Buyers of new EVs under £37,000 can get discount under UK scheme

Buyers of new electric cars priced at less than £37,000 will be able to get a discount of up to 10% under a new UK government scheme, a move that may benefit some cheaper Chinese models but leave Tesla fans still having to pay the full price.The Department for Transport has reintroduced a grant, which had been scrapped in June 2022, to encourage more drivers to switch from petrol and diesel to electric vehicles.The £650m electric car grant will offer a discount of up to £3,750 for the “greenest” vehicles based on sustainability criteria, with a second band offering a discount of up to £1,500.The move may benefit cheaper electric vehicle makers such as BYD, which has overtaken Tesla in sales in the UK. Prices of new cars built by Elon Musk’s company start from about £40,000

UK’s clean electricity growing too slowly to meet climate targets, report says

Britain is expected to fall short of the progress needed to meet its climate targets over the next decade because it is not growing its supply of clean electricity quickly enough, according to the government’s energy system operator.The latest 10-year forecast of Britain’s carbon emissions by the government-owned body has revealed that by 2035 the UK will be producing almost a third more carbon emissions than in scenarios where it is on track to meet its legally binding climate targets by 2050.It is the second official warning in the last month that the government’s climate targets are at risk of being derailed, after the Committee on Climate Change reported that two-fifths of the emissions reductions needed to meet the UK’s interim climate target by the end of the decade still have significant risks or insufficient plans to deliver them.The latest forecast report, published by the National Energy System Operator (Neso), represents the operator’s current view of the next 10 years based on the UK’s existing project pipelines and policies to highlight “the difference between where we are heading compared [with] where we need to get to”.It suggests that the UK will produce 274m tonnes of carbon (MtCO2) by 2035, well above the 185–204MtCO2 range shown in the same year for the Neso scenarios in which the UK meets the government’s net zero target by 2050

Musk’s giant Tesla factory casts shadow on lives in a quiet corner of Germany

Politics of carmaker’s owner has soured sentiments in Grünheide, south-east of Berlin, where the factory promised jobs and revitalisationWhen Elon Musk advised Germans to vote for the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) in elections last year, Manu Hoyer – who lives in the small town where the billionaire had built Tesla’s European production hub – wrote to the state premier to complain.“How can you do business with someone who supports rightwing extremism?” she asked Dietmar Woidke, the Social Democrat leader of the eastern state of Brandenburg, who had backed the setting up of the Tesla Giga factory in Grünheide.Hoyer said that in Woidke’s “disappointing, but predictable” answer, he denied the charge. “He said he didn’t know him personally. As if that excused him

An AI-generated band got 1m plays on Spotify. Now music insiders say listeners should be warned

They went viral, amassing more than 1m streams on Spotify in a matter of weeks, but it later emerged that hot new band the Velvet Sundown were AI-generated – right down to their music, promotional images and backstory.The episode has triggered a debate about authenticity, with music industry insiders saying streaming sites should be legally obliged to tag music created by AI-generated acts so consumers can make informed decisions about what they are listening to.Initially, the “band”, described as “a synthetic music project guided by human creative direction”, denied they were an AI creation, and released two albums in June called Floating On Echoes and Dust And Silence, which were similar to the country folk of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young.Things became more complicated when someone describing himself as an “adjunct” member told reporters that the Velvet Sundown had used the generative AI platform Suno in the creation of their songs, and that the project was an “art hoax”.The band’s official social media channels denied this and said the group’s identity was being “hijacked”, before releasing a statement confirming that the group was an AI creation and was “Not quite human

Stokes is a destiny man who loomed over Lord’s like the angel of the north | Barney Ronay

The England captain can realistically set his sights on winning the series against India, then the Ashes“I’m not tired. I’m not tired. I’m not tired.” Really, Ben? Really? Well, you’re pretty much on your own in that case old boy, after a day where simply watching Ben Stokes being Ben Stokes felt like a full contact sport, psychodrama, soap opera, and in its stickiest moments like a man engaged in an act of public self‑medication by Test cricket.This fifth day at Lord’s was entirely dominated by Stokes, who loomed over it like the angel of the north, arms outspread, another note in his own extraordinary sporting life

Never mind Bazball, this was Bazbrawl: say goodbye to happy-go-lucky England | Andy Bull

India broke a golden rule in the third Test: don’t try to pick a fight with Ben StokesThere was a large handwritten sign propped against the inside wall of the North Gate of Lord’s. “In affectionate remembrance of Bazball,” it said, the letters drawn in the bacon‑and-egg colours of an MCC tie, “which died at Lord’s on 10 July, 2025. RIP.” The stewards must have taken it off one of the Indian fans who hadn’t read the small print on his fifth-day ticket. Lord’s being the place it is, instead of stuffing it into a bin, they had put it aside and popped an item ticket on the top corner in case the writer wanted to pick it up on his way back out of the ground