Andy Burnham may already be facing a tricky obstacle in his push to return to Westminster. Past comments about rejoining the EU have come back to haunt him, particularly given that the Makerfield constituency voted overwhelmingly to leave in the Brexit referendum. Plus, Wes Streeting has confirmed he will stand in any leadership contest, raising fresh questions about where all this leaves Keir Starmer

Deep-rooted problems of food inequality are hidden behind area’s affluence and beauty

• Rural Britain is becoming ‘food desert’ for lower-income families, study finds

What does a “food desert” look like? In the case of the modestly affluent Cotswolds village of Kempsford, very pretty. When I visit the sun is shining from cloudless blue skies on to lovely honey-coloured stone houses, some draped in purple wisteria.

Aside from the loud hum of US air force planes revving up at the nearby Fairford airbase it’s a picture of rural calm. There’s a primary school and a pub. A house on the main street is called “The Old Bakery”. But there is no shop selling food for miles.

From MP-baiting abominations to Engelbert Humperdinck, the UK has sent some real stinkers to the song contest – some so bad artists have even had to change their name. Here are the worst offenders

Well, this is awkward. The UK continued its run of disastrous results in the Eurovision song contest on Saturday night, when Look Mum No Computer finished rock bottom of the scoreboard. Cue the usual geopolitical conspiracy theorising and head-scratching about how to remedy matters next year. Paging Cliff Richard and faxing Bucks Fizz …

It put the cherry on top of a chastening week for Britons in Vienna. No less than Boy George had been roped in to add star power to San Marino’s entry, but it failed to even qualify for the final. The UK now hasn’t won the annual pop party for almost three decades. But where does this latest fiasco figure in the all-time hall of shame? We count down the UK’s 10 biggest Eurovision flops, from least bad to absolute worst. Hello Europe, this is humiliation calling.

Some of the homes have been repossessed, while others are being sold off by debt-laden housing associations. Who buys them – and who will end up living there?

Amid the high-stakes bustle of numbered paddles shooting up and gavels banging down, an unexpected voice calls desperately from the corner of the auction room. “That’s my house,” shouts the woman, watching her home of 20 years up for sale.

“I live there. You can tell the people who are bidding I’m not coming out of my house,” she continues.

Over the past five years, I’ve spoken to people struggling to get by in former mining towns. They’re crying out for more radicalism, not less

Among other defeats, the recent local elections saw Labour lose heavily across the Midlands and the north of England. The results are reminiscent of the 2016 Brexit vote and, with the return of those electoral geographies, some of the old tropes have resurfaced, too.

Once again, England’s post-industrial towns are cast as the angry, reactionary counterparts to booming, progressive cities. Certainly, Reform UK is winning there now, but that is not the full picture. These places should not be chalked up as lost causes for the left.

Sacha Hilhorst is a Hallsworth Fellow at the University of Manchester and a senior research fellow at Common Wealth

Makerfield will be a test of what Labour would have to look like to beat Reform – so prepare yourself for regrets, broken promises and baffling assertions about ‘red wall’ voters

It is a gruesome shock and yet was entirely predictable: we stand on the brink of a byelection that is three things at once. First, a straight popularity contest for Andy Burnham, which itself is a worry, because there must be a limit to how many times you can be called “King of the North” without it boiling your brain, and if that limit exists at all, it must surely have been reached. Second, it’s a limbering-up round for the coming Labour leadership challenge. Third, and most importantly, Makerfield is a test of what Labour would have to look like to beat Reform when it matters. So what could be more helpful than for everyone involved – every cabinet minister, every backbencher, every commentator – to reach back into their memory and find the stupidest thing that was ever said about Brexit, and say it again in a more excitable voice. Get ready for Brexit-argument bingo; if you think you’ve heard them all before, that’s why it’s so fun.

Keir Starmer jumped first, even before the byelection was on the cards. After announcing a plan to nationalise steel – an industry that is already under government control – he made some huge admissions about Brexit, followed by some even larger promises. He said it had made us poorer, it had sent migration through the roof and it had made us less secure. It wasn’t what you’d call hold-the-front-page, since it’s common knowledge that Brexit has made us poorer; but it’s extremely surprising, of course, to hear the prime minister make a straightforward statement on the EU which relates to reality, rather than a convoluted set of red lines, related to an alternative universe in which Europe is begging to take us back, but we’re holding firm.

Burnham vows to have ‘relentless domestic focus’ in Makerfield in first speech since announcing byelection run

• UK politics live – latest updates

Andy Burnham has said he will not try to return the UK to the EU, saying Britain would be stuck in “a permanent rut if we’re just constantly arguing”.

Burnham said Labour’s offer in general to voters had “simply not been good enough”, in his most explicit comments yet that he intends to stand to replace Keir Starmer as prime minister, should he win the Makerfield byelection. “If I get to stand, a vote for me will be a vote to change Labour, because Labour needs to change if we are to regain people’s trust.”

Matt Brittin begins task of finding budget cuts as World Service and Radio 4 journalists protest against plan to increase workloads

Matt Brittin, the BBC’s new director general, has warned staff that “tough choices are unavoidable” under his tenure, as his first day coincided with a strike by a group of the corporation’s journalists.

Brittin, formerly Google’s most senior executive in Europe, arrived at the corporation’s New Broadcasting House while a group of journalists from the World Service’s Newshour and Radio 4’s The World Tonight were picketing in response to a plan to increase their workloads.

RMT union says two 24-hour stoppages from midday on Tuesday have been suspended

• Business live – latest updates

Planned strikes by drivers on London Underground this week have been called off, the RMT union has announced.

The union said the two 24-hour stoppages from midday on Tuesday, which were set to disrupt travel over four days this week, had been suspended.

US president says there ‘won’t be anything left’ of country if it doesn’t come to an agreement

• UAE blames Iran or its proxies for drone strike fire near nuclear plant

Friedrich Merz has been embroiled in a row with Donald Trump over his war on Iran ever since the German chancellor suggested the Trump team was being outplayed in its negotiations with Tehran and said he would not advise his children to study or work in the US in the current climate.

The Guardian’s Berlin correspondent, Deborah Cole, has looked at the declining relationship between the two leaders in this story. Here is an extract:

Disputes over trade and military aid for Ukraine have fuelled tensions between the US and its European allies and tested the Nato alliance.

Merz is struggling to revive an anaemic German economy and has said the impact of the US-Israeli military action in Iran and the ensuing closure of the strait of Hormuz has been severely damaging to European interests.

We strongly condemn the renewed Iranian airstrikes against the United Arab Emirates and other partners. Attacks on nuclear facilities pose a threat to the safety of people throughout the entire region. There must be no further escalation of violence.

Iran must enter into serious negotiations with the USA, stop threatening its neighbours, and open the strait of Hormuz without restrictions.