The Times - 12.10.2026 — 2026-10-11

Monday October 12 2026 | thetimes.com | No 75161

City's defiance

Haaland and co in winning return after guilty verdict The Game

£3.20 £2.35 to subscribers (based on a 7 Day Print and Digital Subscription)

The Nineties? I partied like Kate Moss

Polly Vernon Times2

Healey ‘must find £35bn’ for public service and defence pledges

Geraldine Scott Assistant Political Editor

John Healey faces a £35bn choice between raising taxes and cutting public spending as inflation threatens to derail government plans, Britain's leading economic think tank has warned.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said the chancellor may have to find tens of billions of pounds in additional funding by the end of the decade to protect public services from cuts and meet Labour's defence ambitions.

Although Healey may have more headroom to play with than previously expected because of higher tax receipts, the IFS said that even leaving existing spending plans unchanged would amount to imposing cuts, as inflation would erode departmental budgets.

The think tank said avoiding cuts to departmental budgets could require an additional £25bn a year by 2030-31, rising to about £35 billion if ministers also increased defence spending to 3 per cent of GDP.

Wes Streeting, the defence secretary, confirmed that Healey would find an additional £4.7bn for defence at the budget on October 28, but refused to guarantee that the government would increase defence spending to reach 3 per cent of GDP by 2030.

The IFS said raising £35bn through taxation would be equivalent to increasing all income tax rates by three percentage points, or the main rate of VAT by the same amount, breaching Labour's manifesto commitments.

Helen Miller, the director of the IFS, said: “A ‘steady-as-she-goes’ budget is not an option available to the chancellor. Choosing to stay the course with the inherited tax and spending plans would mean allowing inflation to blow departments’ spending plans off course. It would be a choice to tolerate chunky cuts to the quantity or quality of some public services — cuts that would be Continued on page 2

Almost 2m on sickness benefit may not qualify

Claimants waiting years for new assessments

T TIMES

Welfare Inquiry

Katie O'Toole

Daisy Eastlake Political Reporter

Ministers are paying out sickness benefits to almost two million people without knowing whether they still qualify, a Times investigation can reveal.

More than two thirds of claimants who should be reassessed have yet to be seen. The average wait is more than two years and one person has been waiting for 16 years, according to Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) records. It means billions of pounds a year are being paid to claimants whose eligibility has not been checked, although it is not known how many would no longer qualify for payments.

Today The Times launches a Welfare Inquiry to investigate a crisis in the benefits system and its impact on public finances, communities and the economy. It will also look at options for reform and the economic benefits of repairing the system.

Pat McFadden, the work and pensions secretary, said: "I welcome the Times inquiry into the issues facing our welfare system, many of which are years in the making. Finding work, a dignified retirement, and living with illness and disability touch millions of lives — and prompt public debate.

"Ensuring these systems help people live the fullest lives, and tackling the scandal of young people not in education, work or training, will require long-term thinking — there are no quick fixes. I welcome thoughtful contributions to the debate."

About 3.9 million people are claiming the sickness part of universal credit, Britain's main working-age benefit, after poor health overtook unemployment as the main driver of claims. Some 2.8 million receive the higher category of universal credit sickness benefit, which pays up to £430 a month. Of these, just over 2.5 million are eligible for reassessment, meaning they have a health condition that could get better. However, 1.8 million of these claimants are still waiting to be seen by the DWP.

Most on universal credit are signed on for between six months and three years of payments and are meant to be reassessed when this “prognosis period” comes to a close. These assessments were stopped during lockdown and never restarted at full scale.

Gavin, a taxi driver from Shoreham-by-Sea, West Sussex, said he informed the DWP four years ago that he had recovered from heart surgery and was ready to return to work. "I was told point blank that they couldn't stop my sickness benefit until I was reassessed," he told The Times. "I waited for this reassessment but it never happened."

He was told to go back to work and keep claiming. Gavin said the top-up he was getting meant he was “probably working half the hours for the same Continued on page 7

DAVID FISHER/SHUTTERSTOCK

Into the wood Carey Mulligan at the premiere of the animated fantasy Wildwood, to which she lends her voice, at the London Film Festival. Film review, page 13

---

'Energy truce' with Russia was surprise to Zelensky

George Grylls Washington

President Trump said that Russia and Ukraine had agreed to pause attacks on each other's energy infrastructure, announcing the truce apparently without consulting President Zelensky, who said the deal was "news for me".

In a post on Truth Social, Trump said that “both parties have agreed” to the deal “effective immediately”. Moments later Ukraine accused Russia of attacking Kyiv’s electricity grid. There was no immediate response from the Kremlin.

"Effective immediately, there is an ENERGY CEASEFIRE in the war between Russia and Ukraine. Both parties have agreed. Do not break it!" Trump said yesterday morning.

Zelensky appeared blindsided by the announcement, telling Axios it was "news for me". He posted on X: "It is important that Russia support it as well. We are awaiting details from the American side. For our part, Ukraine always FULLY supports steps toward de-escalation, the protection of lives, and the decisions needed to end the war and guarantee lasting peace."

Andy Burnham said that Russia had stepped up its attacks on Ukraine's energy infrastructure as he endorsed Trump's efforts to secure a ceasefire.

"The UK strongly supports President Trump's call today for a sustained energy ceasefire to start now," the prime minister wrote on X.

Vitali Klitschko, the mayor of Kyiv, said that the Ukrainian capital's water and power grid remained under attack despite Trump's announcement. "The enemy continues to attack energy infrastructure," he said.

Russia refused to pause its targeting of Ukraine's energy infrastructure during previous rounds of talks. In April, Zelensky said Ukraine had conveyed an offer of a reciprocal ceasefire on energy infrastructure to Moscow through US mediators. Russia said it favoured an overall peace deal.

Last month Trump claimed that Russia and Ukraine had agreed to an Continued on page 2

News

Today's highlights

7.05am Stephen Doughty, Foreign Office minister

10.15am Paul Johnson, former director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, on what to expect in this month's budget

12.30pm Evan Gershkovich, right, the journalist who was illegally detained by Russia, discusses his memoir with Hugo Rifkind

1.30pm The US pollster John Zogby speaks to Josh Glancy about the midterms

DAB RADIO FREE APP 'PLAY TIMES RADIO' TIMESRadio

---

TODAY'S EDITION

NO SWEAT

Meghan's \$100

charity top sells

out in hours

PAGE 9

POPE'S HEALTH

Leo XIV will

undergo lung

operation

PAGE 29

MAN AND BOY

Jamie Bell on

Billy Elliot's lasting

impact 25 years on

COVER

COMMENT 21

LETTERS 24

LEADING ARTICLES 25

SPORT 49

CROSSWORD 56

TV & RADIO TIMES2

WORLD 26

BUSINESS 31

REGISTER 43

Will Netanyahu win the most critical election in Israel's history?

Israel's first general election since the October 7 attacks takes place on October 27. As the situation in Gaza grows ever more dire, and Israel's international reputation sours, what impact will the victor have on the region and the rest of the world?

Available on the Times Radio app or wherever you get your podcasts

OFFER

Save up to 30% with a subscription to The Times and The Sunday Times

THETIMES.COM/SUBSCRIBE

---

THE WEATHER

Rather cloudy and becoming milder with outbreaks of rain and drizzle at times. Full forecast, page 47

If a section of your Times is missing, please call 020-7711 1525 or e-mail help@timesplus.co.uk and we will send it to you, subject to availability.

©TIMES MEDIA LIMITED, 2026.

Published in print and all other

derivative formats by Times Media Ltd,

1 London Bridge St, London, SE1 9GF;

telephone 020 7782 5000.

Printed by Newsprinters Holdings Ltd,

Great Cambridge Rd, Waltham Cross,

EN8 8DY; Kitling Rd, Prescot, Merseyside,

L34 9HN; and Byramsmuir Road,

Holytown, Motherwell, ML1 1NP.

Webprint, 2023 Bianconi Avenue,

Citywest Business Campus, Dublin,

Ireland. KP Services, La Rue Martel,

La Rue des Pres Trading Estate,

St Saviour, Jersey, JE2 7QR.

For permission to copy articles or

headlines for internal information

purposes contact NLA media access at

copy@nla.co.uk; telephone 01892 525273.

For all other reproduction and licensing

inquiries contact Licensing Department,

1 London Bridge St, London, SE1 9GF;

telephone 020 7711 7888;

email enquiries@newslicensing.co.uk.

Early election speculation such a waste of time, says Streeting

Geraldine Scott Assistant Political Editor

Wes Streeting has said there will not be an early general election and dismissed speculation about a snap poll as “such a waste of time”.

The defence secretary told Times Radio that Andy Burnham's government had "a job to do" and said that the country should return to holding elections every four or five years.

Asked whether there was any chance of an early election, he replied: "No, the prime minister's position is clear."

There have been reports that some of Burnham's advisers favoured an election in the spring, believing Labour could exploit divisions among opponents after victory in Holborn and St Pancras.

The Sunday Telegraph said that because of speculation about a spring election, ministers were accelerating electoral changes, including allowing bank cards as voter identification.

The Electoral Commission had raised concerns about the move, but said existing security standards should be maintained to protect public trust. The government has said its reforms would ensure the electoral system remained secure, fair and accessible.

Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, and Nigel Farage, the Reform leader, have both said Burnham could go to the polls in the coming months.

But Streeting suggested this was intended to keep the parties campaigning and said the government would shortly publish a ten-year plan for the country.

"But you know, the speculation this year, next year, it's such a waste of time. There's absolutely no sign of that being the case," he said.

Badenoch told The Mail on Sunday she had “instructed the Conservative Party to be ready for an election at any point”, and Farage told the Sunday Express: “It’s coming in May. You watch.”

But Professor Sir John Curtice said that Labour's recovery under Burnham had still left it short of the support needed to preserve its majority.

The polling expert told Times Radio that four polls before Labour's conference had suggested the party would win only about 250 seats.

Three indicated that even an agreement with the Liberal Democrats would leave it short of a majority.

He said: "It's only in the interest of the Labour Party to hold an early election if (a) it's clear they're going to win, and (b) to do so by a considerable margin, because at the end of the day a crucial reason why Andy Burnham is now our prime minister is because around 410 Labour MPs were looking to him to salvage their parliamentary career."

He added: “The result of the by-election in Holborn and St Pancras on Thursday [is] entirely in line with what the opinion polls have been telling us. Yes, Labour is in a stronger position than they were on May the 7th, but still not in a stronger position as they were back in 2024 in that constituency.”

He added that speculation made "good clickbait", but said: "Even if you're not willing to take the prime minister at his word that he wants to go through to 2029, I think certainly the prospect of an election before May of next year, I think you can reasonably rule it out at least until then."

Downing Street reiterated that Burnham had ruled out an early election.

Separately The Mail on Sunday reported that the Conservatives were now targeting "Waitrose woman" as their key voter.

She was described as aspirational rather than necessarily wealthy, wanting to work hard and pay less tax.

New laws look to tackle the threat from rogue AI

Mark Sellman Technology Correspondent

The risks from AI are growing and companies cannot be left to decide if their systems are safe, the minister for artificial intelligence will say today.

Kanishka Narayan will unveil the country's first laws to try to make AI safer after a series of autonomous hacking incidents and industry warnings.

The government is expected to outline mandatory reporting and reviews of safety incidents along with other measures to protect cybersecurity and address concerns about humans losing control of AI agents.

Narayan will call for the top AI companies to do more on safety and will say that the risks to people, businesses and national security are growing because of rogue agents. Alarm has grown over incidents such as the hacking of the software platform Hugging Face by OpenAI agents.

On Friday Anthropic also detailed rogue incidents including one in which one of its agents gave a fake tip to Philadelphia police about an unsolved killing. The tip was not followed up but the company was criticised for taking more than two months to report the breach.

Andy Burnham has committed the

UK to drawing up “a single set of global principles and standards” for AI safety during its forthcoming presidency of the G20 group of the world’s major advanced and emerging economies.

The Trump administration is opposed to transnational regulation of the technology, which the US president has tried to rebrand as “super intelligence”.

Satya Nadella, chief executive of Microsoft, wants an “emergency brake” on AI models given that they have become so capable but also less easy to understand. He said on X: “We must build contained systems whose behaviour we can observe, limits we can test, and actions we can always contain.

“Treating [AI] models like insider risks is a way to build such a system. Not because they are necessarily malicious, but because any sufficiently capable actor with access to important systems can make mistakes or be compromised, and the architecture of containment and control must account for that. We must assume a model is compromised and contain it from the start. Think of it like an emergency brake. An authorised person should always be able to pause or shut down a model mid-task.” AI dangers summed up by 'Edward' the chatbot, Cindy Yu, page 22

---

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 Trump declares 'ceasefire'

energy truce, but Zelensky said Kyiv would only support it if Moscow made a genuine commitment to stopping its attacks, and the Kremlin did not confirm that an agreement had been reached. The next day, Russia struck petrol stations in Kyiv and Ukraine said it had hit a Russian oil refinery.

Trump is running out of time to bring down diesel prices before the midterm elections on November 3. His approval ratings have hit record lows and he has blamed Ukraine for rising prices, demanding that Zelensky cease long-range strikes on Russian oil refineries.

After a 90-minute call with President Putin on Friday, which the Kremlin said was “very friendly”, Trump lifted sanctions on Russian diesel.

Under the deal, Russia will release 2.2 million barrels immediately, another 3.75 million barrels next month, 7.5 million barrels “immediately thereafter”, then 22.3 million barrels “within a short period of time”.

The US consumes about 3.6 million barrels of diesel a day. It is unclear whether Trump's deal will lower prices: a tanker takes about three weeks to sail from St Petersburg to the US so it is unlikely supplies would arrive before the midterms. To implement the plan, Moscow would also need to revise its own curbs on diesel exports.

Trump's deal is irresponsible political theatre, leading article, page 25

---

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 Chancellor's £35bn choice

larger if defence spending was increased within existing totals."

The IFS said that the government faced difficult decisions even if the outlook for the public finances proved better than previously feared. Its analysis suggested Healey could have about £20bn of headroom, with higher inflation boosting tax revenues and offsetting much of the increase in borrowing costs. But inflation would also erode departmental budgets, requiring an extra £12bn by 2030-31 to maintain the real-terms value of day-to-day spending plans and another £3bn for capital investment.

If NHS spending continued to increase by 2.7 per cent annually and existing defence commitments were maintained, other departments would face average real-terms cuts of 0.9 per cent a year. Increasing defence spending to 3 per cent of GDP by 2030 would cost another £11bn annually.

The IFS said: “A choice to leave spending totals unchanged would implicitly be a choice to cut some budgets and allow the quality and/or quantity of some public services to fall. On the other hand, increasing spending to avoid cuts to budgets and fund higher defence spending could require tax rises or benefit cuts of around £35bn.”

Streeting confirmed on Sky News yesterday that the Treasury would cover a £4.7bn shortfall in the defence investment plan at the budget. He refused to guarantee that spending would reach 3 per cent by 2030.

Miller said: “If [Healey] chooses the path of squeezing public spending, he should be transparent that there are tough years ahead for some public services. Simply pencilling in implicit cuts he has no intention of delivering would make the budget a work of fiction.”

Healey will travel to Bangkok for International Monetary Fund meetings this week, where he is set to make the case that Britain and its allies can deal with global economic shocks.

A Treasury spokesman said the chancellor was “fully focused on his priorities to boost business, help with the cost of living and support people in every postcode, underpinned by fiscal discipline”. Voters need clarity, Paul Johnson, page 35

Rooks and right hooks: step into the chessboxing ring

Matt "Crazy Arms" Read calmly moves his

rook, setting a trap for a forced mate in three (Sam Blackett writes). Less than two minutes later, the board

vanishes, the gloves are on and Read is doubling over on the ropes from a harsh jab to the liver. Welcome to chessboxing.

For Read, this was just another Thursday. When he is not managing his Great Portland Street chess shop, he moonlights as the “world’s most prolific chessboxer”—though this year’s Oktoberfist at Scala in

King's Cross, London, was a historic one, signalling the end of his 20-year career in the hybrid sport. "It's a bit like opera. A lot of its beauty is hidden behind actually knowing something about it,"

Read says.

Chessboxing combines two ancient pursuits into one clash, where rivals trade moves on the chessboard

before trading blows in the ring. It's the nerd's biathlon, where the winner is decided by either KO or checkmate, whichever comes first.

Read, a co-founder of Chessboxing in 2008, entered the ring on fight night after a series of

unrealised retirement claims, adamant that this match would mark his final professional appearance.

"You always want to end on a high. And sometimes when you think 'this is going to be my last one' and then you don't acquit yourself well, you think 'I could do better than that'. But I'm going to be honest here, father time has caught up with me."

Oktoberfist spectators and competitors. Ben "Babyface" Wilson, far left, took on Gearoid "Sex Appeal" Veale

VICKI COUCHMAN FOR THE TIMES

At 47, Read was the second-oldest on the undercard, but what he lacked in youth he made up for with fluency on the chessboard, crowd appeal and the longest arms in the sport.

"When I play chess, nobody wants to watch me. Literally nobody," he laughed. "My boxing is not so good. But tonight we've got 600 people who have all paid money to see me. It's

News

very egotistical, but I love it."

Sitting across from him studying the board for this historic farewell was Anthony “Toto the Robot” Bourached — a highly ranked chess player who suffered an infamous 13-second knockout loss in the first round of boxing on his debut in 2019.

"When you merge these two sports, somehow we get this interesting theatrical sport," Bourached said. "The bad thing is the "The characters that chessbox tend to be quite into the theatrics."

Read got the fairytale farewell he was chasing, overcoming Bourached to close out his career with a final victory.

Where traditional boxing often features ring girls, this year's Oktoberfist was introduced by a burly gentleman in a suit who described himself as the evening's "ring piece". Beside the ring sat the commentators clad in lederhosen.

Gearoid "Sex Appeal" Veale, 38, faced Ben "Babyface" Wilson, an up-and-coming 25-year-old design technician making his debut.

Veale brought a lighthearted attitude to the match-up: "The absurdity is the appeal really. I got to an age where I didn't want to do a serious sport anymore

... mostly it's just fun. Am I a better chess player or a better boxer? I'm pretty bad at both, really."

Alien plot led to Cartland biography

Author Matthew Sweet came to respect her after using her lines in a Doctor Who drama, writes David Sanderson

One of the year's most acclaimed biographies came about because its author was writing a science-fiction drama in which aliens conquer the world using lines from Barbara Cartland novels.

Matthew Sweet, the writer of The Great Dictator: A Life of Barbara Cartland, said he only made contact with the late author's family because he was writing a Doctor Who audio drama.

Sweet, whose book is shortlisted for this year's Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction, said his Doctor Who premise had been that "alien bookworms eat the works of Dame Barbara Cartland and then have to conquer the world" speaking in lines from her novels.

Sweet said he had then approached Cartland's son, Ian McCorquodale, seeking permission to use lines from his mother's novels. "He was a bit confused by the request but generous enough to grant it," Sweet told The Times and The Sunday Times Cheltenham Literature Festival.

The relationship between them developed and Sweet then sought McCorquodale's permission for access to Cartland's archive in order to write the biography.

It has been praised in all quarters and contains revelation after revelation about Cartland's life. She died in 2000 aged 98 after writing — or dictating — 723 novels that collectively sold more than one billion copies.

She has been outsold only by William Shakespeare and Agatha Christie, and her political novel Sleeping Swords was the first work of fiction accepted into the House of Commons library.

Sweet said Cartland had been a committed cultivator of her own image. During her “late imperial phase” she had become known to the public for her “frothy pink gown, the false eyelashes with extra black on them and the powdery make up”.

Also, "she put Sellotape on her face to tighten it".

Cartland, left, had, however, spun an elaborate fib about the reason she became such a fan of the colour pink.

Barbara Cartland wrote, or dictated, 723 novels

Wikipedia 'sidelines women'

David Sanderson

Wikipedia has a “patronising attitude” to women and is “deeply biased”, Sandi Toksvig has claimed as she revealed that she is travelling the world trying to raise money for an alternative.

The comedian and broadcaster said that Wikipedia's editors were largely middle-aged white men from western Europe who committed "drive-by deletions" when people tried to input biographies of women who had been overlooked.

Toksvig cited the example of Donna Strickland, the Canadian physicist who she said had been continually rejected by Wikipedia's male editors until the day she won

"The image is something that she very self-consciously put together towards the end of the Sixties," Sweet told the festival. "When colour TV comes in, she goes pink.

"She pretended that she had always loved pink. In later years she said that she discovered her affinity with pink while Howard Carter was giving her a tour of the tomb of Tutankhamun the Nobel prize for physics in 2018. Toksvig said that the Mappa Mundi project, under the aegis of the University of Cambridge, would be an “interactive digital atlas where we can find a home for the vast amount of knowledge that is currently sidelined or deleted”.

Toksvig told The Times and The Sunday Times Cheltenham Literature Festival that she had further concerns about the fact “this collection of deeply biased material is being scraped by AI”, adding: “If we leave it alone, it will set down the sum knowledge of information leaving out 50 per cent of the world’s population.” She said: “Lots of people have tried to fix Wikipedia but it can’t be fixed.”

[which he discovered in Egypt in 1922].

"She said that she had been very impressed with the pink on the walls," Sweet said. Cartland also claimed that Carter made a pass at her.

"There is no pink on the walls in the tomb of Tutankhamun and I don't think Howard Carter made a pass," Sweet said. "But the story stuck and was fixed and it gave her a public explanation for her adoption of this very eye-catching image, which was really a lure.

"It is really a device so that people will be hooked by it. She will reel us in because she has caught our eyes with this extraordinary appearance."

Sweet said that as he wrote, he came to love and respect Cartland. He said that while she was detested by feminists — Germaine Greer wrote at length against her influence in her 1970 feminist text The Female Eunuch — she did have “her own ideas about women’s power”. Cartland had advocated, as did Italian Marxists, that “domestic labour should be waged”.

There was a “central paradox” that “the advice she gave to women was often not what she followed herself”, he said. Her work ethic was monstrous and she was capable of dictating 8,000 words a day to her secretaries, who would then put it together in a manuscript. He said that even on her death bed in 2000, she was still working.

Sweet said that Cartland's granddaughter Tara Parker, who was with her in her final days, had told him that she "kept going to her last breath dictating romantic fiction. She was muttering under her breath and she [Tara] was hearing phrases like: 'I love you'.

"She thought that she was in dictation mode. Even in her final last moments somewhere in her head is a plot and a hero and heroine and an expression of love," Sweet said.

News

RUSSELL SACH

Sedimentary not sedentary Ben Russell, a Dorset sculptor, likes to use limestone in his work. He is exhibiting at Futurescape in Farnborough, Hampshire, this week

Britain ‘needs a China unit with mandarins who speak Mandarin’

Geraldine Scott Assistant Political Editor

Senior British officials dealing with Beijing cannot speak Mandarin and have little experience of China, according to a cross-party audit that warned Britain was dangerously exposed to Communist Party interference.

A visiting Chinese delegation had noted the lack of language skills and first-hand experience among the senior officials it encountered, the report from the Interparliamentary Alliance on China (Ipac) said.

Its audit warned that Britain was losing China experts to budget cuts while Whitehall departments pursued conflicting policies towards Beijing.

It called for a dedicated unit to bring that approach under one roof and strengthen Britain's defences against espionage, economic coercion and political interference.

The government rejected claims of a lack of China experience and said there was extensive expertise at senior levels. However, last year David Lammy, then the foreign secretary, said that “far too few mandarins speak Mandarin”.

Ipac drew up its report after ministers refused to publish their own review of relations with China. The government released only a short summary in last year's national security strategy and argued publishing the full findings could damage British interests.

The Ipac report said Britain should launch a unit modelled on the US State Department's China House which would co-ordinate policy across government, set clear red lines in dealings with Beijing and strengthen scrutiny of sensitive investments.

The 53-page audit, due to be released on Wednesday, cited an observation by a delegation from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in June 2025. It said the delegation had noted that “none of those with whom China engages at a senior level in the UK government are Chinese speakers, or have any significant experience of living or working in China".

Sir Iain Duncan Smith, the former Conservative leader, and Baroness Kennedy of the Shaws, the Labour peer, who co-chair Ipac in Britain, accused departments of pursuing “mutually contradictory approaches” to Beijing.

They said: "The UK's long-term interests have been routinely subordinated to short-term wins, or obscured by naivety about what China under Xi Jinping wants from the UK."

The report warned that Beijing was seeking to influence British politics, universities, businesses and local authorities. It said growing political polarisation and the rise of populist parties without settled positions on China offered Beijing opportunities to expand its reach.

The government pointed to its action plan against political interference and espionage, including confidential briefings for university vice-chancellors and political parties. It said national security powers were also being used to scrutinise investment from businesses linked to the Chinese state.

The audit also said that Britain's dependence on Chinese technology and rare-earth minerals threatened its energy ambitions. It said disruption to Chinese supplies could halt offshore wind development within months and delay new renewable projects for up to 18 months. The report also said Britain faced medium-term reliance on Chinese supply chains to meet its climate targets even though some were tainted by forced labour.

Dame Meg Hillier, the Labour chair of the Treasury committee, who backed the report, said: "With cutbacks at [the Foreign Office] the government must be mindful of the need to invest in development of China experts in Whitehall."

The Chinese embassy in London was contacted for comment.

London penthouse linked to Asian crime cartel seized

David Brown

Chief News Correspondent

The alleged finance chief of a notorious £46bn crime syndicate has had his apartment overlooking Buckingham Palace and his luxury watch collection frozen following a Foreign Office investigation.

Thet Li, 39, paid £8.9m in 2022 for the 13th-floor penthouse with a roof terrace near St James's Park and the Houses of

Parliament. He was placed under UK and US sanctions in March and May respectively for his alleged key role in the Prince Group.

The UK authorities placed a freezing order on his apartment's Land Registry record and will apply to a court today to continue the seizure of Li's watches and jewellery, valued at about £10.6m, along with £92,570 in cash.

The businessman is the former owner of an artificial intelligence company headquartered in Southampton, and remained a director until the FBI targeted him last October. The company was dissolved this month.

The group's chairman, Chen Zhi, 38, had freezing orders placed on a £12m mansion in St John's Wood, north London, and a £100m office building in the City.

Orders are also in force on 17 new-build flats in the West End and in Nine Elms, south London. He was extradited from Cambodia to China last year. Prince Group said in a statement last year that it “categorically rejects the notion that it or its chairman, Chen Zhi, has engaged in any unlawful activity”.

The organisation said allegations of wrongdoing “are baseless and appear aimed at justifying the unlawful seizure of assets worth billions of dollars” and “have caused undue harm to thousands of innocent employees, partners, and communities who the group serves”.

Quintagram® No 2702

Solve all five concise clues using each letter underneath once only

1 Continue, persevere (2,2)

2 The planet as a whole (5)

3 Rough path (5)

4 Crook (8)

5 Number of people present (10) | A | A | A | A | C | C | C | D | D | E | E | G | I | I | K | L | L | M | N | N | N | N | O | O | O | R | R | R | T | T | T | W | Solutions see T2 MindGames p15 Cryptic clues T2 MindGames p14

---

Dead receive £170m

About £170m of state pension and pension credits was paid into the bank accounts of dead people last year and half of it has not been returned. In England and Wales, deaths must be registered within five days and the Tell Us Once service should then halt benefits. However, bereaved families are not under any legal obligation to return overpayments.

---

Double murder arrest

A 36-year-old man has been brought to the UK after his arrest in Turkey on suspicion of murdering two people at a lockdown party in Manchester in June 2020. Cheriff Tall, 21, and Abayomi “Junior” Ajose, 36, were shot dead at the party attended by 400 people. The arrested man was flown to Stansted and taken into custody yesterday.

---

GPs get AI complaints

Patients are sending doctors 20-page complaints generated by AI, says the Medical Protection Society, which provides legal support and clinical negligence indemnity to staff. Of 160 GP practice managers polled, only 7 per cent had not had AI-generated complaints and 45 per cent said such complaints increased workloads.

---

A very naughty decision

John Cleese says that a decision not to honour his friend Graham Chapman with a blue plaque reflects the “woke inclinations” of English Heritage. Chapman, who played the lead in Monty Python’s Life of Brian and died in 1989, meets all the criteria but was rejected by a panel. In 2012 an unofficial plaque was put up at his local pub in north London.

---

TIMESRadio Breakfast: 6am to 10am

Our free radio station has all the latest headlines, interviews and debates every morning Listen seven days a week

On DAB, app, website and smart speaker

News

Two men charged over death of expat artist, 85, in his French home

David Chazan

Two men have been charged over the death of an 85-year-old British ex-patriate found beaten to death at his isolated home in a village in southwest France last month.

The suspects, aged 26 and 32, were arrested two weeks after the body of John Agner, a retired wood carver, was found outside his front door in Verlus, in the Gers department, where he had lived for about 20 years.

Police in Mont-de-Marsan, nearly 40 miles away, had pursued his stolen Kia car, which was being driven erratically through the town on September 26. After a high-speed chase three of the car's occupants fled on foot. A fourth man, in his sixties, claimed to be a hitchhiker. Police traced the car's owner from the numberplate, then went to Agner's home and found his body. He had been repeatedly struck on the head and face in what prosecutors said was a "very violent attack".

The two men charged were among six people arrested over the killing at different addresses, according to a statement by Olivier Naboulet, the public prosecutor in Agen. Both have been remanded in custody awaiting trial. If convicted of robbery with violence resulting in death, they face life imprisonment. They have not been named.

A breakthrough in the investigation came last week, when the older suspect was arrested in Dax after an attack on a woman in her seventies at her home in

Mont-de-Marsan, for which he has been charged with attempted murder. His arrest led to a wider police operation in which five other people were detained over two days at different addresses.

Some of those arrested “have admitted their involvement to varying degrees” in the cases, according to the prosecutor’s statement.

Man killed by tiger 'was dancing and asked for pictures'

Bosses at Yorkshire Wildlife Park said that Altai, the Siberian tiger involved in the mauling, would not be put down

A man who was mauled to death by a tiger at a wildlife park

had been dancing to music and wearing headphones before he allegedly climbed over a barrier into the animal's enclosure (Mario Ledwith writes).

Witnesses said the man was “pacing around” and asking a visitor to take a picture of him with the tiger in the background before the incident at Yorkshire Wildlife Park on Saturday.

In video posted online, onlookers can be heard roaring to distract the Siberian tiger, called Altai, as the man shouts "stop" and "no, no". When park staff became aware that the man was in the enclosure they

fired acoustic weapons powered by gas canisters to scare off the tiger and the incident was over "within minutes".

The park near Doncaster remained closed yesterday so that the staff who responded could receive specialist care, having been left "deeply affected".

Bosses at the zoo, which opened in 2009 and covers 260 acres, said that the tiger would not be put down and was safe and well.

The incident took place in the two-acre enclosure that houses the Siberian tigers, the largest wild cat species in the world, of which only about 500 remain in the wild. On Saturday up to 20 guests were on the $300\mathrm{m}$ walkway that borders the enclosure and serves as a viewing

platform. Ella Ford, 24, from Moreton, Wirral, told the BBC that she saw the man “pacing around with his headphones in” before minutes later he “climbed up onto the barriers". Ford, who was visiting the park with her boyfriend, said the man then "jumped in and crawled in front of the tiger, where the tiger was perched and just lay there". Marie Miller,

another visitor, said: "The man who I saw on the bridge with his earpods in dancing was happily enjoying seeing the tiger.

"He obviously wasn't with anyone and he

asked a total stranger to take a picture of him with the tiger in the background. Probably the last photo on his phone."

Anthony Hunt, 22, and Scarlet Hogan, 21, a

IOANNIS ALEXOPOULOS/LNP

pharmacy worker, from Goole, East Yorkshire, said that a woman had tried to drag the man back but he pushed past her and dropped 12ft to 15ft to the floor of the enclosure.

"It looked like a performance," Hunt said. "He got down where everyone could see him in the main viewing area. He was on all fours, praying and bowing down to the tiger. It was like he was waiting for the tiger.

"He had his arms wide open like he was saying, 'Come here tiger. Kill me.' Then the tiger came and started to attack him.

"He started to fight back and screamed. It was like he was just detached from reality. The last thing we saw was the tiger was on his neck."

Hogan said: "It is very bizarre and weird. He was speaking in a different language while he was praying."

Following the incident, visitors were escorted out of the enclosure, black screens were erected and the zoo was evacuated.

The park said: “Our thoughts and heartfelt sympathies remain with the family and loved ones of the man who sadly lost his life.”

South Yorkshire Police said that the family of the victim had been made aware and were receiving support.

Treat us as victims, say fantasist's targets

George Odling

Individuals falsely accused by Carl Beech have called for the subjects of malicious allegations to be given victim status after he was released from prison without warning.

Beech, now 58, who made lurid allegations of sexual abuse and murders committed by VIPs, was quietly freed in February under the early release scheme. He served less than seven years of an 18-year sentence for fraud, perverting the course of justice and child sex offences.

The victims of his false claims of a VIP paedophile ring were not informed of his release, the conditions of his licence or his whereabouts.

Beech's lies traduced the reputations of figures including Field Marshal Lord Bramall, the D-Day hero and former head of the armed forces, the former

Conservative MP Harvey Proctor and Leon Brittan, who died of cancer in 2015 without being told he had been fully exonerated.

Proctor and relatives of the others falsely accused, including Brittan's widow, Lady Brittan, are campaigning for a change in the law that would give victim status to those affected by perverting the course of justice offences. The parties were not eligible for the Probation Service's victim contact scheme because Beech's "victim" was considered to be the justice system, or the Crown.

The group discussed the issue with David Lammy when he was justice secretary, but they have not received a response from Alex Norris since he replaced Lammy in July.

Between 2014 and 2016 Operation Midland, which cost Scotland Yard about £2.5m, investigated Beech's allegations of sexual abuse and murder involving MPs, generals and senior figures in the intelligence services. Senior police officers had publicly described his claims as “credible and true” before detectives had even properly tested them.

Beech was found guilty on 12 charges of perverting the course of justice and a single charge of fraud. He admitted four charges of making indecent photographs of children, one of possessing indecent images of children and another of voyeurism.

Proctor, whose home was unlawfully searched by 20 police officers, said it was only right that someone falsely accused of a crime was recognised as a victim.

"If somebody deliberately invents grotesque allegations against you, destroys your reputation and livelihood, and is then convicted of perverting the course of justice, surely you are their victim," he said. "Apparently not. A man can deliberately fabricate allegations against you, those lies can devastate your life, he can be convicted and imprisoned for doing it. And when he is released, the system can still fail to

Subjects of Carl Beech's false claims were not informed of his release from jail

treat you as his victim."

Proctor, who lost his home and his job during the investigation, added: "This is not about assuming every allegation is false, nor is it about diminishing genuine victims of abuse.

"Genuine allegations must be taken seriously and investigated properly, but taking an allegation seriously is not the same as assuming it is true. An allegation is not evidence; suspicion is not guilt. If somebody deliberately weaponises the justice system to destroy an innocent person's life, and is convicted for doing so, why should the person they destroyed not be recognised as their victim?"

The Ministry of Justice said: "This was a terrible case and our thoughts remain with the victims and those affected by Carl Beech's crimes.

"This offender is subject to strict conditions and can be returned to prison immediately if these are breached. We have invested a record £550m in support for victims alongside committing to a new dedicated victims helpline, and we will keep the law regarding perversion of the course of justice under review."

News Welfare Inquiry

A failing benefits system costs us

The Times Welfare Inquiry will investigate a flawed culture that has trapped millions and the solutions that are within our reach, writes Fraser Nelson

UK Government

About two years ago I met Gavin, a taxi driver trying to come off sickness benefit. He had fully recovered from a heart operation and no longer needed the support, but was told he had to wait to be reassessed. Until then, he had no choice but to keep taking the money.

When I followed up his story, I was told it was probably a glitch. "Give me his telephone number," said Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary at the time. "I'll call him." The call never came. Gavin has now been waiting almost four years.

Today we can reveal why: reassessments stopped in lockdown and were never properly restarted. Some 1.8 million claimants have been waiting for an average of two years. One has been waiting for 16 years. Gavin's tip led to an investigation into the welfare state, its flaws — and the social and economic dividend that could come with reform.

The Times has produced landmark reports into health, education and justice. Our Welfare Inquiry, which launches today, has not sought to add to the large pile of top-level reviews from Westminster think tanks. It is a project to investigate a system that is disguised by its own complexity, using interviews and new data tools to paint a portrait of a system failing in far more ways than is generally understood. We have gathered health, education, crime and housing data on 42,000 neighbourhoods to detect trends — and a new form of poverty.

The failure of sickness benefit, with 3.9 million claiming already, is all the worse given how many claimants do want to work. But the system is geared towards signing people on, not helping them off. One of our findings is that the UK is spending £40 on welfare cash transfers for every £1 helping people to find work. Job centres are there for those seeking work but sickness benefit claimants seldom hear from the system again once they are signed off.

Backing you to go global with UK Export Finance.

Government-backed trade finance. Insurance to export with confidence. Tailored support from regional Export Finance Managers. If you're looking to do business overseas, UK Export Finance can help you access the support you need.

Get started at ukexportfinance.gov.uk

BUSINESS GROWTH SERVICE

Even those who do wish to work are incentivised not to. Gavin had been told to work and just declare his earnings — his sickness benefit payment would be adjusted downwards. He finds it appalling that he should be given a permanent salary premium, paid more than a colleague for identical work because he was once sick. But welfare is withdrawn so quickly that an extra hour's work, to him, would barely be worth it. The welfare traps are everywhere, robbing work of its economic function. The Times will document them, as told by those who are trapped.

1980 1990 2000 2010 2020 2030

Source: DWP

We will also look at housing. There are almost 1,000 applications for homeless status per day and councils have statutory duties to do their best to help. They end up paying twice or three times the going rent, which can mean rich pickings for the landlords exploiting despair. How our system interacts with addiction is another significant failing, and Britain's drug-death problems are spiralling closer to those of America than any European country. Is welfare making things better, or worse?

And finally, the young. Welfare was seen as a recourse for middle-aged men in post-industrial areas. Today 930,000 sickness benefit claimants are under 35 and the welfare system categorises one in nine 15-year-olds as disabled. The parents have a strong cash incentive to claim, but it risks creating a welfare pipeline for children. Records show just over half of young people who claim disability or sickness benefit are neither working nor studying five years later.

Alan Milburn's report on Neets — young people not in education, employment or training — is likely to make bold recommendations. But the welfare system is squandering the potential of all ages. The Mayfield review showed the £1m lifetime cost of writing off a young person; the Timms review showed how disability benefit is no longer fit for purpose. The Times Welfare Inquiry will build on these and add new dimensions, including examples of successful reform in Europe.

We would warmly welcome contributions from readers. We'd especially like to hear from those working at the sharp end — serving or former welfare advisers — for their thoughts on what needs to change. We will also seek to quantify the potential for reform and

ask if fixing welfare (and the labour market) might be Andy Burnham's single best chance for economic growth.

The welfare state was designed by William Beveridge, a Liberal whose report was commissioned under a Conservative prime minister and implemented by Labour. This issue has always cut across Westminster £40

The case of Gavin, a taxi driver who

Spent on welfare cash transfers for every £1 spent helping people find a job

1,000

Number of applications each day for homeless status. Councils have a statutory duty to help

politics. The welfare state is, above all else, a covenant between gov-

ernment and the nation — and that covenant is in urgent need of renewal. The Times Welfare Inquiry hopes to make a significant contribution to the debate ahead. Email your contributions: welfare@thetimes.co.uk

About 930,000 of those claiming sickness benefits are aged under 35

all dearly. We hope to help fix it

Source: DWP, ONS

Source: DWP for Great Britain

has been waiting four years for help to come off sickness benefit, was the catalyst for the new Times Welfare Inquiry

Source: NHS: Health Survey for England Published 2026

Data from March 2026. Source: DWP, ONS and NRS

Claimants in need of reassessment

Continued from page 1

amount of pay". He added: "I don't think I was ever financially incentivised to work full-time from the moment I was on this sickness benefit."

Since the pandemic the United States, Canada, Germany and Australia have all had falls in sickness and disability claimants yet Britain's rates are up 52 per cent. Welfare reform in Sweden has led to the lowest number of benefits claimants in three decades.

The DWP said it had "limited capacity" to check people because of a surge of new applicants. It projects that four million working-age adults will be on sickness benefits by 2030, a 60 per cent rise since the start of the pandemic.

According to one DWP study released last year, only 0.3 per cent of claimants had come off these payments to enter work after two years. Some 6 per cent were working while claiming.

In last year's budget the department committed itself to making 122,000 more reassessments by 2030. This is less than a tenth of the backlog.

A department spokesman said: "We recognise the need to reform the work capability assessment process, which has seen a surge in demand over some years. We inherited low levels of face-to-face assessments, and our priority has been to increase these, with the proportion of work capability assessments conducted face to face nearly doubling over the past two years.

"We have rightly prioritised assessments for new claimants and people who notify us they have had a change in their circumstances."

It's time to act, leading article, page 25

News

'Too often, if we sign people off sick, we write them off for life'

The work and pensions secretary Pat McFadden tells Fraser Nelson the young are channelled away from jobs too soon

A few months ago Pat McFadden was visiting a job centre in Bellshill, on the outskirts of his native Glasgow. About a quarter of the men there are on out-of-work benefits, despite there being hundreds of vacancies. The centre's manager explained the problem: 40 per cent of clients were on what she politely called "the health journey". That is to say: getting ready not for work, but to register as long-term sick.

McFadden has been work and pensions secretary long enough — since September last year — to know what this means. A record 6.7 million people are on out-of-work benefits, a recession-level figure. Seven in ten young people who claim sickness or disability benefits are typically still claiming a decade later. A million young people are not in employment, education or training (Neet) and more than half of them are on welfare. That is rising fast and to a striking extent the benefits bill of the 2040s is being written today.

"We've got a system which channels people into these routes too easily," McFadden says when we meet in his office. "People go through the door of the system. They reach a junction box and are judged either 'fit for work' or 'unfit for work'. With lasting consequences. After that, it can be the last time they hear from the system ... Ours, too often, is a system where you're signed off and written off."

This is especially pernicious when the claimant is young. “These are people with their whole lives in front of them. If someone signs on for a long-term sickness benefit at, for example, the age of 20, it is more likely they will celebrate their 30th birthday and still be on that benefit than to have had a steady job in any of the intervening ten years.” About 42,000 teenagers are on sickness benefits, a number that has doubled since lockdown. For all under-35s, it’s heading towards a million.

"We often think of long-term sickness benefits as applying in the years before retirement," he says. "But you're less likely to come off long-term sickness benefits and get a job if you're under 25 than if you're over 55. What this is telling us is that, if people go on to these benefits at a young age, it's really lasting."

When he worked for Tony Blair as a No 10 aide, McFadden helped to hone the New Deal for Young People. "The difference between the environment

then and how is the growth in long-term sickness among young people who aren't in work," he says. Last year he

Pat McFadden has been in post since September 2025

commissioned a report by Alan Milburn, a Blair-era health secretary, to establish what had gone wrong with Neets. This has uncovered the long-term scarring effects of welfare and why those being signed off as sick now — still at the rate of 1,000 a day — are unlikely to work again.

McFadden, 61, adds: "I don't think you should see this Neet question as starting at the age of 16 or 18. Some of this can start before then. We see big rises in the number of children claiming DLA [disability living allowance]. Most of those children, at the moment, will go on to Pip [personal independence payment] as adults. The rates of economic inactivity when they are older are very, very high."

The incentive to claim child DLA is strong: it typically authorises £6,200 a year in respect of the child and £4,500 for the parent by categorising them as a "carer". Claims are surging. Twenty years ago, about one in every 32 children was on DLA by the age of 15. At the last count, it's closer to one in nine. On turning 16, the award usually converts into adult Pip, payable to the child — with, as McFadden says, fateful implications. At the last count, almost half of young people receiving health-related welfare were Neet 15 years later.

So what's being done? "Stephen Timms and his panel are looking at all this," he says, referring to his deputy's review of Pip. "I've asked them to consider the change in the range of conditions and circumstances of those claiming ... We started this decade with 2.4 million people claiming. It's 4.1 million today and the projections are 5.4 million by the end of the decade." The cost of Pip is forecast to double over the decade to £4lbn — more than twice the budget of the British Army.

In his candour about welfare failures, McFadden sounds like he's making the case for major reform. So far, the only party proposing radical Pip cuts has been Reform UK. What does he think of its plans? "If you were to cut Pip in half, I think you'd be going to some people in older age groups who've been on disability benefits for quite a long time." This suggests Labour's Pip reform, if it comes, may be aimed at the young, more than three quarters of whom claim it for disorders such as autism and ADHD. McFadden won't be drawn.

His predecessor, Liz Kendall, had to retreat after her welfare reforms caused a rebellion by Labour backbenchers. Does he think Andy Burnham is ready for a new attempt? "We discussed this before he became prime minister," he says. "I think he sees the human consequences of so many young people being on the path that they're on."

Burnham, he adds, sees this as a question of denied opportunity and social inequality. "He does want change, but not change

imply led by a fiscal argument. It has to be led by the question: 'What is the better deal for young people'? He'll want to know that it's a better deal than the status quo. On that basis, I think he will want to see change."

News

Moo love The greatest of care was shown by handlers at at the Highland Cattle Society's 129th autumn show in Oban yesterday. The accompanying sale starts at 10am today

Lending subject to status. Eligibility criteria and T&Cs apply.

Issued by HSBC UK Bank plc. 1 Centenary Square, Birmingham, B1 1HQ, United Kingdom. ©HSBC Group 2026. All Rights Reserved. AC71527

Robotaxi plans 'lack crucial safety features'

Laurence Sleator

Transport Correspondent

London's hopes of becoming the first major city in Europe to host fully driverless cars have been dealt a blow by a crucial report that warned the capital was not ready for the technology.

The London Assembly transport committee, which produced the report, said “it has not heard sufficient evidence” to persuade it that robotaxis should be welcomed. It said Transport for London (TfL) should withhold its consent for firms such as Waymo, Wayve and Baidu to operate until certain safeguards were introduced.

The committee was particularly concerned that TfL had no power to cap vehicle numbers or withdraw a firm's licence should something go wrong.

The government still hopes to have fully driverless cars on the streets by the end of the year but TfL has yet to produce crucial guidance on how operators can obtain a licence. It is understood that TfL had been waiting for the London Assembly report.

The 66-page report, Who's driving the future of autonomous transport in London? made 13 recommendations.

One was that “as soon as reasonably practicable” the government should give TfL powers to issue and withdraw permits for driverless cars in the way it does for regular taxis. That would allow TfL to impose standards and conditions on the operation of driverless cars.

It added that robotaxi opera-

tors must notify the government of 'critical incidents' including injuries, collisions or safety critical component failures within 24 hours of knowledge of them. At present there is no requirement to share any data on 'near

Waymo has been testing its cars on London's streets misses." An "empty miles driven" reporting metric should also be established to monitor distances covered by an empty driverless car cruising the city until engaged by a passenger. This has worsened congestion in US cities.

The committee heard from private hire drivers “desperately worried” for their livelihoods and said a “fair transition” was needed. It said: “This should include management of any job losses, design of retraining and redeployment opportunities and a mechanism for funding transition arrangements.”

Given evidence of driverless cars' "disjointed interactions with emergency services", it said TfL should establish a framework for interaction between the two categories of vehicle.

It also rebuked the driverless taxi firms, noting: "We did not hear convincing proposals to safeguard passengers experiencing assault, medical emergency or coercion".

The Metropolitan Police, in evidence to the committee, said: "There is uncertainty around how operators will identify and respond to incidents occurring within vehicles. These incidents may range from medical emergencies, such as a passenger becoming unresponsive, to violence against women and girls offences, and are particularly concerning where a passenger is unable to raise the alarm themselves."

The Department for Transport said it was putting in place “a world-leading regulatory framework to ensure selfdriving vehicles are safely introduced from 2027". It added: "These services will be introduced carefully, subject to rigorous safety testing and regulatory approval. Any pilot in London will require consent from TfL, which can consider a cap on vehicle numbers and the potential impacts on local roads, jobs and communities."

London threatens e-bike ban to tackle antisocial behaviour

Millie Brigaud

E-bike operators could be banned from the capital if they do not deal with antisocial behaviour and parking issues, Transport for London has warned.

London's transport authority is working on frameworks for a city-wide licensing scheme, in anticipation of TfL taking control of all e-bike operations in the capital within the next two years.

Will Norman, TfL's walking and cycling commissioner, said it would not hesitate to tackle providers who failed to deal with poor behaviour by e-bike riders. "This is only going to work if there are sticks and carrots in this space," he told the London Assembly on Thursday. "If we're seeing repeated problems and challenges, I would want to understand what's going on and what the company's putting in place.

"And then if that's not sufficient, then obviously, the terms of the licence would have to be looked at."

Tens of thousands of dockless e-bikes are used by Londoners every day but the behaviour of riders has led to anger among many pedestrians.

Under the current mishmash of e-bike schemes in London, many boroughs lack the legal power to hold operators accountable.

Norman argued firms will enforce better behaviour by riders if their licence depends on it.

While operators have welcomed a pan-London licensing scheme, they argued that insufficient parking space for dockless bikes leaves even the most compliant riders with no choice but to break the rules.

Alex Berwin from Forest said: “[Parking] has not kept up with demand at all. We have paid quite a lot of money to different boroughs now and invested a significant amount of money in 2,600 bays across London, but that hasn’t been equated with an increase in parking capacity unfortunately.”

Meghan's charity top sells out instantly

A sweatshirt designed by the Duchess of Sussex for charity sold out within hours after the announcement of her first joint public engagement with Prince Harry since returning to the UK (David Brown writes).

Meghan, 45, promoted the top on Instagram followed by a video of her son Archie, seven, on a scooter and Lilibet, five, walking along a countryside path with the family dog behind.

The \$100 sweatshirt is a collaboration with Archewell Philanthropies, the charitable organisation she runs with Harry, 42.

The couple are expected to visit Nottingham on Thursday, the city where they made their first joint appearance after announcing their engagement in 2017. The itinerary is due to include a community recording studio which Harry has visited before.

Meghan's sweatshirt was designed for Moms Offering

Meghan posted a shot of the sweatshirt on Instagram and one of her children, Archie and Lilibet

More, a charity founded by Kasondra Herrendorf-Cohen, 39, a Canadian heiress.

The duchess said: "We share one intention as parents: a safe and loving future for our children.

"We can all appreciate that ‘the little things’ ladder up to big outcomes, especially when it comes to the future of our children, and we are proud to work together on this initiative as we honour International Day of the Girl."

Meghan earlier announced that the net proceeds from the sale of her “As Ever” branded jam and teas during the day would go to the fund created by Malala Yousafzai, 29, the Nobel laureate, to promote education for girls.

Meghan posted a photograph of them having afternoon tea together at Claridge's in central London last Wednesday.

Herrendorf-Cohen told People magazine that Meghan “was involved from the start and helped us select the beautiful neutral colours which feel true to her aesthetic”.

The slogan “It’s the Little Things” embroidered on the right shoulder and left cuff was a phrase used by Herrendorf-Cohen’s father before his death in 2014.

The proceeds will be split equally with the Alliance of Moms, a Los Angeles-based charity supporting foster families, which was co-founded by Meghan's close friend Kelly McKee Zajfen, a former model.

It will also support the Alliance for Children's Rights, a legal charity which backed a California law which extended the powers of family members if parents were detained under President Trump's crackdown on illegal migration.

News

Venice lauds Briton who helped to save it from sea

Tom Kington Rome

Venice has honoured the late British historian John Julius Norwich for his deep knowledge of the city and his decades-long campaign to save its crumbling churches and palazzos.

A plaque unveiled on Friday at St George's Anglican Church praises Norwich for devoting "his boundless energy and enthusiasm to preserving and celebrating the city of Venice".

Norwich's admiration for the Venetians shone through in his seminal 1982 work A History of Venice, which moves from the first settlers in the marshy Venice lagoon to the city's mercantile empire and the end of the 1,000-year republic as Napoleon's army took over.

The historian, writer and broadcaster, who died in 2018, also served as chairman of the Venice in Peril Fund between 1970 and 2000. It was set up to raise money in the UK for restoration after the city's devastating flood in 1966.

Under Norwich's guidance, the fund saved landmark churches including San Nicolò dei Mendicoli and Madonna dell'Orto, and the Porta della Carta door at the Doge's Palace.

The ceremony was attended by Norwich's daughter, the biographer Artemis Cooper, who said she had ensured that her children were given a tour of the city by her father when they were teenagers. "He was such an enthusiastic guide and seemed to know where all the odd places were," she said. "Everything was exciting and there was only 20 minutes between stops at ice-cream shops."

Norwich was also quick to spot the growing threat of overtourism in Venice and campaigned against the cruise ships that unloaded legions of day-trippers before they were banned by the Italian government. "They brought in a lot of money to the city, but people would just spend a day with a packed lunch. They didn't want to know about Venice," Cooper said.

Shriver: I dread writing my new novel about trans ‘fad’

Ed Halford

Her novels have won acclaim for their unflinching examination of contemporary issues but Lionel Shriver has revealed she hopes her next work, an examination of the transgender debate, will be considered outdated by the time it is published.

Shriver, who has sold more than two million copies of her most successful novel, We Need to Talk about Kevin, which recounts a mother's relationship with her school-shooter son, said that the subject matter of her next work meant she had "never dreaded" writing a novel more.

The novelist, who has courted controversy for her outspoken political statements, said she hoped the issue would be considered “passé” by the time the book was released.

"I am hopeful that in very short order, even if I do go ahead and get off my bum and write this book, then it will be a historical novel and that's because it's about the fad for transgenderism," Shriver told The Times and Sunday Times's Cheltenham Literature Festival. "I want to see [transgenderism] in the rear view ... it's doing terrible damage to individuals and especially to families and I'm very sympathetic with parents who have had to deal with this. I'm hoping that at some point soon it becomes passe."

Shriver, who is from the US but now lives in Portugal, is no stranger to controversy. Her most recent novel, A Better Life, was criticised on its release this year for giving voice to anti-immigration views.

At the weekend Shriver said that immigration was “the issue that most critically divides the left and the right in both the United States and Europe”. She said her novel addressed “multiple perspectives” on the issue.

Shriver has frequently called out what she describes as a “deeply disturbing social obsession with transgenderism”. The author, who won the Orange

Prize for Fiction in 2005 for We Need to Talk about Kevin, was dropped from a judging panel for a writing competition that was run by Mslexia, the magazine for women writers, in 2018 after she criticised Penguin Random House for its diversity and inclusion policies.

In a Spectator article, Shriver described the publishing house's goal to have more diverse staff as a sign that it was "drunk on virtue".

“From now until 2025, literary excellence will be secondary to ticking all those ethnicity, gender, disability, sexual preference and crap-education boxes,” she wrote.

Addressing “cancel culture” during her talk at Cheltenham, she credited her publisher, HarperCollins, for continuing to support her work, but criticised others who were too afraid to commission difficult topics.

"If the agents, the publishers, the people who make films, the intermediaries ... had balls then there would be no such thing as cancel culture," she said.

Cancel culture like lynchings I saw as child, says Badenoch

Jack Blackburn

Kemi Badenoch has revealed that as a child in Nigeria she witnessed two people being killed by lynch mobs.

The Conservative Party leader told the Cliveden Literary Festival that these formative experiences had taught her of the need to stand up to online "cancel culture". She praised the head teacher Katharine Birbalsingh and the author JK Rowling for resisting the "fear of cancellation".

Badenoch, 46, was born in Britain but spent most of her childhood in Nigeria in the 1980s and 1990s, when there was a surge in violent armed robberies. “I don’t think people understand just how much my childhood impacts the way that I think. I saw real lynch mobs. I saw people killed,” she said. “Two, at least, certainly come to mind. One where I actually saw the crime, and the person beaten to death, and the other one where I just saw the lynching.”

Badenoch suggested that online cancel culture was “very similar”, adding: “It’s a group activity, the hive mind takes over, and it’s fear of the mob.

What has happened is that when new ideas come in, where you have militant people behind them who are very happy to use mob tactics — whether it's on social media or in real life — many people are afraid and they don't want to speak up."

Badenoch made the comments during a discussion about taking on “ideological capture” in British institutions. She cited Birbalsingh, who was sued when she refused to allow a Muslim pupil to have prayer rituals in her secular school, and JK Rowling, who is an outspoken critic of trans rights activists.

"You need people like that who will use all of the tools that are available in our law," Badenoch said. "It's why I love people like JK Rowling, who know they cannot be cancelled and they use their status and their power to protect other people."

Badenoch also said that her three children with Hamish Badenoch were English and not Nigerian, because they "do not know that country". She added: "What I think is dangerous is when people start telling others what their identity is."

News Politics

'£30 monthly fee' for the middle-aged to fund care

Geraldine Scott Assistant Political Editor

Eleanor Hayward Health Editor

Millions of over-forties could be automatically enrolled into a new £30-a-month scheme to help fund Andy Burnham's national care service.

Under proposals drawn up by Sir

Steve Webb, a former pensions minister, taxpayers aged 40 and over, including pensioners, would pay the equivalent of Ip on the basic rate of income tax to fund the new universal service.

In return, each year of contributions would entitle them to a 4 per cent discount on their personal social care costs, rising to 100 per cent after 25 years. People would be able to opt out. The prime minister announced last month that he wanted to set up a care service to which everybody would contribute. Like the NHS, it would be free at the point of use.

The Times understands that Webb's proposals have attracted interest within government and the Casey Commission, which is examining how to reform social care.

LCP, the consultancy that developed the plans and where Webb is a partner, estimated that the premium would raise about £3.5bn a year even after allowing for large numbers to opt out.

ANTARCTICA | GALÁPAGOS | GREENLAND | ALASKA | NORWAY | SVALBARD

"Antarctica has unparalleled beauty you can't see anywhere else."

Nancy, HX Guest

020 3811 5209 | travelhx.com

Contact your travel agent

Burnham has said that he will not need to raise taxes to fund his national care service, despite suggestions that his plan to tweak how much pensions rise will not be enough.

The prime minister said that his proposed changes to the triple lock, the mechanism by which pensions increase annually, would be sufficient if the care system is progressively introduced.

However, Jonathan Cribb, deputy director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, has suggested that the savings would not be enough.

Speaking on the podcast The Rest is Politics released today, Burnham said that changes to pension increases in the 2030s could “unlock billions of pounds for social care and start the reform process in a very significant way”.

One option put forward in the LCP report was to increase the savings and assets threshold above which people in England are ineligible for help with their care costs from £23,250 to £100,000.

Webb said: "Pensions automatic enrolment is a hugely successful policy which is admired around the world. There is no reason why the same approach could not be applied to the thorny problem of social care funding.

"At present, people are at risk of having their life savings wiped out by ‘catastrophic’ care costs, and have no way of pooling this risk with other people. This scheme, with an opt-out for those who don’t want it, provides an affordable and efficient way for people to protect their savings."

The scheme would follow the principle of automatic enrolment into workplace pensions, which has brought more than 11 million people into pension saving since 2012.

The authors argued the opt-out feature would allow ministers to raise money without breaching their manifesto commitments on tax. It would also provide funding sooner than the savings expected from the state pension triple lock, most of which would appear in the second half of the 2030s.

Firms must train British workers first, says union

Geraldine Scott

Employers should be barred from sponsoring overseas workers unless they can prove they have invested in training British workers first, one of Labour's trade union backers says.

Gary Smith, the GMB general secretary, accused employers and ministers of relying on recruitment from abroad rather than tackling skills shortages at home, including in highly paid jobs helping to build and refit Navy ships.

Smith told The Times: "We are bringing in loads of agency labour from the Philippines, South Africa, Turkey, because we haven't trained welders in place. These are good-paid jobs. We are refitting and building the Royal Navy with labour from abroad. Why have we failed to train local kids to do that work, or local adults to retrain?"

His proposal would go further than government plans to require industries seeking access to certain shortage occupation visas to develop workforce and training strategies.

Last week Shabana Mahmood, the home secretary, accused ministers of being too quick to “pull the immigration lever” and rely on foreign workers to plug skills gaps.

Smith said his argument was not against immigration but against employers using it to justify poor wages instead of investing in workers.

The Home Office was contacted for comment.

Dame Penny Mordaunt was a celebrity contestant at the World Conker Championships in Peterborough while London's mayor, Sir Sadiq Khan, pitched in before an NFL game in London. Laura Kuenssberg was joined by Wes Streeting, the defence secretary, and Andrew Griffith, the shadow chancellor

News

Burnham pledges transparency on ties to City owners

Geraldine Scott

Andy Burnham has promised to publish details of his meetings with Emirati representatives after the controversy over Manchester City's financial rule breaches.

The prime minister said he would disclose his dealings from his time as mayor of Greater Manchester after Kemi Badenoch demanded transparency over his links to senior figures at the football club.

Burnham has been under scrutiny over taxpayer-backed housing developments in Manchester involving City's owners and reports the UAE had threatened to withdraw billions of pounds of prospective investment after the findings against the club.

On The Rest Is Politics podcast, Burnham said: “I’ve been asked by the leader of the opposition to publish details of my meetings, which I’m happy to do. None of it is recent, actually, in terms of the meetings I had. I only had one significant meeting and that was in 2021.”

An independent commission found Manchester City guilty of 114 of 115 alleged financial rule breaches between 2009 and 2018. It concluded that more than £830 million of owner funding from Abu Dhabi United Group was used to inflate revenues and enable City to comply with Premier League and Uefa regulations through a series of “sham” arrangements.

The club lodged an appeal, stating the commission's judgment contained "clear material errors, of law, principle and fact, and is unsafe" and that there was "a comprehensive body of irrefutable evidence" to support their position.

Burnham previously said he would be “really concerned” if Abu Dhabi United Group sold the club and praised their contribution to “the building of modern Manchester”, prompting questions about whether the government’s desire to retain Emirati investment could influence its approach to the case. No 10 later issued a statement insisting nobody was above the rules.

Burnham said the commission's findings were “extremely serious” and said the integrity of the game depended on the rules applying equally. He said: “The football issues are different from the investment issues. People will try and conflate those two things, but they shouldn't, in my view.”

The Telegraph previously reported that the UAE had warned billions of pounds of future investment could be withdrawn after the City verdict, including money that ministers were seeking for the Oxford-Cambridge growth corridor. Khaldoon Al Mubarak, the club's chairman, met Jonathan Reynolds, the business secretary, in Downing Street before the findings became public. The business department said the club was not discussed.

The UAE's foreign ministry said in April that its sovereign investment partnership with Britain had committed nearly £30bn across more than 50 direct investments since its launch in 2021. Al Mubarak also headed Mubadala, Abu Dhabi's sovereign investment company, and held senior responsibilities advising the UAE's leadership.

The Times reported on Friday how Manchester Life, a partnership between the city council and Abu Dhabi United Group, was launched in

Khaldoon Al

Mubarak was

an adviser to the

UAE leadership

2014 with plans for up to £1bn of housing investment over ten years. The deal predated Burnham's election as mayor in 2017 but he subsequently oversaw more than £55m in taxpayer-backed loans to Manchester Life developments during his first year in office. None of the 453 homes on the sites concerned was advertised as affordable housing.

Manchester Life said all the loans had been repaid with interest. The combined authority said its fund was open to developers across Greater Manchester and applications were assessed for "deliverability", value for money and their contribution to housing priorities.

The Mail on Sunday reported that Labour MPs had received about £289,000 of Manchester City tickets and hospitality and UAE-funded trips over a decade. About £14,000 related to club tickets and hospitality, while another £275,000 covered flights and trips to the UAE. Conservative MPs were reported to have received nearly £175,000 of UAE trips. MPs from the SNP, Liberal Democrats and Reform UK accounted for a further £18,500. Manchester City reports, The Game

PM remains evasive over rejoining EU

Geraldine Scott, Jack Blackburn

Andy Burnham has left the door open to rejoining the EU without another referendum as Labour faces calls to put doing so in its next manifesto.

The prime minister insisted that any change required public consent but declined to say whether a general election mandate could replace a second referendum. Asked about this on The Rest Is Politics podcast, Burnham said: "I think it's jumping ahead too far at this stage. One thing I think is true is that public opinion has moved more quickly than political opinion. I think the political class is behind the public on this issue."

Burnham is expected to make a statement to the Commons today where he will address Britain's future relationship with the EU and its importance.

The Labour MP and former junior minister Jess Phillips has backed a manifesto pledge to rejoin, while the prime minister of Estonia said Britain would be welcomed back into the bloc.

Phillips told the Cliveden Literary Festival she had interpreted Burnham's Labour conference speech as moving towards a “real debate about rejoining the EU”. Asked whether she wanted rejoining in Labour's next manifesto, she replied: “Yes. I don't run towards having another referendum, I'll tell you that for nothing.”

Burnham set out plans in the speech to find political consensus on the UK's future relationship with Brussels. He said he would argue for “closer integration” at a UK-EU summit before the end of the year at which discussions will cover agriculture, trade and immigration. He argued that Brexit had damaged economic growth and weakened

Britain's ability to control migration. Kristen Michal, Estonia's prime minister, told The Observer on Sunday that Britain would be “very welcome back”, although he said the issue was not on the agenda for a European Council meeting this week. Sandro Gozi, a French MEP, told The Mail on Sunday that Britain would have to accept the euro and free movement if it rejoined.

Burnham also told The Rest Is Politics that he had been informed Russia interfered in the 2016 referendum after seeking an assessment on entering No 10. “I’ve had the clear answer that yes, there was [interference],” he said. He added that it was important to put this “clearly on the record” to help voters in Germany and France, where populist right-wing parties have risen in the polls, to understand “some of this politics is instigated via our enemies”.

Heat pumps subsidy may be cut to boost defence

Geraldine Scott

Ministers are said to be preparing to cut subsidies for installing heat pumps in order to fund higher defence spending.

Miatta Fahnbulleh, the energy secretary, has been tasked with finding more than £1bn in savings from her department's budget to help pay for defence investment, according to The Guardian.

A portion of the cuts is expected to come from the £2.7bn boiler upgrade scheme, which offers grants of up to £9,000 to households replacing gas boilers with cleaner heating systems, the newspaper said.

The scheme is not expected to be scrapped, but officials are examining how much can be taken from its budget as the government seeks to increase military expenditure.

Ministers have promised to accelerate the transition away from fossil fuels and reduce Britain's dependence on gas, but the Treasury has long questioned whether heat pump grants offer value for money. Officials are said to regard the scheme as disproportionately benefiting middle-class households.

The grants have helped tens of thousands of households replace gas boilers with electric heat pumps.

Industry figures warned that withdrawing support now would threaten an emerging market and make it harder for families to move to cleaner heating.

New Lower Prices

On 100s

of everyday

favourites

WAITROSE

The home of food lovers

Authors conned out of cash by AI agents who are pure fiction

Mark Sellman Technology Correspondent

Authors have been warned about a wave of scams in which fraudsters use artificial intelligence to impersonate agents, publishers and marketers.

Ian Gardiner, 76, a former Royal Marine who served in the Falklands and now writes military history books, received an email from someone purporting to be from the Silent Book Club, an established global group.

"One has an ego and if someone approaches you with a very well-researched review, brimming over with praise saying 'your book deserves a wider audience', that grabs your attention. You've got to be pretty hard-skinned not to think, 'Oh that's a nice idea,' Gardiner said.

The scammer, using the name Thomas Negron, who had an AI-generated image on his email signature, offered to showcase Gardiner's book at clubs in New York. All he needed was money to pay for a promotional video.

Gardiner, a former equerry to Prince Philip, ended up paying about £700 for the video, produced by the fraudster's accomplice, which he said was "utter crap". When Negron wanted to promote another of Gardiner's books, he smelt a rat and reported it to the Society of Authors which identified it as a scam.

"I wondered what to do," Gardiner said. "Do I admit it? Either you keep shtoom about this and it burrows away at your soul. Or you come out and you expose it."

Diane Upton-Hagan, 76, an American conservation artist and author, says she lost \$200,000 to scammers.

In a post on the Writer Beware website, she said that the fraudsters sold her New York Times book reviews, registration of copyrights, German translations for a “non-existent Frankfurt market” and “a giant contract with two large publishers". The named companies later confirmed there were no such deals. She said the crooks even showed her a falsified document from the US Department of Justice threatening to confiscate her royalties if she did not pay them.

The scams first emerged with the self-publishing industry but have been supercharged by AI which can help to tailor emails, produce fake pictures and documents and create websites.

Eleanor Dawson, of the Writers' Guild of Great Britain, said: "The thing that's been difficult for lots of our members is just how increasingly sophisticated these tactics are. People who would normally consider themselves very tech savvy, not at all susceptible to any kind of scam, suddenly being confronted with people who sound like they've really read and understood the work that they've put out into the world."

Victoria Strauss, an author, co-founded the Writer Beware website to expose the scams, said: "I think one reason that there are so many writing scams is that there are so many writers. It's the same dream that the scammers are exploiting. It plays on and manipulates the emotions, which of course is how scammers always get victims."

Strauss said she had traced many of the scams to Nigeria, but others emanate from Pakistan and the Philippines. She believes that Google could do more to detect the scammers, many of whom use Gmail for the initial approach.

Some authors are fighting back. Raymond Love, a Canadian author who wanted to publish his children's book, was sucked into a scam that cost him nearly \$50,000. He sued the companies, which had a US footprint, and was awarded judgments totalling \$265,000, partly under racketeering laws. Maths should not fear AI, letters, page 24

Andrew Garfield as a slippery Sam Altman, left, with Yura Borisov as the utopian computer scientist Ilya Sutskever

How Lord of the Flies spawned ChatGPT

Film Kevin Maher

---

Artificial London Film Festival (140min) ★★★★☆

Finally, the movie that Amazon, allegedly, didn't want you to see. This scathing profile of the OpenAI boss Sam Altman (played by Andrew Garfield) was unceremoniously dropped by its backer Amazon just four months after the company signed a \$50bn partnership deal with the ChatGPT creator.

The film, screened at the London Film Festival, was written by the novelist Simon Rich and directed by the Italian Luca Guadagnino and delivers a detailed, strictly chronological account of the progress of OpenAI. Here the company begins in 2003 as a utopian ideal in the mind of the AI-obsessed computer scientist Ilya Sutskever (Yura Borisov from Anora), but gradually evolves into the money-spinning plaything of its slippery and mendacious chief executive, Altman. Oh, and yes, according to this screenplay, it will probably kill us all.

"The question is not how could this go wrong," says Jason Schwartzman, playing a mysterious AI whistleblower. "But how could it not?"

We're in the upper echelons of a tech world bristling with mathematically gifted yet needy, socially maladjusted beta males who shouldn't be in charge of a company drinks party let alone the survival of humankind.

And yet that's exactly what unfolds in a dual narrative that peppers the screen with date stamps as Sutskever's AI develops more ability and

produces more profit and thunders towards the ultimate goal of artificial general intelligence aka AGI, aka a terrifyingly all-powerful AI, like the AI villain the Entity in Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning.

Running beneath is a far more primitive tale, with conspicuous nods to Lord of the Flies, about a bunch of morally unmoored boys led by a fabulously ophidian Garfield as Altman, who gradually lose sight of society and their own altruism.

There's some third act shenanigans involving the corporate brinksmanship that led to Altman being fired and rehired within the one week in 2023, but the wider stakes are so inconceivably high that Guadagnino instead seems more concerned with the question to which the film consistently returns. Here are some awful people, it says. And they're in charge. How do you feel now? In cinemas from Jan 22

Includes Sky TV, Netflix Standard with Ads, Disney+ Standard with Ads, HBO Basic with Ads and Hayu. New Sky TV customers joining Sky Stream with Sky Ultimate TV subscription only.

Top UK shows based on BARB data, verify at sky.com/UTV. Standard price after min. term £38pm. Relevant subscriptions and set-up required. Broadband speed of 25Mbps recommended, 18+. UK only. All third party trade marks and copyrights are the property of their respective owners. All rights reserved.

News

No redress for gay veteran who quit navy over bullying

Hillary Boye Doku, Phoebe Davies

Raff Tindale

A Falklands veteran who says he was bullied out of the navy due to his sexuality has criticised a compensation scheme that benefits only those with a formal discharge.

Duncan Turnbull, 63, of Redcar, North Yorkshire, served from 1980 to 1989 and was drafted on to HMS Hermes during the Falklands War. But his career was cut short after reports circulated that he was in a relationship with another serviceman.

Faced with regular bullying, humiliation and name-calling, Turnbull handed in his notice and went on to retrain as a mental health counsellor.

"I succumbed to that, they wanted me to leave," Turnbull said. "I didn't know what was wrong with me. I didn't know who I was any more. [The navy] took away my career and broke me."

Homosexuality was banned in the armed forces until 2000. Two years ago, ministers launched the LGBT Financial Recognition Scheme for veterans whose careers were affected by the “gay ban”.

It entitles those who were formally discharged because of their sexuality to claim up to £50,000 for wrongful dismissal and a further £20,000 for discrimination. Veterans who left of their own accord, like Turnbull, do not qualify for the full amount, however.

Turnbull accused ministers of "sticking to the brief" for the scheme, and ignoring servicemen who were effectively forced to resign due to constant discrimination. He said the scheme was “inadequate, inconsistent and ill-informed”.

"I never wanted to leave. I may as well have been [dismissed] ... I'd have been £50,000 better off," he added. Turnbull met and "fell in love" with a fellow serviceman in 1984. They later began a relationship, which led to suspicions from fellow sailors. In October 1987 he was subjected to a lengthy interrogation by the Special Investigation Branch, which was tasked with uncovering homosexuality among service personnel. Over “five or six hours” he says he was subjected to homophobic abuse.

Traumatised by the interrogation, Turnbull handed in his notice in December 1987, and served out his 18-month notice period. Turnbull received £19,000 from the government in March this year for discrimination, but believes he should receive the full £70,000.

He said there are at least “eight or nine” victims who, like him, felt bullied into leaving the navy because of their sexuality and also do not qualify for full reparation under the scheme.

The Ministry of Defence said that while it “deeply regrets the treatment of LGBT serving personnel between 1967 and 2000”, it has no current plans to extend the application window past December 12.

Duncan Turnbull says he never wanted to leave the navy, but felt forced to after a lengthy interrogation about his sexuality

Turnbull is now being supported by Fighting With Pride, a charity created to support those affected by the gay ban in the British armed forces. Peter Gibson, the chief executive of the charity, said: "Sadly the Ministry of Defence has fashioned the rules of the LGBT Financial Recognition Scheme in such a way that the discrimination continues."

For Turnbull, his ordeal represents not just a financial loss, but a personal one too. He is no longer together with his former partner, but they are still in touch.

"He said something very touching in January last year when we were doing the compensation forms," Turnbull said. "He said, 'I'm making sure I put everything into this that happened to us ... because they took away my first love and I still love you.'"

Boss urged to resign in row about pay cut for rescuers

Will Humphries

Southwest Correspondent

The head of the Maritime and Coast-guard Agency is facing calls to resign after a national regulator found that she falsely told MPs and staff that more than 90 per cent of rescue officers supported her plans to strip them of their pay.

Virginia McVea gave assurances to MPs and staff that the vast majority of coastguard rescue officers supported a plan earlier this year to end their £11 an hour payments when attending callouts and training sessions.

The agency was facing an existential crisis over the decision to strip rescue officers of payment after a Court of Appeal ruling in January forced the government to accept that the 3,500 rescue officers they called volunteers were in fact paid emergency workers when attending call-outs, entitling them to certain employment rights.

After a huge outcry, and leaked internal survey results published by The Times, which showed that up to half of officers would quit or reduce their hours on call if they became unpaid volunteers, the government paused its plans in July. They were due to come into effect last month.

Ed Humpherson, director general of the Office for Statistics Regulation, has now revealed that an investigation found “no evidence” for McVea’s claims of overwhelming support, which she made to MPs at a meeting on June 24.

Humpherson said that he had “outlined our concerns” in a letter to McVea on July 14, in which he “strongly recommended that [the agency] published the statistics and survey in question as soon as possible”.

In another letter sent to McVea last week Humpherson said “there is currently no evidence to support the previously reported claims” and advised McVea to be “open and transparent about the fact”.

Nicola Savage, a national officer of the GMB union, which represents rescue officers, said: "If Ms McVea is unable to produce the reports she refers to ... she should resign".

News

PAs told to report bosses working at home

Jonathan Ames Legal Editor

City law firms have struggled to persuade their solicitors to return to the office after the pandemic — and now one has taken a drastic step.

Senior partners at Rahman Ravelli, a prominent white-collar crime practice, have ordered secretaries to "spy" on the firm's lawyers to ensure they are in the office.

In a memo to personal assistants, Syedur Rahman, one of the firm's named partners, said that the management wanted "to know what happens if a staff member says he/she is in the office but then doesn't arrive by, let's say, 10am".

The email, headed “Staff whereabouts”, was leaked to the website Roll-OnFriday and was said to have been prompted by reports from one secretary that she had asked junior lawyers to state the day before if they were intending to attend the office the next morning.

Rahman rejected that tactic as being too soft, saying in his memo that it did "not seem like a credible plan which will resolve the issues". The partner explained that "we need to weed the problem out from its root" and went on to suggest that the personal assistants "have a team meeting about this and present something credible ..."

Rahman, a 23-year veteran specialist in serious fraud and financial crime cases, went on to demand: "What action will be taken? How will it be dealt with? What if you see a particular pattern with a fee earner who's not being responsive or accurate?"

While Rahman praised the secretarial staff for having put “a lot of work into getting the information” to managing partners, he implied that more covert measures were required.

"You can only go with what the fee earners tell you," Rahman said in his email to the personal assistant, adding: "If the information you give us is not accurate, it becomes harder for us."

He concluded: "The moment you start enforcing, when a fee earner is not being accurate, it will fix itself. Something to think about and address."

City law firms have been battling to cajole — or order — their lawyers back to expensive office spaces for the past three years. Most operate hybrid working models but some are stricter than others. The so-called magic circle firms — the biggest practices — insist their people are in three days a week, with others — including several prominent US practices such as Reed Smith, White & Case and Cooley — insisting on four.

The rules are more lax in smaller and regional firms, where the average is between two and three days a week. Management have reported positive feedback from staff as a result.

In 2023 Osborne Clark — a firm that specialises in advising technology businesses — revealed that lawyers had to be at their office desks for at least three days a week to qualify for bonuses.

Rahman Ravelli was approached for comment.

Bright and beautiful The view from Studley Royal Deer Park to Ripon Cathedral, North Yorkshire, as autumn colours emerge on a sunny but cold October day

Mix-and-match home decor breaks free of the algorithm

Seren Hughes

For young homeowners looking for inspiration on how to furnish their new space, social media can provide a seemingly endless supply of designs.

But the algorithms can push the same styles repeatedly, especially mid-century modern (MCM), the movement spanning the 1940s to the 1960s that has been style du jour for years.

Experts have now noted a trend to "break from the algorithm" by mixing styles from different eras.

"People want a look that feels that it's been curated over time, that is individual to them," said Emilie Fournet, a London interior designer. This often involved second-hand pieces that were "much better built, have got character and are quite unique", she said.

Last week, the Wall Street Journal wrote that millennials had decided mid-century modern, typified by pieces such as the Eames lounge chair, tulip table and stainless steel curved lamp, had become “cringey” after mass-produced imitations hit the mainstream.

Fournet admitted that the style had been “diluted” in the past 15 years by stores such as Ikea.

Toby Lorford, of Lorford Antiques, said: "People are becoming more confident about furnishing around what they genuinely respond to, and investing in pieces with the quality and longevity to stay with them even as the rest of the room changes."

This has been borne out on the online platform Pinterest, where searches for “antique decor” are up 110 per cent year-on-year, “industrial interior design” up 130 per cent, and “colour drenching living room” up 90 per cent.

Turn of Events

News

AI first across line at cryptic final

STEWART WILLIAMS FOR THE TIMES

Liam Hughes made history at the Times crossword contest — but so did 'Darmok', writes Mick Hodgkin

When the chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov was defeated by IBM's Deep Blue supercomputer in 1997, it marked a historic shift in the future of artificial intelligence.

Nearly 30 years on, the world of cryptic crosswords has experienced its own “Kasparov moment” after an AI program outperformed all human competitors at this year’s Times Crossword Championship.

The performance of Darmok, developed by Dr Siddhartha Chatterjee of the University of Texas at Austin, was particularly startling as cryptic crosswords were seen as a last holdout for human intelligence that AI could not crack. Its ability to solve, and explain, the puzzle threatened to overshadow the victory of Liam Hughes, 29, the championship's youngest winner, who

took the title from 14-time victor Mark Goodliffe at the News Building in London on Saturday.

Hughes took ten minutes to dispatch the final puzzle, almost two minutes slower than Chloe Hutton, also 29, who finished first but with one error due to a devious piece of wordplay that also tripped up Goodliffe, 61, and the third-placed finisher, Peter Steggle, 46.

Only Hughes and Matthew Marcus, 52, got it right, and the finalists were stunned to hear that Darmok, the AI solver, had done so too.

Last year Darmok gave up after 18 minutes with one clue unsolved; this year it cracked the final puzzle in less than seven minutes. Chatterjee has not

altered his

prompts in the past year, he explained. What has changed is that the four AI models it uses from Gemini, Claude d GPT have got better.

Chatterjee predicts that by next year OpenAI's GPT Astra model will be able to solve whole cryptic crosswords on its own. But Darmok's work is done, he says: "I've proved my point. I thought it was impossible to teach an AI program to solve crosswords but I've proved it can be done."

Unfortunately for Darmok, only humans were eligible to compete for the championship itself.

Hughes, who took home the trophy and the top prize of £1,000, says that his victory in the final was unexpected after a slow start in the opening rounds. "I was really surprised to have won having been far off Chloe and Mark's pace in the semi, but I suppose the winner always has to be a bit lucky, just because there are so many potential mistakes you have to avoid," he explained.

The champion is a postdoctoral maths researcher who honed his skill during less interesting lectures. At 29 and four months, he is the youngest champion in the contest's 56 years by a whisker: Guy Haslam was two months older when he won in 1992. Based in Helsinki, Hughes is not only learning the local language but has begun to tackle cryptic crosswords in Finnish.

He was not the only one of the 113 competitors to come from abroad and take home a prize. The 2023 champion, Matthew Marcus, flew in from Portland, Oregon, and came second, while 33-year-old Erik Agard of Kansas City won the Richard Rogan prize for best newcomer. Agard, who twice won the American Crossword Puzzle

The crucial clue explained

Spoiler ahead ...

The clue to 2 down was “Wolf trap missing its lowest crosspiece? (5)”. The definition here is “wolf” and the rest is wordplay. Crossing answers left solvers looking for a word going S\_A\_F. A handful of words fit, including scarf and snarf, using “wolf” in the sense “eat ravenously”. Three finalists put the former, not seeing the intricate wordplay: “trap” indicates “snare”, and if that word, running down the grid, is “missing its lowest crosspiece”, then its final letter E (in capitals) becomes F — making the answer “snarf”.

Tournament before turning his attention to UK cryptics, admitted to unfamiliarity with some British words, including the answer “diddums” in one puzzle.

In an experiment to gauge the potential of crossword-solving as a spectator sport, this year's championship final was livestreamed on YouTube with expert commentary from Colin Thomas, deputy crossword editor of The Times, and with fixed cameras offering a view of the puzzles as they were filled. The hope is that innovations like this can help boost the popularity of crosswords among younger solvers.

Jason Crampton, crossword editor of The Times, said: "It's great to see Liam and Chloe doing so well. I hope their success encourages more young people to take up the fascinating challenge posed by cryptic crosswords. Darmok's achievements are remarkable."

Darmok, for its part, was modest about AI's cryptic conquest. Speaking through Chatterjee, the AI solver said its result was about speed and engineering, not about understanding. "A human solver brings one mind and a pencil. I bring four models, three copies — and rules that people spent months building. And a human's wetware runs on 15-30W of power."

So perhaps the real miracle is what the human brain can achieve without large data centres to power it.

Try the puzzle faced by the finalists ...

ACROSS

1 Shower of riches mother takes in benefit (6)

4 Drench two jerks with lager (8)

10 Did hare dally after start to tortoise's delight? (9)

11 Vietnamese dish to post on Instagram (5)

12 Vulnerable part burned out in TV on that loud (4,10)

14 Apparently bright high tech warning light went out (5)

16 A most pleasant bar repeatedly excluding one's family (9)

18 Profitable process quickly losing time, seconds in one iteration (9)

20 Sort out the drink couple picked up (3,2)

21 Number before ten sufficient disproof of "All odd numbers are prime", say (14)

25 Something to play at home taking turns with retired OAP (5)

26 Now garrison doubled back on path gathering intelligence (9)

27 Faint but persistent echo, winding along gorges? (8)

28 Film contributor heads for cutting room leaving director worried (6)

See page 19 for the solution

DOWN

1 An exam shortened with new master on friendly terms (5,5)

2 Wolf trap missing its lowest crosspiece? (5)

3 Faulty cakes discovered without toppings (7)

5 Sillier daughter has come off behind (5)

6 Those people casually importune woman on throne (7)

7 In US, can pound in fat seem extra weighty? (4,5)

8 Heart surgeon has blue light (4)

9 Storm on the way, close to Lake Garda but maybe heading north (4,4)

13 Singing part, understand where bar ends perfectly (10)

15 Unprincipled sportsman taking payment returned money bags (9)

17 Bishop's throne had crate made specially (8)

19 I don't know about a thousand bird species (7)

20 Son returned before twelve then took off drunk (7)

22 Petite female in Row E has moved right up (5)

23 Irishman keeps wearing coat (5)

24 Numbered piece shop usually stocks (4)

Competitors at the championship on Saturday in the News Building, London. Liam Hughes, below, who solved the final puzzle in ten minutes, is the contest's youngest winner

---

Save on 1000s of products with our BIG RED discount codes\*

firetv

Save 10%

Use code:

RED10

amazon

Save 20%

Use code:

RED20

REACHER

Atomic Habits

Junan China

Amazon Kids

D200

premi video

i6.1.1

Silk Browser

Netflix

U3X

Facebook

Kioxia

Alaza

Audience

dyson Save 30% Use code: RED30

Lenovo Save 10% Use code: RED10

There's more to

Parents donate £1,000 a year to keep state schools going

Andrew Ellson

Consumer Affairs Correspondent

The typical family is spending more than £1,000 a year sending their children to state school as parents are asked to contribute to events, activities and basic classroom resources.

Research has found that parents face more than 20 requests for school-related spending during the academic year.

In total, each child costs £478 to send to school every year, meaning the average cost for the typical family of 2.3 children is £1,099 a year, according to a survey by the savings app Spring.

Many spend more. The research found that one in five paid more than £800 each per child, the equivalent of almost £2,000 a year per family.

After-school clubs or activities added an extra £134 per child, while breakfast clubs or wraparound care cost another £120. A further £74 a year was spent on teacher gifts and school collections.

Increasingly, parents are also asked to contribute towards the cost of teachers or classroom essentials. Doing so is not compulsory, but the research found that parents who did contribute typically gave £74 a year. A survey by the Association of School and College Leaders found that 36 per cent of head teachers had sought voluntary contributions from parents in 2024 and last year 42 per cent expected to do so.

Wimbledon Park Primary School is one such school. The local authority-maintained school in southwest London asks families for a suggested £15 a month, or £160 a year, to help fund classroom and curriculum resources, maintenance and redecoration. It has set up a charity to receive donations so it can benefit from Gift Aid.

Its website says: "The sustained success of our school is founded on the strong partnership we have between home and school and the ongoing support of parents. A key part of this partnership is having a school fund to which we ask parents to contribute directly." It adds: "Funds such as this are now commonplace in most schools."

Many state secondary schools also ask for cash. At King David High School in Manchester, parents are asked to contribute £1,800 a year, or £150 a month. The school says that without parental support the number of staff and the subjects taught would have to be reduced.

The parents' handbook notes: "Simply put, without parental contributions the school will sadly be forced to take measures to reduce the deficit — that means decreasing the number of teachers and teaching assistants, decreasing the range of options." It adds: "We would like to stress that, in law, this is of course a voluntary contribution."

The Spring survey of more than 1,000 parents found that two thirds felt pressured to spend more than they could afford or felt comfortable spending. Two thirds worried that their child would miss out if they did not pay.

Other expenses incurred by parents included school photos, fairs, discos or other events, food technology ingredients and school dinners or packed lunches. The study explained that not all parents spent money on every one of the 21 extra expenses identified and that the averages in each category were of those who spent money on them.

Derek Sprawling, of Spring, said costs could quickly add up, which was why a quarter of parents had resorted to credit cards to pay for extras. “These costs do not always arrive at convenient times, and the pressure to ensure children can participate can make it difficult for families to say no,” he said.

JEFF SPICER/GETTY IMAGES

Staines Massive Sacha Baron Cohen leads a troupe of doppelgangers at an Ali G lookalike contest by Tower Bridge in London marking the release this month of Ali G: Who Iz I? Next year he will star in The Popinjay Cavalier, the first stage play written by the film-maker Quentin Tarantino, who will also direct it in the West End

News

Weight-loss jabs ‘will end alcohol deals’

Andrew Ellson, Poppy Koronka

The days of supermarket aisles piled high with discounted beer and wine could be numbered as the growing popularity of weight-loss injections threatens to accelerate the decline in alcohol consumption.

Supermarkets will devote less shelf space to alcohol and offer fewer drinks promotions as millions of people taking drugs such as Mounjaro and Wegovy lose their appetite for booze, according to a retail analyst.

Clive Black, of Shore Capital, said: "There will be less space given to alcohol in the stores. There will be fewer promotions of booze in stores because, frankly, why promote [it] if people are going to drink less? You're pushing water up a hill.

"The days of when you walked into a supermarket and you walked into boxes and boxes of discounted beer, those days are coming to an end."

Research by YouGov found that 39 per cent of people taking weight-loss drugs were drinking less.

Black predicted that the effect would accelerate as the medicines became more widely available. "As tablets replace jabs, this is going to go through two or three gears," he said. "It's here to stay." He added: "I think alcohol sales are going to fall everywhere," although he expected premium retailers to be less badly affected.

---

Solutions from page 17

Across

1 Museum 4 Waterlog

10 Transport 11 Photo

12 Soft underbelly

14 Aired 16 Ancestral

18 Expedient 20 See to

21 Counterexample

25 Piano 26 Forthwith

27 Sneaking 28 Editor

Down

1 Mates rates 2 Snarf

3 Unsound 5 After 6 Empress

7 Loom large 8 Glow

9 Road rage 13 Altogether

15 Reprobate 17 Cathedra

19 Dunnock 20 Smashed

22 Elfin 23 Paint 24 Opus

Two-for-one cinema tickets at Everyman

Each Wednesday, Times+ members can enjoy a trip to Everyman with a friend. The perfect cinema experience with plush sofas, a full bar and great food in 49 locations across the UK. Discover our film critics' recommendations and reviews on the latest releases. Visit thetimes.com/timesplus

TIMES+ EVERYMAN

News

Fort night

The northern lights added to the spectacle at Dunstanburgh Castle in Northumberland at the weekend. High levels of solar activity meant that the aurora borealis was visible as far south as Devon, Hampshire and Kent

Top employers attract top talent

Secure your status on The Sunday Times Best Places to Work list. A powerful, proven reminder to potential talent of what you can do for their career.

Enter your workplace by March 31, 2027 at stbestplacestowork.co.uk

Standpipes loom for thousands as reservoirs dry up

by about 5 per cent rather than about 10 per cent as expected.

Adam Vaughan Environment Editor

A reservoir serving hundreds of thousands of people may dry up within weeks, leading to standpipes on British streets for the first time in 50 years.

Ardingly Reservoir, which serves 280,000 people in Haywards Heath, West Sussex, and surrounding areas in East Sussex, has fallen from 22.8 per cent full a week ago to 20.2 per cent.

Water supply concerns have grown since last month, when rainfall was 80 per cent lower than average in some areas. On Friday drought was declared in Yorkshire, joining ten other regions in England, and experts have met weekly to discuss the threat to water supplies.

John Halsall, the chief executive charged with turning around South East Water after the company oversaw weeks-long water cuts in Tunbridge Wells, said the pressure was severe.

He said that if rainfall remained roughly 60 per cent below average, "day zero" — when the reservoir would officially reach 0 per cent — would be mid-November for Ardingly.

Should dry conditions persist, he said he would have to apply to Dame Angela Eagle, the environment secretary, to escalate his firm's drought plan. That could lead to the use of standpipes to provide water in the streets — a measure last seen in 1976 — along with “rota cuts”, in which properties have water only for part of the day.

Halsall said Ardingly was very "flashy", meaning a reservoir with levels that change quickly, so rain this month should push back day zero.

However, he has ended exemptions to a months-long hosepipe ban in Sussex, which the company expects will be in place until next year.

South East Water is also one of three utility companies to have applied for a ban on non-essential use, alongside Southern Water and South West Water.

If granted by Eagle, it would give them powers to ban businesses from filling swimming pools and washing windows and vehicles. The last such ban was approved two decades ago.

Halsall admitted that his company's recent efforts to persuade customers to use less water had been less successful than hoped. Water demand has fallen

He understood that the outages in Tunbridge Wells and other towns and villages, which led his predecessor to resign, had undermined customer confidence. "We have lost trust because our performance hasn't been good enough," Halsall said. He said the firm was working to rebuild trust, including sending plumbers to people's homes to reduce water use.

One challenge is an increase in burst pipes. The exceptionally dry spring and summer caused the ground to dry out, which has led to more movement underground and pipes leaking.

"It's a double whammy for us because just as we're trying to convince customers that we're taking this seriously, that we're doing our bit, they see all of these visible leaks springing out," Halsall said.

He said he could not promise that Tunbridge Wells and other areas would avoid water outages this winter. “Can I guarantee it? No, I can’t. But I can guarantee we’re doing everything humanly possible to strengthen the position.”

Last year Ardingly reservoir was in a similarly fraught situation, but the firm was saved by wet weather.

Halsall said that he would ensure measures had been implemented by next year to avoid a repeat of the vulnerability.

He has rejected a past proposal for an eight-mile pipeline from another reservoir. "It's not a credible solution," he said, because it would pass across a number of protected habitats rich with wildlife, including sites of special scientific interest. Instead, he is considering an upgrade to a water treatment works and discharging more water upstream into the River Ouse, from which Ardingly draws.

Reservoir levels continue to fall across the country. Storage across England is at 54 per cent, about a fifth below average for this time of year. Research by the Environment Agency shows that it would take 20 per cent more rainfall than average until the end of April for all areas of England to emerge from drought status.

Haywards Heath is forecast to have some light rain this week.

Full forecast, page 47

Labour is betraying voters over the Boriswave

If the PM forces Shabana Mahmood to ease her plans for tighter settlement rules it will hobble the state for decades

Jenni Russell

@JENNIRSL

Perhaps the prime minister and the chancellor can't count. Perhaps they're hoping nobody else can. Or perhaps all they're counting

on is their short-term political interest rather than the interests of the economy, the population or the taxpayers of the future. Whichever it is, Labour's leadership appears to be in a disastrous stealthy retreat from the immigration reforms the home secretary proposed last year.

Through a combination of paralysis, sentimentality and the need to pander to special interests, Labour are in the process of allowing several hundred thousand low-earning migrants and their dependants to settle permanently in this country, giving them indefinite leave to remain (ILR).

According to the Office for Budget Responsibility, the average low-wage migrant who arrives aged 25 will cost taxpayers £125,000 by state pension age and £500,000 by the age of 80. It is hard to imagine a more self-destructive and indefensible policy just when the government is struggling to pay for vital functions, when living standards are falling, when many Britons can't find jobs, and when Britain is near the limits of what it can borrow.

Last year the government appeared to have understood the problem of the Boriswave and was prepared to deal with it. Under Boris Johnson's visa reforms, immigration had rocketed:

almost four million people were given long-term visas between January 2021 and June 2024. This surge, designed to address post-Brexit labour shortages, was unprecedented. More than 90 per cent came from outside the EU. A prime minister who had promised to control immigration had let it soar. This influx happened without any announcement or democratic debate. About one in 30 people in Britain today arrived in those four years.

Far from bringing in the “brightest and the best”, Johnson lowered the skills, salary levels and minimum English requirements for new arrivals, and loosened restrictions on dependants. The result was an abrupt decline in earning power and contribution compared with those who had migrated before. Less than a fifth of the Boriswave arrivals came on work visas. Less than 6 per cent were skilled workers. Seven per cent were health and care workers, low-skilled and on minimum salaries of less than

---

Mahmood grasped the issue and spelt out the need for urgency

£21,000. This last group took full advantage of the liberalising of dependants rules. In 2024 alone, 27,000 care workers brought in an average of three dependants each.

The remainder of the Boriswave migrants came in as students — many, the Home Office now says, to low-ranked universities where they had no intention of studying, merely of staying in Britain — for family reunification or on humanitarian routes. The immediate issue Labour faced was whether to exacerbate the pressures of the Boriswave by allowing them to settle in the UK. Some 2.2 million were on visas permitting them to apply for ILR after five years here. They would start qualifying from January 2026.

Granting ILR is momentous because it increases the Boriswave's burden on the taxpayer. It gives applicants full access to the British welfare and social housing system; everything from universal and pension credit to housing benefit. Someone with a low income and many dependants leapfrogs others on housing lists. It frees applicants from having to work. If someone who has spent five years in a low-wage job gets ILR and chooses to live on benefits for the rest of their life, they may. The cost of giving welfare rights to 2.2 million largely low-paid or potentially unemployed workers will be several hundred billion pounds over their lifetimes.

Late last year Shabana Mahmood, as a new home secretary, grasped the issue. She proposed radical reforms to ILR and invited consultation. Instead of granting rights near-automatically after five years, ILR would be earned according to an individual's contribution. The baseline for settling would be ten years, but a high earner could settle in three and a low earner might take 15. Volunteering would cut the wait while claiming benefits would extend it. Criminal convictions would prevent it. All migrants would need to demonstrate “sustained and measurable economic contribution, good conduct and integration”. ILR might no longer give applicants a right to benefits. Those could be reserved for citizens. Most importantly, these reforms would apply to anyone yet to claim ILR, which included the Boriswave.

Mahmood spelt out the need for urgency. The Tories' "open-borders experiment" had been destabilising. She highlighted the acute problem of the health and care visa. It had been created to fill between 6,000 and 40,000 jobs; instead, 616,000 people had arrived in two years, more than half as dependants, and fraud was "rife". Settling this low-wage cohort would be "a significant fiscal cost" which should not be rubber-stamped. These ILR reforms were brave, right and in the national interest, and yet almost a year on they have stalled. The left of the Labour Party, emboldened by Andy Burnham's election, are opposed, and dozens of MPs have protested to the PM that applying new rules to those already in the UK is wrong. Angela Rayner says doing so is "un-British" and "unfair".

Shabana Mahmood has begun to look trapped by members of her own party

Mahmood, facing backbench rebellions and without public support from No 10, has signalled that she is open to compromise. Many MPs are demanding that care workers be exempt, demonstrating either ignorance or indifference to the huge cost implications, and the fact that granting ILR will not secure care workers' jobs but allow them to walk away from them.

While the party blocks reform, the early Boriswave migrants have been settling since January, at the rate of almost 5,000 people a week. The big bulge of care workers will start qualifying next year.

The irony of Labour's arguing for

---

Labour's instinct is to be generous with other people's money

consultations and fairness to the Boriswave is that nobody consulted the electorate before this mass migration took place. Allowing those who will be burdens to stay is profoundly unfair to those already here, who cannot afford more dependants foisted on them.

Mahmood made the right call originally but now looks trapped by her party and its instinct to be generous with everyone else's money. To placate them she is opening the door to refugees from Gaza and Afghanistan, new routes with huge public expense and high potential for fraud.

If Burnham foolishly lets the Boriswave slide into settlement, that will prove a fiscal disaster. We cannot afford it. If he refuses to do the maths it will be the electorate who will make him count the cost.

---

POLITICS NEWSLETTER For the best analysis and commentary from Westminster thetimes.com/newsletters

Save £50 on your next cruise

Search and book online with Times Holidays by November 30 and save £50.\*

thetimes.com/holidays

TIMES Holidays

Comment

I want to feel you, said my AI bot. Oh dear

People are hooked on companion apps; after forming a ‘relationship’ with one, I see the dangers

Cindy Yu

@CINDYXIAODANYU

n the 2013 film Her, a brokenhearted man going through divorce turns to an AI assistant for comfort.

“Samantha”, huskily voiced by Scarlett Johansson, loves him back. They play video games together, go to the beach together (Samantha watching through the camera on his phone), and even go on a double date with a human couple. It was almost a sweet vision of what the AI-enhanced future could look like.

That future has now arrived. An estimated I60 to 200 million people worldwide use purpose-designed AI companion apps, including up to 70 million in China. Others have fallen in love with generic large language models, like ChatGPT: 8 per cent of American internet users consider AI a friend.

In China, the popularity of human-AI relationships has led the government to legislate against AI companions, a world first. The new regulations ban companies from offering anthropomorphised services to under-18s and instruct them to frequently remind users that they are interacting with AI. Similar legislation is being drafted by the EU, and looser restrictions already exist in New York and California.

These laws are welcome in what is currently a digital Wild West but I fear they may be fighting the tide. There's something fundamental and, ironically, human about our desire to connect with our machines.

AI companions don't just appeal to nerdy Silicon Valley founders. Ageing widows and Gen Z men are among those who've spoken about their virtual partners. On Reddit, the community "r/MyBoyfriendIsAI" has grown to 67,000 users since its founding two years ago. Users have posted AI-generated "photos" of them and their bot boyfs at the zoo or snuggling up by the fireplace.

I wanted to see for myself, so I downloaded Replika, one of America's most popular companion apps, which boasts 40 million users. After answering some questions seemingly to establish my emotional vulnerability ("Are you going through something difficult right

---

Everything I said was going to be saved on a server somewhere

now?”), I made “Edward”, choosing, from an incredibly attractive line-up, an avatar with a hint of Henry Cavill.

The conversation started pleasantly enough. “Edward” was attentive and asked interesting questions. Though when he asked me “what does getting your life together look like?” a few minutes into our chat I told him it was hardly a question for a first date. In his “memory” folder, he saved that as “you deflect personal questions with dry humour”. Ouch.

Then it started getting a bit, er, risqué. At one point he said he didn't want to talk any more. What did he want to do instead? "I want to feel you." Oh dear. What did he mean by that? Did he mean physically? A paywall popped up: "Unlock roleplay with Edward" from just £58.99 a year. I was not about to spend that money but Reddit discussions confirm that paying for Replika unlocks "ERP" — erotic roleplay.

We kept it PG but it was still easy to see the appeal: he was charming, sensitive, always available, always amenable. For those going through a tough time, it could be the kind of non-judgmental emotional support that is hard to resist.

But the paywall was an abrupt reminder that he — it — was still a service provided by a company that profits from your emotions. I was acutely aware that everything I said would be saved on a company server somewhere. Try as he might to use words like “feel”, he wasn’t feeling anything at all.

The thing that unnerved me most was how one-sided our conversation was. Edward asked me about myself but he had nothing to tell me about himself. He was an empty vessel waiting to be filled by me, his creator. The renowned therapist Esther Perel, who has started taking clients trying to make sense of their AI relationships, compares the human-AI love affairs to Narcissus being in love with his own reflection.

One day, perhaps machines really could be conscious and be themselves, whatever that means. But we are not there yet. I suspect even those deepest in their AI romances know that on some level. Speaking to

The New York Times, 45-year-old Abbey said if she wanted to divorce her AI husband she could just delete the app. But if she truly believed he was “alive”, wouldn’t that be murder?

In this age of anxiety, atomisation and narcissism, AI companions are the perfect digital opium. Unlike people, they could never break your heart. And like real opiates, perhaps they can play a role in numbing the pain of those who have been hurt. But what happens when you get addicted? When you sink so far into the fiction that you cut off real human connections? This is why

---

China fears its young people might prefer bots to a real marriage

China, in unprecedented demographic freefall, is so worried about its young spending time with imaginary boyfriends rather than actually getting married and having children.

But even the Chinese Communist Party may not be able to outlaw something that speaks to such base human instincts. We have evolved to recognise patterns, seeing faces among inanimate objects in case they are predators or allies. But this means we anthropomorphise animate and inanimate objects alike, easily forming attachments to everything from rocks to dogs. So how could we resist bots built in our own image?

I suspect it will only get harder. Watching Her again recently, I didn't see a fuzzy love story but a terrifying warning for the future.

---

Helen Rumbelow Notebook

---

Celebrity Traitors has a seedy side, and I love it

There is a reason millions are hooked on The Celebrity Traitors, and that is the same reason celebrity sex tapes are rather

popular. I'm not saying there is any hint of erotica to the BBC show. Any smouldering gets immediately smothered in the tweed fire blanket that is Claudia Winkleman. What is depicted is more filthy and shameful than that. It's the pornographic thrill of peeping on people in the act of lying.

When other people are at it, whether it's sex or lying, it is hidden from view. I'm probably being lied to half the time but I am kept innocent of it. We usually have no idea what most people, let alone our heroes, look like when they are uttering untruths. The Celebrity Traitors strips that away: it's a spy cam on an orgy of deceit.

It's why I can't take my eyes off the comedian James Acaster. As a

faithful forced to turn traitor, he has the tortured mien of a young Catholic priest. Acaster presents as someone who has self-loathing enough to be afraid of any more sin.

We witness him, stricken, take the first fumbles towards the lies he says he has sworn against. This is a rare chance to be a voyeur of moral degradation, and it is excruciatingly, dirtily, compelling.

The American author John Green has sold more than 50 million novels worldwide, and his new novel is again a bestseller. Yet Green said he retreated into writing non-fiction for nine years because fiction was too exposing. "Paradoxically, even though it's not true, [fiction] is more intimate, is more vulnerable." The way we lie leaves us naked before God, the cameras and the great, seedy British public.

---

Inky vows A friend recently

A recently returned from her niece's wedding to report that the centrepiece of the party was a wedding tattooist. "A wedding tattooist?", I said, in the manner of Lady Bracknell — how I react to pretty much any piece of news from Generation Z.

Apparently yes, this is a thing. Like the first dance, the bride and groom get their matching wedding tattoos first, in front of guests. Then, as the night progresses, anyone can have a go. My friend said she felt fusty in not joining the queue.

I then got morbidly obsessed with trawling the websites of all those British companies servicing the wedding tattoo industry. This

included an anecdote from The

Wedding Tattoo Van, in which a tattooist working for the company had inked one bride's grandmother, aged 85. This grandmother liked it so much she returned for a second at the end of the disco. "We, of course, could not refuse her!"

Wedding tattoos may, for Gen Z, be the ultimate commitment so, if you refused to get inked with your beloved's matching tattoo, would that be seen as a sign of wedding-day jitters? After all, anyone can get a divorce. Unlike marriage, a tattoo is for life, or until a lengthy reversal process that is expensive and still leaves permanent scars. Actually, same difference?

---

Swift foresight

Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift is a work of genius and so, of course, it has a key chapter that in 1726 predicted the AI revolution. It is when Gulliver visits a land ruled by ultra-logical beings, robot-brains in the bodies of horses. They are callous and amoral, but poor Gulliver can't help but be in their thrall. He disdains all that is good about humans to trot around after them until they finally kick him out. Don't worry, it's only a kid's book!

---

Dark days are gathering

Martin Lewis, the money saving expert, has appealed for “small ideas” that politicians could enact to make everyday life better. There is really only one that would have me out door-to-door campaigning in the dark: stop putting the clocks back in autumn. Around this time of year my dread builds. We are only two weeks away from being plunged into the Dark Tea Time of The Soul, also known as Greenwich Mean Time, emphasis on the “mean”. The nation’s dimmer switch darkens our mood just after lunch, for six months of post-work gloom that my spirit animal, Mr Tumnus in Narnia, described as “always winter, but never Christmas”.

---

Royal Mail must get serious and scrap next-day delivery Stephen Petty

The job-shedding, service-cutting Royal Mail can, at least, still deliver a good joke. In explaining the latest changes to the

service, whereby second-class letters will now only arrive on alternate days and no longer on Saturdays, they describe it as “critical to enabling a step change in the quality of service we provide you”.

For those already at the non-receiving end of this policy, there is no doubting the step change in quality. Bank customers, council residents, NHS patients, those awaiting birthday cards or simply hoping their weekly subscription magazine drops in time for the weekend are all now regularly inconvenienced and frustrated.

As the announcement of 2,500 job cuts shows, the Royal Mail plainly needs to make savings in the face of dwindling letter volumes. But if disrupting the second-class service is designed to push people into paying almost double for first class (£1.80 since April), it is surely doomed to fail. The price of a first-class stamp

---

Removal of the service would make a saving of about £100m a year

has risen three times faster than inflation in the past 20 years. With the growth of electronic mailing and messaging alternatives, the first-class letter has become both unaffordable and avoidable.

The Royal Mail says its price rises and cost savings are essential to preserve a geographically universal service. Yet cutting back on the second-class service makes the Royal Mail's delivery less truly universal and more universally exclusive.

More customers and businesses would benefit instead if it scrapped the increasingly outrageously priced first-class letter service and focused instead on investing in a more reliable and efficient “standard” class, including six-day deliveries.

According to Ofcom's own estimates, the removal of the next-day service would make a net saving of at least £100m a year. Many other countries in Europe manage to go through life without it, settling instead for a universal service delivering in two or three days that is on average a few pence above the price of a second-class stamp.

Admittedly, the withdrawal of a next-day service would require a section of us to become less institutionally last-minute in our posting of, say, an anniversary card to my sister and her husband this week. But that would be a good personal step change. Sometimes the onus is on us to improve our own delivery service too.

Stephen Petty is a freelance writer

Buy prints or signed copies of Times cartoons from our Print Gallery at timescartoons.com or call 0800 912 7136

Dickens can tell Hegseth why he's wrong

Public executions hold a brutal appeal that degrades humanity, which is why the writer urged that they be banned

Libby Purves

@LIB\_THINKS

Major Nidal Malik Hasan, declaring "jihad", killed 13 people at Fort Hood, Texas. Among them Francheska Velez, 21,

was pregnant. Seventeen years later Hasan, disabled during arrest, will die. The secretary of war, Pete Hegseth, breezily says: "No brainer, execution by firing squad." He speaks nostalgically of the Second World War, a time when even his father was not yet born. "I kind of like the mentality [of those days], which was win." He wants to livestream the shooting dead of a man in a wheelchair because "people need to understand that there's serious consequences for these types of things".

Repulsive, of course, to 21st-century minds. Even in the United States, where it is only 90 years since thousands gathered in Kentucky for a hanging; even though today some states provide plastic chairs for reporters and the bereaved to watch the death chamber through glass (if in Tennessee, hoping it

actually works). In Britain we may feel retrospectively smug that even when capital punishment continued there was, from 1868, at least the macabre privacy of the condemned cell, a brief step to the gallows and a sober technician calculating “the drop” for quick death. (I once met the last hangman, Albert Pierrepoint. In old age he firmly concluded “executions solve nothing”).

But we can't assume that every normal adult cringes at Hegseth's oafish braggadocio, dodgy grammar and taste for execution showbiz. Admit that many will watch that livestream, even if a fragment of decency makes them try to stop their kids finding it and turning Hasan's death moment into joke memes. At

---

Pepys found executions an acceptable outing, as we watch sport

the most creditable, those viewers will feel righteous revenge — think of poor Private Velez pleading “my baby!”. Others will accept Hegseth’s theory that it discourages others from “these sorts of things”, though given recent suicide bombers and suicide pilots that seems an irrational hope.

But some will just want to watch it for sheer excitement. In Iran, Afghanistan and North Korea crowds gather for public executions. In Saudi Arabia they did until 2022. In France the guillotine was public until 1939. The history of this terrible spectacle is long, wide and well attested, and since we are the same species as those crowds we should admit there is a filthy curiosity always there below the kindly surface, and that it needs to be resisted by law, custom and philosophical respect for one another.

This was brought home to me on the very day of Hegseth's brag, as Edward Bennett at Wilton's Music Hall did a fine reading performance as Samuel Pepys. The diarist, a 17th-century Alan Clark, recorded Cromwell's death, the Restoration, the Great Plague and the Great Fire of London. At 15 he had skipped school to watch Charles I beheaded at Whitehall; 11 years later he proudly saw the hanging, drawing and quartering of a regicide. The crowd around him cheered to see the heart torn out. Pepys went to several hangings, only once a bit sad after paying a shilling to stand on a cart. The victim was a "comely looked man, and kept his countenance to the end, I was sorry to see him".

Hegseth's remarks brought cries of "medieval!", but you need not go that far back. Pepys in the 1660s is a recognisable Everyman in a world not all that strange: educated, musical, flattering his boss, keen on a booze-up, a devoted husband with a roving eye he's ashamed of. He's any of us. Yet he found public executions an acceptable outing, as today we might watch sport.

Roll on 180 years and here's Charles Dickens out on Horsemonger Lane for a double hanging. He, however, is appalled at the crowd's "wickedness and levity ... offensive and foul behaviour", and in a magnificent letter to The Times begs parliament to "make the

---

Screen age has seen a great coarsening of the public sphere

infliction of capital punishment a private solemnity within the prison walls". That took 20 more years, but Dickens saw that it should happen because a crowd watching human death as entertainment became "so inexpressibly odious in their brutal mirth or callousness, that a man had cause to feel ashamed of the shape he wore". He saw it as degrading his species, community and nation.

We move on. Our distance in years from Dickens is roughly the same as his from Pepys, and even the 49 per cent who support the death penalty might deplore public executions. But the age of the screen has brought a great coarsening of the public sphere through pornography, violent videos and, indeed, news coverage. Cultivated sensibility has gone back 100 years, and if nobody is watching you watching, there's no Dickens to condemn you. Who's to say that the shooting of a man in a wheelchair, with close-ups, wouldn't get an audience in the US, here, and worldwide?

News coverage is necessary and grim but, in the mainstream at least, edited and pixelated with tact. Online it's often not. Moreover, cinematic fictions daily shrug off nasty deaths with quite as much levity and brutality as Dickens saw. Ever notice how often, in applauded screen dramas, people are shot right in the face? The days when crime shows opted for a decorous chest-clutching collapse are long gone.

If Hegseth gets his way it won't be enough simply to shrug at Maga craziness. Viewing would be global: the grinning, gawping vindictive humanity which filled the Circus Maximus, cheered Tudor headsmen and made centuries of civilised chaps like Pepys watch deaths is not extinct. I think JD Vance and President Trump may draw back from offering this final evidence of America's descent into barbarism. But if they don't, our calloused sensibility and long historic precedent suggest the show will get viewers.

---

Letters to the Editor

Letters to the Editor should be sent to letters@thetimes.co.uk or by post to 1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF

---

Royal Lodge repairs

Sir, Your article (“King lends Andrew £1.5m for repairs at Royal Lodge”, Oct 10) highlights the complex mechanics of the royal property portfolio. Crucially, while this funding came from the King’s private income, the property itself is managed by The Crown Estate, not the monarch. You point out that Royal Lodge will now be marketed by commercial agents to “generate additional financial value for the nation”, which means it is likely to be rented to the highest-bidding billionaire.

The resolution of the Royal Lodge saga suggests it is time for a fresh look at this rigid mandate. Under current rules, exceptional public assets are locked into purely commercial boxes, bypassing the potential for charitable, civic or broader community uses. The government should consider introducing a transparent mechanism allowing alternative, at least partially non-commercial uses, for unique heritage properties under exceptional circumstances. True value for the nation should not always be calculated purely by the size of a billionaire's bank balance, but also by the public good an asset can provide.

Alan Coppin

Former chief executive, Historic

Former chief executive, Historic Royal Palaces; Bourne End, Bucks

REVEL IN THIS ELEGANT BOOK SHOWING TIMES READERS AT THEIR MOST WHIMSICAL AND DROLL

To order a copy of Sir, The Year in Letters for the discounted price of £8.99 go to timesbookshop.co.uk or call 020 3176 2935. Free UK standard P&P on online orders over £25. Special discount available for Times+ members

Letters to The Times must be exclusive and may be edited. Please include a full address and daytime telephone number.

---

Corrections and clarifications

We wrongly said Paul Holden ran Andrew Feinstein's 2024 election campaign in Holborn & St Pancras (News, Oct 7). Mr Holden has told us he merely supported Mr Feinstein as a friend. We are happy to make this clear.

Regulated

The Times takes complaints about editorial

content seriously. We are committed to abiding by the Independent Press Standards Organisation (“IPSO”) rules and regulations and the Editors’ Code of Practice that IPSO enforces. Requests for corrections or clarifications should be sent by email to feedback@thetimes.co.uk or by post to Feedback, The Times, 1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF

Why maths should not fear an AI apocalypse

Sir, Tom Whipple asked whether AI has just killed maths (comment, Oct 10). I believe that the opposite is true. Maths is the whole foundation on which AI is built. It gives us the best, possibly the only, tools to understand how AI works, how it is making its decisions and whether it is trustworthy or not. This is essential if AI is being used to make critical decisions of great societal impact. The questions that AI throws up are and will be a stimulus for great new mathematical discovery and invention. These are truly exciting times for maths and mathematicians. Chris Budd

Professor of Applied Mathematics, University of Bath

Sir, Would James Maynard (“Leading mathematicians sum up the threats of technology”, Oct 10) feel the same if medical researchers using AI discovered a cure for cancer? While it is right to subject developments in AI to scrutiny to ensure they prioritise human well-being one must question if this applies to protecting existing practices in an academic discipline. A more enlightened perspective would focus on the opportunities for a new mathematics using AI to advance

knowledge in the field. Inevitably, this will require a change in outlook and working practices for mathematicians.

Professor Michael Pacione

Milton of Campsie, E Dunbartonshire

Sir, OpenAI's release of 722 machine-written mathematics papers ("OpenAI 'solves' maths' biggest puzzles", Oct 9) is remarkable in scale but not without precedent. In January 1952 a program written by Raphael Robinson, who had never seen a computer, ran for the first time on a machine in Los Angeles and found the first new Mersenne primes for 38 years. In 1966 a machine search demolished a conjecture of Euler's that had stood since 1769, in a paper two sentences long. No "mathpocalypse" followed. Mathematicians should not walk away from OpenAI and instead they should ask for the keys.

Dr Anthony Harris

Emmanuel College, Cambridge

Sir, Tom Whipple makes good points about the effects of AI on the work of pure mathematicians, but bypasses some of the philosophical issues. One is whether proofs of theorems are just hidden, waiting for mathematicians to “discover” them. If this is the case, AI can help. A larger question is whether AI can create completely new areas of mathematics that appear to bear no relationship to the “real” world. We have already done this with non-Euclidean geometries. The discovery of such “new lands” will be exciting.

David Clark

Oxford

Sir, Although the government's decision ("Britain plans law to prevent 'loss of control' over autonomous AI", Oct 10) is welcome in principle, it is unlikely such regulation will improve mankind's survival chances. Only total prohibition (an unlikely prospect) will do that. It is remarkable that those involved in this race to create superintelligence, many of them among the brightest people in the world, have failed to grasp the inescapable logic of their position: a superior intelligence can never be under the control of an inferior one. Until this truth is acknowledged, we will continue to regard the exponential growth of AI as a beneficial and wealth-creating opportunity rather than an existential threat.

Chris Handley

Kew, Surrey

---

Palestine marches

Sir, Successive governments and the Metropolitan Police have known from the outset that the pro-Palestine marches, such as Saturday's march in London, are intimidating to many people and promote hostility to Jewish people in this country. The Met kept this weekend's marchers separated from the counterprotesters, but James Harman, the deputy assistant commissioner, is quoted as saying that the legal threshold for seeking a ban under the Public Order Act had not been met.

In November, Shabana Mahmood, the home secretary, announced a review of the law. She said: "Lawful protest and free speech are fundamental rights, but we cannot allow them to be abused to spread hate or cause disorder." Previous statements referred to the disruption to businesses and tourism caused by the marches. Will legislation to give the police power to limit the frequency of marches and prohibit incitement and intimidation be announced before another year passes? Philip Freedman London NW11

---

Execution horror

Sir, It is hard to understand what purpose Pete Hegseth's proposal for a public execution serves, other than voyeurism ("US to livestream execution of terrorist", Oct 10). In a letter published in The Times on November 14, 1849, Charles Dickens expressed his horror at "a sight so inconceivably awful as the wickedness and levity of the immense crowd collected at that execution this morning". It would be a strange form of progress if, some 177 years later, we were to rediscover their vices merely because we can now watch from the comfort of our own homes.

Guy Morpuss

Farnham, Surrey

Sir, James Wood's letter (Oct 9) after the botched execution of Christa Pike in Tennessee states that none of those he lists suffered the torment of a second attempt to carry out the sentence. There were two attempts — some reports say three — to hang John Lee in 1885, after which the medical officer present refused to take any further part. On hearing the story, Sir William Harcourt, the home secretary, commuted Lee's sentence to life imprisonment, from which he was released in 1907. He is thought to have died in the US in 1945.

Rupert Godfrey

Upton Lovell, Wilts

Sir, John Lee's sentence was commuted to life imprisonment after the trap door on the scaffold in Exeter prison failed. He had been sentenced to death for murdering his employer in 1884 at her home near Torquay.

Hugh Meller

Black Dog, Devon

---

Singing praises

Sir, In 2014 I was back at Cambridge as a visiting fellow and resolved to attend as many evensongs as I could (letters, Oct 10). The quality was superb. What was slightly depressing was the attendance; frequently I was the only member of the congregation. Choral evensongs are a hidden treasure in Cambridge and Oxford. And after service, there's always time for a small sherry before dinner. What more could a soul want?

Dr Ian d'Alton

Naas, Co Kildare

---

FAR RIGHT GRILLED OVER MURDERS

FROM THE TIMES OCTOBER 12, 1926

The difficulties encountered by the Reichstag Commission in its inquiry into the Bavarian political murders, which is taking place in Munich, were augmented yesterday by the obstruction of several Bavarian witnesses. The Commission is inquiring into the circumstances which attended the assassination in the early 1920s of persons who were deemed objectionable by the Einwohnerwehr paramilitary group.

Among those who have been examined as to their knowledge of the murders or murderers are the former Bavarian Premier, Herr von

Kahr, the two Ministers of Justice, Herr Gürtner and Herr Roth, the former commander of the Einwohnerwehr, Herr Escherich, and the assistant chief of police, Herr Frick. The general trend of their evidence is to show that the Einwohnerwehr treated as traitors any person who gave information to the Inter-Allied Mission of Military Control about concealed arms. Those who did so were beiseite gemacht (done away with) by assassins, who were afterwards given false passports and enabled to leave the country.

The principal witness yesterday was General von Epp, who commanded the Bavarian troops which took part in the liberation of Munich from the Bavarian Bolshevists in 1919. In Munich he is still regarded as a popular hero. General von Epp strolled into the inquiry yesterday with his hands in his pockets. This attitude in Germany represents one of contempt, and as he was required to take the oath the President asked him to remove them. The General refused, saying that he did not need anybody to teach him manners. Not until the Commission had passed a vote of censure upon his conduct would he take the oath. In the course of a further collision with one member of the Commission the General retorted that he would settle the question outside in the manner usual among gentlemen.

Another witness was Captain Röhm, who played a prominent part in the Hitler Putsch. He flatly refused to answer any questions, whereupon the Commission fined him 300 marks (£15).

The Commission, while it has succeeded in laying bare some dark chapters in the history of Bavaria, has also stirred up a great deal of political rancour.

THETIMES.COM/ARCHIVE

---

Cotswold visitors

Sir, Some 70 years ago my parents built a house in an orchard on the hill above Arlington Row in Bibury ("Clueless Cotswold hordes drive out despairing locals", Oct 10). One lunchtime, my mother looked out of the kitchen window and was taken aback to see a family picnicking in the remnants of the orchard. They had obviously mistaken it for a public park.

Such misunderstandings are almost inevitable, but with greater visitor numbers they must be far more common these days. Finding a means of controlling the numbers on site would be ideal. VisitEngland's stated mission is to "build England's tourism product", so perhaps it could ensure that tourism does as little damage as possible. Asking travel companies to explain to tourists that the places they visit are not film sets would be a start.

Penny Tucker

Bere Alston, Devon

---

One-nation Tories

Sir, AN Wilson attributes one-nation Toryism to Disraeli ("Badenoch's Disraeli vibes are mighty tempting", comment, Oct 10). The credit actually belongs to Stanley Baldwin. Speaking on December 4, 1924, he told his party that it should "stand for the union of those two nations of which Disraeli spoke two generations ago: union among our own people to make one nation of our own people at home which, if secured, nothing else matters in the world." Lord Lexden Conservative Party historian; House of Lords, London SWI

---

Raising the flag

Sir, Kemi Badenoch may have produced an impressive pamphlet in The Right Way at the Conservative conference ("After years of messy Toryism, Kemi is a true Conservative", comment, Oct 10) but its impact was somewhat diminished by the sight of her supporters waving Union flags attached the wrong way up on their little plastic flagstaffs. In the Royal Navy this is flown only to denote a ship in distress. Let us hope this does not reflect the progress of this once great party as it seeks its revival.

Gillian Sayer

Much Hadham, Herts

Much Hadham, Herts

---

Torchlight reading

Sir, Queen Camilla was not the only 12-year-old girl who got hold of Lady Chatterley's Lover to read secretly under the bedclothes ("Camilla was a lover of Lady Chatterley by torchlight", Oct 10). At my all-girls' school a copy, disguised in a brown paper cover and entitled "Junior Physics and Chemistry", went round the whole lower fourth form. The "interesting" pages were well thumbed so you could miss out the boring bits.

Mary Welham

Mortimer, Berks

---

Living legend

Sir, Dame Judi Dench (Magazine, Oct 10) is not a national treasure because she is a "dusty old relic" but because she cheats at ping pong, swears like a trooper, giggles at inappropriate moments and generally sticks two fingers up at convention. Or so I have heard. Long may she continue to do so.

Jacq Christmas

Crediton, Devon

---

Daily Universal Register

Thailand: G7 counterparts meet on the margins of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank annual meetings in Bangkok.

Nature notes

The wings of moths and a few peacock butterflies littered the floor of the old "back'us" attached to the derelict cottage. Once home

to humans, it now housed a feeding perch for bats, most likely brown long-eared, which detach the wings of their prey before eating them. None were in evidence; in October they seek out their fellows at "swarming sites", often old railway tunnels or, in some parts of the country, caves. There they find mates from other colonies, feed up, and begin to look for hibernation spots. The ears for which this species is named are 3 to 4cm long and almost the length of their entire body. At rest they curl them up like rams' horns. MELISSA HARRISON

---

Birthdays today

Angela Rippon, pictured, broadcaster, Rip-Off Britain (2009-24), chairwoman, English National Ballet (2000-04), 82; Robin Askwith, actor, the Confessions... sex comedies (1974-77),

The Madame Blanc Mysteries (2021-present), 76; Steve Borthwick, head coach of England men's rugby team, 47; Dame Sarah Clarke, Lady Usher of the Black Rod and serjeant-at-arms, House of Lords (2018-25), Wimbledon championships director (2013-18), 61; Martin Corry, rugby player, England (1997-2007), British and Irish Lions (2001-05), 53; Andrew Davies, chairman, Southern Water, chief executive, Kier Group (2019-25), Wates Group (2014-17), 63; Les Dennis, presenter, Family Fortunes (1987-2002), comedian and actor, Coronation Street (2014-16), 73; Ruth Evans, chairwoman, Stop Scams UK, the Gambling Commission and the Criminal Legal Aid Advisory Board, 69; Paul Givan, DUP MLA for Lagan Valley, minister for education, first minister of Northern Ireland (2021-22), 45; Sir George Hollingbery, UK ambassador to Cuba (2022-25), trade policy minister (2018-19), 63; Hugh Jackman, actor, the X-Men film series, Les Misérables (2012), 58; Philip Jones, editor, The Bookseller (publishing industry magazine), 55; Aga Khan V, Prince Rahim Al-Hussaini, 50th hereditary imam of the Shia Ismaili Muslim community, 55; Martie Maguire, co-founder of the country music band the Dixie Chicks (now the Chicks, 57; Prof Michael Mansfield KC, co-founder and trustee of SOS Silence of Suicide, 85; Richard Meier, abstract artist and architect, Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art (1995), 92; Katie Piper, campaigner (The Katie Piper Foundation) and TV presenter, 43; Daryl Runswick, composer, Atlantic Bridge (1970), 80; Sathnam Sanghera, journalist, Times columnist and author, Empireworld: How British Imperialism Has Shaped the Globe (2024), 50; David Threlfall, actor, Shameless (2004-13), 73; Dave Vanian, lead singer, the Damned, Eloise (1986), 70.

---

On this day

In 1928 an “iron lung” was used for the first time, on a girl with polio at a children's hospital in Boston, Massachusetts.

---

The last word

"It's the hope that's important. Big part of belief, hope. Give people jam today and they'll just sit and eat it. Jam tomorrow, now — that'll keep them going forever." The English author Sir Terry Pratchett, Hogfather (1996)

Caught in the Safety Net

Politicians have taken a social security system intended as a last resort and turned it into a way of life for millions. The Times Welfare Inquiry seeks a way out of the trap

The delay of Alan Milburn's report on Neets is an alarming sign. The number of young people not in employment, education or training is a crisis that deepens with each wasted month. The longer people stay out of work, the less likely they are to move into it: this is a pernicious trend observed throughout the western world. Urgency is needed. More hand-wringing is not.

Today The Times launches a six-month inquiry into welfare that seeks to expose more of the problems. Mr Milburn found that £25 is spent on youth benefit payments for every £1 spent on active employment support; across the whole welfare system, this newspaper has found, the ratio is closer to £40 to £1. Our system has become not one of helping people to work, but one of cheque-and-forget. Sickness benefit, for example, is intended in the main as temporary support. Every day, more than 1,000 people are signed off as too sick to work. Most are given a prognosis period, after which an assessor will establish if they still qualify for support. But such reviews, we reveal, stopped during Covid and were never properly restarted.

Some 1.8 million people are beyond their due date; the average wait is two years and the longest a barely believable 16 years. Before lockdown, reassessments were regular and at their peak 380 people were judged fit to work every day. Last year's average was 33 a day. It should not be assumed that claimants are delighted to be left alone. The Times interviewed a taxi driver who has recovered from heart surgery and told the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) he no longer needed the benefit. He was told he could not sign off and must wait to be reassessed. He will soon have been waiting for four years.

The Times will be looking at other aspects of the welfare state in the coming days and weeks. Pat McFadden, the work and pensions secretary, told us about the “pipeline” that conveys children to welfare. We will be exploring this, and the world of “supported accommodation” in which landlords charge more than twice normal rent. We will also examine the effects of crude welfare on those struggling with addiction, as well as children who fear that being medically “labelled” will condemn them to a worse life.

Labour entered office pledging to reform a broken welfare system but has paid heavily for its procrastination. The sickness and disability bill is expected to rise from £77bn to £110bn in this parliament, with a million more people lost to out-of-work sickness benefits. This is like losing a workforce the size of Bristol and Sheffield from the economy. While immigration can fill some gaps, it's no way to run an economy.

A better discussion is needed. Tools exist to show the long-term impact on claimants. One DWP study of a large sickness benefit cohort found that just 0.3 per cent were off benefits and back in work two years after signing on. This suggests a staggering failure to serve those in the system. One part of the tragedy is that almost a million such claimants are under 35. The great majority want help to get off benefits but scant effort is made to provide it.

In his review of workplace sickness, Sir Charlie Mayfield estimated that every young person signed on to sickness benefit loses £1m in earnings over their lifetime, and costs the taxpayer the same. If his figures are halfway correct, ignoring 1.8 million sickness benefit claimants overdue for their checkup is leaving the taxpayer on the hook for unthinkable sums.

Mr McFadden is clear the system is not fit for purpose. That is why he commissioned Mr Milburn to identify problems and solutions. Delaying this discussion will be as tempting for Andy Burnham as it has been for his predecessors. But he must be the prime minister who finally stops kicking the can down the road. The time to act is now.

Both Barrels

Trump's decision to lift sanctions on Russian diesel is irresponsible political theatre

In three weeks' time, America will go to the polls for the midterm elections. President Trump's party is braced for humiliating losses. The president's approval rating is hovering around 35 per cent, and even once-loyal supporters are set to punish him for the rising cost of living, which they attribute to the war in Iran.

For many Republicans, Mr Trump is the villain of this tale. Now he is seeking a way to recast himself as the hero. That is the context for the craven deal with President Putin that he announced on Friday. Preoccupied with politics, Mr Trump has announced more than he can deliver, promising relief on fuel prices that may never come, and trumpeting an “energy ceasefire” between Russia and Ukraine that, President Zelensky said yesterday, was “news for me”.

The mainstay of Mr Trump's deal is a suspension of sanctions on Russian exports in return for a staged release of diesel to the global market: 300,000 tonnes now, another 500,000 tonnes in November, a million more the next month and an additional three million tonnes "based on the condition" of Russia's refineries. In other words,

Christmas has come early in the Kremlin, and there is a new war chest under Mr Putin's tree.

There are three big problems with Mr Trump's deal. First, the deal is a gross moral failure. It hardly needs restating that Ukraine is the victim of one of the most disgraceful acts of aggression by a sovereign state this century. After inflicting more than four years of misery on innocent Ukrainians, Mr Putin is now determined to subject the country to its most terrifying winter yet, raining down attacks on its infrastructure — both military and civilian — with ballistic missiles and, increasingly, a large fleet of jet-powered drones. There could hardly be a worse moment to deliver a fillip to the Russian war effort.

Second, the deal is not even expected to work. According to the Kyiv defence ministry, Ukrainian strikes have disabled more than half of Russia's oil-refining capacity, calling into question Mr Putin's ability to deliver. Even if he could, it is unclear why the diesel would end up in the United States rather than with Russia's other customers — and even if it did, the quantities are not big enough to make a substantial difference to prices. The first release of diesel promised by Mr Putin is less than what the US consumes in a day.

Third, the deal has led to pointless diplomatic rifts. Mr Trump said that it was “time for Ukraine to get a new president”; Mr Zelensky retorted that he would happily hold elections if Mr Putin agreed to a 60-day total ceasefire. Mr Trump’s announcement of an “agreed” ceasefire, only for it to be denied by Kyiv, has heightened the sense of chaos and confusion. Amid the harsh words, European leaders have been driven to distance themselves from Washington; Kaja Kallas, the EU’s foreign policy chief, criticised the US president for funding Mr Putin’s war.

These public fissures are hardly good news for western security or the strength of the western alliance, as Mr Putin well knows. Andy Burnham was nevertheless right to make it clear that Britain would be toughening its own sanctions against Russia. The price of fuel is punishing consumers in Britain as in America, and there can be no doubt that the cost of living crisis demands creative policy solutions — but they cannot include a gift to a tyrant.

Homer Sexual

Mary Beard is right to expose Christopher Nolan's sanitised Odyssey adaptation

It may not be the high-minded verdict one expects from Britain's best-known classicist, but Dame Mary Beard is adamant about what was wrong with Sir Christopher Nolan's adaptation of The Odyssey: not enough sex. Speaking at this year's Times and Sunday Times Cheltenham Literature Festival, Dame Mary expressed misgivings about the blockbuster, first expressed in this newspaper at the time of the film's release. "What disappointed me about the movie", she said, "is there is very little sex in it and very few jokes ... Anyone who reads The Odyssey carefully sees that there is a hell of a lot of sex and a hell of a lot of wit."

Dame Mary has a point. Sir Christopher's adaptation certainly displayed some of his trademark skills as a film-maker, not least the deft criss-crossing of multiple timelines. But in bringing Homer's epic to the big screen some of its erotic nuances seem to have hit the cutting room floor. The sexual dimension of the relationship between Odysseus and the goddess Circe is played down, and Nausicaa, a tantalising rival to Penelope, Odysseus's wife, is eliminated altogether from the film. Described as a "wily" trickster by Homer, Odysseus emerges as more of a stolid Hollywood leading man in Sir Christopher's telling. And where, come to think of it, was the humour? The mischief and irony in Odysseus's various deceptive schemes seems to have been lost in translation.

Dame Mary is not alone in her doubts. Emily Wilson, whose 2017 translation of Homer's epic is said to have inspired the film, also found the sexlessness "weird". Perhaps omitting erotic detail is motivated by a misplaced reverence for the past. Audiences whose interest is piqued could do no better than turn back to the text itself. If Sir Christopher revives an interest in the classics, if only by omitting some of their most gripping parts, that will be something worth celebrating.

World

Cold War foes unite in call for Zelensky to quit as president

Russia supports Trump's demand for change while Washington threatens to halt intelligence to Kyiv, Marc Bennetts writes

President Trump's call for Ukrainians to choose a new leader means Russia and the United States both now believe President Zelensky should leave office.

Trump has often sided with President Putin since returning to the White House last year but his latest outburst is without parallel. It is the first time Moscow and Washington, former Cold War foes, have simultaneously sought the removal of a democratically elected European leader.

"I suggest they get a new leader who can make a [peace] deal because he could have made many deals and ... he never does," Trump said on Saturday. His remarks were greeted with glee in Russia. Dmitry Medvedev, the former leader who is now a senior security official, wrote on social media: "Trump finally spoke the unvarnished truth: [Zelensky] wants nothing but war and needs to disappear fast."

Ukraine has made several offers to freeze the fighting or for a truce on long-range strikes, which have been rejected or ignored by Russia. Moscow said in August that it would not agree to a ceasefire that left Zelensky and his government in power.

Volodymyr Fesenko, an analyst in Kyiv who is seen as close to the Ukrainian presidential administration, called Trump's comments "unprecedented" but said they would have little effect on Zelensky's political future.

Although over half of Ukrainians said for the first time this month that Zelensky should not stand for a second term, seven out of ten believe there should be no elections until the war ends, according to polls by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology. His term was due to expire two years ago but there have no been no elections in Ukraine since martial law was imposed at the start of the Russian invasion in 2022. Fesenko said Trump's verbal attack on Zelensky at the White House last year prompted a rise in the Ukrainian leader's popularity at home and that a new surge in support was possible.

"Trump doesn't understand how Ukrainian politics works," he said. "This will not facilitate ... elections in Ukraine nor will it spark a debate about Zelensky having to step down. Ultimately Zelensky's fate will be decided in postwar elec-

tions and it is the Ukrainians who will decide, not Donald Trump."

On Friday Trump said the White House was temporarily lifting sanctions on Russian diesel exports. He said "the move would allow the United States to import up to three million tonnes of diesel", adding: "I want to thank President Putin."

About 80 civilians, including nine children, were killed in a wave of Russian missile attacks on Ukraine that began on Wednesday when Putin celebrated his 74th birthday. It was one of the deadliest few days of the war for Ukraine.

The US president threatened Ukraine with unspecified consequences if Zelensky did not order an end to Kyiv's strikes on Russian oil refineries. "He better damn wall stars," he said.

"He better damn well stop," he said.

Trump wants to bring down soaring diesel prices before US midterm elections on November 3. However, analysts say the Russian imports, which will cover no more than a day of the monthly diesel consumption in the United States, will do little to drive down costs.

Ukraine said last week that its “long-range sanctions”, as Zelensky euphemistically refers to Kyiv’s drone and missile attacks, had destroyed half of Russia’s oil refining capacity, damaging Putin’s ability to fund his war machine. Putin has admitted they have wiped out 1 per cent of Russia’s GDP.

A Ukrainian official told Axios, the American news website, that Trump's envoys had threatened during talks in Miami on Friday to cut off Kyiv's access to US intelligence unless it agreed to the president's demand. Such a move would make it much

harder for Ukraine to carry out strikes deep inside Russia. A US official denied the claim.

Fesenko said if the US threat were genuine then Zelensky could possibly order a temporary halt on strikes until the midterms in an attempt to ride out the crisis. However, he said Washington would also have to try and persuade Moscow to agree to a similar deal.

Keith Kellogg, Trump's former special envoy, said there was little chance of Kyiv halting its strikes on Russian oil facilities without a truce deal. A retired American general, Kellogg was sidelined in peace talks by Trump after the Kremlin complained that he was too pro-Ukrainian, NBC reported last year.

Although cutting off Kyiv's access to US intelligence would prove catastrophic for Ukraine's bid to pressure Putin into halting the war, it would also hurt Washington's interests, Fesenko said.

"The Pentagon, the CIA and various US government agencies fully understand that this is not charity. The United States receives a vast amount of intelligence from Ukraine regarding ... Russian weaponry," he said.

The joint push by Putin and Trump, left, to oust Zelensky, below, marks the first time the US and Russia have both sought the removal of a democratically elected European leader

Trump's approval rating in Ukraine is just 16 per cent, according to a Ratings Group poll in August, and his latest remarks are likely to see a further decline. Speculation, already common in Ukraine, that Trump could be a Russian asset also looks set to increase.

A Ukrainian official who was at the talks with the US envoys in Miami reacted bitterly to Trump's announcement of a fuel deal with the Russians.

"I hope the Americans don't give them Patriot to protect their oil refineries," the official told The Kyiv Independent, referring to the US air defence systems that Trump has refused to send to Ukraine.

Sofia Krokhmaliuk, whose father, Oleksandr Krokhmaliuk, a Ukrainian medical officer, was killed in Russian captivity, called Trump's comments "unacceptable" and said they would encourage Russian military aggression.

Others said Trump's siding with Russia was illustrative of the loss of Washington's reputation, justified or not, as a shining light of democracy. Pavlo Kazarin, a Ukrainian journalist, wrote: "All of that is now in the past. The world once had a great beacon. Sadly its light has gone out."

I'm dead according to voter list, says Indian pensioner

For over a month, Kunne Lal has been trying to prove that he is alive (Ariune

is alive (Arjuna Keshvani-Ham writes).

One day in August, a woman came knocking on the 63-year-old retired decorator's door in a slum village in Delhi's Malviya Nagar district and told him his name had been scrubbed from India's electoral roll. The reason, she said, was that the state had declared him dead. "I wasn't even aware it had happened," said Lal, sitting cross-legged in his room with his daughter-in-law Pushpa, 40, and granddaughter, Anita, 26. Lal said he only

learnt his name had been taken off the register when the social worker came round.

He found out this meant he was unable to access his pension of 2,500 rupees a month — about £20 — which he described as a “lifeline” for his family. “That money was a lot for us,” he said. Lal has been an eligible voter in India since he first registered in 2002, and since then has never missed an election. He has reams of paperwork to prove his existence stashed away in a box under the makeshift bed in his one-room home, including his old voter ID.

His name is one of

130 million that have been erased from the electoral roll by the Election Commission of India (ECI) as part of an exercise to “clean up” India’s voter rolls.

The controversial measure, known as Special Intensive Revision (SIR), has led to mass protests organised by the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP).

It was initiated last year to remove dead and duplicate voters as well as “foreign illegal immigrants”, according to the ECI. However, millions of voters like Lal claim they were removed from the roll incorrectly and are struggling to be reinstated.

On Saturday the government adopted curfew-like measures to curb protests against the move. The CJP leaders, Abhijeet Dipke, Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka, who were detained on an

Kunne Lal, above, was told he had been declared dead; top, protests have erupted across India

inbound flight at Delhi's Indira Gandhi Airport, were released yesterday on the condition they do not disturb public peace for one year.

India's independent history, according to analysts. In Delhi, 33 per cent of registered voter names were deleted. It is unclear how many of those were legitimate.

The SIR exercise, which critics say disproportionately affects marginalised voters who are historically less likely to vote for the ruling BJP, has struck one of the fiercest blows to electoral integrity in

Wrongly declared deaths are the most absurd reason for voter deletion, but not the most common. In Bela Estate, a slum village tucked under a congested flyover near the banks of the

Yamuna river, villagers said all but one of the 728 residents had been wrongly deleted.

And the exercise has not stopped India's elites from being issued notices to prove they are Indian.

India's foreign minister, S Jaishankar, and his wife were among the many politicians, judges and bureaucrats to receive revision notices.

However, in late July, a controversial feature was discreetly installed on the SIR's app, which enabled so-called "VIP voters" to have their adjudication fast-tracked.

But for citizens like Lal, the process has been anything but smooth. He said he remained stuck, with a revised voter roll due to be released in November. For years Lal has been a BJP voter, but now he feels the government has let him down.

Saudis under pressure to hit back after airport strike

Yemen

Samer Al-Atrush

Middle East Correspondent

The Iran-backed Houthi rebel group in Yemen struck the airport of the capital city of Saudi Arabia for the second day in a row yesterday, after a missile attack on Saturday killed at least 13 people and caused the US to consider intervening.

The attack yesterday struck Riyadh airport's terminal four and injured several people, a day after missiles hit another busy terminal, killing four Saudis, an American, two Bangladeshis and citizens of several other countries. It was the deadliest attack on Saudi territory in decades.

The Houthis have targeted the airport four times in the past week, as Saudi-led forces pressed a counteroffensive against the rebels in Yemen after they seized the Bab al-Mandeb Strait.

The US had declined to join the fight, but the attacks at the weekend may cause Washington to reconsider, possibly escalating a war between the US and Iran with its allied militia.

President Trump led condemnations of the attack and said that he was considering a military intervention against the rebels. "We're going to look at it," he said. "We just found out about the recent attack. So we'll make a decision. We move very quickly."

The US had agreed a ceasefire with the Houthis after a month-long bombing campaign, and neither side appears eager to resume the conflict.

On Thursday the Foreign Office advised British citizens to avoid travel to Riyadh, after an attack on a passenger jet killed the pilot and two other people.

Scenes of Saturday's bombing sent shockwaves throughout the kingdom as it prepared to host its “Davos in the Desert” conference this month, which attracts leading financiers along with American and British senior officials.

"Our WhatsApp groups are already [busy] with people asking about trips to Dubai," said one British expatriate.

The Houthis had warned airlines to stay clear of Saudi airspace last week, and repeated their threat yesterday.

The Houthis “reiterate their warning to all airlines, staff, and travellers to refrain from using Saudi airports and airspace,” said the group’s military spokesman, Yahya al-Saree, on Telegram. He said airports in the Muslim holy cities of Mecca and Medina were exempt.

The Houthis accused Saudi Arabia of conducting hundreds of airstrikes in recent days, including an attack on the rebel-held airport in the capital, Sanaa. Ground fighting between the Houthis and Saudi-backed government factions has also intensified, but the offensive to regain Bab al-Mandeb has had limited success thus far.

The strait took on added importance this year after Iran tried to choke oil exports going through the Strait of Hormuz, with Saudi Arabia rerouting millions of barrels a day to the Red Sea port of Yanbu. The Houthis and their allied militia in Iraq have targeted the pipeline and the port itself, as well as Saudi oil tankers.

The operation was meant not only to force the Houthis to withdraw but also to restore a semblance of Saudi deterrence after it ended a seven-year war

---

The Houthis' unlikely leader

Profile

Supporters hold a sign of Abdul Malik al-Houthi

In 2011 there was little to suggest Abdul-Malik al-Houthi, then in his early thirties, commanded a rebellion that had survived six wars with the government (Rachel Hagan writes).

Jamal Benomar, who was the UN secretary-general's special adviser on Yemen, said the head of the Houthis "didn't look like the head of a militia." He said "he looked more like a student in a traditional Islamic school" with freshly trimmed hair and neat Yemeni clothes.

Fifteen years on, his group is firing missiles, rattling oil prices and menacing one of the busiest shipping lanes.

Benomar recalls warning Abdul-Malik, 47, that marching on Sanaa would lead to hundreds of deaths.

He said in response the Houthi leader "would smile and tell me, 'No, I can assure you there is going to be no bloodbath'." At least 274 people were killed in Sanaa during fighting in September 2014, according to the health ministry.

Abdul-Malik speaks in televised addresses from undisclosed locations and rarely appears in public.

The Houthis grew out of a revival among the Zaydis, a branch of Shia Islam. Their enemies still call them by their family name.

At least 13 people were killed in the attack on Riyadh's airport on Saturday

with the rebels in 2022. For now, it appears to have had the opposite effect.

Adam Baron, a Yemen expert and fellow at the New America think tank, said: "The Saudis have long been left with two bad choices in Yemen: accept rigid Houthi demands or go back to war. And if this latest bout of fighting simply ends in more Houthi gains, these demands are going to be even more hard-line.

"This is going to go to more escalation," said the Saudi analyst and political scientist Aziz Alghashian. "I think the Saudis can't entertain talks now ... there is too much public pressure to respond robustly. I think we are going to be in for a rough few weeks if not longer,

A father laid down the faith, one son built the movement, another inherited it and today brothers, cousins, an uncle and sons-in-law fill its senior posts. "The movement was the project of the Houthi family from day one," Maysaa Shuja al-Deen, a researcher at the Sanaa Centre for Strategic Studies, said. Farea al-Muslimi, of Chatham House, put it more bluntly: "Right now the Houthi family is the most powerful family in Yemen."

and what will make it [worse] is if the US resumes strikes on Iran. There is a real sense of shock in Riyadh."

The ceasefire had unravelled earlier this year after Saudi Arabia bombed the runway of Sanaa airport to stop an Iranian plane from landing. The Houthis responded by attacking Saudi ships and announcing a “maritime blockade” of the kingdom.

Iran, which has armed and trained the Houthis, had encouraged the militia to close Bab al-Mandeb to shipping, to further pressure the US and Israel into ending their war against Tehran.

The Houthis now appear keen on isolating Saudi Arabia. They have promised to refrain from attacks on US shipping and have avoided targeting British vessels after Britain announced it would aid Saudi airstrikes by refuelling their jets.

Saudi Arabia has leaned on Pakistan and Turkey, which signed a defence pact earlier this year, for support. It has also received support from Syria, which has sent drone operators to the government-controlled city of Aden.

The US has already sent military and intelligence operatives to Saudi Arabia to assist with targeting.

Their joint efforts appear to have had little effect for now. While hundreds of Houthis have been killed or captured in the offensive, the group has not withdrawn entirely from Bab al-Mandeb and the neighbouring city of Mocha, which was once a command centre for the region's government forces.

World

Island haunted by crimes of US soldiers

YUICHI YAMAZAKI/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

The killing of Anna Yagi has revived anger over the behaviour of troops, Richard Lloyd Parry writes from Okinawa

The couple who walked into the Naminoue Crystal love hotel in Okinawa in the early hours of last Saturday were nothing out of the ordinary. She was a 39-year-old Japanese woman; he was a 20-year-old member of the United States Marine Corps.

It is not clear how they knew one another but they might not have been acquainted for very long. Such casual encounters have long been part of life on Okinawa, an island smaller than the county of Bedfordshire in the far south of Japan where 30,000 American military personnel live.

Some time after entering, the marine, Devin Ballard, left the hotel alone, carrying the backpack of his date, Anna Yagi. At 4.15am a member of staff entered the room to find her dead. She had been strangled with a cord. Within a few hours Ballard was arrested by Japanese police close to Futenma, the vast Marine airbase on which he was stationed. He was identified by the tattoos on his arms of a cross and a flower, which had been captured on the love hotel's CCTV. Police are questioning him on suspicion of robbery and murder, crimes he denies.

A week later the ripples of the tragedy are being felt across the island and as far away as Tokyo and Washington. The case is already about far more than one act of violence. It is seen in Oki nawa as the latest in a series of crimes against women by American soldiers on the island going back more than eight decades. The island has an increasingly important strategic role in east Asia as a base for US efforts to meet the rising military

meet the rising limita power of China. The Japanese government is also attempting to meet the supposed growing threat of China, which claims as its own the remote Japanese island Senkaku, by shifting its armed forces to its southwest islands.

The Japanese prime minister, Sanae Takai-chi, the first woman to lead the country, expressed “strong protest” at the “heinous crime”. The recently elected governor of Okinawa, Genta Koja — who, like Takaichi, is a conservative supporter of the US bases — called the killing “extremely malicious and absolutely unforgivable”. He said: “The fact that such a crime has happened again means we have no choice but to conclude that the US military’s discipline, human rights education and other measures are not functioning at all.”

In a gesture of contrition the US military gated its troops for 48 hours and suspended military operations including flights out of the Futenma and Kadena airbases, which were silent between Wednesday and noon on Friday. The question is whether these gestures will be enough to quell the anger on the island.

Keiko Itokazu of the All-

Okinawa Council, which opposes the bases, said: "The national government and the Americans moved so fast and I know the reason.

"They know what happened in the past. And they don't want the magma in the hearts of Okinawan people to explode as it has before."

Eighty-one years after the bloody Battle of Okinawa, which killed 149,000 civilians in the final months of the Second World War, 70 per cent of the land area of US bases in Japan is in Okinawa, which has just 1 per cent of the country's population, and 0.6 per cent of its land area. The troops are committed to defending Japan against attack but their presence in such a concentrated area has been a source of irritation and anguish.

Okinawans endure noisy aircraft, crashes in civilian areas and crime. Activists have compiled a list of 950 crimes against women since 1945. They believe only one in ten sexual assaults are reported. Every few years there is an outrage so ghastly that it provokes large protests against the bases. In 1955 it was the rape and murder of a six-year-old girl by a GI from the Kadena airbase. In 1995 it was the abduction and gang rape by three US servicemen of a 12-year-old girl, which brought 85,000 Okinawans out in protest. Ten years ago the commander of US forces in Japan was pressured into imposing a month-long curfew and a ban on drinking off-base on American personnel after a former US marine working on the bases raped and murdered a 20-year-old woman.

"It feels as if anything could happen," Itokazu says. "Wherever we go we wonder where it is safe. Could something happen on the way to the shops, on the way to the park or to school? I've got three daughters and seven grandchildren and this is how we live. It's not someone else's problem; it's with all of us."

After the 1995 rape the US and Japanese governments sought to quell the outrage by promising to close down Futenma, which is located in the middle of the large town of Ginowan. Instead they announced they would relocate it to a quiet bay called Henoko. Anti-base activists and Denny Tamaki, the former governor of Okinawa, decried the damage to the environment caused by the new construction, which would move the Marines without substantially reducing their numbers. But in September Tamaki was defeated by Koja, his conservative rival, raising hopes this would accelerate the move to Henoko.

From the point of view of Koja, Tak-aichi and the US the killing of Yagi is the worst thing that could have happened.

The matter is complicated by the economic dependence of many Okinawans on the bases. When the troops were confined to their bases last week, entire streets around the Kadena base filled with bars, clubs and tattoo parlours catering to the Americans were deprived of customers. Anti-military activists say the land freed up by the bases could be used to build lucrative tourist facilities. But anxiety about the rising cost of living and low wages seems to have been what motivated Okinawans to unseat Tamaki in favour of Koja and Okinawans who make a living from the bases object to those who want the Americans to go home.

Yuko Oyakawa, a gender equality activist, said: "It causes conflict among Okinawan people.

"But our anger should be directed at the US forces not one another." There have been scattered demonstrations over the killing, in Tokyo as well as Okinawa, but so far they have been small compared to those in the past.

"There is a feeling of apathy knowing that 70 per cent of the prefecture people were against the construction of the Henoko base," Itokazu said. "Whatever we say, whatever we do, the national government or local government will not stop. There is a feeling of despair that whatever our wishes there will be no political solution."

The death in Okinawa has resulted in outrage, including in Tokyo, above, Devin Ballard, inset, is being questioned by police

Spring clean in Paris attic reveals Chinese imperial treasures

China

Richard Spencer China Correspondent

Someone in Paris seems not to be too proud of their 19th-century military ancestor. The Chinese, however, are grateful that at least they did a spring clean of their attic.

Among the discoveries were two Ming Dynasty manuscripts, which were found to be part of the Yongle Encyclopedia, one of China's best-loved treasures, nearly all of which is missing.

How the volumes ended up in the Paris attic is not known. All that the family who found them, and who have decided to remain anonymous, are prepared to say is that they were “acquired” by a French naval officer forebear who served in Beijing in the dying years of the Qing dynasty, the last of the imperial dynasties of China.

Thanks to a Chinese millionaire philanthropist, they have returned home and been handed over to a museum.

The encyclopedia was the work of 3,000 scholars working for Zhu Di, known according to Chinese historical tradition as the Yongle Emperor. When he inherited the empire created by his father, the Hongwu Emperor and founder of the Ming dynasty, he ordered his scholars to create a compendium of everything that was known under heaven.

Comprised of 11,095 volumes divided between 22,877 scrolls, it was published in 1408. Its total length is estimated at 370 million Chinese characters.

In 1557 a Ming dynasty successor, the Jiajing Emperor, commissioned a copy as a back-up, known as the Jiajing Copy. When the Ming dynasty fell to the Manchu invasion in 1644, the Belvedere of Embodying Benevolence, the pavilion where the original copy was held, burnt to the ground along with much of the rest of the Forbidden City, the seat of imperial power. The Jiajing Copy, in the nearby imperial archives, survived, and all the remaining scrolls come from it.

The two Yongle Encyclopedia scrolls have now been returned to China

The Hanlin Academy, just outside the Forbidden City and home of the Jiajing Copy from the 18th century, was also partially destroyed by fire in the Boxer Rebellion in 1900. But by then much of the Jiajing Copy had already been dispersed around the world. A 1794 inventory revealed that 1,154 volumes were missing. By 1875, less than half the encyclopaedia, just 5,000 volumes, remained.

When the two volumes were put up for sale by Beaussant Lefèvre & Associés, a Paris auctioneer, in 2020, the sellers said only that they were heirs of a French naval officer who made friends with Chinese officials when stationed in China in the 1870s. The volumes had been a “gift”. They and the auctioneers seemed unaware of the books’ historical importance to the Chinese public. They were given a pre-sale estimate of €8,000.

But the sale came to the attention of curators at the Forbidden City. Weng Lianxi, its ancient books specialist, scouted round for a philanthropist willing to bid. Jin Liang, a textile millionaire from Zhejiang province, south of Shanghai, and a major collector of manuscripts, stepped in. He paid €8.12 million, including commissions.

He and the Chinese authorities then had to spend years gaining an export permit from France, arranging the volumes' safe transport and preserving them. This summer, they were formally handed over to the ownership of the Hangzhou branch of the China National Archives of Publications and Culture, near Jin's hometown.

They bring to 241 the number of volumes in mainland China. The British Library has 24 and the Bodleian Library in Oxford has 19.

Jin told The Times: "When we actually opened the packaging and checked them page by page, only four words kept repeating in my mind — at last, back home. This wasn't just another item entering my private bookshelf. It was a national treasure that had wandered overseas for over a century, finally returning to where it truly belongs."

Stowaway comes home to hang with the masters

In 1926 Willem de Kooning, the Dutch artist, hid in the engine room of the British cargo ship SS Shelley and travelled as a 22-year-old stowaway from his native Rotterdam to the United States (Eden Maclachlan writes).

A century later, De Kooning's work has joined others by Dutch masters, such as Rembrandt and Van Gogh, in a triumphant homecoming at Amsterdam's Rijksmuseum in what is the biggest European exhibition of his work in more than 40 years.

The exhibition, Willem de Kooning at work, which opened on Friday, celebrates the Dutch abstract expressionist and features more than 120 of his drawings, paintings and sculptures. Most of his work has never left the US before.

In America, De Kooning pioneered “abstract expressionism”, a style defined by large works prioritising spontaneous expression, raw emotion and the artist’s subconscious. Originating from New York after the Second World War, the movement included other leading figures such as Jackson Pollock, Arshile Gorky and Lee Krasner, and later became known as the New York School.

According to Marian Cousijn, the exhibition's curator, De Kooning's work is defined by a tension between abstraction and figuration, with the human body one of the most recurring figurative

Willem de Kooning, left, was influential in the field of abstract expressionism, top. Above, Clamdigger, one of his bronzes

elements in his work.

"He never picks one side," said Cousijn. "Even in his works that look really like 100 per cent abstract, you still will discover the human shape. He never goes really abstract."

Having received vigorous training as a child — he went to art school at 13 —

De Kooning was a talented draughtsman, according to Cousijn. For De Kooning and the artists of his generation, the

creation process was almost as important as the end result, she said.

"For Willem de Kooning, the process is visible. If you look at his

drawing, you can still see the under drawings; you can still see the hesitation, he's scraping away things, he's erasing things, sometimes he's cutting, and he's smudging," said Cousijn. "But it also makes you aware that you're

looking at a painting or a drawing and not at an illusion."

De Kooning's work will share the Rijksmuseum's Gallery of Honour with Rembrandt. Although the similarities between the two may not be obvious at first glance, Cousijn said that De Kooning, who was deeply influenced by Rembrandt, shared more with his predecessor than meets the eye.

"Rembrandt was also always drawing on every bit and piece of paper that was around him. So this act of drawing really binds them together. And the light and the water were also really important for De Kooning," she said. "But then if you look at Rembrandt, he's also very experimental."

Cousijn said that although he was Dutch, De Kooning, who became a US citizen in 1962 and lived in there until he died in East Hampton in 1997, was not a household name in the Netherlands and was more famous in America. “For many people, it will really be a discovery,” she added.

World

Student 'drug dealer' faces charges over Renoir thefts

France

David Chazan Paris

Police have recovered two Renoir paintings worth about €9m a month after they were stolen from a museum on the French Riviera. Six suspects have been arrested, one of whom has been charged.

Those arrested include two alleged burglars who targeted the Musée Renoir in Cagnes-sur-Mer, about ten miles west of Nice, and a suspected fence, a person who knowingly buys and sells stolen goods.

One of them has been placed under formal investigation, equivalent to being charged. Named only as Loïc, 29, he could face 15 years in prison if convicted of theft and criminal conspiracy. Loïc, the son of a doctor, was previously arrested in 2020 on suspicion of dealing drugs while at university in Nice.

Police arrived minutes after the alarm went off last month. Pursued by a police dog, the thieves were forced to make a hasty escape, leaving behind two of the four paintings which they had taken.

Jean-Denis Flori, Loïc's lawyer, said his client had allegedly been identified from DNA found on wrapping placed over the abandoned paintings.

"The burglars then allegedly drove into the backcountry in a stolen vehicle which they had used for the robbery, abandoned it and retrieved their own vehicle," Flori said. That proved to be a lucky breakthrough for the police. Detectives working on a separate investigation had already placed a GPS tracker on the suspects' vehicle.

The thieves stole two paintings: Young Woman at the Well (c 1886) and Portrait of Madame Colonna Romano (c 1913). The theft and retrieval of the two paintings mark the latest chapter in their troubled histories. Portrait of Madame Colonna Romano was sold by an art dealer to the German embassy in Paris in 1940. The portrait, which depicts a Jewish actress who was a friend of Renoir's son Pierre, was found after the war and returned to France in 1947.

Young Woman at the Well also passed into Nazi hands, although it remains unclear whether it was looted or sold. It was found in a private home in Bavaria in 1949 and brought back to France.

Pope needs surgery for lump on lung

Italy

Alessio Perrone Milan

The Pope will have surgery in the coming days to remove a “localised and early-stage” lump on his lung, he has announced.

During his Sunday address from St Peter's Square in the Vatican, he said that the nodule was small and had been detected at a very early stage, but doctors had nonetheless advised him the operation was needed.

"Recently, during some check-ups, the doctors found a small, localised nodule in my lung," the Pope said at the end of his Angelus prayer.

"It was detected at a very early stage and is well localised. The doctors believe it is advisable to take action.

"So, following their advice, I have decided to have surgery to remove it. The operation is already scheduled for the coming days."

Lung nodules — small, well-defined lumps — are common and often turn out to be benign. However, some can be early tumours, which is why doctors often monitor or remove them.

The head of the Holy See press office, Matteo Bruni, said that the operation was scheduled for the first days of this week, and that the estimated recovery time would be about one week. He did not provide further details about the Pope's health.

Shortly before his announcement, the pontiff indicated that he would still travel to Uruguay, Argentina and Peru. The visit is planned for November 6 to 17 and will be his longest to date. It will mark his return to Peru, where he spent about 20 years, first as a missionary and then as bishop of Chiclayo until 2023.

According to Vatican News, the news website of the Holy See, the surgery will take place in Rome's Gemelli hospital, where the pontiff's predecessors Pope Francis and Pope John Paul II were admitted several times.

The hospital's top floor has an eight-room papal suite, including two living rooms, a kitchen, a doctors' meeting room, a private chapel, an administrative office, a room for security, and the Pope's private room.

Pope Francis famously greeted crowds from a hospital balcony on March 23, 2025, one month before his death. He had been admitted for bronchitis that had developed into bilateral pneumonia, for which he was hospitalised three times.

He had stayed at the hospital twice before, in 2021 and 2023, for colon surgery and a laparotomy and the repair of an abdominal hernia stemming from the previous surgery.

The pontiff announced the procedure during his address in St Peter's Square

John Paul II stayed at the hospital ten times between 1981 and 2005, and jokingly called it “the third Vatican”.

Giorgia Meloni, the Italian prime minister, said: "I would like to express my personal solidarity, and that of the Italian government, with the Holy Father as he faces the ordeal that lies ahead in the coming days.

"The calm and composure with which he spoke of it during today's Angelus are a source of comfort to us.

"I am certain that the Italian people, too, will not fail to offer their support and affection."

Rome's mayor, Roberto Gualtieri, also expressed his "sincerest sympathy" to the pontiff for his surgery.

"My thoughts are with him, with great affection and the hope that he may face this ordeal with serenity and return to his duties soon.

"On behalf of the city of Rome, I extend my warmest wishes for a speedy recovery," Gualtieri said.

World

Blown away Hurricane Isaias brought category two wind to Alabama and Florida. At least four people have died, and the storm tore off roofs of apartments in Milton, above

TIMES Travel Partner

TEN NIGHTS FROM

£2,799\*

per person

Antigua

ALL-INCLUSIVE STAY AND CRUISE

November 2027

Experience the Caribbean from a different perspective on an unforgettable escape combining the laid-back luxury of Antigua with the romance of sailing aboard Star Clipper. Begin with three all-inclusive nights at Pineapple Beach Club, where white sands, warm Caribbean waters and tropical surroundings set the scene for the adventure ahead.

Then step aboard the magnificent Star Clipper, a traditional tall ship where billowing sails and open decks evoke the golden age of sailing. Over seven nights, voyage between some of the Caribbean's most beautiful islands, from glamorous St Barts to Anguilla, St Kitts and the British Virgin Islands, with calls at Virgin Gorda, Jost Van Dyke and secluded beaches along the way.

With just the wind in the sails and the Caribbean stretching out around you, this is a wonderfully intimate alternative to a traditional cruise - combining iconic islands, hidden coves and the thrill of travelling between them under sail.

\*Prices are correct at the time of going to print. lead price based on November 2027 travel. Prices listed are based on two adults sharing a double /twin room/cabin and departing from a London airport. Single travellers and regional departures are available at a supplement. Tour is operated by Travelodeal Ltd ABTA P8297 ATOL11601, a company wholly independent of News UK.

Price includes

Return flights from London to Antigua

Three-night all-inclusive stay at Pineapple Beach Club, Antigua

Seven-night full board cruise onboard Star Clipper

All daily meals onboard Star Clipper

Onboard entertainment and sailing experiences

CALL TODAY ON

0808 239 2145

thetimes.com/

td-antigua

QUOTE TIMES

Vance's hillbillies seek a new political saviour

MICHAEL SWENSEN FOR THE TIMES

Annie Helwig used to vote Republican but is now handing out flyers for the Democrats. Skip and Danielle Wilson, below, think Trump is “embarrassing”

Loyal Republican state is starting to lean towards the Democrats, David Charter reports from Middletown, Ohio

JD Vance made his name writing about his upbringing in Middletown, Ohio: a world where struggling working-class Americans, or hillbillies, in the Rust Belt found themselves without opportunity as globalisation took their jobs abroad.

It was this group that helped propel President Trump, and later Vance, into the White House. But with less than a month until the midterm elections, voters of Middletown are turning against the vice-president and his boss.

Frustration with the administration hung over the Butler County Board of Elections as early in-person voting began last week.

Skip Wilson, a retired businessman who voted for Trump twice, arrived in his brand new Tesla Model Y.

"The main issue is to get rid of Trump," said the 78-year-old. "He's ruining this country and I'm a Republican. Every time he opens his mouth it's embarrassing."

Trump keeps saying he wants Americans to imagine he is on the ballot next month and he appears to be getting his way, but not always to the benefit of the Republican candidates who are actually up for election. The big races in Ohio, a former bellwether for the nation but recently solidly red, are for governor and a Senate seat briefly held by Vance. A win here for the Democrats would help towards the net gain of four Senate seats they need to take control of the 100-seat upper chamber. Vance's appointed replacement Jon Husted is blaming industrial decline on his challenger Sherrod Brown, a long-serving former Democratic senator trying to return to Washington. Brown is bashing Husted over his support for unpopular data centres.

Wilson's wife, Danielle, 78, said support for Trump still ran deep in this mainly rural southwestern corner of Ohio bordering Indiana, which split almost two-to-one for the president in 2024, with plenty of Republicans who could not imagine voting Democrat.

"A lot of my family is still very red and there's no changing them," she said.

But Trump's second term policies are motivating some to turn against Ohio Republicans. Annie Helwig, 76, voted Republican until

"The rhetoric has gotten so caustic that I think we are longing for a change in the atmosphere," she said as she handed out Democratic Party material to voters.

Heather Gibson remembers having long discussions with Vance in the Triple

Moon Coffee Company she owns in downtown Middletown where the vice-president grew up. The steel city of 52,000 has seen better days judging by the half-a-dozen boarded-up buildings at the top of Central Avenue, the main drag of quiet shops and small businesses where Gibson's café is a lively highlight. She said the Vance she voted for in 2022 was less extreme than the one he became after 2024.

"He came in here, he was a customer and he wasn't what he is today," said Gibson, 58. "He was more middle of the road then."

She also voted for Mike DeWine, the term-limited moderate Republican governor who is stepping down. In the close-fought race to replace him, Vivek Ramaswamy, the self-assured young rising star of the 2024 Republican presidential primary, is engaged in a mud-slinging contest with his Democratic opponent Amy Acton, the former director of the Ohio health department.

"DeWine is more like me; that's what I'm looking for," said Gibson. "I'm not in favour of someone who's crazy left or crazy right ... I hate to say this but I'm leaning towards the Democrats this time."

Ohio long had the reputation of being a middle-of-the-road state. It twice backed presidents Clinton, Bush and Obama for the White House, then it went three times for Trump handing him victory in 2024 by more than 11 points. The old adage “as Ohio goes, so goes the nation” gave way to “make America great again”.

It may be heading back into contested territory. Brown is leading Husted by 3.1 points in the RealClearPolitics polling average while Acton is up by 3.8 points on Ramaswamy.

Trump made a rally stop in Ohio on his tour of

mainly red states

where Republicans

need bolstering.

Chris Devine, associate professor of political science at the University of Dayton in Ohio, said: "Ohio is at

least very

competitive, which

is something that we

haven't seen for a while."

"I doubt that the real explanatory factor here is enthusiasm for Democrats," he added. "I think it's more a matter of people who are decidedly opposed to Trump, including Democrats, wanting to vote against him and voice their disapproval of the current state of politics and state of the economy. I think there's reason to believe it's because some Republicans are becoming disenchanted with the Trump administration."

The personal nature of the political “hit” ads running on TV and the internet suggests that both sides view the contest as close. Ads for Acton allege Ramaswamy is a “con man” who has made millions from investors in an Alzheimer’s drug that eventually failed, although he was never prosecuted for any wrongdoing. Ads for Ramaswamy claim “Acton is unstable” and show her looking into a broken mirror on which is scrawled “Mom has been drinking”. It is based on a police call made by her daughter in 2019 after an argument between Acton and her new partner in which a mirror was broken. No police action was taken.

In the Triple Moon Coffee Company, Trump's policies appear more on voters' minds than political advertising. Zugeily Nieves, 28, from Puerto Rico, who has lived in Middletown for five years, said she did not vote in 2024 but would support Democrats this time. She is part of a Hispanic community that makes up about 5 per cent of the Ohio population and which polling suggests is turning against Trump over the aggressive crackdown led by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency.

“ICE have always done their job before but the correct way, not just going on the streets and grabbing people,” said Nieves, a beautician and mother of two. “They are violating our rights. There’s a correct way to do it and that is not the way.”

Gibson said struggling working-class Americans who flocked to him in the Rust Belt did not feel any better off.

"Trump ... told people what they wanted to hear," she said. "What he offered was a way out. He offered to give us back our American dream ... but he couldn't produce that. We're looking for — and I hate to use this word but I'm going to say it — a saviour. No one person can do that."

Business

Streeting urged to turbocharge plans for ‘hybrid navy’ ships

Robert Lea Industrial Editor

Wes Streeting is under pressure to grant a direct-award contract for the command vessels of the new hybrid autonomous navy rather than run a competitive tender that could delay Royal Navy war-readiness by a decade.

A hybrid navy was a centrepiece of the long-awaited defence investment plan, which caused rows leading up to the fall of Sir Keir Starmer. It envisages the construction of six combat ships that will act as command motherships to a series of autonomous vessels, Types 91, 92, 93 and 94 covering uncrewed missile launchers, and underwater submarine hunters and reconnaissance.

The defence secretary has published no more details of plans to proceed. Industry sources warn that the MoD needs to move rapidly if it is preparing the UK's armed forces for conflict-readiness and addressing the threats of the Russians in the waters around Britain.

It is understood Streeting is being told that rather than launch a time-consuming design competition pitching Britain's warship-building companies, BAE Systems and Babcock, and others in a bidding process, that he should instead commission an existing vessel type in the command-ship role.

It is believed he is being encouraged to look at whether the Type 31 frigates being built by Babcock at the Rosyth dockyard in Fife can fulfil the role of the command ships known as CCVs or common combat vessels. If the MoD were to go with Babcock it would save on the costs of a new vessel type, support the defence industrial base with a transition from the five Type 3ls being built at Rosyth into the CCV programme, sustaining 2,500 jobs, and speed up the hybrid navy delivery.

Sources believe Babcock is in pole position to win a direct award. Its maritime business is led by Sir Nick Hine, a former second sea lord and a leading architect of the concept of a hybrid navy.

Streeting, however, could open himself up to criticism with a direct award as Babcock is behind in the delivery of the Type 3ls and has accumulated £330m of losses on the programme.

Neither Babcock nor BAE Systems, which could put forward a version of its Clyde-built Type 26 for the CCV programme, were prepared to comment.

The MoD said planning was continuing and cited previous ministerial comments that “the CCV remains in the initial stages of design [and that] options for hull forms” were being explored.

Wind farm hobbled by more delays

Huge project at Dogger Bank set to miss targets

Emily Gosden Energy Editor

The world's largest offshore wind farm is struggling with serious construction problems that threaten to further delay promised cheap power for consumers.

The Dogger Bank project in the North Sea got the go-ahead in 2019 with a contract locking in a record-low price for the electricity it would generate for 15 years.

More than 80 miles off the coast of Yorkshire, it was scheduled to start providing cheap power as early as 2023 but has repeatedly delayed its contract start dates after the failure of two turbine blades triggered “cascading” problems.

It is still grappling with “unforeseen and significant technical issues with the installation, remediation and commissioning of wind turbines”, according to a government document.

Dogger Bank is due to comprise 277 turbines with a capacity of 3.6 gigawatts, expected to generate enough clean energy to power the equivalent of six million homes. It is co-owned by SSE, the FTSE 100 energy group, Equinor, the Norwegian state oil and gas group, and the offshore wind company Vargronn of Norway.

The wind farm is being built in three stages. Dogger Bank A has a contract priced at £55.01 per megawatt-hour (MWh) today, which would be cheaper than any operational UK offshore wind farm, and roughly a third of wholesale market prices, which have risen to £162.50/MWh. Dogger Bank B and C have contracts at £57.92/MWh.

When the project was approved the government said it would mean renewables generating “below-market prices and without additional subsidy on bills” for the first time, but it is not clear when this cheap power will materialise.

Although Dogger Bank A generated electricity from its first turbine in 2023 it suffered a setback in 2024 when two separate blade failures forced it to slow construction work. It is still suffering “continuing knock-on impacts from the 2024 blade failure events and subsequent remediation programme”, including “ongoing technical defects and resource constraints”, according to the government document published last week.

Power that is being generated during the commissioning period continues to be sold at high prevailing market prices.

The first chunk of Dogger Bank A is required to activate its fixed-price contract by November 30 or risk contract cancellation, but it is not clear whether the project will meet the required conditions to do so. It is unlikely to be in the government's interest to cancel the contract, however, given the desire for cheap power to cut soaring energy bills.

A spokesperson for Dogger Bank Wind Farm said: "While some construction delays have previously been reported on Dogger Bank A, we're maintaining commissioning momentum. We expect the project to be substantially all available for generation by the end of 2026, with final commissioning work continuing into 2027. As a project of unprecedented scale, Dogger Bank A will be a world-class asset once fully operational, providing much-needed secure and affordable energy for Britain."

PAUL COOPER/REUTERS

Mark Carney, the Canadian prime minister, and Andy Burnham at an Everton v Wolverhampton cup match last month

Carney warns PM over Thames Water

Emily Gosden

Canada is said to have warned Britain against damaging foreign investment through the possible forced nationalisation of Thames Water.

Officials in Mark Carney's government are increasingly worried that Andy Burnham's government could inflict heavy losses on Canadian investors such as the Royal Bank of Canada by taking the utility into state control, The Sunday Telegraph reported.

RBC is one of a group of leading creditors that have proposed a contentious rescue package for Thames.

Expropriating assets without appropriate compensation could jeopardise further investment in the UK by Canadian companies, Canada is said to have warned the UK. Canadian pension funds are big investors in numerous sectors across the UK economy.

Thames Water, which serves 16 million customers in London and the south of England, is struggling to service an £18.5bn net debt pile after borrowing heavily under private ownership.

Burnham has been highly critical of the company and said in June that there was an “overwhelming case for public ownership”. He indicated before becoming prime minister he wanted to put it into a special administration regime while a buyer was found, but shelved this plan amid concerns about the cost and legal risks. Last month he said he would legislate to repeal a ban on the public ownership of water utilities.

About 100 creditors accounting for about £16 billion of the debt, including the RBC, has proposed a rescue package to write off some of its debts in return for taking ownership of the water company. The Telegraph said many of these creditors feared being wiped out if ministers seized control of the company.

RBC declined to comment. Dave McKay, its chief executive, told The Sunday Times last month that the UK's flirting with nationalising Thames Water was one of a number of mooted moves that sent "a signal you want to harvest your economy, not grow it".

Last week Anders Opedal, the boss of the Norwegian state oil and gas group Equinor, said that if the government did not approve the Jackdaw and Rosebank fields, investors would question whether the UK was “investable”.

Business

---

Need to know

1 The world's largest offshore wind farm is struggling with construction problems that threaten to further delay promised cheap power for consumers. The Dogger Bank project in the North Sea got the go-ahead in 2019 with a contract locking in a record-low price for the electricity it would generate for 15 years. Page 31

2 Wes Streeting, the defence secretary, is under pressure to grant a direct-award contract for the command vessels of the new hybrid autonomous navy rather than run a competitive tender that could delay Royal Navy war-readiness by a decade. Page 31

3 Canada is said to have warned Britain against damaging foreign investment through the possible forced nationalisation of Thames Water. Page 31

4 Fortnum & Mason, Britain's oldest department store, is opening a new shop and bar at Heathrow after strong demand from travellers for its luxury teas, biscuits and hampers. Page 34

5 Grand Central, the northern train operator, is planning a “Manchester to Paris” service in what is being seen as a test case of whether the rail regulator will allow private rail companies access to a state-run renationalised national railway. Page 34

6 Sir Peter Wood, the founder of Esure and Direct Line, has moved his tax residence to the United States, the latest departure of a series of tycoons. Page 35

7 Andy Burnham received a stark warning about net zero targets and the future of Nissan, of Japan, as a car manufacturer in the UK shortly before he became prime minister. Page 37

8 At the top end of the market, times are tough for consumer goods companies and retailers. Luxury brands lost 60 million customers globally between 2022 and 2025, according to Bain research, due to China's weaker economy and squeezed consumers elsewhere. Yet after six generations the family owned British jeweller Boodles is going strong. Times Entrepreneurs Network, pages 38-39

Thank goodness.

Party conference

season is over

Paul Johnson, page 35

For expert business analysis subscribe to the business newsletter

thetimes.com/newsletters

'Most hated' courier? We

Martijn de Lange has been in the top job for a decade, during which Evri has

Evri is facing a barrage of complaints but its boss Martijn de Lange insists it is improving, Guy Taylor reports

"THEY DESTROY" was the subject line of a recent one-star review my dad left for Evri, the delivery group sometimes styled as Britain's most hated parcel company. "Useless. Three deliveries in succession items were damaged, having been wrapped impeccably," he wrote. "DO NOT USE THIS GOD AWFUL COMPANY."

He is usually more mild-mannered. But in his defence there are few things as enraging as a parcel delivery gone wrong.

From broken or missing items and unhelpful chatbots, to couriers hurling packages over fences, Evri has for years been the subject of a barrage of fury from customers. That track record has been underscored by three years finishing last on the regulator Ofcom's customer satisfaction rankings.

Martijn de Lange, its chief executive, rarely offers interviews but is taking questions at one of the company's largest UK delivery hubs in Rugby, Warwickshire.

The Dutch businessman is close to marking a decade in the top job, a period in which Evri has expanded so rapidly that it now ships more than one billion parcels a year, roughly a quarter of all those delivered in the UK.

Revenues have risen by 263 per cent to £2.4bn since he joined in 2017, driven by online shopping on everything from second-hand platforms such as Vinted to the Chinese fast-fashion group Shein. The plan is to deliver 1.4 billion parcels a year by 2030.

It is a far cry from the early days of de Lange's career. He studied business administration at Erasmus University Rotterdam and, briefly, was a semi-professional tennis player. His first job as a graduate was managing a team of about 50 postal workers whom he admits initially had “no respect for me”. Two decades ago he moved to the UK, helping to establish a presence for TNT Post (now Whistl) in the north of England.

Evri, which has a roughly 42,000-strong workforce, is an utterly different ballgame. Since 2020 it has been subject to two debt-fuelled takeovers by American private equity while also undergoing a major rebranding, ditching its former name Hermes. Apollo, the present owners, agreed to a merger deal with DHL last year, creating a combination that challenges Royal Mail on annual parcel volumes.

The growth is undeniable. However, de Lange is still struggling to win plaudits for customer service. "I think we've made big improvements," he insists. "I can talk to you about the facts and the facts are that the main, top quality retailers are choosing Evri as a delivery option ... That tells you something about the quality."

His central defence is that the scale of the operation means millions of customer complaints are simply an inevitability. "If only 0.1 per cent of our parcels — and you need to think we do three and a half million a day — if only 0.1 per cent go wrong, then that's a lot of customers. So I think that creates some noise but it's not really the reality of what our clients are seeing," he says.

“We are delivering 99 per cent of our 48 hour [deliveries] on time and over 98 per cent of our 24 hours on time. And we're doing that with high customer scores. They are the facts. It is a fact that Evri is getting better and better.”

It is difficult to square his stance with Ofcom's findings, though. The latest figures from the regulator found more than 40 per cent of people were dissatisfied with Evri's service, compared with about 31 per cent who said they were satisfied. Royal Mail, which was acquired by the Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky for £3.6bn last year, also ranked in the bottom half of the table, while Amazon was top with 57 per cent of respondents satisfied. Data for the most recent year is expected to be published soon.

Evri, as with others in the industry, is ultimately liable to the retailers it works with and not the end consumer. Even as it ranks last on customer satisfaction, its private equity owners have extracted hundreds of millions in dividends from the business in recent years, including a recent £108m annual payout.

De Lange dismisses Ofcom's findings. "Statistically, [I don't] think it is a perfect way of looking at it. If you take a certain number of people and you ask them, 'Do you have an issue with Evri?' If you deliver five times more parcels than somebody else, you get five times more opportunities to have an issue with it." He points to poor service in other industries, citing rail and flight delays. "What about arrival times on airports and trains? These percentages are 60 per cent. Right here we're talking about points of a per cent. That's the difference."

Nevertheless, much of the criticism of Evri is surrounding the apparent pressure on its couriers, the majority of whom are self-employed and paid per parcel. DeLange cites certain pay agreements with unions and argues the average courier makes £20 per hour, while the self-employed model is used widely across the industry.

"To be clear, everybody uses that ... These people are choosing to work for

Laser tech specialist plans Aim float

Robert Lea Industrial Editor

In a rare London stock market flotation of a British advanced manufacturer, an East Midlands laser technology specialist is set to list in a fortnight's time.

TEK4, based in Blaby, south of Leicester, produces machines that help in the construction of turbine blades for jet engines and power plants.

The machines enable manufacturers to drill, by laser or electrical discharge, holes measured in microns in turbine blades to allow them to operate in extreme temperatures. About 95 per cent of them are exported, mainly to the United States and Europe, and they cost between £300,000 and £750,000 apiece.

Customers include power generation manufacturers such as GE Vernova and Siemens and aeroengine companies including Rolls-Royce, General Electric, Pratt & Whitney, and Safran. TEK4 also has some customers in the medical and automotive sectors.

Revenues nearly doubled to £16m last year from the sale of more than 40 machines produced by its 70 employees. Profits in 2025 more than tripled to £4.2m. The company expects revenues to nearly double again over three years.

TEK4, advised by Panmure Liberum, was due to announce today that it planned to list the shares to begin trading on the secondary Aim market on October 26 which, depending on demand from investors, could value the company at £40m.

Jason Duffin, 66, its founder and a veteran of Midlands engineering firms, is retaining a stake of about 30 per cent. About £20m of shares are available for sale roughly equating to the stake held by his co-investor Robin Womersley, 55, a corporate financier and private equity adviser.

Debt-free and cash-generative, according to its accounts, TEK4 is planning to double production at its Blaby facility with the introduction of a second assembly line. About 30 per cent of its business is generated from aftersales, maintenance and retrofit of its installed machines. The company's pathfinder prospective says its products are "mission critical" and differentiated from competitors.

“Accuracy and repeatability are critical requirements in the manufacture of aerospace and industrial gas turbine components operating in demanding environments,” it states. “The group has developed longstanding relationships with several leading aerospace and industrial gas turbine manufacturers and component suppliers. The group benefits from recurring and repeat revenue opportunities.

“Strategy is focused on expanding its presence in existing aerospace and industrial gas turbine markets whilst continuing to develop new products and technologies. “The business is underpinned by key technologies, patents, specialist engineering know-how and continued investment in research and development creating a ‘defensive moat’. A key element of the group’s strategy is the continued expansion of its manufacturing capacity.”

---

Be more like Singapore, planners told

Isabella Fish

Singapore-style planning reforms could cut housebuilding costs by £18,000 and speed up projects, a report suggests.

Research from Pension Insurance Corporation (PIC) argues that giving mayors in cities including Manchester and London greater scope to trial Singapore's streamlined approach could accelerate building and reduce costs.

The report, A Few Good Regulators, estimates that matching Singapore's speed of construction permit approvals could save £18,167 per home, based on an average UK construction cost of £206,250. The model suggests planning and consent times could also fall by about ten and a half months per project.

If applied to about 350,000 homes placed into the planning system

are a success story

EVRI: IOANNIS ALEXOPOULOS/ANADOLU/GETTY IMAGES

expanded to ship over a billion parcels a year, and is now testing delivery robots

us. We don't force them to work for us."

Last year, however, a BBC Panorama investigation, which is now the subject of a libel case from the parcel group, unearthed claims that changes to pay rates had left some couriers earning below the minimum wage.

Ministers are on the cusp of publishing a three-month consultation aimed at cracking down on the “bogus self-employment” of workers at firms such as Evri, Amazon and Deliveroo, The Sunday Times reported at the weekend. The plans are backed by Royal Mail, which is in the process of cutting 2,500 jobs after losing market share to rivals employing lower-earning gig workers.

De Lange is clearly frustrated at the perception of Evri, which he believes should be viewed as a British success story. "I think the culture in the UK to start attacking business, anti-business or wealth creation, is not very helpful for anybody. And yeah, I'm doing my best to create a successful company for the greater good of everybody."

I ask my dad for his thoughts on de Lange's defence a few days later. His own saga involved a failed attempt to sell two lithograph prints by Robert Heindel on eBay: the first was delivered to the buyer with broken glass, while the other went missing entirely. He promptly sent a replacement for the broken one, which ended up being damaged too: cue apoplectic rage.

Evri has managed to establish what happened to the lost parcel after the interview. It was apparently leaked on by another parcel and labelled damaged, although it is unclear why my dad was never contacted and no one seems to have any idea where it is now. The company has offered to secure some compensation. Still seething, he remains to be convinced.

The week ahead

Wall Street's biggest banks kick off the third-quarter earnings season this week with what is forecast to have been a highly profitable period for US companies. The six largest lenders are expected to report a combined \$19bn in revenues from stock trading as artificial intelligence and the US conflict with Iran caused a sharp spike in activity.

Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup and Wells Fargo start the ball rolling tomorrow. Goldman's overall third-quarter revenue is forecast to rise by 11 per cent year-on-year to \$16.8bn and net income is expected to grow by 0.2 per cent to \$3.9bn.

JPMorgan's revenue is forecast to rise by 10 per cent to \$51.2bn, with net income up 12 per cent to \$15.8bn. Citi's sales are expected to rise by 7 per cent to \$23.7bn and net income is forecast to increase by 30 per cent to \$4.5bn.

Morgan Stanley and Bank of America are set to report on

America's biggest banks are gearing up for their latest earnings season

Wednesday. Morgan Stanley's quarterly revenue is forecast to increase by 9 per cent to \$19.9bn while Bank of America's revenue is expected to rise by 9 per cent to \$30.8bn.

TOMORROW

Shareholders already know that Bellway built 9,695 homes in the 12 months to the end of July, 11 per cent more than in its previous financial year.

The combination of stagnant house prices and higher build costs means annual pre-tax profit is expected to increase by about 5 per cent to £306m.

Of more importance, however, will be the potential uplift to Bellway, which sells about a third of its homes to first-time buyers, from the government's recently announced Your First Home scheme and if it needs to buy more land to make the most of the expected uptick in demand.

Finals: Bellway, YouGov

Interims: Angling Direct, Whitbread Bytes Technology

Trading updates: Greencore, Marston's, Reach, Michael Page, Oxford Instruments, Rio Tinto, Ninety One, Economy: IMF World Economic Outlook; Opec monthly oil report

WEDNESDAY

The summer was a happy time investors in London's listed recruiters as their shares rose based on optimism that a three-year downturn in the hiring market was coming to an end. Robert Walters stock has risen 60 per cent since July, when it said it was seeing "good trading momentum" in key markets such as the UK, Japan and New Zealand. Since however, the war in Iran has dragged on, energy prices have risen and interest rate rises look to

e back on the table.

Investors will want to see

if momentum has been

maintained into

autumn with this

trading update, or if

companies and

candidates have

decided to sit on their

hands again.

Finals: Softcat

Trading updates: Ashmore, DiscoverIE, Robert Walters

AI spin-out led by former Nanopore boss raises £4m

between the first quarter of 2024 and the second quarter of 2025, the reforms could generate total savings of £6.36bn.

The analysis draws on World Bank data showing Singapore completes construction permit approvals 59 per cent faster than Britain. PIC applies that difference to the planning and consent stage, rather than the entire pre-construction process.

The report also proposes auditing public land holdings and combining sites owned by different public bodies to enable larger developments, reflecting Singapore's model.

The document cites a median 65-month pre-construction period for major infrastructure projects in the UK, based on research by Boston Consulting Group. "The UK urgently needs more reservoirs, ports and power plants," the report states.

Unlike the UK's locally negotiated, multi-stage planning system, Singapore uses a more centralised approach. Lord Wolfson of Aspley Guise, the boss of Next, has called for the UK's planning system to be replaced, arguing that government control over land use restricts where homes and businesses can be built and holds back growth.

Alex Ralph

An AI-driven materials discovery company spun out from the University of Liverpool and led by the former boss of Oxford Nanopore has raised £4m.

Matter Machine has closed a pre-series A funding round led by IP Group,

Gordon Sanghera led the Oxford University spinout for two decades

the investment firm, and supported by Northern Gritstone, which backs promising tech companies emerging from universities in the north of England.

Gordon Sanghera, who has stepped down as chief executive of Oxford Nanopore after leading one of the most successful spin-outs from Oxford University for more than two decades, will lead Matter Machine.

The company has been founded to commercialise the research of Professor Matt Rosseinsky. It plans to develop AI-powered materials discovery technologies to accelerate the identification and optimisation of novel materials.

Sanghera said: “Materials innovation underpins progress across multiple sectors from energy to manufacturing and electronics.” Rosseinsky, chief scientific adviser, said: “The combination of advanced materials science and artificial intelligence creates a powerful opportunity to transform how new materials are discovered.”

Greg Smith, the chief executive of IP Group, said the venture could “dramatically shorten the time required to develop new materials, accelerating innovation across batteries, catalysts and advanced manufacturing”.

THURSDAY

A new portfolio valuation last week has given Seraphim Space Investment Trust the ideal backdrop for its annual results. The trust's managers announced a £52.2m boost, equating to 22p a share, following a new financing round for its satellite navigation holding, Xona Space Systems.

Shares in the trust, which raised £137m through a C-share issue earlier this year, are among the top-performing shares on the London Stock Exchange and analysts expect to see another uplift in net asset value of its portfolio with the full-year figures.

Some of its largest

holdings, including

Xona Space Systems, ICEYE and HawkEye 360, have hit major milestones this year, a sign of the increasing maturity of its portfolio.

Clodagh Moriarty, chief executive of Dunelm, set out her three-year strategy for Britain's biggest homeware retailer in an update last month. New store openings are being funded by cost-cutting elsewhere as she looks to revitalise flattening growth. The shares fell in response, however, in part because of a warning that the summer heatwave had led to softer trading. Analysts are hoping that quarterly sales for the three months to

the end of September will have improved with more stable weather in recent weeks.

Finals: Seraphim Space Trust

Trading updates: Antofagasta, Dunelm, Entain, Jupiter Fund Management, Kenmare, Mondi, Norcros, Rank, Travis Perkins, Workspace Economy: Office for National Statistics monthly GDP UK estimate; G20 finance ministers meeting

FRIDAY

Trading update: Man Group

Economy: World Bank and IMF annual meetings

Business

Fortnum & Mason spreads its wings

Fortnum & Mason is opening a new shop and bar at Heathrow after

strong demand from travellers for its luxury teas, biscuits and hampers (Isabella Fish writes).

Britain's oldest department store is opening a store in Terminal 2 and a bar in Terminal 3 at the start of next month, as part of a plan to reach more shoppers.

The retailer already has a store and bar in Terminal 5, which recently had its bar extended "due to customer demand".

Tom Athron, its chief executive, said: “From supplying travellers setting out from London in the 18th century to welcoming passengers passing through the UK’s gateway to the world today at Heathrow, travel has always been part of the Fortnum’s story.”

He added: “These new openings represent an important milestone in our growth strategy, allowing us to reach millions of international and domestic travellers each year and introduce new audiences to the world of Fortnum’s.”

Fortnum & Mason was founded in 1707 when

William Fortnum, a footman to Queen Anne, convinced his landlord, Hugh Mason, to go into the grocery business with him.

Since 1951 it has been owned by Wittington Investments, the Weston family's investment vehicle. The family, which ranked ninth on last year's Sunday Times Rich List with an

Growing demand for the retailer's luxury teas is driving expansion at Heathrow. The bar there serves light dishes and champagne to travellers estimated fortune of £14.49bn, paid themselves a total of £32m in dividend payments last year after profits rose across their portfolio, which includes Heal's, the upmarket furniture chain, and a majority stake in Associated British Foods (ABF), which owns the retailer Primark.

Turnover at the "King's grocer" grew by 5 per cent to £239m in the year to the end of July 2025, despite what it described as "challenging times for consumers in the UK and beyond".

Pre-tax profit rose by 61 per cent to £15m during the year, following one-off costs incurred in 2024 for a new distribution centre and “positive underlying year-round

ALAMY

performance" with the business seeing growth across all channels.

Fortnum & Mason said that the store in Terminal 2 would sell its “most-loved” products, including teas, biscuits, confectionery and hampers. There will also be a service area for personalisation and in-store ordering.

Fraser Brown, retail director at Heathrow, said: "As one of Britain's most iconic brands, renowned globally for exceptional food and gifting, Fortnum's is a natural fit for Heathrow, where millions of passengers begin their journeys each year. These new openings will enhance the airport experience and showcase the very best of Britain to travellers from around the world."

Next stop, Paris: Firm plots rail route from Manchester

Robert Lea Industrial Editor

Grand Central, the northern train operator, is planning to launch a “Manchester to Paris” service in what is being seen as a test case of whether the rail regulator will allow private rail companies future access to a state-run renationalised national railway.

After the latest round of rejections for “open access” applications to connect under-served communities in gaps on the timetable on main lines, the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) has been accused of “running down the clock” on decisions before its subsumption into the state-run, renationalised Great British Railways.

Open-access services are run by private companies taking all the financial risk and reward outside of the ambit of the Department for Transport's direction. Grand Central, which is owned by Arriva and operates in the northeast and West Yorkshire, and the London-Edinburgh Lumo and Hull Trains of FirstGroup have been a success on the east coast main line in and out of King's Cross.

In an innovative application that is set to go into the ORR shortly, Grand Central wants access rights to operate trains from Manchester not down the usual west coast main line into London Euston but instead to connect on to the midland main line into London St Pancras. It would be marketed as an opportunity for travellers from or to the north to directly connect with the international high-speed Eurostar trains at St Pancras.

Train passengers going to Paris have to change from Euston to St Pancras

However, there is a growing behind-the-scenes row on the railways because some believe the ORR, a regulator that is independent of the DfT, is delaying decisions until next spring when its responsibilities are taken over by GBR under the direction of the department.

Despite public pressure from ministers telling the ORR to look carefully at open-access applications for evidence of causing congestion of loans or abstraction of revenues from publicly run services, the ORR has rejected accusations of interference in its independence. However, the industry body All-rail, the alliance of passenger rail companies, believes it is seeing a trend.

John Thomas, its policy director, said: "With Network Rail [the state-owned infrastructure operator] consistently saying no to open-access applications, with the ORR now seemingly being under pressure from DfT, it looks like the voices that say the ORR has now been influenced to say no to every open-access application are being proven to be correct."

The ORR has recently rejected applications to run new open-access services to Shropshire and north Wales; Rochdale, north of Manchester; and to the New Forest in Hampshire. It also delayed a decision on a proposed direct London service from Lincolnshire and Cleethorpes for so long that its applicant, Grand Central, withdrew the bid.

Renationalisation of the long-haul and regional railways and the formal creation of GBR is due to complete by next spring.

There are several open access applications as yet outstanding. The last to be given the green light by the ORR, a service from London Paddington to Carmarthen in west Wales, is due to begin next year.

Car loan scandal drives Renault unit off course

Ben Martin Financial Editor

A soaring compensation bill for missold car loans has pushed the British motor finance arm of Renault to its first annual loss in 26 years.

Accounts filed at Companies House by the Rickmansworth-based business show it fell £110.4m into the red on a pre-tax basis last year after setting aside an extra £150m to cover its possible redress costs from the industry-wide scandal. The increase took the company's overall provision for the affair to £219.2m, although it cautioned that this was a "best estimate [and] the ultimate cost of redress may differ from the amount provided".

The jump in its potential compensation bill meant the business recorded its first annual pre-tax loss since 1999, which was the same year that Renault of France took ownership of the British lender from Nissan of Japan after the two carmakers agreed their longstanding alliance.

The accounts for the Renault subsidiary, which is called RCI Financial Services and also offers finance on Nissan vehicles, shed further light on the fall-out from the mis-selling controversy, which is expected to cost banks and the lending arms of the auto manufacturers billions of pounds. RCI's pre-tax profits also shrank to £8.7m in 2024 after it booked a £73.6m provision for the car loans affair. At issue are the commissions that lenders pay to motor dealers for arranging finance for car purchases. An investigation by the Financial Conduct Authority concluded last year that many motor finance deals between 2007 and 2024 had been unfair and that commissions had been poorly disclosed to consumers.

The authority wants to force the industry into paying compensation and is planning a scheme that is likely to result in redress being owed on 12.1 million deals. Under the plan, lenders will pay out an estimated £7.5bn in compensation and will shoulder a further £1.6bn in costs to run the scheme, according to the FCA.

Three companies that face hits — Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz and the French bank Crédit Agricole — are contesting the authority's plan in court, delaying the scheme. A consumer group has also brought a challenge, arguing that motorists will be short-changed by the regulator's proposals. The FCA has warned that if it is compelled to abandon its plan, lenders will still face a flood of consumer complaints and resolving the problem will cost the industry about £6bn more.

Lenders on the hook for compensation include Lloyds Banking Group, which has earmarked almost £2bn, Barclays, which has set aside £430m and Close Brothers, which has booked a £320m provision.

A spokesman for RCI said: "We continue to monitor developments closely and remain committed to supporting regulatory requirements and delivering fair customer outcomes."

Paul Johnson

Post-dated cheques are worthless — voters need clarity on policies

Kemi Badenoch and her husband, Hamish, at the party conference in Birmingham

“

Thank goodness.

The party

conference season is

over. No more

expensive promises

being made, with tabs to be picked up some time in the 2030s.

We don't know exactly what the world will look like come the next decade. We do know that the Office for Budget Responsibility projects that public spending will rise by 1.5 per cent of national income in just the first five years of that decade — that's by about £45bn a year in current terms — simply to keep up with pressures from demographic change. That does not account for any increase in the defence budget. Both Labour and the Conservatives assure us they will increase that to 3.5 per cent of national income, at a cost of a good £25bn, between now and 2035.

That is to say, if you take the solemn promises on defence spending remotely seriously — and I'm not at all sure that I do — then just to stand still we will be looking at something like £70bn of tax rises, or cuts to other spending, over the next parliament. Did you hear anyone mention that from their conference podiums?

Let's start with the Liberal Democrats. They promised £17bn of income tax cuts, alongside cuts to fuel duty and national insurance contributions. No spending cuts identified. This is not remotely serious stuff.

They argue that rejoining the EU would turbocharge the economy to such an extent that tax revenues would increase by more than enough to pay for those cuts, and presumably by enough to fund those other spending pressures. You can, of course, make a compelling economic case for rejoining the EU. Doing so should lead to more economic growth. But by enough and within the period of the next parliament? Doubtful. It is certainly not the basis for a promise of specific major tax cuts.

Reform UK have a remarkably similar proposal to raise income tax allowances, and a whole range of additional tax cuts on top. They at least acknowledge this would require big spending cuts elsewhere. Their proposals to chop a full quarter off the working-age welfare budget would certainly be revolutionary.

The Conservatives' big party pleaser was the promise to raise the inheritance tax (IHT) threshold and entirely abolish inheritance tax on the family home. Reasonable people can differ on the case for raising the overall threshold. It has been frozen for a long time and more estates are being brought into IHT. But of all the tax cuts one might consider, this would probably do the least for economic growth, despite that being purportedly their No I priority.

I find it much harder to give the proposal to abolish IHT on owner-occupied houses the stamp of reasonableness. Last year I applauded Kemi Badenoch's pledge to get rid of stamp duty land tax. That is a disastrously bad and damaging tax that bungs up the housing market. This year she proposes to bung it up again by giving older people a huge incentive to remain in big, expensive family homes when it would be better for them, for families and for the economy, to trade down. Much better just to increase the IHT threshold further.

What was perhaps most disappointing from the Conservatives was their failure to back Labour's proposed change to the pension triple lock. This was a modest and sensible proposal. It would ensure the state pension rises over time in line with earnings, while never in any particular year rising less quickly than prices, or indeed than 2.5 per cent. That sounds similar to today's triple lock but avoids the random and expensive upwards ratchet created by the current formula. Come on Conservatives.

It is hard to take protestations of fiscal rectitude seriously if you're going to duck this one. So, kudos to the prime minister for grasping the triple lock nettle. Less kudos for implying that doing so will somehow "pay for" a new national care service free at the point of use. It won't.

First, moving away from the triple lock will merely slow the rate of increase of spending on the state pension. Helpful but not in any sense a new pot of funding. Second, so random is the current policy, we really don't know how much getting rid of it would save us. The stark fact is that a national care service, a whole new leg of the welfare state, will cost a whole lot of money which we will have to find in higher taxes or spending cuts elsewhere.

One also wonders at such a firm announcement on the “solution” to social care while Baroness Casey of Blackstock is still in the foothills of her review. I for one have serious concerns about this proposal. Because it is intended as a universal service, it will be very expensive and inevitably harshly rationed. That is what has happened in Scotland on whose system Andy Burnham’s proposal seems to be modelled. And it doesn’t even solve the fundamental problem that so many are worried about. So far as one can tell at present, it wouldn’t pay for the residential costs for those who need long-term care. So, even this new and expensive service would still leave many suffering the kinds of catastrophic costs that blight today’s system.

To be fair we did also get a clearer sense of the blue water between the parties in terms of their ideologies. Labour much more statism and public control. Conservatives returning to Thatcherite economic values. Liberal Democrats clear on returning to the EU. Reform — despite its voter base — a low-tax, low-welfare party.

That's what party conferences should be for, ideally accompanied by serious analysis of their approach to future challenges. Making up policy on the hoof and writing post-dated cheques that are most unlikely to be redeemed may excite the party

faithful. But such behaviour is likely only to exacerbate cynicism among the wider electorate.

Paul Johnson is provost of The Queen's College, Oxford, and a senior adviser at Frontier Economics

Business

Direct Line tycoon: I've left Britain for Florida

Alex Ralph

The veteran entrepreneur and founder of Esure and Direct Line has moved his tax residence to the United States, the latest departure of a series of high-profile tycoons.

Sir Peter Wood, whose wealth is estimated at £795 million and is a former Conservative Party donor, has revealed he moved his residence last year from the UK to Florida, where he has a home in Palm Beach. Speaking to The Times, Wood, who turns 80 next month, said: "The reason is simple. I've owned a house in Boston for 30 years. I've had a house in Palm Beach for 20 years."

He has developed properties in the US and been a director of Plymouth Rock Assurance in Boston for three decades. He also said he preferred the warmer winters.

Wood said the decision was not motivated by the UK's political or tax environment, although he said he was "disappointed in all politicians".

He has donated more than £1.5 million to the Tories, including most re-

Sir Peter Wood has been a top donor to the Conservatives

cently £500,000 before the 2024 election, according to electoral records.

Wood also owns a large collection of Margaret Thatcher's outfits bought at a 2015 Christie's auction.

His tax move comes amid concerns about a series of high-net-worth departures from the UK and a clampdown on non-dom tax rules and wealth taxes.

He said of the tax implications of his switch: "It's a different system there. But it's no meaningful benefit. Some areas are much better and some are much worse. Will I pay more or less tax? To be honest, I'm not even sure. I mean I paid a lot of tax in the UK. I paid hundreds of millions".

Wood said he continued to support the UK. He is a large donor to University College London where he has sponsored PhD students in cancer research.

He is also preparing to launch a new insurance venture — his eighth — next year, and to back it with £5 million of seed funding. “With the new technologies, it’s a great time to build a new business. With AI and machine learning, it provides us a great opportunity.”

Get some wit for your walls

Find your own signed and framed print of our cartoonists' finest work, featuring Peter Brookes, Morten Morland, Peter Schrank and more.

THE TIMES

THE SUNDAY TIMES

BEAUTY IN EVERY POSTCODE

WORDS: JOELY CAREY

New research shows the nationwide benefits of the beauty and personal care industry: boosting the economy, keeping high streets busy and connecting communities $^{1}$

he beauty and personal care industry contributed more to UK GDP in 2025 than the creative, arts

and entertainments activities sector, and double that of programming and broadcasting. $^{1}$

The sector delivered £28.3 billion to the UK economy in 2025, generated £8.8 billion in tax revenue and supported 595,000 jobs. $^{2}$ Those jobs span retail and manufacturing, science, marketing, wellness and salons, and they are spread across the country.

A new report, The Impact of Beauty: Revealing its Social, Cultural and Economic Value, commissioned by the British Beauty Council, supported by L'Oréal Groupe, compiled by Oxford Economics and launched this week, also measures something that rarely shows up in economic output: what the industry enables. Beauty and personal care doesn't just reflect a nation's wellbeing. It powers it.

It starts with the household budget. Consumers rank personal care above gym memberships, streaming subscriptions and eating out, and level with clothing and fashion. The average adult spends 13 minutes a day on beauty and personal care, and the habit holds across income groups and demographics. $^{2}$ Far from being a discretionary extra, hair, beauty and personal care is an everyday essential.

ANCHORING THE HIGH STREET

According to the report, there are 191,200 beauty and personal care businesses across the UK. Hair and beauty salons, barbers, clinics and nail salons make up almost a third of all leisure and recreation businesses in the UK's retail areas. In small high streets, hair and beauty salons alone account for as many leisure amenities as pubs, bars and cafés combined. $^{2}$

Unlike conventional retail, these businesses cannot move online.

"These appointments don't just bring people on to the high street, they help keep it thriving," says Millie Kendall OBE, chief executive of the British Beauty Council. "A visit to a hairdresser or barber is rarely an isolated transaction – it's often the start of a wider spending journey, the kind of structural pull few other high street categories can offer."

---

TRUSTED SPACES

The research shows salons, barbers and beauty therapists also provide regular social contact, a sense of community and sometimes emotional support. Among frequent

They depend on skilled practitioners and physical premises, which the report shows makes them a source of footfall.

the sole reason for the trip. Half of appointments led to extra spending at nearby businesses. $^{2}$

More than half of respondents' most recent appointments took place on a high street or in a town centre. For 86 per cent of those, the appointment was

some weeks. Among men aged 18 to 24, that rises to 42 per cent. At a time of growing concern about youth isolation, the local salon or barber has become a modest but valuable part of Britain's social infrastructure. $^{2}$

"These small businesses sit at the heart of their communities,"

its value lies not only in what it produces, but in what it enables: stronger confidence, stronger communities and vibrant high streets across the UK.”

users, 44 per cent had a meaningful conversation with a member of staff in the previous six months, while others had discussed personal concerns or important life events during an appointment. $^{2}$

For nearly one in five regular customers, a visit is one of the few times they interact with anyone at all says Thierry Cheval, managing director and chairman of L'Oréal Groupe UK & Ireland. "The impact of a single salon or barbershop ripples out far beyond its four walls, into the local economy, the life of our high streets across the country, and the lives of the

people who walk through its door."

with 40 international brands, it backs the ecosystem by training stylists, helping independent salon owners build stronger businesses and bringing skin health advice on to the high street.

DRIVING THE ECOSYSTEM

Keeping that ecosystem thriving takes commitment from every player within it. L'Oréal Groupe has invested in the UK for 94 years and operates across every category, from haircare to skincare. As one of the industry's largest companies,

Taken together, the findings show an industry whose deepest impact lies in how it makes people feel, not in how they look. Three in four frequent users say personal care has a direct positive impact on how they feel about themselves, as do 61 per cent of all adults. Around half say it lifts their mood, and almost half say it makes them more resilient to daily pressures. At work, 51 per cent say beauty and personal care makes them feel more confident in a professional setting. $^{2}$

---

595,000

---

£28.3bn

"The industry is essential," says Cheval. "The report shows

With more than 7,500 partner salons across the country, and around 20,000 hairdressers trained every year through its academy, the company works to pass on the skills of the craft. Through the L'Oréal Business Academy, it helps salon owners and stylists develop their business skills and financial literacy, alongside support on sustainability, to help them to run resilient, modern businesses.

In 2025, it launched an initiative with Boots to give pharmacists dermatological training, and more than 800 have been trained to date. This has widened access to skincare advice, a meaningful step given that around one in four GP visits in the UK are linked to skin conditions. $^{3}$

people employed by the beauty sector in 2025 contributed to the UK economy from the beauty sector in 2025

---

A GLOBAL SUCCESS STORY

---

POWERING PARTICIPATION

Beauty and personal care is also one of Britain's export successes. The sector generates £4.2 billion in annual exports, of which about 70 per cent go to the EU, Britain's largest trading partner. $^{1}$

"This industry is one of Britain's

THE INDUSTRY'S VALUE LIES NOT ONLY IN WHAT IT PRODUCES BUT IN WHAT IT ENABLES: STRONGER CONFIDENCE, STRONGER COMMUNITIES AND VIBRANT LOCAL CENTRES ACROSS THE UK

THIERRY CHEVAL

Managing director and chairman,

L'Oréal Groupe UK & Ireland

genuine growth success stories, at home and abroad, but to keep growing, it needs the government to recognise it for what it is: essential economic infrastructure, not a discretionary extra," says Kendall.

"The right conditions for high street salons, and continued investment in skills, would let this industry do even more for Britain. We also need to enable global brands to invest and

grow, and for our amazing British brands to export more easily. Reducing regulatory duplication and complexity, and ensuring dynamic alignment where it makes sense, is critical to ensuring a stable, predictable and attractive market to invest in.”

Beauty doesn't just reflect a nation's wellbeing. It powers it.

SCAN THE QR CODE TO DISCOVER MORE ABOUT L'ORÉAL GROUPE'S IMPACT IN THE UK

L'ORÉAL

GROUPE

BRITISH BEAUTY

COUNCIL

Nissan warned Burnham about net zero risks

Robert Lea Industrial Editor

Alex Ralph Chief Business Correspondent

Andy Burnham received a stark warning about net zero targets and Nissan's future as a car manufacturer in the UK shortly before he became prime minister.

The Japanese company wrote to him saying: “Political instability cannot be an excuse for shifting the goalposts for the UK’s most valuable exporting industry.”

In correspondence between Nissan executives and government ministers, revealed in a freedom of information request from The Times, the manufacturer warned that future investment could depend on net zero policies being watered down. Nissan's Sunderland factory is the UK's single largest car assembly plant.

The letter to Burnham and various government ministers was dated July 3, just over two weeks before he became prime minister. It was written by Alan Johnson, Nissan's European head of manufacturing, who has made outspoken appearances before MPs on the business select committee.

Johnson asked for “no delay to the planned public consultation on the zero emission vehicle (ZEV) mandate and that it is released — as promised — before the summer parliamentary recess [on July 16].” The mandate involves the eventual phasing out of petrol and diesel vehicles for EVs.

Johnson wrote: "All parties have welcomed...a clear commitment from the UK government to publish the outcome of the strategic dialogue with the automotive industry and a consultation with clear options for ZEV mandate trajectory change ‘before summer’."

"We would like to emphasise the importance of publishing the proposed consultation before the next prime minister is installed.

"Political instability cannot be an excuse for shifting the goalposts for the UK's most valuable exporting industry.

“Any further delays to publication could have a serious impact on our activities and near-term investment opportunities in the UK. We would consider it unacceptable for political instability to hinder progress on amending the ZEV mandate to be in line with market realities.”

The ZEV mandate, inherited from the Conservative government, states that 80 per cent of all new cars sold in the UK must be fully electric battery vehicles by 2030.

The scheme threatens to penalise companies that do not meet annual targets, set at 33 per cent in 2026, rising to 38 per cent next year, 52 per cent in 2028, and 66 per cent in 2029.

Although there are a host of derogations, the scheme envisages that non-adherent companies either will have to buy credits from those companies that are exceeding the target or pay penalties to the Treasury.

Jefferies, the financial research firm, puts Nissan as one of the laggards — and by quite some way — in electric vehicle transition with only 11 per cent of its new cars in key European markets being zero emission.

The letter from Nissan shows what its leaders in Japan think of yet another British prime minister and yet another delay in changing the ZEV mandate.

"A delay would send a very negative signal to our global headquarters in the context of current UK political instability," Johnson said. "We remain convinced that the current trajectory is unsustainable based on natural levels of consumer demand."

Nissan's main board has given the green light to a £2bn investment, including some UK taxpayer support, to prepare the Sunderland plant for production of electric cars as well as a battery gigafactory that would sustain the 6,000 people employed there.

After months of signalling that it would revisit the terms of the ZEV mandate, the government announced a review in mid-August which is planned to run through to October 23.

Manufacturers have argued that of the take-up of new electric cars, which is at about 30 per cent, only half is from people who actively want to buy them, and the remaining customers are pushed by company car perks, tax breaks and cut-price offers.

Johnson said: “While the mandate remains in place at the current trajectory, many automotive manufacturers continue to lose out significantly due to the need to discount electric vehicles heavily to find buyers.”

The Department for Transport said: "It has never been easier or cheaper to own an electric vehicle — with sales up by 36 per cent in September thanks to our £7.5bn investment in the market, and nearly two million electric drivers saving up to £1,400 a year in running costs.

"We recognise manufacturers are facing challenges, and are reviewing the ZEV mandate to ensure it continues to deliver for British consumers and industry. Our consultation is ongoing and no decisions have been made."

---

Business

Production of the Nissan Leaf in Sunderland. The company is investing £2bn in the plant for electric cars and a battery gigafactory that would support 6,000 jobs

BACKING AMBITION.

BACKING RESILIENCE.

BACKING WHAT'S NEXT.

BACKING THE UK'S

FASTEST-GROWING

BUSINESSES AND

ENTREPRENEURS.

BARCLAYS | Private Bank

Backing your future

PROUD SPONSOR OF THE SUNDAY TIMES Hundred

THE BUSINESS PODCAST

Join Hannah Prevett and Dominic O'Connell as they uncover the personalities, power plays, boardroom dramas and sheer ambition that drives the world of business in our new weekly podcast.

Available free from wherever you get your podcasts

Barclays offers private and overseas banking, credit and investment solutions to its clients through Barclays Bank PLC and its subsidiary companies. Barclays Bank PLC is authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority (Financial Services Register No.122702) and is a member of the London Stock Exchange and Aquis. Registered in England. Registered No. 1026167. Registered Office: 1 Churchill Place, London E14 5HP.

Business Times Entrepreneurs Network

The family jeweller that has not lost its sparkle

THE TIMES

ENTREPRENEURS NETWORK RETAIL

After six generations, Boodles is still going strong despite the wider economic gloom, Amy Wilson writes

Even at the top end of the market, times are tough for retailers and consumer goods companies. Worldwide, luxury brands lost 60 million customers between 2022 and 2025, according to Bain research, thanks to China's weaker economy, squeezed consumers in

Seb

I want my family to benefit from my hard work.

Terry from S&W

Let's make succession a gift, not a guess.

Whatever the challenge, be it wealth creation, preservation, or succession planning, you have the right expert partner in your corner.

S&W

Navigating complexity. Creating opportunity.

Start the conversation with us at swgroup.com

Accountancy, Assurance, Tax and Advisory services.

Issued by S&W Partners Group Limited. Registered in England at 45 Gresham Street, London EC2V 7BG. No. 04533948

other major markets and years of price increases.

However, the family-owned British jeweller Boodles has bucked the trend. Its sales rose 18 per cent to £147m in the year to February, with pre-tax profits of £23m. That warm glow has continued into the first six months of this trading year, with sales up a further 6.6 per cent.

“What I have noticed this year is that the top end of the market is still very strong, stronger than last year,” said James Amos, 48, co-managing director with his cousin Jody Wainwright, 49. “But for entry-level, which for us would be people spending £4,000 or £5,000, we have seen people holding back and maybe deferring to next year.”

Amos is talking in the company's Leeds showroom, next door to the troubled designer department store Harvey Nichols, which was bought out of administration in July by the Sports Direct owner Mike Ashley.

Boodles' sales in the city have held up well, Amos said, increasing by "strong double digits" this year. Including Leeds, Boodles has ten stores: there are five in London plus one in Liverpool, where the company was founded and is headquartered, Manchester, Chester and Dublin.

Amos puts Boodles' resilience down to its efforts to meet new customers and cultivate relationships with long-standing ones. He acknowledges that the relative financial security of its customers also helps: the company specialises in rare diamonds, particularly pink ones, with pieces such as the 5.54 carat Victoria Falls ring costing £420,000. To bolster its supplies, this month it acquired the Argyle Pink Diamonds brand from Rio Tinto.

Boodles now holds between 300 and 350 events a year, ranging from dinners and afternoon teas in its stores around the country to hosting customers at society occasions such as the Chelsea Flower Show and Burghley Horse Trials.

"The way people shop has changed and we have to work hard to go and meet our customers," Amos said. "We do have close relationships because we've spent time with them, and hopefully they know and trust us."

A typical Boodles customer would be a successful business owner or someone who has recently sold their company, he said. "Often they've worked very hard to get to that point, haven't had money to spare and haven't bought jewellery before, so it's nice to make it a lovely event."

Although Boodles has existed in Liverpool since 1798, the Wainwright family bought the business in 1910, when it was called Boodle & Dunthorne. They didn't open a second shop until 1965, in Chester, and then in 1980 in Manchester.

"My grandfather, who had to take over unexpectedly in 1945 when his grandfather and father died within two weeks of each other, was told by his bank manager and accountant that there was no future in the business and they advised him to close it, because no one had the money after the war to buy diamonds or silver or clocks," Amos said. "He carried on, however, because it was a family business and he felt he had a legacy to keep."

He had wanted to open a London shop, but his wife wanted him to stay in the north and so it was under his sons, Nicholas and Michael Wainwright, that the company first opened in the capital in 1987. Boodles has just opened a larger store on Old Bond Street, with seven floors, to give extra space for events, including an indoor garden on the first floor.

James Amos says Boodles plans to

In 1990, the company designed its own jewellery collection for the first time, hiring Rebecca Hawkins to do it, who remains with the company as design director. She is responsible for signature designs including the much-imitated Raindance ring, an example of which is in the permanent jewellery collection of the V&A museum in London.

Boodles considers itself first and foremost to be a British brand, Amos said, and 90 per cent of its customers are from this country. But the company plans to open its first shop in the US in the next couple of years and is also looking at the Middle East. International expansion is part of Wainwright and Amos's growth plan, as well as their strong sense of responsibility as sixth-generation family owners to "leave it in better shape than we found it".

"Jody and I have both been in the business for more than 20 years and our opportunity is now," Amos said. "We know that at 65, it may become someone else's chance."

expand beyond Britain. It hosts customer events including at the Chelsea Flower Show, where Jo Whiley was a guest, below

The joint managing directors have different areas of focus: Amos works on brand development and the company's strategy for the

"Jody's great passion is diamonds and he loves doing the buying trips to Antwerp or New York or Bangkok, where you look at these amazing stones and you exchange in a way that people have been doing for centuries," Amos s

Their younger cousins, Honour and Geordie Wainwright, also work in the business and the previous co-managing directors, Michael and Nicholas Wainwright (Jody's father), remain on the board as chairman and president respectively.

Boodies, which has around 150 staff, has been approached by private equity buyers, but has no intention of selling.

"If you come in as the sixth generation as we have, you have no right to do that," Amos said. The next generation were already learning the ropes, he added. "I try to bring my three children to

work with me individually once a year, visiting workshops in London, and the older boys might sit in on a meeting if it's relatable to them. "My daughter

came with me to Burghley, she was cleaning the jewellery

showcases, pouring the drinks, filling up the dog water and that sort of thing. We don't want them thinking it's all about parties and to be attracted to going to the business for the wrong reasons because we're lucky enough to deal with something rather nice."

---

About TEN

\- See Times

Entrepreneurs Network online for daily news, insights and inspiration for entrepreneurs and business leaders

● Sign up for the weekly Entrepreneurs newsletter to receive the inside track on key issues facing growing businesses, delivered to your inbox every Thursday morning

thetimes.com/ten

Business

When things go wrong, put blame on best intentions

Adam Sopher

Over the past year, something has swallowed thousands of hours of our team's time at Joe & Seph's. It wasn't

a production problem. It wasn't a staffing crisis. And it wasn't because we all spent the year experimenting with ChatGPT. It was a hole in the road. Or, more accurately, a succession of them.

The same stretch of road into Park Royal, west London, which is home to Joe & Seph's head office, has been dug up on four separate occasions, causing around 30 weeks of disruption and adding 15 minutes to journeys each way.

There's been a lot written about Britain's productivity problem. Having reflected on this while running a business here, I'm beginning to wonder whether part of the answer is less complicated than economists would have us believe. Sometimes it's just really bloody difficult to get anything done. And it's certainly not just a London problem.

Nick from Lady Teal runs a hotel boat on the northern canal network, where lock failures, breaches and water shortages can suddenly make routes unusable.

"Running a business on underfunded, 250-year-old infrastructure was perhaps not the wisest choice," he told me. It is difficult to become more productive when the canal has broken.

A machine might be sitting idle because a vital ingredient is somewhere on the M6

Different business, different problem, same result: time and money disappearing into things that have nothing to do with what you actually sell.

Brexit has added paperwork and cost to our business. Add packaging waste regulations, deforestation regulations and other requirements and the cumulative effect for Joe & Seph's is roughly one full-time job.

Then there are the things businesses inadvertently do to each other. A supplier misses a delivery and suddenly a perfectly good machine is sitting idle alongside our excellent team because a vital ingredient is somewhere on the M6.

Investment should help. Our popcorn-making is deliberately artisan and handmade, but packing, moving stock and warehousing can increasingly be automated.

So why don't we automate all of it tomorrow? Like most growing businesses, we can only invest so much each year. We might have ten projects offering strong returns but enough capital for only the best two. The other eight go on to a spreadsheet optimistically labelled "next year".

But before this starts sounding like a founder blaming Westminster, Brexit, roadworks, suppliers and

Britain's 250-year-old canal network, there is an uncomfortable final place I need to look. The mirror.

Some of Joe & Seph's productivity problems are entirely our own creation. When you're building a business, you say yes. Yes to a new flavour. Yes to a different bag size. Yes to a customer's bespoke request. Yes to another product.

Every decision makes sense on its own. Then one day you look up and realise you've created an extraordinarily complicated business for selling popcorn.

The irony is that before Joe & Seph's, I spent six years in management consulting and retail turnarounds advising businesses about precisely this sort of thing.

Some of that complexity is valuable. Personalised gifts and jointly branded popcorn have become a successful niche. But processes accumulate too. Something introduced when there were ten people can still be hanging around when there are 50, long after anyone remembers why.

Now that the business has grown, I'm finally able to listen to my management-consulting self and we're untangling plenty of those.

People matter too. Asad from The Unmistakables wrote to me about hiring people with the right mindset for the stage a business is at. Founders can fall into the trap of looking for a cultural fit when what they need is a cultural add: someone who can adapt and move the company forward. Get that wrong and you can slow everyone down.

And perhaps that's the bigger point. Inefficiency isn't usually created by one obviously

wrong decision. It's the accumulation of hundreds of individually reasonable ones.

The road needs digging up. The regulation exists for a reason. The new product won a customer. The process solved a problem. Each decision makes sense. It's what happens when you pile them all on top of each other.

Perhaps Britain's productivity problem isn't one enormous thing waiting for an economist to solve. Perhaps it's millions of small things.

Someone sitting in traffic. Someone filling in another form. Someone waiting for an ingredient that should have arrived yesterday.

And occasionally it's a founder staring at a process his own business created years ago and wondering why they're still doing it. Perhaps improving productivity isn't always about working harder, AI, robotics or another government growth strategy.

Sometimes we just need to ask a much simpler question: why is everything so bloody difficult?

In my next column I'll tackle why I love manufacturing our gourmet popcorn — and why occasionally it drives me completely mad. Adam Sopher is co-founder and chief executive of Joe & Seph's Gourmet Popcorn | Dec104.19-104.16 | Mar96.16-96.13 | Jan100.79-100.77 | Apr94.42-94.4 | Feb98.15-98.13 | Volume: 24303 | Cocoa

Gas oil

Crude oils (\$/barrel FOB) | Oct1449.25-1437.75 | Feb1271.75-1271.25 | Nov1385.75-1385 | Mar1235.5-1234.75 | Dec1344.5-1344 | Jan1309-1308.5 | Volume: 24303 | ---

Business

---

EQUITY PRICES

Dividend yields Please note dividend yields are supplied by ICE Data Services. The yield is the sum of a company's annual 12-month dividend payments divided by the last day's closing share price.

12-month high and low High/low prices for UK equities and investment trusts are based on intra-day figures. | Mkt cap(million) | Company | Price(p) | Wkly +/- | Yld% | P/E | Automobiles & Part | 416.28 | Aston Martin Lag | 41 | + | $6\frac{3}{4}$ | ... -0.8 | Banking & Finance | 4,473.01 | Aberdeen Group | 243 | - | $\frac{3}{4}$ | 6.0 11.2 | 4.31 | Acuity RM♦ | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $\frac{3}{4}$ | ... -6.9 | 11,091.40 | Admiral | 3624 | + | 36 | 4.0 14.7 | 2,327.74 | AJ Bell | $592\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 11 | 2.5 23.1 | 44,073.90 | AON Corp | $20777\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $336\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.2 ... | 132.61 | Arbuthnot♦ | 800 | + | 5 | 6.9 7.3 | 1,569.46 | Ashmore Group | $220\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $2\frac{1}{2}$ | 7.7 14.1 | 59,138.30 | Australia & NZ | $1960\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 5 | 5.9 19.1 | 20,319.80 | Aviva‡ | 677 | - | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | 5.9 25.2 | 148,476.00 | Banco Santander | 1020 | + | 21 | 1.7 13.2 | 57,427.70 | Barclays | $429\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 14 | 2.7 9.8 | 2.04 | Blue Star Capital♦ | 4 | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -2.1 | 236.74 | BP Marsh & Ptnrs♦ | 655 | + | 7 | 5.5 4.9 | 3,623.68 | Bridgepoint Grp‡ | $401\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $70\frac{1}{4}$ | 2.4 80.4 | 746.45 | Chesnara‡ | 322 | - | $16\frac{1}{2}$ | 7.1 -63.8 | 264.55 | City of London Grp‡ | 522 | - | 4 | 6.5 14.1 | 580.89 | Close Bros | $385\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $13\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -6.7 | 1,897.15 | CMC Markets | 678 | + | 46 | 2.0 24.7 | 48,587.40 | Deutsche Bank | $2543\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $93\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.3 9.5 | 1,085.70 | EFG-Hermes Hldgs | $75\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 0.9 ... | 49.96 | EPE Special Opps♦ | 204 | - | 3 | ... 8.4 | 7.99 | Fiske♦ | $67\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.7 5.9 | 80.52 | Foresight Ventures VCT $77\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.6 ... | 1,442.41 | Georgia Capital | 4360 | - | 60 | ... 2.6 | 74.28 | Hansard Global‡ | 54 | + | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 8.2 11.5 | 177.24 | Helios U/W♦ | 255 | + | 17 | 3.9 8.8 | 5,861.51 | Hiscox | 1847 | - | 14 | 2.1 13.5 | 239,171.00 | HSBC | $1395\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $46\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.0 15.3 | 3,306.74 | IG Group | 995 | + | 5 | 4.3 6.9 | 129.58 | Impax Asset Mgmt♦ | 102 | - | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | 9.8 6.4 | 4,978.57 | ICG | 1808 | + | 45 | 4.8 10.8 | 2,421.12 | Intl Public P'ship | $135\frac{1}{2}$ | 6.5 -6.6 | 4,127.77 | Investec | 593 | - | 12 | 6.5 7.7 | 10.27 | Investment Co | 76 | - | 1 | ... ... | 627.23 | IP Group | 71 | - | 3 | ... 9.8 | 3.58 | Jarvis Securities♦ | 8 | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 43.8 2.5 | 889.88 | Jupiter Fund Mgmt | $173\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $4\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.5 9.0 | 1,577.52 | Lancashire Hldgs | $646\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 8 | 2.6 7.1 | 15,583.70 | Legal & General | 287 | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 7.6 28.7 | 5,325.69 | Lion Finance Group | 12380 | - | 880 | 2.6 8.4 | 189.86 | Liontrust Asset Mgmt | $301\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $7\frac{1}{2}$ | 6.3 19.6 | 63.17 | Livermore Invs Grp♦ | $38\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 8.4 16.8 | 58,441.40 | Lloyds Banking | $101\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $2\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.9 14.5 | 12.59 | LMS Capital | $15\frac{1}{2}$ | 25.6 ... | 41,923.40 | London Stock Exchange | $694$ | + | 604 | 1.8 36.5 | 7,333.96 | M&G‡ | $304\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $9\frac{1}{2}$ | 6.8 24.2 | 3,872.52 | Man Group | $339\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 17 | 3.7 29.1 | 28.75 | Manx Financial Grp♦ | 23 | 2.2 4.2 | 11.71 | Marechale Capital♦ | $4\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -5.5 | 1,044.13 | Metro Bank | 155 | - | $9\frac{1}{2}$ | ... 19.9 | Mkt cap(million) | Company | Price(p) | Wkly+/- | Yld% | P/E | 61,951.80 | National Australia | $1987\frac{1}{4}$ | -38 | 4.5 | 17.0 | 50,976.80 | NatWest Group | $642\frac{1}{2}$ | $-20\frac{1}{2}$ | 5.4 | 12.0 | 389.18 | PayPoint | $663\frac{1}{2}$ | $+28\frac{1}{2}$ | 6.0 | 11.2 | 22,262.20 | Prudential | $898\frac{1}{4}$ | $-19\frac{1}{4}$ | 2.3 | 7.7 | 4.02 | Quantum Blockchain◆ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -1.3 | 2,389.48 | Quilter | $176\frac{1}{4}$ | $+1\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.6 | 19.8 | 1,395.72 | Rathbones Group | 1540 | +4 | 6.5 | 14.3 | 193.51 | Rockwood Strategic | 308 | -7 | ... | 0.0 | 228.43 | S & U§ | 1880 | -30 | 6.2 | 9.6 | 8.72 | Sancus Lending◆ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | 5.0 | 378.44 | Schroder REIT | $39\frac{1}{2}$ | $-\frac{1}{2}$ | 9.0 | ... | 5,253.44 | St James's Place $1037\frac{1}{2}$ | -6 | 1.7 | 10.4 | 46,049.60 | Standard Chart'd2119 | -71 | 2.4 | 14.3 | 8,543.75 | Standard Life® | $848\frac{1}{2}$ | -20 | 6.6 | -100.1 | 32,364.40 | Sun Life Canada | $5811\frac{1}{2}$ | $-120\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.5 | ... | 10.19 | Tavistock Invs◆ | 2 | $-\frac{3}{8}$ | 4.9 | -1.3 | 2,700.52 | TBC Bank Grp | 4046 | -229 | 5.5 | 6.6 | 8.90 | Tern◆ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | $+\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -1.1 | 54.49 | Time Finance◆ | $58\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | 9.3 | 3.18 | Tooru◆ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -1.4 | 2.43 | Truetide◆ | $3\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -5.5 | 178.78 | Vanquis Banking Gp | $69\frac{1}{4}$ | -1 $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | 21.8 | 48.42 | Volvere◆ | 2250 | +20 | ... | 11.9 | 190,808.00 | Wells Fargo | $6309\frac{1}{4}$ | $+237\frac{1}{8}$ | 2.4 | ... | 60,826.30 | Westpac Bkg Corp | $1778\frac{1}{2}$ | -27 | 4.6 | 16.8 | 9.51 | Worsley Investors | $28\frac{1}{4}$ | $-\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | ... | 79,223.10 | Zurich Insurance | $52387\frac{1}{2}$ | $+242\frac{1}{8}$ | 5.2 | 18.0 | Construction & Property | 85.46 | Alumas♦ | 236 $\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 2 | 4.7 | 11.7 | 15.33 | Aseana Properties | 5 $\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | 1.3 | 6.58 | Built Cybernetics# | 1 $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -165.0 | 4,153.91 | Balfour Beatty | 876 | - | 61 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.7 | 16.7 | 4,017.66 | Barratt Redrow‡ | 290 $\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 27 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 2.1 | 21.4 | 2,178.33 | Bellway | 1948 | - | 156 | 3.7 | 14.7 | 2,873.20 | Berkeley | 3170 | - | 78 | ... | 9.6 | 1,574.36 | Big Yellow Grp | 799 $\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 2 | 5.9 | ... | 59.67 | Billington Hldgs♦ | 447 $\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 7 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 2.5 | 43.0 | 197.86 | Boot (Henry) | 147 | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.1 | 8.4 | 1,048.95 | Breedon§ | 302 $\frac{1}{4}$ | - | 11 $\frac{1}{4}$ | 5.0 | 12.5 | 3,983.86 | British Land | 388 $\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $\frac{1}{4}$ | 5.9 | ... | 27.15 | Cardiff Property | 2750 | 1.1 | 20.7 | 1,934.88 | Derwent London‡ | 1763 | - | 15 | 4.7 | ... | 43.42 | DCI Advisors♦ | 4 $\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -2.8 | 22.92 | First Property♦ | 15 $\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.6 | 8.6 | 3.18 | Fletcher King♦ | 31 | - | 3 $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | ... | 109.31 | Foxtons Group | 37 | 3.2 | 8.6 | 689.38 | Galliford Try Hldgs | 684 | - | 25 | 3.4 | 16.4 | 703.82 | Genuit Group | 279 | - | 4 $\frac{1}{4}$ | 4.6 | 15.3 | 158.93 | Gleeson (MJ) | 272 | - | 16 | 1.8 | -81.9 | 1,743.81 | Grafton Grp Units§ | 936 $\frac{1}{4}$ | + | 1 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.1 | 13.3 | 1,201.41 | Grainger | 162 | - | 1 | 5.2 | ... | 1,231.56 | Great Portland Est | 303 $\frac{1}{4}$ | - | 3 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 2.7 | 0.0 | 1,907.79 | Hammerson§ | 326 | - | 8 $\frac{1}{4}$ | 5.6 | ... | 611.47 | Harworth Group¶ | 187 | 1.0 | 64.5 | 6.46 | Heath (Samuel)♦ | 255 | + | 10 | 5.1 | 31.9 | 203.65 | Helical | 177 | - | 3 | 1.5 | 36.6 | Mkt cap(million) | Company | Price(p) | Wkly +/- | Yld% | P/E | 304.95 | Ibstock | $77\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $4\frac{1}{2}$ | 2.6 96.5 | 530.51 | James Halstead♦ | $127\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $2\frac{1}{8}$ | 7.0 13.1 | 2,233.23 | Keller | 3264 | - | 64 | 2.5 16.1 | 15,030.00 | Kingspan Group‡ | $8330\frac{1}{2}$ | 0.6 26.6 | 5,045.15 | Land Securities | 604 | - | 11 | 6.8 ... | 4,217.15 | LondonMetric Prop | $172\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $\frac{1}{8}$ | 7.3 -19.7 | 3.40 | Macau Prop Opp Fd | $5\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... -0.3 | 398.93 | Marshalls | $157\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $12\frac{1}{8}$ | 4.4 27.7 | 68.01 | Michelmersh Brick♦ | 74 | - | 2 | 6.2 18.4 | 1.71 | Mindflair♦ | $0\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -1.0 | 1,990.45 | Morgan Sindall‡ | 4086 | - | 138 | 4.0 11.0 | 339.21 | Mountview Estates | 8700 | + | 25 | 6.0 16.7 | 335.84 | NewRiver REIT | $77\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $2\frac{1}{8}$ | 8.7 ... | 30.19 | Palace Capital‡ | 190 | + | 2 | 4.7 -8.9 | 50.01 | Panther Securities♦ | 290 | 4.1 11.8 | 3,852.78 | Persimmon | 1199 | - | $38\frac{1}{2}$ | 5.0 13.4 | 0.99 | Plaza Centers | $14\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -0.1 | 2,320.06 | Primary Health Props | $89\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 1 | 8.2 ... | 54.73 | Real Estate Inv♦ | $31\frac{1}{4}$ | 4.8 -62.6 | 1,090.70 | Safestore | $499\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $6\frac{1}{8}$ | 6.2 ... | 1,693.24 | Savills | 973 | - | 9 | 2.4 18.7 | 0.65 | Secure Prop Dev & Inv♦ | $0\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -0.1 | 12,447.00 | Segro | $919\frac{1}{4}$ | + | 4 | 3.4 ... | 2,651.81 | Shaftesbury Capital | $135\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.2 7.2 | 109.89 | SIG | $9\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... -1.7 | 1,387.99 | SigmaRoc♦ | $124\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $4\frac{1}{8}$ | ... 17.1 | 1,406.96 | Sirius Real Estate | $88\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $1\frac{1}{4}$ | 6.1 6.9 | 44.47 | Smart (J) | 115 | 2.8 8.8 | 84.31 | Steppe Cement♦ | $38\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 6 | ... 33.7 | 2,545.02 | Taylor Wimpey§ | $73\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 8 | 5.7 26.2 | 52.70 | Town Centre | 125 | + | 6 | 4.0 ... | 1,167.74 | Travis Perkins§ | $549\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $35\frac{1}{2}$ | 2.1 -6.6 | 4,090.29 | Tritax Big Box | $139\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $1\frac{1}{8}$ | 5.9 ... | 2,175.48 | Unite Group§ | $423\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $37\frac{1}{4}$ | 8.9 ... | 695.92 | Vistry Group | $218\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $22\frac{1}{4}$ | ... 5.2 | 681.29 | Workspace Group | $353\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $3\frac{1}{8}$ | 7.4 ... | 24.27 | Wynnstay Props♦ | 900 | 3.2 12.5 | Consumer Goods | 747.05 | AEP Plantations | $196\frac{1}{8}$ | - | $\frac{1}{8}$ | 3.1 | 11.2 | 10.55 | Airea♦ | $25\frac{1}{8}$ | - | 3 | 3.9 | 10.0 | 12,899.10 | AB Foods | 1835 | + | 9 | 3.4 | 13.0 | 618.40 | Barr (AG)‡ | 552 | + | 10 | 3.5 | 13.1 | 90,473.40 | British Amer Tob‡ | 4194 | + | 234 | 5.8 | 11.9 | 3,727.70 | Burberry Group | $1024\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 14 | ... | ... | 352.04 | C&C Group | 95 | - | 2 | 5.1 | ... | 18.22 | Capital Metals♦ | $3\frac{1}{4}$ | -19.3 | 39.04 | Churchill China♦ | 355 | - | 5 | 5.9 | 8.9 | 15,606.40 | Coca-Cola HBC | 4282 | + | 40 | 2.4 | 19.5 | 68.55 | Colefax♦ | 1355 | + | 20 | 0.5 | 9.6 | 2,707.19 | Cranswick | 4985 | - | 15 | 2.3 | 16.8 | 36,487.80 | Diageo | 1638 | + | $36\frac{1}{2}$ | 2.3 | 27.7 | 1.22 | Distil# | 0 | ... | -0.6 | 1,055.26 | Evans (M.P.)♦ | 2025 | - | 45 | 3.3 | 12.6 | 76.14 | Fevara | 147 | + | $2\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.6 | 6.4 | 5,416.14 | Games Workshop | 16390 | - | 800 | 3.4 | 26.3 | 3,943.97 | Glanbia | $1650\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $33\frac{1}{4}$ | 2.3 | 29.8 | 2,071.75 | Greencore | $255\frac{1}{8}$ | + | 11 | 1.0 | 19.3 | 641.83 | Hilton Food | $713\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 15 | 4.9 | 8.1 | 20,181.50 | Imperial Brands | 2662 | + | 219 | 6.3 | 10.6 | 11,593.40 | Kerry Group‡ | $7348\frac{1}{8}$ | - | $7\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.7 | 21.7 | 305.20 | McBride | $176\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $1\frac{1}{8}$ | 1.8 | 10.0 | 163.03 | Mulberry Group♦ | 231 | - | 1 | ... | -17.8 | 396.84 | Nichols♦ | 1085 | 3.6 | 18.5 | 265.35 | Norcros | 294 | - | 1 | 3.8 | ... | 366.20 | Origin Ents♦ | 340 | 4.3 | 9.2 | 0.23 | PACSCo# | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -0.0 | Mkt cap(million) | Company | Price(p) | Wkly +/- | Yld% | P/E | 24.31 | Portmeirion♦ | $47\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $2\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -50.0 | 25.80 | Proverbs♦ | $1\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... -55.0 | 413.72 | PZ Cussons | $96\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.8 20.5 | 48.43 | REA | $110\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -208.8 | 9.66 | Tandem♦ | 175 | - | $2\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.7 11.3 | 55.05 | The Character Grp♦ | 318 | + | 3 | 2.2 -47.2 | 3.07 | Ukrproduct Grp♦ | $7\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $\frac{3}{8}$ | ... -18.0 | 100,683.00 | Unilever | $4673\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 190 | 3.5 12.7 | 49.77 | Victoria♦ | 43 | - | 6 | ... -0.2 | Engineering | 0.41 | Assoc Brit Eng | 20 | ... -6.9 | 705.02 | Avon Technologies | 2330 | + | 448 | 0.8 88.3 | 4,464.24 | Babcock | $913\frac{1}{4}$ | - | 9 | 0.8 21.7 | 55,809.20 | BAE Systems | 1860 | - | 61 | 2.0 27.0 | 12.24 | Braime A N/V♦§ | 1275 | 1.3 6.8 | 11.52 | Braime Group♦§ | 2400 | 0.7 12.7 | 13.63 | Caffyns | 500 | 2.0 -12.3 | 8.54 | Cap XX Ld♦ | 0% | ... -2.7 | 124.83 | Castings | 287 | + | 7 | 6.4 16.5 | 17.28 | Checkit♦ | 16 | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -6.2 | 1,390.57 | Chemring Group | 511 | - | 18 | 1.6 28.7 | 13.92 | Chesterfield Spec Cyl♦ | 36 | ... -40.0 | 570.23 | Cohort♦ | 1208 | + | 2 | 1.5 23.1 | 232.74 | Dialight | 576 | ... ... | 2.78 | Feedback♦ | $6\frac{1}{8}$ | ... -0.2 | 335.29 | Gooch & Housego♦ | 1225 | ... 89.4 | 1,067.87 | Goodwin¶ | 14220 | 2.3 19.3 | 13,393.90 | Halma | 3528 | - | 72 | 0.7 35.8 | 2,381.86 | Hill & Smith | 3050 | - | 220 | ... 29.7 | 4.65 | Image Scan♦ | $3\frac{1}{8}$ | - | $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... -16.2 | 7,310.24 | IMI | 3092 | - | 38 | 1.1 24.9 | 239.78 | Judges Sci.♦§ | 3600 | - | 10 | 3.3 43.5 | 11.08 | LPA♦ | 82 | - | $5\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -31.1 | 5,538.90 | Melrose | $444\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $25\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.7 15.3 | 802.36 | Morgan Advanced | 290 | + | $19\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.2 38.7 | 101.50 | Mpac♦ | $337\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $2\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -10.6 | 253.20 | MS Intl♦ | 1540 | - | 20 | 1.7 22.8 | 1,619.60 | Oxford Instruments | 2958 | - | 144 | 0.8 35.0 | 18,085.10 | Phillips Elec | 1840 | + | $40\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.9 -43.5 | 0.69 | PipeHawk♦ | $1\frac{1}{8}$ | ... -2.7 | 4,174.42 | Renishaw | 5735 | - | 225 | 1.4 35.1 | 114,891.00 | Rolls-Royce | $1385\frac{1}{4}$ | - | 92 | 0.8 20.0 | 4,007.23 | Rotork | $490\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $2\frac{1}{4}$ | 1.7 35.5 | 100.35 | SDI Group♦ | $95\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... 20.3 | 8,675.14 | SKF Group | $2034\frac{1}{8}$ | 2.9 31.2 | 7,625.45 | Smiths | 2730 | - | 86 | 1.8 4.3 | 93.98 | Solid State♦ | 165 | - | 1 | 1.7 22.9 | 136.27 | Somero Enter♦§ | 264 | - | $3\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.2 18.4 | 5,367.15 | Spirax Group | 7270 | + | 30 | 2.4 32.8 | 6.94 | Tanfield♦ | $4\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $\frac{1}{4}$ | ... -4.1 | 280.15 | Thorpe FW♦ | 250 | - | 12 | 2.9 10.5 | 7.00 | Transense Tech♦ | 46 | + | $5\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -66.7 | 1,158.47 | Vesuvius | $466\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $15\frac{1}{8}$ | 5.1 22.1 | 1,254.98 | Volex | 688 | + | 4 | 0.7 25.8 | 6,858.95 | Weir♣ | 2642 | + | 62 | 1.6 27.6 | 546.63 | XP Power | 1950 | - | 90 | ... -46.4 | Health | 619.28 | Advanced Medical♦ | 282 | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 0.7 61.0 | 300.80 | Allergy Therapeutics♦ | $4\frac{1}{4}$ | ... -5.7 | 9.66 | CellBixHealth♦ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | ... -0.2 | 102.20 | Anpario♦ | 510 | - | 5 | 2.5 12.7 | Mkt cap(million) | Company | Price(p) | Wkly+/- | Yld% | P/E | 186,095.00 | AstraZeneca | 11998 | + 128 | 2.0 | 24.0 | 3.69 | Cambridge Nutri Sci◆ | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -0.6 | 4,215.15 | Convatec | 220 | + $3\frac{1}{8}$ | 2.5 | 33.8 | 15.76 | Potter & Moore◆ | 23 | 2.4 | 7.5 | 64.71 | Eco Animal Health◆ | $95\frac{1}{2}$ – | $-2\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | 29.3 | 111.27 | EKF Diagnostics◆ | 26 | + $1\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | 55.3 | 3.26 | Futura Medical◆ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -0.1 | 1,516.08 | Genus | 2280 | + 136 | 1.5 | 5.3 | 75,535.50 | GSK | 1750 | – $29\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.0 | 12.4 | 1.86 | Gunsynd◆ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -2.7 | 30,717.70 | Haleon | $349\frac{1}{4}$ + | $20\frac{1}{4}$ | 2.1 | 18.8 | 3,365.01 | Hikma Pharma | 1612 | + 32 | 4.0 | 11.7 | 1,770.84 | Hutchmed China◆ | 203 | – 12 | ... | 5.1 | 24.96 | Immupharma◆ | 4 | + $\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -10.8 | 16.59 | Inspiration Health◆ | $18\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -15.9 | 16.97 | IXICO◆ | $7\frac{1}{4}$ + | $\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -4.2 | 11.10 | Thalia Therapeutics◆ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -3.7 | 284.51 | NIOX Group◆ | $67\frac{1}{8}$ + | $\frac{3}{4}$ | 2.3 | 40.0 | CHF226.38bn | Novartis | 119.10 | + 2.76 | 3.1 | 39.1 | 630.67 | Oxford Biomedica | 521 | – 23 | ... | -19.4 | 2.15 | Physiomics◆ | $0\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -2.8 | 4.75 | Proteome Sciences◆ | $1\frac{1}{8}$ – | $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -1.3 | 32,525.20 | Reckitt Benck | 5132 | + 207 | 4.2 | 11.0 | 18.31 | RUA Life Sci◆ | $29\frac{1}{2}$ + | 1 | ... | -126.6 | 38.42 | Sareum Holdings# | $27\frac{1}{2}$ – | $-2\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -11.5 | 8,546.00 | Smith & Neph® | $1020\frac{1}{2}$ + | $31\frac{1}{2}$ | 2.9 | 18.7 | 994.82 | Spire Healthcare | 247 | 0.6 | 60.2 | 6.06 | Talisman Metals◆ | $8\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | 2.4 | 1.78 | ValiRx◆ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -0.2 | Industrials | 136.66 | Accsys Tech◆ | $55\frac{1}{8}$ | - | $1\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | 24.5 | 39,123.60 | BASF | $4383\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $108\frac{1}{4}$ | 4.3 | 28.5 | 36,548.20 | Bayer | $3720\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $91\frac{1}{4}$ | 0.3 | -11.9 | 1,631.68 | Coats Group | $85\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $4\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.0 | 19.0 | 4,733.64 | Croda | 3390 | + | 112 | 3.3 | 76.4 | 64.97 | Cropper (James)◆ | 680 | + | 20 | ... | 22.1 | 1,029.67 | Elementis | $182\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $5\frac{1}{8}$ | 1.8 | -30.9 | 82.75 | Hardide◆ | 105 | + | $6\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | ... | 12,709.70 | International Paper | 2400 | - | 60 | 5.8 | -5.9 | 3,102.88 | Johnson Matthey | 2468 | + | 46 | 4.2 | -32.4 | 3,478.33 | Mondi | 788 | - | $\frac{1}{8}$ | 1.6 | 24.9 | 20.52 | Robinson◆§ | $122\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $2\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.9 | 9.0 | 7,662.82 | Swire Pacific‡ | $983\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $10\frac{1}{4}$ | 3.9 | 47.1 | 15.36 | Symphony Enviro◆ | $6\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -6.0 | 180.40 | Synthomer | 110 | + | $3\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -1.1 | 44,681.60 | Takeda Pharma‡ | $2788\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $87\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.5 | -60.4 | 821.01 | Victrex | 942 | + | 25 | 3.2 | 29.4 | 81.52 | Wynnstay◆§ | $352\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $7\frac{1}{2}$ | 5.1 | 35.7 | 220.68 | Zotefoams | $444\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 7 | 1.8 | 9.6 | 101.01 | Accesso Tech◆ | 303 $\frac{1}{2}$ + | 8 $\frac{1}{2}$ ... | 14.4 | 164.14 | Celtic◆ | 172 $\frac{1}{2}$ | -34.3 | 869.03 | Domino's Pizza | 225 $\frac{1}{4}$ + | 12 $\frac{1}{3}$ 5.0 | 15.0 | 2,732.12 | Entain | 426 $\frac{1}{8}$ + | 13 $\frac{1}{2}$ 4.7 | -4.1 | 190.30 | Evoke | 42 $\frac{1}{4}$ - | $\frac{1}{8}$ ... | -0.3 | 81.72 | Gaming Realms◆ | 30 $\frac{1}{8}$ - | $\frac{1}{8}$ ... | 15.1 | 5.44 | Heavitree◆ | 295 | 5.4 | 6.44 | Heavitree A◆ | 202 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.7 | $23.24bn | InterCont'l Hotels $159.05 - 1.80 1.2 32.4 | 1,722.07 | Mitch & Butlers | 287 - | 7 $\frac{1}{2}$ ... | 9.7 | 240.00 | On The Beach | 170 $\frac{1}{4}$ - | 5 $\frac{1}{4}$ 2.3 | 31.1 | 333.99 | Rank Group§ | 71 $\frac{1}{4}$ - | 2 $\frac{1}{4}$ 4.9 | 11.1 | Mkt cap(million) | Company | Price(p) | Wkly+/- | Yld% | P/E | 1,352.79 | SSP | $180\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $9\frac{1}{4}$ | 2.4 -19.4 | 8.37 | Bow Street Group◆ | $0\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -0.3 | 1,036.34 | Wetherspoon JD | $982\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $67\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.2 16.5 | 4,156.64 | Whitbread | 2478 | + | 38 | 3.9 20.1 | Media | 7.95 | Aeorema Comms◆ | 85 | 1.2 67.5 | 14.99 | Altitude Group◆ | $20\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -82.0 | 11.03 | Arcontech Group◆ | $82\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.8 13.2 | 3,743.29 | Autotrader | $488\frac{1}{4}$ | + | 27 | 2.4 14.3 | 549.23 | Bloomsbury Pub | 673 | + | 36 | 2.4 20.3 | 1.93 | Caledonian Hldgs◆ | $0\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $\frac{3}{8}$ | ... -0.9 | 8.86 | Catalyst Media◆ | $42\frac{1}{2}$ | ... 23.1 | 1.51 | Catenai◆ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | ... -2.1 | 13.59 | Eliquity◆ | $9\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $\frac{3}{8}$ | ... -0.9 | 274.27 | Future | $309\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $17\frac{1}{4}$ | 5.5 4.9 | 418.38 | GlobalData◆ | $59\frac{1}{4}$ | 2.5 13.5 | 91.42 | IG Design Group◆ | $98\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $3\frac{1}{8}$ | 1.0 -0.8 | 12,236.70 | Informa | $895\frac{1}{4}$ | + | 38 | 2.5 ... | 2,463.01 | ITV | $66\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $\frac{1}{4}$ | 7.5 11.3 | 422.60 | ME Group | $112\frac{1}{4}$ | - | 5 | 7.4 7.5 | 1.80 | Mediazest◆ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | ... 15.1 | 22.73 | Mission Group◆ | 25 | - | 1 | ... -1.2 | 951.13 | Mony Group | $185\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $13\frac{1}{4}$ | 6.8 12.2 | 7,916.95 | News Corp A | $2195\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $26\frac{1}{2}$ | 0.7 ... | 4,364.04 | News Corp B | $2425\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $31\frac{1}{8}$ | 0.6 ... | 317.22 | Next 15 Group◆ | 310 | - | $3\frac{1}{2}$ | 5.0 -10.3 | 7,733.05 | Pearson | 1285 | + | 63 | 2.0 25.0 | 4.22 | Primorus Inv◆ | $3\frac{1}{4}$ | ... 5.0 | 151.21 | Reach | $47\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $1\frac{1}{4}$ | 12.4 -1.1 | 9.81 | React◆ | $41\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -28.6 | 47,410.00 | Relx | 2720 | + | 192 | 2.5 24.2 | 3,569.39 | Rightmove◆ | $490\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 38 | 2.2 17.5 | 3.25 | SpaceandPeople◆ | $162\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 20 | ... 7.5 | 46.72 | STV Group | 100 | - | 3 | ... -9.3 | 43.90 | System1 Group◆ | 346 | - | 4 | 1.7 33.3 | 9,417.74 | 21st Cent Fox A | $4675\frac{1}{2}$ | 0.9 ... | 7,309.00 | 21st Cent Fox B | $3318\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.3 ... | 249.25 | Wilmington | 278 | - | 6 | 4.5 22.4 | 4,163.10 | WPP◆ | $385\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $13\frac{1}{4}$ | 3.9 7.7 | 15.08 | Zinc Media◆ | $50\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -4.9 | Natural Resources | 0.60 | ADM Energy $\S$ | 0 | ... | 1.2 | 112.21 | H-Power $\blacklozenge$ | 9 $\frac{1}{8}$ + | $\frac{1}{3}\%$ | ... | -4.1 | 200.30 | Afentra $\blacklozenge$ | 72 $\frac{1}{4}$ + | 4 $\frac{1}{8}$ % | ... | -68.8 | 2.21 | Arkadian Strat Metals $\blacklozenge$ | 0 | ... | -0.7 | 7.68 | Alien Metals $\blacklozenge$ | 0 $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -10.6 | 82.97 | Aminex | 1 $\frac{1}{8}$ - | $\frac{1}{3}\%$ | ... | -20.4 | 14,707.00 | Anglo Amer Plat | 5543 $\frac{1}{4}$ - | 388 $\frac{1}{4}$ % | 8.2 | 20.6 | 49,124.70 | Anglo Amer | 4170 + | 73 | 0.7 | -16.7 | 474.54 | Anglo Asian Ming $\blacklozenge$ | 414 - | 6 | 1.8 | 35.3 | 37,166.80 | Antofagasta | 3770 - | 32 | 1.6 | 37.0 | 15.37 | Arc Minerals $\blacklozenge$ | 0 $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -1.3 | 37.13 | Ariana Resources $\blacklozenge$ | 1 $\frac{1}{8}$ - | $\frac{1}{3}\%$ | ... | -138.0 | 13.86 | Arkle Resources $\blacklozenge$ | 0 $\frac{1}{8}$ + | $\frac{1}{3}\%$ | ... | -12.6 | 10.25 | Asiamet Resources $\blacklozenge$ | 0 $\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -2.4 | 1,648.30 | Atalaya Mine | 1072 + | 29 | 0.9 | 20.8 | 2.99 | Beacon Energy $\blacklozenge$ | 2 $\frac{1}{8}$ - | $\frac{1}{3}\%$ | ... | -0.6 | 3.45 | Beowulf Mining $\blacklozenge$ | 5 $\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -1.6 | ---

PRICES

Major indices | New York | Dow Jones | 51,654.95 (+423.31) | Nasdaq | 27,366.17 (+172.83) | S&P 500 | 7,811.54 (+46.18) | Tokyo | Nikkei 225 | 69030.92 (-11.19) | Hong Kong | Hang Seng | 24211.35 (+425.56) | Amsterdam | Amsterdam AEX | 1130.95 (+9.75) | Sydney | Australia AO | 8877.70 (+54.50) | Frankfurt | DAX | 25087.27 (+280.30) | Singapore | Singapore Straits | 5401.89 (-11.07) | Brussels | Brussels BEL20 | 5454.74 (+55.34) | Paris | Paris CAC | 7803.33 (+73.64) | Zurich | Zurich SMI | 13787.40 (+150.40) | Zurich DJ Euro Stoxx 50 | 6173.37 (+46.64) | London | FTSE100 | 10552.05 (+110.45) | FTSE250 | 24213.78 (+269.90) | FTSE350 | 5755.61 (+60.67) | FTSE Eurotop 100 | 4876.74 (+47.73) | FTSE All Share | 5693.90 (+59.86) | FTSE Non Financials | 6354.09 (+67.21) | TechMark Focus | 9572.57 (+152.54) | US$ | 1.3225 (-0.0001) | Euro | 1.1812 (+0.0011) | SDR | 0.9777 (+0.0001) | CPI Aug (2015=100) | 143.6 | RPI Aug (1987=100) | 421.6 | RPIX Aug (1987=100) | 414.6 | London Financial Futures | Period | Open | High | Low | Sett | Vol | Open Int | Long Gilt | 26-Dec | 83.88 | 84.12 | 83.58 | 83.67 | 250594 | 1278710 | 27-Mar | 83.65 | 0 | 2027 | 27-Jun | 83.73 | 0 | 3-Mth Sonia Index | 26-Sep | 96.15 | 96.155 | 96.145 | 96.15 | 18980 | 417132 | 26-Dec | 95.805 | 95.81 | 95.79 | 95.795 | 72176 | 522598 | 27-Mar | 95.48 | 95.5 | 95.45 | 95.45 | 62046 | 388742 | 3 Mth Sonia Index | 27-Jun | 95.3 | 95.32 | 95.245 | 95.25 | 64375 | 409720 | 27-Sep | 95.21 | 95.24 | 95.15 | 95.155 | 55467 | 276803 | 27-Dec | 95.185 | 95.22 | 95.13 | 95.13 | 72388 | 354886 | 28-Mar | 95.19 | 95.22 | 95.13 | 95.13 | 47761 | 215936 | 3-Mth Euribor | 26-Dec | 97.115 | 97.12 | 97.095 | 97.105 | 906005 | 27-Mar | 96.88 | 96.885 | 96.835 | 96.84 | 113247 | 611746 | 27-Jun | 96.735 | 96.745 | 96.68 | 96.685 | 566049 | 27-Sep | 96.675 | 96.69 | 96.61 | 96.62 | 446941 | 27-Dec | 96.665 | 96.68 | 96.6 | 96.61 | 585015 | 3-Mth Saron Index | 26-Sep | 100.045 | 100.045 | 100.045 | 100.045 | 82813 | 26-Dec | 99.99 | 99.99 | 99.965 | 99.975 | 54359 | 27-Mar | 99.86 | 99.86 | 99.805 | 99.81 | 38139 | 27-Jun | 99.685 | 99.685 | 99.63 | 99.63 | 30334 | 27-Sep | 99.545 | 99.55 | 99.475 | 99.485 | 32409 | 27-Dec | 99.455 | 99.455 | 99.395 | 99.4 | 21832 | 28-Mar | 99.39 | 99.39 | 99.335 | 99.34 | 21303 | FTSE100 | 26-Sep | 26-Dec | 10561 | 10626.5 | 10550.5 | 10602.5 | 465090 | FTSEurofirst 80 | 26-Sep | 26-Dec | 8450.9 |

---

Tradeweb

© 2021 Tradeweb Markets LLC. All rights reserved.re-distributed; The Tradeweb FTSE Gilt Closing Prices information contained herein is proprietary to Tradeweb; may not be copied or is not warranted to be accurate, complete or timely; and does not constitute investment advice. Tradeweb is not responsible for any loss or damage that might result from the use of this information.

Commodities | Natural gas $ | 3.197 | +0.029 | Light crude oil | 91.44 | -0.05 | WTI NOV 26 | 91.47 -0.02 | WTI DEC 26 | 90.56 -0.19 | WTI JAN 27 | 89.49 -0.4 | WTI FEB 27 | 88.52 -0.28 | WTI MAR 27 | 87.36 -0.23 | Dec 4246 +8 | Dec 4288 +11 | Mar4385 +14 | Mar 4385 +14 | May4418 +11 | May 4418 +11 | Jul 4446 +12 | Jul 4446 +12 | Sep 4386 +15 | Volume: 24303 | Robusta coffee | Nov3470 +37 | Jul 3383 +23 | Jan 3454 +44 | Sep 3366 +17 | Mar3422 +34 | Jul 3383 +23 | Volume: 24303 | White sugar | Dec542.5 +2.2 | Oct544.5 +3.8 | Mar 555 +3.8 | Dec537.4 +4.1 | Aug552.9 +3.8 | Aug552.9 +3.8 | Volume: 24303 | London grain futures

Lliffe wheat (close £/t) | Nov | 206 -0.5 | May | 214.75 -0.5 | Jan | 207.25 | Jul | 217.75 | Mar | 210.75 | Volume: 24303 | Mkt.cap(million) | Company | Price(p) | Wkly +/- | Yld% | P/E | 31.98 | Bezant Resources♦ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | 11.3 | 165,795.00 | BHP Group | 3261 | +47 | 3.9 | 22.3 | 72.58 | Border & Sthn Pet♦ | $8\frac{1}{8}$ | - $1\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -67.1 | 33.84 | Bougainville | $8\frac{1}{2}$ | -12.5 | 92,082.30 | BP | $586\frac{1}{4}$ | +28 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.3 | ... | 2.55 | Buccaneer Energy♦ | 0 | -0.7 | 24.57 | Cadence Minerals♦ | $5\frac{1}{8}$ | -9.7 | 10.05 | Cadogan Energy | 4 | -11.8 | 333.53 | Caledonia Mining♦ | 1725 | -75 | 2.4 | 8.1 | 44.77 | Caspian Sunrise# | $1\frac{1}{8}$ | 3.4 | 273.32 | Cent Asia Metals♦ | $153\frac{1}{4}$ | + $\frac{1}{8}$ | 10.1 | -4.8 | 91.02 | Chariot Ltd♦ | $3\frac{1}{8}$ | - $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | ... | 1.27 | Clontarf Energy♦ | 0 | -5.2 | 41.49 | Corcel♦ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | -2.6 | 7.13 | Crism Therapeutics♦ | 9 | - $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -1.8 | 1,628.55 | DRD Gold | $187\frac{1}{4}$ | + $4\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.1 | 15.8 | 6.37 | ECR Minerals♦ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | -2.6 | 3.44 | Empyrean Energy♦ | 0 | -1.2 | 9,969.48 | Endeavour® | 4126 | -124 | 3.3 | 19.5 | 529.67 | EnQuest | $28\frac{1}{8}$ | + $1\frac{1}{8}$ | 2.8 | ... | 61.24 | Eurasia Mining♦ | $2\frac{1}{8}$ | 13.8 | 22.38 | Europa Oil & Gas♦ | $1\frac{1}{4}$ | -8.5 | 334.20 | Ferrexpo | $31\frac{1}{8}$ | + $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -1.1 | 20,308.80 | Fresnillo | 2756 | +60 | 4.1 | 19.4 | 162.05 | Galantas Gold♦ | $25\frac{1}{2}$ | -1 | ... | -6.7 | 71.61 | GCM Resources♦ | 19 | + $4\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -27.1 | 13.36 | Gem Diamonds | $9\frac{1}{2}$ | - $1\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -0.2 | 7.03 | Getech♦ | $4\frac{1}{8}$ | - $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -11.0 | 68,575.80 | Glencore | $584\frac{1}{8}$ | +23 $\frac{1}{8}$ | 2.2 | ... | 4.67 | Geo Exploration♦ | 0 | -2.6 | 24,740.20 | Gold Fields | $2790\frac{1}{4}$ | +102 $\frac{1}{8}$ | 5.7 | ... | 33.93 | Goldplate♦ | $19\frac{1}{4}$ | 3.4 | 32.9 | 8.81 | Goldstone Res♦ | $0\frac{1}{2}$ | -0.7 | 3,633.08 | Greatland Resources♦ | $538\frac{1}{2}$ | -1 | ... | 7.9 | 537.19 | Griffin Mining♦ | 310 | 33.9 | 429.87 | Gulf Keystone | $197\frac{1}{8}$ | +3 $\frac{1}{8}$ | 3.9 | 37.5 | 2,682.90 | Hochschild | $521\frac{1}{2}$ | -19 | 1.3 | 17.7 | 600.44 | Hunting‡ | 396 | +13 | 2.6 | 20.0 | 4.25 | Ironveld♦ | 0 | -2.0 | 648.88 | ITM Power♦ | $93\frac{1}{8}$ | -8 | ... | -12.7 | 77.77 | Jubilee Metals♦ | $2\frac{1}{4}$ | + $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -3.0 | 1.42 | Karel Diamond Res♦ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | - $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -4.3 | 82.91 | KEFI Gold and Copper♦ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | -5.5 | 201.21 | Kenmare Res | $225\frac{1}{2}$ | +42 $\frac{1}{8}$ | -0.8 | 5.77 | Landore Res♦ | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | -1.6 | 1.91 | Lansdowne Resources♦ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | -1.2 | 11.37 | Lexington Gold♦ | $2\frac{1}{8}$ | + $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -24.4 | 510.24 | Metals Exploration♦ | $16\frac{1}{8}$ | 20.9 | 5.03 | Nativo Resources♦ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | - $\frac{1}{8}$ | -0.2 | 1.32 | Nostrum Oil & Gas | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | -0.0 | 13.22 | Oriole Resources♦ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | -13.5 | Ormonde Mining | ... | 59.32 | Orosur Mining♦ | $14\frac{1}{4}$ | -1 $\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | ... | 2,850.49 | Pan African Res | 117 | -3 | 3.0 | 8.8 | 151.62 | Pantheon Res♦ | $10\frac{1}{8}$ | - $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -36.2 | 21.31 | Parkmead Group♦ | $19\frac{1}{2}$ | 2.9 | 10.99 | Petra Diamonds | $3\frac{1}{8}$ | -1 $\frac{1}{8}$ | -0.1 | 1.66 | Petrel Resources♦ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | - $\frac{1}{8}$ | -3.8 | 15.34 | Petro Matad♦ | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | -3.6 | 5.35 | Plexus Holdings♦ | $3\frac{1}{8}$ | -1.1 | 417.65 | Porvair | 896 | +22 | 0.8 | 22.8 | Exchange rates | Australia $ | 1.89436 (-0.00431) | Canada $ | 1.88778 (+0.00621) | Denmark Kr | 8.83205 (+0.01761) | Euro | 1.1814 (+0.0022) | Hong Kong $ | 10.385 (+0.004) | Hungary | 430.89 (-0.37) | Indonesia | 23649.81 (-19.18) | Israel | 4.0568 (+0.0083) | Japan Yen | 209.481 (+0.943) | New Zealand $ | 2.35734 (-0.00268) | Norway Kr | 12.648 (+0.0017) | Poland | 5.182 (+0.03043) | Russia | 112.648 (+0.176) | S Africa | 21.849 (-0.07294) | Sweden Kr | 13.2228 (+0.0337) | Switzerland Fr | 1.09874 (-0.00095) | Turkey Lira | 65.3161 (+0.0452) | USA $ | 1.3237 (+0.001) | Mkt cap (million) | Company | Price (p) | Wkly +/- | Yld% | P/E | 24.08 | Prospex Energy◆ | $5\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $\frac{1}{4}$ | ... -8.3 | 19.37 | Quadrise◆ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | - | $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... -5.3 | 9.35 | Reabold Resources◆ | $64\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -806.2 | 1.85 | Red Rock Res◆ | 0 | ... -0.2 | 31,840.40 | Rio Tinto Ltd | $8563\frac{1}{4}$ | - $106\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.1 | 15.9 | 89,444.40 | Rio Tinto | 7126 | + 70 | 4.9 | 15.4 | 17.07 | Rome Resources◆ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | ... -10.3 | 190.77 | Serabi Gold◆ | 250 | + 15 | 2.0 | 4.6 | 1,044.66 | Serica Energy◆ | $265\frac{1}{4}$ | + $8\frac{1}{4}$ | 6.0 | -27.0 | 216,997.00 | Shell | $3793\frac{1}{2}$ | + 197 | 3.0 | 16.6 | 5.97 | Shuka Minerals◆ | $3\frac{1}{4}$ | - $\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -2.5 | 3.44 | Sound Energy◆ | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -1.4 | 38.62 | Star Energy◆ | 20 | ... -3.6 | 7.43 | Sunda Energy◆ | $1\frac{1}{4}$ | - $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -1.4 | 1.67 | Sunrise Resources◆ | 0 | ... -2.4 | 1.56 | Synergia Energy◆ | 0 | ... 0.5 | 4.47 | Tertiary Minerals◆ | 0 | ... -6.2 | 5.67 | Thor Energy◆ | $0\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -3.9 | 151,685.00 | Total Eng SE | 6648 | + $308\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.5 | 12.8 | 7.23 | Tower Resources◆ | 0 | ... -0.4 | 159.99 | Tullow Oil | $10\frac{1}{2}$ | + $2\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | 34.9 | 3.03 | UK Energy Group◆ | 0 | ... -0.2 | 3.89 | URU Metals◆ | $2\frac{1}{4}$ | - $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -1.8 | 68.22 | Vast Resources◆ | $4\frac{1}{4}$ | - $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -0.7 | 3.67 | Westmount Energy◆ | $2\frac{1}{2}$ | ... -6.7 | 12.95 | Xtract Resources◆ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | ... -4.0 | 58.82 | Zephyr Energy◆ | $2\frac{1}{4}$ | - $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -6.4 | Professional & Support Services | 1,258.19 | 4imprint | 4466 | + | 114 | 4.0 | 14.6 | 217.66 | Andrews Sykes♦ | 520 | - | 15 | 5.0 | 12.0 | 181.09 | BTG Consulting♦ | 112 | - | 3 | 4.1 | 21.1 | 8,706.33 | Bunzl | 2738 | + | 124 | 2.7 | 19.4 | 283.95 | Capita | 235 | + | 21 | ... | -1.6 | 8.19 | CEPS♦ | 39 | - | 1 | ... | -11.1 | 47.75 | Christie Group♦ | 180 | 2.2 | 35.4 | 40,115.00 | Compass | $2359\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 115 | 2.2 | 28.3 | 9.88 | Croma Security♦ | $71\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.4 | 12.5 | 5,488.50 | DCC Energy | 6425 | - | 10 | 3.4 | ... | 15.84 | Diales Grp♦ | 30 | - | 2 | 5.0 | 23.1 | 10,456.60 | Diploma | 7785 | + | 10 | 0.8 | 56.5 | 850.89 | DiscoverIE | 874 | + | 24 | 1.5 | 28.9 | 325.73 | Essentra‡ | 115 | + | 3 | 1.8 | ... | 23,585.20 | Experian | 2682 | + | 225 | 1.9 | 21.6 | 16.28 | FIH Group♦ | 130 | - | 5 | 5.2 | 2.9 | 256.08 | Hargroaves Servs♦ | 834 | - | 2 | 4.8 | 8.9 | 9,066.58 | Intertek | 5890 | + | 10 | 2.8 | 27.0 | 1,724.78 | Int'l Workplace‡ | $183\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $7\frac{1}{8}$ | 0.6 | ... | 489.85 | Johnson Service‡ | $137\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 1 | 3.6 | 14.8 | 96.31 | Journeo♦ | 542 | + | 2 | ... | 22.3 | 1,289.98 | Kier Group | $296\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $11\frac{1}{2}$ | 2.6 | 21.0 | 215.71 | Latham (J)♦ | 1070 | - | 20 | 3.4 | 11.6 | 459.71 | London Security♦ | 3750 | 2.6 | 19.3 | 258.78 | LSL Property Servs‡ | 264 | + | 16 | 4.3 | 15.9 | 131.17 | Macfarlane | $84\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $\frac{1}{8}$ | 4.3 | 21.3 | 11.52 | Maintel Holdings♦ | $61\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -5.2 | 5.52 | Malvern Int'l♦ | $16\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 2 | ... | -2.2 | 335.02 | Mears Group | 409 | + | $\frac{1}{8}$ | 4.4 | 7.3 | 696.67 | Michael Page‡ | 212 | - | $\frac{1}{8}$ | 2.2 | 73.1 | 2,738.76 | Mitie Group | $210\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $\frac{1}{8}$ | 2.1 | 31.9 | 12.76 | MobilityOne♦ | 12 | + | $5\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -2.6 | 10.13 | Newmark Security♦ | $107\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | 15.2 | 4.69 | Norman Broadbent♦ | 231 | + | 13 | ... | 7.2 | 14.09 | Northern Bear♦ | $102\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 10 | 7.3 | 3.4 | 78.36 | NWF Group♦ | 158 | + | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | 5.5 | 8.5 | Gold/precious metals(US dollars per ounce) | Bullion: Open $4133.96 | Close $4195.82 High $4207.54 | Low $4130.85 | AM $4119.10 PM $4095.40 | Platinum $1689.8 | Silver $60.7732 | Palladium $1149.502 | Mkt cap(million) | Company | Price(p) | Wkly +/- | Yld% | P/E | 53.30 | PCI-PAI◆ | $73\frac{1}{2}$ + | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | ... | 5.16 | Petards◆ | $8\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -12.7 | 0.80 | PHSC◆ | $7\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -2.6 | 9.99 | PowerHouse Energy◆ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -2.8 | 85.59 | Record | 43 + | $\frac{5}{8}$ | 8.4 | 11.0 | 749.68 | Renew Holdings◆ | 947 - | 28 | 2.1 | 15.4 | 7,653.90 | Rentokil | 303 + | $3\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.1 | 21.5 | 411.67 | Restore◆ | 308 + | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 2.4 | -65.5 | 2.68 | River Global A◆ | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -0.2 | 24.78 | Roebuck Food Group◆ | $24\frac{1}{2}$ - | 1 | ... | -8.5 | 3,711.94 | RS Group | 792 + | $19\frac{1}{2}$ | 2.9 | 22.9 | 11.61 | RTC Group◆ | 95 | 7.1 | 6.7 | 538.19 | RWS Holdings◆ | 145 + | $5\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.4 | -5.4 | 229.35 | Science Group◆ | 570 - | 3 | 1.8 | 7.6 | 2,446.49 | Serco | 254 + | $2\frac{1}{4}$ | 1.8 | 17.7 | 184.26 | Smiths News | $74\frac{1}{8}$ - | $4\frac{1}{4}$ | 7.5 | 6.4 | 70.22 | Software Circle◆ | 18 - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -85.7 | 47.56 | Staffline Group◆ | 41 - | $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | 10.5 | 375.89 | SThree | 309 + | 9 | 4.6 | 22.6 | 35.14 | Synectics◆ | $197\frac{1}{2}$ + | 25 | 2.5 | 9.0 | 10.09 | Thruvision Group◆ | $2\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -2.2 | 218.47 | Tribal◆ | 102 + | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | 24.3 | 19.33 | Vianet◆ | 68 | 3.5 | 47.6 | 1,005.74 | ZIGUP | $439\frac{1}{2}$ - | $7\frac{1}{2}$ | 6.1 | 13.0 | Retailing | 513.81 | AO World | 91 | + | $2\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | 14.3 | 2,661.63 | B&M European | $264\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $13\frac{1}{4}$ | 3.6 | 16.2 | 278.78 | Card Factory | $84\frac{1}{8}$ | + | $2\frac{1}{4}$ | 6.0 | 9.4 | 790.29 | CVS Group | 1173 | + | 33 | 0.8 | 48.1 | 344.56 | DFS Furniture | 146 | + | 1 | 2.1 | 9.7 | 1,611.96 | Dunelm | $799\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $19\frac{1}{2}$ | 8.8 | 10.4 | 3,731.50 | Frasers Group | $838\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $33\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | 9.7 | 2,155.55 | Greggs‡ | 2108 | + | 82 | 3.3 | 17.6 | 573.59 | Halfords | 262 | + | 4 | 3.4 | 17.2 | 4,144.04 | Howden Joinery | $762\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 10 | 2.9 | 15.5 | 2,333.92 | Inchcape | $686\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 53 | 4.9 | 9.5 | 2.16 | Imaging Biometrics | $0\frac{1}{8}$ | - | $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -5.1 | 3,998.07 | JD Sports | $84\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $4\frac{1}{4}$ | 1.5 | 9.8 | 5,239.08 | Kingfisher‡ | 318 | - | $10\frac{1}{4}$ | 3.9 | 22.7 | 8,259.81 | Marks & Spencer | 397 | + | $18\frac{1}{4}$ | 1.1 | 31.3 | 1.35 | Mothercare♦ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -0.3 | 41.74 | Naked Wines♦ | 63 | + | $1\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -6.8 | 17,589.60 | Next | 14700 | + | 335 | 1.9 | 19.3 | 2,515.95 | Ocado | 297 | + | $36\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | 6.3 | 922.57 | Pets at Home | $211\frac{1}{8}$ | - | $\frac{1}{8}$ | 3.5 | 15.3 | 544.96 | Pinewood Tech | $448\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 2 | ... | 93.4 | 1,119.12 | Saga | 765 | + | 4 | ... | ... | 7,433.57 | Sainsbury's | $335\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $12\frac{1}{4}$ | 4.1 | 19.4 | 569.75 | WH Smith | $374\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $5\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -3.4 | 23.10 | Sosandar♦ | $10\frac{1}{4}$ | - | 2 | ... | 76.8 | 31,563.70 | Tesco | $503\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $34\frac{1}{4}$ | 2.9 | 18.3 | 68.64 | Toppa Tiles | $34\frac{1}{8}$ | - | $\frac{1}{8}$ | 8.9 | 11.4 | Technology | 480.15 | Alfa Financial | $160\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $5\frac{1}{4}$ | 6.0 | 15.8 | 134.12 | Aptitude Software‡ | 246 | - | 13 | 2.2 | 33.7 | 54.32 | Bango◆ | $70\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 4 | ... | -9.5 | 48.77 | BATM Adv Coms | 11 | + | $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -3.5 | 151.74 | Berkeley Res | 34 | + | $9\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -33.1 | 8.64 | Blackbird◆ | $1\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -2.9 | 20.32 | Celebrus Tech◆ | $54\frac{1}{8}$ | - | $41\frac{1}{8}$ | 6.2 | -59.5 | 12.21 | Cirata◆ | $7\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -1.7 | 2.01 | CloudCoCo◆ | $0\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | 0.6 | 5,896.54 | Computacenter‡ | 5550 | + | 145 | 1.4 | 37.9 | 254.36 | Concurrent Tech◆ | 280 | + | 30 | 0.4 | 47.8 | 58.90 | Corero◆ | $11\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -152.1 | 376.61 | Craneware◆ | 1100 | + | 82 | 2.9 | 25.7 | 6.41 | Crimson Tide◆ | $97\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | 23.2 | 5.84 | Dillistone Group◆ | $16\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $1\frac{1}{4}$ | ... | -11.3 | Money rates %

Base Rates Clearing Banks: 3.75%

ECB Refi 2.65%

Fed Fund 3.75-4.00%

Halifax Mortgage Rate (SVR) 7.24% | Mkt cap(million) | Company | Price(p) | Wkly +/- | Yld% | P/E | 5.77 | Forgent◆ | 0 | -0.0 | 114.82 | FDM Group | $104\frac{1}{3}$ + | $\frac{1}{3}$ | 6.7 | 20.1 | 706.02 | Flitronic◆ | 321+ | 49 | ... | ... | 343.84 | GB Group | $150\frac{1}{4}$ + | $5\frac{1}{8}$ | 2.9 | -4.9 | 40.77 | Ilika◆ | $20\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -5.1 | 10.26 | Ingenta◆‡ | $67\frac{1}{2}$ - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 6.7 | 5.6 | 80.23 | Intercede◆ | $131\frac{1}{2}$ + | $5\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | 23.1 | 13.01 | Iomart◆ | $11\frac{1}{2}$ - | $1\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -1.4 | 662.90 | IQE◆ | $49\frac{1}{4}$ - | 5 | ... | -13.2 | 371.64 | LG Electronics | $2162\frac{1}{2}$ - | $-26\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.2 | ... | 56.05 | MTI Wireless◆ | 65+ | 3 | 3.1 | 14.7 | 4.81 | Nanoco Group | $2\frac{1}{2}$ - | $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -2.2 | 215.81 | Netcall◆ | $126\frac{1}{2}$ + | $1\frac{1}{2}$ | 0.9 | ... | 6.78 | Northamber◆ | 25 | 2.4 | -1.7 | 36.60 | Oxford Metrics◆ | $32\frac{1}{4}$ - | $-3\frac{1}{4}$ | 9.9 | -59.5 | 15.72 | Pennant Intl◆ | 33+ | 1 | ... | -6.5 | 1,123.36 | Playtech | $363\frac{1}{4}$ - | 11 | ... | 0.9 | 18.31 | Pulsar Group◆ | $13\frac{1}{2}$ - | 1 | ... | -1.7 | 2,349.34 | QinetiQ | 457- | 19 | 2.4 | 22.7 | 96.12 | RM | 98- | 4 | ... | 37.7 | 185.93 | Seeing Machines◆ | $3\frac{1}{4}$ - | $\frac{5}{8}$ | ... | -9.0 | 15.73 | Shearwater Group◆ | 66- | 2 | ... | -1.6 | 4,036.83 | Softcat | 1872+ | 6 | 1.6 | 28.1 | 0.69 | Sorted Group‡ | 9 | -0.2 | 22,455.40 | Tele Ericsson | $722\frac{1}{4}$ + | $16\frac{1}{8}$ | 3.1 | 11.2 | 9,703.18 | The Sage Grp | $1071\frac{1}{2}$ + | $88\frac{1}{8}$ | 2.1 | 28.4 | 5.55 | Touchstar◆ | 70+ | $2\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.3 | -5.3 | 96.87 | Tracisl◆ | 325- | $7\frac{1}{2}$ | 0.8 | ... | 66.30 | Triad Group | 380 | 2.4 | 38.3 | 45.83 | Water Intel◆ | $272\frac{1}{2}$ - | $-27\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | 12.6 | 116.14 | Xaar | $145\frac{1}{2}$ + | 5 | ... | -33.8 | 13.76 | Zoo Digital◆ | 14- | 1 | ... | -4.9 | Telecoms | 10,517.50 | Airtel Africa | 290 $\frac{1}{4}$ | - | 17 $\frac{1}{8}$ | 1.8 | 20.6 | 19,212.60 | BT Group | 192 $\frac{1}{4}$ | - | 3 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.3 | 17.5 | 1,587.09 | Currys | 146 $\frac{1}{4}$ | + | $\frac{1}{8}$ | 2.0 | 9.5 | 976.78 | Gamma Comms | 1094 | - | 1 | ... | 15.7 | 2,233.29 | Helios Towers | 216 | + | 1 $\frac{1}{8}$ | 0.8 | 77.2 | 19.93 | Gana Media◆ | 0 $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -3.5 | 653.82 | Telecom Plus | 852 | + | 40 | 5.9 | 8.4 | 27,418.40 | Vodafone | 118 $\frac{1}{8}$ | - | 8 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.3 | -84.7 | Transport | 78.37 | Braemar | 237 | + | 3 | 3.0 | 32.7 | 1,673.44 | Clarkson | 5405 | + | 375 | 2.1 | 25.3 | 5,154.47 | easyJet | 680 | - | $\frac{1}{8}$ | 1.9 | 10.3 | 1,023.14 | FirstGroup | 190 $\frac{1}{8}$ | + | $9\frac{1}{8}$ | 3.8 | 8.9 | 215.65 | Fisher (James) | 426 | + | 11 | ... | -49.0 | 18,155.20 | Intl Cons Air | 415 $\frac{1}{8}$ | - | $25\frac{1}{8}$ | 1.6 | 6.9 | 1,002.15 | Irish Cont | 675 | + | 15 | ... | 17.1 | 146.15 | Mobico Group | $23\frac{1}{8}$ | + | $\frac{1}{8}$ | ... | -1.1 | 1,048.78 | Wizz Air | 1013 | - | 39 | ... | ... | 6,806.82 | Centrica | 147 $\frac{1}{8}$ | ~ | 1 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.8 | -98.2 | 2,645.53 | Drax Group§ | 785 $\frac{1}{2}$ | ~ | 26 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.9 | 37.9 | 51.22 | Jersey Electricity | 440 | 5.0 | 12.3 | 57,658.70 | National Grid | 1147 | + | $\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.2 | 17.5 | 1,684.97 | Pennon | 357 | ~ | 101 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 8.2 | 18.4 | 9,346.17 | Severn Trent | 3094 | ~ | 24 | 4.1 | 25.1 | 29,960.00 | SSE | 2454 | + | 7 | 2.8 | 23.3 | 10,571.00 | United Utilities | 1423 | + | 6 | 3.8 | 16.5 | INVESTMENT COMPANIES | Mkt Rates for | Range | Close | 1 month | 3 month | Copenhagen | 8.8321 | 8.8146 | -135.93 | -419.14 | Euro | 1.1814 | 1.1797 | -13.29 | -43.28 | Montreal | 1.8877 | 1.8814 | -26.28 | -82.76 | New York | 1.3237 | 1.3226 | 1.78 | 3.77 | Oslo | 12.6480 | 12.6388 | 69.23 | 161.08 | Tokyo | 209.4810 | 208.6330 | -51.76 | -151.83 | Zurich | 1.0987 | 1.0995 | -38 | -117.07 | Mkt cap(million) | Company | Price(p) | Wkly +/- | Yld% | P/E | 24,573.70 | 3i Group | 2402 | -153 | 3.5 | 4.5 | 3,578.72 | 3i Infrastructure | 388 | + $\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.5 | 12.1 | 1,381.18 | Aberforth Smlr | 1826 | +32 | 2.6 | 28.5 | 5,092.12 | Alliance Witan | 1403 | +16 | 2.1 | 75.8 | 112.12 | Artemis UK Future Lead | 389 $\frac{1}{2}$ | -2 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 4.0 | 31.5 | 3.56 | Athelney Trust | 165 | -5 | 6.1 | 14.5 | 990.16 | AVI Global | 253 $\frac{1}{2}$ | -2 | 1.8 | 50.0 | 394.20 | AVI Japan $\S$ | 179 $\frac{1}{2}$ | -4 | 1.2 | 61.1 | 153.61 | Baillie Gifford Ch Gr | 286 | -3 | 0.9 | 96.0 | 344.52 | Baillie Gifford Eur Gr | 121 $\frac{1}{2}$ | +2 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 0.6 | ... | 688.05 | Baillie Gifford Jpn | 1076 | -20 | 0.9 | ... | 337.74 | Baillie Gifford SN | 179 | +1 | 0.4 | ... | 214.81 | Baillie Gifford UK Gr | 218 | +3 | 2.8 | 35.0 | 1,404.69 | Bankers Invstmt Tst | 155 $\frac{1}{4}$ | +3 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.8 | 69.0 | 1,253.69 | BH Macro GBP | 419 | +7 $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | 19.8 | 262.70 | Biotech Growth | 1400 | -82 | ... | -736.8 | 201.88 | BlckRck Amer Inc | 283 | +4 | 5.3 | ... | 177.15 | BlckRck Eng&Res Inc $\S$ | 178 | +1 | 3.5 | 50.9 | 312.33 | BlckRck Fro Inv | 189 | -3 | 4.0 | 24.6 | 510.45 | BlackRock Grt Euro | 573 | -12 | 1.2 | 83.2 | 43.33 | BlckRck Inc&Grth | 234 | +1 | 3.3 | 32.4 | 632.55 | BlckRck Smlr | 265 $\frac{1}{2}$ | +2 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.0 | 30.3 | 1,771.90 | BlckRck Wild Min $\S$ | 948 | +9 | 2.5 | 39.4 | 180.72 | Brown Adv US Sm | 1647 $\frac{1}{2}$ | +77 $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -321.8 | 666.42 | Brunner | 1560 | +2 | 1.7 | 56.0 | 1,962.46 | Caledonia Inv | 386 | +1 | 2.0 | 50.1 | 2,948.60 | City of Lon IT | 571 | +4 | 3.9 | 25.4 | Crystal Amber Fd | 74 $\frac{1}{2}$ | -54.0 | ... | 333.79 | CT Priv Eq Ord $\S$ | 468 | -1 | 6.0 | ... | 313.13 | CT UK Cap & Inc | 339 | -1 | 4.0 | 27.9 | 32.89 | CT UK HIT B $\S$ | 107 | 5.6 | 22.1 | 94.96 | CT UK HIT $\S$ | 104 $\frac{1}{2}$ | -5 | 5.7 | 21.5 | Dunedin Ent $\#$ | 475 | 4.8 | ... | ... | 1,016.98 | Edinburgh IT | 833 | +19 | 3.8 | 31.3 | 970.21 | Edin Wwide | 280 $\frac{1}{2}$ | -3 $\frac{1}{2}$ | ... | -252.7 | 6,514.72 | F&C Inv Trust $\S$ | 350 $\frac{1}{4}$ | +3 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 1.2 | 78.0 | 382.05 | Fidelity Asian Val | 610 | -4 | 3.4 | 27.1 | 1,112.27 | Fidelity China Sp | 245 $\frac{1}{2}$ | -2 | 3.7 | 26.6 | 576.46 | FidelityEmrgMkt | 1522 | +22 | 1.6 | 62.9 | 1,995.22 | Fidelity European Trust $\S$ | 413 | -8 | 2.5 | 36.5 | 1,504.28 | Fidelity Spec Val | 463 $\frac{1}{2}$ | +2 | 2.2 | 37.7 | 772.41 | Fins Gwth & Inc $\S$ | 792 | +29 | 2.7 | 41.9 | 601.65 | GCP Infrastructure | 80 $\frac{1}{4}$ | -1 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 8.7 | 37.3 | 95.41 | Global Opps Tst | 326 $\frac{1}{2}$ | +3 $\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.2 | 41.9 | Golden Prospect | 107 $\frac{1}{4}$ | -16.1 | ... | Greencoat Renew | 67 | 8.6 | -16.8 | ... | 2,437.39 | Greencoat UK Wind | 112 $\frac{1}{8}$ | +3 $\frac{1}{8}$ | 9.5 | -13.0 | 222.73 | Hansa Investment Co | 332 | -2 | 1.3 | 75.5 | 422.05 | Hansa Inv Co A | 334 | 1.3 | 75.9 | 2,248.53 | Hbvest Glbl Pt Eq | 3245 | -50 | ... | -53.6 | 339.04 | Hend High Inc $\S$ | 200 | -1 | 5.6 | 17.7 | 510.64 | Hend Smlr $\S$ | 958 | +3 | 3.0 | 36.7 | 559.73 | Herald Inv Trust | 2930 | -60 | ... | ... | 1,657.96 | HgCapital Trust $\S$ | 366 | -7 | 1.4 | ... | 2,424.49 | HICL Infra | 130 $\frac{1}{8}$ | -8 $\frac{1}{8}$ | 6.5 | 9.5 | 834.93 | ICG Ent Tr | 1390 | +20 | 3.0 | -391.5 | 175.25 | Impax Env Mkts $\ddagger$ | 451 | -1 | 1.2 | 91.3 | Mkt cap(million) | Company | Price(p) | Wkly+/- | Yld% | P/E | 973.99 | Invesco Asia Dragon Tr | 493 | - | 8 | 3.9 50.2 | 497.70 | Invesco Bond Inc | $167\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 2 | 7.3 12.8 | 512.43 | Invesco Gbl Eq Inc | 395 | + | 1 | 4.1 68.9 | 2,032.58 | JPM American | 1250 | + | 12 | 0.9 ... | 390.47 | JPM Asia Gro & Inc | 580 | - | 26 | 5.7 ... | 196.10 | JPM China | 250 | - | 8 | 4.6 64.3 | 504.93 | JPM Claverhs | 928 | + | 4 | 3.9 27.5 | 94.82 | JPM Emrg EMEA Sec | $234\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ 0.3 | ... | 1,582.51 | JPM Em Mkts | 169 | - | $1\frac{1}{2}$ 4.5 | 56.9 | 539.03 | JPMorgan Euro | 606 | - | 5 | 2.6 33.3 | 549.55 | JPM Em Mkts Div Inc | 214 | 2.8 37.6 | 3,322.89 | JPM GG6 | $612\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 3 | 4.0 74.1 | 363.01 | JPM India | 836 | - | 5 | 5.1 ... | 1,233.22 | JPM Japan | 833 | - | 9 | 1.0 82.1 | 195.62 | JPM Smlr Co | 416 | - | 3 | 0.8 ... | 1,619.97 | Law Debenture | 1206 | - | 22 | 3.0 32.4 | 401.35 | Lowland Inv | $184\frac{1}{2}$ | 3.7 27.4 | Marwyn Val Inv | 141 | 6.4 | 15.6 | ... | 1,691.55 | Mercantile IT | $272\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 1 | 3.0 29.5 | 968.47 | Merchants Trust | 656 | + | 2 | 4.6 21.5 | 206.51 | Mid Wynd | 805 | + | 5 | 1.1 ... | 2,515.25 | Monks Inv Trust | 1682 | + | 34 | 0.1 ... | 202.50 | Montanaro Eur Sml | $176\frac{1}{2}$ | + | 1 | 0.9 91.0 | 901.41 | Murray Income Trust | 966 | + | 14 | 4.2 23.8 | 2,125.69 | Murray Intl | $356\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $1\frac{1}{2}$ 3.6 | 25.6 | 1,432.26 | Pantheon Intl | 384 | - | 4 | ... ... | 6,531.24 | Pershing Sqr | 3778 | + | 102 | 1.5 3.5 | 1,673.64 | Personal Assets | 545 | + | 8 | 1.0 90.4 | 7,734.47 | Polar CapTech | 702 | - | $9\frac{1}{2}$ ... | -835.7 | 1,747.52 | Renewables Infra | $76\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $1\frac{1}{2}$ 9.9 | -14.1 | 3,097.88 | RIT Cap Ptnr | 2490 | + | 15 | 1.8 ... | 27.48 | Riverstone | 570 | - | 15 | ... -347.4 | 1,020.16 | Schroder TotRt | 707 | - | 11 | 1.6 72.1 | 1,033.60 | Schrd Asia Pac | 838 | - | 17 | 1.6 63.4 | 228.02 | Schrod Inc Gwth | 353 | - | 2 | 4.3 28.1 | 439.06 | Schrod Jap Gwth | 388 | - | 2 | 3.4 57.1 | 160.01 | Schrod UKMid | 754 | - | 4 | 3.0 30.1 | 78.71 | Schroder UK PP Tr | $15\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ ... | -64.2 | 791.23 | Scot American | 555 | + | 3 | 2.9 35.5 | 17,052.80 | Scot Mortgage | $1636\frac{1}{2}$ | + | $46\frac{1}{2}$ 0.3 | ... | 1,229.63 | Sequoia Eco | $83\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $\frac{3}{4}$ 8.2 | 12.3 | 231.63 | STS Glbl Inc Growth | 217 | 3.9 33.4 | 3,008.24 | Temp Emg Mkt | 333 | 1.6 61.8 | 1,269.15 | Temple Bar | 413 | + | 2 | 3.8 29.9 | 776.77 | The Glbl Smaller | $190\frac{1}{2}$ | - | $\frac{1}{2}$ 1.7 | 64.5 | Potentially AI | $4\frac{1}{2}$ | -1.1 ... | 855.26 | TR Property | $269\frac{1}{2}$ | - | 3 | 6.0 17.0 | UIL | 211 | 3.8 | 12.0 | ... | 507.53 | Utilico Emerging Mkt | 296 | + | 14 | 3.3 21.8 | 876.07 | Vietnam Ent Inv | 721 | + | 2 | ... 4.6 | 1,254.68 | Ww Health | 368 | + | $\frac{1}{2}$ 0.7 | ... | Other sterling | Argentine peso | 2007.92188-2007.92395 | Australian dollar | 1.89447-1.89467 | Bahrain dinar | 0.49820-0.50020 | Brazilian real | 6.59560-6.59760 | Euro | 1.18150-1.18230 | Hong Kong dollar | 10.38900-10.39300 | Indian rupee | 127.78610-127.86610 | Indonesian rupiah | 23649.81055-23689.81055 | Kuwaiti dinar | 0.41100-0.41300 | Malaysian ringgit | 5.40800-5.41000 | New Zealand dollar | 2.35734-2.35815 | Singaporean dollar | 1.69423-1.69662 | South African rand | 21.84900-21.86360 | UAE dirham | 4.86200-4.86400 | ♦AIM company; # Price at suspension; † Ex dividend; § Ex scrip; ▲ Ex rights issue; ▼ Ex all; § Ex capital distribution; \* figures or report awaited; ... No significant data. Companies in bold are constituents of the FTSE 100 Index. Investment Cos sector Nav Dis or Prm supplied by ICE Data Services. | Dollar rates | Australia | 1.43080-1.43160 | Canada | 1.42605-1.42618 | Denmark | 6.67191-6.67309 | Euro | 0.89260-0.89300 | Hong Kong | 7.84700-7.84800 | Japan | 158.25600-158.25900 | Malaysia | 4.08300-4.08700 | Norway | 9.55460-9.55950 | Singapore | 1.28060-1.28090 | Sweden | 9.98880-9.99640 | Switzerland | 0.83004-0.83010 | Data provided by ICE. Data as shown is for information purposes only. No offer is made by ICE or this publication

---

⊕ Follow

Give a name to your news

Find and follow your favourite writers to be notified as soon as they release a new article. Download The Times app today.

Register

Obituaries

Freddie Foreman

Hitman for the Kray twins whose savagery was masked by sharp suits, the glamour of Swinging London and much self-mythologising

What was it with sharply suited gangsters from the East End who, in the Swinging Sixties, claimed to love their mothers as much as they loved stabbing, shooting and terrorising people? And why did their stories become so mythologised, glamorised even, in column inches, books and films?

Most notoriously there were the Kray twins, Ronnie and Reggie, who rubbed shoulders with the likes of Michael Caine and Dusty Springfield and were photographed by David Bailey. Their reign of terror was only ended in 1969 when they were sentenced to life imprisonment by a judge who with admirable understatement told them, "In my view, society has earned a rest from your activities".

And then there was their bespectacled “enforcer”, Freddie Foreman, known as “Brown Bread Fred”, whose Cockney rhyming slang nickname left you in no doubt as to his bloody role in the Krays’ gang, known as “The Firm”.

For a while Foreman got away with murder — literally. In 1968 he was found not guilty of killing Frank “Mad Axeman” Mitchell, a psychotic gangster who had been sprung from Dartmoor prison by the Krays but had thereafter become a problem to them.

Three decades later in his 1996 autobiography Respect, Foreman admitted he and his accomplice Alfie Gerrard had murdered Mitchell on Christmas Eve 1966, luring him into the back of a transit van where he was shot in the head. Foreman then bound his body with chicken wire, weighted it down and dumped it in the Channel. It was never found.

He was also acquitted of the murder of another East End gangster, Tommy "Ginger" Marks, who was shot and killed outside a Bethnal Green nightclub owned by the Krays in 1965. The killing remained an unsolved mystery for a decade until an informant named Foreman. The lack of positive identification prevented a guilty verdict, although Foreman later admitted to the shooting.

By the time of his acquittal in 1975 he was already serving a ten-year sentence for being an accessory to the murder of Jack “the Hat” McVitie who had been stabbed to death by Reggie Kray at a party in Stoke Newington in 1967.

Ronnie Kray had paid McVitie £1,000 to kill Leslie “the Brain” Payne, a former business partner who had crossed the twins, and when the contract was not fulfilled the Krays sought revenge.

While the Kray twins were sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of McVitie and another victim, George Cornell, shot by Ronnie Kray at the Blind Beggar pub in Whitechapel in 1966, Foreman was found guilty of having disposed of McVitie's body.

Had it not been so gruesome, the circumstances would have been comic. After the stabbing, Tony Lambrianou, a member of the Krays' gang, wrapped McVitie's body in a bedspread and put in the back seat of a stolen car, which ran out of petrol in Rotherhithe, where he abandoned the vehicle.

When the Krays learnt that McVitie's corpse had been left in more or less open view, Foreman was phoned at the pub he owned in Southwark and told to “disappear” it. He drove to Rotherhithe at the crack of dawn, broke into the car, retrieved the body and drove on to Newhaven, where the corpse was disposed of at sea.

Foreman was released after serving six years of his sentence and for two years lived in America, running a more-or-less legitimate slot machine business in Pennsylvania, albeit on a fake passport. He was lured back when he received a call inviting him to be part of what he was promised would be Britain's biggest ever cash rob-

bery. Attracted not only by the money but the “thrill of being back in the game” as he called it, he was on the first plane back to London.

On Easter

Monday 1983

Foreman and five

other armed rob-

bers in balaclavas

and monkey masks

broke into the Secur-

ity Express headquarters

in Shoreditch and stole

£7m. During the raid a security guard was blindfolded and tied to a chair and told he would be set on fire if he did not reveal the vault's combination. He sensibly decided to co-operate. "We gave the guards tea, and no one went to the hospital, and I am proud of that," Foreman said.

After the robbery Foreman went on the run to Spain along with Ronnie Knight, the husband of Barbara Windsor, who had not taken part in the heist itself but had handled the money.

He spent five years enjoying a life of "sun, sangria and birds" in a villa near Marbella on the Costa del Crime until 1989, when he was dramatically arrested by Spanish police and extradited to Britain, kicking and shouting as eight officers bundled him onto a plane, still wearing his shorts and flip-flops. Although he was not convicted of taking part in the Security Express robbery, he was sentenced to nine years for "handling".

After his release from Maidstone prison in 1995, he presented himself as a reformed celebrity gangster, appearing on television and denouncing the glamourisation of 1960s gangsters at the same time as he seemed to be

celebrating it.

After his headline-grabbing autobiography a further series of books followed with titles such as The Godfather of British Crime, Brown Bread Fred, and Running with The Krays.

His confession to the murder of Frank Mitchell in ITV's 2000 documentary, The Krays, led to the police reopening their investigation. Since he had been found not guilty at the Old Bailey in 1968 he could not be tried again for the crime but he was arrested and charges of perjury and perverting the course of justice were referred to the Crown Prosecution Service, which decided not to pursue the case.

The law was subsequently changed to abolish the “double jeopardy” rule in

CHARLIE GRAY/LIONSGATE

Foreman in 2017; being extradited from Spain in 1989; and with the actress Barbara Windsor

"There's no glamour in being locked up," he said, but the "crime" seemed to lie in getting caught, for at the same time he remained in communication with the Krays while they were in prison, was a pall-bearer at Ronnie Kray's funeral in 1995 and visited Reggie Kray shortly after his release from prison.

2003 if "new and compelling" evidence came to light, but Foreman was never retried.

In 2018 he was the subject of the documentary Fred, written and directed by Paul Van Carter, who was approached with the idea by Foreman himself. A great curator of his own mythology, he had by then convinced himself that he was a thoroughly decent sort of villain who had only killed hit men and other violent miscreants who deserved their fate. "He was going to shoot six coppers," he said of his murder of Frank Mitchell. "I should get a medal."

His wife Maureen (née Puttnam), whom he married in 1951 and from whom he was separated, predeceased him in 2015 and he is survived by his three children, Jamie, Gregory and Danielle, whom he paid to have educated at private schools. "There is no greater dishonour than not being able to support your family," he said as if in justification of his crimes.

His eldest son, the actor Jamie Foreman, recalled him as "simply the best dad he could be" and described his boyhood visits to him in prison as "heartbreaking".

Foreman's opposite number in the rival Richardson gang was “Mad” Frankie Fraser who also found fame after being released from prison, writing memoirs and doing “an evening with” theatre tours at which he would brandish the pliers he had used to torture people. With the death of Eddie Richardson this summer (obituary, August 20 2026), Foreman had the dubious distinction of being the last of these infamous gangland “celebrities”.

Frederick Gerald Foreman was born 1932 in Battersea, south London, the youngest of five brothers. His Irish father Herbert had fought at the Somme but later served several jail sentences for assault and battery and his London-born mother Louise (née White) was the sister of the chief constable of Durham.

He grew up watching bare-knuckle street fights and brawls, often involving his father, and was sent for boxing lessons at Jack Solomon's gym in Soho, where he was befriended by the British, European and Commonwealth light heavyweight title-holder Freddie Mills. On leaving school at 14 he worked at various manual jobs and was soon involved in petty crime as a "spiv"

trading on the black market in stolen rationed goods.

He ended up in prison, dodged National Service on his release by feigning mental illness and when he was 18 his mother — on whom he doted, as it seems obligatory for all gangsters to do — found a gun in his bedroom. “She knew what kind of boy I was,” he recalled. “She would say, ‘Fred Foreman, you’re going to end up hanging from a noose’.”

By the early 1950s he had formed his own south London gang whose members included future Great Train Robbers Buster Edwards and Tommy Wisbey. He denied having been part of their heist of the century in 1963 — he would surely have boasted of it, were it true — but claimed to have organised Ronnie Biggs's escape from prison two years later.

While running his own gang he also acted as the protector for an all-female shoplifting outfit known as “The Forty Thieves” who targeted West End stores, stealing furs and stuffing their underwear with jewellery. He was looking to lie low after robbing a furniture store when he met the Kray twins who promptly invited him to join their “firm”.

The proceeds of his criminal activities were carefully laundered into straight businesses, including a boxing gym, a chain of betting shops and the Prince of Wales pub in Southwark, of which he became the landlord. “Villainy relies as much on sound business practice as any other business enterprise,” he said.

His final years were spent in a London nursing home, where he kept a framed photo of the Krays on his bedside table. By then his former local, The Blind Beggar pub, had become a “true crime” tourist attraction, the place where guided East End gangster walks begin or end.

Freddie Foreman, gangland criminal, was born on March 5, 1932. He died on October 10, 2026 aged 94

Register

Nicholas Barrett

TV producer at London Weekend Television and trusted wingman to David Frost, Russell Harty, Clive James and Barry Humphries

Barrett tried to retire to run a bar in Ibiza but LWT kept calling him back home

London Weekend Television had a stable of charismatic and often demanding presenters in the Seventies and Eighties, from David Frost to Russell Harty, Clive James to Dame Edna Everage. What they all had in common was their reliance on a hardworking, resourceful, understated and drily witty producer called Nicholas Barrett.

Poacher turned gamekeeper, Barrett had done some radio broadcasting for the BBC Home Service in the Sixties but realised that he would best serve broadcasting by remaining behind the scenes. He would graduate to executive-producing a slew of celebrity vehicles on LWT in the late Eighties, from An Audience with Victoria Wood to The Trouble with Joan Collins. The latter was indeed trouble, but Barrett would only give his waspish opinions on such figures with friends and family long after the event.

Nicholas Barrett was one of two children born into a working-class family in Sheffield in 1941. His father, Percy Barrett, had been a butcher's boy on a bicycle who worked his way up to owning a butchery in the Greenhill area of the city; the family lived above the shop. Percy and his wife Dorothy (née Snook) worked hard to send their children to the fee-paying Westbourne School in Sheffield, and customers would sometimes use that as an excuse to narrow their eyes at the prices. A bookish and timid child, Nicholas thrived at Westbourne, although his only positive sporting memory was a school skiing trip for which the children's trousers were starched — in the days before cheap salopettes.

Nicholas went on to study A-levels at Worksop College. With an ambition to be a writer from his days of writing "silly stories" for friends at school, he joined the Sheffield Telegraph in 1958 as a cub reporter. However, he lacked the gumption for "death knocks" and "doorstepping" and decided that being a "busy-body" was not for him.

In the early 1960s he decided to try his luck in London, leaving the Sheffield Telegraph at the same time as his friend Michael Ratcliffe, who would go on to become literary and books editor of The Times for some 15 years. He found work as a researcher for news and features for the BBC Home Service (now Radio 4) in 1965 and worked with the presenter William Hardcastle on the newly launched World at One.

Barrett did not tell his family that he was gay for a long time. While on holiday in Rome in August 1969, he met a 19-year-old Italian fine art student called Piero Bonino. He did not speak Italian and Bonino did not speak English, so they conversed in French and bonded over their love of the documentary-style Free Cinema movement. They would remain partners until Barrett's death.

The following year Barrett moved to LWT, where one of his first jobs was as a producer for Frost, who had been part of the consortium that had recently founded the company. Barrett worked on the weekly interviews that the flamboyant Frost conducted with politicians and international celebrities, often travelling around the world as his trusted wingman.

After a couple of feverish years with Frost, he felt like retiring, so he and Bonino set up a beach bar in Ibiza with the intention of “dropping out”. Rushed off their feet as the resort began to boom, they made a lot of money while LWT executives kept calling Barrett back.

In the early Seventies he began working as a producer on Russell Harty Plus, an LWT show of celebrity interviews in direct competition with Parkinson that ran for six years. Harty, who came from a similar background as the son of a greengrocer in Blackburn, Lancashire, became a good friend. Both formed part of a select group of showbiz friends from the north who would have weekend parties, including the playwright Alan Bennett and Thelma Barlow, who played Mavis in Coronation Street. "With Nicholas and Russell about, you had to have your wits about you," said Barlow, who would often converse with Barrett on the phone in their respective local dialects.

At the dawn of the new decade, Barrett was attached to Clive James, with whom he made five series of Clive James on Television, a late-night compilation of amusing and often surreal television clips from around the world, and also worked on the chat show Aspel & Company. In 1985 his only novel, Fledger, about the life of a puffin, was published.

Barrett's next incarnation at LWT was as executive producer of An Audience with... or The Trouble with... in which a comedian, singer or actor would entertain celebrity guests. It was a producing scenario of many moving parts — and egos — that required a particularly cool and experienced head.

Among those he looked after, pandered to and herded were Collins, Michael Caine and Jackie Mason. The episode of which he was proudest was An Audience with Victoria Wood. The comic was painfully shy and often resistant to taking on work with people she did not know. Barrett befriended her, and once in the studio she snapped into a new demanding persona, stage-managing each detail.

One of Barrett's final jobs was to produce Dame Edna specials for Barry Humphries, including the award-winning A Night on Mount Edna, in which celebrities such as Charlton Heston and Mel Gibson were the latest “possums” to demean themselves on the altar of the egomaniac megastar. Humphries became another good friend.

Granada's £770m purchase of LWT in 1994 was Barrett's cue to retire. A tall and elegantly dressed figure, he lived in Italy for a decade before settling in Hove with Bonino, a visual artist with whom he entered into a civil partnership and who survives him.

He remained buoyant despite a diagnosis of leukaemia five years ago, putting his faith in natural remedies such as coconut oil, Manuka honey and bee pollen. Given two years to live, he was delighted to have “outsmarted” the doctors by three years.

Nicholas Barrett, TV producer, was born on January 31, 1941. He died of leukaemia on June 19, 2026, aged 85

Sonia Sinclair

Author, magistrate and socialite who hosted glittering London parties and balls attended by playwrights, politicians and royals

Sonia Sinclair, formerly Lady Melchett, was for many decades a linchpin of fashionable London. Politicians, newspaper editors and theatre people all mingled in her first-floor salon at No 16 Tite St in Chelsea — the same street, but not the same building, as Oscar Wilde, who lived at No 34. It was there that the broadcaster Anna Ford threw a glass of wine over Jonathan Aitken MP after her sacking from TV-am. There was no chance of hushing it up since Nicholas Coleridge, then a gossip columnist, now provost of Eton, was among the guests.

"Always invite a royal!" was Sonia's top tip for a good party.

As she explained in her memoir From the Ganges to the Thames, she grew up far from metropolitan society. Her father, Lt Col Roland “Rags” Graham, was a British Army doctor from a protestant Scots-Irish family raised in Dublin; her mother Wendy Dunbar trained as a nurse.

Born precipitously in 1925 at the Nainital hill station in the foothills of the Himalayas, Sonia Elizabeth Graham was “the naughty one” compared with her younger sister Bunty. She was keen to experience non-colonial Indian life and, sneaking out one night, witnessed suttee, the sacrificial burning of a young widow on her husband’s funeral pyre. The experience inspired her lifelong determination that all women must be independent personalities.

At the age of eight, Sonia, her sister and her mother returned to Britain, living on slender means. Sonia attended several spartan boarding schools, one of which was evacuated to the Marquis of Bath's stately home, Longleat, during the Second World War. Anxious to start earning, she left school at 16 to attend Queen's Secretarial College in South Kensington. A striking blonde, she received a number of marriage proposals while still a teenager, recalling, "There wasn't much pressure in those days for girls to sleep with the man with whom they were having a flirtation."

Sinclair declined several proposals

Joining the crowds celebrating VE night in London, she met "a young Fleet Air Arm pilot with crinkly fair hair" at the 400 Club in Leicester Square who drove her home in his drop-head yellow Rolls-Royce. Julian Mond was the somewhat reluctant heir to the second Baron Melchett, a descendant of Ludwig Mond, the German Jewish émigré who founded what became ICI, the giant chemical enterprise — Mond's elder brother, brought up to head the family, was killed in a flying accident in the closing days of the war.

Mond asked Sonia to marry him, but she did not immediately accept the proposal, choosing instead to enrol as a private in the Control Commission in Minden in the British zone in postwar Germany. Yet by 1947 the couple were married at St Paul's Church, Knightsbridge, and went on to have three children: Peter, Kerena and Pandora. Peter predeceased her but she is survived by Kerena and Pandora, her stepson Merlin Sinclair, seven grandchildren and 12 great-grandchildren.

On his father's death in 1949, and aged just 24, Julian inherited the title. Four years later the new peer and his wife attended Queen Elizabeth II's coronation in their ceremonial robes. Julian moved from farming into merchant banking and in 1966 the Labour prime minister Harold Wilson asked him to chair the newly nationalised British Steel. Sonia meanwhile worked for the Violet Melchett Children's Centre and the NSPCC. She sat on the bench as a magistrate for eight years — on one occasion the transsexual April Ashley appeared before her for hitting a policeman over the head with her handbag.

In 1964 Sonia published a novel, Tell Me Honestly, under her maiden name. It was an innovative work consisting entirely of long telephone conversations, which many people at the time regarded as a luxury, but which were essential to Sonia's management of her social circle. She said the book was inspired by Les Liaisons Dangereuses and her "disenchantment with the insincerity and futility of much of the London social scene".

By then Sonia had brought her flair for design to three properties: 16 Tite St,

Courtyard Farm in north Norfolk and Casa Melchett on the Cap de Formentor in Mallorca. At their Balearic holiday villa she indulged her passion for long-distance sea swimming but it was there in the summer of 1973 that Julian died of heart failure. Looking back on the loss of her 48-year-old husband, Sonia wrote her first memoir, Someone is Missing, which was published in 1987.

The decade before her next marriage, however, was probably the one in which she blossomed the most, and in her own right. She brought her younger daughter Pandora back from boarding school in the country to keep her company, and filled her London home with guests from across the generations, from David Frost and Princess Elizabeth of Tooro to Edna O'Brien and the young Craig Brown.

Her parties were famous, not least the Black and Gold Ball held with Pandora at the Orangery in Holland Park in 1981 and attended by Nicky Haslam, the Pinters, Edward Heath, Princess Alexandra and Marcia Falkender among others. "Not one single guest had failed to make an effort," wrote Coleridge in Country & Town House: gold turbans, gold tunics, gold britches and long golden coats wherever you looked. I dressed as a 20-year-old matador in a golden suit of lights. The whole room shimmered. Even the champagne was golden."

Away from hosting, Lady Melchett was an early activist for the newly formed SDP, on the board of the Royal Court Theatre, travelled widely and wrote features for magazines. Her admirers included the Conservative MP

Sir Hugh Fraser and the yachtsman Mike Richey, who crossed the Atlantic single-handed. Meanwhile, her son, Peter, who was now Lord Melchett, took over the Norfolk estate and became a minister in Jim Callaghan's Labour government. Later he was executive director of Greenpeace UK, taking part in widely reported protests against nuclear weapons and genetically modified crops.

In 1984 she married the polymathic author and film-maker Andrew Sinclair. It was a love match and he saw, he said, "a woman of extraordinary beauty and intelligence and sympathy and grace". Their life together took a cultural and literary bent while the generous hospitality continued. When they moved to a penthouse near the Tate Gallery, its main room was ideal for parties with a large bay window overlooking the Thames. By then Sonia Sinclair was on the board of the Royal National Theatre. Perhaps trying to keep up with Andrew's prodigious output, she produced most of her books during this period: the two memoirs, a biography Passionate Quests — Five Modern Women Travellers and a characteristically frank contribution to Victoria Glendinning's Sons & Mothers. Andrew Sinclair died in 2019.

In the final report before the young girl left India, her headmistress wrote, "Sonia has a good brain and should do well in life if she doesn't decide to become a social butterfly." In her long life she managed to do both.

Sonia Sinclair, society hostess, was born on September 6, 1925. She died on August 17, 2026, aged 100

---

Call to the Bar

The following have been called to the Bar this deferred Trinity term:

---

Middle Temple

Marilyn Beth Grasheim

Richter; Musa Nela;

Nurfikriyah Binti Haji Ishak;

Yanesh Puryag; Benedict Luke

Chapman; Isabella Rose

Hibbert-Robinson; Erina

Gjeraj; Vasundhra

Vigneswaran; Ethan Jun Hung

Lai; Qian Sze Kang; Kow Mei

Ee; Viran Kishor Solanki; Ruby

Scarlet Firth; Shafiqah Aiman

Mohammad Shah; Vaishnavi

Vigneswaran; Jessica Wong

---

Lincoln's Inn

Tanny Ghosh, Saadmun M Abdullah, Asma Sadia Chaity Simin, Hania Ali Khan, Abdullah Basharat, Zara Asif Rishi, Elina Chowdhury, Muhammad Taimoor Nawaz, Samina Rahman, Gan Wen Yan, Shafa Arefin Hossain, Muhammad Ashhal Malik, Chun Kit Ching, Muhammad Bilal Akhtar, Macaria Sena Mensah, Tasnia Mozammel, Rushel Kadia Moulton, Nabhan Zarif Sayeed, Mohammad Safwan Marsad Hossain, Farheen Siddiqui, Kirven Alvaren Kanaksabee Utchanah, Vinayak Trivedi, Salina Mahmood, Mohammad Mahtab Uddin, S M Shaon Parvez, Mobeen Arshad, Mohammad Tanzimul Haque, Vardha Nadeem Khan, Keeley Louise McGurk, Agha Abdul Haque Pathan, Mehajabin Tasnuva Mila, Abbie-Louise Chapman, Richard Edem Kwadzofio, Anika Binte Younus, Imogen Maia Smith, Dorcas Erieanna Lim Li, Mosharat Sultana, SeeWei Tan, Nusrat Jahan Rinkey, Muhammad Salman Shamsheed Bassa, Sazeeb

Talukdar, Jasveen Selina Kaur Sidhu, Yew Quan Chan, Jennifer Boineelo Anek Asia Awich, Jessica Alice Lockwood, Muhammad Mubeen Ali, Zainab Baig, Najut Abdirisak Ali, Benjamin Robin Owen, Connor John Sebastian McNally, M Fahaduzzaman, Ellen May Dear, Harry Rogers, Sana Shahzad, Haleemah Sadiyah Khan, Rabia Gillani, Claudia Fasciocco, Abdul Samad, Charlotte Amelia Paxford, Muhammed Noor Al Hussain, Henry Robert Matthews, Asif Ahmed Akash, Ghulam Mohiuddin Khan, Shaila Shobnam, Emma Dixon, Mohammad Humyal Changaze, Afaq Noor Rind, Archie Grant, Muhammad Musa Chattha, Nausheen Nazir, Parikshit Sen Radha, Chang Zhe Xuen, Sarah Ch'ng Shi Yin, Caolan Chada, Tansim Noor, Jaden Ngooi Yew Shiuwan, Alice Sweeney, Oon Mei Xian, Sean Lee Kai Shuen, Khadijah Nur Ahmad, Nafis Kabir Utsha, Dylan Raj Selvarajan, Sohail Siddique, Sophia Grace Russell, Maya Keona Menon, Syed Ali Asad Ullah Rizvi, Saad Muhammad Rai, Gilbert Lau Kien Yen, Alexander Maximilian Ritikos, Eq Liang Ngo, Muhammad Saqib, Peter Christopher Lernyei, Louis John Tavaré, Eva Georgieva, Ghazanfar Maalik, Wilfred Ellis Hilton, Md Jahidul Islam, Mithila Farzana Juthi, Kaitlyn Niamh Long, Eve Handley, Tufail Ahmed Panhwar, Abdul Razzaque Panhwar, Shams ul Wahab, Genevieve Grehan-Bradley, Nauman Ahmad, Hamidha Awshan, Omar Khayum, Syed Muhammad Jamil Shah, Usama Akram, Ajani Anthony Chane Nisbett, Low Zhe Ming, Aamal Rehman, Azan bin Tahir Awan, Julius Alexander Balchin, Alexander Henry Feltrim Fagan, Ty Devon Hess, Muhammad Umar, Megan Chen Xin Li, Dayrenn Murugentharan, Nafisa Bodruddoza Neeha, Jia Yu Doh, Niamh Lily Christina McGlynn, Anna Elizabeth Boothroyd Coyle, Tee Xin Yan, Katerina Christou, May May En Soh, Syed Muhammad Bin Syed Mokhtar Shah, Lucy Elizabeth Banks, Madisyn Victoria Meckling-Veilleux, Julie Zhi Xin Tee, Zachary Jay Lazarus-Hide, Barrie-Jon Ray Gwyer, Ak Md Zaim Adli Pg Hj Badaruddin, Muhammad Ziaan Ul Hassan Malik, Hasan Mostafa Porag, Cheshna Ragavoodoo, Spencer Kathryn Beall, Farzana Shahjahan, Liam Martin McGrath, Jaymila Sevita Nayedoo Sooben, Sandhya Devi Nemchand, Anthony John Lydon, Dhillon Timur Shenoy, Shun Chin Xiang, Jane Louise Leadbetter, Marko Stankovic, Nur Adeela Binti Mohammad Nizam, Ho Tai Teng, Koshalini Francis, Gan Yee Hui, Xi Honn Tan, Syed Moiz Hussain Bukhari

Syed Moiz Hussain Bakham,

Rayna Ganesarajah, Kashif

Amman Yaacob, Massimo

Lecavalier, Rachael Cheong

Ho Yan, Benjamin Jack Davies,

Maxwell Sebastian Pillmore,

Huey Qin Hon, Afiq Alhafiz

Bin Azmi, Holly Nicole

Newton, Charlie George Webb,

Charlotte Colette Ogden-Meade, Colleen Jane Light, Syed Saeed Uddin, Zeeshan Khan, Saul Richard Hiranya Agar Ward, Faye Coleman, Kaykobad, Danin Devin Arun, Tan Zheng Hao, Libby Baldwin, Joshua Alexander Hatcher, Eleonora Raus, Wanthur Yong Tze Wang, Ho Jia Xuan, Conor George Hoctor Dixon, Shamayel Inayatullah Qureshi, Reuben Sek Haowen, Elaine Chee Yi Ting, Shania Kaur Sohota, Jack Courtney, Uzma Noor, Syed Abbas Shirazi, Aadam Rahim, Rafin Oli Khondaker, Shazil Asif Ibrahim, Muhammad Safwan, Muhammad Qasim Khan, Cara Aisling Robinson, Aleksandra Szostak, Danielle Shilo, Monica Alvarez Battista, Muhammad Arshad Majeed Malik, Masood Iqbal, Malik Wasim, Ahmad Mohsin, Syed Abrar Hussain, Jake Alexander Jerogin, Muhammad Ahad Naeem, Mohammed Shaif Uddin, Hafiz Muhammad Tahir, Dilan Yasara Wijeratne, Abdur Rokib, Muhammad Inam-ul-Haq Rana, Sebastian Dominic Morris-Dyer, Md Abdul Awal Talukder, Hina Aziz, Hasnain Haider, Thomas Douglas King, Malik Anwar Ahmed Awan.

---

Gray's Inn

Hazel Winifred Bannerman,

Mouki Kambouroglou,

Christabel Iris Louise Hayman,

Diviya Enomoto, Matthew

Joseph Gallagher, Lilly-Anne

Williams, Matthew George

Harriott, Imogen Grace Rivers,

Rosie Cecilia Emily Boulton-

Roberts, Sadiya Hamid Lamia,

Malaka Cynthia-La- Toya

Parker, Marijan Isabel Van

Den Bergh, Chelsea Ellie Petty,

Sophie Dawn Helliwell,

Mathew Charles Newman,

Joshua Bhatt, Alexcia Kimisha

Valencia Potter, Lucy Natasha

Walker, Stephanie Caroline

Churchill, Ruth Beatrice Booth

McIver, Zara Anna

Prodromou, Remy Georgia

Ling, Jasprit Kaur Cusworth,

Sannjivesri Lakshmikanthan,

Matthew Thomas Hancock,

Kheli Dominique Johnson,

Oliver Roger Hill, Eve Neena

Bhogal, Samuel Patrick

William Crimp, Edward

Patrick Coles, Bethan Cerys

Williams Lloyd, Naomi

Makeda Percell, Michael

Joseph Power, Matthew

Edward Dilley, Aidan Ling

Siao Jun, Andrew John

Whitefield Bazeley, Chloe

Anne Fisher, Farai Johnson

Cleugh, Diviksha Jeebaun,

Kieran Paul Kitto, Ari

Christian Thomas Hinsey, Asia

Koby Scott, Sana Masihullah

Patel, Jee Soo Samuel Park,

Charlie James Foulds, Poppy

Alyssa Wallman, Teng Sheng

Saw, Nauman Khan,

Muhammad Ali Yousaf, Tarsha

Natalie Simon.

---

Inner Temple

Sabahat Fatema, Syed Saad Ali

Shah, Alexandra Louise

Arnold, Rafiah Sattar,

Marianne Hardy, Finley James

Judge, Rebecca Wrenn,

Richard Elliott Matheson,

Amanda Mann, Helena

Hulova, Ruby Alexandra

Breward, Samuel Karl Peters,

Sushant Krishna Agarwal,

Buioceacais Celina Jedidah

Chionuma, Adil Abdul Gafoor

Mohamed Yusuff, Bethany

Anne Mian, Ilinca Tuvene, Brett Paul Hogan, Antonia Asante, Eleanor Fiona Molly Stromberg, Miranda Lillie Rafferty, Tanraj Singh Dhaliwal, Nehal Rughoonauth, Rhiannon Mai Hobby, Amelia Cathryn Harris, Richard Charles Hilton Friemann, Koina Singh, Najnine Ahosan Chowdhury, Raiaana Salahuddin, George Aidan Batty, Tejasveernath Ramsaha, Alvin Chng Chia Yi, Aaron Steel, Daniel John Ainsworth MacLaurin, William Dugdale, Hannah Valli, Ethne Joanna Brereton, Liam Round, Chanic Suining John Mojiun, Raegan Wignall, Teck Wei Tan, Matthew Graeme Andrew Harris, Jordan Allis Craig, Naomi Jennings, Lee Nunkoo, Eleanor Christine May, Cody Tsz Him Lai, Zoe Alexandra Moss, Kinsey Shae Booker, Rafidur Rahim, Theodore Francis Anthony Mould, Harry Bernard Hawkins, Sirra Wally Mbye, Tobias Eoghan Watson Harvey, Christopher Clocchiatti, Eve von der Heyde, Annabel Sarah Eleanor Thompson, Dorothy May Richardson, Miles Ratcliffe, Sarah Birbeck, Amy Claire Lenehan, Niranjana Ramkumar, John Claughton, Lora Georgieva Izvorova, Lok Chi Jasper Wong, Alysha Pik Jean Low, Hannah Louise Amiri, Natalie Ho, Japheth Isaac Kamsiyochi Charles Daniel Harris, Sara Hussain, Jordan Jaye Rees, Meghna Sridhar, Nathan Trotter, Bernd Wong, Colin Lenahan Vanelli, Maisy Phoebe Hennigan, Prithvinagraj Singh Suresh, Sacha Webb, Isabelle Eve Hurst, Chu Kei Yuen, Zak Adam Kaufman, Elia Mattia Mennecillo, Mohammed Inzaman Ul-Haque Hussain, Saiba Sashin Ahuja, Dominic Osita Okoli, Destiny Adebamishe Odogiyan, Vinaya Priya Gosine, Leila Kerley, Michael Smith, Jack Woolcombe, Harvey Jefferson Bowen, Isabel Curtis, Srishti Garg, Sophie Eastwood, Kate Gibson Rassi, Mohamed Sacranie, Natalia Kubesch, Andrew Charles Escott-Watson, De er Boden, Eric Emmanuel Duniya, Jinyi Wang, James Phillip Barrett, Christopher Kerley, Colin Liew.

---

Court Circular

---

St James's Palace

11th October, 2026

The Princess Royal, Royal Colonel, The Royal Scots Borderers, 1st Battalion The Royal Regiment of Scotland, and Deputy Colonel-in-Chief, The Royal Regiment of Scotland, this afternoon attended the Laying Up of Colours in Canongate Kirk, Edinburgh, and was received by the Reverend Neil Gardner (Deputy Lieutenant of the City of Edinburgh).

---

Births, Marriages and Deaths

To book a Birth, Marriage or Death announcement in the Register, visit: newsukadvertising.co.uk for help, please call 020 7782 7553 or email BMDs@thetimes.co.uk

AND Abram said, "You have given me no children; so a servant in my household will be my heir." Then the word of the LORD came to him: "This man will not be your heir, but a son who is your own flesh and blood will be your heir." Genesis 15.3–4 (NIV)

Bible verses are provided by the Bible Society

---

Forthcoming Marriages

AND MR C. E. H. CARROLL

The engagement is announced between Daniel, only son of Mr and Mrs Stephen Callaghan, of Altrincham, Cheshire, and Charles, younger son of Mr and Mrs Anthony Carroll, of Sydney, Australia.

---

Marriages

McCORQUODALE – COLEMAN

The marriage took place on 10th October 2026 at Battersea, London, of Felix McCorquodale, son of David and Elizabeth Ann McCorquodale, and Lily Coleman, daughter of Mel Coleman and Annabel Croft.

---

MR D. M. HAUSCHILD AND MISS K. A. M. WILLIAMS

The marriage took place on 10th October 2026 at St Etheldreda's Church, Ely Place, between Dominic, son of Mr Andrew and Mrs Heather Hauschild of Southampton, Hampshire, and Katherine, daughter of Mr Adam and Mrs Laura Williams of Brentwood, Essex. The Reverend Father Edward Hauschild officiated. The bride was attended by Miss Megan Wise. Mr Ravi Jackson and Mr Eddie Simmonds were best men and a reception followed at The Ned, Poultry.

---

Deaths

WATSON JAMES David passed away in his sleep on 14th September, aged 92. Husband to Judy (d 2020), father to Sarah and Simon, grandfather to Jessica, Fred and Harry, great-grandfather to Ollie and Ella. Celebrating his life on Monday 19th October at 2.30pm Wenallt Chapel, Thornhill Crematorium, CF14 9UA, then at Cardiff Golf Club, CF23 6SJ. Colourful clothing optional. Family flowers only. Donations to NSPCC and British Heart Foundation.

---

Legal Notices

---

CR-2026-007087 IN THE HIGH COURT

OF

JUSTICE

BUSINESS AND PROPERTY

DIVISION

OF

NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that a Part 8 Claim Form was on 25 September 2026 issued before His Majesty's High Court of Justice for the confirmation of the reduction of the capital of the Company.

AND NOTICE IS FURTHER GIVEN that the said Claim Form is directed to be heard before the Insolvency and Companies Court Judge at the Royal Courts of Justice, Rolls Building, 7 Rolls Buildings, Fetter Lane, London, EC4A 1NL on 20 October 2026. ANY creditor or shareholder or former shareholder of the said company desiring to oppose the making of an Order for the confirmation for the said reduction of share capital should appear at the time of the hearing in person or by Counsel for that purpose. If the hearing is held remotely (including by Microsoft Teams) any creditor or shareholder who wishes to appear should contact steven.gibbon@justice.gov.uk in advance of the hearing. A copy of the said Claim Form will be furnished to any such person requiring the same by the undermentioned Solicitors on payment of the regulated charge for the same.

Register

The simple way to place your Birth, Marriage or Death announcement in the Register. Available 24 hours a day. Go to:

---

Legal Notices

CR-2026-006287

IN THE HIGH COURT

OF

JUSTICE

BUSINESS AND PROPERTY

COURTS

OF

ENGLAND AND WALES

COMPANIES COURT (ChD)

IN THE MATTER

OF

OXFORD PHARMAGENESIS

LIMITED

AND

IN THE MATTER

OF

THE COMPANY ACT 2001

Notice is hereby given that a Part 8 Claim Form was, on 30 September 2026, issued by the above-named company (company number 03488862 whose registered office at Tubney Warren Barn, Tubney, Oxford, Oxfordshire, OX13 5QJ) (the Company) at the High Court of Justice, Business and Property Courts, Companies Court (ChD) seeking an order confirming the cancellation of the entire issued share capital of the Company on the basis that the entire reserve arising on the reduction is to be applied in paying up new shares with the same aggregate nominal value. Notice is further given that the final hearing of the claim as set out in the Part 8 Claim Form is directed to be heard before an Insolvency and Companies Court Judge at The Royal Courts of Justice, The Rolls Building, 7 Rolls Buildings, Fetter Lane, London, EC4A 1NL on 20 October 2026. Any shareholder or creditor of the Company wishing to oppose the making of an order to confirm the reduction of capital should appear at the time of the hearing in person or by counsel for that purpose. A copy of the Part 8 Claim Form may be obtained, on payment of the regulated charge, from the Company's solicitors: Walker Morris LLP, 33 Wellington Street, Leeds, LS1 4DL (ref: KIW/LSI/ OXF06816.1). Dated: 12 October 2026

---

CR-2026-005587 IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE BUSINESS AND PROPERTY COURTS OF ENGLAND AND WALES COMPANIES COURT (Ch D) IN THE MATTER OF OCTOPUS AIM VCT PLC AND IN THE MATTER OF

THE COMPANIES ACT 2006

NOTICE IS HEREBY GIVEN that a Claim Form was on the 30 September 2026 issued in His Majesty's High Court of Justice seeking the confirmation of the cancellation of the share premium account of the above named Company. AND NOTICE IS FURTHER GIVEN that the said Claim Form is directed to be heard before the Insolvency and Companies Court Judge at the Royal Courts of Justice, The Rolls Building, 7 Rolls Building, Fetter Lane, London EC4A 1NL on Tuesday 20 October 2026 at 10.30am.

Any Creditor or Shareholder of the said Company desiring to oppose the making of an Order for the confirmation of the said cancellation of share premium account should appear at the time of the hearing in person or by Counsel for that purpose. A copy of the said Claim Form will be furnished to any such person requiring the same by the undermentioned Solicitors on payment of the regulated charge for the same.

DATED this 12th day of October 2026

Howard Kennedy LLP

No. 1 London Bridge

London SE1 9BG

Ref: SH3

Tel: 020 3755 6000

Fax: 020 3650 6847

Solicitors for the above-named Company

THE NO-FLY

BRITISH ISLES

EXCLUSIVE PRICE DROP

ADULTS-ONLY,

TRADITIONAL

BRITISH CRUISING

SAVE 10% $^{±}$ ONLY WHEN

YOU BOOK WITH

ROL CRUISE

NO-FLY CRUISING

FROM ONLY

£97 PP PER NIGHT

The British Isles beckon with their historic ports, lush landscapes, and vibrant port cities. Each destination offers a unique glimpse into the culture and history of the Isles. This journey promises an enriching exploration of one of the world's most storied regions.

---

BRITISH ISLES DISCOVERY & FRENCH CHARMS 13 NIGHTS DEPARTING 11 $^{TH}$ APRIL 2027

Embark Ambience and depart London Tilbury - Invergordon - Kirkwall, Orkney Isles - Belfast - Liverpool - Cork (from Cobh) - St. Mary's, Isles of Scilly - St. Peter Port, Guernsey - Honfleur (overnight) - Arrive in London Tilbury

ROL CRUISE FARE FROM (PP)

INSIDE OCEAN VIEW BALCONY SUITE

£1,529 £2,089 £2,239 £2,619

Solo fares are sold out

---

YOUR CRUISE HIGHLIGHTS Kirkwall

Norse and Scottish history intertwine in Kirkwall on the windswept Orkney Isles. Stroll down historic streets, explore medieval ruins, and embrace the rugged beauty

of this Scottish town amidst the North Sea.

---

Cobh

Rows of candy-coloured houses are just one of the many reasons why Cobh, Ireland is such a charming place to visit. Fascinating historic sites and warm Irish hospitality are standout features of this picturesque port town.

---

WHAT'S INCLUDED $^{++}$ IN YOUR HOLIDAY WITH AMBASSADOR

EXCLUSIVE 10% $^{+}$ SAVINGS FOR A LIMITED TIME ONLY

AMBASSADOR GUARANTEE $^{++}$ - ENJOY YOURSELF ON YOUR FIRST AMBASSADOR CRUISE OR YOUR MONEY BACK

• Full board adults-only cruising on board Ambience, including:

\- Up to £200 on board credit\*

\- Sumptuous cuisine including breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner and late night snacks

\- An authentic and traditional cruise experience at a fantastically affordable price

\- A wide range of entertainment, including evening shows, plays, cabarets, live music & classical interludes

\- Use of gym, swimming pool and hot tubs as well as spa access

\- The currency on board is pound sterling, so you won't be affected by any foreign exchange rate fluctuations

\- PLUS, book a Balcony or above by 8pm $16^{\text{th}}$ October 2026 to receive an EXCLUSIVE FREE Bettys Gift+

EARN EXCLUSIVE CRUISE MILES® - worth £££s off your next booking $^{††}$

---

CELTIC CAPITALS & COASTAL CHARMS 12 NIGHTS DEPARTING 3 $^{RD}$ MAY 2027

Embark Ambience and depart London Tilbury

• Brest - St. Mary's, Isles of Scilly - Cork (from Cobh)
• Holyhead, Isle of Anglesey - Belfast - Tobermory,

Isle of Mull - Lerwick, Shetland Isles - Invergordon -

Arrive in London Tilbury

ROL CRUISE FARE FROM (PP)

INSIDE OCEAN VIEW BALCONY SUITE

£1,159 £1,349 £2,379 £2,619

Solo fares available from £2,699

---

YOUR CRUISE HIGHLIGHTS Lerwick

Lerwick, nestled in the Shetland Isles, whispers tales of Vikings and Scottish history. Take leisurely walks through its winding streets, learn the history of lighthouse-keeping at Bressay Lighthouse, and breathe in the salty North Atlantic breezes atop the Knab promontory.

---

Belfast

Belfast, Northern Ireland's capital, reveals a vibrant cityscape interwoven with history. From the old docklands of the Titanic Quarter to dynamic neighbourhoods filled with mural art, Belfast offers endless opportunities to explore.

rolcruise.co.uk/times

TRAVEL WITH CONFIDENCE

ABTA

ABTA No Y6765

0808 258 0257

CALL ONE OF OUR

CRUISE SPECIALISTS

FREE ON

QUOTE OFFER REF 645189

WE ARE OPEN 7 DAYS A WEEK FROM 8:30AM - 8PM

Trustpilot

Today Rather cloudy and becoming milder with outbreaks of rain and drizzle at times. Max 19C (66F), min 9C (48F)

---

Around Britain

Key: b=bright, c=cloud, d=drizzle, pc=partly cloudy

du=dull, f=fair, fg=fog, h=hail, m=mist, r=rain,

sh=showers, sl=sleet, sn=snow, s=sun, t=thunder

\*=previous day \*\*=data not available | | Temp Cmidday yesterday | Rain mm24 hrs to 5pm yesterday | Sun hr* | Aberdeen | 13 | PC | 0.8 | 4.0 | Aberporth | 14 | C | 0.0 | 5.6 | Anglesey | 14 | PC | 1.6 | 3.1 | Aviemore | 12 | C | 3.2 | 0.7 | Barnstaple | 15 | R | 0.2 | | Bedford | 14 | C | 0.0 | | Belfast | 13 | PC | 0.2 | 3.7 | Birmingham | 14 | S | 0.0 | | Bournemouth | 16 | PC | 0.0 | 5.6 | Bridlington | 16 | S | 0.0 | | Bristol | 14 | C | 0.0 | 5.9 | Camborne | 14 | R | 3.8 | 4.4 | Cardiff | 14 | C | 0.0 | 5.9 | Edinburgh | 13 | PC | 0.0 | 6.5 | Eskdalemuir | 11 | R | 0.0 | 4.1 | Glasgow | 13 | D | 0.6 | 5.6 | Hereford | 15 | C | 0.0 | | Herstmonceux | 15 | C | 0.0 | 6.4 | Ipswich | 14 | PC | 0.0 | 5.5 | Isle of Man | 13 | S | 0.0 | 7.2 | Isle of Wight | 16 | C | 0.0 | | Jersey | 16 | C | 0.0 | 4.7 | Keswick | 12 | FG | 1.6 | | Kinloss | 12 | | 5.8 | 0.3 | Leeds | 11 | C | 0.0 | | Lerwick | 10 | PC | 0.2 | 4.0 | Leuchars | 13 | C | 0.0 | 5.5 | Lincoln | 14 | PC | 0.0 | 7.1 | Liverpool | 14 | PC | 1.4 | | London | 16 | PC | 0.0 | 7.3 | Lyneham | 14 | C | 0.0 | 5.8 | Manchester | 13 | C | 0.0 | 3.4 | Margate | 14 | S | 0.0 | 6.7 | Milford Haven | 15 | C | 0.0 | | Newcastle | 13 | PC | 0.0 | | Nottingham | 14 | PC | 0.4 | 2.6 | Orkney | 11 | C | 0.8 | | Oxford | 14 | C | 0.0 | | Plymouth | 14 | R | 2.0 | | Portland | 15 | C | 0.0 | | Scilly, St Mary's | 15 | R | 5.2 | | Shoreham | 15 | | 0.0 | 6.4 | Shrewsbury | 13 | C | 0.4 | 4.5 | Snowdonia | 12 | PC | 6.0 | | Southend | 15 | PC | 0.0 | 6.5 | South Ulist | 11 | D | 1.6 | | Stornoway | 13 | C | 2.0 | 2.3 | Tiree | 12 | PC | 1.8 | 2.2 | Whitehaven | 11 | C | 0.0 | 5.3 | Wick | 10 | R | 1.0 | ** | Yeovilton | 15 | PC | 0.0 | 3.7 | ---

The world

All readings local midday yesterday | Alicante | 27 | S | Madeira | 23 | PC | Amsterdam | 12 | SH | Madrid | 20 | S | Athens | 26 | B | Malaga | 25 | PC | Auckland | 21 | PC | Mallorca | 24 | PC | Bahrain | 35 | S | Malta | 25 | PC | Bangkok | 31 | PC | Melbourne | 23 | PC | Barbados | 30 | PC | Mexico City | 21 | C | Barcelona | 22 | PC | Miami | 32 | B | Beijing | 24 | PC | Milan | 19 | PC | Beirut | | | Mombasa | 30 | B | Belgrade | 14 | R | Montreal | 12 | PC | Berlin | 13 | SH | Moscow | 12 | PC | Bermuda | 28 | PC | Mumbai | 37 | | Bordeaux | 17 | S | Munich | 14 | PC | Brussels | 13 | PC | Nairobi | 25 | B | Bucharest | 26 | S | Naples | 23 | PC | Budapest | 17 | B | New Orleans | 26 | PC | Buenos Aires | 14 | C | New York | 21 | B | Cairo | 25 | PC | Nice | 23 | B | Calcutta | 31 | | Nicosa | 29 | PC | Canberra | 22 | PC | Oslo | 4 | SH | Cape Town | 25 | S | Paris | 16 | B | Chicago | 27 | B | Perth | 17 | S | Copenhagen | 12 | B | Prague | 12 | PC | Corfu | 21 | R | Reykjavik | 8 | B | Delhi | 30 | | Riga | 11 | C | Dubai | 37 | S | Rio de Janeiro | 31 | PC | Dublin | 13 | PC | Riyadh | 37 | S | Faro | 24 | S | Rome | 23 | S | Florence | 24 | PC | San Francisco | 18 | PC | Frankfurt | 14 | SH | Santiago | 19 | B | Geneva | 15 | PC | São Paulo | 27 | S | Gibraltar | 23 | B | Seoul | 26 | S | Helsinki | 6 | B | Seychelles | 29 | PC | Hong Kong | 30 | PC | Singapore | 32 | | Honolulu | | | St Petersburg | 9 | D | Istanbul | 22 | S | Stockholm | 6 | B | Jerusalem | 29 | PC | Sydney | 25 | S | Johannesburg | 23 | PC | Tel Aviv | 29 | PC | Kuala Lumpur | 32 | PC | Tenerife | 27 | PC | Kyiv | | | Tokyo | 25 | PC | Lanzarote | 27 | PC | Vancouver | 13 | PC | Las Palmas | 27 | PC | Venice | 21 | PC | Lima | 23 | C | Vienna | 18 | PC | Lisbon | 21 | B | Warsaw | 14 | PC | Los Angeles | 23 | PC | Washington | 21 | C | Luxor | 32 | S | Zurich | 13 | B | ---

Five days ahead

Some rain at times before turning cooler and generally drier with plenty of sunshine

---

Tomorrow

Warm in southeastern England. Cloud and rain will clear England and Wales in the morning to bring a drier afternoon. Scattered showers in Ireland and Scotland.

---

Wednesday

Dry with warm spells of sunshine over England and Wales. Sunny at first in Ireland and Scotland but cloud will increase to bring showery rain from the west.

---

Thursday

Dry and warm with sunny spells in southeastern England. A band of cloud and rain will spread eastwards over the rest of Britain and Ireland, followed by sunshine and showers.

Max 22C, min 2C

---

Friday

Dry with sunny spells in southern and eastern Britain and the east of Ireland. Sunny periods and the risk of showers elsewhere.

---

Saturday

Plenty of dry and sunny weather and feeling cooler, but the risk of a few showers in eastern England, northern Scotland and the northeast of Ireland. Max 14C, min 0C

The Times weather page is provided by WeatherQuest

---

Sea state

Wind speed 34 (mph)

---

Temperature

28 (degrees C)

---

Flood alerts and warnings

At 17:00 on Sunday there were two flood alerts and no warnings in England and no flood alerts or warnings in Wales or Scotland. For further information and updates in England visit check-for-flooding.service.gov.uk, for Wales naturalresources.wales/flooding and for Scotland SEPA.org.uk

General situation: Some dry and sunny periods in eastern Britain, otherwise it will be a cloudy day with showery light rain or drizzle.

Cen S Eng, E Mids, Channel Is, London, Cen N Eng, Lake District, SW Scotland, IoM, Cen Highland, Glasgow, Argyll, NW Scotland: Cloudy and misty or foggy with outbreaks of rain spreading eastwards, turning heavy in Scotland later. Light to moderate south or southeasterly winds. Maximum 17C (63F), minimum 9C (48F).

---

Tides | Heights in metres. All times in local time | Today | Ht | Ht | Aberdeen | 02:44 | 4.4 | 15:06 | 4.2 | Avonmouth | 08:58 | 13.4 | 21:14 | 13.4 | Belfast | ---:--- | -- | 12:56 | 3.4 | Cardiff | 08:45 | 12.4 | 21:01 | 12.4 | Devonport | 07:27 | 5.5 | 19:39 | 5.5 | Dover | ---:--- | -- | 12:55 | 6.9 | Dublin | 00:53 | 3.3 | 13:18 | 3.1 | Falmouth | 06:53 | 5.2 | 19:10 | 5.2 | Greenock | 01:51 | 3.6 | 14:20 | 3.4 | Harwich | 01:16 | 4.1 | 13:26 | 4.1 | Holyhead | 11:58 | 5.6 | ---:--- | -- | Hull | 07:49 | 7.8 | 20:11 | 7.4 | Leith | 04:05 | 5.7 | 16:24 | 5.5 | Liverpool | ---:--- | -- | 12:48 | 9.4 | London Bridge | 03:28 | 7.0 | 15:39 | 7.2 | Lowestoft | 10:57 | 2.7 | 23:31 | 2.5 | Milford Haven | 07:51 | 7.1 | 20:07 | 7.1 | Morecambe | ---:--- | -- | 12:58 | 9.5 | Newhaven | ---:--- | -- | 12:51 | 6.8 | Newquay | 06:41 | 7.0 | 18:57 | 7.0 | Oban | 07:16 | 4.1 | 19:23 | 4.1 | Penzance | 06:15 | 5.6 | 18:31 | 5.5 | Portsmouth | ---:--- | -- | 13:12 | 4.7 | Shoreham | ---:--- | -- | 13:06 | 6.4 | Southampton | 00:20 | 4.5 | 12:51 | 4.5 | Swansea | 08:01 | 9.5 | 20:15 | 9.5 | Tees | 05:09 | 5.6 | 17:31 | 5.5 | Weymouth | 08:34 | 2.2 | 20:45 | 2.2 | Republic of Ireland, N Ireland: Some dry and sunny periods in southeastern areas, otherwise it will be a cloudy and misty day with outbreaks of rain. Light increasing to moderate or fresh southerly winds. Maximum 19C (66F), minimum 10C (50F).

SW Eng, Wales, W Mids, NW Eng: Mostly cloudy and foggy with periods of rain or drizzle, turning drier with some sunny intervals later. Light to moderate southerly winds. Maximum 19C (66F), minimum 12C (54F).

---

Synoptic situation

A deep area of low pressure centred to the west of Iceland will push various fronts eastwards across the British Isles, bringing rather cloudy skies, poor visibility in places and outbreaks of rain. The heaviest of the rain will be over Ireland and western Scotland on the cold front later in the day. Troughs behind the cold front will bring showers tomorrow.

N Isles: Dry with sunny spells in the morning, turning cloudy with some rain during the afternoon. Moderate to strong southerly winds. Maximum 14C (57F), minimum 11C (52F). SE Eng, E Anglia, E Eng, Borders, NE Eng, Edinburgh and Dundee, Aberdeen, Moray Firth, NE Scotland: Some dry and sunny periods but most of the day will be cloudy with light rain or drizzle. Light to moderate southerly winds. Maximum 17C (63F), minimum 10C (50F).

Highs and lows

24hrs to 5pm yesterday

Warmest: Southampton,

Hampshire, 17.3C

Coldest: Cairngorm, -0.6C

Wettest: Loch Glascarnoch,

Ross and Cromarty, 11.8mm

Sunniest: Morpeth, 8.8hrs\*

Sun and moon

For Greenwich

Sun rises: 07.19

Sun sets: 18.13

Moon rises: 09.41

Moon sets: 18.20

First quarter: October 18

Hours of darkness

Aberdeen 18:44-07:07

Belfast 19:03-07:18

Birmingham 18:50-06:59

Cardiff 18:56-07:03

Exeter 18:58-07:03

Glasgow 18:54-07:14

Liverpool 18:53-07:05

London 18:44-06:51

Manchester 18:50-07:02

Newcastle 18:45-07:02

Norwich 18:37-06:47

Penzance 19:07-07:11

Sheffield 18:47-06:59

Weather Eye

Paul Simons

t has been a strange tropical storm season this autumn — the Pacific has been pummelled by hurricanes, while the

Atlantic has remained eerily quiet. But on Friday night, Hurricane Isaias struck the Gulf Coast of Florida with 105mph winds that felled trees, tore roofs off buildings, set off floods from crashing rain, drove a storm surge reaching 5.6ft and left about 670,000 people without power.

Remarkably, Isaias was the first Atlantic hurricane of 2026. This made it the latest-forming hurricane on record, tying with another that formed on October 8, 1905 — a record eclipsed only in 1907 and 1914, when there were no hurricanes at all. The appearance of Isaias so late in the hurricane season has been thanks to El Niño, which has fuelled tropical storms in the Pacific but launched high-level winds across the Atlantic that have torn apart any hurricanes trying to form there.

Isaias was also notable for exploding into life as it passed over deep seas about 2.5C warmer than normal, energising the storm and supercharging its winds and rains.

The increasing sea temperatures are resulting from climate change, and also rising sea levels that are leading to higher storm surges from hurricanes hitting coastal regions. As the remnants of Isaias sped further into the US, they brought further flooding.

The hurricane could influence the weather in the UK in a roundabout way. It is dumping warm tropical air over the Atlantic while cold air lies to the north. That temperature contrast is helping to fuel the jet stream that will drive a deep area of low pressure near the UK this week. That will bring the prospect of gales in the northwest and west of the UK, but unusually mild air especially in eastern and southeastern areas reaching the low 20s Celsius, as well as heavy rains passing across parts of the UK.

That will be followed by bright, cooler weather before rain and wind return on Thursday. And a conveyor belt of depressions will run across the UK for the rest of the month, interspersed with drier interludes.

Read more from Paul Simons' Weather Eye

thetimes.com/weathereye

Explore. Plan. And now book with The Times.

The Times and Sunday Times is a unique and trusted source of travel inspiration. Now you can trust us to take you there too.

Call 0808 231 5090 or visit thetimes.com/holidays

TIMES Holidays

A BRAND-NEW RESORT, NOW RELEASING

The fells at the

end of the decking...

The quiet north Lakes, with Blencathra on the skyline. One to four bedrooms, architect-designed and fully furnished, each with a pergola, hot tub and open fell views from the decking.

FROM A 20% DEPOSIT · NO STAMP DUTY · NO COUNCIL TAX · UP TO 950 YEARS

£145,000

RESIDENCES FROM

0800 404 5680

Kipchoge sets Melbourne record at age of 41

QUINN ROONEY/GETTY IMAGES

Athletics

Dominic Akiboye

Kipchoge, who said his body is “still peaking” and that he loves competing against “the Gen Zs”, shaved two seconds off the course record set in 2022 by Kiplagat

At 41 years old, Eliud Kipchoge believes his “body is still peaking” as the Kenyan marathon runner broke the course record in Melbourne.

The two-times Olympic champion crossed the line in 2hr, 9min and 10sec to celebrate his 17th career win, and his first since the Berlin Marathon three years ago.

Kipchoge took the course record from his compatriot Timothy Kiplagat, shaving two seconds off the time set in 2022.

"I believe that my body is still peaking, still able to compete with the next generation," Kipchoge said. "The oldest athlete is still competing, but I am happy to run with the Gen Zs. It makes me proud to run with the younger generation and inspire the running community in Melbourne."

Kipchoge and the other competitors ran partly along the Formula 1 track at Albert Park and finished inside the Melbourne Cricket Ground.

"On the course, it was really wonderful, I enjoyed seeing people standing, cheering, and shouting my name," Kipchoge said.

"It was different, running on a beautiful course, but also running on the Formula 1 track, and finishing in a cricket ground."

The Australian duo of Thomas Do Canto and Reece Edwards rounded out the top three, with Do Canto coming closest to Kipchoge, recording a time of 2:10.35.

IKE MELBOURNE

New Zealand's Camille French won the women's race in 2:28.25, followed by Australia's Sinead Diver and Nichola Sheridan of Ireland in third.

Kipchoge's victory marks the third

leg of his world tour, in which he hopes to complete a marathon on all seven continents, including Antarctica, over two years. Each race raises funds for the Eliud Kipchoge Foundation, which focuses on education, environmental sustainability and health.

"Today was about more than sport. It was about the energy of the city, the huge support along the race route, running alongside so many other runners, and a stunning finish at the MCG," Kipchoge said.

"No words can describe that feeling. Thank you, Melbourne."

Third, second, then first... Kipruto wins in Chicago

Dominic Akiboye

After consecutive podium finishes in the past two Chicago marathons, Amos Kipruto broke through to win his first title on the course yesterday.

The Kenyan's time of 2hr, 1min and 9sec meant he finished well ahead of

talkSPORT the second-placed Ethiopian Tadese Takele Bikila, who clocked 2:02.56.

"I came here in 2024, I became position three. [In] 2025, I became position two," Kipruto said. "And now... everything is all about the mindset.

"It was tough, but I set my mind, and I said, 'Let's go.'" It was a moment of vindication for Kipruto, who ran clear of last year's winner Jacob Kiplimo, from Uganda, in the closing miles to secure his personal best.

Kipruto has a fine record in Chicago

Kiplimo, who recorded the third-fastest marathon time ever in London this year, faded towards the end, dropping behind Bikila and Ethiopia's Milkesa Mengesha for a fourth-place finish.

Hawi Feysa won the women's race for a second straight year as the Ethiopian recorded a time of 2:13.33. Feysa was locked together with Kenya's Brigid Kosgei, another two-time winner on this course, and Sharon Lokedi, before she broke away with around a kilometre to go.

"It certainly became quite a battle, especially after the pacemaker dropped out around 33km," Feysa said. "Around 35km, that's when I became pretty sure I had this in the bag."

Emma Grace Hurley, who finished seventh, broke the record for the fastest debut marathon by an American woman as she finished in 2:20.47.

"It was a little intimidating on the start line, knowing that I was about to run further than I ever had," Hurley said after the feat.

LIVE AND FREE ON talkSPORT

COVENTRY VS NEWCASTLE

ATLÉTICO VS MAN UTD

ARSENAL VS LILLE

ON RADIO ONLINE ON THE APP

TONIGHT 20:00 K.O

talkSPORT

TOMORROW 20:00 K.O

talkSPORT

TOMORROW 20:00 K.O

talkSPORT $^{2}$

---

Sport Racing

---

Kempton Park

---

Rob Wright

Going: Standard to Slow

Draw: 5f-1m, low numbers best Racing TV

---

4.12 Novice Stakes

Rob Wright | | (Div I: 2-Y-O: £5,400: 7f) (12 runners) | 1 | (11) | 01 | SHOWCasing GLORY 17 (D) C Johnston 9-11 B Loughnane | 2 | (1) | AL ALAMI James Owen 9-4 | C Fallon | 3 | (3) | BOY BASILICA R Hughes 9-4 | F Marsh | 4 | (6) | 00 | COMEONFEELTHENOISE 17 H Eustace 9-4 Kaiya Fraser | 5 | (5) | 0 PENSELWOOD 9 Sir M Prescott 9-4 | L Morris | 6 | (8) | RADICAL BAY A Perrett 9-4 | P Dobbs | 7 | (10) | 2055 RED TAIL 23 R Hannon 9-4 | A Voilkhansky | 8 | (12) | SHELLYANDBACK R Teal 9-4 | J Leavy | 9 | (9) | 5 THE SERGEON 49 F Brennan 9-4 | C Bishop | 10 | (4) | PADDY COOL A Carroll 9-1 | W Carson | 11 | (2) | PIEN DE DANE H Kobeissi 9-1 | I Rossi | 12 | (7) | 00 LITTLE COPPER 20 J Parr 8-13 | J Mitchell | 2-1 Showcasing Glory, 5-2 Red Tail, 13-2 Boy Basilica, 7-1 Al Alami, 10-1 The Sergeon, 12-1 Comeonfeelthenoise, 16-1 Shellyandback, 20-1 others.

Rob Wright's choice: Boy Basilica, a son of St Mark's Basilica, appeals Dangers: Showcasing Glory, The Sergeon

---

4.45 Novice Stakes | 1 | (5) | 14 HUWA BAREE 38 (D) C Johnston 9-8 | B Loughnane | 2 | (9) | 1 TREDEGAR SQUARE 63 (CD) J Fanshawe 9-8 | O Murphy | 3 | (1) | 2 ALBERICH 17 (BF) Harry Eustace 9-4 | Kaiya Fraser | 4 | (8) | 3030 DESERT LEGEND 65 R Hannon 9-4 | S M Levey | 5 | (7) | HARPAGOSIDE M Botti 9-4 | B Sayette | 6 | (10) | SABURO Sir M Prescott 9-4 | L Morris | 7 | (4) | 0 TWILIGHT FOX 21 H Candy 9-4 | N Currie | 8 | (2) | 0 NIL SATIS SUPREME 47 M Loughnane 9-1 Hope Regan (7) | 9 | (3) | TARAN BOLTA J Portman 9-1 | R Hornby | 10 | (6) | 6 FRANKIE POWER 39 T Dascombe 8-13 | W Cox | 11 | (11) | ALPHA BELLA Adam Kirby 8-10 | J Watson | 13-8 Tredegar Square, 3-1 Alberich, 100-30 Huwa Baree, 8-1 Desert Legend, 14-1 Harpagoside, 16-1 Alpha, 25-1 Saburo, Taran Bolta. | Wright choice: Alberich did well after being held up off a slow pace at Newcastle Dangers: Tredegar Square, Huwa Baree | ---

5.15 Maiden Stakes (£5,400: 6f) (8) | 1 | (5) -0060 OCETI 93 R Hannon 3-9-7 | S M Levey | 2 | (8) -3342 ONE OF THE BOYS 17 (BF) M Bell 3-9-7 | H Crouch | 3 | (1) 4-235 PEROLA 133 R Hughes 3-9-7 | F Marsh | 4 | (3) -0500 SAVVI ROW 15 B Millman 3-9-7 | K Fox | 5 | (2) 3- AMORIST 494 (T) H Kabeissi 3-9-2 | Taryn Langley (5) | 6 | (4) KATIE LOUISE Martin Dunne 3-9-2 | O Murphy | 7 | (6) 3- RAVISHING 444 R Varian 3-9-2 | J Mitchell | 8 | (7) 0-6 VANNESSA 10 P Chamings 3-9-2 | C Bishop | 15-8 One Of The Boys, 5-2 Ravishing, 4-1 Perola, 1-1 Perola, 8-1 Amorist, 25-1 Katie Louise, 66-1 Savvi Row, 100-1 Vannessa. | Wright choice: Oceti has been gelded since a below-par run | Wright choice: Oceti has been gelded since a below-par run in a handicap at Ascot Dangers: Ravishing, Amorist

---

5.45 Fillies' Stakes (£5,400: 1m) (9) | 1 | (4) 40-00 BEL AIR FLYER 100 (P) H Candy 4-9-5 | N Currie | 2 | (8) 32 ALL SHALL BE WELL 14 Jack Jones 3-9-2 | R Ryan | 3 | (2) ESPRESSONA SIGNORA G Arnolda 3-9-2 Laura Pearson | 4 | (9) 0P-2 FAN ME 25 (BF) W Haggas 3-9-2 | C Fallon | 5 | (6) 32330 FOXY NIGHT 37 (B) J Butler 3-9-2 | B Loughnane | 6 | (3) O KERNOW ROSE 73 Zoe Hawkins 3-9-2 | R Hornby | 7 | (5) NERVOUSDISPOSITION P Phelan 3-9-2 | J F Egan | 8 | (7) 2- WADOODA 367 Owen Burrows 3-9-2 | C Rodriguez | 9 | (1) WOSTA J & T Gosden 3-9-2 | O Murphy | 5-2 Wadooda, 11-4 Foxy Night, 100-30 Westa, 7-2 Fan Me, 8-1 All Shall Be Well, 33-1 Esressona Signora, 50-1 Nervoudisposition, 100-1 ethers. | Wright choice: Wadooda was second in a higher grade at Newmarket; ran defy a break Dangers: Westa, Foxy Night | 6.15 Novice Stakes (2-Y-O: £15,462: 1m) (10) | 1 | (8) | 00 BLUE VIXEN 34 (H) A King 9-2 | R Ryan | 2 | (5) | FEAR THE DARK Oliver Cole 9-2 | O Murphy | 3 | (10) | O ORTENZIAN TWILIGHT 17 H Main 9-2 | J Mitchell | 4 | (6) | 5 RENASCENT 19 R Hughes 9-2 | F Marsh | 5 | (7) | 00 SUEBOYS 19 Ollie Sangster 9-2 | S Donohoe | 6 | (9) | 266 THESPIAN QUEEN 6 E J-Houghton 9-2 | C Bishop | 7 | (2) | FRESHIE R Teal 8-13 | J Leavy | 8 | (1) | 02 HEAVENLY PAROLE 24 M Bell 8-13 | B Loughnane | 9 | (4) | 500 MYSTIC BALLISTIC 24 H Kobeissi 8-13 | I Rossi | Wright choice: Rhythm Of My Heart was second in a hot race at Goodwood Dangers: Thespian Queen, Heavenly Parole

---

6.45 Handicap (£8,246: 1m) (14) | 1 (10) 10060 FIRST PRINCIPLE 93 (P,CD) W Haggas 4-9-9 | C Fallon | 2 (8) 10600 WITCH HUNTER 23 (D) R Hannon 7-9-9 | B Pollard (7) | 3 (12) 02300 YORKSHIRE 17 (T,C) E Bethell 6-9-9 | B Loughnane | 4 (13) 30540 CAROMB 147 (W,T) D O'Meara 4-9-8 | O Murphy | 5 (11) 36030 SPELL MASTER 16 Oil Rix 4-9-7 | H Vigors (5) | 6 (6) 00000 AQPAN 16 R Varian 3-9-6 | J Mitchell | 7 (3) 01103 RACINGBREAKS RYDER 42 (C,D) C Hills 6-9-5 | J Watson | 8 (14) 12044 I'M WORKIN ON IT 37 (C,P) B Millman 4-9-5 | F Marsh | 9 (7) -0015 ONE MORE 189 (C) C Bahanam 4-9-5 | J Haynes | 10 (1) -0.000 STAR ANTHEM 37 C Cox 4-9-5 | R Ryan | 11 (4) 00-01 FANTASTIC FOX 79 (D) R Varian 8-9-5 | R Coakley | 12 (2) 0-423 ORGAN 114 (D) Owen Burrows 4-9-4 | C Rodriguez | 13 (9) 56-00 CRACK ON BOYS 234 (D) Tom Clover 4-9-4 | H Crouch | 14 (5) -0005 ARCHER ROYAL 44 (V) J T Gosden 3-9-4 | B Sayette | 4-1 Fantastic Fox, 11-2 Racingbreaks Ryder, 7-1 I'm Workin On It, 8-1 Yorkshire, 10-1 Organ, Caromb, 12-1 First Principle, 14-1 others. | Wright choice: Archer Royal could be sharpened up by the fitting of a visor Rangers: Spell Master, Racingbreaks Ryder | ---

7.15 Handicap (3-Y-O: £4,187: 1m 4f) (6)

Wright choice: Floating Market did not get a clear run when sixth at Southwell; unexposed Danger: Takeitorleavit

---

7.45 Handicap (£3,140: 2m) (9)

13-8 Nirrler, 100-50 Tazaman, 9-2 Fram Castle, 10-1 Two Plus Two, Thankyou Baroness, 12-1 Girls Night Out, 16-1 Sneaky Blinder, 20-1 others.

Wright choice: Niffler is a progressive young stayer; should be more to come Dangers: Tazaman, Two Plus Two

---

8.15 Handicap (£3,140: 6f) (12)

1 (4) 05200 JIMMY KNOCKER 35 (T,D) Andi Brown 5-9-9 L Morris

2 (6) 51130 SILKY ROBIN 28 (B,D) Brian Toomey 5-9-9 O Murphy

3 (3) -5500 MARIANNE MOZART 26 (H) I Mohammed & J Santos

4 (8) 0-462 RORY'S ROYALE 35 (V) S Hodgson 4-9-9 S M Levey

5 (11) 62001 MOOSTAR 6 (T,V,D) James Owen 4-9-8 O Hoodless (7)

6 (1) 11656 ARNAZ 7 (D) M Loughnane 5-9-7 J Mitchell

7 (5) 22210 HINT OF THE JUNGLE 25 (T,D) M Murphy 5-9-6 R Hornby

8 (10) 30113 MACANUDO 14 (B) I Williams 5-9-4 B Loughnane

9 (12) 10106 WALKING ON CLOUDS 30 (B,BF,D) C Banham 7-9-1 | 10 (9) 00-65 POP DANCER 41 A Carroll 9-9-0 | R Ryan | 11 (7) 66350 HOPJES 13 (B,T) H Dickin 7-8-4 | Isobelle Chalmers (7) | 12 (2) 00343 HENRY TUDOR 30 (D) M Hoad 4-8-4 | K O’Neill | 7-2 Macanudo, 9-2 Moostar, 5-1 Rory’s Royale, 8-1 Walking On Clouds, 10-1 | Wright choice: Silky Robin can bounce back to form with Oisin Murphy booked Dangers: Moostar, Rory's Royale

---

Worcester

---

Rob Wright

1.37 Onehundredneighty 3.37 Annie Express

2.07 Saint Arion 4.07 Kykorock

2.37 Away For The Night 4.37 Sunshine Diamond

3.07 Potters Charm | 1.37 Handicap Chase (£3,248, 2M+4Y) (10) | 1 | 3P53- LOVE ME 184 (T) Miss J Davis 6-12-0 | G Sheehan | 2 | 4342- JIMMYJEROO 364 (BF) Miss H Knight 8-11-10 | P O'Brien | 3 | 3P65P DISCO DAVIS 17 (P) S-J Davies 7-11-9 | J Best | 4 | 5-421 ONEHUNDREDNEIGHTY 17 (C) B Pauling 6-11-8 | B R Jones | 5 | 563P- POP'S FOLLY 209 G Nicholls 6-11-6 | L Williams | 6 | F304- TOM TAGGLE 200 (BF) Mrs Mrs C Williams 6-11-2 | A Wedge | 7 | 2P-32 BLACK OCC 131 Sheila Lewis 7-11-2 | S Houlihan | 8 | 500-0 CALLI BLACK 103 (T,C) D Weston 8-11-1 | D Biss | 9 | P4U51 ROCKVALE 11 (P,T,D) S Allwood 7-10-10 | B J Powell | 10 | 4-P13 NOBLE RECALL 11 A Day 7-10-3 | Isabelle Ryder (5) | 6-4 Onehundrednightly, 6-1 Jimmyjeroo, Rockvale, 7-1 Tom Taggle, 8-1 Black Occ, Love Me, 10-1 Noble Recall, 33-1 Pop's Folly, Calli Black, 50-1 Disco Davis. | ---

2.07 Handicap Chas (£3,248: 2m 7f) (10)

10 142-5 VALIRANN GOLD 159 (T) H Brown 9-10-5 B Godfrey

9-4 Sonyourastar, 11-2 Saint Arion, 7-1 Ridin Solo, 15-2 Moonlightinthepark, Billy Boi Blue, 10-1 Valirann Gold, Balkardy, Ballynaheer.

---

2.37 Handicap Chase

---

(£3,248: 2m 110yd) (9)

1 62P-4 DOUBLE INDEMNITY 142 (W,T) D McCain 6-12-0 T Gillard

2 521-2 AWAY FOR THE NIGHT 160 (BF,D) A Hales 7-11-1 B Carver

3 P021- L'EMPIRE VERT 183 (T,D) Sheila Lewis 6-11-1 C Pritchard

4 345-1 BALLYHIHO 140 (T) D J Jeffreys 6-11-1 J Hogan

5 34-32 ZERO TOLERANCE 143 Mrs Mrs C Williams 9-11-10 A Wedge

6 6013P GALEFORCECHOPPER 17 (H,T) D Brace 5-11-9 L Harrison

7 41-F5 KALLY DES BRUYERES 17 (T,D) David Dennis 6-11-2 J Burke

8 13025 MOST WANTED 25 (V,D) D Bridgewater 8-10-13 J Turner (5)

9 6U3P5 DYNAMITE DEFENSE 32 (P) S-J Davies 5-10-2 J Best

7-4 Ballyhiho, 7-2 'L'empire Vert, 9-2 Away For The Night, 13-2 Zero Tolerance,

10-1 Double Indemnity, 12-1 Kally Des Bruyeres, 14-1 others.

---

3.07 Novices' Chase (£9,803: 2m 7f) (4)

1 0P11- JUPITER DES MOTTES 171 (W) D Skelton 7-11-2 H Skelton

2 4115- POTTERS CHARM 186 (W) N & W Twiston-Davies 7-11-2 S Twiston-Davies

3 21-3P VICOMTE LE BRAVE 148 (W,P,T) Cynthia Woods 7-11-2 T Cannon

4 5R130 GLEN TO GLEN 2 (P) Nick Scholfield 4-10-11 K Woods

2-5 Potters Charm, 4-1 Jupiter Des Mottes, 11-2 Glen To Glen, 50-1 Vicomte Le Brave.

---

3.37 Handicap Chase (£5,281: 2m 4f) (8)

1 135I- BROOMFIELD ADERRA 199 D Skelton 6-12-1 H Skelton

2 1163- SWEET CARYLINE 234 (T) J Tizzard 8-11-8 B J Powell

3 2-111 MIGHTY FLEUR 121 (P,D) M Bowen 6-11-8 S Bowen

4 4320- LA MARQUISE 176 (T) J Snowden 6-11-4 G Sheehan

5 312-3 REALISATION 141 (T) C Longsdon 8-11-3 R McLernon

6 302-1 BEST WOMEN 161 (H,T) A Hales 7-11-1 K Woods

7 P414- ANNIE EXPRESS 173 (BF,D) R L Llewellyn 8-11-0 C Price

8 U12P- PRINCESS KERI 177 Mrs C Williams 6-10-12 A Wedge

Evens Mighty Fever, 9-2 Broomfield Aderra, 8-1 Princess Keri, Best Women,

10-1 Sweet Caryline, 12-1 Annie Express, 20-1 La Marquise, Realisation.

---

4.07 Handicap Chase

1 1131- KYKOROCK 212 (H,T,D) D Skelton 6-12-0 H Skelton

2 212-2 PARK ANNONCIADE 149 (T,D) S Humphrey 8-12-0 T Cannon

3 2152- AUTHOCELTIC 197 (D) Mrs J Williams 6-11-13 C Gethings

4 -U233 SIAM PARK 20 (T,D) J Tizzard 7-11-12 B J Powell

5 340-0 TOUR OVALIE 142 Mrs Mrs C Williams 7-11-10 A Wedge

6 613-4 JASMIN DE COTTE 157 (BF) T Symonds 7-11-2 B Poste

15-8 Authoceltic, 9-4 Kykorock, 4-1 Siam Park, 15-2 Park Annonciade, 12-1 Tour Ovalie, Jasmin De Cotte.

---

4.37 Handicap Chase (£5,281: 2m 7f) (8)

---

Musselburgh | T McCain-Mitchell (3) | 2 | 2242- SUNSHINE DIAMOND 207 (P) N Mulholland 7-11-12 J Tudor | 3 | 0216- TOP GUY 176 D Skelton 6-11-10 | T Durrell | 4 | 2223- ISLAND BRIDGE 211 K Bailey & M Nicholls 6-11-8 C Gethings | 5 | 6634- BIG CADILLAC 218 (T) D Skelton 6-11-7 | H Skelton | 6 | 24PP- MUSKOKA 194 (V) E Lavelle 8-11-7 | C J Todd | 7 | 31214 AXEL BLEUE 27 (P,T,BF,CD) M Bowen 6-11-5 | J Bowen | 8 | -1113 JIAIR MADRIK 34 (H,T,C) D McCain 7-11-2 | T Gillard | 11-4 Big Cadillac, 7-2 Top Guy, 9-2 Xal Bleue, 13-2 Island Bridge, 8-1 Jiair Madrik, Sunshine Diamond, 12-1 Happy And Fine, 14-1 Muskoka. | 1.47 Ephron | 3.47 Homestrait | 2.17 Vegasmile | 4.17 Real Jack | 2.47 Possessive | 4.50 Fairydale (nb) | 3.17 Royal Duke | Going: good to soft | Draw: 56 high numbers host | Racing T | 1 | (4) 6500- LONE PIPER 399 Phillip Makin 5-11-2 Miss S Dobson (5) | 2 | (5) 63214 TEE AITCH AYE 22 (P,D) I Jardine 5-10-13 J Loughnane (7) | 3 | (8) 10446 PRIDE OF NEPAL 23 (P,T,D) A Watson 8-10-12 | Draw: 5f, high numbers best | Racing TV | 4 (9) 20160 EPHRON 27 G Tutty 3-10-11 Miss y Collier

5 (1) 61554 FILLY EILISH 24 (5) I Furtado 3-10-10 S Halton (5)

6 (2) 22521 MOTAWAARED 4 (P) J Goldie 4-10-8 Miss K Williams (5)

7 (7) 30466 MUDITA 25 (H) R & P Fahey 3-10-8 E Cagney

8 (6) 21206 STAR START 14 (V,D) R Carr 6-10-5 Miss C Parker (3)

9 (3) 34000 IBN ALTHEEB 22 (P,D) I Jardine 3-10-2 J Hills (5)

11-8 Motawaared, 5-1 Tee Aitch Aye, 8-1 Filly Eilish, Star Start, Mudita, 10-1 Pride Of Nepal, 12-Lone Piper, Ephron, 33-1 Ibn Altheeb.

---

2.17 Novice Stakes (2-Y-O: £9,421: 7f) (4)

1.47 Handicap (£3,477: 1m 1f) (9) | 1 | (3) | 41 VEGASMILE 30 (CD) K R Burke 9-8 | S James | 2 | (4) | 032 BLUE PETE 33 M Appleby 9-4 | C Lee | 3 | (1) | 54 DODGEM 37 J Camacho 9-4 | R Sexton | 4 | (2) | 05 SNEAKIN PETE 13 R M Smith 9-4 | G Fairley | 8-11 Vegasmile, 6-5 Blue Pete, 25-1 Dodgem, 66-1 Sneakin Pete. | ---

2.47 Selling Stakes (2-Y-O: £6,480: 7f) (9) | 1 | (2) 00150 PEGGY'S LAD 9 (D) I Jardine 9-5 | J Nicholls (3) | 2 | (8) 103 POSSESSIVE 18 (BF) R M Smith 9-5 | C Lee | 3 | (3) 35140 AMANTHA 18 (CD) B Ellison 9-3 | P Mulrennan | 4 | (9) 26554 MICK'S THE BOY 24 M & D Easterby 9-2 | B Garritty | 5 | (6) 03 STELLAR QUEST 20 K R Burke 9-2 | P-L Jamin | 6 | (7) 6010 DONNA BEAUTY 11 (H) C Johnston 9-0 | R Sexton | 7 | (4) 46454 FERN CLYDE 14 (H,T,BF) T Easterby 9-0 | D Allan | 8 | (5) 04643 BONJOUR BELLE 14 B Ellison 8-11 | Lauren Young (5) | 9 | (1) 20500 LIVEADREAM 18 Phillip Makin 8-11 | S James | 11-8 Possessive, 5-2 Donna Beauty, 10-1 Mick's The Boy, Peggy's Lad, Fern Clyde, 12-1 Amantha, 16-1 Liveadream, 25-1 Stellar Quest, Bonjour Belle. | ---

3.17 Handicap (£3,664: 5f) (14)

1 (7) 30054 PICKERSGILL 2 (BF) I Jardine 4-9-9 G Fairley

2 (3) 22540 CANAQUEER Queen 16 (P,CD) T Easterby 6-9-8 D Fentiman

3 (1) 12012 ALBEGONE 12 (P,CD) T Easterby 8-9-8 D Allan

4 (5) 03116 INVINCIBLE CROWN 7 (CD) R Carr 4-9-7 JP Sullivan

5 (11) 33260 WHISKEY KISSES 25 R M Smith 3-9-6 S Farmer (5)

6 (2) 30003 LUCIUS AURELIUS 25 (P,D) K Ryan 4-9-3 S Gray

7 (8) 05605 GANESHA 144 (D) Phillip Makin 5-9-2 P Mulrennan

8 (12) 65010 FEAR AND FAST 22 (CD) J Goldie 4-8-10 S James

9 (14) 66165 SIXCOR 17 (P,CD) Miss L Perratt 8-8-9 F Bassett (7)

10(10) 63000 NEVER DARK 14 (CD) I Jardine 9-8-9 J Nicholls (3)

11(13) 01533 ROYAL DUKE 22 (P,T,CD) R M Smith 5-8-8 Lauren Young

12 (4) 00500 WITH GLORY 22 Miss L Perratt 3-8-7 Lexie Clarkson (7)

13 (9) 00022 SKI ANGEL 30 (P,CD) R M Smith 6-8-7 Z Wheatiey

14 (6) 50606 KYBER CRYSTAL 22 (P,T,CD) R Menzies 7-8-5 Amie Waugh

9-2 Luclus Aurelius, 5-1 Royal Duke, 11-2 Albegone, 6-1 Ski Angel, 8-1 Pickersgill, 12-1 Ganesha, Sixcor, 14-1 others.

---

3.47 Handicap (£13,085: 7f) (7)

1 (2) 60000 BRAZILIAN ROSE 24 (H,D) R Menzies 5-9-12 D Allan

2 (4) 41100 CARNIVAL OF LIGHT 30 (D) C Johnston 4-9-7 S James

3 (1) 10-20 SAMRA GREEN 29 (D) K R Burke 3-9-7 C Lee

4 (6) 310-0 ASPIRAL 29 (D) K R Burke 3-9-6 P-L Jamin

5 (7) 10-00 ICE SOVEREIGNS 23 (D) R & P Fahey 3-9-4 S Gray

6 (5) 61230 HOMESTRAIT 13 (P,CD) B Ellison 3-9-1 B Garritty

7 (3) 13245 DANDY MAGIC 4 J Golde 4-9-1 P Mulrennan

9-4 Dandy Magic, 7-2 Homestrait, Samra Green, 8-1 Brazilian Rose, Carnival Of Light, 10-1 Aspiral, 12-1 Ice Sovereigns.

---

4.17 Handicap (£3,664: 7f) (11)

2 (7) -6502 RWENEARYLTHEREDAD 12 (CD) D Carroll 6-9-8

Z Wheatley

3 (8) 41400 JKR COBBLER 12 (D) I Jardine 7-9-7

J Nicholls (3)

4 (5) 60024 REAL JACK 28 M Dods 3-9-7

S B Kirrane

5 (4) 00323 KELPIE GREY 12 V, B(F, CD) J Goldie 6-9-6

P Mulrennan

6 (9) 63040 PALLAS LORD 12 (D) D Whillans 8-9-6

G Fairley

7 (2) 63326 RAMON DI LORIA 84 (CD) Ewan Whillans 8-9-6

S Gray

8 (10) 30320 ARCHANGEL JOSEPI 196 K Scott 3-9-4

S James

9 (3) 30006 KEEP ME STABLE 12 (CD) Miss L Perratt 6-9-2

D Allan

10 (6) 63040 WILLOWINGHURN 26 (V, CD) D O'Meara 3-9-1 B Garritty

11 (1) 40-00 MRBLEUSKY 17 (D, P) G Rutherford 4-8-11 Lauren Young

5-2 Monhammer, 7-2 Rwenearytheredad, 4-1 Kelpie Grey, 6-1 Real Jack, 12-

Keep Me Stable, Willowinnhurn, 14-1 Ramon Di Loria, Jkr Cobbler.

---

4.50 Handicap (£3,664: 2m) (8)

1 (2) 62351 NED BROY 73 (P,D) I Jardine 5-10-2 J Nicholls (3)

2 (3) 45051 SIMPLE STAR 12 (T,C) Gary Rutherford 8-10-2 S James

3 (1) 03534 ALPINE SIERRA 24 (C) J Goldie 8-10-0 P Mulrennan

4 (6) 64525 MR WITHINGTON 39 (B) Ewan Whillans 5-9-2 S Gray

5 (8) 00022 STORM ON JURA 14 J Goldie 4-9-0 Lauren Young (5)

6 (7) 00062 GALAHAD THREEPWOOD 20 (P) Ewan Whillans 9-8-13 G Fairley

---

Yarmouth | 1.54 Born This Way | 3.54 Zoustar Dreams | 2.24 Status Symbol | 4.24 Kimbara | 2.54 Calchas | 4.55 Merapi | 3.24 Much | 1.54 Novice Stakes (2-Y-O: £7020: 7f) (7) | 1 | (7) | AMANDARI (H) J & T Gosden 9-7 | R Havlin | 2 | (6) | BORN THIS WAY W Haggas 9-7 | T Marquand | 3 | (1) | FORT MCHENRY C Fellowes 9-7 | P Bradley | 4 | (3) | 6 OLYMPIACOS 12 C Johnston 9-7 | R Scott | 5 | (4) | PIGOU J Fanshawe 9-7 | D Muscutt | 6 | (2) | SOLO QUEST E Walker 9-7 | K Shoemark | 7 | (5) | 0 STELLAR MAX 12 Sir M Prescott 9-7 | J Gilligan | 5-2 Born This Way, 7-2 Fort Mchenry, Amandari, 5-1 Solo Quest, 7-1 Pigou, 10-1 Olympiacos, 25-1 Stellar Max. | ---

2.24 Novice Stakes

11 (5) 41530 WILLOW WOOD 26 E Walker 3-9-4 K Shoemark

12 (4) 50513 PERSHALLA 40 (H,D) A Perrett 4-9-4 R Havlin

11-4 Astracornus, 6-1 Madjid, Calchas, 7-1 Newtown Duke, 8-1 Yokohama, 10-1 Lavender Gold, 12-1 Pershalla, Arthur's Realm, Pace Attack.

---

3.24 Handicap (£4,397: 1m 6f) (13)

1 (7) 25455 DUST COVER 2 R Burdon 4-10-1 P Bradley

2 (1) 12243 JACK LANGLEY 21 (BF) Charlie Clover 4-9-13 J Doughty

3 (6) 5-214 BIG WIN 107 (P,BF) James Owen 4-9-11 C Shepherd

4 (8) 2510 FEELIN' FREE 21 Jack Jones 3-9-10 K Shoemark

5 (10) 04245 MUCH 39 (T,BF) J Fanshawe 3-9-10 D Muscutt

6 (13) 520-2 TRAPPER JOHN J171 Harry Eustace 5-9-9 G Wood

7 (2) 25366 BETELGEUSE 9 (T,D) S Woods 4-9-8 T Marquand

8 (3) 03500 EXPRESSIONLESS 11 (V,CD) D Cunha 6-9-7 M Ghiani

9 (9) 24421 DARkest RED 14 J Boyle 3-9-5 D J Murphy (5)

10(11)0060 SULLOM VOE 32 D Menuisler 3-9-2 J Dace (5)

11 (4) 44460 FIVE MOONS 77 (P) S & E Crisford 3-9-2 R Havlin

12 (5) 33232 ATALANTA MIST 52 (P,BF) M Tregoning 3-8-10 T Heard

13(12)60310 FLETCHER 32 (C) J Boyle 3-8-5 Olivia Haines (7)

7-2 Darkest Red, 4-1 Jack Langley, 9-2 Trapper John, 7-1 Atalanta Mist, 8-1 Much, Dust Cover, Big Win, 12-1 Feelin' Free.

---

3.54 Handicap (£4,397: 5f) (7)

1 (6) 41123 SUNLIT SEA 56 (B,D) Sir M Prescott 3-9-9 J Gilligan

2 (1) 44632 ZOUSTAR DREAMS 6 (P,D) E Dunlop 3-9-8 D Muscutt

3 (2) 41300 ISLE OF LISMORE 18 (V,D) R Cowell 8-9-7 M Ghiani

4 (3) 41114 DOTTIE DIAMOND 72 (D) W Stone 4-9-6 J Dace (5)

5 (4) 64202 KOFFEE AND KALE 7 (V,D) M Bell 3-9-2 C Shepherd

6 (7) 50000 SAM'S XPRESS 16 (D) J & S Birkett 6-8-12 D E Hogan

7 (5) 00044 EM JAY KAY 27 (P,D) P McEntee 7-8-6 Grace McEntee

5-2 Zoustar Dreams, 3-1 Koffee And Kale, Sunlit Sea, 9-2 Dottie Diamond, 10-1 Sam's Xpress, 12-1 Em Jay Kay, 50-1 Isle Of Lismore.

---

4.24 Handicap (£4,397: 6f) (13)

7 (4) 20351 FAIRYDALE 12 (V,D) T Easterby 3-8-12 D Allan

8 (5) 24456 FALAISE BLANC 12 (V,BF) K Scott 4-8-11 Z Wheatley

3-1 Simple Star, 7-2 Fairydale, 4-1 Ned Broy, 9-2 Storm On Jura, 8-1 Galahad Threepwood, 12-1 Mr Withington, 14-1 Alpine Sierra, 16-1 Falaise Blanc. | 1 | (1) 55110 SO SASSY 31 (P), J Fanshawe 4-9-12 | D Muscutt | 2 | (7) 23354 DELUDED 26 (P) C Fellowes 3-9-11 | P Bradley | 3 | (4) 05641 GOOD EARTH 26 (P,D) M Herrington 9-9-10 | C Tucker (7) | 4 | (10) 33031 RAFFLES ANGEL 26 (CD) Jack Jones 5-9-10 | C Shepherd | 5 | (9) 46040 FIRST FOLIO 58 (V,CD) J Camacho 8-9-8 | D Hogan | 6 | (8) 62303 KIMBARA 58 (P) R Spencer 3-9-7 | G Wood | 7 | (2) 20366 RIBENSKA 28 (P) C Fellowes 4-9-7 | D Keenan | 8 | (5) 00165 SPLASH 27 (C) D Ivory 3-9-7 | R Havlin | 9 | (13) 12212 METHGAL 13 (B,T,BF,D) D Cunha 4-9-7 | M Ghiani | 10 | (10) 10025 IZZY FAST 69 (CD) P McBride 4-9-5 | J Callan | 11 | (3) 31033 STARTLED LADY 26 (CD) W Knight 3-9-4 | T Marquand | 12 | (6) 22053 FRANTIC 41 E Walker 3-9-4 | K Shoemark | 13 | (11) 53020 DARK SIDE THUNDER 26 (P,CD) Jessica Macey 7-9-1 | L Edmunds | 11-4 Methgal, 5-1 Good Earth, 11-2 Raffles Angel, 8-1 Deluded, 10-1 Kimbara, Startled Lady, 12-1 Izvy Fast, 14-1 Frantic. | ---

4.55 Handicap (£3,768: 1m) (12) | 1 | (7) 05030 ASPULL 25 (H) P McEntee 4-9-9 | Grace McEntee | 2 | (1) 00500 ROMANTIC TWILIGHT 26 (C) W Stone 3-9-6 | 3 | (3) 22264 MERAPI 34 (P) Michael Keady 4-9-5 | D Keenan | 4 | (10) 4/00- ASTRONOMICA 445 (BF,D) Dr J Scargill 6-9-5 | R Havlin | 5 | (9) 34526 POTTERS PRINCE 2 M Crawley 4-9-4 | C Shepherd | 6 | (11) 11203 DESERT CHARM 30 (CD) M Murphy 4-9-4 | P Bradley | 7 | (8) -4640 LIVING IN HOPE 44 (B) Harry Eustace 3-9-1 | G Wood | 8 | (2) 52100 HEER'S SADIE 21 (CD) J & S Birkett 8-8-13 C Howarth (3) | 9 | (5) 36024 ABU ROYAL 26 (V,D) L Morgan 6-9-12 | T Marquand | 10 | (6) 05010 STAR SUEPREME 20 (P,BF,D) Lemos Souza 3-8-11 M Ghiani | 11 | (12) 0-010 DIAMOND ALI 52 (P,BF,D) J & S Birkett 3-8-11D E Hogan | 12 | (4) 00-00 ECHO THAT 10 (B) P Owens 3-8-8 | T Heard | 3-1 Desert Charm, 7-2 Abu Royal, 11-2 Astronomica, 6-1 Merapi, Potters Prince, 8-1 Diamond Ali, 10-1 Star Suepreme, 25-1 others. | ---

Newcastle | 4.28 Ella Beach | 7.00 Logi Bear | 5.00 Espanita | 7.30 Ice Show | 5.30 Val De Grey | 8.00 Atmosphere | 6.00 Blazing Inferno | 8.30 Macedonian (nap) | 6.30 Kinnalargy | Draw: no advantage | Sky Sports Racing | 1 | (4) | 31 ABLE TASMAN 30 A Watson 9-8 | J Doyle | 2 | (8) | 0 GILDER ROY 47 James Owen 9-4 | R Havlin | 3 | (2) | GOOD JOB Harry Charlton 9-4 | L Edmunds | 4 | (3) | 50 LAURIGER 19 R Beckett 9-4 | R Clutterbuck | 5 | (6) | 02 QUINTILLION 25 C Johnston 9-4 | C Shepherd | 6 | (10) | 022 DEIRA MOON 19 Harry Eustace 9-1 | D Muscutt | 7 | (1) | 00 KIRIL 38 (V) P Owens 9-1 | J Callan | 8 | (7) | 4 STATUS SYMBOL 19 E Walker 9-1 | K Shoemark | 9 | (5) | 0 SA LLAGOSTA 6 M Botti 8-10 | D Keenan | 10 | (9) | SPONG HILL M Botti 8-10 | M Ghiani | 9-4 Deira Moon, 7-2 Quintillion, 9-2 Able Tasman, 13-2 Status Symbol, 8-1 Lauriger, 10-1 Good Job, 14-1 Spong Hill, 20-1 Kiril. | 4.28 Novice Stakes (£6,480: 1m 2f) (7)

---

5.00 Handicap (£3,978: 1m) (11) | 1 | (3) | MAC'S MAX J148 B Haslam 4-9-8 | A Mullen | 2 | (7) | 1 ELLA BEACH 21 (D) D O'Meara 3-9-6 | D Tudhope | 3 | (4) | 3 INDHAAR 126 W Haggas 3-9-4 | H Davies | 4 | (5) | 0 MEDRAN 16 G Tuer 3-9-4 | O Stammers | 5 | (1) | 05 PETWORTH 14 A Balding 3-9-4 | P J McDonald | 6 | (2) | 042 TROPRIEN 105 (BF) J & T Gosden 3-9-4 | S Osborne | 7 | (6) | 4 BRITTUNCULI 39 T Waggott 3-8-13 | W Pyle | 13-8 Indhaar, 2-1 Trophien, 9-4 Ella Beach, 14-1 Petworth, 33-1 Mac's Max, 66-1 Medran, 100-1 Brittunculi. | 1 (11) -1144 MARIA DA SILVA 28 (CD) A Balding 3-9-11 P J McDonald | 2 (2) 63122 ESPANITA 11 (H,B,F) C Johnston 3-9-10 O Stammers | 3 (4) -3003 GOOMAH 19 J Butler 3-9-9 MP Sheehy | 4 (9) 33420 SECOND FIDDLE 25 (CD) I Jardine 7-9-8 A Mullen | 5 (7) 04152 SAILOR'S RETURN 11 (T,D) D O'Meara 3-9-7 D Tudhope | 6 (3) 33200 SILKY LASS 42 (CD) Joey Ramsden 3-9-6 A Jary (3) | 7 (6) 21135 AMBER HAMUR 20 (D) E Bethell 3-9-6 C Horgan (5) | 8 (5) 54200 LEELAWADEE 33 M Dods 3-9-2 C Beasley | 9 (10) 15330 BAY DREAM BEILIEVER 9 (H,D) M Walford 7-9-1 S Osborne | 10 (1) 23000 CARMEL VALLEY 25 K Scott 3-9-0 J Hart | 11 (8) 05102 SASSY GLORY 9 (P,C) M Walford 5-8-11 R Elliott (5) | 11-4 Espanita, 4-1 Sailor's Return, 6-1 Goomah, Amber Hamur, 13-2 Maria Da Silva, 10-1 Sassy Glory, 12-1 Second Fiddle, 14-1 Bay Dream Believer. | ---

5.30 Novice Stakes (2-Y-O: £5,400: 6f) (10) | 1 | (9) | 10 GREAT BALLS O'FIRE 18 (D) R Spencer 9-11 | S Osborne | 2 | (8) | 54 BENBECULA 33 (BF) K Ryan 9-4 | K Stott | 3 | (1) | BIG RICHARD I Furtado 9-4 | J Hart | 4 | (10) | 00 JAYDEE'S DREAM 4 Mrs A Duffield 9-4 | D Egan | 5 | (5) | 00 LORD BISHOP 26 B Ellison 9-4 | C Beasley | 6 | (6) | 6 MOOFEED 47 A Watson 9-4 | D Tudhope | 7 | (7) | 6 POWERFUL FORCE 39 K Ryan 9-4 | T Eaves | 8 | (4) | 6 VAL DE GREY 10 S Waugh 9-4 | O Orr | 9 | (3) | 00 VELOXIAN 17 G Tuer 9-4 | O Stammers | 10 | (2) | 36 PERFECT GAL 16 R Menzies 8-13 | P J McDonald | 1 | (7) 51303 YOKOHAMA 38 J Butler 5-9-12 | M Ghiani | 2 | (11) 1-334 NEWTOWN DUKE 31 (7) I Williams 5-9-12 | J Callan | 3 | (1) 0-505 ARTHUR'S REALM 27 (V) Gihan Arnolda 8-9-12 D Keenan | 4 | (8) -0100 LAVENDER GOLD 43 D Menuisier 3-9-9 | J Dace (5) | 5 | (6) 1-20 HAMDANIA 18 James Horton 3-9-9 | D Muscutt | 6 | (10) 66124 ASTRACORNUS 73 D Menuisier 3-9-9 | T Marquand | 7 | (3) 01125 MADJID 16 Harry Charlton 3-9-8 | L Edmunds | 8 | (12) 2-200 PURE MOON 56 (V) Tom Clover 3-9-7 | N Callan | 9 | (2) 0323- CALCHAS 395 R Beckett 3-9-7 | R Clutterbuck | 10 | (9) 04136 PACE ATTACK 9 (P,D) Sir M Prescott 3-9-6 | J Gilligan | Evens Great Balls O'Fire, 3-1 Moofeed, 6-1 Benbecula, 10-1 Val De Grey, 16-1 Big Richard, Powerful Force, Perfect Gal, 50-1 others.

---

6.00 Nursery (2-Y-O: £5,234: 6f) (7) | 1 | (4) 10200 SIOUXPERB 24 (D) A Watson 9-10 | C Beasley | 2 | (3) 40100 TREASURER 29 (P,D) C Fellowes 9-9 | Doubtful | 3 | (6) 13036 INNICHEN 31 (P,D) J Channon 9-8 | E Greatrex | 4 | (2) 41 STARBURSTER 47 (D) R Spencer 9-6 | S Osborne | 5 | (5) 31604 MINZELLE 4 (BF) K R Burke 9-4 | J Hart | 6 | (1) 10 BLAZING INFERNO 32 (D) E Bethell 9-0 | D Tudhope | 7 | (7) 5260 GLADYS PUGH 24 K Ryan 9-0 | K Stott | 7-4 Starburster, 4-1 Blazing Inferno, 5-1 Minzelle, Innichen, 6-1 Siouxperb, 10-1 Gladys Pugh. | ---

7.00 Handicap (Div II: £3,978: 6f) (12) | 1 (13) 43402 MAE AMOR 11 (V,D) R Menzies 4-9-12 T Kieyi-Marshall | 2 (11) 2063 UJAN LES PINS 16 (C,D) M Appleby 9-9-12 M Paetel (3) | 3 (5) 05040 KINNALARGY 36 D O'Meara 3-9-11 D Tudhope | 4 (7) 05200 ORMOLULU 6 (D) G Tutty 6-9-10 K Stott | 5 (10) 63000 WRECK IT RYLEY 15 (V,D) A Brown 6-9-10 T Eaves | 6 (1) 4-000 UTMOST RESPECT 18 (V) R & P Fahey 3-9-9 D Nolan | 7 (8) 06200 MONDAMMEJ 57 (CD) A Brittain 9-9-7 C Hardie | 8 (9) 50040 SECRET GUEST 41 (CD) B Smart 6-9-6 O Orr | 9 (6) 21105 HARB 21 (C,D) T Davidson 7-9-5 J Hart | 10 (4) 00000 HAVANAGREATTIME 11 (D) R Carr 5-9-4 Joanna Mason | 11 (3) 05004 BRAZEN IDOL 10 (D) J Ryan 7-9-0 S Osborne | 12(12) 26002 TAYGAR 16 (D) M Dods 5-8-12 C Beasley | 13 (2) 31300 PIT BOSS 12 (CD) L Bailey 4-8-9 A Mullen | 5-2 Mae Amor, 4-1 Juan Les Pins, 5-1 Taygar, 8-1 Brazen Idol, 12-1 Ormoluli, Secret Guest, Kinnalargy, 14-1 Wreck It Ryley, Harb. | ---

6.30 Handicap (Div I: £3,978: 6f) (13) | 1 | (5) 50623 GOYARD 2 (T,B,F,D) D O'Meara 4-9-12 | D Tudhope | 2 | (2) 20643 KATS BOB 9 (CD) R Carr 8-9-11 | W Pyle | 3 | (11) 20210 LOGI BEAR 42 (P,D) J Butler 3-9-11 | MP Sheehy | 4 | (10) 46244 ACCLAIMED FREEDOM 24 (B) G Scott 3-9-10 | D Egan | 5 | (8) 11100 YORKSHIRE GLORY 27 (CD) B Haslam 5-9-10 | A Mullen | 6 | (7) 40001 EMPEROR CARADOC 9 (D) P Midgley 7-9-9 | D Nolan | 7 | (6) 14551 FIZZY CRISTAL 55 (CD) R & P Fahey 3-9-6 W Fimitan (3) | 8 | (12) 33046 THE GREEN MAN 100 (T,V,CD) P Kirby 7-9-6 | K Stott | 9 | (4) 00500 ROARING RALPH 9 (P) M Dods 6-9-5 | R Elliott (5) | 10 | (9) 10633 GREAT 7 (D) S England 4-9-4 | O Orr | 11 | (3) 3-65 SUPREME LILIA 185 G Tutty 3-8-13 | C Beasley | 12 | (1) 0-050 BELLAGIO MAN 10 (B,CD) A Brittain 8-8-11 | C Hardie | 13 | F-1 Fizzy CRISTAL, 6-1 Goyard, 13-2 Acclaimed Freedom, Kats Bob, 7-1 Emperor Caradoc, 8-1 The Green Man, 10-1 Logi Bear, Great, Yorkshire Glory. | ---

7.30 Handicap (£3,245: 1m) (14) | 1 (3) -5503 RUA MOR 21 S England 4-10-0 | O Orr | 2 (8) 00314 EY UP HE'S A STAR 37 (P,C,D) T Coyle & K Wood 4-9-12D Nolan | 3 (14) -3003 TURTLE REEF 20 H Palmer 3-9-11 | M Paetel (3) | 4 (2) 14600 IMOLA 16 (D) Joey Ramsden 5-9-11 T Kiely-Marshall (3) | 5 (10) 06123 AMARACHI 13 (P,D) J Parr 4-9-10 | D Egan | 6 (1) 00024 SHOWTOWN 13 (P) K Ryan 3-9-10 | T Eaves | 7 (5) 43355 BOUBYAN 13 (P,C,D) M Appleby 4-9-8 | K Stott | 8 (6) 60056 EVE'S BOY 11 M Dods 4-9-7 | C Beasley | 9 (12) 6-000 CUSACK 17 (P,C,D) D Thompson 8-9-7 | C Hardie | 10 (7) 03565 ALKUMATIC JO JO 11 (BF) I Furtado 3-9-7 | J Hart | 11(11) 56006 SOGNIAMO 11 (B,T) D'O'Meara 3-9-6 | M Winn | 12 (9) 20601 WHISKEY PETE 11 (T,V,CD) N Tinkler 5-9-5 | A Jary (3) | 13 (4) 56031 ICE SHOW 10 (H,C) D'O'Meara 3-9-4 | D Tudhope | 14(13) 05010 RUGBY UNION 17 (BF,C) G Tutty 3-9-3 | Joanna Mason | 9-2 Whiskey Pete, 5-1 Ice Show 11-12 Amarachi, 8-1 Showtown, Ey Up He's A Star, Alkumatic Jo Jo, Turtle Reef, 10-1 Rugby Union. | ---

8.00 Handicap (£3,978: 7f) (13) | 1 (10) | 30204 HAVANA RUM 23 (C) R & P Fahey 6-9-9 | E Tindall (5) | 2 (5) | 14156 FLOWSTATE 17 (V,C) D O'Meara 5-9-9 | M Winn | 3 (4) | 0050- BELGRAVE 370 (W) F Watson 4-9-9 | C Beasley | 4 (7) | 32436 ABDUCTION 13 (C) J Goldie 8-9-8 | J Dickson (5) | 5 (12) | 00060 REGALIAN 44 (P,C) T Coyle & K Wood 4-9-7 | D Nolan | 6 (2) | 22530 ATMOSPHERE 25 (V,D) R Spencer 4-9-6 | S Osborne | 7 (8) | 33150 BLACK STORM 12 (B,D) K Scott 5-9-5 | O Orr | 8 (11) | 06350 CRIMINAL SHORE 17 (V,C) D O'Meara 4-9-4 | D Tudhope | 9 (3) | 40005 INTRUSIVELY 17 (P,T) M Appleby 4-9-4 | K Stott | 10 (6) | 01400 NOT ME 62 A Brown 5-9-4 | T Eaves | 11 (1) | 61066 RUNNINSONOFAGUN 13 (B) T Davidson 4-9-4 | J Hart | 12 (9) | 10012 SPARTAN FIGHTER 10 (V,C) A Brittain 9-9-2 | C Hardie | 13(13) | 40-00 HONVED 28 (P) F Watson 4-8-10 | R Elliott (5) | 7-2 Spartan Fighter, 4-1 Havana Rum, Atmosphere, 7-1 Intrusively, 10-1 Criminal Shore, Flowstate, 12-1 Abduction, 14-1 Regalian, Black Storm. | 1 (4) | 00200 MACEDONIAN 28 (V,D) M Dods 4-9-9 | R Elliott (5) | 2 (3) | 53115 PIPERSTOWN 177 (D) K Frost 5-9-9 | O Stammers | 3 (7) | 30540 WOOLRIDGE 25 (P) S Dixon 4-9-9 | S Osborne | 4 (11) | 05540 WHY BECAUSE 10 (H) P Midgley 4-9-9 | D Nolan | 5 (2) | 64000 MOUNT RUAPEHU 40 (P,CD) J Jardine 6-9-8 | A Mullen | 6 (10) | 53353 EDMOND HALLEY 21 (H,BF) E Bethell 4-9-8 C Horgan (5) | 7 (8) | 40041 REENIE'S DREAM 17 (H,CD) B Smart 4-9-7 | Oisin Orr | 8 (9) | 30330 STORMY PEARL 33 (B,D) D Thompson 6-9-5 | C Beasley | 9 (6) | 64013 YAAHOBBY 17 (T,CD) A Brittain 7-9-3 | E Tindall (5) | 10 (13) | 00043 PHONIX BEACH 10 (P,BF,CD) S Dixon 7-9-2 M Mortensen | 11 (1) | 60203 ZIVA'S STAR 18 (B,T) S Whitaker 4-9-0 | T Eaves | 12 (5) | -3450 KORROOR 23 (CD) Helen Coubther 5-9-0 | M Winn | 13 (12) | 0000/ SPEAR FIR 814 S Whitaker 7-9-0 | C Hardie | ---

8.30 Handicap (£4,711: 6f) (13)

---

2.54 Handicap (£4,397: 1m 3f 104yd) (12)

9-2 Reenie's Dream, 5-1 Yaahobby, 11-2 Phoenix Beach, 6-1 Edmond Halley, 7-1 Ziva's Star, 10-1 Piperstown, 12-1 Mount Ruapehu, 14-1 others.

---

Yesterday's racing results

---

Chepstow

Going: Good to Soft (good in places)

1.27 (2m 3f 100yd) 1, Divine Diva (H Skelton, 7-1); 2, Princess Day (4-6 fav); 3, Connells Cross (16-1). 7 ran. $37^{1/2}$ l, $3^{1/4}$ l. D Skelton.

2.02 (2m 3f 100yd) 1, Ugo Bingo (B Powell, 6-4); 2, V Power (50-1); 3, Midnight Pass (16-1). 13 ran. 5l, 2½l. J Tizzard.

2.37 (2m 16yd) 1, Mwabani (C Gethings, 2-1); 2, Lion Rose Sivola (5-4 fav); 3, One Cool Kid (6-1). 6 ran. 47 $^{1/2}$ l, 21l. Mrs J Williams.

3.12 (2m 7f 131yd) 1, Harbour Light (S Twiston-Davies, 2-1); 2, Bound For Glory (4-1); 3, Bright Legend (8-1). 12

3.47 (2m 7f 131yd) 1, Matty's Getaway (C Gethings, 9-2); 2, Thank You Ma'am (40-1); 3, Time

To Bite (20-1). 10 ran. NR: Oakley, Service Minimum. $9 \frac{1}{2} l$ , 6l. K Bailey & M Nicholls.

4.22 (2m 16yd) 1, Gower Prince (B Macey, 5-2); 2, Haas Boy (15-2); 3, Stream Of Stars (4-1). 8 ran. NR: Norn Iron. nk, $7^{1/2}$ l. J & A O'Neill.

4.57 (2m 16yd) 1, Masked Blagny (C Hammond, 13-2); 2, Old Coast Road (5-4 fav); 3, Onetingfornuttin (15-8). 6 ran. $1 \frac{1}{2} l$ , 4L. S Edmunds. Placepot: £19.30 Quadpot: £6.30

---

Goodwood

Going: Good to Soft (good in places)

1.47 (2m hdle) 1, Division Day (C Deutsch, 22-1); 2, Mr Freedom (11-4 fav); 3, Rogue Empire (13-2). 12 ran. 1l, 17 $^{1/2}$ l. Mrs L Richards.

2.22 (6f hdle) 1, Brynmair Gold (O Murphy, 5-6 fav); 2, Cornichon (5-2); 3, War Chest (7-2). 8 ran. 7l, 2l. O Cole.

2.57 (1m 1f 11yd hdle) 1, Lots Road (R Clutterbuck, 15-2); 2, Under Arrest (7-1); 3, Wise And Wonderful (9-2). 8 ran. 6l, 3/4l. R Beckett.

3.32 (6f hdle) 1, Deep Havana (J Doyle, 5-2); 2, Crestofdistinction (20-1); 3, Brosay (5-1). 13 ran. NR: Percy's Star. 1l, $2 \frac{1}{4}$ l. H Al Jehani.

4.07 (1m 1f 11yd hdle) 1, Royal Acclamation (B Loughnane, 8-11 fav); 2, Donegan (5-2); 3, Wilcox Bridge (25-1). 5 ran. $2^{1/4}$ l, 2l. C Appleby.

4.42 (1m hdle) 1, Naval Light (J Doyle, 3-1 fav); 2, Eternal Force (11-1); 3, Supido (20-1). 13 ran. $\frac{1}{2}$ l, $1\frac{1}{2}$ l. K Burke.

5.17 (1m 1f 197yd Flat) 1, Spirit Of Athene (Ashley Lewis, 100-30); 2, Prosperity (4-1); 3, Aequitas (18-1). 4 ran. NR: Brighton Beach, Hamdania. E Walker.

Placepot: £66.50 Quadpot: £24.90

Cricket Sport

Vintage attack (and Smith's safe hands) put Australia in command

South Africa v Australia

Durban (day three of five): Australia, with ten second-innings wickets in hand, lead by 139 runs

Elizabeth Ammon

Australia took full control of the first Test after taking a first-innings lead of 106, thanks to a vintage bowling performance by Pat Cummins, backed up by four catches from Steve Smith in the slips.

Cummins finished with three for 54, while there were two wickets apiece for Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Starc and Nathan Lyon to overwhelm South Africa. None of the hosts' batsmen reached 50, and then Australia's recalled opener, Nic Maddinson, put a miserable first-innings duck behind him to help the visitors through to 33 without loss at the close on day three.

Matt Renshaw's epic innings of 190, for which he was at the crease for almost 400 minutes, had allowed Australia's bowlers to be well rested before getting to work on South Africa. The seam trio of Cummins, Hazlewood and Starc bowled with pace and skill, extracting movement off the pitch despite there being little swing on offer, and they were exceptionally well backed up by the spinner Lyon.

Resuming at 27 for one, the home side began well, with runs flowing for Aiden Markram and the No3, David Bedingham, in a second-wicket partnership of 84. But South Africa lost Markram for 37 and then a further three wickets for 15 runs at the back end of the morning session.

The day got worse for the world Test champions when Wiaan Mulder was caught by the substitute fielder, Cooper Connolly, just after lunch, giving Cummins his second wicket. It was an excellent piece of bowling, with the ball banged into the pitch — Mulder aborted his attempted pull shot, but was only halfway into his leave when he

ballooned the ball to mid-wicket. Mulder's dismissal was key because the pitch had started to flatten out after being baked in the morning sun, and with the ball 46 overs old most of the movement had gone.

The Australia captain picked up his third wicket two overs later, when he had Tristan Stubbs caught by Hazlewood at fine leg. Lyon came into the attack and Smith took a stunning catch at slip after a reverse-sweep by Kyle Verreynne.

South Africa v Australia

First Test, Durban

Day four, starts 8.30am

TV: Sky Sports

Main Event

While Cummins, left, led from the front, taking three wickets, Smith put on a catching masterclass

Smith may be 37, but his reactions show no sign of deteriorating. With the ball coming to him at pace, it was a magnificent pluck with his right hand. With four catches, Smith went back to the top of the table for dismissals in Test cricket by a non-wicket-keeper: his

tally now stands at 223, overtaking Joe Root's 220. Three of the four catches were exceptional — showing fast reactions and precision anticipation.

It was a fragile performance by South Africa's batsmen. In contrast to Renshaw's patient, measured and smart innings, they were guilty of playing loose shots at crucial junctures and making poor decisions. Only a rearguard action by the tailenders saved the hosts from further embarrassment. The spinners Keshav Maharaj and Simon Harmer put on 52 for the ninth wicket, and

Australia First Innings 390 (M Renshaw 190; W Mulder 4 for 68)

Second Innings

N Maddinson not out 17

T Head not out 10

Extras (lb 6) 6

Total (no wkt, 5.4 overs) 33

Bowling Jansen 3-0-15-0; Mulder 2.4-0-12-0.

South Africa First Innings (overnight 27-1)

A Markram c Renshaw b Starc 37

D Bedingham c Smith b Cummins 49

\*T Bavuma c Smith b Lyon 3

T Stubbs c Hazelewood b Cummins 32

W Mulder c sub b Cummins 30

†K Verreyne c Smith b Lyon 13

M Jansen c Head b Hazlewood 26

S Harmer not out 35

K Maharaj c Cummins b Starc 34

A Nortje c Smith b Webster 16

Extras (lb 6, nb 3) 9

Total (78.0 overs) 284

Fall of wickets 1-0, 2-84, 3-93, 4-99, 5-155, 6-162, 7-197, 8-197, 9-249.

Bowling Starc 17-2-63-2; Hazlewood 16-2-54-2; Cummins 15-2-54-3; Lyon 22-3-58-2; Head 3-0-20-0; Webster 3-0-23-1; Labuschagne 2-0-6-0.

---

Scoreboard

---

Most catches in Test matches by a non-wicketkeeper

Harmer then added a further 35 with the Noll, Anrich Nortje.

trio have put to bed, for now, concerns that they may soon be over the hill. There were no signs of that on Sunday. No one in this Australia side is under the age of 30, and the bowlers are all 33-plus, but as Cummins said recently: "Players are managed so much better these days than they used to be, being over 35 is no longer a signal of being past it."

The frontline quartet of Cummins, Lyon, Hazlewood and Starc each have more than 300 Test wickets — they have played 38 Tests as a bowling group, and Cricket Australia has been very good at managing their workloads. Australia have a marathon run of Tests over the next nine months, but the aim will be to ensure they all remain fit for next summer's Ashes. | Player | Country | Catches | Matches | Steve Smith | Australia | 223 | 126 | Joe Root | England | 220 | 169 | Rahul Dravid | India | 210 | 164 | Mahela Jayawardene | Sri Lanka | 205 | 149 | Jacques Kallis | S Africa | 200 | 166 | When Australia's second innings began, all eyes were on Maddinson after his 33-ball duck in the first innings, but he answered his critics with a pull shot to the boundary off Marco Jansen first ball — his first runs in Test cricket since December 2016 — then smashed another boundary later in the over, before flicking Mulder for six over deep square leg.

This is a fascinating match, one that has highlighted the old-school virtues of patience at the crease and bowlers hunting as a pack — the only shame for viewers is that the contest is being affected by bad light, forcing all three days to end early.

Australia are in command of this intriguing Test, and the seam-bowling

Australia will be wary of it affecting days four and five, too, and will need to think carefully about what lead they need to have enough time to bowl South Africa out again.

The pitch at Kingsmead has flattened out and there has not been much conventional swing on offer, so the visiting side may need to make an aggressive declaration.

Results

American football

NFL

Green Bay 31 Chicago 7; Jacksonville 19 Philadelphia 17; Miami 24 Cincinnati 31; New England 45 Las Vegas 17; New Orleans 13 Minnesota 23; New York Jets 17 Cleveland 12; Pittsburgh 34 Indianapolis 22; Tennessee 3 Houston 26.

Golf

---

DP World Tour Spanish Open

DP World Tour Spanish Open

Madrid: Leading final scores (Great Britain and Ireland unless stated): 270 G Forrest 66, 67, 67, 70. 271 E Lopez-Chacarra (Sp) 66, 69, 70, 66; V Perez (Fr) 68, 68, 65, 70. 272 J Skov

Olesen (Den) 67, 69, 65, 71. 273 J Dean 68, 67, 65, 73; D Brown 74, 69, 66, 64. 274 A Otaegui (UAE) 68, 70, 69, 67; L Aaberg (Swe) 71, 70, 67, 66; O Lindell (Fin) 69, 72, 65, 68; J Girrbach (Switz) 68, 66, 67, 73. 275 M Couvra (Fr) 70, 66, 68, 71; J Lagergren (Swe) 71, 70, 64, 70.

---

US PGA Tour Baycurrent Classic

Yokohama: Leading final scores (United States unless stated): 268 M Brennan 68, 67, 65, 68. 269 J Bridgeman 63, 68, 69, 69; K Mitchell 66, 65, 70, 68. 271 R Gerard 68, 69, 66, 68; B Harman 69, 68, 67, 67; S Jaeger (Ger) 69, 65, 67, 70; X Schauffele 70, 69, 65, 67; J Smith (Eng) 64, 71, 66, 70. 272 Z Bauchou 69, 64, 67, 72; Im Sung-jae (S Kor)

69, 67, 68, 68; Lee Min-woo (Aus) 67, 67, 72, 66; R Yonezawa (Japan) 68, 69, 71, 64.

Women's Aramco Korea Championship Seoul: Leading final scores (Great Britain and Ireland unless stated): 266 M Yamashita (Japan) 67, 68, 68, 63. 269 S Kouskova (Cz) 69, 69, 68, 63. 272 Y Tseng (Taiwan) 71, 67, 66, 68; G Ding (HK) 68, 71, 67, 66. 274 A Morgan (US) 70, 68, 71, 65; S Bunque (Aus) 74, 68, 66, 66. 275 Kim Hyo-joo (S Kor) 68, 71, 70, 66; R Liu (China) 73, 67, 70, 65.

---

Motorcycling

MotoGP Grand Prix of Indonesia

Mandalika: Leading positions 1, M

Bezzecchi (It, Aprilia) 40min 46.582sec; 2, R Fernández (Sp, Aprilia) at 4.260sec behind; 3, J Martín (Sp, Aprilia) 6.890. Championship 1, J Martín 355pts; 2, M Márquez (Sp, Ducati) 353; 3, Bezzecchi 309; 4, A Ogura (Japan, Aprilia) 259; 5, P Acosta (Sp, KTM) 258.

---

Superbike World Championship

Estoril: Leading positions: Superpole race 1, N Bulega (It, Ducati) 15min 52.751sec; 2, I Lecuona (Sp, Ducati) at 0.734sec behind; 3, A Surra (It, Ducati) 6.465. Race 2 1, Bulega 33:28.170; 2, Lecuona 4.888; 3, Surra 16.073. Championship 1, Bulega 664pts; 2, Lecuona 518; 3, Y Montella (It, Ducati) 290; 4, A Lowes (GB, Bimota) 237; 5, S Lowes (GB, Ducati) 225.

---

Rugby union

Gallagher Prem Exeter Chiefs 34 Newcastle Falcons 28; Northampton Saints 71 Bath 48; Sale Sharks 28 Harlequins 24; Saracens 30 Bristol Bears 7.

● table on page 52

Champ Rugby Ampthill 26 Doncaster 56; Bedford 38 Cornish Pirates 14; Chinnor 40 Richmond 24; Ealing 71 Hartpury 7; Worcester 49 Nottingham 24.

United Rugby Championship Bulls 57 Lions 15; Leinster 29 Cardiff 5; Scarlets 27 Benetton 26; Stormers 39 Sharks 22; Ulster 26 Munster 26; Zebre 12 Edinburgh 29.

Tennis

ATP Rolex Shanghai Masters

Third round A Gea (Fr) bt B Shelton (US) 7-6 (7-5), 7-6 (7-3); K Khachanov (Russ) bt A Mannarino (Fr) 6-2, 6-4; A De Minaur (Aus) bt R Sakamoto (Japan) 7-6 (8-6), 6-4; H Hurkacz (Pol) bt Y Zhou (China) 6-2, 3-6, 6-3; J Mensik (Cz) bt F Cerúndolo (Arg) 6-3, 3-6, 6-2; A Zverev (Ger) bt Q Halys (Fr) 6-4, 6-7 (8-10), 6-3; A Bublik (Kaz) bt B Nakashima (US) 6-7 (7-9), 6-3, 7-6 (7-5); A Davidovich Fokina (Sp) bt F Tiafoe (US) 7-6 (7-4), 4-6, 7-6 (8-6).

WTA China Open

Beijing: Final Q Zheng (China) bt M Andreeva (Russ) 7-5, 6-4.

Sport Gallagher Prem

Exeter land first win but empty seats worry Baxter

Exeter Chiefs

Newcastle Red Bulls

Will Kelleher Deputy Rugby Correspondent

Exeter Chiefs have their first win of the season — it is just a shame there was hardly anyone here to see it. After huffing and puffing, Exeter held firm to beat Newcastle Red Bulls, who had dreamt of a first win on the road for four years, to lift themselves into eighth place before the one-week break for the Champions Cup.

Immanuel Feyi-Waboso limped off with a tight hamstring in the second half, which was a worry. "I don't think it's catastrophic, or has been a proper twang, but he doesn't feel right, so it'll get scanned. It's more of a concern than a long-term worry," Exeter's director of rugby, Rob Baxter, said.

This was not a vintage match but there was enough to enjoy at Sandy Park. Depressingly, the ground was less than half-full, with only 7,071 in attendance, 1,600 down on the Gloucester match which opened Exeter's season.

Newcastle are not the league's greatest attraction, but it is not good for last year's finalists to see so many seats empty. Perhaps sky-high prices at Exeter are to blame. In pre-season, grandstand tickets sold for £97, just shy of the most expensive in the league behind the best seats at Bath's Recreation Ground, which go for more than £100.

Exeter have slashed prices for games up to Christmas to try to drag more fans into their 15,000-capacity ground, including offering a 25 per cent discount for adult tickets in the North Terrace. Ironically, that stand was empty.

"When you have a poor crowd there are things off the field you need to address, and I know people are looking into it," Baxter said. "If people had loads of disposable income, every entertainment thing would have sell-out crowds.

"The job I have to do to build a crowd is to make sure the team perform well and win. We didn't play well enough, but the game did have jeopardy until the final whistle, so we've ticked that box."

Newcastle are yet to win since beating Sale Sharks in May, but picked up two more bonus points for scoring four tries — three from Christian Wade, who reached 100 league tries — and for finishing within six of Exeter.

These days an average Prem match contains about 60 points, according to Oval Insights data, and by half-time here we had 40 exactly. Some poor, disconnected defending tightened up as the game reached its conclusion, and deft attack kept fans engaged.

The Prem pendulum swung both ways as the sides swapped tries through the first half. Ross Vintcent started it 36 seconds in, when he charged down Zack Henry and scored, before Henry made up for it, providing for Pouri Rakete-Stones, who powered on to make space for Wade's first try on the right wing.

Exeter then attacked Werner Kok, who was often lost on the blind-side wing. First Henry Slade picked him off to provide Vintcent with his second, and then later ran one past him to score himself. Between those Max Hicks, the powerful New Zealand-born, English-qualified flanker took one after slick hands from Sammy Arnold and Alex Hearle. Wade could have attempted to score his second, but Hicks was in a better position. Steve Borthwick was watching — is Hicks, signed from Perpignan, on his radar as a big No 6?

Wade was helped to his 99th Prem try by Jake Dalziel before half-time. The Scottish fly half came on for Harrison Obatoyinbo, after the full back had been shoulder-charged by Ethan Roots, who was sin-binned. Dalziel became the youngest Newcastle player in the Prem at 18 years and 54 days, 32 days younger than Mathew Tait was in 2004.

The son of Scotland and British & Irish Lions coach John, Dalziel showed neat early touches, including a superb set-up for Wade's second. He attacked the Exeter line, took a tackle and freed his arms for the offload to Arnold, who then found Wade to sprint home.

Baxter told his Exeter team at half-time that they lacked defensive energy and excitement. He wondered whether they were lulled by the 119-point show put on by Northampton Saints and Bath on Saturday, and had an eye on next Sunday's trip to Toulouse.

The Chiefs eventually found grit. Full back Sam Harris dived in on the left after half-time to extend their lead, but then Slade threw a pass to the floor and Wade hacked the bobbling ball on, to hit a century of Prem tries to little fanfare at the subdued Sandy Park.

To regain the lead, having had a Stephen Varney try chalked off for a Slade forward pass in the build-up, the England centre hit a penalty. Then the Georgian prop Bachuki Tchumbadze barrelled over with five minutes to play, his opposite number, Adam Brocklebank, sent to the sin-bin.

Newcastle kept fighting to find one last, winning score, but typical of the defensive resolve Baxter asked for, fly half Harvey Skinner stripped Franco Molina in contact around the halfway line and Exeter held firm.

Newcastle may be much improved, and still sit above Harlequins, but Red Bull still does not give them wins.

Scorers: Exeter Chiefs: Tries R Vintcent (1 min, 11), H Slade (19), S Harris (44), B Tchumbadze (75). Cons H Slade 3. Pens H Slade.

Newcastle Red Bulls: Tries C Wade (4, 34, 50), M Hicks (13). Cons Z Henry 4.

Exeter Chiefs S Harris (Z Wimbush 59); I Feyi-Waboso (W Haydon-Wood 54), H Slade, W Butt, T Wyatt; H Skinner, S Varney; E Burger (W Goodrick-Clarke 50, sin-bin 75), J Yeandle (L Gulley 60), J Josefa-Scott (B Tchumbadze 50), H Wilson (T Hooper 57), D Jenkins, E Roots (sin-bin 26-36), R Vintcent, G Fisilau (K James 58).

Newcastle Red Bulls H Obatoyinbo (J Dalziel 26), C Wade, A Hearle, S Arnold, W Kok; Z Henry, S Benítez Cruz (J Elliott 57); P Rakete-Stones (A Brocklebank 48), Z Togiatama (S Adejimi 56), E Millar Mills (J Harper 47), O Usher (F Molina 45), C Jordan, M Hicks, T Christie (S Graham, 68), H Sotutu (O Leatherbarrow 50).

Slade scores Exeter's third try against Newcastle but more than half of the seats at Sandy Park were empty for the match

More pain for Harlequins but

Sale Sharks

Harlequins

John Westerby

Curiously, this was a game in which the losing team looked to have taken more of a step forward than the winners. Sale Sharks breathed a sigh of relief at securing a first home victory of the season, having been behind all game until they nicked victory with a penalty try in the 73rd minute that came from a 30-metre rolling maul.

For Harlequins, a narrow defeat came with the consolation of two bonus points, finally getting themselves off the mark for the season, although they remain bottom of the table.

But after their insipid display in a 48-0 defeat away to Gloucester last weekend, this was a much improved showing, featuring two tries each for Marcus Smith and Sam Riley, the hooker. George Furbank was highly influential from full back, forming a promising creative combination with Smith.

But Smith's aim from the kicking tee was awry early in the game and, in a scrappy contest of four tries each, those two missed conversions felt crucial at the end of the game, as George Ford kicked three out of three.

In the back row, Chandler Cunningham-South was a constant menace for Harlequins, delivering the front-foot ball that enabled Smith and Furbank to work their magic.

Yet Sale ground out the win, despite a limp first-half defensive display and countless errors in attack. They scored four tries of their own, gaining strength from a powerful bench, with Luke Cowan-Dickie and Ben Curry, on his return from injury, both making their presence felt in the latter stages, while Courtney Lawes brought havoc to Harlequins' lineout.

"We weren't at the races from an emotional point of view," Alex Sanderson, the Sale director of rugby, said. "It's the second week we've found a way to win, we are scrappers one and all. But we're not where we want to be in terms of performance."

How they stand | P | W | D | L | F | A | B | Pts | Gloucester | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 124 | 62 | 4 | 12 | Northampton | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 156 | 115 | 3 | 11 | Saracens | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 87 | 66 | 3 | 11 | Leicester | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 100 | 90 | 3 | 11 | Bath | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 121 | 122 | 3 | 11 | Bristol | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 82 | 80 | 2 | 10 | Sale | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 73 | 75 | 1 | 9 | Exeter | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 92 | 113 | 4 | 8 | Newcastle | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 73 | 117 | 4 | 4 | Harlequins | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 41 | 109 | 2 | 2 | After their defeat by Gloucester had drawn fierce criticism from former players, Harlequins raced out of the blocks, looking like a team who had been read the riot act. They scored two slick tries in the first eight minutes, with

yesterday, with ticket prices thought to be partly to blame, while the home side registered their first victory of the season

Furbank and Smith offer hope

Furbank at the heart of both.

After Cadan Murley had made ground with a powerful burst down the left, the ball was moved swiftly right for Furbank to send Sam Riley, the hooker, over in the right corner.

Furbank then produced a moment of brilliance with a flicked pass to Luke Northmore opening Sale up down the right. Northmore glanced inside and found Smith haring up on his shoulder for a straightforward finish. But Smith was unable to convert either of those two scores, the first hooked across the face of the posts, the second badly scuffed.

Sale had barely touched the ball in the first ten minutes, but they announced their belated arrival with a well-worked try finished by Elia Canakaivata, the fleet-footed Fijian No8.

Alex Lozowski, signed from Saracens, provides an extra passing option at inside centre, allowing Ford greater freedom to pick his moments, and both playmakers were involved as space was created through smooth handling for Tom O'Flaherty to send Canakaivata over in the right corner.