The ex-soldier has marched 36,000 miles since he left Hull in 1998. He’s crossed the Americas, Asia and Europe, fallen in love, been held at gunpoint and been deported, in between nearly drowning, nearly dying of thirst and nearly being eaten. But that’s just the start of it …

‘It’s a big moment,” says Karl Bushby, who has had plenty of big moments in his life. He is recording himself on his phone for social media. “We’re in Dover, and I’m about to have my first fish and chips and mushy peas in 28 years. Mushy peas, my God, I forgot they even existed!” He points his phone at the plate in front of him. “It better be good.” And he tucks in. “Mmmm. See, this is a big chunk of fish and a decent bit of batter, and that’s something you don’t see in other parts of the world. I mean, come on! That. Is. Fish. And. Chips! You see, Britain is special.”

It has been two days since Bushby swam the Channel to return to England. Tomorrow, he’ll start the walk home to Hull for the first time since he left in 1998. He hopes to get back on 1 November, the same date he set off all those years ago.

As the Oscar-winning Stasi surveillance film hits the stage, Knightley and co-star Luke Thompson talk about the paranoia at its heart, the cost of theatre tickets nowadays – and their fury at ringtones in the stalls

Unpacking assorted tubs of carrot sticks and salad, Keira Knightley winces apologetically. “I just realised I’ve got very crunchy food,” she says. How apropos that she should consider the impact that her lunch might have on my audio recording when we are here to discuss The Lives of Others, a new play in which the characters are divided between the spies and the spied-upon.

Based on the Oscar-winning 2006 film and set in East Berlin in 1984, the play stars Knightley as Christa-Maria, a theatre actor in a relationship with a director, Georg, played by Luke Thompson. Earwigging on them is Wiesler (Stephen Dillane), the Stasi officer whose principles are gradually challenged and weakened by his round-the-clock exposure to this cultured couple.

Preparing her first report on England’s social care system, the peer says ‘everything is on the table’. This should include older people’s wealth, rather than taxes on younger workers

Residents with advanced dementia lined the day room, glazed stares or sleeping mouths agape, with that terrible human vacancy everyone most fears for their own end days.

This was Millvina House in Anfield, Liverpool, which I visited with Louise Casey, who is heading the commission on social care in England, last week. Here is a snippet of what she saw: an angry man jolting into life, shooting out his arm at her and bellowing: “Out! Get out! Get out!” A young care assistant went to stroke his back and calm him down. It’s a hard job, and part of it is watching for warning signs of aggression, one of dementia’s dreadful symptoms. “People don’t want to know,” Casey said, “but if you are born, you will die. Chances are you will need care, and dementia is the biggest killer.”

Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist

Over 10m people have tuned in for episodes of new season of BBC hit as mass TV audiences become increasingly rare

For the celebrities chosen as traitors in the BBC’s juggernaut reality show, the task is simple – kill off fellow contestants without getting caught.

Yet with the new series of Celebrity Traitors once again attracting huge audiences, its UK producers are delighting in one of the show’s more wholesome qualities – its popularity is staving off the death of television’s ability to unite the nation.

Russia’s silence over the death of a lab worker underlines that pandemic preparedness amounts to nothing if information on threats is withheld

In pandemic preparedness work, scientists like to focus on the technical challenges: identifying pathogens, diagnosing infections, understanding their effects and developing vaccines and treatments. Each step promises progress through human innovation, investment and planning. The World Health Organization (WHO), for example, brings experts together to identify and prioritise emerging disease threats and collect the evidence needed to prepare for them. But preparedness depends on more than scientific innovation.

As the past week has shown, politics is the elephant in the room in all of this. No one could have predicted we would be talking about pneumonic plague, and that the death of a single lab worker in Russia would cause global headlines. It might feel like an overreaction: the WHO deals with thousands of potential disease signals worldwide every month. But the circumstances of this case are unusual given the lack of transparency from Russian authorities on what happened – and ongoing concern about biological weapons research.

The 52-year-old reflects on the pain of being sacked after two decades turning Red Bull into an F1 powerhouse, questioning his purpose in life and dealing with panic attacks

Christian Horner should be in steamy Singapore, preparing for another grand prix victory, but here he is, at home on an autumnal morning in genteel Highgate as his wife, Geri Halliwell-Horner, welcomes me with a cheerful hug. Horner smiles as the former Spice Girl produces an impressive imitation of my South African accent which echoes her old headteacher at Watford Girls.

After the most controversial man in the recent history of Formula One says hello, Halliwell-Horner and I discuss the fact that my two daughters also went to her school and that one of their history textbooks had her name printed on the inside page – while the ex-Ginger Spice talks about gritty old Watford, grammar school education and Nelson Mandela.

PM hails next month’s ‘reset’ summit as first step to closer ties, but tensions over trade may prove problematic

Andy Burnham has promised a “serious dialogue” over the UK’s future place in Europe, saying the existing relationship is “not good enough” as he framed next month’s Brussels summit as a possible first step to EU membership.

The prime minister said Britain must take a “clear-eyed rational look” at its long-term relationship with the bloc to boost economic growth and control immigration, which needed to go beyond Labour’s existing red lines.

ZyMix platform has contract with Tencent, which US alleges has links to People’s Liberation Army

A new messaging and payment “super app” marketed at British students uses servers owned by a Chinese company that has been put on a US military blacklist for its alleged affiliation to the People’s Liberation Army.

ZyMix, which is being pushed on university campuses as the UK’s first super app designed “for gen Z”, combining chat, payments and community features, has a contract with a German-based subsidiary of Tencent Holdings, a Chinese conglomerate in Shenzhen.

Exclusive: Chris Bruni-Lowe used Redfield & Wilton Strategies role to develop potential campaign tactics, sources say

A close adviser to Nigel Farage had an influential role at a national polling company despite not being publicly associated with the firm, the Guardian can reveal.

Chris Bruni-Lowe, Farage’s private pollster for many years, played an important role in the operations of Redfield & Wilton Strategies and used it to develop potential campaign strategies, according to several sources who have worked there.

High valuations and debt put sector in danger, while fund also warns on government borrowing and cyber-attacks

The threat of an AI share price crash rippling out across global markets is putting world financial stability at risk, the International Monetary fund has warned.

In its twice-yearly Global Financial Stability Report, the IMF highlighted the sky-high valuations for AI companies along with their increasing debt pile as one reason that risks in the system are “elevated”.