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The Independent

October 2026

Chancellor targets Amazon and Temu in tax crackdown to deliver Budget for ‘white van man’

It comes amid growing concern that Chinese retailers are using online marketplaces to undercut British competitors by evading the 20 per cent VAT on all their sales

As has always been the case, decisions on tax are a matter for the Chancellor to set out at fiscal events, rather than routinely commenting on rumour, speculation or proposals.”
That means having the beauticians and white van drivers of our towns at the forefront of his mind as the budget draws nearer
This is a step in the right direction but the Treasury needs to go further and make online marketplaces responsible for collecting every penny of VAT on the sales made on their platform

Lung cancer: The symptoms everyone should know as Pope Leo diagnosed with adenocarcinoma

Breathlessness is another insidious sign of lung cancer that tends to creep up on people,
If lung cancer is found at the earlier stage when it is just in one part of your lung, then surgery or radiotherapy has an excellent chance of nipping it in the bud and controlling it for good,
Coughs come and go all the time, particularly heading into autumn and winter, but if you’ve had a cough that isn’t getting better month after month, that is a concerning sign,
Chest X-rays often misses small early tumours, as they can be hiding away, and there isn’t a reliable blood test that is helpful for early-stage lung cancer,
There has been a huge push in recent years, and quite successfully in the UK, to start a screening programme for lung cancers,
Difficulty swallowing can be a sign that there is cancer pressing on your oesophagus,
The A stands for appetite loss, but it’s also the shorthand for unexpected or unplanned weight loss, usually combined with feeling fatigued,
Coughing up blood is more of an obvious danger sign that scares most people and usually triggers them to seek medical help,
You should contact a GP if you have even a single persistent symptom,

Saudi engineer accused of planting secret listening device inside OpenAI HQ

At this time, we have no indications of this individual inappropriately accessing or exfiltrating model weights, source code or customer data,
We used our models to understand the device and where it had come from, identifying that a specific employee had planted it a few days earlier,
Kash PatelfBI Director
Abdulrahman Alfozan allegedly concealed a covert recording device inside his employer's executive conference room to secretly capture sensitive communications about the company’s super intelligence technology,

Sonay Kartal upsets Belinda Bencic as promising return from injury continues

Sonay Kartalbritish tennis player
I trusted that I would be able to get my level back, I just didn’t know how quickly. I did a lot of things right today but I still think there’s a long way to go.... I can produce the level, but can I sustain it — I think that’s going to be the hardest challenge. I’m happy to be back, I’m feeling good.”

Why this Champions League campaign feels very different for Manchester City

When you build yourself as a player, you build yourself against any noise,
Enzo Marescamanager
If this is the last Champions League for a while, I don't know,
Enzo Marescamanager
We know how serious the situation is, but at the same time, it's not something that we can do. Where we can do things is inside the pitch,
Probably it has been more tough for our fans than for the players or for me,
Rúben Diasdefender
We trust the club, we're very calm,
Enzo Marescamanager
We're going to try to improve compared to the last two, three years, where the team struggled a bit,

New species of dinosaur discovered from fossil ‘overlooked’ for over 100 years

The dinosaur is a long-clawed predator the size of a large tiger

Vietnam buries remains of 731 war dead nearly 6 decades after the Tet Offensive

Due to the harsh conditions of war and the passage of time, we have been unable to identify the names, ages, or hometowns of the majority of the martyrs in this group,
The resultant conflict has changed the pattern of the war,
The memory of that burial pit has stayed with me,

Texas prosecutor says ICE agent appeared to intentionally strike man with vehicle in Houston

Sean Teareharris county district attorney
In a case like this, the most obvious criminal charge is aggravated assault with a deadly weapon,
He already had a surgery for the injury under his knee and now we’re waiting for swelling to go down in his ankle to be able to have a reconstructive surgery on his ankle,
Miguel Parra Hernandez ran in front of an ICE vehicle and was struck,

The truth about social infertility for child-free millennials like me

As a new report finds that almost 40 per cent of women are becoming mothers later than they’d wanted to, Olivia Petter examines the truth about why her generation are waiting longer to have a baby, if at all

For many women, delaying having children is not necessarily their preferred choice, but a reflection of the economy, social and professional pressures
Female fertility declines with age, particularly from the mid-to-late thirties onwards, because both egg quantity and egg quality diminish,
Every woman deserves accurate fertility information early enough to make genuinely informed choices about her reproductive future,
If I’d met the right person who wanted children at 30, I would have spent the last seventeen years living another life,
I think we've created an ever-increasing list of things women are supposed to do before they're ready to settle down and have children,
From around 40, research shows that some men will have lower sperm motility, a longer time to conceive and a higher risk of miscarriage,

Greta Thunberg joins French teens protesting over run-down schools: ‘Whole world watching with awe’

She joined and applauded hundreds of teenagers who demonstrated boisterously outside school north of Paris

The international community sees these students and they’re leading by example,
Of course people are going to fight back,
We’re certainly making noise and getting people talking, but unfortunately, our message isn’t reaching the people who should be making the changes,
These movements are connected in one way or another. We are fighting against the same system,
This generation is one that has been growing up with a sense of hopelessness for the future, when we can see our future and our rights taken from us,

The not-so-secret vulnerability in Ukraine's drone arsenal? Chinese technology

Without this 5%, there is no camera,
Today, about 70% to 80% of our components are made in Ukraine,
If China stops their production to us... we are blinded,
Volodymyr Zelenskyyukrainian President
They are slightly on Russia’s side. And by ‘slightly,’ I mean not direct weapons supplies, but a greater openness to them, a greater willingness to help them rather than us — and for a country as large as China, ‘slightly’ means a lot,
We just need to have partner companies which purchase it in other countries, then a third, then to Ukraine,
We should be ready for that situation when China will fully choose the Russian position,

Ukraine-Russia war latest: Putin hits Kyiv energy facilities as Zelensky says allies gave ‘no warning’ of strikes

In less than ​two years, we have gone from 'having no cards' to 'not playing your cards'. That is an achievement,
Once again, no advance ‌warning from our partners. The main target was energy infrastructure, specifically thermal plant No. 4,
Donald Trumppresident
The facts show that the ⁠Russians do not consider themselves bound to abide by what the president of the United States said,
Andy Burnhamprime Minister
My message to the Ukrainian people could not be clearer, we are ‌with you for as long as ‌it takes, and we will go further and faster in our support to back your courageous fight for ⁠peace in Europe,
Ukraine relies on the so-called Space-Based Infrared System which the US deploys — and the US system is really second to none and only the United States can provide that,

Kelly Clarkson and a Brooklyn store clashed on social media. Behind it, power dynamics loomed

I think really the responsibility here is to use this power in a responsible way,
Social media has... kind of created this false sense of reality where, I really think even the act of watching someone’s content on your phone and it looks like they’re talking directly to you,... This is not something that a small business owner has the capability to deal with,
You can’t hold the celebrity responsible for everything that their followers do, of course,
I don’t understand why these people are willing to debase themselves on behalf of a celebrity they never met,
Nowadays everybody's looking for something, you know, publicity,