Train companies have announced largest ticket increase for five years, signalling a depressing start to the new year for struggling commuters. Fares for all journeys in 2018 show an average rise slightly below the 3.6% set by the government in August for regulated fares, which include season tickets. Rail operators said it showed the industry was attempting to keep down the cost of travel. It is unlikely that many passengers, dealing with the creaking rail service, will agree with their...

A young MS sufferer has slammed Primark staff after she was left stranded during an emergency evacuation - because she was in a wheelchair. Wheelchair user Alicia Thain, 21, was terrified after she was left on the first floor of the store while fire alarms went off and other shoppers fled. Panicked customers quickly left the store in the Westgate Centre, Oxford, on Sunday afternoon. But Alicia and mum Anna, 56, were stuck with staff while everyone else left down...

Left wingers can keep toasty and warm this winter with a cheeky Christmas jumper - showing Jeremy Corbyn. A group of Jeremy Corbyn superfans have created Christmas jumpers to show your support for the Labour leader - and raise money for charity. Their ‘Corbs’ jumper features a portrait of Jeremy Corbyn wearing a Santa hat, and has roses knitted into the festive design, along with the slogan 'Jerry Christmas.' In addition, they are also trying to 'Make Christmas Great Again'...

A charity backed by Bake Off winner Nadiya Hussain has staged a colourful tribute to the 800 children whose lives are lost across the globe every day due to dirty water and poor sanitation. Eight hundred buckets were placed alongside the River Thames to raise awareness of the one in nine kids around the world who don't have clean water. Each empty bucket in the display would hold almost enough safe drinking water to last a child an entire week....

The stereotypical image of 'southern softies' could soon be a thing of the past - after a study found northerners jack up the heating long before southerners do. Despite there being just a two degree difference between the north and south of the UK at the moment, those living south of London will simply don another layer to keep warm while Geordies and Scots will reach for the thermostat instead. Three quarters of hardy southerners think you should put a...

Just as the sun's rays dim with each passing day, the Winter Solstice pacing a grim march ever closer with each rotation of Earth on its frigid axis - November got DARK. Look at this lot! The new Rolo Tomassi track - truly a beast of graveyard-slinking synths and Eva Spence's inimitably howl. Converge are back with The Dusk In Us with all their metalcore muscle flayed away to reveal the noise rock sinew beneath. Even Sufjan has been Drawn...

It’ll come as no surprise to many of you that this endearingly gentle if excessively whimsical oddity from ‘The Lonely Island’ crew first debuted at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. With its geeky sensibility towards the creative process, and its cloyingly sentimental exploration of a subject matter that arguably demands a far more emotionally incisive consideration, Brigsby Bear very much feels like a film that has been geared towards the crowds who descend upon Park City every January. Written by...

Urgent action must be taken to protect vital early years services, after research reveals funding in some areas has been cut by almost 50 per cent since 2010, says Barnardo’s. Department for Education figures reveal children’s centres have had funding cut from £1.2bn to an estimated £0.6bn over the last six years. Barnardo’s is calling on the Government to help financially stricken local authorities find new ways of providing a range of essential early intervention and family support services across...

The humble pigeon is far more intelligent than previously thought and can even have abstract thoughts, reveals new research. Rather than being bird brains, pigeons can understand both space and time, according to the study. Not only can they discriminate these abstract concepts, but researchers found that pigeons seem to use a different region of the brain than humans and primates to do so. In experiments, pigeons were shown a static horizontal line on a computer screen and had to...