London, Sept 21: Middlesbrough residents are the laziest in Britain, according to new research.

Residents there lie in bed until 8.12am, whereas the average Brit gets up at 6.48am, reports the Daily Star.

Sleepyheads in the Teesside town were closely followed by late risers from Dundee (8.08am) and Bradford, West Yorks (8.07am).

Natives of Middlesbrough include 49-year-old comedian Bob Mortimer and magician Paul Daniels, 70.

But local factory worker Gary O’Brien, 42, hit back: “This is a hard-working town and it is an insult to brand us lazy.

“I have to get up by 6.30am at the latest, and have done for the past 25 years.”

London, Sept. 20 : A leader of Britain’s ruling Labour Party has renewed calls for a ban on a new radical Islamic organization -- Al Muhajiroun – in the wake of media reports that it is promoting a conference aimed at children.

The web-based group, Islam4uk, has planned the event entitled Muslim Youth: The Spark of the Fire – which is to take place in east London tonight.

Among its founders are the radical preacher Omar Bakri Mohammed - who is living in exile in Lebanon - and former solicitor Anjem Choudary, who both played a part in Al Muhajiroun.

London, Sept 20 : A British man has captured a smiling dragonfly on his camera phone.

It has been identified by the British Dragonfly Society as a female Southern Hawker Aeshna cyanea.

Its happy demeanour comes from the "frons" - the frontal area of an insect''s head above the mouth parts.

Mark Manders, a council worker from Nottingham, stumbled across the colourful insect while rock climbing in the Peak District in Derbyshire.

"It was so huge, I thought it was quite unusual. To see one that big, and I think it was laying eggs too,” Telegraph quoted him, as saying.

London, Sept. 20 : Former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill wanted to eliminate "bad man" Mahatma Gandhi, the leader of India’s freedom struggle.

Second World War archives reveal a conversation that Churchill had with South African leader Field Marshal Jan Christian Smuts, which showed the former blaming the latter for Britain’s troubles in India.

On one occasion, Churchill told Smuts: “You are responsible for all our troubles in India – you had Gandhi for years and did not do away with him.”

London, Sept. 20 : The suspension of a senior British Muslim police commander on charges that he fabricated evidence in a case connected him, has resulted in race ties at Scotland Yard sinking to a new low.

Leaders of ethnic minority officers at Scotland Yard have announced that they are cutting all links with senior managers, following the suspension of Commander Ali Dizaei, who is also the president of the National Black Police Association (NBPA).

The Metropolitan Police branch of the NBPA said it had lost all confidence in the leadership of Britain''s largest force and described the decision to suspend Commander Ali Dizaei from duty as the culmination of a "sustained witch-hunt".

London, Sept 20 : Brit kids could be using brain-boosting ‘smart drugs’, which improve short-term memory and increasing speed of thought, within a generation, predicts a Government-funded thinktank.

The drugs, known as "cognition enhancers" could improve brain performance in a number of ways.

The Academy of Medical Sciences has already advised ministers that the use of such drugs - commonly known as "cogs" - would be so widespread that they would need to be regulated.