Return to the residents of Recession Road

The garage owner

Secret talks with Ulster Unionists were to 'devise electoral pact'

The Conservatives were forced on to the defensive yesterday over secret talks that the party hosted between Northern Ireland's two main Unionist parties this month.

Poet?s ?life-enhancing? tribute to dead wife, A Scattering, wins Costa

A slim, quietly devastating volume of poetry written as a tribute to the poet?s dead wife won the Costa Book of the Year award last night, one of Britain?s most important literary prizes.

Eric Cantona confident he will score in 90 minutes of drama

Fifteen years ago this week Eric Cantona left an indelible mark on English football with a kung-fu kick at a spectator. Last night he was hoping for a more peaceful but no less significant imprint on French theatre with his stage debut in Paris.

Gap between rich and poor 'at its widest since the war'

The divide between rich and poor is greater after 13 years of Labour rule than at any time since the Second World War, according to the Government?s own report into inequality.

Middle England applauds velvet courage with a scorpion's sting

The most electrifying moment of the whole Chilcot inquiry, as seen from the cheap seats in the public gallery, came just after 3pm yesterday when Elizabeth Wilmshurst, late of the Foreign Office, picked up her slim blue binder and prepared to leave.

Recession Q&A: Has it really ended, and why has it lasted so long?

How bad is it?

1,000 days after disappearance, Madeleine McCann inspires Armitage poem

One thousand days after she disappeared, Madeleine McCann has inspired a poem by Simon Armitage, the writer widely regarded as the runner-up for last year?s poet laureateship.

Care home manager Rachel Baker asked resident: 'Shall we end it all now?'

The drug-addicted manager of a care home for the elderly may have had a ?bizarre and perverted? desire to control the ?terminal destinies? of two elderly women when she gave them lethal injections of painkillers, a court was told yesterday.

There is fundamental uncertainty in climate change, science tsar says

The impact of global warming has been exaggerated by some scientists and there is an urgent need for more honest disclosure of the uncertainty of predictions about the rate of climate change, according to the Government?s chief scientific adviser.

Nato aid effort puts lives at risk in Afghanistan, say charities

Nato?s billion-dollar aid budget is putting lives at risk and undermining the long-term prospects for stability in Afghanistan, according to a damning report.

We?re still being held back, admits Darling, as economy grows 0.1%

Alistair Darling, the Chancellor, acknowledged last night that the anaemic 0.1 per cent growth during the last three months of 2009 will place the economy squarely at the heart of the general election campaign.