Former Wimbledon champion on how taking accountability for his crimes allowed for rehabilitation, watching Novak Djokovic from his cell and the new era of brotherhood in the sport

“I heard the screaming and I didn’t know what it was,” Boris Becker says as he remembers staring into the dark in Wandsworth prison, just over two miles from Wimbledon’s Centre Court where he won the first of his three men’s singles titles at the age of 17 in 1985. “Were people trying to kill themselves or harm themselves? Or couldn’t they deal with their loneliness? Or are they just making crazy noises because they have lost their minds already?”

Becker had been sentenced to a two-and-a-half-year jail term. Amid his insolvency, he was found guilty of not declaring all his assets so that additional funds could be distributed to his creditors. The judge confirmed that his money was used, instead, to meet his “commitments to his children and other dependents, medical and professional fees, and other expenses”.

There are 27% fewer art teachers in England today than there were in 2011, and the proportion of students taking arts subjects has plummeted. Here’s what it’s like to work in a job that is essential and often perilously undervalued

When 64-year-old Sue Cabourn began her career in the late 90s, the next generation of artists including Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin and Gillian Wearing were dominating the cultural agenda. All of them were state-educated but, had they attended school now, things might have panned out differently.

There has been an exodus of art teachers (a 27% drop in the number working in English state-secondary schools from 2011 to 2024), lower uptake (48% fewer students have taken on arts subjects at GCSE since 2010), and a reformed system that critics say has stifled creativity and prioritised Stem (science and technology) subjects over arts and humanities.

Could you keep the markets calm and your MPs happy as you pull the economic levers to deliver a budget?

On 26 November, Rachel Reeves will deliver this year’s budget to parliament. As in all years, the chancellor has to strike a balance between:

Raising the money needed to fund the services that voters demand.

Keeping taxes at levels that are acceptable to voters.

Persuading the government’s creditors in the bond markets that it will continue to be able to pay its debts.

We’re supposed to be used to this by now, but getting used to it is dangerous. Her colleagues should have spoken up

Catherine Lucey, who covers the White House for Bloomberg News, was doing what reporters are supposed to do: asking germane questions.

Her query to Donald Trump a few days ago during a “gaggle” aboard Air Force 1 was reasonable as it had to do with the release of the Epstein files, certainly a subject of great public interest. Why had the Trump been stonewalling, she asked, “if there’s nothing incriminating in the files”.

Margaret Sullivan is a Guardian US columnist writing on media, politics and culture

The author has been explaining Sichuan cuisine to westerners for decades. But ‘Fu Xia’, as she’s known, has had a profound effect on food lovers in China, too

Every autumn in the mid-00s, when I lived in China, my friend Scarlett Li would invite me to Shanghai to eat hairy crab. Named for the spiky fur on their legs and claws, the crabs are said to have the best flavour during the ninth month of the lunar calendar. They’re steamed and served whole, with a dip of rice vinegar spiked with ginger. The most prized specimens come from Yangcheng Lake near Suzhou, which is not far from Scarlett’s home town of Wuxi. She had moved to Hong Kong as a child, attended high school and college in Australia, and returned to China to pursue a career as an entrepreneur. Despite her years abroad, she remained Chinese through and through – and eating hairy crab with her, I became Chinese, too.

Beginning in the Tang dynasty in the seventh century, crabs were harvested from the lakes and estuaries of the Yangtze delta and sent as tribute to the imperial court. Twelfth-century Hangzhou had specialised crab markets and dedicated crab restaurants. “I have lusted after crabs all my life,” wrote the 17th-century playwright Li Yu. “From the first day of the crab season until the last day they are sold, I … do not let a single evening pass without eating them …. Dear crab, dear crab, you and I, are we to be lifelong companions?”

Max Rushden and Geoff Lemon are joined by Ali Martin and Andy Bull to look ahead to the hotly-anticipated first Ashes Test in Perth

Exclusive: Courts minister says change needed to stop criminals opting for juries to delay cases, sometimes by years, and clear huge backlog

• UK politics live – latest updates

Criminals will be stopped from “gaming the system” by choosing trial by jury in order to increase the chances of proceedings collapsing, the courts minister has said, promising to enact radical changes to limit jury trials by the next election.

Drug dealers and career criminals were “laughing in the dock” knowing cases can take years to come to trial, Sarah Sackman said, while warning that inaction would be a road to “chaos and ruin”.

The draft plan, reportedly developed by Trump envoy Steve Witkoff and Kremlin adviser Kirill Dmitriev, would force draconian measures on Ukraine

In the last hour, Ukraine said it had received from Russia the remains of 1,000 people that Moscow said were killed Ukrainian soldiers, in the latest repatriation – a rare area of cooperation between the warring sides, AFP reported.

“Today, repatriation measures took place. 1000 bodies, claimed by the Russian side to belong to Ukrainian servicemen, were returned to Ukraine,” Kyiv’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War said on social media.

Shabana Mahmood says scheme could increase the £3,000 cap currently in place and that payments are ‘good value for money’

In an interview with ITV, Keir Starmer also defended the decision to delay the publication of the government’s review of educational provision for pupils with special educational needs and disabilties (Send) in England until next year. He said the government needed to take time to get this right. He said:

We do need to attend to Send provision. I think uniformly there’s a sense that the system at the moment isn’t working and needs reform.

My strong view is we need to get that reform right and therefore we need to take the time to consult with parents and others.

These breakfast clubs are a real gamechanger.

They’re free and you saw this morning how much the children enjoy them. They’re getting a decent meal, and they’re getting activity, and that sets them up for the day.

Staffordshire students say signs material was AI-generated included suspicious file names and rogue voiceover accent

Students at the University of Staffordshire have said they feel “robbed of knowledge and enjoyment” after a course they hoped would launch their digital careers turned out to be taught in large part by AI.

James and Owen were among 41 students who took a coding module at Staffordshire last year, hoping to change careers through a government-funded apprenticeship programme designed to help them become cybersecurity experts or software engineers.