Bans and taxes on the most popular and effective aid for giving up smoking could lead to a major health crisis

Imagine we’d found a way to get millions of people to switch from alcohol, which in this country kills 10,000 people a year , to another kind of substance: still addictive, still not risk-free, but when compared with the booze, pretty harmless. Coffee, say.

A public health miracle is hailed. Liver units are empty. Heart surgeons spend more time on the golf course, and costly government prevention programmes close. Millions chink into NHS coffers.

Arnold’s feral, fantastical drama set in the rundown Kent of her childhood stars remarkable newcomer Nykiya Adams as a marginalised child who makes a strange new friend

Andrea Arnold’s films have a thrilling, entirely distinctive energy. Take her US-set American Honey (2016), with its itchy, restless outlaw spirit and music used front and centre, or the earthy fervour of her 2011 version of Wuthering Heights . The British director’s films are feral, unpredictable and untameable, informed by empathy, curiosity and a way of working that embraces chaos and discovery. With its marginalised milieu and themes of the wildness within, Bird , which earned an impressive haul of British independent film award nominations last week, could only be an Andrea Arnold creation.

In some ways, though, it’s also a notable departure for this continually evolving film-maker, who returns to the UK – specifically north Kent, where she grew up and later set her short film Wasp – for her first fiction feature since American Honey . The most obvious change is the fantastical element. Having long inhabited the gritty, social realist end of the spectrum, Arnold ventures into magical realism for the first time. If, like me, you’re somewhat allergic to the genre in its more twinkly and whimsical forms, fear not: this version has teeth.

Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick is planning to stack the incoming White House staff with Trump loyalists

Scrambling to construct an administration in the wake of his shock victory eight years ago, Donald Trump looked far beyond his inner circle, and those who ardently embraced his agenda. Not this time.

The president-elect has charged Howard Lutnick, a longtime friend, and one of the few high-profile figures in corporate America to vocally endorse his campaign, with recruiting officials who will deliver, rather than dilute, his agenda.

A masculinity researcher on the Democrats’ ‘fatal miscalculation’

Election deniers use Trump victory to sow more doubt over 2020 result

What a second Trump presidency means for big US tech firms

Who could be in Trump’s new administration

New Zealand’s historic series clean sweep has set up an unexpectedly exciting race to the final at Lord’s next year

A week on from New Zealand’s 3-0 triumph in India and the result feels no less seismic. The more you consider the history, the disparity in economics or player pools, India’s 12-year unbroken run of dominance in their own conditions and the absence of Kane Williamson, New Zealand’s all-time great with the bat, the harder it is to think of an away victory in modern times to rival it.

India’s fortress had to be breached at some point, not least with flecks of silver creeping into the beards of what could well be their greatest side. But New Zealand as the ones to do it? Their first Test win in India since 1988 to then trigger a cascading clean sweep?

Steve Borthwick called this a ‘young, developing’ team before the defeat by Australia, but the truth is they are not

The English winter is closing in and at Twickenham the temperature is dropping fast. This week, they didn’t miss the last-minute kick and it didn’t make any difference. This week, Marcus Smith stayed on the pitch and that didn’t fix it either.

England lost, again. The three before it were all to the All Blacks, but this one was to an Australian team who are ninth in the world rankings and had lost five of their past six games coming into this fixture. It happened even though England had a 12-point lead at the end of the first quarter and a two-point lead at the end of the fourth one.

• Second reading of governance bill set for House of Lords
• Fair Game argues for more sustainable approach to game

Proposed changes to the football regulator that would ensure clubs could not be sold to nation states are to be put before the House of Lords, as legislation returns to parliament this week. Nineteen changes to the football governance bill have been proposed by Fair Game, an organisation of 34 men’s clubs that argues for a more sustainable approach to running the national sport.

Other proposals include the addition of a human rights component to owners’ and directors’ tests and a mandate to disclose the source of an owner’s funds. The text of the proposed amendment on state ownership says: “The Bill must exclude the possibility that an owner of a club could be a state or state-controlled person or entity.”

Downing Street may be making friendly overtures but the cabinet’s stomachs are in knots about the threats to the UK’s security and prosperity

Peas from the same pod they sure ain’t. No one is ever going to think that Keir Starmer and Donald Trump are twins who were separated at birth. In their temperaments, their worldviews and the values of the parties they lead, two human beings could not be less alike than the former prosecutor who heads Britain’s first Labour government in 14 years and the convicted felon whom Americans have returned to the White House for another four. When Trumpites are being polite about the Labour leader they call him a “liberal”; when they are feeling vituperative they brand him “far-left”. The animosity has been mutual. There’s a bulging catalogue of damnatory remarks about the president-elect by members of the Starmer cabinet.

Which is why Sir Keir felt compelled to lay on the flattery with a trowel when, according to the account from Number 10, he telephoned the American to extend his “ hearty congratulations ”. If that left many Labour people gagging on their breakfasts, they retched even harder when the prime minister went on to claim: “ We stand shoulder to shoulder in defence of shared values of freedom, democracy and enterprise.” He also employed a well-worn diplomatic cliche that one of our ambassadors to Washington banned his staff from using because he thought it fed delusional thinking about the extent of British influence over the US. “I know the special relationship will continue to prosper on both sides of the Atlantic for years to come,” said the prime minister, even though he can’t be genuinely confident of any such thing. The foundations of transatlantic relations frequently shuddered during the first Trump term. Britain’s defence and foreign policy establishments are seized with a justifiably deep apprehension that the world will become an even more dangerous place during the sequel.

Words of encouragement, words of courage, wise words… Some of our most influential figures share the advice that’s helped them most

Good advice respects the recipient’s autonomy, offering insights without taking away their sense of agency. It is rooted in empathy, aiming to uplift and empower, rather than control. It aims to provide clarity and direction while encouraging self-reflection, allowing the person to find their own answers. Most importantly, good advice is given at the right time, when the recipient is open and ready to hear it. On point, well-timed advice is one thing, but not all advice is wanted.

Unwelcome advice is a common problem, especially in the age of social media, where everyone feels free to offer their opinions without being asked. This kind can feel patronising. It often implies that the person receiving advice is not capable of handling their own challenges. While unwanted advice can feel intrusive, navigating how to receive it can be just as challenging. One strategy is to recognise that advice often reflects the experiences and perspectives of the person giving it. It may say more about their worldview than it does about you. If you still feel defensive, ask yourself why. Resistance can sometimes mask a fear of vulnerability. For example, do you need to see yourself as someone who already has all the answers? Feeling as though you should already know something can evoke shame, making it hard to accept guidance.

Canny PR suggests critics are against aspiration but who is policing the spread of poor-quality degrees?

Sometimes you just need to call something out for what it is. English undergraduate education is a hot mess that works in the institutional interests of universities, not young people.

Yes, there are bastions of excellence. But, in expanding an elite system that served a small slice of society a few decades ago to cover about half of young people , politicians have given far too little thought about how to do this in a way that serves students, not universities.