The molluscs are decimating food chains in Switzerland, have devastated the Great Lakes in the US, and this week were spotted in Northern Ireland for the first time

Like cholesterol clogging up an artery, it took just a couple of years for the quagga mussels to infiltrate the 5km (3-mile) highway of pipes under the Swiss Federal Technology Institute of Lausanne (EPFL). By the time anyone realised what was going on, it was too late. The power of some heat exchangers had dropped by a third, blocked with ground-up shells.

The air conditioning faltered, and buildings that should have been less than 24C in the summer heat couldn’t get below 26 to 27C. The invasive mollusc had infiltrated pipes that suck cold water from a depth of 75 metres (250ft) in Lake Geneva to cool buildings. “It’s an open invasion,” says Mathurin Dupanier, utilities operations manager at EPFL.

Mathurin Dupanier indicates the water cooling systems that were blocked by the invasive quagga mussels. Photographs: Phoebe Weston/the Guardian; École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

In the 50 years since equal rights for women were enshrined in UK law, the campaigners have been reduced to caricatures, or forgotten. But their struggle is worth remembering

Celia Brayfield was at her desk in the Femail section of the Daily Mail’s Fleet Street office when an editor called her over. It was July and Wimbledon had started. “He said: ‘We want you to go down and get into the women’s changing rooms and report on lesbian behaviour.’ One didn’t normally swear at that time but I declined. That was the attitude then,” she told me.

From the late 1960s until the early 70s, Brayfield was one of a small group of female journalists working on women’s pages in newspapers. “We were dealing with everyday sexism on an unbelievable scale,” she said. “You learned to wear trousers or take the lift because if you took the stairs someone would try to look up your skirt. But then you couldn’t go to a lot of press conference venues in trousers. In the Savoy, for example, women in trousers weren’t allowed.”

Panto season is upon us, and for the performers, anything could happen. Actors recall their most excruciating moments – from a panic attack while dressed as a cow, to dripping blood while in flight as Peter Pan

When panto goes wrong, the show must always go on. And there is a lot that could go wrong: malfunctioning pyrotechnics, panic attacks, chafing thighs, broken props, broken bones, bruised egos – and that’s before you get live animals involved. Missed cues and forgotten lines are small potatoes by comparison. So with panto season once again in full swing, we speak to seasoned professionals about the exhausting, error-laden, explosive truth behind the most “magical” season of the year.

Adam Buksh played The Genie in Aladdin at Howden Park Centre, Livingston, West Lothian, in 2013
It was halfway through the show when Aladdin got trapped in the cave. Our version was based on the original story, One Thousand and One Nights (not Disney’s), in which Aladdin possesses two magical entities: a powerful Genie of the Lamp (me) and Scheherazade, Genie of the Ring. I was on stage with Aladdin and Scheherazade, using my magic to smash the ring and break the evil sorcerer’s curse. For dramatic purposes, we used a handheld pyrotechnic which was similar to a little lighter with a wheel flint, but made of metal. I would use it to break the ring and free Aladdin from the cave.

From Quality Street to Toblerone to the Terry’s classic, festive treats are becoming more of a luxury – and it’s not just down to the price of cocoa

You’re right – it is smaller. The Terry’s Chocolate Orange on shop shelves this Christmas weighs 12g less than it did this time last year. That’s a decrease in size of 8% – not as big a cut as when the product lost 10% of its mass in 2016, but a further whittling away of a favourite Christmas treat.

Prices have been going up too, although it’s been a series of increases. Figures from market researchers Assosia show that across the big four supermarkets, the full price of a cChocolate oOrange has increased from £1.24 in December 2022 to about £2.25 today – a rise of 81%. If you factor in the size reduction, you’re actually paying 96% more.

Pressure is growing on member states to back a €90bn loan for Kyiv ahead of a Brussels summit

European leaders are being urged to decide whether to use Russia’s frozen assets to fund Ukraine’s defence at a time of unprecedented pressure from the US.

At a critical summit in Brussels on Thursday, EU leaders will be asked to make good on a promise to find urgently needed cash for Ukraine, with Kyiv under pressure to cede territory as Russia ekes out advances on the battlefield.

The hard right and far right are the political winners from the migration ‘crisis’, but only because centrist parties keep legitimising them

For a decade, Europe has remained suspended in a perpetual state of migration crisis. While the Greek word krisis refers to an exceptional moment that disrupts the normal order of things, since 2015 it has become an enduring condition in contemporary Europe. That year, 1 million people sought refuge in Europe, fleeing wars and persecution. In the ensuing decade, the issue of migration has been so thoroughly weaponised that one can hardly remember a time when it was not considered a crisis.

The idea of a permanent state of emergency does not reflect a reality whereby Europe genuinely cannot cope with new arrivals. Rather, it reflects the fact that there are simply too many who profit from manufacturing a sense of crisis.

Dr Maurice Stierl is a migration and border researcher at the University of Osnabrück, Germany

Attention, les paragraphes qui suivent contiennent des spoilers sur l'épisode de Plus belle la vie, encore plus belle diffusé vendredi après-midi sur TF1 ! Si vous ne voulez rien savoir, ne lisez pas ce qui suit !

Vendredi 19 décembre dans Plus belle la vie, encore plus belle

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