There are plenty of incredible restaurants in Cambridgeshire that deserve a bit more praise.
The Michelin Guide has just announced the new restaurants that have been awarded Michelin Stars for 2026. Two restaurants in Cambridgeshire that were awarded Michelin Stars in the past have managed to hold onto the coveted award.
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Midsummer House, which has two stars, and Restaurant Twenty Two, which has one star, have both been able to maintain the high standards of food and service to keep their stars. Both restaurants can be found in Cambridge, offering impressive set menus for those wanting to celebrate a special occasion.
Even though Cambridgeshire only has two food spots recognised by the guide, the county has plenty of places that are still worth visiting for a meal out with friends and family. CambridgeshireLive wants its readers to share their favourite restaurants in Cambridgeshire.
If there is a restaurant that you love because of its service or unique dishes, we want you to nominate them using our survey. A restaurant might stand out to you thanks to its beautiful interior design or high-quality food.
If there is a restaurant that you believe deserves more attention or even a Michelin Star, you can nominate them using our survey below. If the survey does not appear for you, you can open it in a new tab.
Noah was 14 when his naked body was found in a storm drain tunnel in North Belfast in 2020, six days after he left home on his bike to meet two friends
Northwood Park area of North Belfast
Questions have been raised at an inquest as to why the PSNI did not provide a water sample from the storm drain where Noah Donohoe’s body was found.
The pathologist who conducted the 14-year-old’s postmortem examination said an additional test “would be supportive and helpful” but would not have changed her conclusion that Noah drowned.
On Tuesday, two other pathologists told the jury at the inquest into Noah’s death at Belfast Coroner’s Court they agreed that the boy’s cause of death was drowning, and that he had likely died closer to the time of his disappearance than to the discovery of his body.
Noah, a pupil at St Malachy’s College, was 14 when his naked body was found in a storm drain tunnel in north Belfast in June 2020, six days after he left home on his bike to meet two friends in the Cavehill area of the city.
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On Wednesday there was discussion of diatoms, a form of microorganism, that were found in Noah’s lungs, when the pathologists explained to the jury that the presence of these would indicate a person had drowned in natural water, as diatoms wouldn’t be found in treated or tap water.
A sample can be taken from the water a body is found in and tested for diatoms, to see if they match those found in the deceased person.
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Dr Marjorie Turner, who carried out Noah’s post-mortem examination, told the court that a diatom test from a water sample “may have come back negative but that would not change my opinion of cause of death” being drowning.
In questioning, Brenda Campbell KC, representing Fiona Donohoe, posited that in a post-mortem process there is an “opportunity in that autopsy to try and find answers” and that “opportunity might not come again”.
She acknowledged that the absence of that test “doesn’t change anyone’s opinion on the agreed cause of death” but it does “potentially deprive” us of additional information.
Former state pathologist for Northern Ireland Professor Jack Crane agreed, adding “if we had ability to compare diatoms in water and found in Noah’s body it would be supportive evidence” of the theory that he died in the storm drain.
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Dr Turner said it would sometimes be the case that a water sample would be presented at the lab along with the body, with Professor Crane saying that in his experience of dealing with “deaths occurring in rivers and lakes and so forth the expectation was that that water sample would be provided when we did the autopsy”.
Ms Campbell then presented a police document saying a PSNI officer “spoke to pathologist Dr Turner” who requested water samples, and contacted another officer to confirm a water sample was being collected.
A later document claimed officers were informed by former Coroner McCrisken in early July that a water sample was not needed.
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Dr Turner said she was “quite certain” it’s not the case that she directed that no sample was needed.
Later, Donal Lunny KC, representing the PSNI, said the officers believed it wasn’t an “urgent request” to get a water sample, to which Dr Turner said she “probably wouldn’t have used the word urgent” and the sample was “not going to be critical, but would be supportive and helpful in an ideal world”.
The pathologist further reiterated that “no matter what the result would have been it would not have altered” her conclusion of cause of death.
Also continuing to give evidence was Dr Nathaniel Cary, a Home Office registered consultant forensic pathologist, who supported Dr Turner’s prognosis of drowning.
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In a statement read to the court on Tuesday, with the caveat that it would be for an adolescent psychologist to determine, he analysed Noah’s behaviour prior to entering the culvert, when he had been seen on CCTV cycling naked.
The toxicology report on Noah’s post-mortem examination was negative for drugs.
Under questioning on Wednesday from Ms Campbell, Dr Cary said that based on his “analysis of many similar cases”, Noah’s behaviour was typical of an “acute psychotic episode”.
He said he had worked on cases where people had entered a “very strange mental state” as a result of taking drugs like cocaine where they “feel hot”, may remove clothing and “pour water over themselves”, and this behaviour can also be seen with new synthetic drugs like MDMA.
Dr Cary agreed with the proposition of Ms Campbell that analysis of Noah’s behaviour would have to be taken into account with the negative toxicological report from the post-mortem as well as other evidence in the inquest.
Dr Turner said that when asking for a toxicological screen it would check for a “wide range” of drugs but “not entirely exhaustive particularly in relation to new ‘so-called designer’ drugs”.
“In this instance all findings were negative but there are some drugs that they will not have been able to test for,” she said.
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She added that “some drugs are unstable in blood” and can continue to break down after someone has died, meaning they would have “disappeared in his blood therefore we cannot completely exclude that as a possibility, either”.
All three agreed that psychiatrists would be better placed to speak on Noah’s behaviour and toxicologists on the intricacies of that analysis, and possible impact of synthetic drugs, and it was said that the jury will hear from those experts at a later date.
The experts were also in agreement over analysis of potential trauma to Noah’s brain.
Dr Turner said there was “no visible abnormality” to the 14-year-old schoolboy’s brain and “no evidence of any trauma at all” beyond light exterior bruising.
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Prof Crane said there was “no apparent injury to the brain at all”, but it is “theoretically possible” to get a “concussive-type injury without any abnormality being seen”.
Dr Cary said he had “never seen” behaviour like Noah’s before his death, resulting from a head injury “of this nature, especially given there was no injury to the brain apparent”.
Teachers at Llantwit Major High are walking out on Thursday with a second strike next week if talks fail
A Welsh secondary school will be closed to most pupils as teachers go on strike on Thursday. Members of the NEU are walking out in a row over a cut in the time they are given to prepare lessons and mark work.
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The NEU said around 30 members will be on strike with a picket line outside the school first thing. The Vale of Glamorgan Council, which runs the 900-pupil school for 11- to 18-year-olds, confirmed it will be shut to most pupils on March 12.
Union officials said members voted overwhelmingly for strike action after the school and governors confirmed a decision to cut planning, preparation, and assessment time (PPA) to the absolute stautory minimum allowed. For our free daily briefing on the biggest issues facing the nation sign up to the Wales Matters newsletter here.
Those times depend on the number of hours individual teachers are contracted to work.
In Wales teachers are statutorily entitled to a minimum of 10% of their timetabled teaching time for PPA, which must take place during the school day.
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This time is non-contact, must be in blocks of at least 30 minutes, and cannot be used for cover. Some schools offer above the stautory minimum.
“Our members are clear that by taking this action longstanding behavioural issues at the school will get worse as sufficient PPA time is essential for dealing with these issues,” the NEU said.
“Whilst there have been meetings between union officials, the school leadership, and local authority, and despite numerous warnings that taking this action would result in strike action, the school have decided to proceed with this cut regardless.”
Daniel Maney, senior Wales organiser for the National Education Union Cymru, said the mood among those on strike was “resolute” with another walkout planned for March 19 if no resolution is reached.
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He acknowledged pupils were approaching a key exam period.
”NEU members have taken strike action due to a lack of commitment on protecting existing terms and conditions,” Mr Maney said.
“Our members are not asking for anything unreasonable – just to be treated fairly and in keeping with longstanding entitlements. We remain committed to reaching a negotiated outcome but equally will not stand by when they are facing detriment.”
He said there were longstanding behavioural issues at the school including “unruly behaviour and disrespect to teachers”.
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While the union acknowledged the head and school leadership were taking measures to address this he said cutting planning and preparation time would only make these matters worse.
When the school was last inspected in 2017 it was rated ‘good’ – the second-highest outcome possible – by inspectors.
A second teaching union, NASUWT Cymru, was meeting on Wednesday afternoon to discuss its response to the cuts to PPA.
A spokesman for the Vale of Glamorgan Council said: “Llantwit Major School will be closed to most pupils on Thursday, March 12, due to industrial action being taken by some staff.
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“The strike action is being coordinated by the National Education Union (NEU). The school’s leadership team, board of governors, and the Vale of Glamorgan Council have been negotiating with union representatives in the hope of avoiding this strike action but this has not been possible.”
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Sir Billy Connolly, 83, said his baby great-grandchild in Scotland gave him hope when people described the world as “a terrible place”.
Sir Billy Connolly has spoken of his joy at being a great-grandfather and how seeing a new life come into the world gives him hope for the future.
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Connolly, 83, said his baby great-grandchild in Scotland gave him hope when people described the world as “a terrible place”. An image of a baby features in his latest limited edition series of artworks, Born on a Rainy Day, The Collector Series, released today through Castle Fine Art.
The picture, titled “A Peep at the Past”, originally created between 2012-13, shows an infant playing on the floor with a snow globe like those Connolly has loved and collected for much of his life. Speaking from his home in Florida, the comedian, actor and musician who has five children and two grandchildren, said the picture now reflects his own experience of becoming a great-grandfather, and the joy of seeing a new life enter the world.
He said: “It’s a little baby person playing on the floor with one of those lovely crystal balls that change, with the snow. They’re lovely things. I used to collect them (snow globes). It’s wonderful, and these things give babies hours of entertainment and I always wonder what they see when they look in.
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“I have a baby that size in Scotland – I’m its great-grandad. I’m a great-grandfather and it’s a joy. Another life coming into the world and you’re partly to blame. It’s a great thing.
“People say ‘the world’s a terrible place’. I say ‘no it’s not’, That’s the world, up near Loch Lomond, playing with a sparkly ball. That’s the world. That’s the world that’s going to be. It’ll be in their hands.”
Connolly, who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2013, retired from comedy in 2020, and has since concentrated on creating art at his home in Florida.
Connolly has said: “Drawing has given me a new lease of life. I managed to get pictures together and people like them, which surprises me and amazes me and delights me.”
His new collectors’ series features six giclée artworks each in a “boutique edition” run of only 50, priced at £1450 each. The series has a variety of inspirations.
One was titled “Just a Thought”, after a phrase Connolly admitted he dreaded hearing during his long career in stand-up and music, whenever he thought a task was completed and he was ready to go home.
Offering an insight into the picture of a person sitting pondering, he said: “There’s been managers and people in charge of my work on the live stage – the promotion side of things – who seem to think they know what you’re going to do. They always, when they’re talking to you, use little phrases like that – ‘Oh Billy, just a thought’.
“You think you’re finished and you want to go. You’ve got your gear packed and you hear ‘just a thought’. ‘Oh f***’. It’s just a thought – don’t panic‘.”
Other pictures in the series include “The Waving Tree” and “Waiting To Be Discovered”, which was inspired by archaeological excavation programmes Connolly loves watching on TV. Another, “Angel And Pillar Of Salt”, depicts the Biblical tale of Lot’s wife who was turned to salt as a punishment for disobeying the angels’ warning.
And “A Chat At The Gym” depicts two women combining their exercise routine with a chance to laugh, chat and enjoy time away from everyday responsibilities.
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Connolly, who admits gym memberships have not always been the best use of his time or money, added: “If you go to a gym anywhere, you’ll see those two people. These are women, messing about, passing a ball to each other and not really building their bodies or getting fit. They’re having a laugh, having a chat.”
“They’re going through the motions of doing exercises and most of the money spent on gyms is squandered – people do it up to the point where they think they’re looking right, and it’s a good thing. It does you just as much good as going for it.”
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We like: Simple to use and easy for beginners to get to grips with
We don’t like: Lacks extras
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If you want a straightforward VPN, ExpressVPN is hard to beat. It lacks a few extras offered by rivals, but those are mainly for advanced privacy needs and are unnecessary for most users.
What ExpressVPN does offer is a far-reaching server network, extending to servers in 105 countries. In our tests, it performed quickly whether accessing sites or streaming videos.
It’s also beginner-friendly. Some VPNs overwhelm with menus and technical jargon, but ExpressVPN keeps things simple, with a large on/off button front and centre.
The service supports a wide range of devices, including computers, phones, Apple TV and even Wi-Fi routers, though you’re limited to five devices per account.
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Like most VPNs, it keeps no logs of user activity. The company highlights a case in Turkey where authorities seized servers as part of an investigation, but found no data, since nothing is stored on disk.
There are no advanced features such as the ability to choose a dedicated IP address. There is, however, a useful kill switch which stops all internet traffic if the VPN disconnects unexpectedly.
The council’s 2026 garden waste subscription service is now open, with brown bin collections set to run from Tuesday, April 7, to November 13.
The annual fee is £41 for one bin, with up to three additional bins available at £27 each, plus the cost of the extra bins.
Residents who subscribe by Monday, March 23, will receive eight collections in total.
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Councillor Owen Riddle, Chair of Hartlepool Borough Council’s Neighbourhoods and Regulatory Services Committee, said: “I’d like to thank the thousands of residents who have signed up annually for this service since it was launched.
“As a local authority, we are committed to increasing our recycling rates, so we would encourage even more people to support us by subscribing as soon as possible.”
Residents signing up after March 23 will receive fewer collections but will still pay the full fee.
Cllr Riddle said: “Last year, just over 13,000 households subscribed and 1,831 tonnes of garden waste was collected and taken to be composted at a local facility.”
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Only loose, compostable garden waste should be placed in brown bins, the council say, and garden waste should not be placed in plastic bags or other packaging, as this affects the composting process.
Non-subscribers can continue to use the Household Waste Recycling Centre (HWRC) on Burn Road free of charge, although a booking system is being reintroduced.
The council says brown bin collections remain the most convenient option for regular garden waste disposal.
For more information or to subscribe, visit hartlepool.gov.uk and navigate to the garden waste subscription service.
Everyone loves fresh, everlasting flower bouquets but they aren’t the easiest arrangements to care for and their maintenance can take up a lot of time. Thankfully, there’s another option: dried flowers.
These natural blooms are a more sustainable choice, offering longevity and guaranteeing forever-artful arrangements with low maintenance. Like fresh flowers, dried blooms or preserved flowers are available in a surprising range of vivid tones. As an interiors and DIY specialist, I’ve always found them the easiest go-to option for home decoration. With Mother’s Day approaching, they also make superb gifts, since they’re hardy and travel well.
Several retailers across the UK offer beautiful bunches, from well-known names like Bloom & Wild and Lisa Angel to more boutique options such as Grace & Thorn. Prices vary widely, from as little as £11.66 to over £100 for a bouquet. These florals make lovely mantelpiece or side-table decorations, eye-catching centrepieces or simple gifts for mum and dad.
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You can read my reviews of the best dried flowers below, followed by answers to the most frequently asked questions about their care and upkeep. But first, here’s a bit more detail about how I ranked them.
Retirement used to be a time when you’d kick back and relax. Not so for the boomers spending their golden years getting nicked in the name of ‘intergenerational justice’
“I thought, ‘this is going to be huge. There’s not a person on the planet who doesn’t know Stonehenge’,” says Rajan Naidu, recounting the time when he and fellow Just Stop Oil protestor Niamh Lynch sprayed the iconic prehistoric structure with orange powder (a non-toxic blend of cornflour and food colouring). It was a stunt that went viral.
Naidu was 73, Lynch 21 – at opposite ends of their lives but united in their commitment to a cause they cared about. Afterwards, they sat silently, crosslegged by the stones in the warm June air. Time seemed to slow right down. And then they were arrested. The action didn’t stop there. It continued in every piece of press coverage, every social media post, every conversation, in their eventual acquittal.
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I’m sitting with Naidu (main picture) in the community cafe of The Old Print Works in Birmingham as he recounts all this. It’s mid-November, a fortnight since he, Lynch and Luke Watson, another activist who filmed the Stonehenge protest, were cleared of causing a public nuisance. Rain taps on the large old windows, while reggae wafts through the space. We tuck into steaming piles of chickpea curry. With his warm smile, white beard and colourful cardie, he’s not how the media might have you picture a protestor: young, shouty, looking for trouble. But he’s part of a recent wave of older protesters shifting those stereotypes.
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“Everybody is a potential activist,” Naidu tells me, cradling his coffee. “Everybody has concerns about the world, things they’d like to put right.” Fairness, he says, is an instinct we have from childhood. Growing up in London, where his family moved from India when he was a toddler, Naidu recalls his parents’ generosity, his father’s respect for others, no matter who they were, and his mother’s kindness. He spent his life working and volunteering in education, reforestation, mental health support, with stints at the Post Office and in factories. Only in his late 60s did he get involved in the kind of non-violent civil resistance that would see him led away in handcuffs “many times”.
It used to be a given that when you hit retirement age, you’d earned the right to put your feet up. Do some gentle gardening, join a choir, go on a cruise. But spending the night in a police cell, surely not? There had been grannies at Greenham Common, those silver-haired civil rights leaders, but they were generally the exception. Largely, protest was seen as the preserve of students, not pensioners.
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And yet in campaigns for disability rights, against library closures and historic building demolitions, or opposing the rise of the far right, older people are taking a stand. I’ve been to meetings for these causes where I, at 42, am one of the youngest in the room. The advanced age of placard holders was particularly notable at 2025’s Lift the Ban demonstrations that called on the government to reverse its ban on the protest group Palestine Action. Of 523 people arrested in August, more than 50% were over 60.
One of them was 75-year-old Jonathon Porritt CBE. “I think this is genuinely unique in terms of the history of social movements and campaigning of this kind. I don’t think there’s been that sort of demographic story before,” the lifelong environmentalist and former leader of the Green Party explains.
At 73, Porritt retired from his job focused on corporate sustainability, frustrated with the slow pace of change, and returned to the front line of politics. At the time of writing, he’s been arrested twice at Lift the Ban events and counting. We chat over Zoom from Chichester, where he is on a book tour for Love, Anger and Betrayal, a collection of interviews with young Just Stop Oil campaigners.
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Perhaps it’s inevitable that a generation who came of age at a time of optimism that they would make the world a better place are looking around and seeing work to be done. Porritt, a former teacher, is driven by “intergenerational justice”, the idea that meeting our needs must not come at the expense of our descendants’ ability to meet theirs.
Everybody is a potential activist. Everyone has concerns about the world
Too many older people, he says, “don’t seem to care at all about what is going to happen to young people in the future. That really does anger me, I’ll be honest, because we’ve made an appalling mess of everything,” he adds. “I don’t expect everybody to go and glue themselves to motorways to demonstrate how much they care about the climate, but I do expect them to be more respectful of and supportive of people who are taking those kinds of direct actions to focus politicians on the true nature of the crisis.”
Trudi Warner feels similarly compelled by a sharp sense of responsibility. Warner made headlines and became the inspiration for Defend Our Juries, the group behind the Lift the Ban campaign, after she was prosecuted for contempt of court sitting outside a climate activists’ trial holding a sign that read: “Jurors: you have an absolute right to acquit a defendant according to your conscience.” The charges were eventually dropped. It was with “some trepidation” that Warner, a retired children’s social worker, stepped up as an activist. “I was schooled in obedience,” she says, closing her eyes in concentration before opening them wide. “But it was something I had to do.”
The strategy of sitting with a sign is less physically demanding than other forms of protest such as marching, Warner notes. And though it can take up to eight hours of sitting before an arrest is made – a feat of endurance – older people tend to have spare time. Porritt points out that while the threats of legal sanctions are “still scary, undoubtedly”, they don’t weigh on him as they might other, younger people with fledgling careers or dependent children to consider. But there are real sacrifices, risks and consequences. Tim Hewes, a 73-year-old retired dentist and priest, spent six weeks imprisoned on remand accused of conspiring to shut down the M25 motorway during 2022 Just Stop Oil protests, as chronicled in his book, Finding Beauty Behind Bars.
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Though the prospect of doing press interviews filled her with dread, Warner came to realise that the visibility of older people like herself – former priests, rabbis, war veterans – was powerful.
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“It’s harder for the media to trash us,” she says. Their presence lends the climate and peace movements a credibility, a gravity, a sense that what they’re demanding is mainstream. The calm that older people have brought to the climate and peace movements is distinctive, too. “It’s counter cultural,”adds Warner, “because in our culture, everybody’s rushing about all the time, being noisy, being attention seeking.”
When Union, the northern school for creativity and activism, launched a call out for their first ever residency aimed at ‘elders’, due to take place in January 2026, it was booked out. Union, which had offered similar programmes for early and mid-career people, devised this partly in response to demand, partly to the rise they’d noticed in older activists. The organisation explores the role that ‘elders’ can play, how they might “hold the space” for others, as director Adrian Sinclair puts it, and what they want from this stage.
It’s not a young people’s movement. It’s not an old people’s movement. It’s a people’s movement
“What’s my legacy? What do I pass on? Those questions are important to older people.” There is also a wellbeing element to it. Studies show that a longer, healthier life isn’t just about staying active or eating well, it’s about having purpose and finding social connection, too.
Back in Birmingham, three young men in hoodies recognise Naidu from his Stonehenge coverage and ask if they can join us to chat. They are fans, full of admiration and full of questions, which Naidu answers graciously.
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“When you see me, you see this old man,” he says. “I don’t define myself in this.” But he is reluctant to talk about himself, instead talking about the “beloved community” that Martin Luther King Jr described, a community that forms through shared values, and about friends of all ages and backgrounds who have greeted him as he emerged from police stations, in the cold and dark, with a hug and a snack.
“It’s not a young people’s movement. It’s not an old people’s movement. It’s a people’s movement.”
Main image by Jaskirt Dhaliwal-Boora
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The council will soon be asking Wishaw locals to help shape their community priorities over the next decade.
Wishaw residents are set to be given the chance to create community projects for the next 10 years.
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The council will soon be asking Wishaw locals to help shape their community priorities over the next decade.
Your views will guide what NLC will focus on with local communities and partners across the public and voluntary sector, including Police Scotland, Scottish Fire & Rescue Service, NHS Lanarkshire and Voluntary Action North Lanarkshire.
As the council gets ready for this next stage, NLC are shining a light on projects that the public helped bring to life over the past few years.
These included the new outdoor gym in Overtown and the new King George V Community Garden in Wishaw.
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The council state: “A new outdoor gym in Overtown is giving local residents a free and accessible space to stay active and enjoy exercising outdoors. The project was shaped through community engagement, with residents highlighting the need for more opportunities to support health and wellbeing in the area.
“The new equipment provides a welcoming space for people of all ages to build fitness, spend time outside and connect with others in their community.
“The outdoor gym has already been well received and is becoming a popular addition to Overtown’s local amenities, reflecting ongoing investment in spaces that encourage healthier, more active lifestyles.
“The new King George V Community Garden in Wishaw was officially launched as part of Mental Health Awareness and Green Health Week, offering a welcoming space for residents to connect with nature and support their wellbeing.
“The garden was created through close collaboration with local groups, who helped shape a space designed for relaxation, community activity and outdoor learning.
“The launch event brought together partners, volunteers and community organisations who have played a key role in bringing the project to life.
“Their involvement has helped create a garden that not only enhances the local environment but also provides meaningful opportunities for people to come together, support their mental health and enjoy time outdoors.
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“The project reflects ongoing investment in community‑led spaces that promote wellbeing, connection and a healthier lifestyle for people across Wishaw.”
When I came up with an idea for a novel back in 2018 about a troubled mother and son, I needed to find an angle. I needed to find something to bring conflict and drama into the lives of these two poor souls. I tried a few different angles; I had them, first of all, trying to navigate the aftermath of a nuclear strike on Scotland but it was terrible – like a fanfiction version of The Road.
Next, I had the boy, Jamie, being found dead in his room and his mother trying to piece the story of his dodgy online life together to try and find out why. I knew right away with that one that killing off a main character in the first couple of pages wasn’t the way forward. While reading an article about a new online community known as incels, as I tore my hair out over the book, I knew I’d found my hook.
Incel is short for Involuntary Celibate. Generally, it means a person, almost always a man, who regards themselves as being involuntarily celibate because they are unable to attract a romantic or sexual partner. For some incels, they say this is because of how they look; because they aren’t tall enough, because they have a weak chin or because their eyes aren’t positioned in what they believe is the most desirable position on their face.
For others, they say it’s because women aren’t attracted to them because they are of low status – because they aren’t high-status, alpha ‘Chads’ (think of the opposite of an incel, a successful, tall, handsome, promiscuous man.)
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I dove headfirst into researching the world of incels. I watched documentaries, read articles, books and papers on the subject and scoured their forums to pick up their terminology.
Having been on the internet for a long time, I consider myself pretty much unshockable and desensitised but even I felt harrowed and uneasy, disgusted even, by what I read in their online spaces.
Their hatred towards women was so visceral and frightening. They detailed their deranged and violent fantasies, involving women they knew, sometimes even family members. They lauded mass shooters, even hailing one of them as a sort of quasi-deity. They spoke to each other as if they hated each other, almost as much as they hated themselves.
It was hard to feel sorry for them. I thought to myself that these guys were beyond help. But something kept me coming back to reading through their forums. After a while I began to think, ‘How have they ended up like this?’
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I began to delve deeper and began reading lengthy posts where young guys opened up about their home lives, childhoods and mental health. Time and time again, these boys would write of their upbringings which were littered with abuse, poverty, bullying, loneliness and often learning difficulties. To me, it painted a bleak picture of lost boys searching in the wrong places for a bit of human interaction.
And ready to prey on these boys were far more sinister men. These men encouraged the boys to blame their problems on women and to seek retribution for it. They detailed ways in which to make the women they may encounter in their day to day lives uncomfortable.
They were egging on these obviously very vulnerable boys, luring them deeper into their toxic worldview until they had them, essentially, brainwashed; fully malleable and compliant, ready to do whatever the men wanted out of fear of being ostracised from the only community they had or of being blackmailed. If this was what I was seeing being written on public forums, it’s hard to even comprehend what might be going on in their private messages to one another or what was happening in other, less accessible parts of the internet.
While their troubled childhoods and desire to be part of a community might go some way towards explaining their online behaviour, it can’t excuse it. These boys need to help themselves if they really do want to break away from these toxic online environments. I suppose this is easier said than done and in an ideal world it would be as simple as that.
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But in the world we live in, where misogyny isn’t just confined to dark corners of the internet but is instead rampant and ever present, I believe it’s down to men to help tackle the problem.
Good male role models are in short supply. The ones that are out there struggle to cut through the noise made by the likes of Andrew Tate who present a cartoonish, ridiculous version of masculinity which, to a thirteen year old boy, looks like the coolest and most aspirational thing ever. But role models don’t have to be celebrities or influencers.
As men, we should be doing our best to set good examples for the boys and other men in our lives, to show them a positive version of masculinity. We all have friends, brothers, cousins, colleagues and classmates who maybe look to us for guidance. While we’ll all have acted in ways we’re not proud of and we’ll all have said things which make us feel a sharp pang of guilt when we are reminded of them, we’re all more than capable of trying to be better than that.
As I wrote my novel, I grew more and more interested in men in general. I pondered over what a makes a good man and still can’t quite come up with an answer.
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Is being a good man just not doing bad things?
Is the bar for us that low?
Is it just as simple as being a good person?
I began to ask myself if I could say, hand on heart, that I am a good man. The answer to that is – I don’t know. But I do know I want to be a better man. I implore you to ask yourself the same.
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Martin Lewis has urged everyone with a mobile phone to dial a five-digit code and screengrab the result
It’s so rare that you’ll know someone who doesn’t own a mobile phone these days. These little squares have become a vital component of daily life, which is why it can be all the more annoying when they get stolen.
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The devices that feel like that our whole lives are in, can be snatched in the blink of an eye and be a major inconvenience. And with technological advancements, it’s easier for thieves to target bank accounts.
But there are ways owner can protect their devices, as well as important information and one way to do this is by using a simple code. The useful tip has been backed by finance guru Martin Lewis, who previously explained why every phone owner should dial it as soon as, reports the Express.
The Money Saving Expert founder shared this advice on his ITV show in 2025, following reports at the time that phone thefts have surged by 40 percent, as criminals increasingly target individuals’ financial information via their mobile devices.
He stressed the importance of immediate action to secure handsets against unauthorised access in the event of theft, thereby reducing the risk of thieves draining bank accounts through stolen phones.
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Martin advised viewers to modify key settings on iPhone, Samsung and Google phones for enhanced protection, including text message settings.
Speaking on his March 11 episode of Martin Lewis Money Show Live last year, he said: “Mobile security tips – thefts are up 40 percent in London but they’re going up right across the country too.
“Now the crucial thing, they’re not just trying to nick your phone, some of them are trying to access your financial data from your phone.”
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“You have to protect yourselves on this, folks.”
Martin recommended the use of remote tracking apps such as Apple’s Find My, Samsung’s SmartThings or Google Android’s Find My Device to locate stolen phones and suspend payments.
He further suggested enabling biometric features like fingerprint ID sign-in on both mobile devices and banking apps, and emailing oneself a screenshot after dialling the provided code.
Martin advised: “Now, this one sounds a bit peculiar. Dial *#06# to get your IMEI image then take a screenshot and save it.
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“That’s what you’ll need to provide to the police if your phone is stolen. Screenshot it and assuming you can access your email not just on your phone, I would just email it to yourself so you’ve got a copy somewhere.”
Lastly, Martin emphasised that ‘possibly the most crucial’ tip is to ensure two-factor authentication does not appear on your lock screen.
He explained: “Many people have that appear on their lock screen so when your phone’s locked, the code still appears. You don’t want that. It means if someone gets your phone they can get the code. So what you need to do to prevent that is turn off your ‘preview notifications’. It will still tell you you’ve had a message but it won’t display your code on your message. Everyone please do that one. It’s a nightmare if you’ve not done it.”
The Martin Lewis Money Show Live episode from March 11, 2025, is still available for viewing via ITVX.
