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The thrill of an event like Halloween doesn't come from a brand new costume or "two pillowcases' worth of sweets", says play specialist Cat Sewell.

The fun comes from carving out the time to play, making ridiculous outfits, and the terror and delight of haunting the neighbourhood, says the artistic director and co-CEO of Polyglot Theatre, a company that creates participatory, immersive, child-led theatre.

Congress must act to ensure that families are able to heat their homes before the start of the season

Heating oil may be the clearest warning yet of how the war in Iran is deepening the US's energy affordability crisis. Families who heat their homes with oil are facing bills that could be 50% higher this winter, adding nearly $900 to the cost of keeping their homes warm. These families were already struggling before the war began.

As the Guardian recently reported, research by my organization found that electricity shutoffs in 10 states had increased 28% over the past two years. Millions of Americans were already falling behind on their utility bills, forced to choose between paying for energy, food, medicine and rent. Now they face another round of increases in gasoline, electricity and home heating costs.

Ex-energy secretary Ed Miliband's agenda appears undermined as money is diverted from renewables to defence

Britain is unlikely to hit its targets on green heating after the cuts announced by John Healey this week, experts have warned, as critics of Ed Miliband claim the former energy secretary's green agenda is being dismantled.

The chancellor unveiled more than £3bn worth of cuts to the energy department's budget this week, much of which will pay for higher defence spending.

Turkey has been hit by powerful thunderstorms and a fatal tornado this week with more heavy rain expected

Heavy rain and strong winds will continue to affect parts of south-eastern Europe and Turkey over the next few days, as an area of low pressure in the region has allowed for the formation of powerful thunderstorms. During a particularly intense thunderstorm in Antalya, a coastal city in the south-west of Turkey, the formation of a tornado resulted in the deaths of four construction workers on Tuesday. Authorities in Greece and Turkey have released severe rainfall and flooding warnings, as a further 100-150mm (nearly 4-6in) of rain is expected this week in central Greece and western parts of Turkey, with locally higher totals possible.

Travelling eastwards towards south Asia, strong winds and heavy rainfall have swept across the Indian regions of Odisha and Andhra Pradesh as Cyclone Arnab made landfall. With wind gusts in excess of 85mph (140km/h) and rainfall totals in some regions exceeding 200mm, the severe storm has prompted mass evacuations of more than 180,000 people, as well as widespread disruption to energy and transport infrastructure. The cyclone will weaken as it continues to traverse northwards over the coming days, though will continue to deliver heavy rain to parts of northern and central India as it does so.

After UK's hottest summer on record, Ardingly near Haywards Heath is just 19% full - and next-closest reservoir is unusable due to broken treatment works

"You can see the water level at Ardingly going down and down. I don't remember ever seeing it this low," says Caroline Allan, a lifetime resident of Haywards Heath, the nearest town to one of England's most depleted reservoirs.

The Ardingly reservoir, managed by South East Water and serving about 95,000 properties in and around Haywards Heath and Uckfield in Sussex, is currently 19% full.

This week's best wildlife photographs from around the world

Scientists call for incentives to preserve vegetation as study highlights benefits of plentiful planting in London

Your front garden could be a first line of defence against air pollution, according to a year-long field study in two London neighbourhoods.

The UK's 26m gardens cover nearly 5% of the country's land area, but they account for a much larger share in urban areas. In Greater London, domestic gardens cover 41% of the city, compared with 27% of Cardiff and 23% of Edinburgh.

In this week's newsletter: There are too many meetings, and not enough decisions, say experts - and time is running out

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When things are not going well at an environmental summit, organisers often tell delegates that the "world is watching" in an attempt to focus minds. But spend any time at biodiversity Cop17 in Armenia and it is clear that the world's attention is elsewhere.

The negotiating halls of Yerevan's Meridian centre are subdued. Environment ministers have arrived from all corners of the world to plan their response to being so far behind the biodiversity targets they agreed four years ago. Right now, they appear on track to miss nearly all of them. They risk continuing the miserable record of never having met a biodiversity target they have set for themselves.

The climate crisis will destroy our economies - we learned this 20 years ago. When will we act?

Heat killed 'staggering' 50,000 people in Europe's cities this summer, scientists warn

Angry Labour MPs urge leadership not to overrule energy secretary on Rosebank

As many as 8 million people have been affected by food shortages, electricity blackouts and health clinic closures

Extreme drought driven by an historic El Niño is affecting as many as 8 million people in Papua New Guinea, causing a cascade of issues from shortages of food and water, to electricity scarcity and schooling disruption.

An influential coalition that includes churches, trade unions and business groups has said the Pacific nation is in the midst of a "national crisis", but there appears to be "no coordinated plan to protect vulnerable communities from the worsening impacts of El Niño."

Oxford study shows Manx shearwaters lose direction when their body clocks get out of sync

Seabirds returning from foraging trips can be thrown hundreds of miles off course by a form of jet lag that arises when their body clocks get out of sync with local time, researchers say.

Tracking data from Manx shearwaters on the west coast of the UK revealed that when the birds returned home to their colonies after trips over the Atlantic, their rapid eastward flights disrupted their sense of time and navigation.

Loch Insh, Cairngorms: In my three decades in Scotland I've adjusted to the darkness of this time of year, and found glory in the quality of light

It is the one clear day in a fortnight of heavy cloud, wind and rain, so I am out by the loch, basking in the rays of light, breathing them in, hoarding for the weeks to come.

This time of year makes them all the more precious. Here in the Highlands, once we are past the autumnal equinox, we can almost feel the Earth tipping away from the sun as the light grows shorter each day and the night steals back. It's a turn that is especially obvious when the clocks change and our evenings are suddenly dark.

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Replacing diesel-powered ferries with electric vessels could reduce emissions and improve air quality

Cutting through New York Harbor in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty, the small white boat we were riding on caught the attention of passengers aboard a nearby sightseeing ferry.

"It's quite a curiosity at the moment," Eric Laakmann, the chief executive and co-founder of Vessev, said.

Climate Central is an independent group of scientists and communicators who research and report the facts about our changing climate and how it affects people's lives.

There is no end in sight for the drivers of illegal mining, while police action appears ineffective

Cora Bailey has been encountering illegal miners ever since she first started treating injured animals in the townships around Roodepoort, west of Johannesburg, in 1991. But as the price of gold has soared, so too has activity in the abandoned mine shafts that mark the area.

In late September, dozens of zama zamas - the name given to illegal miners in South Africa, meaning roughly "to take a chance" in Zulu - arrived to dig for gold across the dirt road from her charity, Claw (Community Led Animal Welfare).

Exclusive: Backbenchers voice alarm over 'intolerable position' faced by Miatta Fahnbulleh over oilfield decision

Furious Labour MPs have been lobbying the prime minister and chancellor not to overrule the energy secretary should she decide to block the Rosebank oilfield.

MPs say they are alarmed at the cabinet splits that have emerged over the issue after sources told the Guardian that Miatta Fahnbulleh was minded to refuse environmental permission for the field.

This year thousands of the golden-coloured butterfly have arrived in Britain in what one expert calls 'a bold attempt at colonisation'

The Queen of Spain has invaded. The enigmatic British visits of this gorgeous golden-coloured butterfly with distinctively shaped, squared-off hindwings have been recorded by lepidopterists for four centuries. Usually there are barely a handful of sightings each summer of a butterfly that is widespread across continental Europe.

This year, thousands have flown in, some from France and Spain that have reached the south coast, and others from the Netherlands, which have fluttered into East Anglia.

Tebay, Cumbria: Historically it's been a tricky thing for hill farms to do, but we've always run ours on organic principles, and now we're fully converting

From 1 November we have change happening on our farm. We have decided to become an organic farm and have started the two-year conversion process with the Soil Association. We've always run the farm on organic principles, but now, with our small shop selling our beef, lamb and pork, we've decided that we will convert, prioritising soil health and biodiversity without the use of chemicals.

It has historically been tricky for hill farms to go organic because many are on commons with shared grazing and no physical boundaries between "hefts", and with shared routes to and from the fell. Now the certifiers are keen to be flexible and adapt, so we have decided to give it a go. The process is funded by the government's sustainable farming incentive scheme, which we were lucky to get into this year as so many farmers missed out.

Here are some of our writers' best ways to stay toasty and occupied, even during cold weather, from teas to pajamas

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When the weather starts to take a turn for the brisk, the impulse to stay inside and hibernate is nothing new - but there are ways to optimize your time spent inside for maximum coziness and pleasure.

From a limited-edition candle to a plush, furry comforter that does double duty, here are some of the ways our writers stay toasty even when the weather outside turns frightful.

In wet weather, garden snails can seek shelter in letterboxes - and find a feast there waiting for them

We've all heard of snail mail - a term popularised since the advent of electronic mail - but who knew that snails eat mail? It might sound far-fetched but it's true.

We have it on good authority from the ecologist Simon Mustoe, who said snails ate his letter from Sir David Attenborough, a BBC report announcing the closure of a Northumberland Royal Mail postbox because of snails "munching the mail", and desperate people on the forums of the Australian hardware chain Bunnings claiming snails have "a real appetite for postal letters" and can "eat a whole letter in two days".

The Canadian prime minister's reckoning with Trumpism in Davos clashes with his attacks on environmental, Indigenous and labour rights

The Canadian prime minister is a hero around the world for his Davos speech that reckoned with a reconfiguration of power in the shadow of Donald Trump.

But at home, Mark Carney is mirroring the US president by radically centralizing power within his office and cabinet and taking a hatchet to dozens of laws protecting environmental, Indigenous and labour rights, all in order to enact his economic agenda.

Shiri Pasternak is an associate professor in criminology at Toronto Metropolitan University and a member of the Infrastructure Beyond Extractivism research team, a collaboration between critical scholars and Indigenous land defenders across North America

Both of these threats have the same roots: private entities seeking to cash in. We have the power to stand against them

A summer of extreme heat, entire villages obliterated in Nepal, a super El Niño breaking records, Exxon publicly saying we may reach 3C by 2050 - could it possibly be any worse?

How about throwing AI extinction in the mix?

Emissions from exported oil would not count against carbon budget, insiders say - reasoning likely to draw dismay from climate campaigners

The giant Rosebank oilfield can be approved without breaching the UK's emission targets, according to government insiders, in a boost to those in the cabinet who are pushing for it to be given the go-ahead.

The Guardian revealed last week that Miatta Fahnbulleh, the energy secretary, was leaning towards rejecting the project, but her position has put her at loggerheads with cabinet colleagues, including the chancellor, John Healey, who are lobbying for an approval.

The radical Stern report showed that a low-carbon future is also good economics. But it seems that capitalism needs a reminder

Saving the only planet we have makes good economic sense. There is, after all, no money to be made on a dead Earth. There may be costs involved now, but they are worth paying to protect our children from certain destruction.

These propositions seem self-evident now. But two decades ago, mainstream economists had very different ideas. They had proved that the climate crisis would be a mere economic blip, easily absorbed by growing economies and therefore not worth spending money on. In their accounting, they considered ice caps and glaciers functionally worthless, that trees only add to GDP when they are cut down, and that a livable climate shouldn't even merit a line on a spreadsheet.

Fiona Harvey is an environment editor at the Guardian

Extreme heat accelerated disappearance of Triglav glacier from mountain revered as a symbol of Slovenian identity

The final ice patch has vanished from Slovenia's Triglav glacier, the latest Alpine casualty of Europe's scorching summer.

The once mighty ice mass lost 93% of its surface area between 1983 and 2003, shrinking to cover less than a hectare of overheated rock, but went on to surprise researchers who feared its imminent demise, clinging on to the mountain for two more decades.

Wharram and York, North Yorkshire: It's the nervy few days before a ceremony that will honour our local waterways, and I have work to do

I visit the source of the tiny stream called the Gypsey Race now and then, drawn by the everyday miracle of its water welling to catch sunlight like a plaything and alchemise it into colours and sparks. Today, though, is different, because I've come to ask for something. Something like permission, or approval maybe.

I've been helping to organise a gathering of river advocates to co-draft a regional charter of river rights - making explicit our responsibilities towards them. We will be holding a ceremony to blend waters from across Yorkshire to make ink in which the charter will be written. I want to collect water from the Gypsey, but I also want some of its potent reputation. Its course is regarded as auspicious thanks to an extraordinary concentration of nearby prehistoric barrows, cursuses and henges, not to mention England's tallest standing stone. Local folklore insists that its capricious flow holds the power of prophecy.

Scientists uncover ancient hills and swamps that disappeared as sea levels rose across northern Adriatic

Venice is famed for being a floating city, but research shows the land it sits on once lay many miles inland. Dramatic changes in sea level over 10,000 years have reshaped the northern Adriatic coastline, with much of the land that our ancestors roamed now lying beneath the waves.

Samuele Ongaro, at the University of Southampton, and colleagues combined seismic data with sedimentary cores from the coastal basins of northern Italy, Slovenia and northern Croatia to model changes in sea level across the region and reconstruct past landscapes over the past 10,000 years.

A striking transformation takes place along the coast of Qinqdao in autumn, when a native seepweed turns a brilliant shade of red.

The 'red beach' phenemon can be seen in the salt marshes and wetlands on the coast of China's Shandong province, where the Suaeda glauca plant matures and absorbs water, changing it from green to crimson between September and November

Coastal communities across California were preparing for days of flooding amid potentially 'record-breaking tides' this week, as water levels began rising on Monday.

• Coastal California braces for flooding amid forecast of 'record-breaking tides'

Chris Packham says £24bn earmarked for projects with 'ludicrously uncertain results' should be redirected to help lower bills and cut emissions

Campaigners are calling on the chancellor to cut the government's £24bn spending plans for "fairytale" carbon capture technologies in favour of funding green schemes that can reliably cut emissions and lower energy bills.

The environmentalist Chris Packham is leading an 11th-hour appeal for the Treasury to use this week's budget to scale back the government's "exorbitantly expensive" support for carbon capture, which is now more than the planned spending for the US, the EU, Norway and Japan combined.

Randomised trials of omega-6s do not show an increase in inflammation caused by the fatty acid

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If you've been online lately, you've probably been bombarded with the discourse about seed oils. Once a completely innocuous food that no one really talked about, they have become the enemy of the moment. Robert F Kennedy Jr, the secretary of health and human services in the US, has called them "toxic" and vowed to act against them. There are countless activewear-clad influencers online saying that nothing harms your health more than these products.

Which is odd, because the Australian dietary guidelines say seed oils are basically fine. You should limit them because they're high in calories but otherwise there's no major reason - according to the guidelines and most experts - why you should avoid them. As Prof Lauren Ball, director of the University of Queensland's Centre for Community Health and Wellbeing, says: "There's no convincing evidence that eating seed oils like canola or sunflower oil in normal dietary amounts harms our health. In fact, these oils contain unsaturated fats, which are generally beneficial for cardiovascular health." Dr Jason Wu, a professor at the University of New South Wales, agrees: "The evidence base consistently points to health benefits of eating seed oils."

Boiler upgrade scheme, which provides grants of up to £9,000 for sustainable alternatives, expected to be slashed in budget

When Bill Tuck first started installing air source heat pumps six years ago, other heating engineers were skeptical the green technology would take off. "Now, the conversation is completely different," he said.

"I'm getting approached by them saying: 'Mrs Jones, my customer for 15 years, she's enquiring about a heat pump. What can you tell me?' The whole narrative has changed."

President has taken an axe to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, stalling climate research on and response to extreme weather events

Sweeping cuts to the premier US climate agency under Donald Trump have severely hampered the country's capacity to forecast, research and respond to extreme weather events, former government officials and scientists have warned, as the US faces a cascade of hazards fueled by a potentially historic El Niño this winter.

From the start of his second term, the president has taken aim at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa), slashing staff levels, canceling contracts and grants, and shutting down databases and research laboratories. The agency that has long been considered a global crown jewel in climate science and forecasting, has lost roughly 20% of its staff since January 2025.

My mother was a keen swimmer, and she lived with depression. I wonder if she found the same respite in the water that has helped heal me since she passed away

It was early morning in late September, off the coast of Kaş in Turkey. Watching the slightly choppy sea from a boat, the last thing I felt like doing was embarking on another 5km (3-mile) swim. Mind fog had sapped my energy, and my mood was decidedly Eeyore-like. But as I pulled on my cap and flippers, adjusted my goggles and took the plunge, something shifted.

Head in the water, the knotted feeling in my throat began to loosen. Breathing came properly. There was respite.

Both private and public schools in tech regions are limiting the use of tech in classrooms. But will low-income districts be able to follow suit?

German Gil spends most of his waking hours looking at screens. Since moving to the San Francisco Bay Area in 2015, the software engineer has bounced between start-ups and giants including Netflix, Facebook and GitHub.

But when it came to the education of his daughter, Victoria, he wanted her to have a different experience, one in which his "kid could be a kid".

Oxfam says investing by rich in disaster recovery widens inequality and gives incentive to delay climate action

The world's wealthiest people are not just profiting from the polluting causes of climate breakdown, they are also increasingly cashing in on the catastrophic consequences, according to a study by Oxfam.

The global equality organisation has found that the richest 0.1% of the world's population are heavily invested in disaster preparedness, recovery and reconstruction - a market that is projected to grow from $70bn to $92bn a year by 2029.

Letter to PM argues series of wrong choices on North Sea oil, Heathrow, EVs and heat pumps will scupper net zero plans

Andy Burnham will "sleepwalk" into climate disaster if he fails to get a grip on a series of important policies whose combined impact could scupper plans to reach net zero, campaigners have said.

Big decisions on North Sea drilling, the expansion of Heathrow airport, electric vehicles (EVs) and grants for heat pumps are awaiting decisions from ministers.

Investigation finds dozens of ministers and civil servants moved into AI roles as government developed datacentre expansion plans

The UK's policy on datacentres and AI was developed without any meetings with environmental groups, an investigation has found.

The nonprofit organisation Spotlight on Corruption said a "considerable revolving door" shaped the government's development of "AI growth zones", a central plank of the former prime minister Keir Starmer's AI and economic policy, with 38 ministers, senior civil servants and special advisers hired to positions in AI companies between July 2024 and September 2026.

Calf of Man, Isle of Man: Such is the wealth of Manx fungi, a map is being built to plot it all. We took a special trip as part of that project

The bird observatory on the Calf of Man was sulking under a low cloud base as we stepped ashore at South Harbour. The dank mist was perfect for our surprise visit to the island, as it was not for the birds we had come across, but fungi - in particular, waxcaps.

My wife, Liz, and I had taken the chance to accompany Nev Kilkenny, a visiting mycologist, who would help identify and study some autumn mushrooms and toadstools - and contribute to a map that is being assembled of Manx fungi.

All it took was one or two careless teenage girls giving the vermin a taste of their snacks and they became the most well-fed animals imaginable

I've written a fair amount about my boarding school years in Nigeria in the 90s, but never about the rats that accompanied my school experience. Picture it: thousands of girls from across the country, each bearing a suitcase or two of a term's worth of "provisions" - cornflakes, sugar cubes, powdered milk, hot chocolate powder, and so on. All it took was one or two careless girls giving the rats a taste of the exotic and they became among the most well-fed rats in the country, enjoying a steady stream of delicious teenage-girl snacks.

I will never forget the sight of rats - six or seven deep - congregating at dusk on the scraggly lawn next to my dormitory, like an illegal gathering of political dissidents. They were large (what with their rich diet), thick tails twitching, noses pushed together, damn near whispering. At first, they would scatter when humans approached. Then we had to clap and stomp to get them to shift. Like the proletariat, the rats began to understand their power, and stand their ground. They were no longer pests but now a sort of predator. If this sounds like the beginning of a highbrow horror, that's how it felt.

V2G tech enables drivers to charge automatically when electricity is cheaper and then sell some back to the grid at times of high demand

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Electric cars that can be used as "power plants on wheels" could be given government backing as part of plans under consideration to help UK manufacturers.

Ministers are considering giving manufacturers incentives to add "vehicle to grid" (V2G) technology to cars as part of its review of the zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) mandate.

Company imitates reflection of sun from mirrors, prompting pushback from some scientists, environmentalists and California locals

Locals in a rural area of California were recently startled to see dazzlingly bright light shining down from nearby mountains at night, illuminating a swathe of the desert below.

Unbeknown to them, the strange nocturnal illumination was the latest step in a company's plan to erect thousands of giant mirrors in space to reflect sunlight on to the Earth during night-time.

Chancellor is in favour of North Sea project, but energy secretary has said she is leaning towards rejecting it

A cabinet split has emerged over whether to approve drilling at the Rosebank oilfield, with the chancellor, John Healey, in favour of the controversial North Sea project.

The energy secretary, Miatta Fahnbulleh, is ultimately in charge of the decision, and the Guardian reported last week that she was leaning towards rejecting it after granting permission for the smaller Jackdaw gasfield.

Eldwick Crag, West Yorkshire: In the low light and the high wind, these corvids are preparing to roost for the night. And they seem to be enjoying themselves

Jackdaws like blustery weather the same way dolphins love choppy seas. There are faster flyers and more graceful flyers, but I can't think of a bird that just enjoys flying as much as a jackdaw does. They bob and bank and yaw and wheel. And right now it's roosting time in the copse above the quarry.

A jackdaw roost - or rather the prelude to the roost, the bedtime gathering, the swirl of small, clacking crows above and about the trees, like particles about to be drawn into a plughole - isn't a murmuration. It's neither as spectacular nor as enigmatic as the twilight displays of starlings; it's a flock, plain and simple (plain as the jackdaw's call of its own name, "jack"). But like everything jackdaws do, it's full of bustling, garrulous life.

The transformation of Europe's busiest shopping street should be a case study in making cities greener, less congested and more inviting places to live

Sadiq Khan has been trying to pedestrianise Oxford Street since he first became the mayor of London in 2016. On Monday, after numerous setbacks, his plan will finally come to fruition. The busiest stretch of the nation's famous shopping street will be closed to traffic in a scheme designed to improve the area and make it more attractive to pedestrians. It should be an emblematic case study in making cities greener, less congested, more inviting places to live and visit.

The Greater London Authority hopes it will rejuvenate a high street fallen on hard times. Since the pandemic, the number of vacant shops on Oxford Street has more than quadrupled. It estimates that the scheme will generate £82m of value a year in the area by increasing footfall and encouraging visitors to linger. This impact remains to be seen, but research from other cities suggests that shops experience higher sales once an area is pedestrianised. Given the prime minister's focus on rejuvenating British high streets, whose dilapidation is correlated with support for Reform UK, he should be watching with interest.

Concrete sprawl in Yaoundé has devastated the city's trees and parks, so volunteers are stepping up, shrub by shrub

A little piece of paradise is buried under the asphalt that is now lined with parked cars. The romantic spot where Sosthène Hugues Ngono used to bring his first dates had been green and beautiful. "It wasn't just a park," he says, standing at the edge of what is now a private car park in Cameroon's capital, Yaoundé.

"It was where I came to clear my head when things felt confused," he says. "Where I met people; where I fell in love, more than once."

Queensland researchers say a published study contains 'silly mistake' that over-inflates vaccine's efficacy, but the regulator is standing by decision to approve it

At wildlife hospitals across eastern Australia, many koalas brought in have distinctive brown patches on their bottoms - a sign of urinary incontinence and a painful inflamed bladder. Others have red, weeping eyes, pointing to a bacterial disease that can cause blindness in the endangered marsupials.

Chlamydia infection, also known as chlamydiosis, is the most significant disease affecting koalas. The culprit is most commonly the bacterium Chlamydia pecorum, which is spread via mating or close contact.

The 2030 target for 80% of new cars to have zero emissions could be cut to as low as half

Electric cars make people happy. More than nine in 10 EV drivers - 94% in a recent poll - are saving money, and a similar number would stick with electric for their next purchase, and recommend them to family and friends. Sales are soaring: more than half of the new cars sold in the UK last month were electric, if hybrids are taken into account, and about 28% of new car sales overall were electric only.

This is hardly surprising, given that soaring petrol and diesel costs have pushed up the price of a full tank to about £120. EV drivers are paying about 2.4p a mile.

Every autumn, Corvo Island in thre Azores turns off its public lighting for a few key days to help fledgling Cory's shearwaters as they attempt to fly to the ocean guided by the stars

Once a year, Corvo, the smallest and most northerly island of Portugal's Azores archipelago, goes dark. Since 2019, the island's 450 or so inhabitants have chosen to switch off the lights every autumn for five nights to tackle the disastrous effects of artificial light on Cory's shearwaters, a seabird endemic to the Atlantic Ocean.

It began in 1991 when the community noticed huge numbers of deaths among young shearwaters.

A newborn Cory's shearwater chick

An 'audit' of the Bureau of Meteorology main dataset for measuring climate change claims it contains 'widespread errors'. It doesn't stack up

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Australia's climate has warmed by more than 1.5C since 1910, according to the Bureau of Meteorology's main long-term temperature data.

If you were so motivated, you might think if you could discredit this data, then you would undermine the whole climate change story and even - perhaps - the rationale for cutting Australia's greenhouse gas emissions.

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Dom Phillips warned that Jair Bolsonaro would make life more dangerous for reporters and the Amazon rainforest, and that his sons were even more extreme

"Bolso shows all signs of fascism, as do his supporters," the murdered British journalist Dom Phillips told me before his death. "His sons are all more extreme if anything."

These words were written in 2018 by the Guardian contributor shortly before the election of the far-right former army captain Jair Bolsonaro as president of Brazil - a prospect that Dom viewed with dread.