He did every substance imaginable – and got punched by Chuck Berry – but Keef’s still going strong. As the Stones knock out another new album, he explains why he’s rejecting AI in favour of ‘the old ways’

Keith Richards has just become a great-grandfather. “This is true! This is true!” he enthuses, video-calling from somewhere in the depths of the Hit Factory, the New York studio first patronised by the Rolling Stones 46 years ago when they were making Emotional Rescue. “It’s been a couple of weeks. It’s a new thing for me. But I’m a fantastic grandad,” he confides. “Great-grandadding is … I try to let them hang with me for as long as humanly possible, then I hand ’em back. I’ve been doing a lot of grandfathering in the last year or so. I’ve got three or four new ones, you know. When I say new, I mean … two or three years old. Or four. Or one, or maybe five.”

Hang on, that seems a little vague. He shrugs and explodes in a wheezy chuckle. “I lose track, you know.”

I have no legs, so the thought of tackling the nearly 6,000-metre peak seemed crazy. But after reflection, and hard physical training, I decided to give it a go

I was born with a rare genetic disease called sacral agenesis, which meant that my legs didn’t work. When I was five, I had surgery to amputate them. Doctors told my parents that I might never sit up, let alone be a functioning member of society – but as a child I wanted to try everything, and my mum and dad were great at encouraging me.

I learned to navigate the world by walking on my hands. I also had a wheelchair, or I’d get around our neighbourhood in Wyoming by skateboard, just like other kids.

The end of outsourcing government jobs, from cleaners to security, is just one progressive idea set in motion in this pivotal byelection week

In the quiet pause before the storm of the Makerfield result drops, good news has passed unnoticed. “The age of outsourcing is over,” declares the Cabinet Office. There will be “the biggest wave of insourcing of public services for a generation” Rachel Reeves says. Finally, here it comes: every government department promises to bring cleaners, security and others of all kinds back as public employees when current contracts expire.

“New approach to procurement signals ambition to end the era of outsourcing by default,” goes the government press release. Shares in the big state contractors Serco, Capita, and Mitie fell on Wednesday after the news.

Polly Toynbee is a Guardian columnist

Twenty-five years after she released her debut album, we pick the best of an artist pairing Chopin-inspired piano with pop, soul and powerful emotion

Two different takes on the same album – one traditional, the other more beat-heavy – packaged together, Keys was an experiment that didn’t quite work, but Skydive, co-written with Raphael Saadiq, is a fine song: both versions are great but Mike WiLL Made-It’s bumping rework wins by a fraction.

With sanctions-relief and a US promise to avoid further meddling, the conflict has been settled on Tehran’s terms

Donald Trump is running fast to escape the catastrophic war on Iran that he and Benjamin Netanyahu started four months ago. He is saying anything that appears to suit the moment. In fact, he clearly feels he can now ditch his friend, the Israeli prime minister. He is offering Tehran’s military regime a $300bn rebuilding fund, an end to economic sanctions and a promise not to interfere in its internal affairs. All this is declared a “major win”. If so, fine. The next 60 days of negotiations will be tortuous and unpredictable. But at least they are pointing in a plausible – and hopefully irreversible – direction.

For once, a US president seems ready to accept defeat in a potentially forever war before it gets out of hand. Iran is not to be another Vietnam, Afghanistan or Iraq. More than that, in the course of the past week, Trump seems to have soured on America’s closest ally. Furious at Netanyahu’s ceaseless bombing of Lebanon, he remarked: “You don’t have to knock down an apartment house every time you’re looking for somebody” – somebody to kill, that is – because “there are a lot of people in those apartment houses and they’re not all Hezbollah”. For all this moral grandstanding, Trump’s military forces, along with Israel, have killed more than 3,300 Iranians, according to the country’s authorities – among them more than 100 children in a girls’ school – and injured many more.

Simon Jenkins is a Guardian columnist

Boaters say low water levels cause them to run aground, while residents say the lock needs to be drained to prevent waste running into their properties

Earlier this month, signs began appearing pinned to a lock on the Huddersfield narrow canal: “Canel [sic] And River Trust,” they read. “Please leave this paddle up after use. To prevent flooding to properties.”

Over the past few weeks, lock 20W, near the village of Greenfield, has become the source of a bitter row between boaters and homeowners. Canal boaters have been pulling the signs down, only for the homeowners to put them back up again.

Burnham hails a ‘turning point’ for the country after a resounding victory over Reform UK and Restore that may force prime minister Keir Starmer to step aside

• Full report: Andy Burnham wins huge majority in Makerfield byelection, paving way for Starmer leadership challenge

• Burnham brings in top economists before possible leadership run

David Blunkett, the former Labour cabinet minister, has suggested that Keir Starmer should stand down after the Makerfield byelection.

In an interview on the BBC’s Newsnight, Blunkett suggested that Starmer standing aside would be the best option for the party regardless of whether Andy Burnham wins tonight or loses.

Tories’ Douglas Lumsden says city has spoken ‘loud and clear’ in support of the North Sea oil and gas industry

• UK politics – live updates

The Scottish National party (SNP) has lost the formerly safe seat of Aberdeen South in a shock loss to the Scottish Conservatives.

The Scottish Conservatives’ Douglas Lumsden beat the SNP’s Richard Thomson by 6,050 votes, with a 14.69% swing away from the SNP. The Tories vote share was 49.51%. Lumsden’s vote tally was 14,308, with Thomson on 8,258.

Exclusive: Former chief Brexit negotiator says staying out of euro and Schengen area would be ‘perfectly possible’

• ‘Cynical to get power’: Michel Barnier on Boris Johnson, Brexit and the EU’s future

Michel Barnier has said Britain could regain its special terms if it rejoined the EU and claimed it was becoming clearer every day to the British people that they would be stronger in Europe.

In an interview before the 10th anniversary of the Brexit referendum next week, the EU’s former chief Brexit negotiator said he could not see any obstacle to the UK keeping the pound and remaining outside the passport-free Schengen travel area should the country rejoin.

Jamie Varley jailed for life and partner John McGowan-Fazakerley jailed for 25 years over death of Preston Davey

A secondary school teacher has been jailed for life for sexually abusing and murdering the baby boy he was adopting with his partner.

Jamie Varley, 37, was sentenced to a whole-life order on Thursday for abusing and killing 13-month-old Preston Davey. It means he will stay in prison for the rest of his life and will never be eligible for parole, the judge Mr Justice Turner said.