Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs, Liverpool-born actor says depression and anxiety followed death of his father when he was 15

The actor David Morrissey has spoken of how “terrible” social anxiety contributed to him becoming an alcoholic.

“I am a recovering alcoholic,” Morrissey, who has been sober for 21 years, told Lauren Laverne on BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs. “Drinking first was about anxiety. I’ve had this terrible social anxiety and that helped me get through it.”

Ellen Mulvey ran up huge betting losses online and wrote ‘addiction is the worst disease’ before she died

A family is calling for wholesale reform of the gambling industry after an inquest heard details of the life and death of Ellen Mulvey, a “generous and caring” woman with a high-flying City job who also had a secret addiction.

Mulvey’s family believe she lost hundreds of thousands of pounds gambling without their knowledge, first via mainstream operators and then on unlicensed platforms.

Boy died aged 13 months after ‘routine abuse’ by Jamie Varley and his partner, John McGowan-Fazakerley, jury hears

A baby boy was “routinely ill-treated, sexually abused and physically assaulted” before he was killed by a secondary school teacher adopting him, a jury has heard.

Jamie Varley, the teacher, 37, and his partner, John McGowan-Fazakerley, 32, were in the process of adopting Preston Davey.