Rising inflation, Burnham’s Manchester power grab, Erin Patterson appeal claims

UK consumer-price inflation rose to 2.9% in the year to July 2026, from 2.6% in June, according to the Office for National Statistics. Higher household energy costs were a principal driver, leaving inflation above the Bank of England’s 2% target and adding pressure to the government’s cost-of-living response. The figures arrived as Prime Minister Andy Burnham advanced his plan to make Manchester a second centre of government through “No. 10 North”, a staffed office intended to support a wider transfer of tax revenue and decision-making to regional mayors. Burnham presents the move as decentralisation and a route to more balanced growth; critics have characterised the Manchester operation as a symbolic power grab or gimmick, while key details of the proposed funding settlement remain unannounced.

In Australia, Erin Patterson began an appeal against her convictions for the murders of Don and Gail Patterson and Heather Wilkinson, and the attempted murder of Ian Wilkinson, following a death-cap mushroom meal in 2023. Her lawyers argued that the jury’s accommodation in the same hotel as a police witness and prosecution personnel, the handling of evidence, and aspects of cross-examination made the trial unfair; prosecutors rejected the hotel claim as lacking substance. Patterson, who received life sentences with a 33-year non-parole period, maintains the poisoning was accidental. The prosecution has also appealed, arguing that the sentence should exclude parole altogether. The Victorian Court of Appeal reserved its decisions, which may take weeks or months.