I didn’t see being a couple of years away from technically qualifying for an 18-30s jaunt to be a problem. But the booze, humiliation and a ‘mystery pooer’ made me rethink my entire life

‘First the bad news,” yelled our lairy Irish club rep as the coach drove us from Ibiza airport to our hotel. “All the great clubs: Amnesia, Space, Pacha … they’re CLOSED!”

A confused silence descended. “But the good news?” he yelled. “We’re gonna have a fucking amazing time anyway!!!”

As the all-inclusive holiday has a revival, I recall honing my buffet talents at the Pizza Hut salad bar in the 1980s. It's skill and science: exhilarating

School’s almost out and the holidays are here, which means for millions of Britons we have arrived at the start line for what might be called our biggest annual event: Wimbledon and the World Cup are one thing, but the all-inclusive and all-you-can-eat buffet olympics remains, I would argue, this country’s strongest competitive sport. Arriving at Luton airport before dawn last year, my children walked past the bars and with the innocence of the American-born said, owl-eyed, “Are they drinking … alcohol?” They are, my darlings, and will continue to do so from first light in the terminal until the last coach leaves the resort.

This is how it is now. Since Covid, vacation trends in Britain have skewed increasingly towards formalising this country’s latent maximalist instincts when it comes to enjoying our holidays. Between 2023 and 2024, bookings for European all-inclusive resorts rose by 30%, and the latest figures from Abta suggest that a quarter of British holidaymakers will now opt for the all-inclusive – meaning bottomless canteen-style food and drink, which, no matter how much we paid for it up front, I defy any of us not to experience as “free”.

Emma Brockes is a Guardian columnist

Armed with a new album inspired by ‘dead English blokes’, the revered musician discusses writing nasty songs about his neighbours and how he’s finally made it in Nashville aged 73

‘I owe a lot to a dead man’s cock.” So begins the first song, a propulsive piece of Lennonesque powerpop called I Am This Thing, on The Confuser, the latest album by the 73-year-old English gentleman survivor of the 60s/70s frontline, Robyn Hitchcock. The album has been recorded by a crack team of session guys in Nashville, where Hitchcock lives and runs a boutique record label with his second wife, the Australian singer-songwriter Emma Swift.

“I’m not just some sort of old public school dilettante floating around the South Bank or whatever,” Hitchcock protests, unbidden. “Making it work in Nashville means I actually am a real musician songwriter in the real musician songwriter town. And I think, ‘OK, I actually did do this!’ I wanted to go to Nashville when I, as a 13-year-old boarding school boy, heard those Dylan records he made here. And a mere 60 years later, here I am!”

Reputation for frumpiness is over as M&S wins over younger audience with shows at Silverstone, Ibiza and now LFW

This autumn’s London fashion week boasts plenty of familiar labels, from Burberry to Alexander McQueen, ready to show off their wares. But on Wednesday there was an unexpected addition: Marks & Spencer is joining the luxury lineup.

The British high-street retailer will celebrate its 100th anniversary in the fashion industry by staging a catwalk show in September highlighting its latest women’s and menswear collections.

Intensive farming has all but destroyed England’s ancient woodlands and freshwater wetlands. On a farm in Lincolnshire a radical aristocrat hopes to show there’s money in protecting nature

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In the silent countryside south of Grantham, three vast steel barns rattled in the breeze. Gathered in a loose circle beside them were 15 landowners, land agents and a couple of young investors; all expensively dressed men, many with a sceptical mien. It was June 2022, and Sir Charles Raymond Burrell, 10th Baronet, was explaining how the purchase of 1,525 bleak acres (617 hectares) of prairie fields of wheat and beans could revolutionise farming and nature conservation, not just in South Lincolnshire but across Britain and beyond.

Burrell, known by everyone as Charlie, led the group on a walk from the barns beside the unlovable modern farmhouse, a red-brick behemoth with small windows like piggy eyes. We began by crossing a field of broad beans. Less than a century ago, it had been a patchwork of 10 fields. As we walked over the hard, cracked ground, we encountered not a single insect. Later, by a verge, a couple of butterflies flew. As for humans, we didn’t meet a single other person in our two-and-a-half-hour stroll across a range of footpaths and field edges. “This is a ruined landscape,” said one of the guests, the architectural historian Matthew Rice. “Not because of the soils. Because there are no people here. I’m sorry there are not enough stoats but I’d like there to be some children here, too.”

The meltdown in Maine’s Senate race risks the Democrats’ opportunity to turn Trump into a lame duck president.

Two years ago Democrats had one job: stop Donald Trump from returning to the White House. It was the only thing that mattered, but with breathtaking political malpractice, they imploded.

This November Democrats have two jobs: win the House of Representatives and win the Senate to turn Trump into a lame duck president for his final two years. But once again the party, fond of warning that the stakes are existential, is in grave danger of blowing it.

Interim truce looks increasingly precarious as Iran carried out retaliatory strikes on US bases in Bahrain, Kuwait and Qatar

Massive crowds have begun marching through streets of Mashhad in north-east Iran where the slain supreme leader Ali Khamenei will be buried later today.

It follows a week of funeral processions around Iran and Iraq that has coincided with the fresh bout of fighting with the US.

Two women who alleged they were raped by Tyrion Davis in Suffolk had to testify at an invasive court martial on a US base

Minutes after fleeing the home of an American airman, Rebecca called 999 in tears to report that he had raped her. She recalls vomiting at a police station in Suffolk as she described being repeatedly and violently attacked.

Officers took her to a sexual assault referral centre for an intimate examination. There, a nurse measured and photographed her injuries, including bruises and bite marks on her neck.

Neso asks for extra supplies from electricity generators to cope with added demand on Thursday night

Great Britain’s energy system operator has warned that “extreme temperatures” could hit power supplies on Thursday night, as the UK entered its third heatwave of the year.

The National Energy System Operator (Neso) issued a notice overnight asking for extra supplies from power generators to cope with the added demand from households turning on fans and air conditioners to cope with the high temperatures.

Interim report into Pip found process had systematic and deep-rooted problems and required bold and radical overhaul

A landmark government review of disability benefits has warned “challenging discussions” remain on how to overhaul and pay for a system it concludes is unfit for purpose and too often leaves vulnerable claimants dehumanised and degraded.

The Timms review of the personal independence payment (Pip) concluded the benefit, claimed by nearly 4 million people in England and Wales, suffered from systematic and deep-rooted problems that had undermined public trust in the benefits system.