Issue 1410

Second half rules
He could have been forgiven for standing still after a glittering football career but that’s not Gary Neville’s style. Inspired by the values his family taught him, he’s moved into business – helping Manchester’s rough sleepers along the way – and higher education. Michael Taylor asks him whether politics might be the next step. Photos and cover: Howard Barlow.

Great expectations
Dickens enthusiasts in Yorkshire are hoping to strengthen the author’s links with the county. Susan Griffin talks to them and the author’s great-great-great-granddaughter to hear how A Christmas Carol was inspired by his visits to the North.

‘History doesn’t record itself’
On the fortieth anniversary of the first reported Aids case Simon Garfield revisits his seminal text on the epidemic and explains how UK campaigners set the pace for the rest of the world.

The best medicine
He’s widely regarded as one of the UK’s most original comedic voices but Harry Hill’s life almost took a very different path. As his new memoir Fight! hits shelves,
he gets candid with Simon Bland about turning his back
on a life in medicine to focus on his funny bones.

Sunshine after Rayne
Rayne O’Brien runs a care leavers forum, raises money so they can eat together, and has helped improve healthcare for them. All the more remarkable then that she was once a care leaver herself, dumped in a council flat with no money or friends. By Kelly Mattison. Photos: Aaron Bray.

Plus
News, arts and entertainment, columnists Saskia Murphy and Roger Ratcliffe, Simon le Bon’s letter to his younger self – and much more, in one of our bumper Xmas editions.