When we look at how people vote in elections and why they choose certain parties, analysis often focuses on age, education, location or socioeconomic status. Less discussed in Britain is religion. But close to two-thirds of its adults are still religious – expressing either a religious identity, holding religious beliefs, or taking part in religious activities.
For the one-in-three adults in Britain who are Christian, this identity remains an important influence on their political behaviour. New polling, published here for the first time, shows how Reform UK is disrupting our previous understanding of how Christians vote in British elections.
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The relationship between Britain’s Christian communities and the major political parties goes back centuries. The Conservative party has been very close to English Anglicanism since its emergence in the mid-19th century. Catholics and free-church Protestants (such as Baptists and Methodists) have tended towards the Labour and Liberal/Liberal Democrat parties. Even as Britain has become more secular, these relationships have persisted.
Anglicans, for example, have tended to vote Conservative even when the party was in dire straits. In the 2024 election, 39% of Anglicans voted Tory even as the party’s national vote share fell to 24%.
Since the 1980s and particularly in elections since 2015, however, we have started to see changes to the Christian vote. The traditional Catholic attachment to Labour has deteriorated, as has Labour’s appeal to other Christian communities such as Baptists, Methodists and Presbyterians.
Instead, driven by the rising salience of social values (attitudes towards immigration, social change and national identity) as a determinant of political support, the socially conservative leanings of some Christians of all stripes has led to increased support for the Conservatives. And those who traditionally did so – the Anglicans – have become even more supportive. The result has been a steady coalescing of the Christian vote behind the Conservatives.
But now, new polling by YouGov (on June 23-24 2025) for the University of Exeter reveals that this realignment is being disrupted by the growing popularity of Reform UK.
Instead of asking who people would vote for tomorrow, a nationally representative sample of 2,284 adults was asked how likely they were to ever vote for each major party, on a scale from zero (very unlikely) to ten (very likely).
While not the same as a direct question about how someone would vote in an election, the likelihood question provides a much richer measure of the strength of their support for all of the major parties.
Stuart Fox, data by YouGov for the University of Exeter
Among Anglicans, Labour remains deeply unpopular: over half gave the party a 0. In contrast, the Conservatives still enjoy strong support among Anglicans, with 35% giving them a vote likelihood of seven or higher – the kind of support associated with voting for the party in an election.
Reform, however, has caught up. Despite only 15% of Anglicans voting Reform in 2024, 38% now rate their likelihood of voting for the party as high. That’s the same as the proportion who are strongly opposed to Reform – showing that while the party polarises Anglicans more than the Conservatives, Reform could win as much Anglican support as the Tories in an election.
Catholics show a similar trend. Labour’s traditional support is eroding: 40% of Catholics said they had zero likelihood of voting Labour, while 29% are strong supporters. As with Conservatives for the Anglican vote, Reform is almost level-pegging with Labour for the Catholic vote at 28%. It has even supplanted the Conservatives, of whom 22% of Catholics are strong supporters.
It is not yet clear why this is happening. The distinction of Christian (and non-Christian) voting patterns is not an artefact of age – there are manystudies that prove this is the case.
It may be that Reform’s stances on issues such as immigration resonate with Christians’ concerns to the extent that they are willing to set aside their historic party loyalties. Or it may be that Christians are as prone as other British voters to turn to Reform out of frustration with the performances of Labour and the Conservatives in office.
Swing voters and party competition
This data also shows the extent to which voters’ support for parties overlaps or is exclusive. In other words, which voters have a high vote likelihood for only one party (and so are likely committed to backing that party in an election), which do not have such high likelihoods for any party (and so will probably not vote at all), and which have similarly high likelihoods for more than one party (effectively swing voters, persuadable one way or the other).
Among the religiously unaffiliated, 29% aren’t strong supporters of any party. For Catholics, it’s 26%. Anglicans are more politically anchored, however, with only 20% in this category.
While traditionally, we would have expected this to reflect Anglicans’ greater tendency to support the Tories, only 17% of Anglicans are strong supporters of only that party, compared with 21% who are firmly behind Reform. These aren’t swing voters; they’ve switched sides.
A further 12% of Anglicans have high vote likelihoods for both the Tories and Reform. These are swing voters that the two parties could realistically expect to win over.
Stuart Fox, data by YouGov for the University of Exeter
Catholics are even more fragmented. Only 13% are strong supporters of Labour alone, along with 12% and 17% who are strong supporters of the Conservatives and Reform alone, respectively.
Few Catholics are torn between Labour and the other parties, but 5% are swing voters between the Conservatives and Reform: the Tories’ gradual winning over of Catholics over the last 50 years is also being challenged by the appeal of Reform.
The party has provided a socially conservative alternative to the Conservatives, with the result that the Christian vote has become more fragmented. The Tories are no longer the main beneficiaries of Labour’s loss of its traditional Catholic vote.
In addition, Reform is as popular as the Conservatives among Anglicans, and as popular as Labour among Catholics. This suggests it is appealing across the traditional denominational divide more successfully than either of the major parties.
If there is to be a single party that attracts the bulk of Britain’s Christian support, at this point it is far more likely to be Reform than anyone else.
This article was based on analysis by Dr Stuart Fox (University of Exeter), Dr Ekaterina Kolpinskaya (University of Exeter), Dr Steven Pickering (University of Amsterdam) and Prof Dan Stevens (University of Exeter), connected to the research project Investigating the individual and contextual role of religion in British electoral politics, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council. Stuart Fox also receives funding from the British Academy.
“We’re actually facing, in many parts of our country, nothing short of societal collapse.” This was the dire warning from Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, in setting out his party’s goal of halving crime.
In an op-ed in the Daily Mail and a press conference, Farage framed Britain as a nation in crisis from rising crime and lawlessness. But, he said, Reform had the solution: mass deportation of foreign offenders, the construction of prefabricated “Nightingale” prisons, and a wholesale crackdown on offending.
He insisted that British streets were out of control (although recent rises in crime come mainly from online fraud and shoplifting, according to the latest data), pledged to simultaneously increase prison sentences and reduce overcrowding, and vowed to restore order with a “higher and physically tougher standard of police officer”.
Speaking after a weekend of violent anti-immigration protests in Epping, Farage also tied Britain’s supposed lawlessness to migration: “Many break the law just by entering the UK, then commit further crimes once here – disrespecting our laws, culture and civility. The only acceptable response is deportation.”
Invoking crime as a threat, and the politician as its solution, is a tried-and-tested political manoeuvre. We’ve seen it deployed from both left and right, in many parts of the world, for decades. Stuart Hall and colleagues famously examined this phenomenon in the 1970s in their seminal book Policing the Crisis.
Our own analysis suggests that the accuracy of crime statistics often matters less than how politicians frame public anxieties – through media, public rhetoric and policy initiatives. In short: the public often responds to emotion as much as evidence.
One tension in England and Wales is that there are two major sources of crime data. The first – on which Farage leans heavily – is police-recorded crime. But, as is widely understood, that data provides only a partial picture of the true extent of crime. Many people, especially those from marginalised or vulnerable groups, choose not to report their experiences of crime.
Moreover, the consistency and accuracy with which police forces record these offences has been questioned over time. Indeed, police-recorded crime statistics are not designated as official national statistics.
The other (and more robust) source is the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW), which asks a representative sample of the public about their experiences of crime over the past 12 months. Notably, it includes those incidents that were not reported to the police.
Running since the early 1980s, the CSEW has demonstrated long-term declines in incidents of theft, criminal damage and violence (with or without injury) since the mid-to-late 1990s. Curiously, Farage told reporters that the CSEW was “based on completely false data”, without providing any evidence.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS), and most criminologists, regard the CSEW as the more accurate metric of long-term crime trends. (The Conversation asked the CSEW to comment but hadn’t received a response when this article was published.)
The political weight of crime
Crime has electoral value. It allows parties and political campaigners to project strength, decisiveness and control. Farage’s rhetoric is designed to provoke urgency and anxiety. It’s a well-worn script. Margaret Thatcher’s government leveraged fears of law and order. New Labour made “anti-social behaviour” a central point of focus at a time when crime was, in fact, falling.
In research conducted with colleagues, we examined how people’s fears about specific crimes are shaped not just by actual crime rates, or by the person’s age, gender or ethnicity, but also by the political context in which they grew up.
Using data from the CSEW and a method called age-period-cohort analysis, we explored how different “political generations” developed and retained distinct concerns about crime.
We found clear patterns. Those who grew up during the James Callaghan era in the mid-to-late 1970s – when politicians repeatedly warned of “muggings” – were more likely to report anxieties about street robbery over time.
Thatcher’s generation, who came of age during a sharp rise in property crime, were more likely than other groups to express long-term fears about burglary. And those who grew up under New Labour – during the height of the “anti-social behaviour” agenda – reported persistent concerns about neighbourhood disorder, even as recorded incidents declined.
In other words, the political rhetoric people are exposed to during their formative years leaves a lasting impression on their relationship to crime. Debates about crime become embedded in personal and generational memory.
Crime is real and victims suffer. But distorting its nature and prevalence can erode public trust in the institutions tasked with protecting us. It can foster punitive and ineffective policy responses. And it can leave whole communities feeling targeted, criminalised or unsafe, based on selective and often sensational narratives.
We absolutely need to talk about crime. But we also need to talk about how we talk about crime. Who frames the debate, which statistics are used, who and how many are left out of the official records, whose fears are being amplified, and who is looking to exploit crime?
Emily Gray has received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council.
Stephen Farrall has received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council.
“We’re actually facing, in many parts of our country, nothing short of societal collapse.” This was the dire warning from Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, in setting out his party’s goal of halving crime.
In an op-ed in the Daily Mail and a press conference, Farage framed Britain as a nation in crisis from rising crime and lawlessness. But, he said, Reform had the solution: mass deportation of foreign offenders, the construction of prefabricated “Nightingale” prisons, and a wholesale crackdown on offending.
He insisted that British streets were out of control (although recent rises in crime come mainly from online fraud and shoplifting, according to the latest data), pledged to simultaneously increase prison sentences and reduce overcrowding, and vowed to restore order with a “higher and physically tougher standard of police officer”.
Speaking after a weekend of violent anti-immigration protests in Epping, Farage also tied Britain’s supposed lawlessness to migration: “Many break the law just by entering the UK, then commit further crimes once here – disrespecting our laws, culture and civility. The only acceptable response is deportation.”
Invoking crime as a threat, and the politician as its solution, is a tried-and-tested political manoeuvre. We’ve seen it deployed from both left and right, in many parts of the world, for decades. Stuart Hall and colleagues famously examined this phenomenon in the 1970s in their seminal book Policing the Crisis.
Our own analysis suggests that the accuracy of crime statistics often matters less than how politicians frame public anxieties – through media, public rhetoric and policy initiatives. In short: the public often responds to emotion as much as evidence.
One tension in England and Wales is that there are two major sources of crime data. The first – on which Farage leans heavily – is police-recorded crime. But, as is widely understood, that data provides only a partial picture of the true extent of crime. Many people, especially those from marginalised or vulnerable groups, choose not to report their experiences of crime.
Moreover, the consistency and accuracy with which police forces record these offences has been questioned over time. Indeed, police-recorded crime statistics are not designated as official national statistics.
The other (and more robust) source is the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW), which asks a representative sample of the public about their experiences of crime over the past 12 months. Notably, it includes those incidents that were not reported to the police.
Running since the early 1980s, the CSEW has demonstrated long-term declines in incidents of theft, criminal damage and violence (with or without injury) since the mid-to-late 1990s. Curiously, Farage told reporters that the CSEW was “based on completely false data”, without providing any evidence.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS), and most criminologists, regard the CSEW as the more accurate metric of long-term crime trends. (The Conversation asked the CSEW to comment but hadn’t received a response when this article was published.)
The political weight of crime
Crime has electoral value. It allows parties and political campaigners to project strength, decisiveness and control. Farage’s rhetoric is designed to provoke urgency and anxiety. It’s a well-worn script. Margaret Thatcher’s government leveraged fears of law and order. New Labour made “anti-social behaviour” a central point of focus at a time when crime was, in fact, falling.
In research conducted with colleagues, we examined how people’s fears about specific crimes are shaped not just by actual crime rates, or by the person’s age, gender or ethnicity, but also by the political context in which they grew up.
Using data from the CSEW and a method called age-period-cohort analysis, we explored how different “political generations” developed and retained distinct concerns about crime.
We found clear patterns. Those who grew up during the James Callaghan era in the mid-to-late 1970s – when politicians repeatedly warned of “muggings” – were more likely to report anxieties about street robbery over time.
Thatcher’s generation, who came of age during a sharp rise in property crime, were more likely than other groups to express long-term fears about burglary. And those who grew up under New Labour – during the height of the “anti-social behaviour” agenda – reported persistent concerns about neighbourhood disorder, even as recorded incidents declined.
In other words, the political rhetoric people are exposed to during their formative years leaves a lasting impression on their relationship to crime. Debates about crime become embedded in personal and generational memory.
Crime is real and victims suffer. But distorting its nature and prevalence can erode public trust in the institutions tasked with protecting us. It can foster punitive and ineffective policy responses. And it can leave whole communities feeling targeted, criminalised or unsafe, based on selective and often sensational narratives.
We absolutely need to talk about crime. But we also need to talk about how we talk about crime. Who frames the debate, which statistics are used, who and how many are left out of the official records, whose fears are being amplified, and who is looking to exploit crime?
Emily Gray has received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council.
Stephen Farrall has received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council.
The India–UK Free Trade Agreement (FTA), signed on July 24, 2025, marks a historic milestone in bilateral relations, transforming the economic landscape between two influential democracies with shared historical ties. At its core, this agreement aims to double the volume of trade between the two nations to $120 billion by 2030, signalling a shift in strategic and economic alignment in a post-Brexit global order. This comprehensive trade pact not only strengthens commercial ties but also deepens diplomatic and development-oriented collaboration across sectors. The agreement is ambitious in scope, eliminating tariffs on 99% of Indian exports to the United Kingdom covering almost 100% of trade value while India reciprocates by reducing tariffs on 90% of UK goods, with 85% becoming duty-free within a decade. The FTA is expected to boost India’s annual exports by $5 billion and create over one million jobs within five years, catalysing both industrial growth and employment in labour-intensive and technology-oriented sectors.
India’s principal gain lies in its sweeping access to the UK market for sectors where it has a strong comparative advantage. Labour-intensive industries textiles and clothing, leather and footwear, processed food, gems and jewellery, and marine exports stand to benefit immediately from duty-free treatment. The UK has agreed to eliminate tariffs that previously ranged from 4% to as high as 70% on many Indian goods. For example, the processed food sector, which was earlier subject to duties of up to 70%, now enjoys zero-duty access on 99.7% of tariff lines. This development is monumental for rural India, where the agri-processing ecosystem is vital for both livelihood generation and export earnings.
India’s textile and apparel industry, a major source of employment and a vital segment of its exports, is among the biggest beneficiaries. Previously subject to duties of up to 10–12% in the UK, Indian textiles now enjoy duty-free access. This policy move levels the playing field for Indian exporters against rivals such as Bangladesh and Vietnam, enhancing the competitiveness of cotton, synthetic fabrics, and finished garments. With projected gains of $5 billion in textile exports alone, this sector is poised for accelerated growth, enhanced investments, and large-scale job creation, especially in states like Gujarat, Maharashtra, and Tamil Nadu.
Equally significant is the liberalisation of leather and footwear exports. These products, which were earlier taxed up to 16%, now enter the UK market duty-free. This shift supports the expansion of India’s footwear and leather goods industry key employment-generating sectors largely dominated by SMEs and artisanal clusters. The FTA is likely to generate substantial growth opportunities for exporters in Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, and Tamil Nadu, giving a much-needed fillip to these traditionally under-capitalised industries.
In the high-value gems and jewellery sector, which contributes significantly to India’s export basket, the FTA brings immediate benefits. Duties of up to 4% on diamonds, gold, and silver ornaments have now been abolished. With duty-free access to a discerning and high-spending UK consumer base, Indian jewellery exporters are expected to see a surge in orders. The improved price competitiveness will also draw investment into India’s precious stones and jewellery sector, especially in Mumbai, Surat, and Jaipur, reinforcing India’s position as a global jewellery hub.
The agreement also opens new frontiers for engineering goods, auto components, mechanical machinery, and organic chemicals. Tariffs in these segments, previously ranging from 4% to 14%, have been brought down to zero, strengthening India’s manufacturing ecosystem. The UK has also agreed to slash tariffs on automobiles from over 100% to just 10%, albeit under a quota system. This will allow Indian auto parts and engine manufacturers to increase their exports significantly, supporting India’s ‘Make in India’ agenda and integrating more deeply into global supply chains.
India’s marine products sector particularly shrimp and frozen prawn exports gains a significant boost. Tariffs of up to 20% have been brought to zero, opening a $5.4 billion UK market. The removal of import duties will enhance price competitiveness for Indian seafood in the UK and directly benefit coastal communities and fishermen in Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, and Odisha. This measure also aligns with India’s broader objective of revitalising traditional sectors and expanding their global reach.
In agriculture and processed foods, the FTA proves to be a game-changer. With tariff-free access on 95% of agricultural products including spices, mango pulp, pulses, and tea India’s agri-exports are projected to grow by 20% within three years. This liberalisation directly benefits farmers and small agro-industrial units, integrating them into international markets. Importantly, India has retained full protection for sensitive sectors like dairy, poultry, apples, vegetables, cooking oils, and oats. By refusing tariff concessions in these areas, the agreement ensures that India’s small and marginal farmers are not displaced by foreign competition.
The India–UK FTA also provides significant advantages in high-tech sectors. Indian electronics exports smartphones, optical fibre cables, inverters, and electronic components now enjoy zero-duty access to the UK. The inclusion of streamlined customs processes and provisions on digital trade further lowers entry barriers, particularly for SMEs venturing into cross-border e-commerce. This has strong implications for India’s fast-growing technology manufacturing ecosystem and supports the expansion of Indian firms into high-value global markets.
One of the most transformative features of the agreement is its support for the mobility of Indian professionals and skilled workers. The FTA includes provisions to facilitate temporary movement for Indian professionals such as IT engineers, architects, nurses, financial consultants, and even niche cultural workers such as yoga instructors and chefs. Up to 1,800 Indian professionals in these categories will be allowed to work in the UK temporarily. These mobility concessions expand India’s soft power and human capital exports, aligning with the government’s strategy to promote services-led growth.
Additionally, the Double Contribution Convention (DCC) clause in the FTA exempts Indian workers from making social security contributions in the UK for a period of three years. This is expected to benefit over 75,000 Indian workers currently residing in the UK by significantly reducing their financial burden and enhancing the attractiveness of temporary employment opportunities in Britain. This provision is particularly impactful for the IT/ITeS sector, financial services professionals, and other knowledge economy workers.
In tandem with these trade and labour mobility benefits, the UK’s offer also includes 99.3% tariff elimination for animal products, 100% duty elimination for marine products, and full liberalisation of key sectors such as chemicals, electrical machinery, plastics, base metals, headgear, ceramics, glass, and clocks. Across all categories, the agreement promises enhanced market access, easier customs procedures, and a simplified regulatory environment each element helping Indian exporters reduce transaction costs and achieve scale.
Strategically, the FTA supports India’s broader development agenda. It reinforces the objectives of ‘Make in India’, the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) Scheme, and the goal of integrating Indian enterprises particularly MSMEs into global supply chains. The liberalised trade framework incentivises higher production volumes, improved quality standards, and adherence to international compliance norms, all of which contribute to India’s export dynamism. At the same time, by insulating sensitive sectors from duty concessions, the government has safeguarded domestic food security, protected vulnerable producer groups, and upheld rural economic stability.
The India–UK FTA also carries strong geopolitical undertones. For post-Brexit Britain, deepening trade relations with India a rising economic power is a strategic imperative. For India, the agreement allows diversification of export markets at a time when supply chain realignments are underway globally, particularly due to tensions with China and economic uncertainties in Europe. The FTA offers a resilient and rules-based alternative route to prosperity for both partners, anchored in democratic values and mutual respect.
The India–UK Free Trade Agreement of 2025 is a landmark pact with far-reaching consequences for trade, employment, mobility, and strategic cooperation. By unlocking duty-free access across vast sectors, protecting domestic interests, and enabling professional mobility, it serves as a blueprint for future FTAs India may sign with other developed economies. The deal is comprehensive, development-oriented, and forward-looking positioning India for a new era of global economic leadership and strengthening its strategic partnership with the United Kingdom in a rapidly evolving world order.
In conclusion the India–UK Free Trade Agreement (FTA) could serve as a significant catalyst in shaping India’s ongoing and future trade negotiations with the United States and the European Union. As a comprehensive and balanced agreement with a G7 nation, the UK FTA strengthens India’s credibility as a serious and capable negotiator on the global stage. The successful inclusion of sensitive sectors, labour mobility, digital trade provisions, and extensive tariff liberalisation sets a precedent that India can leverage in its stalled or complex discussions with the U.S. and EU. For the United States, which has been engaged in hectic negotiations with India on Bi-lateral Trade Agreement, the Indo-UK FTA could act as a catalyst and a template for further negotiations on a prospective BTA. Similarly, the European Union has also been in talks with India to clinch a FTA by the end of FY26 and the UK deal demonstrates India’s willingness to offer concessions while protecting key domestic interests. This FTA could thus help bridge trust deficits, unlock political momentum, and create negotiating templates for market access, investment protection, and digital standards. Ultimately, the India–UK FTA could become a benchmark, enhancing India’s bargaining position in global trade diplomacy.
(Navroop Singh is a New Delhi-based IP attorney and geopolitical analyst)
Conspiracy theories are a widespread occurrence in today’s hyper connected and polarised world.
Events such as Brexit, the 2016 and 2020 United States presidential elections, and the COVID pandemic serve as potent reminders of how easily these narratives can infiltrate public discourse.
The consequences for society are significant, given a devotion to conspiracy theories can undermine key democratic norms and weaken citizens’ trust in critical institutions. As we know from the January 6 riot at the US Capitol, it can also motivate political violence.
But who is most likely to believe these conspiracies?
My new study with Daniel Stockemer of the University of Ottawa provides a clear and perhaps surprising answer. Published in Political Psychology, our research shows age is one of the most significant predictors of conspiracy beliefs, but not in the way many might assume.
People under 35 are consistently more likely to endorse conspiratorial ideas.
This conclusion is built on a solid foundation of evidence. First, we conducted a meta analysis, a “study of studies”, which synthesised the results of 191 peer-reviewed articles published between 2014 and 2024.
This massive dataset, which included over 374,000 participants, revealed a robust association between young age and belief in conspiracies.
To confirm this, we ran our own original multinational survey of more than 6,000 people across six diverse countries: Australia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, the US and South Africa.
The results were the same. In fact, age proved to be a more powerful predictor of conspiracy beliefs than any other demographic factor we measured, including a person’s gender, income, or level of education.
Why are young people more conspiratorial?
Having established conspiracy beliefs are more prevalent among younger people, we set out to understand why.
Our project tested several potential factors and found three key reasons why younger generations are more susceptible to conspiracy theories.
1. Political alienation
One of the most powerful drivers we identified is a deep sense of political disaffection among young people.
A majority of young people feel alienated from political systems run by politicians who are two or three generations older than them.
This under representation can lead to frustration and the feeling democracy isn’t working for them. In this context, conspiracy theories provide a simple, compelling explanation for this disconnect: the system isn’t just failing, it’s being secretly controlled and manipulated by nefarious actors.
2. Activist style of participation
The way young people choose to take part in politics also plays a significant role.
While they may be less likely to engage in traditional practices such as voting, they are often highly engaged in unconventional forms of participation, such as protests, boycotts and online campaigns.
These activist environments, particularly online, can become fertile ground for conspiracy theories to germinate and spread. They often rely on similar “us versus them” narratives that pit a “righteous” in-group against a “corrupt” establishment.
3. Low self-esteem
Finally, our research confirmed a crucial psychological link to self-esteem.
For individuals with lower perceptions of self worth, believing in a conspiracy theory – blaming external, hidden forces for their problems – can be a way of coping with feelings of powerlessness.
Understanding these root causes is essential because it shows simply debunking false claims is not a sufficient solution.
To truly address the rise of conspiracy theories and limit their consequences, we must tackle the underlying issues that make these narratives so appealing in the first place.
Given the role played by political alienation, a critical step forward is to make our democracies more representative. This is best illustrated by the recent election of Labor Senator Charlotte Walker, who is barely 21.
By actively working to increase the presence of young people in our political institutions, we can help give them faith that the system can work for them, reducing the appeal of theories which claim it is hopelessly corrupt.
More inclusive democracy
This does not mean discouraging the passion of youth activism. Rather, it is about empowering young people with the tools to navigate today’s complex information landscape.
Promoting robust media and digital literacy education could help individuals critically evaluate the information they encounter in all circles, including online activist spaces.
The link to self-esteem also points to a broader societal responsibility.
By investing in the mental health and wellbeing of young people, we can help boost the psychological resilience and sense of agency that makes them less vulnerable to the simplistic blame games offered by conspiracy theories.
Ultimately, building a society that is resistant to misinformation is not about finding fault with a particular generation.
It is about creating a stronger, more inclusive democracy where all citizens, especially the young, feel represented, empowered, and secure.
Jean-Nicolas Bordeleau receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
ER Report: Here is a summary of significant articles published on EveningReport.nz on July 25, 2025.
Gangs are going global and so is the illegal gun trade – NZ can do more to fight it Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Gillespie, Professor of Law, University of Waikato According to the Global Organised Crime Index, international criminal activity has increased over the past two years. And the politically fractured post-pandemic world has made this even harder for nations to combat. New Zealand is far from immune. According
Historic ICJ climate ruling ‘just the beginning’, says Vanuatu’s Regenvanu By Ezra Toara in Port Vila Vanuatu’s Minister of Climate Change Adaptation, Ralph Regenvanu, has welcomed the historic International Court of Justice (ICJ) climate ruling, calling it a “milestone in the fight for climate justice”. The ICJ has delivered a landmark advisory opinion on states’ obligations under international law to act on climate change. The
3 reasons young people are more likely to believe conspiracy theories – and how we can help them discover the truth Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jean-Nicolas Bordeleau, Research Fellow, Jeff Bleich Centre for Democracy and Disruptive Technologies, Flinders University Conspiracy theories are a widespread occurrence in today’s hyper connected and polarised world. Events such as Brexit, the 2016 and 2020 United States presidential elections, and the COVID pandemic serve as potent reminders
Waiting too long for public dental care? Here’s why the system is struggling – and how to fix it Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Santosh Tadakamadla, Professor and Head of Dentistry and Oral Health, La Trobe University Just over one-third of Australians are eligible for public dental services, which provide free or low cost dental treatment. Yet demand for these services continues to exceed supply. As a result, many Australian adults
Butter wars: ‘nothing cures high prices like high prices’ – but will market forces be enough? Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alan Renwick, Professor of Agricultural Economics, Lincoln University, New Zealand RobynRoper/Getty Images The alarming rise of butter prices has become a real source of frustration for New Zealand consumers, as well as a topic of political recrimination. The issue has become so serious that Miles Hurrell, chief
Ultrafast fashion brand Princess Polly has been certified as ‘sustainable’. Is that an oxymoron? Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Harriette Richards, Senior Lecturer, School of Fashion and Textiles, RMIT University Carol Yepes/Getty Images Last week, the ultrafast fashion brand Princess Polly received B Corp certification. This certification is designed to accredit for-profit businesses that provide social impact and environmental benefit. Established on the Gold Coast in
AI will soon be able to audit all published research – what will that mean for public trust in science? Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexander Kaurov, PhD Candidate in Science and Society, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington Jamillah Knowles & Digit/Better Images of AI, CC BY-SA Self-correction is fundamental to science. One of its most important forms is peer review, when anonymous experts scrutinise research before it is
Miles Franklin 2025: Siang Lu’s Ghost Cities is a haunting comedy about tyranny. Is it the funniest winner ever? Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Joseph Steinberg, Forrest Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow, English & Literary Studies, The University of Western Australia Siang Lu David Kelly/UQP The Miles Franklin judges described Siang Lu’s Ghost Cities, winner of the 2025 award, as “a grand farce and a haunting meditation on diaspora”. To my mind, it
Keep fighting for a nuclear-free Pacific, Helen Clark warns Greenpeace over global storm clouds Asia Pacific Report Former New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark warned activists and campaigners in a speech on the deck of the Greenpeace environmental flagship Rainbow Warrior III last night to be wary of global “storm clouds” and the renewed existential threat of nuclear weapons. Speaking on her reflections on four decades after the bombing
Business coalition calls for 25% cut in the cost of red tape by 2030 Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra Business, universities, and investors have jointly urged the federal government to commit to cutting the cost of red tape by 25% by 2030, in a submission for next month’s Economic Reform Roundtable. The push to reduce regulation is in line
Grattan on Friday: net zero battle has net zero positives for Sussan Ley Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra There’s no other way of looking at it: Sussan Ley faces a diabolical situation with the debate over whether the Coalition should abandon the 2050 net zero emissions target. The issue is a microcosm of her wider problems. The Nationals,
The Murray–Darling Basin Plan Evaluation is out. The next step is to fix the land, not just the flows Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Stewardson, CEO One Basin CRC, The University of Melbourne Yarramalong Weir is one of many barriers to the passage of fish in the Murray-Darling Basin. Geoff Reid, One Basin CRC A report card into the A$13 billion Murray–Darling Basin Plan has found much work is needed
The Murray–Darling Basin Plan Evaluation is out. The next step is to fix the land, not just the flows Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Stewardson, CEO One Basin CRC, The University of Melbourne Yarramalong Weir is one of many barriers to the passage of fish in the Murray-Darling Basin. Geoff Reid, One Basin CRC A report card into the A$13 billion Murray–Darling Basin Plan has found much work is needed
Reserve Bank says unemployment rise was not a shock, inflation on track Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Hawkins, Head, Canberra School of Government, University of Canberra Reserve Bank Governor Michele Bullock has fleshed out the central bank’s thinking behind its surprise decision to keep interest rates on hold this month. In a speech today to the Anika Foundation, Bullock said there has been:
Reserve Bank says unemployment rise was not a shock, inflation on track Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Hawkins, Head, Canberra School of Government, University of Canberra Reserve Bank Governor Michele Bullock has fleshed out the central bank’s thinking behind its surprise decision to keep interest rates on hold this month. In a speech today to the Anika Foundation, Bullock said there has been:
Israel waging ‘horror show’ starvation campaign in Gaza, says UN chief This is Democracy Now!. I’m Amy Goodman. More than 100 humanitarian groups are demanding action to end Israel’s siege of Gaza, warning mass starvation is spreading across the Palestinian territory. The NGOs, including Amnesty International, Oxfam, Doctors Without Borders, warn, “illnesses like acute watery diarrhea are spreading, markets are empty, waste is piling up, and
Israel waging ‘horror show’ starvation campaign in Gaza, says UN chief This is Democracy Now!. I’m Amy Goodman. More than 100 humanitarian groups are demanding action to end Israel’s siege of Gaza, warning mass starvation is spreading across the Palestinian territory. The NGOs, including Amnesty International, Oxfam, Doctors Without Borders, warn, “illnesses like acute watery diarrhea are spreading, markets are empty, waste is piling up, and
Historic ruling finds climate change ‘imperils all forms of life’ and puts laggard nations on notice Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jacqueline Peel, Professor of Law and Director, Melbourne Climate Futures, The University of Melbourne Hilaire Bule/Getty Climate change “imperils all forms of life” and countries must tackle the problem or face consequences under international law, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) has found. The court delivered its
Jet ski accidents are tragic but preventable. Here’s how to reduce the risk Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Milad Haghani, Associate Professor & Principal Fellow in Urban Risk & Resilience, The University of Melbourne Richard Hamilton Smith/Getty Two teenage boys were thrown from a jet ski during a ride on the Georges River in Sydney’s south this week. One died at the scene. The other
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jean-Nicolas Bordeleau, Research Fellow, Jeff Bleich Centre for Democracy and Disruptive Technologies, Flinders University
Conspiracy theories are a widespread occurrence in today’s hyper connected and polarised world.
Events such as Brexit, the 2016 and 2020 United States presidential elections, and the COVID pandemic serve as potent reminders of how easily these narratives can infiltrate public discourse.
The consequences for society are significant, given a devotion to conspiracy theories can undermine key democratic norms and weaken citizens’ trust in critical institutions. As we know from the January 6 riot at the US Capitol, it can also motivate political violence.
But who is most likely to believe these conspiracies?
My new study with Daniel Stockemer of the University of Ottawa provides a clear and perhaps surprising answer. Published in Political Psychology, our research shows age is one of the most significant predictors of conspiracy beliefs, but not in the way many might assume.
People under 35 are consistently more likely to endorse conspiratorial ideas.
This conclusion is built on a solid foundation of evidence. First, we conducted a meta analysis, a “study of studies”, which synthesised the results of 191 peer-reviewed articles published between 2014 and 2024.
This massive dataset, which included over 374,000 participants, revealed a robust association between young age and belief in conspiracies.
To confirm this, we ran our own original multinational survey of more than 6,000 people across six diverse countries: Australia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, the US and South Africa.
The results were the same. In fact, age proved to be a more powerful predictor of conspiracy beliefs than any other demographic factor we measured, including a person’s gender, income, or level of education.
Why are young people more conspiratorial?
Having established conspiracy beliefs are more prevalent among younger people, we set out to understand why.
Our project tested several potential factors and found three key reasons why younger generations are more susceptible to conspiracy theories.
1. Political alienation
One of the most powerful drivers we identified is a deep sense of political disaffection among young people.
A majority of young people feel alienated from political systems run by politicians who are two or three generations older than them.
This under representation can lead to frustration and the feeling democracy isn’t working for them. In this context, conspiracy theories provide a simple, compelling explanation for this disconnect: the system isn’t just failing, it’s being secretly controlled and manipulated by nefarious actors.
2. Activist style of participation
The way young people choose to take part in politics also plays a significant role.
While they may be less likely to engage in traditional practices such as voting, they are often highly engaged in unconventional forms of participation, such as protests, boycotts and online campaigns.
These activist environments, particularly online, can become fertile ground for conspiracy theories to germinate and spread. They often rely on similar “us versus them” narratives that pit a “righteous” in-group against a “corrupt” establishment.
3. Low self-esteem
Finally, our research confirmed a crucial psychological link to self-esteem.
For individuals with lower perceptions of self worth, believing in a conspiracy theory – blaming external, hidden forces for their problems – can be a way of coping with feelings of powerlessness.
Understanding these root causes is essential because it shows simply debunking false claims is not a sufficient solution.
To truly address the rise of conspiracy theories and limit their consequences, we must tackle the underlying issues that make these narratives so appealing in the first place.
Given the role played by political alienation, a critical step forward is to make our democracies more representative. This is best illustrated by the recent election of Labor Senator Charlotte Walker, who is barely 21.
By actively working to increase the presence of young people in our political institutions, we can help give them faith that the system can work for them, reducing the appeal of theories which claim it is hopelessly corrupt.
More inclusive democracy
This does not mean discouraging the passion of youth activism. Rather, it is about empowering young people with the tools to navigate today’s complex information landscape.
Promoting robust media and digital literacy education could help individuals critically evaluate the information they encounter in all circles, including online activist spaces.
The link to self-esteem also points to a broader societal responsibility.
By investing in the mental health and wellbeing of young people, we can help boost the psychological resilience and sense of agency that makes them less vulnerable to the simplistic blame games offered by conspiracy theories.
Ultimately, building a society that is resistant to misinformation is not about finding fault with a particular generation.
It is about creating a stronger, more inclusive democracy where all citizens, especially the young, feel represented, empowered, and secure.
Jean-Nicolas Bordeleau receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Travis Van Isacker, Senior Research Associate, School of Sociology, Politics and International Studies, University of Bristol
On a cold, wet November evening, Issa Mohamed Omar and more than 30 other men, women and children set off from their informal camp near the northern French port city of Dunkirk. They walked through the darkness in near-silence for around two hours, until they reached the beach from where they hoped to start a new and better life.
As they arrived, five men were busy pumping up an inflatable dinghy and attaching an outboard engine. These people smugglers had charged each of their customers more than a thousand euros for a trip that costs someone with the right passport less than a hundred.
The travellers were given life-vests, arranged into rows and counted. “There are 33 of you,” one of the smugglers said. For many on board, this was not their first attempt at reaching England.
Most came from Iraqi Kurdistan, including Kazhal Ahmed Khidir Al-Jammoor from Erbil, who was travelling with her three children: Hadiya, Mubin and Hasti Rizghar Hussein, respectively aged 22, 16 and seven.
A father and son from Egypt were shown how the engine worked and provided a GPS device and directions to Dover, around 35 miles (60km) to the west across the Channel. Mohamed Omar would later recall:
The Egyptian man was put in charge of steering the boat by the smugglers. He was travelling with his son, who looked like he was in his late teens or maybe early 20s. I do not know how they came to be the driver and navigator.
There were also at least three Ethiopian nationals – one of whom, father-of-two Fikiru Shiferaw from Addis Ababa, sent his wife Emebet at home in Ethiopia a final WhatsApp voice message:
We have already boarded the boat. We are on the way. I will turn off my phone now. Goodnight, I will call you tomorrow morning.
These were the last words she would ever receive from her husband.
What happened to Fikiru Shiferaw and the other passengers on the night of November 23-24 2021 has been the subject of the UK’s Cranston Inquiry which, during March 2025, heard from 22 witnesses to the disaster, including officers involved in the UK’s search-and-rescue (SAR) response. Chaired by former High Court judge Sir Ross Cranston, the independent inquiry also heard from Mohamed Omar from Somalia – one of only two survivors – as well as family members of many of the dead and missing.
These hearings not only shed light on the actions of UK Border Force and His Majesty’s Coastguard officers during the failed rescue operation – designated Incident Charlie – in the early hours of November 24, but the agencies’ approach to “small boat crossings” in general dating back to 2017.
According to the testimonies, officers had been operating under extreme pressure in the months leading up to the disaster. Kevin Toy, master of the Border Force ship Valiant which was sent out to search for the missing dinghy that night, explained that in the run-up to the incident, “night after night” he could see his crew were “utterly exhausted” by the end of their shifts.
The evidence shows the British government was aware of the growing risk that Border Force and HM Coastguard could be overwhelmed by the rising number of small boat crossings – and that people might die as a result. In May 2020, a document produced by the Department for Transport acknowledged that “SAR resources can be overwhelmed if current incident numbers persist”. At least three senior HM Coastguard officers identified the same risk in August 2021.
Multiple communication failures have also been exposed by the inquiry – among British officers, with their opposite numbers in France, and between both countries’ emergency services and the increasingly desperate people aboard the sinking dinghy.
Despite numerous distress calls and GPS coordinates being shared via WhatsApp, a rescue boat failed to reach the travellers in time. Amid the confusion, when their calls stopped, the coastguard assumed Charlie’s passengers had been picked up and were safe. In fact, they were perishing in the cold waters of the Channel over more than ten hours.
The Insights section is committed to high-quality longform journalism. Our editors work with academics from many different backgrounds who are tackling a wide range of societal and scientific challenges.
As part of my research into the digital transformation of the UK-France border, I attended the inquiry and have studied the many statements, call transcripts, operational logs, emails and meeting minutes it has made public. Initially, I wanted to understand how the November 2021 disaster became a watershed moment in the UK government’s response to people trying to cross the Channel by small boat or dinghy, catalysing the transformation of the UK’s maritime border into the hyper-surveilled space it is today.
But, after speaking to representatives for Mohamed Omar and the bereaved families as well as migrant rights organisations, larger questions have emerged. In particular, given the inquiry’s singular focus on this one catastrophic event in November 2021, those I spoke to are concerned that its recommendations will be unable to prevent further deaths from occurring in the Channel, which have risen dramatically over the last 18 months.
How ‘small boat crossings’ began
Since the UK and France began operating “juxtaposed” border controls in the early 1990s (meaning border checks occur before departure), asylum seekers trying to reach England have had to make irregular journeys across the Channel. Until 2018, these were typically aboard trains and ferries – after sneaking on to a lorry or through a French port’s perimeter security.
At the time of the “Jungle” camp near Calais in 2015-16, media coverage of collective attempts by its residents to enter French ports spiked UK government investment in the border. Between 2014 and 2018, it gave its French counterpart at least £123 million to “strengthen the border and maintain juxtaposed controls”. These funds paid for French police to patrol the ports and border cities, regularly evict migrants’ living sites, and finance detention and relocation centres.
As admitted by then-home secretary Sajid Javid in 2019, this increased security led people to find other ways across the Channel. Beginning in the winter of 2018, smugglers organised journeys in small, seaworthy vessels they had stolen from marinas along the French coast. These “small boats” continue to lend their name to this migration phenomenon – yet the unseaworthy inflatable dinghies used today, with no keel or rigid hull, are not worthy of the name.
Even in the context of the usual sensationalism surrounding irregular migration to the UK, small boat journeys were met with an especially intense response, both politically and in the media.
When 101 people crossed between Christmas and New Year in 2018, Javid declared it a major incident. Ever since, “stopping the boats” has been one of the UK government’s highest priorities. Despite small boat arrivals making up only 29% of UK asylum claimants in 2018-24, billions of pounds have been spent to try and control the route.
Frosty relations and the ‘pushback’ plan
As Channel crossings rose sharply over 2020-21, worsening relations between France and the UK due to Brexit complicated how the two governments worked together to respond. In his testimony, former clandestine Channel threat commander Dan O’Mahoney – appointed by Javid’s successor, Priti Patel, to “make small boat crossings unviable” – described relations between the two countries as already “very frosty” when he began in August 2020.
After France’s then-interior minister, Gérald Darmanin, axed a plan for UK vessels to take rescued migrants back to Dunkirk, O’Mahoney was tasked by senior ministers to come up with an alternative. The resulting “pushback” plan, called Operation Sommen, involved Border Force officers on jet skis driving into migrant dinghies to turn them back as they crossed the border line into UK waters. When France learned of the plan, O’Mahoney recalled:
They thought it went counter to their and our obligations around safety of life at sea … They objected to it very strongly, and it affected our already quite strained relationship with them further.
Operation Sommen was abandoned in April 2022 before having ever been used in anger. However, preparations were said to have taken up “a very considerable amount of time and resource” at both the Home Office and the Maritime and Coastguard Agency – and had “a detrimental effect” on the UK’s overall SAR response to small boat crossings.
At a meeting of senior officials in June 2021 to discuss Operation Sommen, ministers had made clear that the “numbers of people crossing [was] a political problem” – and that improving SAR capabilities did not “fit with [the] narrative of taking back control of borders”.
Although senior HM Coastguard officers recognised “it is extremely difficult to locate small boats or communicate with those onboard”, the inquiry heard that officers did not recall receiving “any small boat training before November 2021”, other than in the procedure to allow Border Force to push them back to French waters.
The head of Border Force’s Maritime Command, Stephen Whitton, told the inquiry he was under “a huge amount of pressure” to prevent small boat crossings, while also “providing the bulk of the support to search and rescue”. Despite carrying out 90% of all small boat rescues in the Channel and “regularly being overwhelmed”, Border Force Maritime Command received “no additional assets to manage the search and rescue response” before November 2021.
‘The pressure we were under’
When the decision was taken for Border Force – a law enforcement rather than search-and-rescue organisation – to be the primary responders to small boat crossings in 2018, only around 100 people were crossing each month. Yet by the time of the disaster three years later, according to an internal Home Office document, the total for 2021 was “already more than 25,000”.
At the inquiry, O’Mahoney stated: “As 2021 went on, it became much clearer that … frankly, we just needed more [rescue] boats.” Whitton admitted that before the disaster, Border Force, HM Coastguard, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution and other support organisations were all “on our knees in terms of the pressure we were under, and it was getting hugely challenging”.
The evidence shows this pressure was acutely felt inside Dover’s Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre, which sits atop the port’s famous white cliffs offering a commanding view of the Channel. Inside, Coastguard officers coordinate SAR operations and control vessel traffic in the Dover Strait – one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.
On the night of November 23-24, three coastguard officers were on search-and-rescue duty: team leader Neal Gibson, maritime operations officer Stuart Downs, and a trainee – unnamed by the inquiry – who was officially only present as an observer.
HM Coastguard’s Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre at Dover overlooking the Channel. Travis Van Isacker, CC BY-NC-SA
Staffing appears to have been a longstanding issue at the Dover coastguard station where, according to divisional commander Mike Bill, there was “poor retention of staff” and “experience and competence weren’t the best”. Only the day before the disaster, during a migrant red days meeting – convened when, due to good weather, the probability of Channel crossers is considered “highly likely” – chief coastguard Peter Mizen had warned that only having two qualified officers at Dover on nights “isn’t enough”.
Over recent months, as the station had become busier responding to small boat crossings and in the wake of an unsuccessful recruitment drive, staff were having to work flat-out throughout their shifts, and were being asked to come in on scheduled days off.
On the night of November 23-24, owing to staff shortages, team leader Gibson told the inquiry he had to cover traffic control duties for three hours from 10.30pm. This meant he was away from the SAR desk at 00.41am, when a message arrived from the national rescue coordination centre along the coast in Fareham, stating that the Coastguard’s scheduled surveillance aeroplanes would not be flying over the Channel that night due to fog.
The officers were told they would be “effectively blind” – and should not allow themselves “to be drawn into relaxing and expecting a normal migrant crossing night”. The message warned: “This has the potential to be very dangerous.”
‘Their boat – there’s nothing left’
According to Mohamed Omar, the sea was calm when he and the other passengers departed the French beach around 9pm UK time. Giving his evidence to the Cranston Inquiry from Paris – he still cannot travel to the UK – a ship approached them around an hour into their voyage:
They came up to us to see what we were doing, and shone a light on us. I remember seeing a French flag on the boat. It was a big boat and I am certain it was the French coastguard. I had heard from people I met in the camp in Dunkirk that this happened sometimes, and that the French boat would follow until you reached English waters.
In fact, Mohamed Omar said, the French ship left the travellers again after about an hour. Shortly after this, the problems began.
A French warship patrols the shore of Mardyck in northern France, close to where Charlie is thought to have departed. Travis Van Isacker, CC BY-NC-SA
Around 1am, seawater began entering the dinghy. By now, it was in the vicinity of the Sandettie lightvessel, around 20 miles north-east of Dover. At first, passengers managed to bail out the 13°C water – but soon the flooding became uncontrollable. The dinghy’s inflatable tube began losing pressure, and a couple of the Kurdish men used air pumps to try to keep it inflated. Others tried to prevent panic spreading among the passengers.
Many onboard began to make frantic calls for rescue. What were reported to be leaked transcripts of some of these calls were published by French newspaper Le Monde a year after the sinking. They showed the first distress call from the dinghy was received by the French coastguard at 12.48am. Speaking in English, the caller said there were 33 people on board a “broken” boat.
According to Le Monde, three minutes later, another call was transferred to the French maritime rescue coordination centre at Cap Gris-Nez by an emergency operator who reported: “Apparently their boat – there’s nothing left.” Following procedure, the French coastguard officer asked the caller to send a GPS position by WhatsApp so she could “send a rescue boat as soon as possible”. At 1.05am UK time, the GPS position arrived.
Rather than send a French boat, Le Monde reported that the officer phoned her counterparts in Dover to warn them a dinghy 0.6 nautical miles from the border line would soon be crossing into UK waters. On the other end of the line was the trainee officer, who was handling routine calls that night despite officially only being an observer.
After the call finished, according to Downs’s evidence to the inquiry, the trainee mistakenly told him the dinghy was thought to be “in good condition” – information he recorded in the log for Incident Charlie. This miscommunication may have affected the urgency of the UK’s SAR response, preventing HM Coastguard and Border Force from appreciating the severe distress the “broken” dinghy was in.
Just before 1am, the French coastguard had sent its migrant tracker spreadsheet, containing information on all small boat crossings that night, to HM Coastguard for the first time. It showed four migrant dinghies at sea – which Gris-Nez had been aware of “for many hours”, according to Gibson.
The issue of the French coastguard appearing to withhold information about active small boat crossings had been raised by HM Coastguard’s clandestine operations liaison officer during a July 2021 review. And earlier that very evening, Gibson told one of his colleagues:
Sometimes they just seem to keep it quiet. Like we’ll not get anything – then we’ll get a tracker at three in the morning with 15 incidents, and they go: ‘Mostly these are in your search-and-rescue region.’ Wonderful.
At 1.20am, Downs phoned Border Force Maritime Command in Portsmouth to request a Border Force vessel search for the dinghy Charlie. He provided the GPS position received from his French counterpart and the number of people onboard – but also the incorrect information that “they think it’s in good condition”.
Ten minutes later, the Valiant, Border Force’s 42-metre patrol ship stationed at Dover, was tasked to proceed towards the Sandettie lightvessel. At the same time, the first direct call to the Dover rescue coordination centre came in from Charlie. The distressed caller said they were “in the water” and that “everything [was] finished”.
Around 15 minutes later, at 1.48am, Gibson took a call from 16-year-old Mubin Rizghar Hussein, who spoke good English. Despite the noise and commotion, he managed to provide Gibson with a WhatsApp number – in order to share their GPS position. The transcript of this call records voices shouting in the background: “It’s finished. Finished. Brother, it’s finished.”
A ‘grave and imminent threat to life’
Gibson told the inquiry that after his call with Rizghar Hussein, he had a “gut feeling that this doesn’t feel quite as usual”. By “usual” he meant what was, according to maritime operations officer Downs, a commonly held belief at the Dover coastguard station that with “nine out of ten”“ callers from small boats: “It would generally be overstated that the boat … was sinking, people were drowning … Whatever was going on would be overstated.”
Acting on his gut feeling, at 2.27am Gibson took the unprecedented decision to broadcast a Mayday Relay – denoting a “grave and imminent threat to life”. By maritime law, this alert required other vessels to offer their assistance.
Gibson told the inquiry he did this to get the French warship Flamant to respond. He could see on his radar screen that Flamant was closest to Charlie’s position and was the best vessel to rescue the people if the dinghy really was sinking.
Why the Flamant did not respond is at the centre of an ongoing criminal investigation in France into two of the warship’s officers and five coastguards from Gris-Nez, for “non-assistance of persons in distress”. This investigation’s strict confidentiality obligation means the inquiry was unable to access any information from the French side about their operations that night.
At 2.01 and again at 2.14am, HM Coastguard had received new GPS positions via WhatsApp showing the dinghy to be more than a mile inside UK waters.
Valiant, having been tasked at 1.30am, only exited the port of Dover at 2.22am and would need at least another hour to reach the Sandettie. Despite this, no other vessel was sent to join the search. At 3.11am, when asked during a call by Border Force Maritime Command whether Charlie was “still a Mayday situation”, Gibson replied: “Well, they’ve told me it’s full of water.”
With a total of four small boats being shown in the Channel that night by the French tracker spreadsheet, Gibson suggested there could be as many as 110 people on board these dinghies – beyond Valiant’s capacity for taking on survivors. Nevertheless, Border Force and HM Coastguard opted to “wait and see what the numbers are, and whether Valiant can deal with that … We don’t want to call any other assets out just yet.”
In a call with Christopher Trubshaw, captain of the Coastguard rescue helicopter stationed at Lydd on the Kent coast, aviation tactical commander Dominic Golden explained that Border Force was “not prepared to bring in their crews who are pretty knackered” unless “we can convince them there are people in real danger”. He then asked Trubshaw to search the Channel for the small boats shown in the French tracker, as the surveillance aeroplanes had been unable to take off.
In her closing submission to the inquiry, Sonali Naik, a legal representative of the survivors and bereaved families, highlighted Golden’s “dismissive attitude” towards Charlie’s distress when he gave Trubshaw the reason for the request, which included the following:
As usual, the catalogue of phone calls is beginning to trickle in … You know, the classic ‘I am lost, I am sinking, my mother’s wheelchair is falling over the side’ etc. ‘Sharks with lasers surrounding boat’ and ‘we are all dying’ type of thing.
Nevertheless, Golden asked the helicopter crew to pack a liferaft. “I can’t imagine we’re going to need it but … potentially you get to play with one of your new toys.”
While Golden described his words as “unwise” or “flippant”, Naik said they were “more than that” – suggesting they revealed rescuers’ general perceptions of the occupants of small boats and the widely held scepticism towards their distress calls.
‘We are dying. Where is the boat?’
With the water inside rising fast and their dinghy collapsing, Charlie’s increasingly desperate passengers kept trying to get rescuers to appreciate how dire their situation was.
At 2.31am in the Dover rescue coordination centre, Gibson received a second call from Mubin Rizghar Hussein, who pleaded: “We are dying, where is the boat?”
Gibson replied: “The boat is on its way but it has to get …” only to be interrupted by Rizghar Hussein saying: “We all die. We all die.”
“I get that,” Gibson told the terrified teenager, “but unfortunately, you’re going to be patient and all stay together, because I can’t make the boat come any quicker.” He ended the call saying:
You need to stop making calls because every time you make a call, we think there’s another boat out there – and we don’t want to accidentally go chasing for another boat when it’s actually your boat we’re looking for.
Gibson broke down briefly when recounting this second call during his evidence to the inquiry, explaining:
If you don’t understand what’s fully going on and you’re getting ‘we’re all going to die’, it’s quite a distressing situation to find yourself in, sitting at the end of a phone – effectively helpless. You know where they are, you want to get a boat to them, and you can’t.
Call records also show that coastguards on both sides of the Channel passed responsibility for rescuing the sinking dinghy off to one another. According to Le Monde, during one call a passenger told the French coastguard officer he was “in the water” – to which she replied: “Yes, but you are in English waters.”
The transcript of the last call before Charlie capsized, made at 3.12am, reveals that Downs asked “where are you?” 17 times – despite the caller being unable to answer anything beyond “English waters”. The maritime operations officer finished by instructing the caller to hang up and dial 999: “If it won’t connect on 999, then you’re probably still in French waters.”
In her closing submission, Naik pointed to “discriminatory stereotypes and attitudes towards migrants on small boats which fatally affected the SAR response” for Charlie – as rescuers, in her words, “jumped to premature conclusions”. According to survivor Mohamed Omar:
Because we have been seen as refugees … that’s the reason why I believe the rescue, they did not come at all. We feel like we were … treated like animals.
Fatal assumptions
At 3.27am, Border Force’s ship Valiant arrived at Charlie’s last recorded GPS position (from 2.14am) – but found nothing. Its master, Kevin Toy, decided to head north-easterly towards the Sandettie lightvessel, the way the tide was flowing.
En route, Valiant spotted two other dinghies in the darkness using its night vision – one still making its way towards the English coast, the other stopped in the water. The stationary dinghy was in greater danger from the Channel’s shipping traffic, so Valiant went to it and began rescuing those onboard – radioing back that it had “engaged unlit migrant crafts stopped in the water” with approximately 40 people onboard.
In the Dover rescue coordination centre, Gibson assumed this dinghy could be Charlie and gave Mubin Rizghar Hussein’s name and telephone number so Valiant’s crew could verify whether he was on board. At 4.16am, Gibson himself tried calling the WhatsApp number that Rizghar Hussein had shared, but the call failed.
At 4.20am, Valiant completed its first rescue of the morning. Two more followed after the Coastguard helicopter spotted two other dinghies in the Sandettie area – but nobody in the water. A near-capacity Valiant then returned to Dover just after 8am with 98 survivors on board.
None of the three rescued dinghies matched the description of Charlie. All were in good condition, differently coloured, and with disparate numbers of people onboard – yet the misplaced assumption Charlie had been rescued persisted amid the night’s murky information environment. Gibson stated that, while he had soon received additional information matching Valiant’s first rescue to a different dinghy, he was still “fairly certain Charlie had been picked up”.
“Once Valiant had picked up these [three] boats,” he explained, “we no longer received calls from Charlie, and a call to a known phone number on Charlie failed.” As a result, neither Valiant nor the Coastguard helicopter were sent back out to continue searching for the stricken dinghy.
In fact, Gibson’s call to Rizghar Hussein’s WhatsApp number did not fail because Charlie’s passengers had been rescued – nor because they had thrown their phones into the sea when Border Force arrived. Rather, it was because the dinghy had capsized and everyone had fallen into the Channel’s freezing waters.
‘No one came to our rescue’
In harrowing evidence to the inquiry, Mohamed Omar explained how, as one side of the dinghy deflated, the passengers – “hysterical and crying” – panicked and moved to the opposite side. This shift in weight caused the dinghy to capsize:
The screaming when the boat tipped and people fell in the water was deafening. I have never heard anything as desperate as this. I was not thinking about whether we were going to be rescued any more; it was all about how to stay alive.
As the passengers were thrown into the water, the dinghy flipped on top of them. Mohamed Omar described having to swim out from underneath to catch a breath: “It was dark and I could not really see. It was extremely cold and the sea was rough.”
As he surfaced, he saw Halima Mohammed Shikh, a mother of three also from Somalia and travelling alone, struggling as she couldn’t swim. She screamed his name for help, and he tried to get her back to what was left of the dinghy – but couldn’t. “I think she was one of the first people to drown,” he told the inquiry.
Others managed to cling to the broken inflatable, hoping rescue was on its way – but “no one came to our rescue”. Pushed and pulled by the waves, some lost their grip and drifted away before dawn. Mohamed Omar recalled:
All night, I was holding on to what remained of the boat. In the morning, I could hear the people were screaming and everything. It’s something I cannot forget in my mind.
By the time the sun finally rose at 7.26am, he estimated that no more than 15 people were left clinging to the broken dinghy – adrift on the tide in a busy shipping lane:
I do not recall speaking with anyone in the water. Those who were alive were half-dead. There was nothing we could do any more. I could see bodies floating all around us in the water. I presume most people were either already dead or were unconscious.
Shortly afterwards, Mohamed Omar said he let go of the dinghy and began to swim, thinking to himself: “I am going to die [but] I don’t want to die here. At least if I die whilst swimming, I won’t feel it.”
He swam towards a boat he could see in the distance and, as he got closer, began to wave his life jacket for attention. A French woman, out fishing with her family, saw him and jumped in the water to save him.
As he finished telling his story, Mohamed Omar told the inquiry: “I’m a voice for those people who passed away.”
Bodies are found
Around 1pm on the afternoon of November 24, 12 hours after the first distress calls from Charlie, a French commercial fishing vessel began finding bodies in the sea nine miles north-west of Calais. But as the news came in, no one at HM Coastguard or Border Force appears to have made the connection with Incident Charlie.
Days later, when the accounts of Mohamed Omar’s fellow survivor, Mohammed Shekha Ahmad from Iraqi Kurdistan, and a relative of two of the deceased emerged, the Home Office refuted their claims that the dinghy had sunk in UK waters as “completely untrue”.
However, five days after the disaster, Gibson contacted the small boats tactical commander to share his concerns that the reported deaths could be from Charlie. He had read a news article in which “the survivor states a male called Mubin called the emergency services, which could possibly be the ‘Moomin’ [sic] I spoke to”.
On December 1, clandestine Channel threat commander O’Mahoney responded to a question from the UK’s Joint Committee on Human Rights, as to whether the migrants whose bodies had been found in French waters had made distress calls to the UK authorities. O’Mahoney told the committee:
We are looking into that. To manage your expectation, though, it may never be possible to say with absolute accuracy whether that boat was in UK waters [and] I cannot tell you with any certainty that the people on that particular boat called the UK authorities.
Thanks largely to their grieving families tireless pursuit of the truth, however, it is now possible to say definitively that Charlie had been in UK waters – and that a number of its passengers spoke to HM Coastguard officers.
It was only after these families raised concerns that the disaster had involved the UK authorities that the Department for Transport commissioned a safety investigation into the incident in January 2022. A lawyer for the bereaved families suggested to me that without the threat of legal action, the Department for Transport “would likely not have done anything” – despite this being Britain’s worst maritime disaster for decades. Meanwhile, according to inquiry evidence, the Home Office is understood not to have conducted an internal review or investigation into its role in the disaster.
After a frustrating two years of waiting for the survivors and bereaved families, the Marine Accidents Investigations Branch published its report – which both confirmed most of their accounts and substantiated their criticisms of the SAR response.
Soon afterwards, the Cranston Inquiry was announced. Despite no bodies having been recovered in UK waters, it has been run almost like an inquest. In his final report – to be published by the end of 2025 – Sir Ross Cranston has promised to “consider what lessons can be learned and, if appropriate, make recommendations to reduce the risk of a similar event occurring”.
A ‘crucial and unique opportunity’
HM Coastguard and Border Force officers have repeatedly told the inquiry how the UK’s approach to small boat search-and-rescue has changed since the November 2021 disaster. More officers have been hired, Border Force has contracted additional boats to conduct rescues, information sharing has improved, and cooperation with French colleagues is better. Today, there are significantly more rescue ships on both sides of the Channel which can intervene faster when dinghies come to be in distress, and have undoubtedly saved many lives.
There has also been massive investment in drones, aeroplanes and powerful shore-based cameras to reduce the risk that HM Coastguard loses “maritime domain awareness” again if some of its surveillance aircraft are unable to fly. New technology automatically translates coastguard officers’ messages into different languages and extracts live GPS locations and images from travellers’ mobile devices.
Such investments make it unlikely that another dinghy could be lost in the middle of the Channel after its passengers call for help, in the way Charlie so catastrophically was.
Nevertheless, people continue dying while attempting to cross the Channel – with 2024 having been by far the deadliest year yet. At least 69 people lost their lives, according to the Refugee Council. So far in 2025, 24 people are documented as dead or missing at the UK-France border by Calais Migrant Solidarity, amid a record number of attempted crossings for the first half of the year.
Some migrants’ rights NGOs have suggested the UK’s “stop the boats” policies, and European efforts to disrupt the supply chain of dinghies and other equipment used in crossings, has driven such deadly overcrowding.
But it is also unlikely that the circumstances surrounding more recent deaths in the Channel will ever be investigated as thoroughly as Incident Charlie, if at all. Lawyers for the bereaved families have therefore been keen to highlight the Cranston Inquiry’s “crucial and unique opportunity” not only to look back and offer answers about one of Britain’s worst maritime disasters in recent decades – but to look forwards and “prevent the further loss of life at sea”.
The survivors, families and migrants’ rights organisations who contributed their evidence thus hope the inquiry’s recommendations go beyond purely operational and administrative improvements to search-and-rescue, to address the fundamental role that UK, France and European border policies play in why more people are dying in the Channel, despite the improvements to search-and-rescue strategies and resources.
Above all, they ask why only some people are able to travel to the UK in comfort and safety while others must make the journey in precarious, overcrowded inflatable dinghies – and thus entrust their lives to the search-and-rescue services whose success can never be guaranteed. As Halima Mohammed Shikh’s cousin, Ali Areef, told the inquiry:
It makes me feel sick to think about crossing the Channel in a ferry where others including a member of my family lost their lives because there was no other way to cross. I will never take a ferry across the Channel again.
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Travis Van Isacker gratefully acknowledges the support of the Economic and Social Research Council
(UK) (Grant Ref: ES/W002639/1).
The House of Lords this week approved government legislation that will allow foreign states to hold up to a 15% stake in British newspaper publishers.
This vote clears the way for the American investment company Redbird to take control of the troubled Telegraph newspaper group following two years of uncertainty. An integral element of that bid is a 15% stake by the sovereign investment fund IMI which is owned by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the vice-president of the United Arab Emirates.
The heated Lords debate raised fundamental questions about who should own newspapers, and the link between ownership and editorial content. On one side were those who argued that Britain’s newspapers faced an “existential threat” without outside investment. On the other were those who warned against the potential influence of a foreign power on one of the UK’s longest standing publishers.
Media mergers and acquisitions are often contentious. But given the parlous state of the newspaper industry, they are likely to become more frequent.
A very different kind of newspaper deal was completed last December, when news website Tortoise Media bought The Observer. Tortoise, which was founded in 2018 by former Times editor and BBC director of news James Harding, startled analysts and journalists alike by taking over a newspaper first published in 1791.
The deal prompted strong opposition from some Observer and Guardian journalists. But from a business perspective, the deal suited both sides.
The Scott Trust, owners of the Observer since 1993, never seemed wholly committed to the Observer. (There was, for example, no dedicated Observer website). Tortoise, meanwhile, was keen to exploit the brand values of an established print product. It saw the Observer as a suitable vehicle for its approach of news analysis and explanation rather than breaking stories.
The media world has also been fixated on the succession story of the Murdoch family and its implications for his UK newspapers. The Sun, News of the World (until its closure in 2011), the Times and Sunday Times have been the bedrock of Rupert Murdoch’s economic and political power in the UK for decades.
In December, he lost the battle to give his eldest son Lachlan exclusive control of his media empire.
Speculation has grown as to whether any of Rupert’s progeny will want to continue the family’s print tradition after his death. His empire has suffered repeated financial and reputational hits since the phone hacking scandal. It is perfectly feasible that, once he goes, all the Murdoch press interests will be up for sale.
These various battles beg the question: why does it matter who owns a newspaper? In short, it matters because ownership, to a large extent, determines content.
Who owns the news?
From the very beginning of printed news, proprietors have exercised control over their title’s political direction and journalistic values. Prewar Britain saw Lord Beaverbrook famously exploiting his Express newspapers to campaign for free trade within the British empire.
Meanwhile, fellow newspaper baron Lord Rothermere turned his Mail newspapers into propaganda sheets for Oswald Mosley’s blackshirts, and cheerleaders for Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini during the 1930s.
The Rothermere family’s continued ownership of the Mail has guaranteed a consistent anti-immigration, anti-Europe rightwing worldview to the present day. How this consistent framing has been transmitted through the Mail’s editors has been well documented by journalist Adrian Addison.
Murdoch’s UK newspaper empire has also pursued his personal free market, anti-EU political vision. He has used his papers to attack the publicly funded BBC and the regulator Ofcom. Murdoch has, however, been slightly more flexible in adjusting his papers’ party political allegiance (guaranteeing a succession of prime ministerial genuflections from Margaret Thatcher through to Keir Starmer).
At the other end of the political spectrum, the Scott Trust – owners of the Guardian – was conceived by the son of C.P. Scott as a vehicle for sustaining his father’s liberal mission for the paper. It has a policy of no editorial interference, apart from continuing the paper’s editorial policy on “the same lines and in the same spirit as heretofore”. Editors are therefore enjoined to focus on the kind of progressive news agenda championed by Scott.
The trust model allows a level of freedom from traditional commercial oversight. Editors can pursue the Guardian’s well-established liberal tradition without worrying about shareholders driven by short-term profit maximisation, or an individual owner with a specific ideological agenda. This partly explains the hostility of Observer journalists to the Tortoise takeover.
Why it matters
The Lords debate focused on the risks of foreign state investment in British newspapers. But all commercial ownership models – and all owners – have their problems. Whether it be greedy shareholders, a power-hungry narcissist, an ideologically-driven family or a foreign state seeking influence in the UK, commercial models all involve editorial compromises.
One approach to the problems raised by commercial ownership is an insistence, through legislation, on a plurality of owners. But this is increasingly difficult in an industry whose traditional advertising-funded business model is under severe pressure. This context is precisely why the Telegraph’s new owner was desperate to access IMI funds.
Upmarket publications such as the Financial Times and the Times can monetise subscriptions, but paywalls discourage easy access and diminish journalistic reach. Subscriptions are also a much less attractive proposition for tabloids whose readers are less willing to pay.
Another approach is to diversify ownership models. Non-profit and charitable publishers, such as OpenDemocracy or the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, can leverage donations and are less vulnerable to the whims of corporate owners or powerful individuals. But this model is much less developed in the UK than the US.
I and colleagues have argued elsewhere that there are strong arguments for making charitable journalism easier. These models can enhance journalistic freedom, but they also come with potential downsides that need to be acknowledged.
All these options presuppose, of course, that newspapers and their online sites still have sufficient relevance and reach for us to continue to worry about ownership at all – a topic for another article.
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Steven Barnett is on the management and editorial boards of the British Journalism Review. He is a member of the British Broadcasting Challenge which campaigns for Public Service Broadcasting. He is on the Advisory Board of the Charitable Journalism Project which campaigns for public interest journalism and on the board of Hacked Off which campaigns for a free and accountable press.
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nando Sigona, Professor of International Migration and Forced Displacement and Director of the Institute for Research into International Migration and Superdiversity, University of Birmingham
The letter that arrived for eleven-year-old Guilherme in June 2025 was addressed personally to him. The UK Home Office was informing him that he and his eight-year-old brother Luca must return to Brazil. Their parents, an academic and a senior NHS nurse, both long-term UK residents with valid visas were not included in the order.
“Whilst this may involve a degree of disruption in family life,” the letter stated, “this is considered to be proportionate to the legitimate aim of maintaining effective immigration control.”
The family’s difficulties with the Home Office began after the parents divorced a few years after arriving in the UK. Mother and children arrived in the UK as dependants on the father’s visa. After the divorce, the mother secured her own skilled worker visa, while the father was granted indefinite leave to remain in 2024.
Under current rules, skilled workers must wait five years before applying for settlement. For the children to qualify for settlement, both parents must be settled or one must have sole responsibility – neither condition applies here. Only after media attention did the Home Office reconsider the decision.
This case is just the latest example of how barriers to migrants’ family life are embedded in the UK’s immigration system – something I have been studying for years. The Labour government’s recently announced immigration plans extend and bolster these barriers.
Current rules require migrants to earn at least £29,000 to sponsor a spouse or child – a figure set to rise to £38,700 in early 2026 after changes introduced by the last government. The newest immigration plans propose doubling the path to settlement from five to ten years. And they restrict the rights to family reunion to only “nuclear” families: divorced parents, adult children and extended kin are left out.
These changes are aimed at reducing migration and restoring “public trust”. But in practice, they make family unity a luxury — harder to achieve for low-paid migrant workers and even for working-class British citizens with foreign partners.
Recent research my colleagues and I conducted — based on over 50 interviews with migrant domestic and food delivery workers and other experts — shows how the immigration system fractures families and puts children at risk.
Faith, a Zimbabwean domestic worker, explained how she was unable to bring her eldest daughter to the UK due to age restrictions on dependant visas. Her daughter was later trafficked into the UK and, though she eventually rejoined her mother, hasn’t recovered from the trauma of separation: “She’s struggling to sleep, can’t eat … always emotional, saying she feels dizzy, scared to be around people.”
Faith had been trapped in an abusive relationship for a long time because her visa was tied to her partner. When she eventually left her partner, her visa was withdrawn – leaving her in breach of immigration rules. Her younger child was placed in care while Faith was detained for breaching the terms of her visa.
Jamal, a food delivery rider from Eritrea, had a similar experience of legal dependency. He came to the UK on a dependant visa linked to his British wife. After their relationship deteriorated, his ability to remain in the country was threatened: “If we have problems, she can cancel my visa. This was her weapon.”
Susan, a Zimbabwean woman working in the care and cleaning sector, moved to the UK to look after her adult daughter who had cancer. When her six month visitor visa expired, she applied for asylum, but her application was refused and eventually she was detained for almost a month.
She faced deportation but was released after a legal aid lawyer helped her submit strong evidence of her daughter’s condition. Reflecting on her experience, she explained: “When it benefits them, they say I’ve had no contact [with my family in the UK]. When they want to deport me, they say I have family to return to [in Zimbabwe].”
Immigration status doesn’t just define one’s own legal position, it can determine who gets the right to have a family in the UK and who does not. While some of our interviewees secured status through a partner’s EU citizenship and reunited with family members already in the UK, others who rely on temporary visas are excluded.
Changes to the immigration in recent years have placed a higher value on how migrants can contribute or provide “value” – seeing them as workers (or students) first, not members of families. Many are allowed in the UK for a limited time and without the right to bring with them even the closest family members. The effect is particularly harsh on women in domestic work, whose visas are short-term and not renewable.
Many interviewees reported that immigration barriers delayed or obstructed their children’s education or healthcare. Samantha’s daughter waited over two months for a school placement because their legal status was still pending. Adriana was charged £8,000 for NHS maternity services because of her undocumented status, which restricts access to free healthcare to GP and emergency care.
Even in less extreme cases, legal insecurity takes a toll. Children grow up hearing their parents talk about “papers”, “Home Office letters” or the risk of being “sent back”.
That the Home Office sent a removal letter to an eleven-year-old is not a clerical error. It is the system working as designed. And even when public outrage forces a reversal — as in Guilherme’s case — the wider machinery of enforcement continues.
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Nando Sigona is Scientific Coordinator of “Improving the Living and Working Conditions of Irregularised Migrant Households in Europe” (www.i-claim.eu), a three-year six-country research project, funded by the European Commission’s Horizon Europe and UKRI.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Nando Sigona, Professor of International Migration and Forced Displacement and Director of the Institute for Research into International Migration and Superdiversity, University of Birmingham
The letter that arrived for eleven-year-old Guilherme in June 2025 was addressed personally to him. The UK Home Office was informing him that he and his eight-year-old brother Luca must return to Brazil. Their parents, an academic and a senior NHS nurse, both long-term UK residents with valid visas were not included in the order.
“Whilst this may involve a degree of disruption in family life,” the letter stated, “this is considered to be proportionate to the legitimate aim of maintaining effective immigration control.”
The family’s difficulties with the Home Office began after the parents divorced a few years after arriving in the UK. Mother and children arrived in the UK as dependants on the father’s visa. After the divorce, the mother secured her own skilled worker visa, while the father was granted indefinite leave to remain in 2024.
Under current rules, skilled workers must wait five years before applying for settlement. For the children to qualify for settlement, both parents must be settled or one must have sole responsibility – neither condition applies here. Only after media attention did the Home Office reconsider the decision.
This case is just the latest example of how barriers to migrants’ family life are embedded in the UK’s immigration system – something I have been studying for years. The Labour government’s recently announced immigration plans extend and bolster these barriers.
Current rules require migrants to earn at least £29,000 to sponsor a spouse or child – a figure set to rise to £38,700 in early 2026 after changes introduced by the last government. The newest immigration plans propose doubling the path to settlement from five to ten years. And they restrict the rights to family reunion to only “nuclear” families: divorced parents, adult children and extended kin are left out.
These changes are aimed at reducing migration and restoring “public trust”. But in practice, they make family unity a luxury — harder to achieve for low-paid migrant workers and even for working-class British citizens with foreign partners.
Recent research my colleagues and I conducted — based on over 50 interviews with migrant domestic and food delivery workers and other experts — shows how the immigration system fractures families and puts children at risk.
Faith, a Zimbabwean domestic worker, explained how she was unable to bring her eldest daughter to the UK due to age restrictions on dependant visas. Her daughter was later trafficked into the UK and, though she eventually rejoined her mother, hasn’t recovered from the trauma of separation: “She’s struggling to sleep, can’t eat … always emotional, saying she feels dizzy, scared to be around people.”
Faith had been trapped in an abusive relationship for a long time because her visa was tied to her partner. When she eventually left her partner, her visa was withdrawn – leaving her in breach of immigration rules. Her younger child was placed in care while Faith was detained for breaching the terms of her visa.
Jamal, a food delivery rider from Eritrea, had a similar experience of legal dependency. He came to the UK on a dependant visa linked to his British wife. After their relationship deteriorated, his ability to remain in the country was threatened: “If we have problems, she can cancel my visa. This was her weapon.”
Susan, a Zimbabwean woman working in the care and cleaning sector, moved to the UK to look after her adult daughter who had cancer. When her six month visitor visa expired, she applied for asylum, but her application was refused and eventually she was detained for almost a month.
She faced deportation but was released after a legal aid lawyer helped her submit strong evidence of her daughter’s condition. Reflecting on her experience, she explained: “When it benefits them, they say I’ve had no contact [with my family in the UK]. When they want to deport me, they say I have family to return to [in Zimbabwe].”
Immigration status doesn’t just define one’s own legal position, it can determine who gets the right to have a family in the UK and who does not. While some of our interviewees secured status through a partner’s EU citizenship and reunited with family members already in the UK, others who rely on temporary visas are excluded.
Changes to the immigration in recent years have placed a higher value on how migrants can contribute or provide “value” – seeing them as workers (or students) first, not members of families. Many are allowed in the UK for a limited time and without the right to bring with them even the closest family members. The effect is particularly harsh on women in domestic work, whose visas are short-term and not renewable.
Many interviewees reported that immigration barriers delayed or obstructed their children’s education or healthcare. Samantha’s daughter waited over two months for a school placement because their legal status was still pending. Adriana was charged £8,000 for NHS maternity services because of her undocumented status, which restricts access to free healthcare to GP and emergency care.
Even in less extreme cases, legal insecurity takes a toll. Children grow up hearing their parents talk about “papers”, “Home Office letters” or the risk of being “sent back”.
That the Home Office sent a removal letter to an eleven-year-old is not a clerical error. It is the system working as designed. And even when public outrage forces a reversal — as in Guilherme’s case — the wider machinery of enforcement continues.
Get your news from actual experts, straight to your inbox.Sign up to our daily newsletter to receive all The Conversation UK’s latest coverage of news and research, from politics and business to the arts and sciences.
Nando Sigona is Scientific Coordinator of “Improving the Living and Working Conditions of Irregularised Migrant Households in Europe” (www.i-claim.eu), a three-year six-country research project, funded by the European Commission’s Horizon Europe and UKRI.
WISeKey and SEALSQ Confirm New Cross-Border Center of Excellence for the 4th Industrial Revolution Activated Between La Line and Gibraltar
Gibraltar/La Línea – July 21, 2025 – WISeKey International Holding Ltd (“WISeKey” or “Company”) (SIX: WIHN, NASDAQ: WKEY), a leading global cybersecurity, blockchain, and IoT company, and its subsidiary, SEALSQ Corp (NASDAQ: LAES) (“SEALSQ”), a company that focuses on developing and selling Semiconductors, PKI, and Post-Quantum technology hardware and software products today announced that a transformative initiative launched several years ago to establish LLG4IRir.com a Cross-Border Deeptech Center of Excellence (the “Center”) for the 4th Industrial Revolution is now being formally activated, following the historic agreement between Spain and the United Kingdom on Gibraltar’s post-Brexit border status.
Strategically located near Gibraltar Airport, this innovative Center will act as a shared technological and industrial hub bridging La Línea de la Concepción (Spain) and Gibraltar (UK). It aims to provide a collaborative platform for companies working in advanced technologies including Artificial Intelligence, Quantum Computing, the Internet of Things, AI, Space, Cybersecurity, and Semiconductors, aiming to position the region as a global epicenter of innovation.
The recent UK–EU agreement facilitates the free and secure movement of people and goods across the border, unlocking opportunity for the Company to realize the full potential of this ambitious project and enabling seamless cooperation between the two jurisdictions.
Meetings held with the Gibraltar government and the Mayor of La Línea have resulted in unanimous support for the project. The Center is recognized as a mutually beneficial opportunity: Gibraltar-based companies will gain access to European Union technology legislation and platforms, while Spanish businesses located at the Center will benefit from cooperation with Gibraltar and potential partnerships with African innovation ecosystems, reinforcing the region’s status as a tri-continental innovation gateway.
First Milestone: Manufacturing Plant for Post-Quantum Communication Devices Under the LLG4IR.com cross-border framework, the first physical installation is planned to be a secure manufacturing facility in La Línea dedicated to producing post-quantum-ready communication devices. These devices are intended to form the foundation of a secure communications infrastructure designed to operate seamlessly with satellite constellations, providing quantum-resilient, end-to-end communications across industries.
This facility is also expected to host the initial manufacturing operations for WISeSat.Space, WISeKey’s secure space communication platform. Production would begin as soon as the site becomes operational, establishing La Línea as a new hub for secure aerospace and telecommunications manufacturing.
In parallel, SEALSQ has allocated a dedicated budget to develop its first post-quantum communication device manufacturing plant, confirming its commitment to secure, satellite-linked, next-generation technologies. This plant will produce devices that connect directly with WISeSat.Space’s satellite constellation, delivering resilient, quantum-secure data flows critical to sectors such as defense, logistics, healthcare, and energy.
Additionally, WISeKey and SEALSQ have signed a memorandum of understanding with the regional port authority to implement Smart Container Technology, allowing maritime cargo containers, even in mid-sea transit, to connect directly with satellites. This will enable real-time, secure, blockchain-verifiable logistics tracking, bolstering supply chain transparency and resilience on a global scale.
A Quantum Corridor for Europe’s Digital Sovereignty The Center is a vital node in the expanding Post-Quantum Corridor, a high-tech European network being developed by SEALSQ and WISeKey to enable secure, quantum-resilient infrastructure from chip to satellite. This strategic corridor connects key technology hubs including:
• La Línea de la Concepción • Gibraltar • Malaga Technology Park • Murcia – home of the QUANTIX Semiconductor Center • Aix-en-Provence – SEALSQ Semiconductor R&D Center and Operational Headquarters • Grenoble – IC’ALPS Advanced Chip Development Lab • Geneva – WISeKey and SEALSQ Global R&D and Cybersecurity Centers
The Quantum Corridor will also integrate leading universities across the region to foster academic–industry collaboration and talent development. It will provide a dynamic environment for quantum, artificial intelligence, and cybersecurity companies to work together, co-developing the secure, intelligent technologies of the future, from next-generation encryption to space-based AI systems and quantum processors.
In the coming weeks, SEALSQ will engage a leading international consulting firm to develop a comprehensive business and technology integration plan for the Cross-Border Center. This strategic study will guide the implementation of the project, from infrastructure to ecosystem development. It will be aligned with existing studies already underway in Gibraltar focused on shared prosperity, helping to shape a unified master plan for the successful and coordinated execution of the initiative on both sides of the border.
Public and Private Funding Synergies The project will benefit from grants and allocation of funding available for this type of strategic activity, particularly those supporting innovation, digital infrastructure, and cross-border cooperation. This public support will be complemented by investment from the private sector on a pari passu basis, ensuring a balanced and sustainable funding model that drives both economic development and technological leadership.
“Think of the Center as an aircraft carrier for innovation,” said Carlos Moreira, CEO of WISeKey. “Companies can land, refuel with knowledge and infrastructure, and take off again stronger. Instead of each company reinventing the wheel, they plug into a common ecosystem, just like plugging into the electricity grid.”
The LLG4IR.com Cross-Border Center of Excellence will serve as a launchpad for collaborative research, startup incubation, international joint ventures, and workforce training programs, aligned with the long-term strategies of the European Union, the United Kingdom, and key private-sector stakeholders.
Further announcements regarding the Center’s commissioning, founding partners, and investment roadmap will follow in the coming weeks.
About WISeKey WISeKey International Holding Ltd (“WISeKey”, SIX: WIHN; Nasdaq: WKEY) is a global leader in cybersecurity, digital identity, and IoT solutions platform. It operates as a Swiss-based holding company through several operational subsidiaries, each dedicated to specific aspects of its technology portfolio. The subsidiaries include (i) SEALSQ Corp (Nasdaq: LAES), which focuses on semiconductors, PKI, and post-quantum technology products, (ii) WISeKey SA which specializes in RoT and PKI solutions for secure authentication and identification in IoT, Blockchain, and AI, (iii) WISeSat AG which focuses on space technology for secure satellite communication, specifically for IoT applications, (iv) WISe.ART Corp which focuses on trusted blockchain NFTs and operates the WISe.ART marketplace for secure NFT transactions, and (v) SEALCOIN AG which focuses on decentralized physical internet with DePIN technology and house the development of the SEALCOIN platform.
Each subsidiary contributes to WISeKey’s mission of securing the internet while focusing on their respective areas of research and expertise. Their technologies seamlessly integrate into the comprehensive WISeKey platform. WISeKey secures digital identity ecosystems for individuals and objects using Blockchain, AI, and IoT technologies. With over 1.6 billion microchips deployed across various IoT sectors, WISeKey plays a vital role in securing the Internet of Everything. The company’s semiconductors generate valuable Big Data that, when analyzed with AI, enable predictive equipment failure prevention. Trusted by the OISTE/WISeKey cryptographic Root of Trust, WISeKey provides secure authentication and identification for IoT, Blockchain, and AI applications. The WISeKey Root of Trust ensures the integrity of online transactions between objects and people. For more information on WISeKey’s strategic direction and its subsidiary companies, please visit www.wisekey.com.
Disclaimer This communication expressly or implicitly contains certain forward-looking statements concerning WISeKey International Holding Ltd and its business. Such statements involve certain known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which could cause the actual results, financial condition, performance or achievements of WISeKey International Holding Ltd to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. WISeKey International Holding Ltd is providing this communication as of this date and does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.
This press release does not constitute an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy, any securities, and it does not constitute an offering prospectus within the meaning of the Swiss Financial Services Act (“FinSA”), the FinSa’s predecessor legislation or advertising within the meaning of the FinSA. Investors must rely on their own evaluation of WISeKey and its securities, including the merits and risks involved. Nothing contained herein is, or shall be relied on as, a promise or representation as to the future performance of WISeKey.
Press and InvestorContacts
WISeKey International Holding Ltd Company Contact: Carlos Moreira Chairman & CEO Tel: +41 22 594 3000 info@wisekey.com
WISeKey Investor Relations (US) The Equity Group Inc. Lena Cati Tel: +1 212 836-9611 lcati@theequitygroup.com
At the moment, everyone needs to fill in an individual voter registration application at least 12 days before an election. Automatic registration would enable electoral officials to update the electoral rolls without people having to make an application to register to vote. They could use other reliable data to make the electoral register as accurate and complete as possible.
Electoral officials would then write to the potential voter to inform them that they had been added to the register. They would have the opportunity to make any corrections needed.
The details are still to be worked out and the change would not come overnight. The process may be semi-automated to begin with – with the individual process sitting alongside some automation.
Why is automatic registration needed?
Many people don’t register in time for elections. Some don’t intend to vote, but others assume that they’re already registered. Some are also just busy.
The result is that there are around 7-8 million people who are not correctly registered when the polling stations open on election day. A significant number are then turned away. The problem is getting worse as the number of people who are not registered is also rising at an alarming rate.
Estimated number of people missing from the electoral register at UK general elections, 1945-2024.
What is especially troubling is that there are large gaps in registrations by age, gender, ethnicity and socioeconomic status. Nearly all over-65-year-olds are on the register, but younger people are increasingly missing. Only 60% of 18-to-19-year-olds are on the electoral rolls – and 16% of the soon-to-be-enfranchised 16- to 17-year-olds (you can currently register to vote at 16).
Automatic registration will therefore be crucial to making votes at 16 a success. Asking and reminding young people to register would inevitably involve an enormous administrative effort. But if data could be transferred from schools and government departments to election officials to put them straight onto the roll, it would save both time and money – and bring about a higher participation rate.
Does automatic voter registration work?
Roughly half of countries around the around the world use automatic voter registration – including Germany, the Netherlands, Iceland and Finland. Countries which have historically not had automatic registration, such as the US, Malta, Canada and Australia, have all moved to at least partially implement it over recent years.
In a recent report with colleagues, I set out how this can be implemented and suggested a range of datasets that could be securely used.
Electoral rolls could be updated when people apply for a passport, register to pay council tax, update their driving licence details, register at university or claim benefits. Electoral officials could also be authorised to update the electoral rolls with data such as council tax data and information held by the Department for Work and Pensions.
One option would be to register people to vote when they apply for a passport. Shutterstock/ClimbWhenReady
Data sharing is already used in electoral registration. Every time a voter registration application is made, it is checked against another government dataset. There is therefore already the data infrastructure to enable automatic registration to work.
Electoral officials already use such data to register, remove or re-register people. This has enabled a lot of savings and less administrative hassle for many people.
Voter identification changes
The government’s election bill proposals will also extend the forms of identification that voters can present at polling stations to include bank cards. It clears the path for future digital forms of ID to be accepted.
The last government introduced a requirement for everyone to provide photographic identification at polling stations at UK general elections and some local elections. Accepted forms of identification include passports and driving licences but also a range of other options. If citizens don’t have identification, then they can apply for a free voter authority certificate, provided that they do so before the deadline.
However, our research found that many people were turned away in polling stations as they did not have required identification. Poll workers reported that the impact particularly affected some groups, such as students and women.
They may not, however, go far enough. The previous government restricted the independence of the Electoral Commission and these changes have not been reversed by the Labour government. The Electoral Commission will play an important role in automatic registration, so the government could renew its independence to help build confidence and trust in elections.
Nonetheless, the move to automatic registration would be a major step forward for a changing democracy – as long as the government now puts on the afterburners to power the effort needed to make these changes work effectively in time for the next election.
Toby James has previously received funding from the AHRC, ESRC, Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust, British Academy, Leverhulme Trust, Electoral Commission, Nuffield Foundation, the McDougall Trust, Unlock Democracy, International IDEA and the Canadian SSHRC.
Thank you very much. It’s lovely to see you all this afternoon – as I hope to make a splash… this time, on dry land!
I don’t know if someone planned it, or if it is just a coincidence that my speech on the economy comes a day after the Chancellor’s Mansion House speech. But I’m grateful both to the Chancellor for being my warm-up act, and to the IPPR for such a timely invitation.
Let me start by taking you back 12 months…
Just a few weeks after taking office, the Government quietly decided to cancel plans for a brand new “exascale” supercomputer at Edinburgh University – a supercomputer that could perform a billion billion calculations every second. 50 times more powerful than any computer in the UK. The announcement didn’t attract much attention at the time. It was rather overshadowed by Labour’s incomprehensible decision to withdraw the Winter Fuel Payment from millions of struggling pensioners. But just like Winter Fuel Payments, Ministers were forced to admit they’d made a mistake, and last month they U-turned on that decision too.
So why am I talking to you about a supercomputer? Partly because I think that computer in Edinburgh, and other projects like it, will be essential to growing our economy over the years and decades ahead. If we are going to support Britain’s amazing tech start-ups and scale-ups… If we are going to attract investment and entrepreneurs from around the world… If we are going to be the home of the next big breakthroughs in science and medicine and artificial intelligence… Then we have to show that we are absolutely committed to investing in the digital infrastructure that those companies and researchers need.
So I am glad that Ministers U-turned, but they cost that project a year. And we all know that in the world of scientific and technological innovation – especially when it comes to artificial intelligence – a year is an awfully long time to lose.
But the other reason I bring up that story is that I think it encapsulates what has gone so badly wrong in government over the past year – especially when it comes to fixing the economy. Labour came into office, opened the books, and found a terrible mess left by the Conservative Party. In this case, Conservative Ministers had announced a new £800 million supercomputer in a glittering press release full of boosterish language and self-congratulation. Just one problem: the project was completely unfunded. So, faced with the challenge of finding the money to make this crucial investment, Labour chose short-term penny-pinching instead.
Just like when it came to Winter Fuel Payments, or bus fares, or family farms, or Personal Independence Payments, or the National Insurance hike that is hurting British businesses so badly. Mistakes made by a government with no vision for our economy, no strategy for growth. Just a desire to find some cash to keep the Treasury spreadsheet happy, no matter what.
Now let me be clear: fiscal responsibility is essential. The Conservatives showed what happens when you let borrowing spiral out of control and don’t grow the economy.
Borrowing more than £100 billion a year, just to pay the interest on our existing debts. More than the entire education budget. Enough to fund the whole of the National Health Service for six months. At a time when government debt is 100% of national income. So managing the public finances carefully, to bring down those borrowing costs and the national debt, and to give businesses the confidence they need to invest, is critically important.
Yet in truth, this started before the last Conservative Government – even before the 2008 financial crisis. For decades now, Britain’s long-term fiscal future has been weakened because the big budget challenges haven’t been faced up to – by governments or oppositions. And I think a key reason for this is the way we do the Budget itself.
The Treasury, hoarding power behind those intimidating walls on Horse Guards Road. The Chancellor, emerging every six months to make a fiscal statement, with a new set of forecasts and a scorecard of policies carefully tuned to meet her fiscal rules. And then what? No real debate.
In theory, MPs have to approve spending for each individual department every year. It’s called the “estimates” process. In practice, it’s a sham. Last month, Parliament “approved” £1.1 trillion in government spending with just three hours of debate. That’s about £6 billion every minute. So instead of real debate and scrutiny, all we get is endless speculation about what new black hole the Chancellor will face in six months’ time, and what tweaks she will make to bring the numbers back into line.
Having tough fiscal rules and sticking to them is critical. But the way we scrutinise the budgets prepared to meet those rules, is nothing short of lamentable. And we need nothing less than a major overhaul of the whole system.
I think we should look at a budget process more like the one Sweden brought in when it faced its own budget crisis in the early nineties. When its debt soared to just over 70% of GDP. Now the Swedish Parliament gets to debate the Government’s budget – and can propose alternatives and amendments – before it is finalised, and gets a proper period of scrutiny and accountability in the months that follow. And now, Sweden’s debt is down to 30% of GDP.
It matters how a country takes its decisions on the budget. It may be less exciting, but process matters. So I think we should put more power in MPs’ hands to hold the Treasury and every Department properly to account on behalf of our constituents. Supported by a new Office of the Taxpayer, based in Parliament. That alone would rock Whitehall to its core. It would make MPs roll up their sleeves, get their hands dirty and take more responsibility. The trade-offs and choices that get hidden and ignored by Britain’s opaque system, would become stark and unavoidable. And without such a major system change like this, I fear British politics will never deliver the fiscal responsibility so desperately needed.
But let’s remember: fiscal responsibility alone is a means to an end. Not the end in itself. And certainly no substitute for an economic vision. You won’t be surprised to hear that my economic vision is a liberal one. With free trade, investment in education, support for enterprise. And rigorous competition policy to stop bigger businesses rigging the system. But if we are to build a liberal economy, we have to start with a clear-eyed analysis of where liberal economic policies have gone wrong in recent years.
We cannot celebrate the advances in overall prosperity without recognising that, too often, that prosperity has not been properly shared. Individuals, communities – even whole regions have been left behind. Boris Johnson’s point about the need to “level up” was right, even if the execution left a lot to be desired. People from all over the world have enriched our economy and our society – but when governments lose control of immigration, as they so clearly did under the same Boris Johnson, it can impose social and financial costs too. And sometimes comfort and complacency has led liberal economists to neglect the importance of security. Food security. Personal security. National security.
Our new liberal economics can’t afford to repeat those mistakes. It can’t be about going back to the world as it was – before Trump, before Covid, before Brexit, before the crash. What we need is Liberal Economics 2.0. Retaining all that worked so brilliantly in version one. But recognising its errors and correcting them, too. Grasping the new realities of our changing world – from AI to climate change, to demographic trends that make the fiscal outlook even more challenging. From the need to increase defence spending to the strength of new economic superpowers like China and India.
The era of interdependence is over. We need cooperation, but not dependence.
But even in this new world, some old truths remain. Some are even truer than before. Like the importance of trade.
Trade was how Victorian Liberals overturned protectionism imposed by the Tories – to usher in a period of free trade and growth. We champion free trade because it enlarges individual freedom. As one of my predecessors as Liberal leader put it – free trade “gives the freest play to individual energy and initiative and character, and the largest liberty both to producer and consumer”. And of course, free trade brings growth and lowers the cost of living.
That is why we opposed the Conservatives’ Brexit deal – the biggest and most destructive act of protectionism in our lifetime. It’s why Liberal Democrats have pressed for a new bespoke UK-EU Customs Union. Why we are pressing Labour to go well beyond its timid “reset” with Europe and tear down Tory trade barriers as quickly as possible. To free British businesses from reels of costly red tape and bring down prices in our shops. And why Liberal Democrats are arguing for a new economic coalition of the willing, for more free trade not just with Europe, but with Commonwealth allies, and Asian allies too.
The anti-free trade politics of Donald Trump have to be taken on. We can’t let the tariff man’s bullying approach to trade and geopolitics succeed. We know where that ends. That’s why appeasing the White House isn’t smart. Remember, Donald Trump isn’t forever. And as ordinary Americans suffer the costs of his idiocy, the tide will turn. Let the Conservatives and Nigel Farage champion Trump. We Liberal Democrats will champion Britain, and defend free trade so hard-won by those nineteenth century Liberals.
The party of trade. And as Liberals, we are also the party of people. Because underpinning our vision for the economy is an understanding of what the economy really is. It isn’t just a series of abstract percentages and meaningless slogans. We understand that, when you strip everything else away, an economy is its people.
So growing the economy means getting the right people, with the right skills, in the right jobs. That starts with a new approach to education and training – which across the UK has got narrower and narrower, when the rest of the world has got broader.
But my local university, Kingston, is reversing that trend with its Future Skills programme. Every undergraduate – whatever they are studying – now also studies everything from creative problem solving to digital competency and artificial intelligence, from empathy to resilience, from adaptability to being enterprising. Skills they need. And skills businesses say they want. That’s the kind of education I want for all our young people. And anyone else who wants it later in life.
And because the economy is about people, I believe that means that to get growth, to boost productivity, we need to focus far more on incentives. We need to build an incentive economy. An economy that gets the incentives right – to motivate people, to encourage people, to reward people who do their bit and play by the rules. And to stop people who break the rules.
In Government, Liberal Democrats focused on getting the incentives right. Introducing the pupil premium. An incentive for schools to take more of the most disadvantaged children – and focus on them. Raising the personal income tax allowance by four thousand pounds. Taking the lowest paid out of income tax. Incentivising work for everyone, but especially the less well-off. So the Liberal Democrat record shows we’ve long been the party of incentives – and so many of our big ideas today are about how we encourage people to do the right thing.
When it comes to backing Britain’s small and growing businesses, for example. The start-ups and scale-ups. The entrepreneurs and the self-employed. They are the engines of our economy, the beating heart of local communities, but they’ve been so let down in recent years. Just remember how the Conservative Government shamefully excluded over a million self-employed people from financial support during Covid. Leaving only us – the Liberal Democrats – to stand up for them in Parliament.
Because we prioritise growth, we have long championed the self-employed and the small business owners. For them too, it’s about government getting the incentives right. That’s why we’d abolish the unfair system of business rates and replace it with a better Commercial Landowner Levy – to increase the incentive to invest and grow. It’s why we’re opposing Labour’s misguided job tax and its unfair tax raid on family farms and other family businesses.
It’s why I’ve proposed the idea of “Employment in a Box”, to force every Government department – especially HMRC – to come together to make the UK the easiest place in the world for a business to take on its first employees. Because we need to stop holding back small firms that want to grow, and free them – encourage them – to do so.
And getting the incentives right also means getting rid of the wrong incentives. So a ban on bonuses for water company CEOs who keep polluting our rivers and seas – and fines if they don’t stop – fit my vision of an incentive economy. We’ve got to stop rewarding failure.
And, of course, we need to think totally afresh about how we incentivise more people into work. With our focus on care and carers, Liberal Democrats have argued for a special higher minimum wage for care workers – £2 an hour higher than the national minimum wage – to incentivise more people into the care sector. And for family carers – where millions have given up work to look after their loved ones, and millions more have had to reduce their hours – we have argued for an overhaul of the crazy Carer’s Allowance system. So it properly supports carers and enables them to juggle work and care – instead of penalising them for taking on more hours. Getting the incentives right.
And that inevitably takes us to the unsustainable welfare bill – and the Government’s shambolic attempt to reform welfare. Cutting Personal Independence Payments from disabled people and their carers was indefensible and it’s right those plans were dropped. But what got lost in the Government’s desperation to make the sums add up was an important truth: we need to get more people who aren’t working into work. It’s better for their dignity. It’s better for their families. And it’s better for the economy. The problem is, the Government’s proposed solution would have made the problem worse. Taking away the very support that enables many disabled people to work at all.
What we need to do – and what our party will always champion – is to put in place the flexibility, security and support people need in order to work. Working from home, if that’s what their condition requires. Part-time, if that’s all they can manage. Helping employers to make whatever reasonable adjustments their workers need. Again, it comes back to Liberal values. Seeing people as individuals, and treating them fairly.
It’s what makes me so angry about the assessment process. The impenetrable forms that show no comprehension of what life is like for disabled people or their carers. The dehumanising nature of it all. Trying to turn everyone into a box to be ticked or crossed. Not an individual to be engaged with and understood. Let me give you an example. Before the pandemic, 83% of PIP assessments were done face-to-face. There were often problems with such face-to-face assessments, no doubt about it. But at least they happened. Then during lockdown, they understandably switched to being done on the phone or by video. But when the pandemic ended, Conservative Ministers chose to make that switch to phone assessments permanent. So, last year, just 5% of PIP assessments were face-to-face. I think that was a massive mistake. That Conservative policy opened the door to error, abuse and fraud. And I strongly suspect it’s one of the main reasons the welfare bill has ballooned – and why public trust in the system has been undermined. We must go back to face-to-face assessments as soon as possible – so those who need support get it, and those who don’t, don’t.
And of course we need to invest in people’s health. Physical and mental health. To get the welfare bill down, and more people back into work. How can we rebuild the economy, when more than six million people are stuck on NHS waiting lists? How can we grow the economy when 2.8 million people are shut out of the labour market by long-term illness? When people are waiting weeks for a GP appointment? A healthy economy needs a healthy population, and a healthy NHS. So Liberal Democrat campaigns on GPs and dentists and hospitals and social care are about giving people the healthcare they deserve, but they are also core to our economic vision too.
And while we’re thinking about people, let me turn to the cost-of-living crisis people are facing right now, and the number one thing driving it: energy bills. With inflation rising to 3.6% last month, this needs tackling urgently. Families and pensioners are being clobbered with energy bills that are still more than £50 a month higher than they were five years ago. So many people, who were already struggling to make ends meet, having to find an extra £50 a month – just to keep the lights on, or keep their homes warm this winter.
And businesses are suffering too. Even with the welcome extra help promised in the new Industrial Strategy, parts of British industry will continue to face some of the highest electricity prices in the OECD.
We have to get those prices down – to boost living standards and grow our economy.
A big part of that are the things Liberal Democrats have consistently championed… Generating far more electricity from cheap, clean, renewable sources: solar, wind, tidal, hydro-electric. Insulating people’s homes and making them more energy efficient, so they are much cheaper to heat. Things the Liberal Democrats had a great track record on in government. Things the Conservatives put into reverse after 2015. And – when it comes to home insulation especially – something I’m afraid this Labour Government simply hasn’t made enough of a priority so far.
But there’s another part of this problem that we haven’t spoken enough about, that I want to address today. And that’s the narrative – seized upon by Nigel Farage and Kemi Badenoch – that says the reason energy bills are so high is that we’re investing too much in renewable power. And if we just stopped that investment – and relied more on oil and gas instead – bills would magically come down for everyone.
The experience of record high gas prices in recent years shows that’s not true. And even when gas prices are softer, the long history of volatility in fossil fuel prices means it’s only a matter of time before high prices return. So we know that tying ourselves ever more to fossil fuels would only benefit foreign dictators like Vladimir Putin – which is probably why Farage is so keen on it.
But I think we also have to be honest and admit that we have done a really bad job winning that argument. Those of us who understand how important renewable energy is for our economy – how only renewable energy can deliver permanently low and secure energy prices, today and in the future – have too readily dismissed the rantings of Farage. But refusing to engage hasn’t stopped his myths from spreading. From gaining traction in the new world of fake news.
So we must change that. Starting with the kernel of truth that underpins the myth. People are currently paying too much for renewable energy. But not for the reasons Nigel Farage would have you believe.
Because generating electricity from solar or wind is now significantly cheaper than gas – even when you factor in extra system costs for back-up power when the wind isn’t blowing or the sun isn’t shining. But people aren’t seeing the benefit of cheap renewable power, because wholesale electricity prices are still tied to the price of gas – Even though half of all our electricity now comes from renewables, compared to just 30% from gas. That’s because the wholesale price is set by the most expensive fuel in the mix – and in the UK, that’s almost always gas. 97% of the time in 2021, the cost of electricity was set by the price of gas.
And what does that mean for families, pensioners and businesses? It means we’re all paying that higher gas price in our bills, even though most of the energy we’re using comes from much cheaper sources. Not only is that manifestly unfair, but it is also undermining public support for the investment we need in renewable power. When people don’t see the benefits of cheap, clean energy in their bills, we shouldn’t be surprised if they’re sceptical about building more of it.
So we have got to break the link between gas prices and electricity costs. We have to. It’s something both the Conservative Government and now Labour have spoken about. But when it came to it, both of them put it in the “too difficult” drawer, and just left the problem to fester. So, as with social care, as with sewage, it falls to us – the Liberal Democrats – to say: it might be difficult, but we have to do it. We can’t afford not to. Not when the price is Nigel Farage.
Now this happens to be a problem we’ve grappled with before – that I grappled with before – back when we were in government. It was part of the thinking behind the incentive mechanism we created for new renewable projects: Contracts for Difference. These contracts give energy companies the certainty they need to invest in renewables. If the wholesale price drops below the agreed strike price, the government pays them the difference.
But crucially, they give consumers a fair deal too. If the wholesale price goes above the strike price – like they did when gas prices soared when Russia invaded Ukraine – energy companies pay back the difference, taking money off household energy bills. If all renewables were on Contracts for Difference, the electricity market would be a lot fairer and people would see the benefits of cheap renewables in their bills when gas prices are high.
The problem is, only about 15% of renewable power is generated under Contracts for Difference. The rest is still governed by the old Renewables Obligation Certificates scheme – or ROCs – introduced by the last Labour Government all the way back in 2002 – when ministers didn’t have the foresight to realise that renewable power would get so much cheaper over the next two decades. Unlike Contracts for Difference, companies with ROCs get paid the wholesale price – in other words, the price of gas – with a subsidy on top. Subsidies paid through levies on our energy bills – costing a typical household around £90 a year. It shouldn’t be this way, and it doesn’t have to be any longer. The Government should start today a rapid process of moving all those old ROC renewable projects onto new Contracts for Difference.
It’s an idea from academics at the UK Energy Research Centre that they call “pot zero”. And in 2022 they estimated that it could save around £15 billion a year – not only encouraging the end of those Renewable Obligation Certificate levies, but in the process cutting the typical household energy bill by more than £200. So my challenge to ministers is this. If you want to bring people’s energy bills down, if you want to tackle the cost of living, if you want to build support for renewable power – stop tinkering, stop dithering, stop deliberating. Start phasing out those unfair Renewable Obligation Certificate schemes today, by offering instead new Contracts for Difference we Liberal Democrats brought in. The incentive scheme is there. We created it. Please – use it. One simple trick to save everyone at least £200 a year.
And there are so many ways we could do more to cut electricity bills for people and businesses. One example: why aren’t we pushing much harder for more interconnectors, cables that allow us to import electricity from Europe when it’s more expensive here, and export electrons when it’s more expensive there? Of course, Brexit was bad news for this trade – for both existing interconnectors and worse news for new projects. But one potentially big benefit for the UK rejoining the EU’s internal energy market is greater cross-border trade in power, and so lower electricity bills for consumers.
After nearly a decade of criminally negligent energy policies under the Conservatives, that pushed up everyone’s bills, I believe the right policies now could cut energy bills in half – at least – within ten years. That should be the goal. Nothing less.
A Liberal Democrat energy policy in service of the British people. Not a Nigel Farage energy policy in service of Vladimir Putin. So just imagine what our economy could look like, in the next decade or so.
Energy bills slashed – easing the pressures on families and businesses. People helped into work, instead of trapped on NHS waiting lists or discarded as “inactive”. Education and training to equip people with the skills for the future.
British start-ups and scale-ups thriving with the support they need. Entrepreneurs and the self-employed recognised for the risks they take. Trade boosted, especially with our neighbours in Europe.
The public finances, carefully managed and properly scrutinised in Parliament. And a supercomputer or two, hopefully not putting think tanks out of business!
An economy growing strongly, where everyone feels the benefits. An economy underpinned by our proud Liberal Democrat values. Proud British values. An economy that is truly innovative, dynamic, prosperous and fair.
That is our vision – and I can’t wait to make it happen.
Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Melise Panetta, Lecturer of Marketing in the Lazaridis School of Business and Economics, Wilfrid Laurier University
Young adults in their 20s and 30s face an altered social landscape where financial realities influence their relationships.(Rene Ranisch/Unsplash)
If it feels like rising prices are affecting your dating life or friendships, you’re not imagining it. Around the world, economic pressures are taking a significant toll on personal relationships.
Young adults in their 20s and 30s, in particular, are facing an altered social landscape where even the most fundamental aspects of relationships are being influenced by financial realities.
Dating today can feel like a mix of endless swipes, red flags and shifting expectations. From decoding mixed signals to balancing independence with intimacy, relationships in your 20s and 30s come with unique challenges. Love IRL is the latest series from Quarter Life that explores it all.
These research-backed articles break down the complexities of modern love to help you build meaningful connections, no matter your relationship status.
In Canada, a staggering 77 per cent of couples report financial strain, and 62 per cent say they argue over money. The rising cost of rent, food and everyday expenses has forced many couples to make difficult financial decisions, sometimes at the expense of their relationship.
These concerns are not unique to Canadian couples. A study in the United Kingdom found that 38 per cent of people in a relationship admit to having a secret account or “money stashed away” that their partner doesn’t know about. And in the United States, couples surveyed reported having 58 money-related arguments per year.
Money has long been one of the biggest sources of conflict in relationships. (Shutterstock)
The economic barriers to independence are particularly pronounced for those contemplating separation or divorce. Traditionally, a breakup meant one partner moving out, but now more divorced and separated couples are finding themselves cohabitating simply because they can’t afford to live alone.
Understanding how to maintain a healthy relationship when facing financial troubles is essential for couples to navigate these difficult times.
Postponing major life decisions
The cost-of-living crisis is also delaying key life milestones for young adults worldwide. A Statistics Canada survey found that 38 per cent of young adults have postponed moving out due to economic uncertainty, an increase from 32 per cent in 2018.
This issue is not only delaying the journey to independent adulthood, it is also reversing it. For example, in the United Kingdom, one in five young adults who moved out have had to move back into their family home due to the cost of living crisis.
Housing affordability plays a major role in these delays. With housing prices soaring in Canada, the U.S., the U.K. and elsewhere, home ownership feels out of reach for many. For instance, 55 per cent of young Canadians report the housing crisis is fuelling their decision to delay starting a family.
The cost-of-living crisis is also delaying key life milestones for young adults worldwide. Real estate signs seen in Calgary in May 2023. (Shutterstock)
These delays have cascading effects on individuals and on broader societal trends, including lower fertility rates and shifts toward smaller families.
Dating in a cost-conscious era
One side effect of the rising cost of living is that couples are moving in together sooner than they might have otherwise in order to split living expenses. Others are adopting a more pragmatic approach to dating and bringing up topics like financial stability, job security and housing much earlier in their relationships.
A dating trend known as “future-proofing” is also spreading. According to Bumble’s annual trend report, 95 per cent of singles say their worries about the future are impacting who they date and how they approach relationships. Top concerns include finances, job security, housing and climate change.
In the U.K., inflation and other day-to-day expenses have also made 33 per cent of the nation’s young singles less likely to go on dates. Around one-quarter of them say it has made them less likely to seek out a romantic partner altogether.
Financial strain is leading fewer people to go on expensive, extravagent date nights. (Shutterstock)
These costs are forcing single Americans to adjust their dating plans. With 44 per cent of single Americans reporting adjusting a date for financial reasons, and 27 per cent outright cancelling plans due to financial pressures, it is clear that the cost of living is fundamentally changing how Americans date.
Also, with 38 per cent of dating Canadians saying the costs associated with dating have negatively impacted their ability to reach their financial goals, some are even skipping dating altogether.
The cost of friendship
Friendships, too, are feeling the pinch. Gone are the days of casually grabbing dinner or catching a concert on the weekend. Nearly 40 per cent of Canadians, 42 per cent of Britons and 37 per cent of Americans have cut back on social outings due to financial constraints.
While this may seem like a small sacrifice, the decline in social interactions carries serious consequences. Regular social engagement is critical for mental health, resilience and career development. The more social activities are reduced, the greater the risk of loneliness and isolation — two factors that can significantly impact emotional well-being.
For many, socializing now means opting for budget-friendly alternatives. However, even with creative adjustments, financial pressures are making it harder to maintain strong social ties.
The changing landscape of connection
If you’re in your 20s or 30s, you’ve probably felt the way the economic realities of today are reshaping what relationships look like. Rising costs are influencing everything, from who you live with, how you date and when — or if — you take major life steps.
Maybe you’ve moved in with a partner sooner than planned to split rent, swapped nights out for budget-friendly hangs or put off milestones like starting a family. You’re not alone. Financial pressures are redefining how we connect with each other.
Finding ways to maintain strong relationships under economic stress is essential. Research shows providing emotional support to your partner, employing positive problem-solving skills and engaging in open communication are key maintaining high-quality relationships.
Melise Panetta does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Luxembourg’s national recovery and resilience plan (NRRP) was initially to be financed by the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) with a total of €93.4 million in grants. This allocation accounted for around 51 % of the plan’s total estimated value (€183.1 million), while a further 46 % of the costs were to be covered by the national budget, and 3 % from other EU co-financing. The NRRP has since been adjusted, first to factor in the European Commission’s 2022 recalculations of the grants available to Member States, bringing Luxembourg’s new RRF total to €82.7 million. In May 2024, Luxembourg submitted a newly revised NRRP, including a REPowerEU chapter with its additional allocation, and modifying existing measures. In February 2025, the country submitted another revised version of plan with no financial implications. The estimated total EU contribution to the NRRP stands at €241.1 million, of which €177.3 million have been dedicated to REPowerEU measures (including a €128.5 million transfer from the Brexit Adjustment Reserve to the RRF). Luxembourg’s RRF allocation remains the smallest in the EU in absolute figures, and the lowest as a share of grants relative to gross domestic product (GDP) (0.4 % of GDP in 2019). Luxembourg has so far received €90.2 million in RRF grants (pre-financing and two payments). The NRRP aims to address Luxembourg’s structural issues. The measures included complement and build on priorities laid out in the national economic stimulus package from May 2020. The central objective is to support social cohesion and the promotion of a modern, attractive economic environment while responding to climate and environmental challenges. The REPowerEU chapter seeks to advance Luxembourg’s green transition, helping it meet EU energy-related recommendations. With 80.1 % of the funds going to climate objectives and 37.5 % to the digital transition (the latter excluding REPowerEU), the NRRP will contribute to EU efforts in these areas. The European Parliament participates in interinstitutional forums for cooperation and discussion on the implementation of the RRF, and scrutinises the Commission’s work. This briefing is one in a series covering all EU Member States. Fifth edition. The ‘NGEU delivery’ briefings are updated at key stages throughout the lifecycle of the plans.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Millie Horton-Insch, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, History of Art Department, Trinity College Dublin
There was great excitement at the news this month that the Bayeux tapestry – the 11th-century embroidered epic depicting the conquest of England by William the Conqueror in 1066 – will go on display at the British Museum in 2026. However, the tapestry had already been in the news earlier this year, admittedly to much less fanfare.
In March, it was reported that a fragment of the Bayeux tapestry had been discovered in Germany in the Schleswig-Holstein state archives. To understand how it ended up there, we must turn to a troubling and little-known episode in the tapestry’s history: Sonderauftrag Bayeux (Special Operation Bayeux), a project operated by the Nazi Ahnenerbe, the SS regime’s heritage research group.
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It has often been observed that art seems to have been of disproportionate concern to the Nazis. However, their manipulation of visual and material culture should be understood as central to – not separate from – Hitler’s genocidal regime and its efforts towards global domination.
The Ahnenerbe, under the ultimate authority of Heinrich Himmler, was established to develop and disseminate histories in support of that mythology central to the Nazi regime: the supremacy of the Aryan race. To this end, the Ahnenerbe oversaw research that claimed to use unassailable scientific methods.
However, it has long been acknowledged that their projects consciously manipulated historical evidence to construct fabricated histories that would support racist ideologies. To achieve this, numerous research projects were conducted. These projects saw scholars travel across the globe in the pursuit of objects that could act as monuments to the mythologies of Aryan supremacy. Sonderauftrag Bayeux was one such project.
Nazi interest in the Bayeux tapestry may seem surprising to British people, where the tapestry is considered a symbol of a singularly significant moment in Britain’s history. However, just as politicians in modern Britain have found it tempting to reference the tapestry in the advancement of their political agendas, so too did the Ahnenerbe.
Sonderauftrag Bayeux aimed to produce a multi-volume study of the tapestry that would assert its inherently Scandinavian character. The objective was to present the tapestry as proof of the supremacy of the early medieval Norman people, whom the Ahnenerbe claimed as the ancestors of modern German Aryans and descendants of “Viking” northern Europeans.
By June 1941, work on Sonderauftrag Bayeux had begun in earnest. Among the team sent to Normandy to study the tapestry first hand was Karl Schlabow, a textile expert and head of the Germanic Costume Institute at Neumünster in Germany. Schlabow spent a fortnight in Bayeux, and it was he who removed a fragment of the tapestry’s backing fabric and brought it back to Germany when his research visit was complete.
Though initial reports suggested that Schlabow removed this fragment when the embroidery was later transferred by the Nazis to Paris, it is more likely that he did so during June 1941, when he and his fellow members of Sonderauftrag Bayeux were stationed in Bayeux.
In a sketch by Herbert Jeschke – the artist commissioned to create a painted reproduction of the tapestry – during this visit, Jeschke depicted himself with Schlabow and Herbert Jankuhn (the director of the project) hunched over the tapestry. The sketch is accompanied by the emphatic title, “Die Tappiserie!”, an expression of delight at their privileged viewing of this medieval masterpiece.
To join the Ahnenerbe, Schlabow, like others involved in the Sonderauftrag Bayeux, was inducted into the SS. He held the rank of SS-Unterscharführer (roughly the equivalent of a sergeant in today’s British army). After the second world war many members of the Ahnenerbe denied having sympathy for Nazi policies.
However, documents seized by US intelligence officers at the end of the second world war reveal that some were denied entry to the Ahnenerbe if they, for instance, had had Jewish friends or expressed sympathy towards communist ideas. They therefore had to (at least outwardly) appear sympathetic to Nazism to be inducted into its ranks.
Details of what exactly the Ahnenerbe project uncovered, or even hoped to uncover, from this study of the tapestry are opaque. It appears that, to a large extent, the act of producing an illustrated study and dispatching researchers to the original textile was enough to claim the object as a monument to Germanic Aryan supremacy. It is clear that perceived Scandinavian influence within the tapestry’s designs was to be central to the study’s conclusions, but the project was not completed before Germany’s defeat at the end of the war.
Like many other members of the Ahnenerbe, Schlabow returned to research after the war, working at the Schleswig-Holstein State Museum in Gottorf Castle.
The discovery of even the tiniest fragment of this remarkable medieval object is cause for much excitement. However, its recovery should be framed firmly in the context in which it was removed. It should come as no surprise that Schlabow felt empowered to steal this piece of the tapestry; the regime for which he worked claimed the object as a piece of his heritage, his birthright as an Aryan German.
This find is a timely reminder that the past is closer than we realise and that there is still much work to be done to explore the long shadows cast by previous practices in the histories we inherit. The recovered fragment is currently on display in Schleswig-Holstein, but will return to the Musée la Tapisserie de Bayeux in Normandy in time for the museum’s re-opening in 2027 when the two elements will be reunited for the first time since 1941.
Millie Horton-Insch receives funding from the Leverhulme Trust.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Millie Horton-Insch, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, History of Art Department, Trinity College Dublin
There was great excitement at the news this month that the Bayeux tapestry – the 11th-century embroidered epic depicting the conquest of England by William the Conqueror in 1066 – will go on display at the British Museum in 2026. However, the tapestry had already been in the news earlier this year, admittedly to much less fanfare.
In March, it was reported that a fragment of the Bayeux tapestry had been discovered in Germany in the Schleswig-Holstein state archives. To understand how it ended up there, we must turn to a troubling and little-known episode in the tapestry’s history: Sonderauftrag Bayeux (Special Operation Bayeux), a project operated by the Nazi Ahnenerbe, the SS regime’s heritage research group.
Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight, on Fridays. Sign up here.
It has often been observed that art seems to have been of disproportionate concern to the Nazis. However, their manipulation of visual and material culture should be understood as central to – not separate from – Hitler’s genocidal regime and its efforts towards global domination.
The Ahnenerbe, under the ultimate authority of Heinrich Himmler, was established to develop and disseminate histories in support of that mythology central to the Nazi regime: the supremacy of the Aryan race. To this end, the Ahnenerbe oversaw research that claimed to use unassailable scientific methods.
However, it has long been acknowledged that their projects consciously manipulated historical evidence to construct fabricated histories that would support racist ideologies. To achieve this, numerous research projects were conducted. These projects saw scholars travel across the globe in the pursuit of objects that could act as monuments to the mythologies of Aryan supremacy. Sonderauftrag Bayeux was one such project.
Nazi interest in the Bayeux tapestry may seem surprising to British people, where the tapestry is considered a symbol of a singularly significant moment in Britain’s history. However, just as politicians in modern Britain have found it tempting to reference the tapestry in the advancement of their political agendas, so too did the Ahnenerbe.
Sonderauftrag Bayeux aimed to produce a multi-volume study of the tapestry that would assert its inherently Scandinavian character. The objective was to present the tapestry as proof of the supremacy of the early medieval Norman people, whom the Ahnenerbe claimed as the ancestors of modern German Aryans and descendants of “Viking” northern Europeans.
By June 1941, work on Sonderauftrag Bayeux had begun in earnest. Among the team sent to Normandy to study the tapestry first hand was Karl Schlabow, a textile expert and head of the Germanic Costume Institute at Neumünster in Germany. Schlabow spent a fortnight in Bayeux, and it was he who removed a fragment of the tapestry’s backing fabric and brought it back to Germany when his research visit was complete.
Though initial reports suggested that Schlabow removed this fragment when the embroidery was later transferred by the Nazis to Paris, it is more likely that he did so during June 1941, when he and his fellow members of Sonderauftrag Bayeux were stationed in Bayeux.
In a sketch by Herbert Jeschke – the artist commissioned to create a painted reproduction of the tapestry – during this visit, Jeschke depicted himself with Schlabow and Herbert Jankuhn (the director of the project) hunched over the tapestry. The sketch is accompanied by the emphatic title, “Die Tappiserie!”, an expression of delight at their privileged viewing of this medieval masterpiece.
To join the Ahnenerbe, Schlabow, like others involved in the Sonderauftrag Bayeux, was inducted into the SS. He held the rank of SS-Unterscharführer (roughly the equivalent of a sergeant in today’s British army). After the second world war many members of the Ahnenerbe denied having sympathy for Nazi policies.
However, documents seized by US intelligence officers at the end of the second world war reveal that some were denied entry to the Ahnenerbe if they, for instance, had had Jewish friends or expressed sympathy towards communist ideas. They therefore had to (at least outwardly) appear sympathetic to Nazism to be inducted into its ranks.
Details of what exactly the Ahnenerbe project uncovered, or even hoped to uncover, from this study of the tapestry are opaque. It appears that, to a large extent, the act of producing an illustrated study and dispatching researchers to the original textile was enough to claim the object as a monument to Germanic Aryan supremacy. It is clear that perceived Scandinavian influence within the tapestry’s designs was to be central to the study’s conclusions, but the project was not completed before Germany’s defeat at the end of the war.
Like many other members of the Ahnenerbe, Schlabow returned to research after the war, working at the Schleswig-Holstein State Museum in Gottorf Castle.
The discovery of even the tiniest fragment of this remarkable medieval object is cause for much excitement. However, its recovery should be framed firmly in the context in which it was removed. It should come as no surprise that Schlabow felt empowered to steal this piece of the tapestry; the regime for which he worked claimed the object as a piece of his heritage, his birthright as an Aryan German.
This find is a timely reminder that the past is closer than we realise and that there is still much work to be done to explore the long shadows cast by previous practices in the histories we inherit. The recovered fragment is currently on display in Schleswig-Holstein, but will return to the Musée la Tapisserie de Bayeux in Normandy in time for the museum’s re-opening in 2027 when the two elements will be reunited for the first time since 1941.
Millie Horton-Insch receives funding from the Leverhulme Trust.
In September 2023, so many people were shocked when the famous Sycamore Gap tree, thriving in a dip along Hadrian’s Wall, was deliberately cut down overnight. For many, the tree symbolised British resilience, heritage and an enduring history. The public response was swift and intense, with widespread outrage and grief over the loss of this cultural landmark.
The two men convicted of felling the Sycamore Gap tree have been sentenced to four years and three months in prison. Meanwhile, the tree lives on thanks to an AI-generated alternate world in the film 28 Years Later.
As a psychologist, I’m interested in what inspired such a strong reaction to the destruction of a single tree. One psychological explanation, known as “terror management theory”, suggests that the emotional response reflects deeper anxieties about death – and not just about this tree.
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Terror management theory, developed by psychologists Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg and Tom Pyszczynski, builds on the work of cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker, author of the Pulitzer prize-winning The Denial of Death (1973).
This book’s central idea is simple yet profound. In it, Becker proposes that our awareness of mortality creates the potential for considerable existential anxiety.
To manage this, we rely on cultural worldviews. These are our belief systems. These worldviews can be religious, secular, political or national. They all share a promise that life is meaningful and offer prescriptions for how we should live. When we live in accordance with our cultural values and standards – whether by being a good parent, a loyal citizen or following religious texts – we gain a sense of self-esteem and feel we are contributing to something enduring and significant.
These worldviews also offer the promise of immortality. Some do so literally, as in religious faiths that promise life beyond death. Others offer symbolic immortality, through lasting achievements, family bloodlines, or the continuation of one’s nation. By embedding ourselves in these worldviews, we gain a sense that some part of us will continue after we die.
Cultural symbols such as flags, religious icons, or even a tree can embody our core values and collective identity and are therefore treated with deep reverence. Throughout history, people have waged wars and shown intense emotional reactions to the desecration of such symbols (burning the American flag or the Qur’an, for example).
The Sycamore Gap tree carried similar significance. As a centuries-old landmark, it came to represent Britain’s heritage, strength and continuity. From the perspective of terror management theory, its felling may have stirred strong reactions because it reminded people that even the symbols we rely on for a sense of permanence can be suddenly lost.
This sense of cultural loss is also echoed by other recent events, such as Brexit and the immigration crisis. A collective fear over the erosion of British values and traditions place questions about the loss of British identity at the centre of public consciousness.
Rooted in mortality
Decades of psychological research support this theory’s claims. One common method (a technique called “mortality salience”) involves making participants subtly aware of their mortality (control participants are not reminded of death).
In studies carried out in the 1990s, researchers found that when the solution to a task required desecrating a cultural symbol, such as using an American flag to separate ink from a jar of sand, participants reminded of death took longer to complete the task and experienced greater apprehension.
Hundreds of studies also show how being reminded of death can increase anger and hostility towards people who threaten or violate one’s cultural values. One line of research examining reactions to those who commit moral transgressions may be particularly appropriate to this case.
For instance, in one study, participants reminded of their own death were more likely to support harsher punishments for those who committed moral transgressions such as someone who destroyed an irreplaceable artefact (much like the cutting down of a tree). Other research has shown similar effects: participants (including judges!) when reminded of death gave out harsher penalties or sentencing for those who have committed a crime.
You might question whether these effects truly reflect death anxiety or if they could be explained without invoking a desire for immortality. Research may provide compelling evidence. One study found that reminders of death increased support for harsher punishments for moral transgressors (replicating the study mentioned earlier).
However, when participants were first presented with evidence of an afterlife, the effect of death increasing harsher punishments disappeared. In other words, the promise that death is not the end appeared to buffer from the anxiety that death arouses.
The fall of the Sycamore Gap tree was more than a loss of natural beauty. It was, for many, a symbolic attack on permanence, on meaning, and on shared identity. Yet while such losses can stir outrage and calls for punishment, research also shows that when people endorse prosocial values like empathy, reminders of death can actually foster forgiveness towards those who commit moral transgressions.
According to terror management theory, these responses are not just about anger, but about what it means to be human in the face of inevitable death. In this light, the tree’s felling uprooted something sacred: a collective continuity that gives meaning to our brief lives. As we grieve its loss, perhaps we’re also mourning something more elusive – the comforting illusion that some things might last forever.
This article features references to books that have been included for editorial reasons, and may contain links to bookshop.org. If you click on one of the links and go on to buy something from bookshop.org The Conversation UK may earn a commission.
Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?
Samuel Fairlamb does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
In September 2023, so many people were shocked when the famous Sycamore Gap tree, thriving in a dip along Hadrian’s Wall, was deliberately cut down overnight. For many, the tree symbolised British resilience, heritage and an enduring history. The public response was swift and intense, with widespread outrage and grief over the loss of this cultural landmark.
The two men convicted of felling the Sycamore Gap tree have been sentenced to four years and three months in prison. Meanwhile, the tree lives on thanks to an AI-generated alternate world in the film 28 Years Later.
As a psychologist, I’m interested in what inspired such a strong reaction to the destruction of a single tree. One psychological explanation, known as “terror management theory”, suggests that the emotional response reflects deeper anxieties about death – and not just about this tree.
Get your news from actual experts, straight to your inbox.Sign up to our daily newsletter to receive all The Conversation UK’s latest coverage of news and research, from politics and business to the arts and sciences.
Terror management theory, developed by psychologists Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg and Tom Pyszczynski, builds on the work of cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker, author of the Pulitzer prize-winning The Denial of Death (1973).
This book’s central idea is simple yet profound. In it, Becker proposes that our awareness of mortality creates the potential for considerable existential anxiety.
To manage this, we rely on cultural worldviews. These are our belief systems. These worldviews can be religious, secular, political or national. They all share a promise that life is meaningful and offer prescriptions for how we should live. When we live in accordance with our cultural values and standards – whether by being a good parent, a loyal citizen or following religious texts – we gain a sense of self-esteem and feel we are contributing to something enduring and significant.
These worldviews also offer the promise of immortality. Some do so literally, as in religious faiths that promise life beyond death. Others offer symbolic immortality, through lasting achievements, family bloodlines, or the continuation of one’s nation. By embedding ourselves in these worldviews, we gain a sense that some part of us will continue after we die.
Cultural symbols such as flags, religious icons, or even a tree can embody our core values and collective identity and are therefore treated with deep reverence. Throughout history, people have waged wars and shown intense emotional reactions to the desecration of such symbols (burning the American flag or the Qur’an, for example).
The Sycamore Gap tree carried similar significance. As a centuries-old landmark, it came to represent Britain’s heritage, strength and continuity. From the perspective of terror management theory, its felling may have stirred strong reactions because it reminded people that even the symbols we rely on for a sense of permanence can be suddenly lost.
This sense of cultural loss is also echoed by other recent events, such as Brexit and the immigration crisis. A collective fear over the erosion of British values and traditions place questions about the loss of British identity at the centre of public consciousness.
Rooted in mortality
Decades of psychological research support this theory’s claims. One common method (a technique called “mortality salience”) involves making participants subtly aware of their mortality (control participants are not reminded of death).
In studies carried out in the 1990s, researchers found that when the solution to a task required desecrating a cultural symbol, such as using an American flag to separate ink from a jar of sand, participants reminded of death took longer to complete the task and experienced greater apprehension.
Hundreds of studies also show how being reminded of death can increase anger and hostility towards people who threaten or violate one’s cultural values. One line of research examining reactions to those who commit moral transgressions may be particularly appropriate to this case.
For instance, in one study, participants reminded of their own death were more likely to support harsher punishments for those who committed moral transgressions such as someone who destroyed an irreplaceable artefact (much like the cutting down of a tree). Other research has shown similar effects: participants (including judges!) when reminded of death gave out harsher penalties or sentencing for those who have committed a crime.
You might question whether these effects truly reflect death anxiety or if they could be explained without invoking a desire for immortality. Research may provide compelling evidence. One study found that reminders of death increased support for harsher punishments for moral transgressors (replicating the study mentioned earlier).
However, when participants were first presented with evidence of an afterlife, the effect of death increasing harsher punishments disappeared. In other words, the promise that death is not the end appeared to buffer from the anxiety that death arouses.
The fall of the Sycamore Gap tree was more than a loss of natural beauty. It was, for many, a symbolic attack on permanence, on meaning, and on shared identity. Yet while such losses can stir outrage and calls for punishment, research also shows that when people endorse prosocial values like empathy, reminders of death can actually foster forgiveness towards those who commit moral transgressions.
According to terror management theory, these responses are not just about anger, but about what it means to be human in the face of inevitable death. In this light, the tree’s felling uprooted something sacred: a collective continuity that gives meaning to our brief lives. As we grieve its loss, perhaps we’re also mourning something more elusive – the comforting illusion that some things might last forever.
This article features references to books that have been included for editorial reasons, and may contain links to bookshop.org. If you click on one of the links and go on to buy something from bookshop.org The Conversation UK may earn a commission.
Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?
Samuel Fairlamb does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Portugal is set to receive €22.2 billion in grants and loans from the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF), the EU response to the crisis triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic. This amount corresponds to 3.1 % of the entire RRF, or 10.7 % of Portugal’s 2019 gross domestic product (GDP), and includes REPowerEU grants (€0.7 billion) and Portugal’s share (€81.4 million) from the Brexit Adjustment Reserve. The Council approved the latest revision of Portugal’s national recovery and resilience plan (NRRP) in May 2025. The plan has a strong focus on the country’s social, economic and environmental resilience, with measures targeting culture, housing, health, broad social responses, and forest and water management. Measures relating to climate transition, including those on industry decarbonisation and energy efficiency of buildings, account for 39.1 % of the allocation. The contribution to digital objectives represents 21.7 % of the allocation, with measures and reforms aimed at public administration and finances, education and businesses. Portugal has so far received €11.4 billion of RRF resources (51.3 % of the plan), which the Commission disbursed in the form of pre-financing and five grant and loan instalments. Portugal’s sixth and seventh payment requests are being assessed. In the context of the 2025 European Semester, the Council has recommended that Portugal accelerate implementation of its plan. The European Parliament has been a major supporter of creating a common EU recovery instrument, and takes part in interinstitutional settings to cooperate, discuss and scrutinise implementation of the Commission’s work. This briefing is one in a series covering all EU Member States. Third edition. The previous editions were written by Henrique Morgado Simões. The ‘NGEU delivery’ briefings are updated at key stages throughout the lifecycle of the plans. The author would like to thank Amalia Fumagalli and Ana Luisa Melo Almeida, trainees in the Directorate Members’ Research Service, for their research assistance.
Today, Plaid Cymru has committed to commission an independent review into the bureaucratic burden on the farming sector within the first 100 days of a Plaid Cymru Government.
Plaid Cymru’s Rural Affairs spokesperson, Llyr Gruffydd called for the review when speaking ahead of the Royal Welsh Agricultural Show.
The last major assessment was the ‘Working Smarter Review’ which published its results in 2012. It laid out 76 recommendations on how to reduce red tape on the sector. Since then, Brexit, new trade deals, increased regulations on bovine Tb, water quality (NVZs), bluetongue movement restrictions, and the new proposed Sustainable Farming Scheme (SFS), means it’s timely to revisit the cumulative burden of the increased regulation placed upon the sector.
The Plaid Cymru spokesperson for Rural Affairs went on to explain Plaid Cymru’s expectations for the upcoming Sustainable Farming Scheme (SFS).
This comes as the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Huw Irranca-Davies, is expected to publish the latest developments on Tuesday (15th July).
Mr Gruffydd says the SFS must be ‘workable for farmers’ or risk the scheme not delivering for ‘farming or the environment’. This includes providing longer-term funding certainty through a multi-annual funding commitment, which Plaid Cymru has pledged to deliver if it forms the next Welsh Government in 2026.
Plaid Cymru Shadow Rural Affairs Secretary, Llyr Gruffydd MS, said:
“The increased burden of bureaucracy and red tape on farming businesses has not been reviewed for over a decade. Much has changed since then with increased burdens introduced on bTB, NVZ regulations, new proposals on the Sustainable Farming Scheme and bluetongue movement restrictions to name but a few. Whilst much focus has been on individual schemes and regulations, the cumulative impact has not been properly considered.
“That is why, in the first 100 days of a Plaid Cymru Government, we will commission an independent review of the cumulative bureaucratic burden on the agriculture sector in Wales.
On the long anticipated new Sustainable Farming Scheme proposals Mr Gruffydd said:
“Any scheme that is introduced by the Welsh Government must be workable for farmers – otherwise it will not deliver both for farming or the environment. Plaid Cymru has previously called for a reduction in the number of Universal Actions within the scheme, greater flexibility on tree planting including scrapping the 10% target, and more emphasis on the social value of farming as a public good.
“We also previously secured a longer transitional period between the BPS and the SFS and we would urge the Government to avoid any kind of funding cliff edge as we move from one system to the other.
“We also hope that the Cabinet Secretary will commit to long-term funding for the scheme. The sector cannot operate on a 12 month funding cycle. Longer-term certainty is needed in order to plan, invest and grow. Funding stability is essential to support productivity and efficiency gains both for food production and for nature.
“I can therefore announce that a Plaid Cymru Government would provide a multi-annual funding commitment if we form the next Government. We will also match the current Government’s budget on the SFS as an absolute minimum.
“I’m also keen to see an updated economic impact assessment on the scheme as part of the wider suite of information provided. It’s only right that everyone understands what the impact of these changes will be on the wider rural economy.
“Plaid Cymru understands and supports our farming communities, and that’s why a Plaid Cymru Government in 2026 would pull out all the stops to help the sector thrive and grow.”
Denmark’s national recovery and resilience plan (NRRP) corresponds to 0.2 % of the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF), or 0.5 % of Denmark’s 2019 gross domestic product (GDP). The third and latest revision of the Danish NRRP was approved by Council on 8 July 2025. The EU financial contribution totals €1 625.9 million, including RRF grants (€1 429 million), a REPowerEU grant (€130.7 million) and a transfer of part of the Danish allocation under the Brexit Adjustment Reserve to the plan (€66.0 million). Denmark has so far received 67.2 % of the NRRP resources in the form of pre-financing and three payments; this is well above the current EU average (48.8 %). A further two payments will depend on progress made in implementing the plan. The amended plan reinforces green initiatives and seeks to enhance the resilience of the Danish economy and society, devoting 69 % of the plan to the green transition (up from 59 % in the original plan). In its 2025 country report, the Commission assessed the implementation of the Danish plan as ‘well under way’. The European Parliament participates in interinstitutional forums for cooperation and discussion on NRRP implementation and scrutinises the Commission’s work. This briefing is one in a series covering all EU Member States. Fourth edition. The ‘NGEU delivery’ briefings are updated at key stages throughout the lifecycle of the plans.
International Monetary Fund. Monetary and Capital Markets Department “France: Financial System Stability Assessment”, IMF Staff Country Reports 2025, 180 (2025), accessed July 14, 2025, https://doi.org/10.5089/9798229017428.002
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The French financial system has proven resilient to the shocks of the last five years but faces headwinds from domestic and external policy uncertainty and high fiscal consolidation needs. Bank-insurance conglomerates that include four Global Systemically Important Banks dominate the financial landscape, and financial markets have become increasingly complex in the post-Brexit environment. Banks’ capital and liquidity buffers remain high, but with low profitability versus peers.
Last week, the MP for Coventry South, Zarah Sultana, made an audacious decision. Having already lost the Labour party whip for opposing the two-child benefit cap, Sultana announced she would co-lead a new leftwing party with Jeremy Corbyn, who was expelled from Labour in 2024.
From one angle, her decision may seem simple. Discontent with Keir Starmer’s Labour government, on everything from welfare cuts to Gaza, has never been higher, and Sultana is a vocal critic. Yet, launching a (still unnamed) new party is bold. It tackles head-on an old and vexing question for socialist critics of capitalism in the UK.
In 1976, the socialist theorist Ralph Miliband (yes, Ed and David’s dad) described the faith in Labour’s capacity to become a socialist vehicle as “the most crippling of all illusions”. But socialists who agree with Miliband senior then have an almighty problem.
Writing months after the 2019 defeat of Corbyn’s Labour party, the veteran “New Left” academics Colin Leys and Leo Panitch echoed Miliband in their book Searching for Socialism. But they also saw few immediate alternatives with “any prospect of electoral success”. This, they wrote, is the “central dilemma” for British democratic socialists.
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The reaction to Sultana’s announcement from the British left has been accordingly mixed. Leaks revealed that Corbyn’s team was caught off guard. Responses from prominent potential supporters were reserved. Momentum, the leftwing grassroots organisation, hastily distributed the pamphlet Why Socialists Should Be in the Labour Party.
It’s too early to know whether these issues are teething problems or portents. But the barriers to Sultana’s venture are formidable. What would it take for a new leftwing party to succeed? What would “success” even look like?
A careful reading of political history can help us answer these questions. This is not the first time that new parties have emerged from Labour factionalism. Many readers will be aware of the 1981 departure of the “gang of four” Labour figures, who founded the Social Democratic party (SDP) that later merged with the Liberal party to form the Liberal Democrats.
Nor is it the first time that smaller parties have appeared on Labour’s left. Between 1920 and 1991, the Communist party of Great Britain was a potent force in the trade union movement. From the 1990s to the 2010s, several vehicles contested local and national elections against Labour, from the Socialist Alliance to Left Unity.
Challenges for a new party
Each of these iterations had its historical peculiarities. But stepping back, we can identify three recurring challenges that any leftwing insurgent party must confront.
First, they must agree on an electoral strategy and purpose, given the institutional brutality of British democracy. The UK has some proportional elections, including in Scotland and Wales (expected to be next contested in 2026). Councils are also possible avenues of influence.
But there is no avoiding the fact that legislative and executive power is hoarded in the House of Commons, elected by first past the post. Labour will discourage possible defectors by warning that a split in the left vote will let in the right. Neil Kinnock, Labour’s former leader who found himself fighting off the SDP while trying to evict Thatcher in the 1980s, dubbed Sultana and Corbyn’s venture the “Farage assistance party”.
Left of Labour parties are often aware of the risk. Indeed, far left activists have in the past advocated voting Labour, with “varying degrees of (un)enthusiasm”.
Advocates of a new party will note that Labour is only polling in the low 20s, suggesting a pool of ex-Labour voters potentially interested in shopping around. However, there are others it could torpedo too.
One recent poll on support for a hypothetical Corbyn-led party – which we should take with some salt – found that its 10% support comes partly from eating into the Green vote. An electoral arrangement with the Greens, on the other hand, may require shared policy platforms, raising the question of why a separate party is needed.
A poll from More in Common conducted specifically about a Sultana-Corbyn party found 9% of Labour voters and 26% of current Green voters saying that would vote for such a party.
The Socialist Labour party (SLP) – founded in 1996 by the prominent trade unionist Arthur Scargill in reaction to Tony Blair’s New Labour – is the obvious cautionary tale. Scargill wanted a purer, better Labour party. Yet, Labour looked set to kick out an 18-year-long Conservative government.
Scargill could not convince many sympathetic activists to join. As historian Alfie Steer argues, the SLP instead became dominated by socialists hostile to the Labour party. The party could not overcome the resultant contradictions in its purpose and collapsed into acrimony.
The SLP also illustrates the second key consideration: timing. The SLP struggled partly because it launched just as Labour was sweeping triumphantly into power. Sultana’s timing is arguably more astute. She has waited for Starmer’s bubble to burst and for disillusionment to fester.
However, the broad left within Labour has also just found its voice by rebelling against government policy. The temptation for a risk-averse Labour activist may be to leap onto this critical bandwagon without taking the more dangerous step of defecting.
The final challenge is securing institutional durability without debilitating splits. It is telling that Sultana felt compelled to include Corbyn’s name despite his reported reservations.
Sultana herself has an impressive political profile, especially on TikTok. Any new party will rely heavily on prominent spokespeople to force it into the national conversation. Yet, such vehicles can become trapped by their dependence on individuals. The Respect party of the 2000s, for example, was reliant on the charismatic but polarising figure of George Galloway.
The fledgling party will also need a lasting structure that determines how candidates are selected and policy is formed. This risks dragging it into dreaded constitutional debates. It is already reportedly divided over the existence of co-leaders.
Intra-party democracy is off-putting to outsiders. But as constitutional scholar Meg Russell argues, it speaks to fundamental questions about the extent, and limits, of democracy. Such disputes have frequently wracked the left (and the radical right, as Reform’s recent constitutional changes show).
To what extent should policy be “democratically” decided? Should a new party limit who can join, and if so, on what criteria? How will leaders be selected? From the CPGB to the SLP, these questions have proven divisive in the past. They could easily prove so again.
The new party faces severe challenges, but it would be unwise to write it off completely. In a volatile context, it has a chance to make its mark if it is clear in its strategic electoral purpose, cultivates an institutional and activist base and times its interventions astutely. But the obstacles to success are enormous – and with Reform currently polling top, the risks are high.
Colm Murphy is currently a member of the Labour Party, but he is writing purely in an academic capacity.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Matilde Rosina, Assistant Professor in Global Challenges, Brunel University of London
After weeks of rising Channel crossing figures, the UK government has agreed on a long-awaited migration deal with France. Keir Starmer and Emmanuel Macron announced a “one in, one out” pilot – and the UK prime minister said the “groundbreaking” scheme could start returning migrants to France within weeks. The deal was announced alongside a separate agreement to coordinate the use of French and British nuclear weapons.
The migration agreement will allow the UK to return selected numbers of small boat arrivals to France. In exchange, the UK will admit an equal number of asylum seekers with legitimate ties to the UK (such as family), who have not previously attempted to enter the country illegally.
The plan will start as a pilot, with initial reports suggesting the UK could return up to 50 people per week (2,600 per year). That is roughly 6% of small boat arrivals in 2024. The remaining arrivals will continue to be processed under the UK’s existing system.
The “one in, one out” system appears similar to an agreement in 2016 between the EU and Turkey. Under that scheme, for every irregular migrant returned from the Greek islands to Turkey, one Syrian refugee who had stayed in Turkey could be legally resettled in the EU. Under the EU–Turkey deal, only 2,140 migrants were returned to Turkey by 2022, compared with over 32,000 who were resettled in the EU.
The British government’s hope is that this pilot will lay the groundwork for a broader EU-UK return framework that would allow it to return more people. Before Brexit, the UK was part of the EU’s asylum framework, the Dublin regulation. This allowed any EU country, including the UK, to return asylum seekers to the first EU country they entered or passed through.
From 2008 to 2016, the UK was a net sender of asylum seekers: it returned more people to EU states than it accepted, receiving fewer than 500 people annually. The trend reversed after 2016, with the UK accepting more migrants than it returned.
But southern EU countries could complicate any expansion or permanent implementation of the pilot. Italy, Spain, Greece, Malta and Cyprus have opposed a UK–France agreement, fearing it would lead to more people being sent back to them – southern European states are where migrants typically arrive in the EU first.
Challenges ahead
The deal is a significant step for a UK government that has struggled to control the narrative on migration. Losing ground to Reform, the government has recently proposed tightening legal immigration rules, including by making it harder and longer to acquire British citizenship, and by cutting legal migration routes.
It also marks a notable shift in the UK’s post-Brexit migration strategy. But questions remain about the details and implementation.
The French president hailed it as a “major deterrent” to Channel crossing, as migrants would not remain in the UK but be returned to France. Macron said that one-third of arrivals in France are heading towards the UK. So it follows that any deterrent from Channel crossings would also lead to a reduction in people coming to France.
Yet, as I have shown in my research, deterrence is rarely effective. This is because information about deterrence factors does not necessarily reach the asylum seekers or stop smugglers. It also does not address the underlying drivers of migration, such as poverty, conflict and corruption.
Moreover, returns are notoriously difficult to enforce. Many asylum seekers lack documentation, and complex legal processes raise administrative and financial costs.
Scalability also poses a challenge, given EU countries’ divided stances on an EU-wide deal.
It is, however, promising that the UN refugee agency has given the agreement its backing, stating: “If appropriately implemented, it could help achieve a more managed and shared approach, offering alternatives to dangerous journeys while upholding access to asylum.”
The last UK government’s attempts to deter Channel crossings, such as the Rwanda scheme, had led to the agency raising serious concerns.
How many asylum seekers does the UK take?
This deal comes amid an increase in asylum applications in the UK. Annual applications rose from 38,483 in 2018 to over 108,000 in 2024.
In just the first half of 2025, small boat arrivals increased 48% compared with the same period in 2024, exceeding 20,000. By contrast, irregular arrivals to the EU decreased by 20% in the first half of 2025, mainly driven by a drop in arrivals to Greece and to Spain’s Canary Islands.
When accounting for population, the UK receives fewer asylum applications – 16 for every 10,000 people living in the UK – than the EU average (22 per 10,000).
Data shows that between 2018 and 2024, 68% of small boat asylum applications processed in the UK were approved, indicating that most were made by people in genuine need.
UK–France migration cooperation dates back to the 1990s, but since 2019, the focus has been on addressing the rise in Channel crossings.
A significant step was the UK-France joint declaration of March 2023, under which the UK committed €541 million (approximately £476 million) between 2023 and 2026. Funds were allocated for assets including drones, helicopters and aircraft, and for the creation of a migration centre in France. Importantly, the agreement sought to increase surveillance along the French border, rather than return migrants.
This cooperation deepened in February 2025, when both countries agreed to extend their partnership to 2027 and reallocate €8 million for new enforcement measures.
Joint maritime activities have played a role too: since October 2024, UK Border Force vessels have entered French waters on three occasions to assist boats in distress and return people to the French coast.
Overall, this new agreement represents a milestone in UK–France migration cooperation, and the UK’s first significant post-Brexit returns scheme with an EU country. While questions remain over its scalability – given the modest return numbers, legal and logistical hurdles, and European political divides – it is a crucial step in cross-Channel cooperation on migration and asylum, making progress on what has been an intractable problem for UK governments.
Matilde Rosina does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
New York, July 11, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Cyabra Strategy Ltd. (“Cyabra”), the AI-powered platform for real-time disinformation detection, has uncovered a coordinated Iranian state-backed bot network designed to infiltrate and influence online discourse around Scottish independence. Active between May and June 2025, the campaign aimed to manipulate UK political sentiment, promote Iranian-aligned narratives, and deepen domestic divisions.
Cyabra’s investigation found that 26% of accounts engaging in Scottish independence conversations on X (formerly Twitter) were fake, publishing more than 3,000 coordinated messages. These accounts blended pro-independence, anti-Brexit, and anti-UK institutional themes to mimic grassroots sentiment and sway opinion in Iran’s favor.
The campaign experienced a defining disruption beginning June 13, 2025, immediately following a military escalation between Israel and Iran. The Iranian-linked network went silent for 16 days—then reemerged with renewed coordination and a messaging pivot, praising Iran’s strength and mocking the West. This behavioral shift offered clear evidence of state-backed orchestration behind the campaign.
“The sudden disruption to Iran’s influence operations capabilities due to their war with Israel exposed the entire operation,” said Dan Brahmy, CEO of Cyabra. “It was like watching state-backed disinformation self-destruct in real time. When Iran paused, so did the bots revealing the strategy, the propaganda, and the 224 million views their fake campaign had already amassed.”
The network deployed AI-generated personas, recycled content, and strategic use of hashtags like #ScottishIndependence, #FreeScotland, and #BrexitBetrayal to infiltrate legitimate conversations. Cyabra’s platform traced these behaviors to known Iranian influence tactics.
Importantly, authentic users unknowingly amplified the manipulated content, further obscuring the line between real discourse and engineered narratives.
Cyabra has entered into a business combination agreement with Trailblazer Merger Corporation I (NASDAQ: TBMC), a blank-check special-purpose acquisition company.
About Cyabra Cyabra is a real-time AI-powered platform that uncovers and analyzes online disinformation and misinformation by uncovering fake profiles, harmful narratives, and GenAI content across social media and digital news channels. Cyabra’s AI solutions protect corporations and governments against brand reputation risks, election manipulation, foreign interference, and other online threats. Cyabra’s platform leverages proprietary algorithms and NLP solutions, gathering and analyzing publicly available data to provide clear, actionable insights and real-time alerts that inform critical decision-making. Cyabra uncovers the good, bad, and fake online.
About Trailblazer Trailblazer is a blank check company formed for the purpose of entering into a merger, share exchange, asset acquisition, stock purchase, recapitalization, reorganization, or other similar business combination with one or more businesses or entities. For more information, visit: www.trailblazermergercorp.com
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Important Information for Investors and Stockholders In connection with the Business Combination, Trailblazer Holdings, Inc., a subsidiary of Trailblazer (“Holdings”) has filed a registration statement on Form S-4 (the “Registration Statement”) with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”), which includes a preliminary proxy statement/prospectus, and certain other related documents, which will be both the proxy statement to be distributed to holders of shares of Trailblazer’s common stock in connection with its solicitation of proxies for the vote by its stockholders with respect to the Business Combination and other matters as may be described in the Registration Statement, as well as the prospectus of Holdings relating to the offer and sale of its securities to be issued in the Business Combination. . After the Registration Statement is declared effective, the proxy statement/prospectus will be sent to all Trailblazer stockholders so that they may vote on the Business Combination.
INVESTORS AND STOCKHOLDERS OF TRAILBLAZER ARE URGED TO READ CAREFULLY THE REGISTRATION STATEMENT, PROXY STATEMENT/PROSPECTUS, AND OTHER RELEVANT DOCUMENTS FILED OR TO BE FILED WITH THE SEC WHEN THEY BECOME AVAILABLE, AS THEY WILL CONTAIN IMPORTANT INFORMATION ABOUT THE BUSINESS COMBINATION AND THE PARTIES INVOLVED.
Trailblazer stockholders are currently able to obtain copies of the preliminary proxy
statement/prospectus and other documents filed with the SEC that are incorporated by reference therein, and will be able to obtain the definitive proxy statement/prospectus and other documents filed with the SEC that will be incorporated by reference therein, once available, in all cases without charge, at the SEC’s web site at www.sec.gov, or by directing a request to: Trailblazer at 510 Madison Avenue, Suite 1401, New York, NY 10022, Telephone: 646-747-9618.
Participants in the Solicitation Cyabra, Trailblazer, and their respective directors and executive officers may be deemed participants in the solicitation of proxies from Trailblazer stockholders regarding the proposed Business Combination. Information about Trailblazer’s directors and executive officers and their ownership of Trailblazer’s securities is set forth in the proxy statement/prospectus pertaining to the proposed Business Combination.
No Offer or Solicitation This press release does not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any securities, or a solicitation of any vote or approval. No sale of securities shall occur in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation, or sale would be unlawful before registration or qualification under applicable laws.
Source: People’s Republic of China – State Council News
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer (L) welcomes French President Emmanuel Macron at 10 Downing Street in London, Britain, on July 10, 2025. [Photo/Xinhua]
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on Thursday that Britain and France have signed a new deal to allow the two countries to coordinate their nuclear deterrents for the first time.
During a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron at a military base in Northwood, near London, Starmer said the two countries had signed the Northwood Declaration, a deal designed to show adversaries that any attack on either nation would result in a response from both nations.
For his part, Macron, who will conclude a three-day state visit to Britain later Thursday, highlighted the importance of defense and security cooperation between the two countries, noting that times have changed in Europe and the Britain-France partnership “must change accordingly.”
Referring to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Macron said Europe must be able to rely on the strategic collaboration between Britain and France, Europe’s only two nuclear powers.
A statement by Downing Street underscored the “extreme threat to Europe” that would prompt a joint nuclear response. “Any adversary threatening the vital interests of Britain or France could be confronted by the strength of the nuclear forces of both nations,” it said.
Meanwhile, Britain and France plan to order additional highly lethal Storm Shadow cruise missiles and step up replenishment of arms depots as part of a renewed defense agreement, according to the statement.
Following a Britain-France Summit at Downing Street and a “coalition of the willing” virtual meeting, which included Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Starmer announced that a new coalition headquarters supporting Ukraine will be established in Paris.
On the issue of migration, the two leaders unveiled a new “one in, one out” scheme to reduce English Channel crossings.
Under the scheme, migrants arriving in Britain via small boats will be “detained and returned to France in short order,” Starmer said. In parallel, individuals who have not previously attempted to cross the Channel illegally will be allowed to enter Britain through a newly created route.
The route will be subject to strict security checks and limited to those meeting the eligibility criteria. Starmer described the plan as “groundbreaking” but didn’t specify how many migrants would be returned.
Macron said he’s “totally committed” to the pilot scheme, which will come into effect within weeks.
However, it remains unclear whether the scheme will serve as an effective deterrent. Despite joint funding and efforts, more than 20,000 people have crossed the Channel in small boats so far this year, marking a 50 percent increase compared to the same period in 2024.
Both Macron and Starmer face rising pressure at home from far-right and anti-immigration sentiment. Addressing the British parliament on Tuesday, Macron described the migration challenge as “a burden” shared by both countries.
Starmer also said the two countries “have gone further” to improve trade and investment, adding that both sides will strengthen collaboration on supercomputers, satellite connectivity, and artificial intelligence.
Macron hailed the development as a “reset” in bilateral ties, noting that trade volumes have topped pre-Brexit levels and the two countries are strengthening their partnerships in civilian nuclear power and cooperating in space exploration.
During his visit, Macron reiterated support for the two-state solution to solving the conflicts in Gaza, and called recognition of the State of Palestine the “only path to peace.”
The visit marks the first state trip to Britain by a French president since 2008, and Macron is the first European Union head of state to visit since Brexit.
Observers said trust between the two sides still needs to be rebuilt after years of tension, particularly during the Brexit negotiations. Macron previously described Brexit as a product of “lies and false promises.” Dialogue between the two nations had diminished following disputes on fishing rights and the Britain-Australia submarine deals.
Sebastien Maillard, an expert at London-based think tank Chatham House, said that “the memory of these difficult times has not vanished” on either side. “Trust needs time to build,” he added.
The Special Committee on the European Democracy Shield (EUDS) detects and assesses possible loopholes and gaps in existing or planned legislation and policies to strengthen democratic processes in the EU against malicious interference, foreign and domestic. One way to do this is via the sharing of best practices and the learning from tools from relevant third countries. Another objective of the mission to London was to exchange specifically in the context of a renewed cooperation post-Brexit.
The Special Committee on the European Democracy Shield (EUDS) detects and assesses possible loopholes and gaps in existing or planned legislation and policies to strengthen democratic processes in the EU against malicious interference, foreign and domestic. One way to do this is via the sharing of best practices and the learning from tools from relevant third countries. Another objective of the mission to London was to exchange specifically in the context of a renewed cooperation post-Brexit.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Alexandra Makin, Third Century Research Fellow, Manchester Metropolitan University
The Bayeux tapestry is set to return to the UK for the first time in almost 1,000 years. One of the most important cultural artefacts in the world, it is to be displayed at the British Museum from September 2026.
Its significance for history is unquestioned – but you may not think of the Bayeux tapestry as a work of art. Sure, you may recognise it from your history lessons or political campaigns. Maybe you like embroidery and textiles or know about it because of the modern versions it inspired – think the Game of Thrones tapestry or the Great Tapestry of Scotland. Perhaps you are an early medievalist and use it as comparative evidence.
For me, this now famous wall hanging is undoubtedly art, created with great skill. What fascinates me as a textile archaeologist is how early medieval people saw and understood the tapestry.
First, let’s contextualise it a little. The hanging is not a woven tapestry but an embroidery, stitched in wool threads on nine panels of linen fabric that were then sewn together. It was made in around 1070, probably in England. Nobody knows how big it originally was, but it now measures 68.3 metres long by approximately 70cm high.
Starting at the end of Edward the Confessor’s reign (1042-1066), the tapestry’s comic book narrative tells a vivid, very modern story of the struggle for power and the English throne – and the brutal means William of Normandy (1028-1087) used to get it.
This article is part of Rethinking the Classics. The stories in this series offer insightful new ways to think about and interpret classic books and artworks. This is the canon – with a twist.
It follows the highs and lows of Harold Godwinson, Edward the Confessor’s brother-in-law, who became king after Edward’s death in 1066, and his eventual downfall at the Battle of Hastings.
The end of the hanging, and therefore the story, is now missing but it was probably the triumphal coronation of William. It would have provided a mirror in symmetry to the first scene, which depicts an enthroned Edward.
Sensory archaeology of the tapestry
Today, the hanging is famous because it is the only surviving example of its kind. But documentary sources from early medieval England demonstrate that this type of wall hanging was a popular way for families to depict their stories and great deeds.
A good example is the Byrhtnoth wall hanging, which Æthelflæd, the wife of an Anglo-Saxon Ealdorman of Essex Byrhtnoth, gave to the church in Ely after he was killed in 991. We know that the Normans also understood these storytelling wall hangings because Abbot Baudri of Bourgueil (c. 1050-1130) expertly incorporated such a device in a poem he wrote to honour Adela of Blois (c. 1067-1137), the daughter of William the Conqueror and Matilda (c. 1031-1083).
The Bayeux tapestry was, therefore, an obvious way to tell people about the downfall of the English and the rise of the Normans. But this is not all. The early medieval population of Britain loved riddles, multilayered meanings and hidden messages. Evidence survives in pieces like the gold buckle from the 7th-century Sutton Hoo ship burial, the early 8th-century Franks Casket and the 10th-century Book of Exeter. So it is not surprising that people today have argued for hidden messages in the Bayeux tapestry.
While these concepts are interesting, so much emphasis has been placed on them and the role the embroiderers played in creating them, that other ways of early medieval viewing and understanding have been ignored.
Early medieval society viewed its world through the senses. By using sensory archaeology, a theoretical approach that helps researchers understand how past societies interacted with their worlds through sight, touch, taste, smell and sound, we can imagine how people encountering the Bayeux tapestry would have connected with and understood it.
A guide to the story depicted on the Bayeux tapestry.
Art historian Linda Neagley has argued that pre-Renaissance people interacted with art visually, kinaesthetically (sensory perception through bodily movement) and physically. The Bayeux tapestry would have been hung at eye level to enable this. So if we take expert in Anglo-Saxon culture Gale Owen-Crocker’s idea that the tapestry was originally hung in a square with certain scenes facing each other, people would have stood in the centre. That would make it an 11th-century immersive space with scenes corresponding and echoing each other, drawing the viewer’s attention, playing on their senses and understanding of the story they thought they knew.
If we imagine ourselves entering that space, we move from a cooler, stone-hewn room into a warmer, softer area, encased in linen and wool, their smell tickling our noses. Outside sounds would be deadened, the movement of people softened, voices quietened. People would move from one scene to another, through the open doors of the stage-like buildings where the action inside can be seen and watched, boldly or surreptitiously. The view might be partially blocked by others and their reactions and gesticulations as they engaged with and discussed what they saw.
The bright colours of the embroidery would have made a kaleidoscope of colour, a blur that defined itself the closer people got to the work. The boldness and three-dimensionality of the stitching helped to draw them into the action while any movement of the hanging brought the imagery alive.
Here are the main characters in the room with you, telling you their story, inviting you to join them on their journeys of victory or doom.
As onlookers discussed what they saw, or read the inscriptions, they interacted with the embroidered players, giving them voice and enabling them to join the conversation. If the hanging formed part of a banquet then the smell of food, clanking of dishes and movement of the fabric and stitchwork as servants passed would have enhanced the experience. The feasting scenes dotted throughout the hanging would be echoed in the hall.
I believe the Bayeux tapestry was not simply an inanimate art object to be viewed and read from the outside. It was an immersive retelling of the end of an era and the start of something new. When you entered its space you became part of that story, sensorially reliving it, keeping it alive. To me, this is the true power of this now famous embroidery.
Beyond the canon
As part of the Rethinking the Classics series, we’re asking our experts to recommend a book or artwork that tackles similar themes to the canonical work in question, but isn’t (yet) considered a classic itself. Here is Alexandra Makin’s suggestion:
The ITV series Unforgotten, now in its sixth season (with a seventh on the way) gripped me from the start. It follows a team of British police detectives as they track down the killers of people whose bodies have been recently found, but who were murdered years before.
As they do, we, the viewer, are given access to the characters’ often emotional stories. We are brought into their sphere and experience their pain, distress, happiness, horror. We get unrivalled access, eventually, to the motives for their seemingly strange actions. As with the Bayeux tapestry, we are swallowed up in their worlds. This is achieved by Chris Lang’s fabulous writing, the cinematography and the exquisite acting.
Together these elements make a whole, opening a window, immersing you in a world full of powerful sensory engagements. For me, this is classic art in the making.
Alexandra Makin undertakes unpaid consultancy work for the Bayeux Tapestry Museum.
