Breaking Bad actor RJ Mitte dies aged 34

The American actor was cast as Bryan Cranston’s on-screen disabled son when he was 14, and drew on his experience of living with cerebral palsy for the role.

His disability is rarely mentioned in the show, which ran from 2008 to 2013, with Walter ‘Flynn’ White Junior defying his father and cracking jokes at his expense. He won a Screen Actor’s Guild award for his performance in the role in 2014.

What did he do after ?

Mitte continued acting with roles in Talking to Strangers and Switched at Birth. He also created The Mitte Foundation, a charity to support community initiatives, and was an ambassador for United Cerebral Palsy.

He died on Monday at what is believed to be his home in Brownsville, Texas, aged 34. No cause of death has been determined.

I’m in deep despair as I write this tonight…That kid was still pretty raw when we started shooting the pilot in February 2007, but little by little we watched him grow into a real fine actor…All that promise and potential is now such a loss.

bryan cranston, Actor for Walter white in , on instagram

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Midwives win £750,000 over nitrous oxide exposure

More than 120 maternity staff at Basildon University Hospital have been awarded almost £750,000 after they were exposed to high levels of nitrous oxide, which is given to women during childbirth, at work.

How did midwives get exposed to the gas?

• Leaky pipes and poor ventilation caused exposure to the gas.
• Midwives reported fatigue, headaches, brain fog and anxiety.

The payout was awarded to staff who worked at the hospital between 2021 and 2023, after the Royal College of Midwives (RCM) took legal action against the hospital.

Roughly 80 members of the RCM received compensation along with around 60 others.

The union said the hospital knew about the leaks in 2021 but staff were not warned about the risks until October 2022.

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The UK towns at risk of running out of water this winter

Five successive heatwaves and the warmest summer on record have left millions of Britons living in drought conditions, which experts believe could remain in place for the foreseeable future unless there is a “significant amount of rainfall” this winter.

Which regions are in drought?

• Yorkshire became the latest area to fall into drought last Friday.
• All of central, southern and eastern England are already in drought.

Eight reservoirs ‘exceptionally low’

The i Paper understands the Environment Agency is concerned about the low levels at Wimbleball, Ardingly, Clatworthy, Colliford, Hanningfield and Abberton.

These are variously operated by South West Water, South East Water, Wessex Water and Essex and Suffolk Water.

England would need 120 per cent of typical rainfall over the next seven months just to be considered out of the drought status.

No bans have ended in the past month, with restrictions on water usage still in place in most of southern and eastern England, affecting almost 30 million people.

• Professor Liz Bentley, chief executive of the Royal Meteorological Society, said the bans would stay in place for the forseeable future unless there is a “significant amount of rainfall” soon.

Does medical cannabis really help patients with insomnia?

There is “insufficient” evidence to conclude whether or not medicinal cannabis can help patients with insomnia, according to a new review.

What the review found

• More research must be done to judge whether medical cannabis is an effective treatment for insomnia.
• Scientists examined nine studies relating to 537 patients aged between 18 and 76 years.
• “Medical cannabis may have little to no clinically meaningful effect on quality of sleep/satisfaction with sleep, total sleep time, or daytime functioning,” the authors concluded.

Medical cannabis in the UK

Medical cannabis is only likely to be prescribed on the NHS for rare forms of epilepsy, for some patients having chemotherapy, and for some who live with multiple sclerosis (MS).

However, private health providers can prescribe medical cannabis for insomnia.

2 million

From June 2025 to May this year, 1,967,268 unlicensed cannabis items were issued on private prescription.

This suggests a big jump on previous data.

660,000

Previous figures showed 659,293 items were dispensed in 2024.

This was up from 282,920 the year before.

Meet the 71-year-old Miss Great Britain contender

Ann Marie Harper, from Ayrshire, is preparing to make history as the oldest Scottish contender to reach the national final in the pageant’s 81-year history.

The Scottish pageant queen, also known as Glamour Gran Ann, is to compete at the Miss Great Britain Classic competition on 16 October.

It is open to women aged 45 and over – meaning she will be pitted against rivals up to 26 years her junior.

Ahead of the competition – which she qualified for by winning Miss Great Britain Classic Ayrshire in June – Harper said: “it doesn’t matter what age you are, people can do wonderful things.

“I realise this could make history because I’m over 70, and I don’t believe it’s been known before.

“It’s given me a real boost in my life, to say it doesn’t matter what age you are, people can do wonderful things.”

The taxes Healey could raise in Budget – and the risks

The Chancellor, John Healey, is weighing up tough choices over whether to slash spending on public services or raise billions of pounds through tax rises in the Budget on 28 October. 

• 
  Speculation has grown that Healey could hit the nation’s biggest banks with a tax rise after he held talks with finance bosses last week.
• 
  Some Labour backbenchers have been pushing for a windfall tax on banking profits to sit alongside existing levies on the sector. 
• 
  Bank executives warned such a measure could affect lending and make the UK less attractive to investors.
• A bank windfall tax has the backing of voters, though, according to a BMG Research poll for The i Paper, which found half the public support one.

Capital gains tax reform

• Many economists saw an increase to capital gains tax (CGT) as the front-runner after Healey said the UK had the “lowest CGT of any European G7 nation”.
• CGT is paid on the profit of the sale of an asset such as a second home or shares.
• Labour insiders are pushing for CGT rates to align more closely with income tax rates to remove a loophole for those who earn money on properties and shares.

• Pensioners and those saving towards their retirement could be in the firing line for some tax increases.
• One option would be to cut the size of the tax-free lump sum people can take from their pensions. Another idea is to limit pension tax relief. 
• However, policies that directly affect older voters are known to be politically toxic as pensioners are more likely to turn out at the polls.

Other options on the table

There is speculation that smaller tweaks to inheritance tax could be made, such as tightening rules around giving gifts.

Healey had also been looking at the high value council tax surcharge – the “mansion tax” – but has now ruled out lowering the threshold for the property surcharge.