Coal delivery arrives to keep Scunthorpe steel plant working for months

Steelmaking at Scunthorpe will continue for months, the government has said, after it confirmed that a shipment of more than 55,000 tonnes of coking coal arrived in the UK this weekend.The shipment – more than four times the weight of the Shard, western Europe’s tallest building – landed at the Immingham bulk terminal on the Humber River on Sunday and will be taken by rail the 20 miles to the British Steel site to power its blast furnaces.It arrived just over a fortnight after ministers recalled parliament to approve emergency legislation to take control of the site and continue production amid fears that British Steel’s Chinese owner, Jingye, planned to let the furnaces run cold.The takeover prompted a frantic scramble at the highest level of government to secure new shipments of raw materials to feed the plant’s two furnaces, nicknamed Queen Anne and Queen Bess.The blast furnace coke that arrived on Sunday was imported from Bluescope Steel’s plant in Australia

Indie brewers kept out of UK bars and pubs by multinationals, study finds

Global beer corporations are using their financial muscle to elbow smaller competitors off the bar, according to research that found independent breweries have been shut out of most of their local pubs.The number of breweries in the UK that are not owned by a larger business or multinational is already in decline, falling by 100 last year to 1,715, according to figures released earlier this year by the Society of Independent Brewers and Associates (Siba).In its annual independent beer report, parts of which have been shared with the Guardian, the trade body for British indie brewers said tough conditions were exacerbated by difficulty selling to local pubs.Siba members told a survey that 60% of the pubs within 40 miles were inaccessible to them, choking off potential sources of revenue and reducing choice for consumers thirsty for more interesting options at the bar.They blamed conditions imposed by large breweries and some pub chains, including financial agreements that impose conditions on what beers pubs can sell

Meta faces Ghana lawsuits over impact of extreme content on moderators

Meta is facing a second set of lawsuits in Africa over the psychological distress experienced by content moderators employed to take down disturbing social media content including depictions of murders, extreme violence and child sexual abuse.Lawyers are gearing up for court action against a company contracted by Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, after meeting moderators at a facility in Ghana that is understood to employ about 150 people.Moderators working for Majorel in Accra claim they have suffered from depression, anxiety, insomnia and substance abuse as a direct consequence of the work they do checking extreme content.The allegedly gruelling conditions endured by workers in Ghana are revealed in a joint investigation by the Guardian and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism.It comes after more than 140 Facebook content moderators in Kenya were diagnosed with severe post-traumatic stress disorder caused by exposure to graphic social media content

Microsoft says everyone will be a boss in the future – of AI employees

Microsoft has good news for anyone with corner office ambitions. In the future we’re all going to be bosses – of AI employees.The tech company is predicting the rise of a new kind of business, called a “frontier firm”, where ultimately a human worker directs autonomous artificial intelligence agents to carry out tasks.Everyone, according to Microsoft, will become an agent boss.“As agents increasingly join the workforce, we’ll see the rise of the agent boss: someone who builds, delegates to and manages agents to amplify their impact and take control of their career in the age of AI,” wrote Jared Spataro, a Microsoft executive, in a blogpost this week

London Marathon sets world record for number of finishers

Total surpasses previous record of 55,646 set in New York, and event also broke record for crowd numbers The London Marathon’s organisers have hailed an “extraordinary” day in the nation’s capital, as the 45th edition beat the world record for number of finishers and attracted record crowds.By 6.30pm on Sunday evening, the number of finishers had surpassed the previous best of 55,646 for a mass participation race set in New York.Meanwhile, race director Hugh Brasher said that about 800,000 people had cheered them on – approximately 60,000 more than usual – due to the warm weather and higher number of participants.“It’s been an extraordinary day of records,” said Brasher

Gloucester dismantle Exeter in record-breaking West Country derby victory

Premiership beatings do not come much heavier than this record-breaking West Country derby annihilation. There was nowhere for Exeter to hide on this bright but brutal Sunday in Gloucestershire as a rampant home side rattled up 13 tries to revitalise their ambitions of making the playoffs and inflict the heaviest defeat in the visitors’ top-division history.It would have been a proper cricket score had Gloucester not missed half a dozen conversions and it was all but inevitable from an early stage that Exeter’s previous widest losing margin of 43 points would be blown away. Being booed by the Shed is one thing, hearing laughter ring around the ground is another level of embarrassment.The club’s chairman, Tony Rowe, could be seen laying down the law in the away dressing room after the game, clearly stung by this non-performance from a team theoretically building for next season