Let it be: Paul McCartney urges EU to drop ban on veggie ‘burgers’ and ‘sausages’

Paul McCartney has joined calls for the EU to reject efforts to ban the use of terms such as “sausage” and “burger” for vegetarian foods.The former Beatle has joined eight British MPs who have written to the European Commission arguing that a ban approved in October by the European parliament would address a nonexistent problem while slowing progress on climate goals.The new rules would spell the end the use of terms such as steak, burger, sausage or escalope when referring to products made of vegetables or plant-based proteins. Suggested alternatives include the less appetising “discs” or “tubes”.McCartney said: “To stipulate that burgers and sausages are ‘plant-based’, ‘vegetarian’ or ‘vegan’ should be enough for sensible people to understand what they are eating

The K-shaped Christmas: wealthy few drive holiday spending splurge while many struggle to get by

A soaring stock market rewards the already well-off but Trump’s handling of the economy has caused his approval ratings to plungeEntering Printemps in downtown New York City feels like an escape. A slight smell of musk hangs in the air as shoppers weave carefully around racks of coats and shelves of handbags and shoes. For the holidays, the store set up a small ice rink on its second floor where skaters perform on weekends.The French luxury retail emporium opened its first New York outlet earlier this year and has said it wants shoppers to feel so comfortable that it feels like their own chic “French apartment”. The store has a bar upstairs, along with a roving champagne cart, and encourages shoppers to sip on their drinks while they browse

Cloudflare apologises after latest outage takes down LinkedIn and Zoom

Cloudflare has apologised after an outage on Friday morning hit websites including LinkedIn, Zoom and Downdetector, the company’s second outage in less than a month.“Any outage of our systems is unacceptable, and we know we have let the internet down again,” it said in a blogpost, adding that it would release more information next week on how it aims to prevent these failures.The outage on Friday came after Cloudflare adjusted its firewall to protect customers from a widespread software vulnerability revealed earlier this week, and was not an attack, it said. Earlier, it said a separate issue had been reported with its application programming interfaces.The issue, which affected 28% of its traffic, lasted for half an hour and was resolved shortly after 9am GMT, it said

‘Urgent clarity’ sought over racial bias in UK police facial recognition technology

The UK’s data protection watchdog has asked the Home Office for “urgent clarity” over racial bias in police facial recognition technology before considering its next steps.The Home Office has admitted that the technology was “more likely to incorrectly include some demographic groups in its search results”, after testing by the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) of its application within the police national database.The report revealed that the technology, which is intended to be used to catch serious offenders, is more likely to incorrectly match black and Asian people than their white counterparts.In a statement responding to the report, Emily Keaney, the deputy commissioner for the Information Commissioner’s Office, said the ICO had asked the Home Office “for urgent clarity on this matter” in order for the watchdog to “assess the situation and consider our next steps”.The next steps could include enforcement action, including issuing a legally binding order to stop using the technology or fines, as well as working with the Home Office and police to make improvements

Britain’s Norris pips Verstappen to win maiden F1 world title after third place in Abu Dhabi – as it happened

Time to wave the chequered flag on today’s live blog, and a thrilling F1 season. I’ll leave you with Giles’ Richards race report. Thanks for joining me – see you in March for the Australian Grand Prix. Bye!And here’s Oscar Piastri, who won four of the first six races but ultimately came up short. “We gave it everything, a bit of a gamble on strategy to try and win the race and the championship

Steel, courage and a sense of humour: how Lando Norris claimed his first F1 title | Giles Richards

After blows in mid-season the British driver rallied to hold off the challenge of his teammate Oscar Piastri and a stunning late run from Max Verstappen to make history in Abu Dhabi“Just want to go have a burger and go home,” was the disconsolate entreaty from Lando Norris when he felt his Formula One world championship hopes had taken a mortal blow after he failed to finish at the Dutch Grand Prix in August. Yet it was testament to the resolution he has shown all season that while down he was far from out, as he proved in going on to claim the title that he felt had slipped away.When Norris took the world championship with his third‑place finish in Abu Dhabi on Sunday he became the first British champion since Lewis Hamilton took his last title in 2020 and, similar to Hamilton for his first win in 2008, he had to show his absolute determination to close it out after a rollercoaster ride for the 26-year-old.Quite apart from what has been a gruelling test of his driving ability across a season marked by intense competition, the level of emotional and psychological control that Norris has had to demonstrate must not be underestimated.He had gone in as favourite back in Melbourne for the opening race but for great swathes of this season he has been under the cosh