Afghan protester 'shot dead' at Qur'an rally
Man reported to have been killed in Faizabad, northern Afghanistan, after crowds attack Nato base in protest at Florida pastor's plans
A protester against a US pastor's plans to burn copies of the Qur'an is reported to have been shot dead in northern Afghanistan after crowds attacked a Nato base.
The man was killed in Faizabad, the capital of Badakhshan, a provincial government spokesman said. It happened when thousands of worshippers poured onto the streets after Eid prayers had been held in nearby mosques.
The crowd was estimated at around 10,000 people. Some had hurled stones at a Nato base run by Germans, and the protester was shot when troops inside opened fire, Amin Sohail said.
The Nato-led International Security Assistance Force in Kabul said it was aware of the protests and was investigating.
Demonstrations against the desecration of Islam's holy book prompted threats of attacks on US bases elsewhere in Afghanistan. Protests were held in Kabul and near the Pakistan border.
"If they do this, we will attack American bases and close the highway used by convoys supplying American troops," a cleric called Zahidullah told the Reuters news agency.
In London thousands of people gathered at the Ahmadiyya Muslim mosque, in Morden, to hear Hadhrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad, the world head of the community, denounce the US pastor.
"Religious extremism, be it Christian extremism, Muslim extremism, or any other kind is never a true reflection of the religion," he said.
"A number of churches have condemned this act. There is nothing wrong with intellectual or theological debate, but this should be conducted within the bounds of decency and tolerance. Instead, what we are seeing is hatred being spread."
Terry Jones, the Florida pastor who threatened to burn copies of the Qur'an on the anniversary of 9/11, has "suspended" the event amid conflicting claims over a deal involving a planned Islamic centre near the site of the 2001 attacks on New York.
The extremist preacher first said he had cancelled the book-burning after condemnation by Barack Obama, the Pentagon, the state department in the US and outrage around the world.
Jones then said the event was only on hold, claiming he had been "lied to" over a deal to call it off in exchange for a promise to move the Islamic centre away from Ground Zero.
Speaking outside his Dove World Outreach Centre church in Gainesville, Jones said: "As of right now, we are not cancelling the event, but we are suspending it."
The confusion over whether the burning would take place has done little to quell the global outrage.
The Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, said he hoped Jones would not proceed. "The Qur'an is in the hearts and minds of all … Muslims, but the affront against the holy book is a humiliation to the people," Karzai told reporters at his palace after prayers.
"We are hopeful that he gives up this affront and should not even think about it."
The president of Indonesia, which has the world's largest Muslim population, called on the US to ensure that no burnings took place.
"I continue to urge the government and the people of the United States to ensure the prevention of such an incomprehensible, irrational and immoral act," Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said.
Royal Mail to be privatised or sold
Move by business secretary Vince Cable to introduce legislation to start the process raises fears the Royal Mail's universal service obligation could be at risk
The government is to start the process of privatising or selling Royal Mail, raising fears that its universal service obligation could be at risk.
Business secretary Vince Cable announced this morning that new legislation will be introduced in the autumn that would inject private investment into the service. This follows the publication of a new report which warned that "urgent action" needed to be taken to protect the Royal Mail from collapse.
Under the government's plans, a slice of the group would also be handed to its workers. Cable confirmed the move after Richard Hooper, former deputy chairman of Ofcom, warned that Royal Mail's financial position has deteriorated since 2008.
Cable said that Royal Mail faced a combination of "potentially lethal challenges", including declining mail volumes and low investment. He added that the Mail was still too inefficient, and was hampered by a "dire pension position", with a deficit estimated at £8bn back in March.
"We are determined to safeguard Royal Mail for the future and help it tackle these challenges," said Cable.
Unions, though, reacted with anger to the plans. Billy Hayes, general secretary of the Communications Workers Union, claimed privatisation would harm customers in rural areas and could even end the universal service obligation – Royal Mail's longstanding promise that letters be delivered daily to virtually any address in the country.
"Privatisation would be devastating for Royal Mail and the whole country's postal services. The universal service has been a key part of the UK post for 170 years but because it isn't the profitable element of mail, the privatisation will put it at risk," Hayes claimed.
Hooper had been asked to assess the situation at the Royal Mail again after producing a report in 2008 that recommended privatisation. His new conclusions, published this morning, paint a grim picture. Hooper said that the decline in the number of letters being sent is greater than forecast in the 2008 report, with worldwide falls in the next five years of up to 40% predicted. Although parcel deliveries will continue to increase as more people shop online, this is not expected to cover the decline on the letters side. Hooper also argued that the pension deficit, at £8bn, was "even more unsustainable" than before.
Hooper said that private sector capital must be introduced into Royal Mail either through a sale to a partner or trade investor, or by a flotation on the stock market. He also recommended that the pension deficit should be taken over by the government.
The previous Labour government had shelved its own plans for partial privatisation of the Post Office in June 2009, following opposition from its own MPs. Lord Mandelson had hoped to sell a 30% stake in the business.
It is not clear how much of the Royal Mail would be sold off under the coalition government's plan. According to one report, as much as 20% could be handed to its employees.
It is known that the Post Office network will be retained in public ownership, due to "its hugely important social and economic role in communities throughout the UK".
The CWU, though, remains opposed to privatisation of the Royal Mail. "We've put in place a detailed and fully funded modernisation programme which is dramatically transforming Royal Mail," said Dave Ward, the union's deputy general secretary. "Why does the government want to threaten the stability and capital of this programme when it's proving a major success?
"We fear the pensions of our members will be at risk under privatisation. Everyone hears about the deficit, but there's over £26bn in assets which belongs to the postmen and women who have paid their contributions every week of their working lives."
Police union fears 40,000 job losses
Police officers say government funding cuts could cause rise in crime rate as Hampshire is latest force to cull jobs
Up to 40,000 frontline police jobs could be at risk if government funding cuts go ahead, the Police Federation warned today as Hampshire Constabulary became the latest force to reveal cuts.
The force needs to save £70m over the next four years and will shed 1,400 posts. The loss of a fifth of its workforce will result in a reduction of hundreds of frontline officers. Kent police recently unveiled proposals to cut 1,500 jobs.
Simon Reed, vice-chairman of the body that represents officers in England and Wales, said cuts of 25% would "devastate" the police service and it was inevitable that crime would rise.
John Apter, chairman of the Hampshire branch of the federation warned that the cuts would damage the service. "We accept that there are difficult times ahead but … fewer officers will mean the force will have to stop doing certain things.
"I have sympathy with the chief constable, he is trying to provide a service with his hands tied behind his back."
But the policing and criminal justice minister, Nick Herbert, said: "I understand the Police Federation wants to make its case and protect every job, but we must be careful not to frighten the public.
"Police forces can make savings. They can become more efficient. They can share services and procure equipment better."
The Home Office said future funding for the police would be decided by the government's spending review, due in October.
Last week the then head of Cambridgeshire police, Julie Spence, said the reductions could lead to a policing armageddon and warned that police could be reduced to a 999 emergency service.
Ian Learmonth, the chief constable of Kent, said cuts were likely to reduce staff and officer numbers to levels not seen for a decade – and warned that crime could rise.
The chief constable of Essex, Jim Barker-McCardle, has warned the funding cuts could force senior officers to "design a new blueprint" for policing. The force's policing budget could be reduced by £45m – about a sixth – by 2015 and hundreds of jobs might go, he said.
However, he added, the cuts would give senior officers an opportunity to challenge the way things were done and forces would have to "rise up … and slay the last breaths of the fire-breathing monster of bureaucracy".
BA union threatens to widen dispute
Unite leader to consult staff across British Airways about co-ordinated response
The Unite trade union has threatened to escalate the cabin crew dispute at British Airways to a company-wide confrontation by consulting 30,000 BA staff over a "co-ordinated response" to allegations of union-busting.
Tony Woodley, joint general secretary of Unite, said he was calling a meeting of shop stewards across the airline to warn staff that BA was determined to reduce Unite's power within the carrier. BA has consistently denied accusations, voiced by Unite and academics, that it is attempting to break trade unionism at a business where Unite has considerable influence by representing around three-quarters of BA's 40,000 staff.
Woodley said the sacking of 13 cabin crew and suspension of more than 60 flight attendants since an industrial row broke out last year indicated a further agenda at the airline.
"I am therefore calling an early meeting of representatives of all Unite BA members to set out the facts of what is happening in the company, in particular what I believe, in the absence of any serious proposals from the company to settle the dispute, is a plan to eliminate Unite from a sizeable part of the company and weakening the position of the union in the remainder, and to discuss the need for a co-ordinated and concerted union response."
Willie Walsh, BA chief executive and a former shop steward at Ireland's Aer Lingus, has rejected Unite's claims as "nonsense".
British Airways and Unite have held a series of meetings this year in a bid to end a dispute that has seen 22 days of walkouts so far. One meeting at the Acas conciliation service was abandoned after it was invaded by members of the Socialist Workers party. The main barrier to a peace agreement, Unite claims, is BA's refusal to fully reinstate staff travel perks that were stripped from the estimated 6,700 cabin crew who took part in industrial action over changes to their working practices.
The consultations with all BA Unite members are not guaranteed to trigger an airline-wide ballot for industrial action, which would take more time to organise than a cabin crew ballot.
Torture theat to Swazi activists
Swaziland prime minister says government would consider using sipakatane – beating the feet with spikes – to crush dissent
Swaziland has threatened pro-democracy activists with torture as tensions in sub-Saharan Africa's last absolute monarchy continue to grow.
The warning that sipakatane - beating people's feet with spikes - could be used against protesters was condemned by trade unions in the country after a week in which 50 protesters were arrested and several foreigners treated roughly and deported.
Sipakatane, also known as bastinado, involves using metal or wooden spikes to beat someone's bare feet repeatedly, leaving them bleeding and potentially unable to walk.
Barnabas Dlamini, the Swaziland prime minister, was quoted in state media yesterday as saying the government would consider using it to crush dissent.
Returning from the inauguration of the Rwandan president, Paul Kagame, Dlamini added that there were lessons to learn from that country on how to deal with "meddling" from abroad. "Each person should mind the politics of his own country and not come here to meddle in our affairs, especially if that country has a lot of its own problems," he told the Times of Swaziland newspaper.
The paper reported: "Dlamini said every country or community had its own dissidents and it was up to government to deal with the noisy minorities, whom he said he wished would behave in a grown-up manner and stop behaving like children."
Trade unions described the threat to use the form of torture as "a declaration of war" and demanded it be withdrawn.
Mduduzi Gina, of the Swaziland Federation of Trade Unions, said: "It means even here at home, it will be used on those fighting for people's rights. Such is done at a home where there is a child who is seen to be speaking the truth, but we are of the view that we are past that time."
King Mswati III of Swaziland has been criticised for leading a lavish lifestyle while most of his subjects endure poverty. He has 13 wives. Swaziland has one of the world's highest rates of HIV infection, with more than a quarter of those infected aged between 15 and 49.
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) said several South Africans had been deported from Swaziland prior to this week's pro-democracy marches. They included Cosatu's deputy international secretary, Zanele Matebula, who had been in a hotel with other activists. "Police stormed in and demanded to know who the South Africans were among us," he told South Africa's Mail & Guardian newspaper. "There was a lot of pushing, shoving and screaming."
Matebula was bundled into a police van with four other South Africans. "We were arrested and questioned for four hours," he said. "Then we were told to get our bags from the hotel, and they put us in a van and sped us to the border."
Cosatu stepped up its rhetoric today, saying: "We join the chorus of global protests and condemnation at the brutal and jackboot tactics of the Swaziland tinpot dictatorship, tactics of arbitrary arrests, torture and murder of political activists reminiscent of apartheid South Africa. The brutality of the dictatorship of the last absolute monarchy in sub-Saharan Africa, Swaziland, was paraded with impunity in the full glare of the international community for the entire world to see."
Osborne faces benefit cuts backlash
Coalition MPs question chancellor's plan to slash the benefit budget for the unemployed by a further £4bn
The chancellor, George Osborne, today faced a growing backlash from coalition MPs over his decision to slash the benefit budget for the unemployed by a further £4bn.
Bob Russell, a Liberal Democrat, has tabled an urgent question in parliament on Osborne's decision, which he described as unethical.
Russell said he hoped his question would be answered on Monday.
Osborne said last night that he would go after those who regarded welfare benefits as a "lifestyle choice".
But Russell, the MP for Colchester, accused Osborne of using the welfare bill as a "smokescreen" for the country's ills.
He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "Yes, let's deal with the welfare cheats. But the notion that they are responsible for all the ills of the nation is in fact a smokescreen and it's not very ethical."
Fellow leftwing Liberal Democrat MPs, Mike Hancock and Tim Farron, joined Russell in vowing to vote against such cuts.
Hancock said: "This goes right to the heart of the benefit system in this country. He has a lot of questions to answer and this is not the right way to do things."
Farron said: "The government needs to demonstrate that those who got us into this mess are going to more than bear the brunt and that the most in need will not be targeted. We need to scrutinise where the cuts are made."
The opprobrium of the Lib Dem backbench is likely to prove embarrassing for Nick Clegg, the deputy prime minister, who defended the government's programme of spending cuts and explained that "hard decisions" needed to be taken for the long-term good of the country.
In a speech yesterday, Clegg tried to send out a nuanced message that the cuts in the October spending review would not fall in one blow, and would not be "dramatically different" to those proposed by Labour.
Osborne, by contrast, adopted a blunt tone, telling the BBC: "The welfare system is broken. We have to accept that the welfare bill has got completely out of control and that there are five million people living on permanent out-of-work benefits. That is a tragedy for them and fiscally unsustainable for us."
Treasury sources indicated they were confident they would secure £4bn in further savings by 2014-15 on top of the £11bn savings set out in the June budget.
The Department of Work and Pensions, however, said no agreement had been struck, or specific figure agreed. Iain Duncan Smith, the work and pensions secretary, has been involved in bitter talks with the Treasury over his potentially costly plan to improve work incentives for those on the dole, and some of his allies were annoyed by Osborne's rhetoric at a sensitive point in complex negotiations.
One source said: "This feels like an effort to get Andy Coulson off the front pages rather than anything to do with welfare reform."
The Treasury said the £4bn extra saving was not dependent on a fall in unemployment, but was an estimate of the number of extra people who will find jobs due to the government's work programme and changes to work incentives.
The benefit savings could be increased if the Treasury presses ahead with proposals to restrict universal benefits such as the winter fuel allowance, travel passes and TV licences.
The chancellor's plan to cut benefits came as leading economic thinktank the OECD warned that G7 countries may have to delay their deficit reduction plans as the pace of economic recovery has slowed.
Johnson to stand again for mayor
Conservative announces decision on an appearance on Nick Ferrari's radioshow on LBC 97.3
Boris Johnson ended speculation about his political intentions by declaring he is seeking a second four-year term as mayor of London on behalf of the Conservative party.
Johnson's long-awaited announcement preempts the result of Labour's mayoral selection process, due in two weeks, in which Ken Livingstone is bidding against former MP Oona King to stand as Labour candidate at the 2012 election.
Johnson's campaign plans are already under way, it emerged today, with fundraising plans and key team members in place, including Australian political strategist Lynton Crosby, who was enlisted on Johnson's 2008 mayoral campaign.
Johnson today said he had waited until now because he wanted to look at his record in office into his four-year term before making a final declaration, admitting that there had been a "certain amount of nailbiting" over his flagship bike hire scheme, which was launched in the summer to popular acclaim.
Johnson, who has long been rumoured to have his sights on a return to parliament, said that he thought it was "pretty obvious" he was going to stand again.
He said he realised he needed to go public with his intentions in order to strengthen his hand in negotiations with the government over funding for London.
He told LBC 97.3 in an appearance on the Nick Ferrari show. "I want to knock all this speculation on the head. I want to be able to talk to government so they know absolutely when I eyeball them and I see George Osborne and I see Dave, they know that it is my intention to be there," he said.
He played down the suggestion that he had ambitions to become prime minister: "I'm more likely to be decapitated by a Frisbee or locked in a disused fridge".
Johnson said David Cameron and George Osborne were "broadly positive" about his decision. Pressed on their response, he said: "You'd have to ask them".
David Cameron is unlikely to be impressed by the way Johnson has attempted to distance himself from the Conservative-led government this week, raising doubts about the government's deficit reduction plan, warning that the consensus on the coalition cuts was beginning to break down.
Asked about Cameron and chancellor George Osborne, Johnson said: "I want to be able to talk to them about what I think London needs and they need to know from me, and people need to know, that I am determined to keep going with this job."
Aware that Livingstone has used the mayoral selection campaign to align Boris Johnson with the coalition's spending cuts and to declare himself the best candidate to protect London from cuts, Johnson is seeking to cast himself as an independent Conservative battling for the capital as he repeatedly warns of the need to keep planned transport infrastructure projects fully funded.
Johnson chartered terrain likely to be unpopular with the Conservative rank and file when he issued a broadside against government plans to cap the number of migrants from outside the European Union who are allowed to work in the UK.
In his response to the government's consultation, Johnson said "a major rethink of government policy is required" as the cap was "likely to have a significant negative and disproportionate impact on London".
It will "put the economic recovery at risk by creating skills gaps and placing London at a competitive disadvantage in the global competition for talent and inward investment", he said.
Today, Johnson played down his rift with the coalition over its planned cap on non-EU immigration, saying he was merely lobbying for limits to be "thought through" so businesses such as law firms and film companies were not prevented from importing the best talent.
Johnson's attempt to be seen as a faithful outpost of the Conservative government chimes with the role Livingstone played as mayor under a Labour government.
Johnson said he expects a rematch in 2012 with the rival he defeated in 2008, though it is rumoured he sees this as an easier option than standing against King."I expect they will go for Ken," he said. "The union block vote will go behind the old warhorse I suppose."
The Labour party caused surprise by announcing that the selection process, which was widely expected to start at the turn of the year, would be run concurrently with the Labour leadership race.
Livingstone urged voters to punish Johnson for the coalition's assault on public spending.
"I welcome Boris Johnson's confirmation that he will run again in 2012 because he now has a record that means he can be held to account," he said.
"Boris Johnson cannot escape the fact that he has pioneered huge cuts in London and he vigorously campaigned for his Tory colleagues to win the general election, knowing full well the economic policy they would deliver and the damage they would do to policing and transport. The government's cuts are his cuts."
King attacked Johnson's record in office and claimed that most Londoners feel their lives have not been touched by either of the mayors we have had so far.
"The high number of teenagers killed on London's streets so far this year is an example of where no progress has been made in dealing with the capital's long-term problems," she said.
"Labour's own selection process is days away from concluding. What voters need to consider is who can best beat Boris – a candidate who was defeated by him in 2008 or somebody who believes in fresh ideas and fresh thinking".
Johnson is set to be officially endorsed as the Tory candidate next month.
Ancient Iranian charter returns home
Deal agreed after Tehran threatens to cut cultural ties with British Museum
A Babylonian artefact sometimes described as the world's first human rights charter is to go on display in Iran after Tehran threatened to cut ties with the British Museum if it did not lend the object.
The Cyrus cylinder is a 6th century BC clay object inscribed with an account in cuneiform of the conquest of Babylon by the Persian king Cyrus the Great. It arrived in Iran today and will go on display soon at Iran's national museum for four months, state TV reported.
Iran said it was in a dispute with the British Museum for months over its request for a loan of the object and had repeatedly threatened to cut ties with the institution. At one point, a senior Iranian cultural official accused the museum of turning a cultural issue into a political issue.
The loan discussions, which began last October, took place during a time of tension between the two countries. Tehran is under pressure from the west over its nuclear programme, and it has accused Britain and other foreign governments of interfering in its domestic policies by stoking the street protests that followed the disputed presidential election in June 2009.
The British Museum said it acted in good faith throughout the negotiations and has a policy of cultural exchanges with other nations independent of political considerations.
The object's inscription describes how Cyrus conquered Babylon in 539BC and captured the last Babylonian king. It also tells of how he then freed many people held captive by the Babylonians and arranged for them to return to their homelands. It does not mention the Jews brought to Babylon as slaves by Nebuchadnezzar, but their freedom was also part of that policy.
State TV said a delegation from the British Museum accompanied the artefact and another British expert would soon arrive to arrange its display.
The Cyrus cylinder is often called the world's oldest human rights document, but it was common in Mesopotamia for kings to begin their rule with such reform declarations, according to the British Museum.
Obama urged to back 60mpg target
Environmental campaigners focus on more modest goals as hopes of US climate legislation dwindle ahead of expected Republican gains
America's environmental groups have given up on getting climate change legislation through Congress at a time of Republican ascendancy, and have downsized to a series of more modest goals like fuel economy.
In a sign of that strategy reshift, 20 environmental groups launched a new campaign yesterday to press Barack Obama to propose far more ambitious fuel efficiency and pollution standards for cars of 60mpg by 2025.
Meanwhile, Clean Energy Works, a coalition of 80 grassroots groups that had 45 paid staff in Washington to lobby to get a climate change law through Congress, is shutting up shop.
The rethink, which is still a work in progress, gets underway at a dispiriting time for greens.
The election of the greenest-ever president in Barack Obama failed to produce the hoped-for sweeping climate and energy legislation in Congress. Democrats are now preparing themselves for heavy losses in November's mid-term elections, which will make it even harder for Obama to get his agenda through Congress.
Greens say they are refocusing their energy on ensuring that existing institutions - such as the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) - take action on climate change. The EPA is poised to begin using its authority to order industries to curb emissions.
"We are diversifying our strategy into a building block approach as opposed to looking at a single focus of a comprehensive bill because obviously for this year it does not appear it is going to happen, and it is not clear what is going to happen next year," said Joe Mendelson, who leads the global warming campaign at the National Wildlife Federation.
"We are going to focus more on the individual building blocks that get us to where we need to be in emissions."
The Sierra Club, Environment America, Natural Resources Defence Council and other groups wrote a letter to Obama, the EPA and the transportation department yesterday demanding it raise the average fuel efficiency for the American fleet to 60mpg by 2025.
The environmental groups told reporters that adopting the new standard, beginning with cars manufactured in 2017, would spur the development of new hybrid and plug-ins models, and that 55% of new cars sold in 2025 would be hybrids, with electric drive vehicles accounting for 15%.
The new car and light truck standard would save 49bn gallons of petrol a year by 2030, and reduce America's greenhouse gas emissions by 535m metric tons or 6% a year. The push is timed for the administration's expected roll-out of new car stand proposals at the end of the month.
Obama faced an additional challenge yesterday from green unions, with the United Steelworkers of America filing suit to demand the administration take action against China at the WTO.
In a 5,000-page petition, the steelworkers accused China of unfair subsidies to solar panel, wind turbine and battery factories, undercutting US manufacturers.
The petition pits Obama against some of his closest allies. The steelworkers' leadership has been strong supporters of his clean energy agenda.
Behind the scenes, the leaders of environmental organisations have been meeting regularly to try to chart a new strategy now that the prospects of even modest movement on energy and climate are dead in Congress.
The mainstream environmental organisations are also gearing up against the Canadian tar sands, the single largest supplier of crude oil to the US, and a planned pipeline from Alberta to Texas.
They are also rededicating campaigns against the highly destructive coal mining practice of mountaintop removal, and the use of coal.
The Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, indicated early this week that there were limited prospects even for a "piecemeal" bill promoting more efficient home appliances.
The movers behind yesterday's push on car efficiency argued that getting gas guzzlers off the road would be a big move to reducing global warming. "This has always been a focus," said Debbie Sease of the Sierra Club. "It is not a substitute for a broader set of climate and energy policies, but it is one of the ways we actually meet the targets."
But she admitted that the defeat of climate change legislation in Congress meant now, more than ever, there was no "silver bullet" for dealing with climate change.
"We didn't get the silver bullet," she said. "We are going to be focusing on a lot of silver buckshot."
• This article was amended on 10 September - it originally said 535 metric tons
Chef serves up £111 cheese sandwich
Celebrity chef Martin Blunos unveils a lunchtime snack served with gold dust - and £92 worth of truffle
At first glance it looks like the sort of snack that the cartoon characters Scooby-Do and Shaggy would approve of - a multi-layered sandwich with tasty goodies spilling out everywhere.
But this may just be the world's most expensive cheese sandwich, made with a special cheddar blended with white truffles and sprinkled with gold dust – and carrying a price tag of £111.
The creation was unveiled by the celebrity chef Martin Blunos at the Frome cheese show in Somerset where he is judging a sandwich-making competition featuring less ambitious versions of the lunchtime staple.
Blunos said: "We Brits are known to love our cheese sandwiches, and here's one that is fit for the banqueting table. The white truffle fuses beautifully with the West Country cheddar and the edible gold gives it a really special look."
Actually the gold sprinkles are relatively cheap. What makes it so expensive is that white truffle cheese, which itself cost £92 to make.
Blunos used a £5 loaf of sourdough dressed with extra virgin olive oil and then layered cheese, slices of quail egg, tomato, apple and fresh figs. He added dainty mustard red frills, pea shoots and the herb red amaranth for a salad layer and topped the whole masterpiece with edible gold dust.
There is no current record for the most expensive cheese sandwich but Blunos and cheesemaker Pilgrims have applied to the Guinness World Records to have their sandwich recognised.
Black tomato – £1.51
Balsamic vinegar – £2.25
Pea shoots – 60p
Red mustard frill – 55p
Red amaranth – 55p
Two fresh figs – 1.36p
Apple – 34p
Sourdough loaf – £5
Extra virgin olive oil – £1.60
Quail eggs – £1.53
Edible gold dust – £3.30
West Country vintage farmhouse cheddar blended with white truffle – £92
The unsung heroes who are making a difference
These 50 green pioneers only scratch at the surface of those whose work is not yet widely known. Who else should we be celebrating?
Faced with the mind-numbing bad news about the environment over recent months, a couple of us at the Guardian decided to try to cheer ourselves up by finding examples of the right kind of environmental change. We set out to find 50 green pioneers, people who are making a practical difference but whose work is not yet widely known.
Here's a small selection of the projects that remind us that all is not yet lost – the first 10 are people whose initiatives we find particularly inspiring. There are bound to be plenty of interesting people we have missed, so please add your own suggestions.
Next week we will publish a list of the top 10 green heroes as chosen by you. We'll also run a poll so you can vote for your favourite green hero in the top 10.
For a chance to have your suggestions included, please tell us in the comments below who you would like to see included in the readers' top 50. For example: "I nominate Brian Jones for the reader top 50" or "Vote: Joanna Smith". You can also send your suggestions to our Twitter account, @guardianeco, or post them on our Facebook page.
Alison is the founder of , a food-growing community project in Newham, east London. She obtained a derelict, concreted site from the council on the social housing estate where she lives. She started mobilising the community to grow food there in builders' bags. People on the estate grow seedlings in propagators on their windowsills, then transplant them into the bags and the raised beds they have built. The project teaches growing skills and helps to create a stronger sense of community.
Barbara brought straw-bale building to the UK in 1994. She is the founder of Amazonails, which has been involved in the construction of over 100 straw buildings and has pioneered a wide range of techniques to simplify construction, save energy and reduce other environmental impacts. Amazonails also teaches green building techniques, with an emphasis on getting women involved in construction.
Andrew and Jamie founded the Ethical Property Company in the 1980s. They buy buildings, improve their environmental performance and turn them into centres which house charities, social enterprises, community and campaign groups. They offer affordable rents and places where different groups can share skills and ideas. They have raised millions of pounds from investors, and have set up centres all over Britain (and one in Brussels).
John has worked for or with the Brighton & Hove city parks department since the 1960s. Noticing that wild flower species were declining, he set up a seed bank. As there was nowhere suitable for storage, he planted and harvested the seeds every year to keep the stocks replenished. His seed bank has been used to restore local ecosystems, greatly boosting their diversity and encouraging the return of rare species of butterflies and other insects. His son Mark is helping him to boost his production of wildflowers and create new flowering meadows.
David converted a contaminated former sewage works near Rotherham into a beautiful nature therapy park for the elderly and disabled. The restoration involved moving 18 tonnes of scrap metal and fly-tipped rubbish and 26 tonnes of contaminated soil and rubble. It now has free public access and is cited as a world-class example of bio-diversity restoration and nature therapy.
Tim is director of the Public Interest Research Centre. PIRC turns technical research about climate change, energy and economics into engaging material that laypeople can immediately grasp. Among its recent work is the Offshore Valuation report, showing how much offshore renewable energy the UK can tap into, and Climate Safety, which updates climate science since the last report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Damian set up the Help Save Bees campaign to raise awareness about the disappearance of native British bees and explain the small but important steps people can take to help reverse their decline, such as cutting out insecticides, sponsoring meadows, installing bee shelters and creating bee-friendly gardens. He managed to organise a meeting about the issue at 10 Downing Street while Gordon Brown was prime minister.
Robert set up his company, Shiply.com, with the aim of reducing the amount of haulage on the roads. His customers describe what they need moved, where to and from and when, and freight companies which are already making similar trips bid for their business. The point is to ensure that lorries which would otherwise be mostly empty top up their loads, reducing unnecessary trips.
Brian and Peter are the inventor and developer of the Eco Kettle. According to independent trials, it saves 30% of the energy people normally use in boiling water. By pressing a button on the top of the kettle you can specify the exact amount of water you want to boil. You can also programme it to heat water to below boiling point. 200,000 have been sold so far in the UK, and have saved an estimated 1000 tonnes of carbon dioxide.
Mark and Nick set up Project Dirt to encourage different green initiatives to collaborate and share their expertise and experience, and to help people who want to be greener learn from existing schemes. They have created a community of almost 400 projects with shared interests, exchanging news and ideas and ensuring that people don't keep inventing the wheel.
Dave and Jim founded Bikeworks, which refurbishes and recycles old bikes, trains homeless people and helps people to start cycling.
Bruce has provided much of the energy behind the Inverness Green Gym (which restores local habitats) and has done a great deal to encourage people like himself – people with learning difficulties – to participate.
Polly is a barrister who has formulated the declaration of planetary rights, which seeks to invest ecosystems with similar legal safeguards to those won by humans after the second world war.
Barbara is a lichen specialist who works with Opal – Open Air Laboratories – helping laypeople to conduct scientific research on the environment.
Ben is the executive director of Arcola Theatre in Hackney, London, which uses performance to promote sustainaibility and aims to be the world's first carbon-neutral theatre.
Joanna has set up a managed allotment system near Godalming in Surrey, using pigs to clear the land and helping people who don't have time to do everything themselves to grow their own vegetables.
Darren is the founder of ecocomputersystems.org.uk, which recycles and refurbishes computers and uses them to train unemployed and low-paid people.
Colin is CEO of Green-works, which employs disadvantaged people to recycle and rebuild office furniture, then donates much of it to the developing world.
Pam, who is in her 80s, is the Woodland Trust volunteer of the year, and the driving force behind the creation of its Heartwood forest in Hertfordshire.
John is the UK's first certified Passivhaus architect (qualified to design buildings with minimal energy use) and builder of the country's first non-domestic Passivhaus project.
Shawn, who is 15, has inspired many other young people to join conservation efforts in Southwater, East Sussex, and leads Health Walks through the countryside there.
Martin runs the Christmas Tree Man, the UK's only environmentally friendly Christmas tree service, which delivers living trees in pots and returns them to the ground after Christmas.
Sarah and Rose founded Green Knickers, which makes fairtrade pants out of organic cotton, bamboo and hemp.
Matthew is the founder of E-day and E-Meters, which encourages people to reduce their energy consumption.
Richard founded the Brighton and Hove wood recycling project, which collects, salvages and re-uses waste wood.
Ben and Nicola, inspired by Richard (above) started a similar project in Bristol.
John is the director of Eigg Electric, which has helped the Eigg islanders to cut their home energy use by 47% and produce 90% of their electricity from renewables.
Lucy founded and runs the Green Register, which promotes sustainable practices in the UK's construction industry.
Nigel started the Hill Holt Wood project, which teaches disadvantaged young people sustainable woodland forestry and other skills such as maths.
James is the founder of Walkit, which maps walking routes around UK cities.
Amelia edits Amelia's magazine which brings together environmental issues with art, music and fashion to find creative solutions.
Jane worked with Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall to set up the Landshare project, which puts people who want to grow food in touch with those who have spare land.
Rachel and Malcolm founded the Touchwood Project in the Orkney Islands, which seeks to improve the local environment and teach people outdoor skills.
Rosemary is the founder and director of Cambridge Carbon Footprint, which uses innovative techniques to overcome psychological barriers to acting on climate change.
Jenny is field officer for the Scottish Beaver Trial, the first ever official reintroduction of a native mammal in the UK.
Julie farms previously disused land in Hackney, London, producing organic fruit and vegetables.
John is the chairman of the Sustainable Energy Academy, Milton Keynes, which teaches and demonstrates energy saving in homes.
Esther set up Sustainable Moseley, which seeks to make Moseley in Birmingham a greener and pleasanter place in which to live.
Mark and Adam run Active in Ashington, which encourages people in their part of Northumberland to walk and cycle more.
Ed co-founded Seed homes, which are built quickly and cheaply from eco-friendly materials.
Adam is chief executive of Household Energy Services, which helps people reduce their home energy consumption.
Julian is managing director of Atkinson, which makes sustainable coffins.
Carolyn runs the Knowle West Media Centre in Bristol that helps train young people and develop local environmental projects.
Graham is project manager of the Green Business Network, which helps to promote schemes that combine social inclusion and environmental protection.
Robert is executive producer of Dott Cornwall, which tackles environmental and community issues through better design.
Joe is the founder of Freedom Clothing Project, which seeks to get the fashion industry to take environmental issues seriously.
Jamie co-runs Worn Again, an upcycling scheme which turns discarded textiles into designer products.
Mary helped set up a community group called Park View 4U, which has transformed semi-derelict playing fields in Lytham, Lancashire, into a much-loved community space.
Chris is a bat conservationist who trains people in Birmingham and the Black Country to identify and record bats and help protect them.
Jonathon founded The Hub, which has set up places across four continents where people can come together to tackle social and environmental challenges.
A brief history of dubstep
As part of our day of exclusive Magnetic Man content, Artwork charts the rise of dubstep: 'Dubstep is global, but there are still people round the corner from where I live who don't know what it is. This is my story of where it came from and where it's at.'
Some people might think dubstep is a new phenomenon, but it actually grew out of garage and grime about a decade ago. In Croydon, south London, there was a shop called Big Apple Records that acted as a hub for people into all sorts of bass-led music (sadly, it closed five years ago). I had a recording studio above the shop and started the Big Apple record label with John Kennedy and DJ Hatcha. We were the first label to sign Skream and Benga when they were just 15 years old alongside Digital Mystikz (DMZ), Mala, Coki and Loefah. These artists made some of the first dubstep records.
Around this time Hatcha, who also worked at Big Apple, was championing this sound at a London club night called FWD. We were all making records for Hatcha to spin and meeting in the record shop to discuss the sound we were making. It was a bit like a bass university. And through Benga, Skream, Oris Jay, Plastician, Chef, LB, Kode 9, N Type and Benny Ill, the dubstep sound was brought to life.
We have just finished the festival season with Reading and Leeds. This is unbelievable for us, considering a few years ago you wouldn't get to play those festivals unless you had a guitar in your hand or a set of drums in front of you. It shows how much this music has grown in the past few years that a non "rock'n'roll" band can be accepted at a major rock festival (although it should be pointed out that we continue some of the old rock'n'roll traditions after the shows).
I was speaking to Skream this weekend about how dubstep has gone so far in the past three years – we were wondering if a new style of music has ever spread around the world so rapidly. If you think about drum'n'bass taking off in the 90s, a scene would blow up in one country in one year, then another a year or so later. The internet has changed all that and helped spread dubstep across the world almost instantly. At the same time, dubstep is constantly changing, incorporating different sounds and styles all the time.
The Outlook festival was held in Coatia last weekend, a dubstep event hosting some of the biggest names in the genre from around the world. If you thought you would hear only straight-up dubstep you were in for a surprise. Loefah played Detroit techno, Skream played metal, and Joker mixed it up with some UK funky and house.
I think the fact dubstep artists embrace other genres is a big part of why it's so difficult to define the music. The borders are becoming increasingly blurred between dubstep, grime, drum'n'bass, techno, house, funky ... everything. However, there is one element that links all of these genres together and that is ... BASS.
The music industry has been in the doldrums for a long time with few A&R people willing to take a risk. You get the feeling they are all being told by bosses to "sign us a hit or you're out". This is very short-sighted, and has done a lot of damage to the music on the majors. Luckily, we found a label (Columbia) that didn't ask us to water down our sound. Hopefully, other majors will follow suit and let their A&R teams make choices based on the music they believe in.
There are so many great acts out there, with fresh music deserving the same exposure we are getting at the moment (see below). With the support of more labels like ours, and Radio 1 willing to take risks as they have in supporting us, the remainder of 2010 and 2011 will hopefully be the start of another revolutionary and exciting time in UK music.
Skream: "You should be checking out dBridge and Instra:Mental. They're coming up with some amazing stuff right now and dBridge has just done a great remix of our track Perfect Stranger. You should also check out Tensnake – the track Coma Cat goes off!
Artwork: "I'd recommend Kito, she's fantastic – a female producer from Australia who lives in London. She's just been signed to Diplo's label but I think she was signed with Skream first. She has a fantastic sound and she's a brilliant producer.
Benga: I'm going to go for my all-time favourite, Sub Focus. Every single thing he's done to date has been amazing. His mix, riff-wise, everything.
Books a footnote at literary festival
Blacks don't read, according to a prominent African journalist. So how can such an event survive?
"It's a fact," pronounced the read-me headline, "Darkies just don't read."
Provocative? An understatement. Sihle Khumalo's column in the Sunday Times of South Africa last year said bluntly: "Go to any black household and you will find lots of music tapes, LPs, CDs and DVDs and a handful, if any, of general books. That, by the way, includes blacks in the suburbs. The lack of reading is a black thing, irrespective of where you live. It is way more fashionable to have loads of music than to be truly knowledgeable."
Khumalo noted that the only general bookshop in Soweto, the country's biggest black township, had closed down because of lack of custom.
The theme was taken up by the newspaper the Sowetan, which told the story of an ambassador who visited a Soweto school and hid a 100-rand note in a novel to see if anybody would find it. Four months later he went back and found the money exactly where he left it. The book had not been opened.
So South Africa, where illiteracy runs high, stands accused of a deeply unliterary culture. Stephen Johnson, managing director of publisher Random House Struik, told the Mail & Guardian: "Books and reading are simply not on the national agenda at all. It's shameful."
It doesn't sound like fertile soil for a literary festival. In Britain, these are now all the rage: barely a town or village is untouched by the invasion of wind-blown marquees, plastic chairs and superstar authors expected to prove as captivating in person as on the page. I have fond memories of Bill Deedes, Christopher Hitchens, John Pilger and John Updike at Hay-on-Wye and Martin Amis, Michael Frayn and Stephen Fry at Cheltenham.
Yet South Africa has well-established book festivals in Cape Town and Franschhoek. Last weekend, after more than a decade in mothballs, the Mail & Guardian resurrected its version in Johannesburg. The venue was 44 Stanley Avenue, a maze of old warehouses, workshops and garages that have been converted into pleasant if self-consciously trendy boutique shops and restaurants. The main room featured four antique crystal chandeliers, five dummy chickens perched on the cross-beam ceiling and an elegant bookcase with no books in it.
The festival theme was Being here now: South Africans in 2010, and certainly the gaze was inward rather than directed at trends in world literature. Indeed, it has been argued that much South African writing remains parochial, a notable exception being Craig Higginson's determination to "not worry about the local thing" in his novel Last Summer, set in Stratford-upon-Avon.
But even last weekend, books were not always at centre stage; half of the eight sessions were more political or media debates. All were relaxed and conversational. They offered glimpses of a relentlessly complicated nation attempting to define itself, contest itself and wrestle with its internal contradictions.
Moeletsi Mbeki, the political economist, admitted he was weary of that unholy trinity: colonialism, apartheid and racism. "If I never hear those three words again, I will go to my grave a very happy person because I think those three words tell us very little about what is happening in South Africa," he said.
It was remarked that South Africa might be like 19th-century America, where explosive change played out in ways that no one could discern at the time.
From the country's crippling public-sector strike, Mbeki, brother of the former president, Thabo, arrived at a startling proposition: "The fact civil servants are fighting for justice is a good thing about South Africa, not a bad thing. America had a civil war and 600,000 died, but it was the only way they could get rid of slavery. How are we going to get rid of the massive inequality in this country? Do we need a civil war? We may need it."
Another session marked the 25th anniversary of the Mail & Guardian itself. I asked if journalists had a kernel of nostalgia for the 1980s and 90s, when South Africa had an epic narrative - heroic Mandelas and apartheid villains - and the eyes of the world upon it.
Nic Dawes, the editor, replied: "I suppose I am to a degree envious of what seems from distance like the moral clarity of that campaign. That's certainly something that we lack now, when people on all sides of the story seem to occupy a much more complex spectrum of positions. But I think that, actually, in some ways, some of that clarity is returning right now, because the story around governance, corruption and those sorts of things is acquiring a kind of epic quality. It's not just a minor nibbling away at the corners of the state any more."
He added: "I do think there's a large narrative developing around the criminalisation of the state and the scale of assault on basic governance, which is now very large and very serious. The line between those who would govern and those who would loot is the difference between success and failure, so for me that's the kind of epic picture that we have to look at now."
The following day, questions about identity and indigeneity were at the centre of debate. Curiously, Rian Malan, arguably the most gifted non-fiction writer in South Africa today, was relegated to a seat in the audience and could later be seen pursuing his other artistic talent, the guitar.
The author Kevin Bloom recalled a Sunday afternoon in Soweto with a group of volunteers, one of whom opened up about how his mother was dying from Aids.
Bloom recalled: "We stopped walking and he cried a bit. And then he looked at me and said, 'When are you going back to your country?' It remains the most profound thing that has happened to me ever as a journalist in this country, because I lived 15km away from him and so much is asked in that question. What is the notion of home? How do we explain home to ourselves in the context of that question? On the deepest level, certainly for people of my generation, 'When are you going back to your country?' is one of the most profound questions about the concept of home."
Another panellist, the sculptor and writer Pitika Ntuli, treated the packed room to some poetry from TS Eliot and WB Yeats. One of the latter's best-known lines has become a firm favourite to describe the South African condition, possibly with a little help from Chinua Achebe, and is quoted almost daily in political commentary. Ntuli recited the stanza in full:
Turning and turning in the widening gyre,
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Prince Charles's green garden party
Bibi van der Zee meets celebrities and green experts at the launch of the Prince of Wales's sustainable garden party
Gérard and Juliette: a classic spat
The spat between Gérard Depardieu and Juliette Binoche recalls the great Hollywood rivalries – and also the lowliest gossip rags
At a film festival last December, Christophe Lambert gave me and a couple of other reporters his take on French cinema. "It's like a tree," he announced, with that Gallic mix of philosophy and indignation. "Catherine Deneuve is like a tree. She will never disappear until she's dead! 'We have to take her in this movie!' Why? If she's not right for the part, why do we have to take her? In America, it's constantly moving. In Europe, it's constantly ground-based and not moving. Sometimes you go, 'Oh God, I've seen Gérard Depardieu five times this year. Don't they have somebody else?'"
Lately, of course, we've learned that Depardieu shares Lambert's concerns – though his somewhat more bilious overexposure complaints target not his own output but that of Juliette Binoche ("She has nothing. Absolutely nothing!"). Binoche has in turn expressed polite bafflement at Depardieu's outburst, proposing that "it has to do with himself", that he is perhaps jealous or – a beautifully provocative phrase – "wounded in his maleness". Now, Vanessa Paradis has reportedly pitched in on Depardieu's behalf, suggesting that he had "a bad day ... I'm sure he loves her and I'm sure he admires her. He's a very free spirit."
The longer this petty contretemps drags on, the more it comes to resemble the kind of seething family dynamic – full of minor slights that touch raw nerves and reconciliation attempts that fan the flames – French cinema excels at depicting. (Perhaps Arnaud Desplechin could direct the movie?) We probably shouldn't be surprised if the country's cinematic elite can seem as insular, self-regarding and dysfunctional as, well, our own royal family. There's surely some justification in Lambert's assertion that the French film industry's star system is in many ways more entrenched than its Hollywood counterpart, with less room at the top for newcomers and more powerful inertia keeping incumbents in place. No wonder these established performers, like the jostling elders of a clan, are not always one another's biggest fans.
Perhaps more surprising is quite how much attention this spat has received. Sure, it's unusual for big-name actors to denigrate each other so publicly, but in the context of movieland feuds this is small potatoes. Think of the slow-burning resentment of Joan Fontaine and Olivia de Havilland in the 1940s or the long-running enmity between Joan Crawford and Bette Davis, both played out with a certain amount of studio abetment and using the Oscar dais as a bragging platform. Or the notoriously fruitful animus between Werner Herzog and Klaus Kinski, featuring alleged firearm threats and arson attacks and feeding into the fevered production of triumphs such as Aguirre: The Wrath of God and Fitzcarraldo.
More than the conflict itself, the Binoche-Depardieu story is interesting for what is shows about the strength of the market for stories about conflict. What's better than gossip? Gossip about a fight. Better than that? Gossip about a fight between stars! The golden age studios recognised this, supplying hacks with off-the-record titbits that helped to fuel classic feuds. And there are still plenty of cases where demand forges conflict where there may be none. Jen v Angelina! Angelina v Brad! Kathryn Bigelow v James Cameron! Mel Gibson v everyone! (Alright, there's proven enmity in that last one.)
These days film stars generally keep their feelings under wraps, and much of the heat is taken off them by the explosion of a celebrity economy that leaves readers and viewers spoiled for choice when it comes to fights. There are plenty of personal rivalries in other fields requiring some kind of exceptional ability – music, sports, modelling – but the rise of the professional celebrity has inculcated the idea that, in the absence of conspicuous talent, you can succeed by offering real-life drama. The promotion of conflict is, for instance, integral to the DNA of reality TV, while celebs like Paris Hilton and Jordan have proven that a strenuously publicised make-up-break-up cycle can keep you in the headlines for months, even years. The newest category of celeb, the Wag, arguably exists for the sole purpose of being publicly wronged.
Which is to say that, when you put our perennial desire for gossip about fights in an age of hyper-mediated emotional exhibitionism, you end up with a bunch of professional drama queens. And who better to lead the way than the French acting aristocracy?
Alternative Montreal attractions
The best of Montreal's thriving urban culture, from city surfing to fringe festivals and a roller derby
Surfing is not something you'd typically associate with a city that's a couple of hundred miles from the sea, but the St Lawrence River has a standing wave that's ripe for action. It's known as the Habitat wave because it is right near the distinctive, Lego-like apartment complex, Habitat 67, and you can learn to master it with lessons from Imagine Surfboards (imaginesurfboards.com), which claims to be the world's largest river-surfing school. A one-day course costs C$99. More experienced surfers can hire their own boards.
Ice hockey is the number one sport in Montreal, but for something a little different, try the Roller Derby. The girls's team has gathered quite a following, with 800 people attending each game and tickets selling out fast. If this inspires you, hire some rollerblades from Ça Roule (caroulemontreal.com) and go for a spin around the Formula One Track. Or for purchases, check out the new skate shop, Neon Skates (twitter.com/neonskatesMTL), at the back of well-loved, second-hand store Local 23 (23 Rue Bernard Ouest).
Yes, Arcade Fire are based in Montreal, but they aren't the only ones. The city is renowned for its indie/alternative scene, with Casa de Popolo, La Sala Rosa and Divan Orange being good places to catch new talent. There are plenty of music events year-round, including Osheaga Festival (Aug), Pop Montreal (Sept) and M for Montreal (Nov). If you're brave, try Igloofest (Jan), which sees participants dressing up in retro ski suits and dancing around outdoor ice bars in bracing temperatures of -10C and below.
Every Sunday, a crowd of drummers gathers at the foot of Parc Mont Royal for a lively, improvised session. It attracts musicians of all ages, plus picnickers or those who fancy dancing. If you'd rather be a participant than a spectator, Kosa Music (kosamusic.com) can help you brush up your skills via percussion workshops and private lessons.
There is more to Montreal food than the famous poutine, the city's beloved fast-food dish of chips, gravy and cheese curd. This year has seen a boom in new restaurants, including Kitchen Galerie Poisson (399 Notre-Dame Ouest) with its unpretentious and affordable oyster bar, and Brasserie T (1425 Rue Jeanne Mance), an offshoot of the city's most critically acclaimed restaurant Toqué, but without the waiting lists. In the warmer months, you can also try a lobster roll from Muvbox, a pop-up restaurant in the Old Port.
Has Montreal got more vintage clothes shops (aka friperie) than any other city? It can seem like it at times. You can find a good concentration of them by wandering up Boulevard St Laurent to Mile End. Friperie Saint Laurent (3976) is a classic, with a good collection of bags, T-shirts and leather jackets, while modern boutiques Preloved (4832 St Laurent) and General 54 (54 St Viateur Ouest) stock fresh designs from recycled fabrics.
Now that the Plateau neighbourhood's hipness has, well, plateaued and hipster hangout Mile End up and came long ago, what is the next neighbourhood to watch out for? Hochelaga-Maisonneuve in the city's east is hotly tipped and has even got a silly nickname to prove it: Ho-Ma. Maisonneuve was once a separate town (and a successful industrial one at that), then it fell into bankruptcy and, 100 years on, it remains one of the poorest neighbourhoods in town. Following an influx of students, artists and immigrants, its fortunes are tipped to change once again. It's early days yet, but talked-about hotspots include Restaurant Cabotins (restaurantcabotins.wordpress.com) and Sata Sushi (satasushi.com).
Montreal is a wonderful city for cycling, and as a tourist you can easily devise your own city tour on a Bixi public bike (the bikes that London has just imported for its city cycle scheme; bixi.com/home, C$5/£3 a day). Look out for the city's most unusual, hybrid bike stores as you go. Have a coffee at Café Vélo Québec (1251 Rachel Est), then pop into its adjoining shop for a range of route maps and accessories. In Mile End, Brakeless (5390 Avenue du Parc) stocks streetwear and occasionally throws happening barbecues. There's also the superbly named Bikurious (1757 Rue Amherst), a gay bike shop that does an interesting sideline in "lesbian haircuts".
If you miss one festival in Montreal, rest assured you'll catch another one (or three) the following week. The big hitters, such as the Jazz Festival (June/July) and the Just For Laughs comedy festival (July), have thrown up fringe events and gigs throughout the year. The city's official St Ambroise Fringe Festival (June) is a performing arts showcase that chooses its participants by lottery. Cafe noticeboards are a good way to find out about the more alternative festivals and obscure tie-in events.
Situated in a converted 1875 warehouse, Auberge Alternative describes itself as a "boutique hostel". "Bohemian" may be a better word, but it's certainly been designed with care. Dorms and private rooms come with salvaged furniture, handmade beds and a partially organic breakfast. There is also an annual artist-in-residence programme, a small workshop is available on request and, in true Montreal style, instruments are welcome. Alternatively, try cinema-themed B&B Absolument Montréal, whose decor includes old movie posters and reclaimed cinema seats. Your options for the night include the Bollywood room or Cinecittà , a homage to Italian cinema.
Auberge Alternative: auberge-alternative.qc.ca. Dorms £15, private room £46.
Absolument Montreal: absolumentmontreal.com. Doubles from £67.
Ten essential student items for less
Moving away from home for the first time can be an expensive time. But it is possible to kit yourself out without laying waste to your bank balance, says Reni Eddo-Lodge
It's easy to move away from home horrendously under prepared. If you're moving into halls you should be provided with the basics (bed, desk, chair, wardrobe). But for everything else you'll need to get value for money; good quality products that will do the job without falling apart three weeks into term. Going for the cheapest option might seem a good idea while you are shopping, but you'll pay for your frugality later. Here we list the items we think you should splash out on, and how to save money on them.
StudentStore.co.uk lets students take advantage of the National Desktop and Notebook Agreement, run by Toshiba and Samsung. The scheme is only available to university students and staff, and offers laptop computers at reasonable prices with a three-year warranty as opposed to the standard one year.
Sony is offering "back to university" deals for students buying televisions and laptops, while Apple has an education discount for teachers, students, schools and universities. Higher education students are entitled to a discount of up to 15% on a Mac and software, plus a three-year warranty. Further education students are entitled to a discount of up to 13%, but not the extended warranty.
It is definitely worth investing in a good night's sleep. Inexpensive pillows with little or no head support can leave you with an aching neck. A pair of duck feather and down pillows from Argos are comfortable and at £9.99 won't burn a hole in your pocket. You can also pick up inexpensive duvets from plenty of shops, for example a 10.5 tog duvet, also from Argos, for £9.99.
Cheap pots and pans can appear convenient, but they only last for a short time. To avoid garnishing your mashed potato with the distinctive taste of rust, spend money on a decent set that will last for the duration of your study. Tesco offer an affordable three-piece set including frying pan for £29 that should do the job nicely. It is a good idea to have your own set – communal pots and pans in a flat share work in theory, but in practice can lead to needless arguments.
If you're a regular oven user, be warned that cheapskate baking trays have a tendency to ingrain dirt on their surface. Save yourself hours of grappling with a wire wool scrubber by purchasing a couple of durable baking trays – this one from Wilkinson is enamel and costs £6.
Ryman offer value pads of paper for £1.99. Take advantage of WHSmith's stationery sale where you can pick up ring binders for as little as £1.19. Organisation is the key, so use sticky labels to mark which ring binder holds information for a particular module.
Cutlery has a tendency to disappear in student halls, so make sure you have enough for yourself as well as your flatmates. There's no need to spend a lot – this set from Ikea is perfect for students. In terms of kitchen utensils, Wilkinson's plastic spatulas, kitchen gadgets and assorted utensils are student friendly.
If it's not practical for you to take your clothes hangers with you, the trick is to sweet talk the local dry cleaner or find deals on bundles. Hanger bundles can range from packs of three to packs of 10. If you don't want to spend too much it's a good idea to go for wire or plastic instead of wooden hangers. Ikea is currently selling packs of four for just 49p.
There are plenty of discounts on towels at the moment, like this bright red Egyptian cotton towel for £9.99 from TK Maxx. Tesco Direct currently have a half-price towel sale on – this blue one is a steal at £3.
Bargain multi-sets of plates, cups and bowls appear quite inexpensive, but you can end up with lots of stuff you never use. It is a good idea to buy bits individually. Wilkinsons has a selection of individually priced kitchenware at low prices, such as this mug for £1. Go for printed crockery like this plate so you can work out which set belongs to you.
You may not be provided with a desk lamp in halls, so it's worth buying one for mammoth study sessions. Tesco Direct has a minimalist black lamp for £7, and for £5.99 Homebase has a bendy desk lamp with a goose neck clip. Argos is currently selling an angled desk lamp for an unbelievably reasonable £2.99.
Perfect for parties, you can pick up portable iPod speakers for less than £20. Logic's i-StationGo speakers cost £14.95 at John Lewis. Cardboard speakers look great, really do sound OK and can be folded away – Nigel's Ecostore has a boombox-shaped speaker for £19.99, excluding p&p.
You may find that sockets are few and far between in your appointed accommodation, so extension leads can prove invaluable. Asda sells a four-plug extension lead for £4, while Homebase has a similar lead for £1.79.
Viral Video Chart: Playing bear
Fun with bears and less fun on a cruise in this week's web clip roundup
Watch this before you read on.
This is the most fun I've ever had with a) Tippex or b) a viral video. I tried tickles, cuddles (this is a bit like Blankety Blank), kisses, eats, licks, sucks (that got a disapproving tut from The Bear) and lastly circumcises, which finally got a #404. See you in about an hour.
Elsewhere we've got babies eating lemons and some fabulous, other wordly, ethereal beach bubbles. And there's this terrifying and thankfully silent footage from a ocean liner in heavy seas. Not what you'd envisaged when handing over that cheque for thousands, is it?
I had a rough crossing on the Pentland Firth once and that's quite enough for one lifetime. The fact the furniture was bolted to the floor should've been a warning.
Guardian Viral Video Chart. Compiled by Unruly Media and edited by Jemima
1 A hunter shoots a bear
Not at all what it seems, and really quite clever.
2 Midichlorian Rhapsody
One for the Star Wars fans among you (isn't that everyone?)
3 Teenage Dream (with me)
Don't knock it - he's had three million views. He could be the next Numa Numa kid.
4 Cat Parkour
Les chats, ils grimpent les choses...
5 MGM lion attack in Las Vegas
Did you call me a pussy?
6 Pacific cruise liner in heavy seas
Scary boat trip.
7 Babies eating lemons for the first time
Ah, the squinting gag-shiver reflex...
8 Ablisa's X Factor audition
Where's the Auto-Tune when you need it, eh?
9 Dirty car artist
Hang on - he cleans it before he paints in it? Not quite in the spirit of 'I wish my wife was this dirty', is it?
10 Giant Stinson Beach bubbles
Like some kind of sea creature from the deep...
Source: Viral Video Chart. Compiled from data gathered at 16:00 on 9 September 2010. The Weekly Viral Video Chart is currently based on a count of the embedded videos and links on approximately two million blogs.
Jonathan Jones
The real-life wreckage from a Baghdad car bomb, on display at the Imperial War Museum, ponders dismemberment and death
Jeremy Deller is an artist of the real. The power of his work does not come from elegance or style – though some might disagree – but a ruthless and sometimes miraculous ability to make us look at real life. With his new work, Baghdad, 5 March 2007, at the Imperial War Museum, he makes us see real death. It is the closest he could get, within the parameters of public display, to laying out the bodies of Iraq's killed on the floor of the gallery.
A dismembered body is what you immediately think of when you come into the museum and see a car destroyed in a 2007 truck bomb attack among the book stalls of Al-Mutanabbi Street in Baghdad, an attack that killed 38 people. Lying among the missiles, tanks and war planes in the museum's main hall is the eviscerated corpse of what was once a car. It is more than wrecked. It appears to have been flung in the air, crushed, then burned in an inferno. It suggests a human body in a deeply perturbing way. First, because it is so flattened, with viscera of pipes and tanks sticking out. Then again it is scorched by fire to a colour that evokes dried blood. It looks curiously like Lindow Man in the British Museum.
That visual suggestiveness is not the work of a sculptor in a studio. Deller did not make this. He had the idea of exhibiting a car from a Baghdad bombing, was able to get his hands on one, and toured it around America as an object of curiosity before the Imperial War Museum made the brave decision to show it in their displays. The horrible sculptural quality of this relic is accidental, and it forces you to confront the real suffering of the people killed and wounded in Baghdad on that particular day. It is a simple enough thought: if the bomb did this to metal, what did it do to flesh?
The truth stares you in the face, while gleaming machines of death loom above. It makes you imagine not just this reality, but all the realities those weapons created, from a burned-out Panzer on the eastern front to a London street just hit by a V1. Deller has often created works of populist social theatre, but here he achieves something new: the most serious and thoughtful response to the Iraq war by any British artist.
Robert Plant: Band of Joy
Never one to give 'em what they want, Robert Plant goes his own way again, and Alexis Petridis approves
It seems surprising that Robert Plant is never considered part of rock's sexagenarian awkward squad, that select cabal of artists who've turned bewildering audiences and critics into an art form, who see pleasing the crowd as dereliction of duty. Judging by his solo career, that's where he belongs – in the old contrarians' clubhouse, basking in the sunny glow of Lou Reed's winning personality, wiping a tear of mirth from his eye as Neil Young recalls how his fans hated 2009's Fork in the Road so much they actually pleaded with his record label not to release it, nodding while Van Morrison revisits the time he decried music magazines for their "obsession with the past" during an interview to promote an album of 50s and 60s country-and-western covers.
Plant could certainly hold his own with them, at least on musical terms. No sooner had he minted a new-wave AOR style distinct from Led Zeppelin and scored a hit single with the unfortunately titled Big Log than things started to go off-road. First an album of high-camp 50s rock'n'roll covers as the Honeydrippers, then the flatly indescribable Shaken 'N Stirred: whatever Plant's fans imagined he'd end up doing in the 80s, it probably wasn't singing a song called Doo Doo a Do Do over honks of atonal synth and flailing bass. On the occasions he's acquiesced to the clamour for something Zeppelin-shaped, he's thrown some kind of curveball: singing over samples of the band on 1989's Now and Zen, enlisting Steve Albini as producer for the Page and Plant album Walking Into Clarksdale, then abandoning the reunion altogether, first to play the Queen Mary Ballroom in Dudley Zoo with the Priory of Brion, then to form Strange Sensation, the latter making Plant one of the few musicians in the world who'd rather be in a band with a bloke out of Cast than Jimmy Page. When Led Zeppelin finally did re-form, Plant appeared to go out of his way to talk the event's significance down, then coolly walked away to promote his country album with Alison Krauss, Raising Sand.
Not even Raising Sand's mammoth critical acclaim, multi-platinum sales and five Grammy awards could quell the clamour for a Led Zep reunion, much of it emanating from his former bandmates. Those who like to read deep meanings into things might feel there's something telling in his decision to resurrect the name Band of Joy for his latest solo album: originally the name of Plant and John Bonham's 60s psych-blues band, it harks back to a world in which Led Zeppelin never existed.
The preponderance of Nashville session players in Band of Joy's ranks might lead you to expect a continuation of Raising Sand's country explorations: singer Patty Griffin – her desolate voice a fascinating counterpart to the downhome warmth of Alison Krauss – and guitarist Darrell Scott have both written mainstream country hits for the Dixie Chicks. It's an idea immediately upturned by the opening cover of Los Lobos' Angel Dance. The mandolin riff in the chorus suggests it could have been performed as straight country, but instead the pretty melody is swamped in tremolo-heavy guitars: it sounds humid and mysterious. It's evidence of Band of Joy's often thrillingly tangential approach to their material, which is brilliantly chosen. You wouldn't think it based on the way he dressed in the 70s, but Plant is a man of exquisite taste, hence two tracks from slowcore band Low's 2005 album The Great Destroyer – their creepy intensity ratcheted up by guitarist Buddy Miller's opaque smears of feedback and Plant and Griffin's eerily controlled vocals – rub shoulders with a Richard Thompson song, House of Cards, a fabulous, obscure bit of mid-60s New Orleans r'n'b called Can't Buy My Love and the late Townes Van Zandt's heartbreaking final song, Harm's Swift Way. Rather than play up the song's weary pathos, the performance is straightforward, propulsive country-rock: you notice its sweet tune before the lyric's stark intimations of mortality.
At the other extreme, there's Even This Shall Pass Away: a 19th-century poem set to a clattering syncopated beat and buzzing synthesised bass, Plant's voice entwining with fragments of densely effected guitar. You could, if you squint hard, see the ghost of Led Zeppelin lurking around its sound, yet it feels like a song with its eyes fixed firmly on the future, rather than resting on past glories. Like the rest of Band of Joy, it feels more edifying than a Led Zep reunion, not just for the guy singing on it, but the listener. It's marked by the fresh excitement of mapping out new territory rather than the more craven pleasure of wallowing in nostalgia: an object lesson in the value of not giving people what they want.
My wife's illness ruined our sex life
You need support to help you feel less resentful and to find other ways of giving each other pleasure. And don't discount extramarital sex: it could work for both of you
For a decade my wife has been suffering from poly-viral arthritis. She is exhausted and her sexual interest has dwindled. Now she uses orgasms to get to sleep rather than enjoyment. I don't know what arouses her any more. I feel neglected, unfulfilled and tired myself as I end up doing things alone we'd normally share. I've been told, when we argue about the issue, that I can look for a lover, which seems utterly wrong. I'm no longer sure what works for me sexually as I've been dependent on fantasy too long. The condition is taking over more of my wife's life and while we get on very well, I can't help but feel neglected and ill-used (which I know is irrational and unfair).
It's very hard when illness or disability means that a lover becomes a carer. You are both mourning the loss of your sexual relationship and the loss of her health. Depression and despair are common, and typically undermine sexuality. You need more support. Perhaps take more breaks or get extra household assistance – to help you feel less resentful. Your sexual response will improve when you are not giving so much. If she wishes, try timing love-making to when her pain level is lowest, and consult her doctor regarding using moist heat pads and strategically placed cushions. If the suggestion of outside sex is a true, loving offer, I have seen such an arrangement benefit both partners.
• Send your problem to private.lives@guardian.co.uk
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