Ed Miliband needs a plan now to help industry weather UK transition to net zero | Phillip Inman

Ed Miliband may want his political legacy to be a transition to net zero, but he could find his eventual political epitaph includes words on how he helped bury UK industry under the weight of high electricity charges.Industrial ovens are being switched off and turbines spun for the last time as businesses add up the cost of powering their factories and decide it’s not worth the time and trouble.It would be harsh to blame the energy secretary for a crisis he inherited and a decline in manufacturing that has been going on for four decades. But the way the transition to renewables was managed under the Tories, and now under Miliband can only be described as a disaster that will see much of UK industry depart for an easier life elsewhere.The decline is not new

What is private credit, and should we be worried by the collapse of US firms?

The collapse of two US firms, First Brands and Tricolor, has shone a light on private credit and its growing influence in the global economy.The failures have led to ballooning losses at traditional banks, and, coupled with worries about the health of US regional banks, have raised concerns about weak lending standards and potential threats from an opaque corner of the so-called shadow banking sector.But what is private credit and should we be worried?Private credit emerged in the 1980s as a relatively niche industry offering private loans to businesses.Unlike banks, where loans are backed by customer deposits, private credit firms’ loans are backed by money raised from private investors, including pension funds, insurers and high net worth individuals. But they have become increasingly intertwined with the traditional banking industry, with lenders in Europe and the EU significantly exposed to private credit firms

Inside San Francisco’s new AI school: is this the future of US education?

In the world’s tech innovation epicenter, an “AI-powered” private school has made headlines for unabashedly embracing the technology.Alpha School San Francisco, which opened its doors to K-8 students this fall, is the newest outpost of a network of 14 nationwide private schools. Its learning model entails just two hours of focused academic work per day, during which the school says students can learn twice as fast as their counterparts in traditional schools – with the help of artificial intelligence.AI, Alpha says, is central to the school’s learning philosophy, brand and impact on students.Alpha is not alone in its efforts to incorporate AI into the classroom

The platform exposing exactly how much copyrighted art is used by AI tools

Ask Google’s AI video tool to create a film of a time-travelling doctor who flies around in a blue British phone booth and the result, unsurprisingly, resembles Doctor Who.And if you ask OpenAI’s technology to do the same, a similar thing happens. What’s wrong with that, you may think?The answer could be one of the biggest issues AI chiefs face as their era-defining technology becomes ever more ubiquitous in our lives.Google and OpenAI’s generative artificial intelligence is supposed to be just that – generative, meaning it develops novel answers to our questions. Ask it for a time-travelling doctor, you get one that their systems have created

Champions Day horse racing at Ascot: shock winners at 200-1 and 100-1 – live

1 Crown Of Oaks 5/1 2 Ebt’s Guard 10/1 3 Holloway Boy 16/1 4 Shout 6/14.40 BALMORAL HANDICAP bettingNative Warrior 9/2Crown of Oaks 6/1Shout 7/1Cerulean Bay 9/1Ebts Guard 10/1Arisaig 14/1Fifth Column 14/1Tribal Chief 16/1Holloway Bay 16/1Oliver Show 20/1Great Acclaim 22/1Bopedro 22/1Godwinson 22/125/1 BAR – 20 RunnersFull betting here via Oddschecker4.40 BALMORAL HANDICAP previewA fiendishly trappy handicap to conclude the card, and a race that has often piled on the pain for losing punters hoping to get out of trouble with winners at 80-1, 25-1 and 14-1 in the last three seasons. Simon and Ed Crisford’s Shout, a ready winner over this track and trip in early September, has been well supported today and is likely to set off as favourite at around 6-1, but he is 9lb higher in the weights for today’s race and there are plenty of very credible alternativese, including Crown Of Oaks, from the William Haggas stable, and Native Warrior, another recent winner on the straight course in a seven-furlong handicap two weeks ago. I thought the 25-1 about Oliver Show was a fair price when I went through the race on Friday and it seems there were at least a few punters who agreed with me, as George Boughey’s Lincoln runner-up is now down to around 12-1

Australia selector confident Pat Cummins will play major part in Ashes

Australia’s chair of selectors is confident that Pat Cummins will play in the Ashes series against England. The 32-year-old has not bowled since Australia’s 3-0 series defeat of West Indies in July because of a stress injury in his back. Cummins had admitted he was unlikely to play in the Ashes opener in Perth on 21 November.However, George Bailey said: “We know time is getting short and there’s permutations around that, not just around the back, but other factors as well. It’s positive