Shame the soon to be outgoing prime minister couldn’t apologise when she realised she needed the MPs she’d insultedArriving at the EU summit this week, Theresa May had that purposeful air of a school superintendent walking up the drive to the Addams family mansion, determined that Wednesday and Pugsley should be enrolled in a conventional educational establishment without delay. Some long hours later, May staggered back down the drive much as that school superintendent might, short of having no shoes and an actual bat in her electrocuted hair. And so to the latest scenes in the Brexit farce. The formula for successful farce-writing, as laid down in the 19th century, is to get your character up a tree in the first act, throw stones at them in the second, then get them down in the third. As far as Brexit goes, the UK went up the tree voluntarily, and has now been throwing human waste at itself for two and a half years. Does anyone want to come and get us down? Sorry, it’s quite … disgusting up here now.

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Readers respond to the news that England could run short of water within 25 years, and offer solutionsYour report on looming water shortages (

Prof Yasmin Alibhai-Brown

Vulnerable people are being wrongly detained and without adequate safeguards, says

Val Spouge

Prof David Blake

Former MEP

Brexit-chess metaphors | Chlorinated chicken | Wordsearch | Breakup songs | The Clangers | Obesity battleJackie Eales (

Theresa May now appears to believe that crashing out might be acceptable. MPs have to work together to stop herThe cliff-edge has moved a tiny bit further away, but it’s still there. Britain will not crash out of the European Union

Questions of style and usage in this week's Independent

I've always taken joy in finding the funny side of awful things. You can't control the sad, scary and upsetting stuff, but you can turn it into a hilarious learning opportunity

China has also been accused of using the incident in domestic propaganda against New Zealand, with which it has tensions

A mother was arrested this week for allegedly abusing her kids for ‘hilarious’ videos. Why are people watching this stuff?When my twins were babies, I caught a short episode of them on video in which one leaned over and snatched the pacifier from the other one’s mouth and, for a second, I dreamed of putting it on YouTube and scoring one of those baby-does-hilarious-thing hits, in which the ad revenue rolls in while you sleep and you are rewarded simply for being alive.

Be it Jacob Rees-Mogg or Nigel Farage, blusterers and braggarts are rewarded with platforms that distort our political debateIf our politics is becoming less rational, crueller and more divisive, this rule of public life is partly to blame: the more disgracefully you behave, the bigger the platform the media will give you. If you are caught lying, cheating, boasting or behaving like an idiot, you’ll be flooded with invitations to appear on current affairs programmes. If you play straight, don’t expect the phone to ring.

This will be a huge, visible demonstration of public opposition to the Tories' mishandling of the biggest issue of our time

Her ambition was harnessed to a kind of patriotism and an ideal of serving society that is much less widely believed in todayIn many ways Mary Warnock, whose

Schools are broke, but without teaching assistants, children’s education will suffer. We must lobby the government Next month I could lose my job. My 11 years as a teaching assistant is coming to an end due to government cuts in education. Across the London of borough of Hackney, where I work, 66 schools have had government cuts to per-pupil funding since 2015. Headteachers have been left with the unenviable task of cutting back on subjects and staff to balance the books. Often, teaching assistants are the first to go. Our role is to support pupils in the classroom through assisting teachers in the delivery of the national curriculum to all children. For some of us, this could involve working as a full classroom assistant, while for many it is the one-to-one or small group interventions that are considered of greatest need.

The responsibility will have to fall to backbench MPs to take control of the process and steer the UK away from a 12 April crash-out

My illness is often misunderstood but Hollywood’s take on a romance between two teenagers will hopefully open eyesThe film

There are many reasons the prime minister’s authority has collapsed but she is not the only one who failed to listenDeranged, deluded, desperate. And that’s just me watching the endgame of this Brexit debacle. Deluded, I guess, in that I still think Brexit does not mean Brexit at all, it means something else altogether and always has done. To have properly opposed it people need to have understood that. Deranged in hoping that a petition that I signed – oh why not? – is more than some foot-stomping remainery thing. And I am desperate that a

As a nation we face huge global and domestic challenges. To tackle these problems, we must be stronger together – but Brexit risks destroying that forever

A prime minister, devoid of emotional intelligence, unwilling to recognise the public mood or work cross party, is failing this nation

The queen of light entertainment has opened an existential can of worms by convincing HMRC there isn’t just one ‘Lorraine Kelly’

It is nearly three years since the murder of Jo Cox. The PM needs to show real leadership to calm rising tensions

Brexit Britain has lost its mind. Maybe, just maybe, we can reverse the death drive...

Brexit is a disaster, but it’s not yet a done deal. The Put it to the People March is our chance to demand a sayLast weekend, Tim Shipman, the political editor of the Sunday Times, tweeted: “The urge to march for things and against things is one I have never understood. Why not write a letter instead?” He may have been referring to the start of the March to Leave,

It is only when people of different faiths, or of no faith, and from different backgrounds work together that we can truly overcome the prejudices arising from not knowing the "other"

This directive will help artists’ futures with protection from video-streaming services like YouTube. Why lobby against it?

Nobody voted for the division that has torn through our country as a result of Theresa May's wrong-headed approach, which is why thousands will be marching in protest tomorrow

Those who voted for Brexit because they wanted change were right. Those who campaigned for Remain to keep the status quo were wrong. A Final Say will give us a chance to do things differently

European leaders have known for some time that the prime minister wasn’t up to the Brexit job. This week she’s proved it The EU has no time for Theresa May, which doesn’t mean there is no flexibility in the Brexit timetable. Continental leaders have granted an

The cause of Remain is not lost. Join us on Saturday to bring the country back from the brink

We need to turn out on in such numbers that even our wilfully blind PM can no longer continue to claim that she is acting out the 'will of the people'

The loss of the scheme would be a devastating blow for the social mobility of students from disadvantaged backgrounds Joining the tremendously long list of downsides to the UK’s imminent departure from the European Union is the possible

The outcry over primary school sex education is a reminder that we haven’t moved as far from Section 28 as we thoughtAre you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin. So opens a Jackanory-style film uploaded to social media this week by one Birmingham mother, featuring her reading aloud from a picture book called Mommy, Mama and Me. It’s a cosy, toddler-friendly bedtime story about two mothers doing what mothers do the world over: pouring juice, tucking children up in bed, playing hide and seek. Your children’s primary school or your local library might well have a copy. Although they might have plumped instead for And Tango Makes Three, the tale of two daddy penguins adopting a chick.

The debate on assisted dying has been nudged towards common sense by the Royal College of Physicians’ vote What is the principal cause of death in Britain? The answer is premeditated killing. And who are the killers? The answer is doctors. It’s said that over half of all deaths result from a specific medical decision, either to administer a knowingly lethal drug dose or to withdraw life-saving treatment. The better we get at keeping ourselves alive, the more cunning we must be in getting to die. So a modest cheer for the Royal College of Physicians’ vote on Thursday to

She has turned the country into North Korea, frightening the world into line with our own suicidal madness

I can face discrimination from both sides, but the church and the LGBT+ community have more in common than they think

There's no doubting that Biden is beloved to many Americans. Rumours today suggest he may be considering running alongside Stacey Abrams, with her as VP. But another old white dude at the helm isn't what the country needs after Trump

If the prime minister was being truthful, these are the words she would have spoken to the nation

The prime minister’s inflexibility and tactical ineptitude have just hit a new low, at the very time that Britain faces a grave national emergencyWhen she put herself forward to lead the Conservative party in 2016,

If undertaken in the right spirit, the restoration of huge tracts of the Highlands could be a hugely beneficial enterpriseWhat exactly is meant by rewilding depends on who is talking about it. The term was coined by Dave Foreman, a leading figure in the 1980s wave of environmental direct action in the US, to describe the kind of large-scale wilderness restoration he and others advocated. Their idea was that conservationists should move beyond trying to protect particular beauty spots or species, and focus on rebuilding ecosystems that could sustain themselves with minimal human interference. Since then,

Readers have their say on the prime minister’s assertion that it is MPs who are to blame for the Brexit impasse, and not herTimothy Garton Ash is right (

Northern council leaders say that HS2 will add billions to their economies and create half a million jobs; while

Our news organisation recognises its responsibilities with regards to reporting terror, says the Sun’s

NHS | Unemployment | Jilted John | Breakup songsIt’s good to see the Bristol stool chart being mentioned in the national press (

Fresh from turning on MPs, May spent today not convincing foreign leaders that Meaningful Vote 3 will save the franchiseForced to summarise Theresa May’s Downing Street

If the Kennedy Bill passed it would enable MPs to resolve Brexit without the Sword of Damocles hanging over them. With Article 50 revoked and no deal off the table, MPs can concentrate on what happens next

The Tories’ partisan games have killed so many potential solutions that an election is the best option leftWe are being trolled by a prime minister who is prepared to drive a nation into the abyss to preserve the cohesion of the Conservative party. Like a partner who perennially hints at a romantic three-course meal and a possible popping of the question, only to serve up beans on toast, Theresa May’s latest

It is hard to imagine a time when the Brexit shambles will be over. If and when it is, however, this humiliating experience surely demands that we take a new look at how the UK is governed

Straight Inc. was founded by Trump Victory co-chair and major Republican fundraiser Mel Sembler, a man who started out selling dresses. He still considers it his 'greatest achievement'

I feel the urge once more to act, in that grand old tradition of taking to the streets to protest. Finally, there's a chance for us to do right by the country, even if our prime minister won't

The authorities must act now – following the Christchurch shooting minorities are at real risk from the far right Friday marks one week since the

High principles that go unchallenged when you're cycling round a few far-left meeting halls are not fit for purpose when you intend to run the country

It hasn't worked for her. The whiff of decay is unmistakeable. Britain probably will still be in the EU in 10 days' time; but Theresa May might no longer be prime minister

We are an international laughing stock at the moment. But something like this has been coming for decadesThe French EU minister, Nathalie Loiseau, has called her

It is easy to shout for tighter controls. But what we really need is for adults to stop condemning social media sites, and start trying to understand them

I have seen the impact Brexit’s uncertainty is having. The EU must protect citizens’ rights – it is a question of basic humanityWhat does it feel like to live in limbo for 1,000 days? Millions of

If we leave the EU, the natural world we all depend on will face a barrage of threats

Theresa May has proved beyond doubt, and in the most public manner possible, that she has completely lost it

Last night’s statement was poisonous. Credible threats have been made to MPs – she should not be unleashing populismThe sense of anger is hard to adequately put into words. Yesterday, in the toxic climate that now defines British politics the prime minister took to the steps of Downing Street to

Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

Women don’t need new laws to protect them, just for the existing laws to be properly implemented

Nursultan Nazarbayev stood down on Tuesday after thirty years. But his manoeuvring since already suggests he is uneasy with giving up any of his hard fought power

In the last 72 hours alone, 76 Americans have been killed by a gun. Six of the dead were children. How long are we going to sit here and pretend there's no way to prevent this?

She fought from the start like a real politician, scorning the killer, attacking racism, slapping back at Erdogan's revolting election propaganda

Vain promises and empty slogans have got us nowhere. Fossil-fuel extraction must end before more lives are lostAs

May and her awful approach to this process has been the finest incentive for a Final Say we could have hoped for

As more and more climate change-related tragedies occur across the global south, it is essential that western societies find the empathy required to deal with our global crisis

All political careers end in failure, but this prime minister has never really had any success

We don't like the idea of robots taking our jobs, so why do we think it'd be a good idea to let them lead? Let's stop being ludicrous and consider whether we really would be prepared to sacrifice democracy for technocracy

The prime minister’s angry refusal to countenance any Brexit plan but her own has left her petulant, defiant and doomedAttempting to turn voters’

The prime minister is right: parliament – including her – has let the people down. It is time to put it back to the people for a decision

Sweeping the subject of working mothers under the carpet only implies there isn’t a problemThere are times in every parent’s life when, however much they try to avoid it, the professional and the domestic messily collide. It happened to me a few years ago when, during a teachers’ training day, I took my seven-year-old with me to interview Joan Collins over lunch. Collins was delighted at her presence and ordered her a giant bowl of ice-cream. However, halfway through the conversation, she suddenly looked startled, fumbled under the table for a bit, and then pulled out a sticky, pink-spattered Chanel shoe. “I do believe dear Lily has dropped ice-cream in my shoe,” she announced, looking a little pained.

Unemployment figures are at a historic low but there are also bleaker parallels with the 1970s Britain’s recent jobs record has been remarkable. The economy is chugging along but the last time