Hackney Council are at it again. Taking half arsed decisions on Banksys. Last time they completely removed a stencil of a girl in a frilly dress and gas mask from Gillett Square. This time they've tried to wipe out the crude phallus being painted by the old fashioned, beard and hat sporting artist on the side of the Vietnamese restaurant in Victoria Park Road. What are they like? A council spokesperson said: "Most people......

That’s the creative process used by artist Paul Day to produce his landmark sculpture for the station. Or so we choose to believe. Sadly, the facts tell us that it’s really made from conventional modelling techniques, and shows the sculptor in a clinch with his half-French wife, Catherine. The nuzzling pair were today installed on the concourse beneath St Panc’s famous clock. According to Day, the 30ft group ‘reflects the romance that train travel......

An astonishingly workaday title for a book that features a singing otter, flying dinosaurs and a sheet of electronic tissue paper. Welcome to the madcap world of Paul Ewen, a softly spoken New Zealander with a knack of finding trouble in public houses. It’s a world not unlike that of Michael Hodges, only with less vitriol and more adjectives. The just-published paperback collects together 44 ripping yarns, each set in one of London’s famous......

We're drowning in paper: Up to 12 tons of newspapers a day are being abandoned by commuters on London Underground stations and trains, new figures show. The statistics were revealed by Ken Livingstone following a question raised by the London Assembly Conservatives at Mayor's question time in January. They have asked Transport for London to install more newspaper recycling points on the network to tackle the problem. Sure recycling is one way forward, but......

This week - Filth and disgustingness (Dirty Sanchez: The Movie), a dystopian look at London 2027, (Children of Men) and the sequel to Clerks, (Clerks 2). Today's Friday Film News is going to be a little different in terms of order. Usually the first spot is given to the most hyped film of the week, or the most worthy film. However, as the focus of this post is supposed to be the reviews and......

Another week, another blockbuster. This time it's Cruise, Spielberg and the aliens in War of the Worlds and the critics just can't seem to agree on whether it's any good or not. At the top end of the scale, you've got Jim Christopher in The Times and his four star review. How refreshing to see Spielberg rock the boat with nothing more shocking than pure old-fashioned fear. He prises the story away from kick-ass......