Happy Monday. At long last, we are approaching a bank holiday weekend with a scorching forecast.

An obvious but fun one for you, the reactionary nature of BBQ sales on a sunny bank holiday weekend. A good weekend of weather can see BBQ sales jump up to 100% vs the normal baseline… add a bank holiday into the mix and you’re looking sales soaring up to four times (400%!) of the standard weekend sales for a BBQ. So in a boost to the economy this weekend, fire up the barbecue and crack open a cold one. See you next Tuesday!

Notable UK earnings this week: Marks & Spencer (MKS), BT Group (BT.A)

Notable US earnings this week: Home Depot (HD), Target (TGT), Lowes (LOW), Intuit (INTU).

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📦 Port of Barrow evaluation as onshore base suitability for energy storage hub. Read more

🏗️ £10bn mega-scheme readies for developers at HS2’s Old Oak Common Station. Read more

🤖 £1bn sign off on Birmingham estate regen for Lovell. Read more

UK Economy grows despite Iran war
Britain’s economy has managed a bit of a stubborn little bounce, growing 0.3% in March despite the first month of the Iran war sending fresh shudders through energy markets. The Office for National Statistics said GDP — the grand total of what the country produces, for anyone who enjoys economic alphabet soup — also rose 0.6% in the first quarter of 2026, beating gloomy forecasts that had pencilled in a contraction. Not bad for a nation that sometimes seems to treat economic resilience like a cup of tea: basic, dependable, and somehow still not boiling over.

The figures put the UK at the top of the G7 growth league for the first three months of the year, though Japan has yet to report. That will be music to Rachel Reeves’ ears, as the Chancellor seized on the data to argue the government’s economic plan is working and that now is absolutely not the moment to rip everything up and start again — a remarkably sensible point, which in politics is often the least fashionable thing in the room.

There is, naturally, a catch — because economics rarely allows a nice clean finish. Some analysts warned the strong March reading may have been flattered by companies rushing to stock up or get ahead of possible supply problems, rather like the nation’s habitual panic-buying of bread and loo roll when the weather turns a bit odd.

British Steel set for nationalisation
British Steel is heading back into public hands, with Sir Keir Starmer announcing legislation this week to give ministers the powers to take full ownership of the company, subject to a public interest test. It’s a chunky bit of state intervention, but then again, when the steelworks at Scunthorpe are involved, subtlety is rather like a cheap sandwich in the rain: it doesn’t last.

The move follows the government’s intervention at the plant in April last year, when control was seized from Chinese owners Jingye to prevent the blast furnaces being shut down. Starmer said talks with the company had failed to produce a commercial sale, but insisted the public interest case is now strong enough to justify full ownership. In other words: no sale, no carry on, and certainly no mysterious furnace-switching drama worthy of a Whitehall thriller.

Ministers will argue the case on national security, critical infrastructure and the economy — the sort of triad that usually gets wheeled out when something is too important to leave wobbling around in the market. British Steel bosses and unions have long warned that if the furnaces were allowed to go cold, restarting them would be eye-wateringly difficult and expensive. Losing the ability to make virgin steel in the UK would have been a serious own goal, especially at a time when Britain is still trying to rebuild confidence in its industrial base rather than just its collecting-it-in-a-box strong suit.

Croydon’s camera constables
Back home, the Met is triumphantly waving the results of its Croydon facial recognition trial like a shiny new badge. Static live facial recognition cameras helped arrest 173 suspects in six months, including a woman wanted since 2004 and suspects linked to rape, voyeurism and kidnapping.

The Met says crime dropped by 10.5%, with violence against women and girls down 21%, and only one false alert among 470,000 passers-by. Civil liberties groups remain unimpressed, warning the tech is intrusive and ripe for abuse—but ministers insist law-abiding Londoners have “nothing to fear”. Which is famously how Britain always introduces surveillance.

Olympics: North dreams, London sulks
And finally, the government has fired the starting pistol on exploring a potential North of England Olympics bid for the 2040s, commissioning UK Sport to assess costs, infrastructure and chances of success. Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy says it’s time the Games “came north”, pointing to venues in Manchester, Liverpool and beyond.

London Mayor Sadiq Khan, however, is lobbying hard to keep the capital in the picture, arguing that ignoring London’s ready-made stadiums would be wasteful and less sustainable. Britain, it seems, can’t even dream of hosting the Olympics without immediately arguing over the postcode.

Trump’s China visit
Donald Trump has described his two-day trip to China as “incredible”, which, in the modern diplomatic lexicon, is usually code for lots of handshakes, not enough hard commitments. There was all the theatre you’d expect from a summit between the world’s two biggest powers; there were fewer visible signs of the sort of concrete agreement that makes markets sit up, settees stop sagging and civil servants reach for another coffee.

Still, Trump was keen to tout business wins for American firms and farmers, while Xi Jinping spoke loftily of a new era of stability in China–US relations. The president left after lunch with Xi at Zhongnanhai, the famously rarefied Beijing compound where China’s top leadership lives and works — a setting that suits grand symbolism rather better than messy trade paperwork, naturally.

Trump said the trip had generated “fantastic trade deals”, including more soybeans and Boeing aircraft for China to buy. On Fox News, he even claimed China had agreed to order 200 jets, before softening that into something closer to a promise-shaped suggestion. Beijing, meanwhile, has not confirmed any of it. A familiar pattern, really: bold announcement, cautious follow-through, diplomatic fog. And in trade talks, fog is usually doing more heavy lifting than the facts.

Trump ballroom (and whatever is built underneath) in jeopardy
Donald Trump’s grand White House ballroom plans have stumbled into another political puddle, after a Senate adviser knocked back the administration’s attempt to shoehorn extra security funding into a wider budget bill. Because apparently even a billion-dollar ballroom can’t escape the exquisite chaos of Washington procedure.

Elizabeth MacDonough, the chamber’s non-partisan referee, ruled that the proposed money is too sprawling to be tucked into legislation mainly focused on immigration enforcement. In plain English: the ballroom is too big, too complex and too politically loaded to be hidden in the budget like a dodgy receipt after a lunch meeting.

Republican senators had tried to secure $1bn (£750m) in taxpayer cash for security upgrades linked to the ballroom and other structures beneath it. Mr Trump says the ballroom itself will be paid for by $400m (£300m) in private donations, but Democrats argue the whole affair is an expensive distraction from the rising cost of living — and, frankly, they do have a point. Americans are being told to tighten their belts while Washington appears to be ordering a new ballroom and a side of taxpayer garnish.

Altman’s armageddon
The Altman v Musk courtroom saga has reached its final, twitchy moment: the jury is now deliberating after three weeks of bruising testimony. Musk claims OpenAI has betrayed its original 2015 mission as a non-profit built to develop AI “for the benefit of humanity,” arguing it’s quietly morphed into a profit machine. He wants over $134bn in damages, the removal of Sam Altman and OpenAI president Greg Brockman, and a rethink of key deals with Microsoft.

Robot dog, real danger
Over in Los Angeles, the fire department deployed a robot-dog to investigate a blaze under a California freeway, in conditions deemed too risky for human crews. It’s the kind of heroic service that doesn’t require lungs, but does require batteries and good boy bones.

Seeing in spectacular
And the robots are getting a vision upgrade. Sensor firm Ouster has unveiled the world’s first native colour LiDAR, meaning it captures full-colour 3D maps.

It can detect objects up to 500 metres away in ideal conditions, handling everything from near-darkness to blazing sunlight. Early adopters include Google and Volvo Autonomous Solutions, suggesting the future will be bright, efficient… and very thoroughly scanned like last on sale stickers.

Spy stations,snack bars
In New York’s Chinatown, a perfectly ordinary office above a ramen shop has turned out to be less “community centre” and more “international intrigue”. Lu Jianwang, a 64-year-old leader of a Chinese community group, has been found guilty of acting as an unauthorised foreign agent after US prosecutors accused him of running the first known overseas Chinese “police station” in America. His lawyers insisted it was meant for driver’s licence renewals, mahjong, and a bit of wholesome ping pong.

It’s landed in the same week that Arcadia Mayor Eileen Wang admitted posting pro-China propaganda at the request of Chinese officials. All this, while Trump visits Xi in Beijing and politely avoids the word “espionage”, because nothing ruins trade talks like mentioning the secret police.

Rai’s roaring rise
Meanwhile, England finally has a new PGA Championship hero. Wolverhampton’s Aaron Rai, 31, has become the first English winner of the tournament in over a century, taking his first major by three shots at Aronimink Golf Club.

Rai finished on 9-under, beating Jon Rahm and Alex Smalley, and collected $3.69m along with the Wanamaker Trophy. He turned the final round into a highlight reel: a 40-foot eagle on the ninth, four back-nine birdies, and then a frankly ridiculous nod to you if you’re still keeping up but tl;dr, on 17th slammed the door shut for the win.