Speculation about a Labour leadership contest is gathering pace after Andy Burnham deflected questions about standing against Keir Starmer. The mayor of Greater Manchester told “BBC Breakfast” last week that he was “fully focused” on his mayoral duties, but couldn’t “rule out what might or might not happen in future”.

No Labour prime minister has been “ousted by his party” while in office, said The Guardian. But dire approval ratings have raised questions about Starmer – and his “potential successors”.

Andy Burnham
Burnham has been at the epicentre of speculation about a move against Starmer since Labour’s autumn conference. But a series of obstacles would have to be overcome: he’d have to step down as Manchester mayor, win a Commons seat in a by-election and then be nominated by at least 80 Labour MPs.

Wes Streeting
Frequently appearing to “rise about his brief”, the health secretary is a “prime suspect for a hypothetical coup”, said The Telegraph. Widely seen as a “more charismatic version of Starmer”, Streeting’s “weakness is that he is seen as too right-wing” by progressives within the party, said The Independent.

Angela Rayner
“Socialist firebrand” Rayner would probably be a leading choice of the Labour left, which has “felt frozen out” by Starmer’s “centrist government”, said The Telegraph. She left the front bench under a cloud for underpaying stamp duty, but could use this to rebrand herself as the “clean break” candidate, said The Independent.

Shabana Mahmood
The home secretary has shown “much-needed leadership” on migration, said The Independent, but this could work against her; she “may be considered too right-wing for the tastes of many in the party”. In the event of a leadership contest, “it may become a choice between her and Streeting not to split the vote”.

Ed Miliband
The Sun reported in September that the energy secretary was “on manoeuvres” – “plotting against his former pal” Starmer. As a former party leader, Miliband “can claim to have a strong understanding of how to manage MPs”, said The Telegraph, but his bruising loss to David Cameron 10 years ago will “probably go against him”.

Retirement may be possible sooner than you expect – in some form, at least. As longer life spans translate into more years at work, an increasing number of people are opting to pursue “microretirement”: taking extended breaks lasting weeks or even months, before returning to employment. These breaks are different from standard holiday leave in that “they’re intentional, unpaid time to rest and recharge”, said Fast Company.

Job hopping
Microretirements can take many forms, including quitting a job and finding a new one once you are ready to work again, or “setting up a plan with your employer” that incorporates extended time off, said Fast Company. Or if you’re the boss, it might mean “taking breaks from your business”.

However, microretirement may come at a cost. Taking time away from a job can “affect your earnings, investments and funding your retirement”, not just in the form of a few missed paydays, but also in terms of career advancement. You “could also be seen as a job hopper” by managers or potential future employers, said Kenyetta Nesbitt-Simmons, a senior partner at an HR consultancy. This may pose a particular problem in competitive fields where a microretirement could be seen as slacking off.

‘Why wait?’
The trend is not limited to workers approaching pension age. Younger people are increasingly embracing microretirement, “to avoid burnout, find greater fulfilment in their work and enhance their overall well-being”, said Fast Company.

Although older age may offer more financial stability, it makes “sense from a health perspective to do adventurous travel while you’re in peak health”, said The Independent. “As we live and work longer, retirement can feel so far away,” Michael Edwards, managing director of travel firm Explore Worldwide, told the newspaper. “There’s a sense of ‘why should I wait?’ None of us know what the future holds and for many, retirement might feel too late to do the sort of travelling we have our heart set on.”

Emmanuel Macron takes a free throw on a basketball court in Gabon’s capital, Libreville. The French president made a brief visit to the former French colony after attending the G20 conference in Johannesburg, before flying to Angola for an African Union-EU summit.

Ludovic Marin / AFP / Getty Images

With Christmas fast approaching, mince pies have returned to supermarket shelves “in full force”, said Holly Morgan in The Mirror. The seasonal staple is as beloved as “carol singers and questionable novelty jumpers”, and Britons eat more than 800 million each year. Here are some of the best takes on the classic mincemeat-filled pastry.

Waitrose No.1 Brown Butter Mince Pies with Cognac
For the second year in a row, Waitrose scooped “Best Buy” in our supermarket category, said Which? researcher Rebecca Marcus. With “moreish” brown butter pastry surrounding “fruity” mincemeat infused with brandy and festive spice, these pies are “worth splashing out on”.

Iceland Luxury Butter Mince Pies
Look no further for a “masterclass in harmony”, said Stacey Smith in Good Housekeeping. Building on traditional flavours, the “yuzu juice-spiked” mince pies are “densely packed” with fruity, “zesty” filling. “Testers described it as ‘a fantastic, classic mince pie’.”

Marks & Spencer Collection Mince Pies
This year’s seasonal offerings from M&S “aced it in my tests for their fruity, nutty filling and buttery pastry”, said Xanthe Clay in The Telegraph. They also rate high for sustainability, since they contain no palm oil and are made with Wildfarmed regeneratively farmed flour.

Sainsbury's Taste the Difference All Butter Mince Pies
These tasty mince pies are “hard to fault”, said Henderson in The Independent. The pastry has an “excellent creamy, buttery flavour”, while the mincemeat is well balanced, with a “decent tang” of brandy. Brilliant quality, they are a “cut above” most rival versions.

The Epstein story is making us forget about the true horror of abuse
Eric Lewis in The Independent
“As a teenager, I played on a football team coached by a predatory pedophile,” writes human rights lawyer Eric Lewis. Child sexual abuse “almost always” hides “in plain sight”. Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes “hid in plain sight among the rich and famous”, but “most child sexual abuse takes place not in Palm Beach mansions or private islands, but in schools, churches and homes with predatory relatives”. It happens at all levels of society and “it is always monstrous”.

Social media is dead – none of my friends are posting any more
Caitlin Moran in The Times
I used to be sure that “social media was the future of human communication”, writes Caitlin Moran, but now “it’s very clear” that it’s not. “Anxiety, depression and general pessimism have gone through the roof” and we know “social media has played a part”. No one’s sharing anymore; it’s “just adverts and AI slop”. We’ve “realised that there is little to gain, and a huge amount to lose, by creating free content for a billionaire’s online platform”.

Middle-aged gardener? You’re now officially ‘cool’
Hephzibah Anderson in The Telegraph
David Beckham has joined “Team Gardener”, writes Hephzibah Anderson. He seems “a decent sort”, but gardening doesn’t need rescuing from its “stuffy, older image” by “those tattooed forearms”. It has always been “resilient” to “attempts to fashion any kind of lifestyle movement out of its humbling toil”. It is “something to be grown into”, requiring “patience” and “a more weathered outlook”. Viewed “in this light, there’s actually something winningly old-school about Beckham’s earthy swerve”.