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Scotsman
6 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Scotsman
The Great British Bake Off 2025: when could series 16 start?
The Great British Bake Off will be back once again in 2025 🍰👀 Sign up to our Arts and Culture newsletter Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... The Great British Bake Off will return in 2025. Channel 4 will be the home of series 16. But when could it start - based on previous years? The Great British Bake Off is one of the shows viewers look forward to most each year. We might be in the dog days of summer, but the Channel 4 favourite will be returning before you know it. Viewers have had time to get over the heartbreak of Dylan's struggles in the final in 2024 and attention might be turning back to the tent. GBBO's sister show Bake Off: The Professionals is finishing its run tonight (July 29) and will crown the latest winners. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Rumours had circulated earlier in the year about host Noel Fielding stepping down, but they have been quashed. A spokesperson for the star shut down the talk and insisted 'no discussion' about him leaving the show. But when could The Great British Bake Off return? Here's all you need to know: Will there be series 16 of The Great British Bake Off? Noel Fielding has confirmed he will be co-host Bake Off in 2025 | Channel 4 The show is set to return once again in 2025. Applications closed at the back end of 2024 and filming was due to take place in the spring. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad When could The Great British Bake Off start? Channel 4 will announce the return date for the beloved baking competition closer to the time, but previous years do offer some clues. The show is heading into its 16th series - and its ninth on the broadcaster. Since series 11 in 2020, GBBO has welcomed viewers back to the tent in September with seasons running through to late November. The show also tends to be broadcast on a Tuesday night. Back in 2024, Bake Off started on Tuesday, September 24 and this followed a start date of September 26 the year before. If we open our calendar and flick it to that month, there are five Tuesdays in September 2025. After Channel 4 moved the show back to September with series 11, the latest it started was actually in 2023 (September 26). The earliest the show has started in the month came in 2022 on September 13. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Looking ahead to September 2025, potential candidates for the start date include Tuesday, September 16, 23 and 30. If it was to follow the trend of the two most recent years, the most likely start date would be Tuesday, September 23.
Scotsman
7 hours ago
- Sport
- Scotsman
Rangers suffer double blow ahead of Panathinaikos clash as duo fail to travel
Summer signing and star striker absent from training Sign up to our Football newsletter Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... Rangers have suffered a double injury setback ahead of their crunch Champions League second qualifying round second leg against Panathinaikos on Thursday. Russell Martin's side travel to Athens with a 2-0 advantage thanks to a pair of stunning second half strikes from Findlay Curtis and Djeidi Gassama in the first leg at Ibrox last week. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Rangers are bidding to reach the penultimate stage of Champions League qualification, with Viktoria Plzen or Servette awaiting the winner in the third qualifying round, while progressing through the tie will also ensure the guaranteed fallback of a place in the Europa League. Rangers playmaker Thelo Aasgaard looks set to miss out against Panathinaikos. | SNS Group However, they will have to make do without two key first-team players for the clash in Greece after Thelo Aasgaard and Hamza Igamane failed to travel with the squad. Neither player was involved as the Rangers squad were put through their paces at Auchenhowie in their final training session and they have remained at home to continue recuperating. Aasgaard, a £3.5million summer signing from Luton Town, had been in a race against time to recover from an injury picked up in a pre-season friendly against Dunfermline on July 15. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Head coach Martin had hoped to have the Norwegian winger available for the second leg but the 23-year-old has not been able to recover in time. 'Thelo didn't quite make it,' Martin said as he addressed the media at the Olympic Stadium in Athens. 'To risk him early on at this stage of the season would be crazy so we will make sure he is right.' Igamame, meanwhile, sat out the weekend friendly draw against Middlesbrough at Ibrox after picking up a strain during his substitute appearance in the first leg win over Panathinaikos. The Moroccan was already behind in his pre-season work due to visa issues, while he has also been at the centre of ongoing transfer speculation amid reported interest from the likes of Rennes, Lille, Feyenoord and Everton.
Scotsman
8 hours ago
- Health
- Scotsman
Nurse Sandie Peggie names 13 colleagues she says agreed with her in trans changing room dispute
Nurse tells tribunal told NHS Fife workplace was 'very toxic' and admits using racial slurs Sign up to our daily newsletter – Regular news stories and round-ups from around Scotland direct to your inbox Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... Sandie Peggie has named 13 colleagues who she alleged disagreed with a decision by NHS Fife to allow a transgender doctor to share a women's changing room. Ms Peggie also told an employment tribunal her workplace was 'very toxic'. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The nurse was suspended after she complained about having to share a changing room with trans medic Dr Beth Upton at Victoria Hospital in Kirkcaldy, Fife, on Christmas Eve 2023. Nurse Sandie Peggie | The Scotsman She was placed on special leave after Dr Upton made an allegation of bullying and harassment, and cited concerns about 'patient care'. Ms Peggie has lodged a claim against NHS Fife and Dr Upton, citing the Equality Act 2010, including sexual harassment; harassment related to a protected belief; indirect discrimination; and victimisation. On Tuesday, Ms Peggie was recalled to be questioned about evidence from other witnesses, and she said it made her 'very sad' to name colleagues who had allegedly shared her concerns about single-sex changing rooms. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Ms Peggie said: 'I didn't want anybody else to be put in the same predicament.' During re-examination by her barrister Naomi Cunningham, Ms Peggie named a total of 13 NHS Fife workers including receptionists and a consultant – some of whom she had named previously. She also branded her workplace 'very toxic', the tribunal heard. She admitted she had used racial slurs but said she was 'brought up like that', and said it was not a 'politically correct way'. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad She claimed it did not cause offence within the community where she lived, including neighbours from Chinese and Pakistani backgrounds. Ms Peggie said the reaction from colleagues when she had been suspended was 'one of shock, they couldn't believe what had happened to me', and she alleged Dr Upton had complained in a previous placement 'because of an elderly patient in their 90s who had called him 'son'', the tribunal heard. She said when she asked for a photograph of Dr Upton using the phrase 'that weirdo', it was a picture from a night out 'where he looked like a man in a dress'. Ms Peggie defended her own comments on topics such as flooding in Pakistan, and a comment about putting bacon through the letterbox of a mosque, as 'dark humour'. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad She was questioned by Jane Russell KC, representing Dr Upton and NHS Fife, on comments provided by two witnesses as well as comments from a Benidorm group chat of colleagues who went on holiday together. The nurse said: 'It was never my intention to offend people outside my group of what I thought was very close friends.' Ms Peggie said she did not make a comment about putting bacon through the letterbox of a mosque, and attributed it to a paramedic, however she said: 'I wouldn't offend any Muslim people by speaking like that in front of them, it's a comment that's been made to one person only or between us.' She said she had 'a fear of it being built' because she was 'frightened of Shariah law', and had an objection to 'illegal immigrants', the tribunal heard. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad It was put to her that two witnesses who attended her birthday lunch recalled her using 'derogatory' terminology to talk about Dr Upton. Ms Peggie said: 'The only thing I was discussing at the lunch was how I felt on the changing room, and that was what I was asking people.' The lawyer said a colleague withdrew from the Benidorm group chat, saying Ms Peggie was 'relentless in her nastiness', and that Dr Upton 'does not deserve the hate campaign that is obviously being waged not only by Sandie but other staff as well', the tribunal heard. Nurse Sandie Peggie and Dr Beth Upton | PA Ms Russell said: 'You were waging a hate campaign against Dr Upton, weren't you?' Ms Peggie said: 'No.' Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Asked if she believed trans people were 'pretending' to access single-sex spaces, Ms Peggie said: 'I don't have any bad feelings about trans people, I just don't believe they should be in the women's changing room. 'I still believe a trans woman is a man and shouldn't be in the female changing room.' The KC was admonished when she asked who was paying for Ms Peggie's legal representation. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Another message was put to Ms Peggie, where she said 'those policies are a… minefield, been looking at menstrual privacy stuff as well', the tribunal heard. Ms Russell said: 'Was this detail about the menstrual flood a cover to disguise the fact that the only reason you went to the changing room was to confront Dr Upton?' Ms Peggie said: 'No.' Earlier on Tuesday, a consultant told the tribunal Dr Upton is "chromosomally male". Emergency department consultant Dr Maggie Currer was cross-examined by Ms Peggie's lawyer, Naomi Cunningham. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The consultant said she did not advise staff that Dr Upton would be allowed to use female changing facilities as she "did not think it was reasonable to violate someone's confidentiality". The consultant disagreed this made it harder for staff to object. She rejected a suggestion that terminology such as the word "bigot" was used in the department regarding attitudes towards gender. Dr Currer also said it was an "error" that she wrote in an email to colleagues that Ms Peggie had been referred to the Nursing and Midwifery Council on January 5 2023, and added: "I was aware she hadn't been so that is indeed an error." Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad She added: "In hindsight I could have checked with medical staff whether or not they were going to be comfortable with Dr Upton using the female changing rooms. "No concerns were raised with me at the time; there are other spaces which people can use to change. "I'm still not sure that advertising Dr Upton's trans status would have been the right thing to do."
Scotsman
8 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Scotsman
The Man on the Endless Stair by Chris Barkley review: 'an ambitious first novel'
Sign up to our Arts and Culture newsletter, get the latest news and reviews from our specialist arts writers Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... This is a first novel, and an ambitious one. This means that one should treat it carefully, indeed gently, neither hailing it as a masterpiece (which very few novels are) or condemning it as pretentious and confused. In truth, it's a mixture, now compelling, now irritating. Chris Barkley The publishers describe it as 'Agatha Christie meets Italo Calvino' – certainly an attractive idea. Still, the detective side of the novel lacks Christie's ruthless morality, while the Calvino side doesn't quite achieve the Italian novelist's ability to make the fantastical appear as natural as our home town. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad However, the somewhat extravagant comparison does say something about the novel. It is set on a Scottish island, murders take place while there is no communication with the mainland, and there is fantasy presented as realism. The novel is set a few years after the end of the Second World War. Euan, a veteran of the Normandy Campaign and now an aspiring Scottish novelist, has caught the attention of Malcolm Furnivall, a successful author of highbrow crime novels. (They sound like the sort of thing that CS Lewis's friend Charles Williams used to write.) Euan has written an article about Malcolm in Cyril Connolly's magazine, Horizon. All this is excellent fooling and agreeably done, even if Malcolm is an absurd and unconvincing character. The same may be said of his island, where he has built a mansion, already falling into disrepair; his books are written in a 'writing shed' in the grounds. Fair enough, though the shed with its tunnels in the basement is not very convincing. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Malcolm, finding his powers failing, drenched in whisky too, is seemingly stuck on what should be the final volume of what sounds like a sadly pretentious sequence, and so he invites Euan to the island, where he will be, as it were, consecrated as his heir. Malcolm has a son and daughter, also a wife and various hangers-on, all of whom may resent Euan. But Malcolm makes it clear that Euan is to be entrusted with the work of completing his last manuscript. This is not a popular decision. Then Malcolm is shot and – the Christie touch – the telephone line to the mainland goes dead. Moreover, the manuscript cannot be found. Euan has to search for it and try to solve the murder. He sets about it energetically, if not all that intelligently. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad So The Man on the Endless Stair becomes a quest novel, as Euan tries to find a way through the maze. His method is not the best: he throws out accusations without evidence. Well, he is of course confused, and his own mind is as disturbed as Malcolm's for he is obsessed with a sister who vanished years ago. Still, even if his quest teeters at times on the brink of absurdity, as other characters disappear and his own life is threatened, it's all entertaining enough. Sometimes Barkley writes very well, sometimes badly; he has the tiresome habit, one even school teachers warn their pupils against, of saying 'I decided to do etc'. Don't say decide, one tells pupils, just do it. The plot is extravagant, conversations often absurd, and yet one keeps reading and doing so with pleasure. Barkley has imagination and talent, and one has to remember this is only his first novel. It's confused and confusing at times, but he is richly talented and, with self-discipline, will write better.
Scotsman
8 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Scotsman
Film reviews: Bring Her Back Late Shift
Sign up to our Arts and Culture newsletter, get the latest news and reviews from our specialist arts writers Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... Building on the promise of their breakthrough horror film Talk to Me, Australian directors Danny and Michael Philippou kick things up several notches with Bring Her Back, a gnarly slice of contemporary gothic horror featuring a terrifying performance by Sally Hawkins. Bring Her Back | Contributed Riffing on her normally kooky demeanour, Hawkins digs deep to play Laura, a grieving foster mother who takes in the visually impaired Piper (Sora Wong) and her older half-brother Andy (Billy Barratt) when Andy's father dies suddenly and horrifically. Laura's still raw with grief from the loss of her own blind daughter in a tragic accident, but her former job as a therapist means she's well placed to present herself as a source of salvation for Piper without raising red flags, something the Philippou brothers milk for all its worth as Andy starts to fear for the safety of both his sister and their strange new adoptive brother Oliver (Jonah Wren Phillips). Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Although Oliver does wince-inducing things with cats, melons and knives, the palpable air of dread emanating from Laura as she gaslights her new charges adds a psychological dimension that's just as intense. There's an overarching mythology at play here too, one parsed out in grainy video clips of cult-like rituals that start coming together in the film's final third. But it's really Hawkins' performance that makes this so unnerving. Decked out in an array of non-threatening knitwear, Hawkins is good at making Laura seem just off-kilter enough that when the extremes of despair to which grief has driven her are finally revealed, she elicits almost as much pity as fear. Late Shift | KEYSTONE There's more nerve-wracking tension in Late Shift, a precision engineered medical procedural following a nurse over the course of a particularly trying evening shift in a Swiss hospital. Played by the brilliant German actor Leonie Benesch (The Teachers' Lounge), this is the preternaturally composed Floria who, nevertheless, finds herself stretched to breaking point on an understaffed surgical ward rapidly filling up with difficult patients. Although writer/director Petra Volpe's workplace drama is schematically designed to highlight the often thankless plight of the nursing profession, both she and Benesch imbue it with enough visual and character-driven grace notes that it avoids preachiness. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Sticking with Switzerland, animation maverick Claude Barras (My Life as a Courgette) returns with Savages, another French language stop-motion marvel dealing with tricky themes in an accessible way. Set in Borneo, it revolves around a young girl with indigenous heritage who's simultaneously awakened to the plight of her ancestors and the consequences of deforestation when she witnesses government contractors orphan a baby orangutang as they clear the land for a palm oil plantation.
