Many in the crowd watching on screen outside minster have stories of meeting or knowing singer, who died in July

Bonnie Tyler’s songs have echoed through her home town of Swansea in recent days in memory of the late singer, but on Monday the church bells stopped and wellwishers lining the streets fell silent as her coffin arrived for a service celebrating her life.

As the white coffin, covered in bouquets of white roses, was carried into the minster, shouts of “God bless you Bonnie” and “bye Bonnie” punctured the quiet. Those gathered to pay their respects burst into applause. Tyler’s If I Sing You a Love Song and It’s a Heartache played before the private service began, which mourners outside watched on a screen in nearby St David’s Square.

In an era of transparency, people are more willing to talk about money struggles on the internet, breaking one of the last social taboos

Discussions regarding personal finances have traditionally been taboo. But gen Z and millennials in the US are finally normalizing conversations about money, openly sharing about salaries, rent and investment strategies, but also their (sometimes substantial) debt.

In recent years, financial influencers (finfluencers) – some licensed professionals, others not – have gained visibility, sharing advice on once-covert, perhaps unsexy topics such as Roth IRA contributions, exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and maxing out 401(k)s. The most popular have a big audience: for instance, Humphrey Yang, a former financial adviser, has more than 2 million YouTube subscribers, and Erika Kullberg, an attorney and financial expert, has more than 20 million followers across social media.

Brexit didn’t create all the problems young people now face, but renewing close ties with Europe will give us so many opportunities

I was 14 when the UK voted to leave the EU. Too young to vote, but not too young to understand that a decision was being made that would affect the rest of my life.

In many ways, Brexit was my political awakening. It taught me that politics matters, because decisions made by people in power can change your future before you’ve even been given a say.

Ceira Sergeant is a student and the founder of National Rejoin March Youth

She starred in her first soap opera at 4 – then the hit show Heroes was totally reworked to allow her character, Claire the regenerating cheerleader, to live on. We celebrate the star, who has died age 36

• Hayden Panettiere – a life in pictures
• Hayden Panettiere obituary

When Hayden Panettiere arrived as Claire Bennet in Heroes, in 2006, she was 17 but not a newcomer. She’d starred in Tiger Cruise, a Disney Channel movie, two years before and was the pin-perfect image of that teen-star world – blond, cute, perky, resourceful and all-American. Bennet the superhero was all those things, amped up to the point of fascinating distortion. She was a cheerleader who could endlessly regenerate. It was a topic of hot debate on fan sites whether or not she could feel pain, a question that was resolved piecemeal through the series. She could, but could instantly overcome it with her superpower – that fact partly informed the view of one academic, professor Olvido Andújar Molina, that Bennet was standing in for the American dream, its core components being strength, resilience and a sweet-natured homeliness.

In Tiger Cruise, Panettiere had filled a similar role, the cute-as-a-button daughter of a naval commander, producing this elemental, almost mournful Oz-like message: “Everything you long for is right here at home.” She was from a showbiz family, her mother, Lesley Vogel, was a soap actor, and her brother, Jansen, who also possessed those perfectly symmetrical features, co-starred in Tiger Cruise, and later, in 2011, in The Forger (better known as the last film Lauren Bacall ever made). Jansen also died horribly young, of complications from an engorged heart, in 2023 aged 28. Panettiere got her first soap opera gig, in One Life to Live, at the age of four, and went on to a recurring role into Guiding Light before she was 10. She was the voice of Dot in A Bug’s Life, and was nominated for a Grammy for her work on the film.

Next year’s competition won’t take place in the country’s capital, an announcement that even surprised Bulgarian winner, Dara

Ever since Bulgarian singer Dara was crowned winner of the Eurovision song contest this May, it has been clear that the Balkan nation would for the first time in its history have the opportunity to host Europe’s biggest party.

So when Bulgarian officials announced last week that the world’s largest live music event in 2027 will be held not in the capital Sofia but in Burgas, a Black Sea port city home to 200,000 people, it came as a surprise – even to last year’s winner.

With a soulful sound and soul-baring lyrics, the Afghan Whigs rode the post-Nirvana boom to the big leagues. Their frontman explains his exploration of the male ego – and how Usher got the band back together

The Afghan Whigs were always heavier than their grunge-era brethren. Not musically – their turbulent, sophisticated rock was rooted in soul and funk, and frontman Greg Dulli says the group only embraced distortion in order to be heard over the volume of metalhead drummer Steve Earle’s playing. “Any kind of jangle wasn’t gonna work.” But Dulli’s lyrics, inspired by the likes of Motown bards Holland/Dozier/Holland, were pitch-black, depicting lovers in co-dependent cycles of betrayal and recrimination. Afghan Whigs songs take place in a world where sin is irresistible, punishment inevitable and some kind of judgment inescapable.

“My songs acknowledge consequence, more than they deal in judgment,” Dulli says, between sips of water in the bar of a London hotel. Forty years on from their formation, the Whigs are resurgent. Their new album, Soft Control, ably holds its own with earlier dark masterpieces such as their 1993 breakthrough Gentlemen, and its bleakly funky conceptual follow-up, 1996’s Black Love – records that affirmed their frontman as alt-rock’s poet of arch romantic dysfunction. “I understood sorrow and loss and loneliness from an early age,” he says. His dad was the youngest of 14; several of Dulli’s uncles died when he was young. “I had been there, so why wouldn’t I explore it?”

Backlash from nurses, medical experts and green campaigners in response to deputy leader dismissing efforts to reach net zero

Reform’s deputy leader has been accused of spreading misinformation after he dismissed efforts to tackle the climate crisis and urged British people to enjoy the warmth of the recent heatwaves.

Richard Tice prompted a backlash from nurses, medical experts and green campaigners on Monday after he told a press conference he believed it was “arrogant” to try to stop the climate emergency, while encouraging people to focus on upsides such as better English wine.

Additional reporting by Denis Campbell and Ajit Niranjan

President issues threat to ‘bomb the shit out of them’ after previously threatening Gulf ally in May

Donald Trump has again threatened to bomb Oman if it “gets in the way” of his effort to end the US-Israel war on Iran, as the two-month window to negotiate peace with Iran expired on Monday with no end to the conflict in sight.

The latest threats against Oman, which is not a party to the war, have illustrated how Trump’s unpredictable and often outrageous approach to diplomacy has upset US partners and failed to achieve the breakthrough that he has promised to end the war.

Calls grow for inquiry into media reporting of the case as Cambridge chancellor criticises ‘racist feeding frenzy’

A Windrush campaigner who launched a fundraiser for Jason Arday’s family has said the outpouring of support shows “Britain still cares”.

Arday, who was found dead on Friday, had resigned the previous week from his post as professor of sociology of education at the University of Cambridge after allegations of plagiarism were made against him.

Southend East & Rochford’s Bayo Alaba has been suspended while inquiry looks at bounceback loans

A Labour MP has been suspended after being questioned about government Covid loans taken out by his businesses.

Bayo Alaba, the MP for Southend East & Rochford, has referred himself to the Labour party for investigation after the Times asked about a loan given to one of his businesses during the pandemic.