Union cites extreme wet weather and post-Brexit phasing-out of EU subsidies as main reasons for slump

Farmers’ confidence has hit its lowest level in at least 14 years, a long-running survey by the biggest farming union in Britain has found, with extreme weather and the post-Brexit phasing-out of EU subsidies blamed for the drop.

The National Farmers’ Union warned there had been a “collapse of confidence” and that the outlook was at its lowest since the annual poll of its members in England and Wales began in 2010.

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Ministers say move will combat growing concerns about ‘privacy and dignity’ in gender-neutral facilities

New restaurants, offices, schools and hospitals in England will be required to have separate male and female toilets, in a move ministers say will combat growing concerns about “privacy and dignity” in gender-neutral facilities.

The law will mean newly built non-residential buildings require separate facilities, and cannot solely have “universal” lavatories.

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Council says punctuation mark causes problem for geographical databases but locals say their loss is a sign of falling standards

A council has provoked the wrath of residents and linguists alike after announcing it would ban apostrophes on street signs to avoid problems with computer systems.

North Yorkshire council is ditching the punctuation point after careful consideration, saying it can affect geographical databases.

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Bernie Evans bemoans the party’s centre-right policies and lack of radicalism to really inspire voters. Plus letters from Lyn Dade, Keith Flett, Jimmy McCluskey and Dr Mark Wilcox

Keir Starmer’s party has not only, as Jonathan Freedland says, sought “to reassure Tory switchers” that they have nothing to worry about, in doing so it has remoulded itself into a centre-right conservative Labour party, with policies so moderate that they’re in danger of Tory adoption prior to the election ( Triumphant Starmer already seems like the prime minister. Now his troubles really begin, 3 May ). Like the effect of Joe Biden’s weak stance over Gaza, the real danger is that many voters will “cast their ballots for alternatives to Sir Keir” ( The Guardian view on local elections: voters aren’t listening to Tories, but are hearing Labour, 3 May ).

Does Freedland seriously believe that if the Gaza situation is “sufficiently calmed” come election day, voters are so fickle that they will have forgotten Starmer’s refusal to support an immediate ceasefire, or his hesitation about whether Israel has the right to withhold power and water from Gaza?

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Party has gained 768 seats, Labour 545 and the Greens 480, while the Conservatives has lost 1,783

The Lib Dems have added more council seats than any other party over the last parliament, gaining more than 750 in the last five years, largely in the south-west and south of England.

As Ed Davey’s party won more seats than the Conservatives in the local elections last week, the Lib Dems said Tories would be “looking over their shoulder terrified” as the general election approached.

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Come to Thurrock, where the Tory council went bankrupt, services are depleted and costs are up. People feel victims of a terrible injustice

Late last Monday, I got home from a long day of political reporting to find a political leaflet produced by the Conservative party. It had nothing do with the local elections; where I live, the only contest was the rather underwhelming vote on a new police and crime commissioner. Instead, what it said looked ahead to the general election.

“Inflation down, wages up, taxes being cut – let’s stick with the plan that’s working,” it read. There were pithy paragraphs about “ensuring high-quality education and childcare for all children”, and “better transport for our community”. As with a lot of what we now hear from the ruling party, I read it as a sign that the government’s pitch to voters had decisively tipped into brazen self-satire. Its implied portrait of everyday life seemed to describe another country. Each promise and boast only highlighted yet another unmentioned failure.

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Throughout her life, Danyah Miller developed coping mechanisms to help deal with certain challenges. Would she have thrived if she had known about dyslexia, or would a label have limited her?

Discovering that I have dyslexia , and most probably dyscalculia , later in my life has raised many questions for me, not least whether a childhood diagnosis would have changed the trajectory of my life, both personally and professionally.

Over the years I’d suspected that I might be dyslexic. I also thought that I was making excuses for myself when met with certain challenges. It wasn’t until last year that I decided to seek an assessment to confirm either way. I was relieved to read, in the first paragraph of my diagnostic report, that my literacy difficulties are consistent with the specific learning difficulty dyslexia.

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Beware what the fitness gurus tell you: the body has its limits. Perhaps that’s why orthopaedic waiting lists are so long

I am preparing for an anaesthetist to sink a hypodermic needle into my back at a busy London hospital ahead of a scheduled surgery to replace my knee. Knowing this might be painful, I ask a fellow patient how he got his mind around the jab. “Two spliffs of good dope worked for me,” he confessed. I’m yet to try that, but this is my second left knee replacement in less than 15 years – an increasingly common story as our population ages and obesity levels cause growing strain on our joints.

More than 2m hip and knee replacements have been performed in the UK since the early 2000s and waiting lists continue to grow. By 2060, demand for hip and knee joint replacement (based on data for England, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Isle of Man) is estimated to increase by almost 40% .

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Many prisoners are homeless after release but former inmate and probation worker want to fix that

Darryn Frost and Steve Gallant are still dealing with the trauma of tackling a terrorist at Fishmongers’ Hall , London Bridge, in 2019.

Gallant, 47, who was on day release from prison where he was serving a life sentence for murder, helped fend off the attacker alongside Frost, 43, a probation worker who had grabbed a 1.5-metre long narwhal tusk as a weapon.

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