmar, Home Minister Saifuddin Nasution said Thursday.

Saifuddin said Myanmar had committed to accept up to 5,000 of its citizens currently living in Malaysia and an unspecified number currently in Cox’s Bazar, a town in south east Bangladesh.

Malaysia had identified up to 4,000 Myanmar nationals in its 19 detention depots, who will be moved to a single site for security screening and documentation purposes, he said.

“We will certainly meet the target of 5,000 individuals once this process is complete,” Saifuddin told to reporters, adding that the foreign ministry will handle the next stage of the repatriation process with Myanmar.

Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim had said Wednesday that those being repatriated were Rohingya refugees.

“People ask why we do not simply send them back. Send them where? Myanmar had refused to accept them before. Now, because of our good relations with Myanmar, they have agreed to take back 5,000 from Malaysia,” Anwar was cited as saying by the New Straits Times.

However, Saifuddin, who did not explicitly identify the 5,000 individuals as Rohingya, said only Myanmar nationals with refugee status were being repatriated.

Foreign ministry officials could not be immediately reached for comment.

Mohammed Mizanur Rahman, a commissioner for refugee, relief and repatriation in Cox’s Bazar, told The Associated Press by phone that he was not aware of any repatriation of Rohingya from Bangladesh.

In Naypyitaw, the capital of Myanmar, officials also rejected reports that the government would accept Rohingyas.

Han Win Aung, director-general of the ASEAN department at Myanmar’s Foreign Affairs Ministry, said the repatriation program was focused solely on verified Myanmar nationals currently held in detention centers in Malaysia.

Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, does not recognize the Rohingya as one of the country’s 135 lawful ethnic minorities, instead referring to them as Bengalis to imply they are natives from Bangladesh and are illegally settled in Myanmar.

“This is not about bringing back Bengalis. There are Myanmar nationals who are being held in detention centers in Malaysia for various reasons,” Han Win Aung told the AP. “Both sides are still at the stage of coordinating to repatriate only those whose identity as genuine Myanmar citizens has been verified.”

Money worries can keep us up at night, but could decades of financial stress leave a lasting mark on the brain itself? That’s the question my colleagues and I set out to answer in a new study – and the answer, it turns out, is yes.

Most research on money and brain health looks at people’s financial circumstances at just one point in time. This makes it hard to know whether a few difficult years have the same effect as decades of enduring struggle. For our study, published in the journal Innovation in Aging, we tracked the same people throughout their adult lives to find out.

We used data from the MRC National Survey of Health and Development, also known as the 1946 British birth cohort study. A cohort study follows a group of people born in the same period throughout their lives. This is the world’s longest continuously running study of its kind, tracking thousands of people born in one week in March 1946 – participants who celebrated their 80th birthdays earlier this year.

The study’s origins go back to the economic anxieties of the 1930s, when the Great Depression left many families worrying about money and the cost of raising children – making it a fitting dataset to revisit those same questions decades later. Using this rich resource, we examined the financial circumstances of 2,759 participants at multiple points across adulthood.

Participants reported their household income at ages 26, 43 and 53. We classed those in the bottom 20% of the group on at least two of these occasions as having persistent low income – about one in six people. Separately, we measured financial hardship by asking whether people struggled to manage on their income or had trouble paying bills, at least twice between ages 36 and 53. This applied to about one in eight.

At age 53, participants took tests of verbal memory and processing speed. A smaller group also had brain scans between ages 69 and 71, which let us measure brain atrophy (shrinkage) and ventricular expansion – the widening of fluid-filled cavities within the brain, a recognised marker of poor brain health.

We found that people who had experienced more financial hardship and low income scored lower on the cognitive tests at age 53. These links held even after we accounted for their childhood thinking skills, education and childhood disadvantage. Among those who had brain scans, persistent low income was linked to greater brain shrinkage in later life.

When we looked at how memory changed from age 53 to 69, those who had faced persistent hardship actually showed slower decline over that period. We believe this is because they had already lost more ground by age 53 – they started from a lower point, so there was less left to lose.

We also found that the link between financial adversity and brain shrinkage was stronger for men, for those who grew up in disadvantaged homes, and for carriers of a gene that raises the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.

For men of this generation – born in 1946, when the male breadwinner model was the norm – the pressure of being the main earner may have made financial stress more acute. Disadvantaged men also had higher rates of smoking and drinking than disadvantaged women.

The finding on genetic risk suggests that people who are already biologically vulnerable may be more susceptible to the effects of financial strain. These subgroup findings are based on smaller numbers within our sample, so we are treating them as suggestive rather than conclusive.

Why would money worries harm the brain?

How might financial hardship affect the brain over time? Chronic stress is known to increase inflammation, which accelerates brain ageing. There is also the simple fact that constantly worrying about money uses up mental energy, leaving less capacity for other thinking tasks – a cognitive load that competes with everything else the brain is trying to do.

We acknowledge that our study cannot prove cause and effect, and the results, drawn from a single generation of British adults, may not apply directly to other populations or countries. But following the same people over many years gives us a clearer picture than studies that only look at a single moment in time.

Financial hardship is increasingly recognised as one of several factors – alongside things such as hearing loss, smoking and physical inactivity – that may shape our risk of cognitive decline in later life. Our findings suggest that reducing chronic financial hardship among working-age adults, wherever they live, could help protect brain health and potentially reduce dementia cases in the future.

PRAGUE (AP) — Keepers at Prague Zoo used tons of ice on Thursday to give its animals some much-needed relief as yet another heat wave hit Europe.

Polar bears Aleut and Gregor wasted no time and were rolling in the beds of ice cubes after entering their outside enclosure.

The twins looked to have fun with the ice treat that was meant to keep them cool amid the extreme temperatures forecast to soar to 38 degrees Celsius (100.4 degrees Fahrenheit) later in the day.

“The bears cool off with it and at the same time it’s an enrichment of their life in the zoo,” said zoo spokesperson Filip Mašek.

The zoo began providing ice to some of the animals two years ago in response to climate change and the increasing number of days with extreme temperatures.

The polar bears, who were born in Nuremberg, Germany, 16 years ago and have adapted to the European climate, were the ones who enjoyed it the most.

This year, the plan was to order ice for the animals in July and August, which are traditionally the hottest months. But the first heat wave struck early and the Czech Republic experienced its hottest day ever with 41.9 C (107.4 F) on June 28.

“The weather keeps surprising us,” Mašek said. He said the ice will be ready sooner next year. “We’ve been taught a lesson.”

Other animals that have benefited from the provision of ice to keep cool in previous years include otters, elephants and parrots.

Some animals in the zoo are used to heat, others could stay in the shade or inner enclosures and use various pools to keep cool. Gorillas were given pieces of ice with frozen fruits in the previous years.

Four people died trying to cross the Channel in small boats overnight, French officials have said.

One man died after a vessel capsized off France’s northern coast late on Wednesday, with a one-year-old child among those injured.

Separately, three people were found dead aboard a small boat early on Thursday after launching from Dunkirk overnight, some 100km (62 miles) up the coast.

French officials confirmed their deaths after several hundred people crossed the Channel into the UK on Wednesday.

The first boat capsized off the coast at Hardelot around 23:30 local time (21:30 GMT) on Wednesday.

The man is thought to have been in his thirties or forties, officials added. Six other people including the child sustained minor injuries.

Local officials said the vessel was a “taxi” boat – vessels which cruise along the coast and pick up their paying customers who are waiting in the sea.

Security officials “neutralised” the boat and an investigation into the incident has been launched.

The second boat launched from the Dunkirk area overnight and was spotted near a breakwater off the coast at 06:00, the French coastguard said.

Search and rescue officials subsequently found three unconscious people on board. Their deaths were later confirmed by emergency medical personnel.

A UK government spokesperson said: “Every death in the Channel is a tragedy and a stark reminder of the dangers posed by criminal gangs exploiting vulnerable people for profit.”

What’s in my cabinet now? Prequel Gleanser (£20, Spacenk.com) my must-try, non-stripping, glycerin cleanser for the face and body; the Prequel Multi-Quench serum (£30, Spacenk.com), a multi-level, rehydrating formula with dual-weight polyglutamic acid, glycerin, osmolytes and ectoin, plus Prequel AM/PM moisturiser (£20, Spacenk.com).

There are plenty of places to grab a bite to eat across the week

The Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann is right around the corner, and with so many events on across the week, you will build up a hunger.

There are so many fantastic food options across Belfast, and there are plans to open several pop-up food markets alongside the well-established markets throughout the city to meet the demand.

With so much happening, we have broken down all of the major food markets taking place across the city in one easy place for you.

Craic & Craft Food Market at ICC Belfast

Set just outside this busy competition and performance venue, the Craic and Craft Market offers a unique opportunity to experience Northern Ireland’s artisan food, drink, and craft producers alongside family-friendly entertainment.

Opening hours: Sunday, August 2, to Wednesday, August 5: 10am–5pm Thursday, August 6, to Sunday, August 9: 10am–10pm

Visitors can enjoy: Street food vendors, Artisan stalls, Family activities, Ferris wheel, Live music, Space to relax between competitions and sessions.

St George’s Market

Enjoy musical performances, dancing, artisan arts and crafts and street food at the market.

During the Fleadh, St George’s Market will be open: Sunday, August 2, from 10am to 3pm, and Monday, August 3, to Wednesday, August 5, from 10am to 5pm, and Thursday, August 6, to Sunday, August 9, from 10am to 10pm.

Fleadh food and drink village

A food and drink village beside Belfast Cathedral, operated by Market Place Europe on behalf of Belfast City Council, will provide a dedicated destination for local traders, producers and growers to showcase their flavours to visitors.

The family-friendly space will be open from 11am to 6pm on Sunday, August 2, and Sunday, August 9, 10am to 8pm from Monday, August 3, to Wednesday, August 5, and 10am to 11pm from Thursday, August 6, to Saturday, August 8.

It will include a delicious, diverse menu celebrating the region’s unique flavours and the best local ingredients, alongside relaxed, communal seating, a covered dining area and a performance space for live music, providing the soundtrack to your snack.

North Street carpark

North Street Car Park, which falls in the pedestrian zone, will swap cars for craic as a pop-up ‘Fleadh hub’ will host guests from August 2-9.

Fleadh Cheoil is the world’s biggest celebration of Irish music and culture, hosted in Belfast for the very first time – competitors from all over the world will showcase the very best of traditional music, song, dance and language in All-Ireland competitions.

The Fleadh at North St. will host live traditional music every day, serve Heineken and Beamish at the bar, and offer local street food and artisan coffee during the eight-day celebrations.

According to the Fleadh guide, it will be open from 3pm until late.

Titanic Quarter Night Market and Titanic Food Festival

Further along the Maritime Mile, a packed programme of activities will also get tastebuds tingling, with the Titanic Quarter Night Market (4pm to 10pm, Thursday 6 and Friday 7 August) and the Titanic Food Festival (11am to 5pm, Saturday 8 and Sunday 9 August).

Common Market

Common Market has become a fan favourite for its raft of food stalls in the popular market and it gets even better for the week of the Fleadh.

With spots like Phat Dragon, Wing Society and Sal’s mixed with hours of live entertainment in collaboration with 39 Gordon Street, it’s going to become the spot to be.

They are set to have a week of unforgettable celebrations of Irish music, culture, food, and great craic! Join them for live traditional music, fantastic local vendors, delicious food, and a brilliant atmosphere for all ages.

HALT at Weaver’s Cross

From Sunday 2nd August to Sunday 9th August, HALT is the place to soak up the atmosphere with live music, incredible food and great company.

With 7 amazing food vendors, ice-cold drinks and one of Belfast’s best outdoor spaces, there’s no better place to enjoy the week.

Around 100 local businesses will also be selling their wares through successful applications for street trading – 60 inside the pedestrianised event zone, at High Street, Bridge Street and Royal Avenue, and a further 40 outside of this special scheme.

Many more will be extending their premises with additional outdoor space for food and drink, as well as longer opening hours to offer live music and other entertainment.

Keep an eye out for Fleadh-Friendly signs in windows across the city centre. Tons of local spots will be running their own exclusive taster menus, festival offers and pop-up acoustic sets.

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