Tributes to ‘role model’ father who fell to his death at Oasis gig

A man who fell to his death during Oasis’s Saturday night gig at Wembley has been named as Lee Claydon.

The father from Bournemouth fell from the upper tier balcony of the London stadium during a sell-out concert by the Gallagher brothers.

Describing him as a “loving family man” who loved fishing and outdoor activities and a “role model” to his son, Lee’s brother Aaron Claydon said: “We will miss him so very much.”

Aaron paid tribute to his brother on a GoFundMe page set up to support Lee’s partner, Amanda, and their family.

In the post, he said Lee was “the man I have always looked up to” who “would have done anything for any of us”.

“Our family has been turned upside down and are struggling to deal with this devastation and unexpected loss,” Aaron wrote.

“Lee leaves behind his son, dad, partner, brothers, sisters, nephews and niece.

“Lee was a loving family man who was a role model to his son Harry and was loved so much by all his family. Lee would have done anything for any of us and he was taken from us far too soon and we will miss him so very much.

“Lee loved all outdoor activities, one of his favourite hobbies was fishing. He also loved music and his guitar. He also really enjoyed going to watch and support the boys and his nephew at their football games.

“Amanda and the boys have our full support at this very sad time, which is why we would love to be able to help them financially as well as emotionally.

“Please help us raise as much funds as we can to take one worry off Amanda and family right now as they are going through any family’s worst nightmare.”

Aaron also took to Facebook to pay tribute to his brother, writing: “Still in shock and cannot believe I am writing this, but sadly over the weekend I lost by best mate the man I looked up to and the man I was lucky enough to call my brother Lee Claydon.

“This is gonna be a tough long journey and I have set up this GoFundMe page to help and support his loved ones. Please read and share.

“Until we meet again Rkid.”

Lee’s cousins, Shannon Gabrielle and Richard Norris, also paid tribute to Lee on the social media platform and shared the fundraiser.

“Absolutely shocked and gutted to hear about our cousin Lee Claydon,” Mr Norris wrote, describing the incident as “heartbreaking beyond words”.

“Please consider supporting the fundraiser to help his loved ones during yet another incredibly difficult time,” he said.

Shannon Gabrielle wrote Lee had died “after no doubt having the time of his life at the Oasis concert this weekend”.

She added his death had “devastated the whole family” and said any donations would help support his “closest knit” relatives.

“You just don’t fathom you will go out for a night of amazing fun and not come home at the end of it,” she wrote.

In a statement issued on Sunday, the Metropolitan Police said: “A man – aged in his 40s – was found with injuries consistent with a fall.

“He was sadly pronounced dead at the scene.

“The stadium was busy and we believe it is likely a number of people witnessed the incident, or may knowingly or unknowingly have caught it on mobile phone video footage.

“If you have any information that could help us to confirm what happened, please call 101.”

The Gallagher brothers also said they had been left “shocked and saddened” by the news of the death following their show.

On Sunday, a spokesperson for Wembley said: “Last night, Wembley Stadium medics, the London Ambulance Service and the police attended to a concert-goer who was found with injuries consistent with a fall.

“Despite their efforts, the fan very sadly died. Our thoughts go out to his family, who have been informed and are being supported by specially trained police officers.

“The police have asked anyone who witnessed the incident to contact them.”

Bill and Hillary Clinton ordered to testify in Epstein investigation

Bill and Hillary Clinton are scheduled to testify before the House Oversight Committee in October as the panel probes the investigations into pedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein and his convicted sex trafficking accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell.

Rep. James Comer, the Republican chair of the Oversight committee, tweeted out a list of testimony dates on Tuesday for upcoming witnesses — including the former president and secretary of state — compelled by subpoena to appear.

A number of other top federal officials including former Attorney General Merrick Garland are also set to testify.

President Clinton’s friendship with Epstein makes his appearance one of the few called by the committee unrelated to the official duties of his office. Fox News also reported that the DOJ has issued a subpoena for records related to the investigation. The schedule of depositions includes former attorneys general who served through the first Trump term and dating back through the Bush administration.

Hillary Clinton’s connection to the case was spelled out in a cover letter released by the Oversight Committee indicating she’ll be questioned about why Ghislaine Maxwell’s nephew worked on her presidential campaign and later at the State Department during her tenure in the Obama administration.

“Your family appears to have had a close relationship with both Jeffrey Epstein and his co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell. For example, your husband President William “Bill” Jefferson Clinton, by his own admission, flew on Jeffrey Epstein’s private plane four separate times in 2002 and 2003 on trips for your family’s foundation, the Clinton Foundation,” reads the letter to the former Democratic presidential nominee.

“During one of these trips, he was even pictured receiving a ‘massage’ from one of Mr. Epstein’s victims,” the letter continues.

“Moreover, your husband was allegedly close to Ms. Maxwell, while Ms. Maxwell’s nephew worked for your 2008 presidential campaign and was hired by the State Department shortly after you became Secretary of State.”

The committee is set to begin taking depositions from witnesses beginning with former Trump first term attorney general William Barr in a few weeks. The committee also voted to subpoena Ghislaine Maxwell, the imprisoned and convicted co-conspirator of Jeffrey Epstein, but that subpoena remains on hold pending Maxwell’s appeal of her conviction.

Attorneys for the imprisoned British socialite claim that she would be willing to testify to the Oversight committee in exchange for a clemency deal. Her lawyers said Maxwell would invoke her Fifth Amendment rights not to testify unless she was offered immunity.

The Maxwell angle of the Epstein case evolved into a new bizarre twist last month after the Justice Department’s memo claiming that a so-called “Epstein Client List” detailing the billionaire’s alleged accomplices, was not found in the troves of the FBI and DOJ’s files on the case. The agency also stated that Epstein, who died in federal custody in 2019, committed suicide.

The statement about the client list’s supposed nonexistence contradicted statements from Attorney General Pam Bondi and others, while frustrating both the president’s MAGA base and millions of other Americans who expected transparency from the administration after it called right-wing influencers to the White House earlier this year to receive binders of documents pertaining to the investigations.

A resulting uproar led the Trump administration to look for a way out. At the Justice Department, deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche (who is also the president’s former personal attorney) conducted a private meeting with Maxwell at the Florida prison where she was being held, and declined to issue a statement afterwards.

Maxwell was then transferred to a minimum security facility, stunning the president’s critics and pouring gasoline on speculation around the idea of a possible cover-up.

President Trump, separately, has sought to distract his MAGA base by launching a renewed effort to attack Barack Obama and members of his national security team for the 2016 Russia investigation while he and members of his administration make vague promises about released information about the Epstein case.

On Monday, the DOJ confirmed that the grand jury transcripts it was seeking to release amid the uproar actually contained information that was already public. The DOJ claimed in its July memo that it would not release any further nonpublic information about the investigation due to concerns about releasing child pornography or identifying information about victims, provoking a standoff with Congress.

RFK Jr cancels $500M in vaccine development

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has canceled $500 million in vaccine development after “listening to the experts.”

HHS announced Tuesday it would start winding down its vaccine development projects that use mRNA technology by canceling contracts and pulling funding for some vaccines that are being developed to fight respiratory viruses such as COVID-19 and the flu.

“We reviewed the science, listened to the experts, and acted,” Kennedy, a vaccine skeptic, said in a statement.

He said the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, which oversees the vaccine development projects, “is terminating 22 mRNA vaccine development investments because the data show these vaccines fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory infections like COVID and flu.

“We’re shifting that funding toward safer, broader vaccine platforms that remain effective even as viruses mutate.”

The projects are being led by some of the nation’s leading pharmaceutical companies such as Pfizer and Moderna to prevent flu, COVID-19 and H5N1 infections.

The mRNA vaccines are credited with slowing the 2020 coronavirus pandemic.

“Let me be absolutely clear: HHS supports safe, effective vaccines for every American who wants them. That’s why we’re moving beyond the limitations of mRNA and investing in better solutions,” Kennedy said, without providing details on what those technologies might be.

The Independent reached out to HHS for comment, which referred to Kennedy’s above statement.

Shortly after President Donald Trump was elected to his second term, Kennedy vowed not to take away anyone’s vaccines.

“If vaccines are working for somebody, I’m not going to take them away. People ought to have choice, and that choice ought to be informed by the best information,” he told NBC News in November 2024.

During his Senate confirmation hearings, Kennedy reiterated that he didn’t want to take vaccines away, but rather wants to make sure Americans are properly informed about them, Politico reported in late January.

“News reports have claimed that I’m anti-vaccine or anti-industry,” he said. “I am neither.”

Kennedy has previously purported claims that vaccines are dangerous, notably falsely claiming childhood vaccines are linked to autism, despite this association being widely debunked.

How the phrase ‘toxic masculinity’ turned toxic

When Andy Hill started to engage schoolboys in masculinity workshops six years ago, he noticed that children didn’t seem to warm to one phrase in particular. “We were trying to address the concept of toxic masculinity,” he says. “It was very common language at that time. But the more work we did with young people, the more we found that when we use this kind of terminology, it just led to this immediate sense of defensiveness.”

Hill is the Creative Director of Voicebox, a charity that aims to help boys aged nine to 16 to thrive against a backdrop of declining school performance, increased scrutiny of misogyny and violence against women and girls, and a broader sense that boys are being left behind. Voicebox is one of several charities that have positioned themselves in recent years as mentors for young men, in part to act as a counterbalance to “harmful ideas of masculinity”.

Out of nine charities working predominantly with children that The Independent has contacted, eight of them say that they too now avoid the term. The charity sector’s re-evaluation of “toxic masculinity” may be a sign that something is shifting in attitudes towards boys.

“The aim of Voicebox was to engage boys in conversations to reflect on these harmful ideas,” says Hill. “But when they heard the phrase ‘toxic masculinity’, what they heard was, ‘You are toxic; you are the problem.’” Six years on, Voicebox has adapted its approach to “empower participants to promote and embody healthy masculinity”. “Boys are not inherently toxic, and they’re not inherently problematic,” he says. “They’re struggling, and we need to reframe the way we’re talking about them.”

Toxic masculinity is a loosely defined term that is used to refer to stereotypical norms of masculinity that are currently perceived as undesirable, such as domination, the devaluation of women, homophobia, stoicism, aggressive competition and violence.

To Hill, many of the traits associated with toxic masculinity have a ‘healthy’ and ‘unhealthy’ expression – which is why he prefers to talk about masculinity in these terms. “Loyalty, courage, strength, bravery, competitiveness, aggression – all of these things are not inherently bad,” he says. “It’s about how they’re channelled.”

Voicebox is not the only organisation adopting a masculinity-positive approach. In May, the prime minister, Keir Starmer, invited several charities to attend a meeting to discuss “how to prevent young boys being dragged into a ‘whirlpool of hatred and misogyny’”. But every one of those attendees has since told The Independent that they avoid the term “toxic masculinity”.

“Forefronting the word masculinity with a negative adjective like ‘toxic’ is not something that we feel is a good way of moving these conversations forward,” said Kirsty Ruthven, from The Children’s Society, which works with teachers in primary schools to challenge gender stereotypes. “It’s important to label the harmful behaviours and outcomes for what they are. So if we are talking about coercion, if we are talking about violence, if we are talking about misogyny, we need to talk about that, and not this vague umbrella of ‘toxic’ that could mean different things to different people.”

Tender CEO Susie McDonald MBE says that the charity prefers to talk about “misogynistic behaviours” to separate these harmful traits from masculinity in general. “We need to support boys and young men in building confidence, compassion, and healthier attitudes, rather than demonising them,” she says. “Ultimately, they are part of the solution.”

Charities set up to tackle violence against women and girls have dropped the term too. A spokesperson for Everyone’s Invited, a charity established to “expose and eradicate rape culture”, said that they don’t use it either. “We were at a school a few years ago, and a boy shared with us how painful it was to hear masculinity constantly described as ‘toxic’,” they said. “Many of the boys we work with feel the same. The language we use is important. We want to open up honest dialogue, and we must ensure that we don’t alienate the people we need most in it.”

The phrase is “unhelpful, stigmatising and oversimplifies complex issues”, according to Rebecca Cant from relationship charity Brook, which works with children in schools across the country.

The charity sector’s re-evaluation of “toxic masculinity” may be a sign that something is shifting in attitudes towards boys. It’s a phrase that is easily applied to men like Andrew Tate; it’s less easy to explain to a classroom of nine-year-olds that their behaviours could be toxic.

In Westminster, however, the fervour around “toxic masculinity” has perhaps never felt stronger, thanks to the influence of Netflix drama Adolescence, which depicts a hypothetical scenario of adolescent femicide via manosphere radicalisation. Starmer said in March that he is “worried” about the influence of “callous, manipulative and toxic influencers” on boys. His intervention has been regarded as a double-edged sword by campaigners who have been trying for years to encourage empathy for schoolboys, who have slipped into a recession of educational performance, employment, pay and life expectancy relative to girls. That boys are now receiving attention over fears they could murder their classmates has not been well received by all.

The prime minister appears to have been careful not to use the exact phrase “toxic masculinity”. His key intervention – the publication of new guidance by the Department for Education for new school lessons to tackle misogyny – contains signals that the government is aware that it is contentious. The guidance does not use the term, and repeatedly stresses the importance of avoiding “stigmatising or perpetuating harmful stereotypes about boys”.

This may come as news to the chair of the education select committee, Labour MP Helen Hayes, who expressed concern about children’s “exposure to toxic masculinity” in a debate on the educational attainment of boys just days prior to the launch. The education secretary Bridget Phillipson, meanwhile, railed against “violent, toxic masculinity” as recently as 2023. In a parliamentary debate on tackling violence against women and girls in May, the Labour MP Fleur Anderson praised the work of charity White Ribbon, “which tackles toxic masculinity head-on in the school”. White Ribbon is another charity that says it prefers not to use the phrase.

“We don’t think the term ‘toxic masculinity’ is very helpful,” says Lynne Elliot, CEO of the 34-year-old charity established to prevent violence against women and girls. “Masculinity isn’t toxic, and many traits of masculinity are really positive. We work with thousands of men each year who work hard to change those gender stereotypes and who stand up and speak out for women and girls. They tell us that the phrase ‘toxic masculinity’ can come across as blaming men, and alienates them.”

Parliamentarians who are otherwise sensitive to sweeping generalisations have been slow to pick up on the trend away from the phrase. The term remains ubiquitous in politics and media, and has been mentioned 31 times in parliament – but on only five of those occasions presented critically or unfavourably. The reality is, however, that almost as soon as it entered popular discourse, critics have argued that the phrase “toxic masculinity” perpetuates harmful stereotypes about boys, and that this harm has largely gone unexamined.

In 2023, researchers set out to examine the impact of positive and negative messages around masculinity on 4,000 men. “Thinking masculinity causes you to engage in bad behaviour (eg inclined to be violent towards women) was correlated with worse mental wellbeing,” says John Barry, the author of the study and the co-founder of the Male Psychology Section of the British Psychological Society, and The Centre for Male Psychology. “But thinking masculinity causes you to engage in good behaviour (eg inclined to be protective towards women) was correlated with good mental wellbeing. A key question is where these beliefs come from, and my guess is the negative beliefs are being promoted daily in the media, academia, governments, NGOs, etc. And these messages impact men.”

Critics of the phrase “toxic masculinity” argue that it elides toxicity with masculinity itself. Even its logical opposite, “non-toxic masculinity”, implies that toxicity is the default state.

“No matter what people claim they mean by the term, it’s much too easy for it to sound negative, especially in a culture where negativity about men and masculinity is fairly common,” says Barry. “If you think about terms like ‘toxic Blackness’, ‘toxic femininity’ or ‘toxic Islam’, it suddenly becomes clear that it’s difficult to combine the word ‘toxic’ with any demographic without it sounding pretty damning of that demographic.”

It is important not to deny the realities of gender-based violence. The threat posed to women by men is grounded in a prosaic fact: almost all men are stronger than almost all women. Even well-trained, athletic women are weaker than average men. This is indisputable and exists outside of ideas about the mutability of gender. All boys, as they develop, face the question of whether they will use their strength for good or bad, and most boys are successfully socialised out of violence against women and girls.

Men nevertheless account for 96 per cent of the prison population, 99 per cent of rape convictions and the vast majority of violence against women and girls. The National Centre for Domestic Violence estimates that one in four women (compared to one in seven men) will experience domestic abuse in their lifetime. Boys are much more outwardly violent than girls (and a great deal more violent to each other than they are to the opposite sex). Because these statistics demonstrate a clear gender disparity, it follows that they are in some sense downstream from masculinity.

But the majority of men and boys are not abusers. The major concern of researchers is that discussions about masculinity in schools risk demoralisation and alienation when they exclude positive framings of masculinity and focus relentlessly on the harm caused by a minority. “We shouldn’t talk about the statistical minority as if they are the majority,” says Barry. “There will probably always be a hard core of damaged boys that, for one reason or another, tend towards bad behaviour. But that doesn’t mean we should talk to all boys as if they are potential rapists.”

Barry argues that policymakers’ attention would be better spent on variables that predict criminal behaviour with higher accuracy than gender. “In saying that bad behaviour is caused by masculinity, the real causes of criminality in men (as in women) are overlooked,” says Barry. “The real causes are things like adverse childhood experience, such as childhood neglect or sexual abuse.”

In the meantime, there is a question mark over how children will respond to Starmer’s new school lessons. Throughout the 20th century, teachers warned children about smoking, casual sex, drugs, rock’n’roll and gender nonconformity. All of these things came to define the counterculture of their respective generations. Politicians who frame masculinity as taboo allow its definition to be shaped by people like Andrew Tate, whose resonant message of cynical self-interest feeds on the invalidation and alienation of young men. As the charities working with boys have suggested, this is not a desirable outcome. Tate’s advocacy of violence, misogyny, polygamy, and machiavellianism is the basis for a dog-eat-dog society of hostility, exploitation and fear. It remains to be seen how the kids will react.

Trump’s special envoy lands in Moscow as ceasefire deadline looms

US special envoy Steve Witkoff is in Moscow today to meet with Russian leadership as Washington attempts to convince Russian president Vladimir Putin to sign a ceasefire agreement with Ukraine.

US president Donald Trump has grown significantly frustrated with Mr Putin in recent weeks and has given him until this Friday to make progress toward peace in Ukraine or face tougher sanctions.

Mr Trump is reportedly considering imposing new sanctions on Russia’s “shadow fleet” of oil tankers if Vladimir Putin does not agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine by Friday.

Moscow’s “shadow fleet” – vessels whose ownership is secret – transport oil around the world to evade western sanctions. White House sources say the sanctions would an easy first step to try to force Mr Putin into a truce, according to the FT.

But sources close to the Kremlin say Mr Putin is unlikely to bow to the sanctions ultimatum.

Yesterday, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said he had had a “productive” conversation with Mr Trump on ending the war, sanctions on Russia and the finalisation of a US-Ukraine drone deal.

Mapped: Worst rat infestation areas as over half a million reported

More than half a million rat infestations have been reported across the UK in less than three years, new data has revealed.

Drainage specialists have said the problem is only getting worse, with the issue now increasingly starting underground – as they issued a warning over potentially fatal health dangers linked to the rodents.

Analysis of Freedom of Information (FOI) responses from UK councils showed the country saw 518,240 reported rat infestations from 2023 to mid-2025.

Nearly a quarter of these were found to be in London alone, closely followed by the north west of England and Scotland, which recorded almost 95,000 and 70,000 infestations respectively.

Stuart McGinn, drainage expert at Drain Detectives, which produced the research, told The Independent there is no single cause behind the regional differences in rat infestations, but he outlined several key factors that do create the perfect conditions in certain areas.

He said: “Urban density is one of the biggest drivers, as is the case in London, which has a complex underground network of drains and older infrastructure that rats can easily exploit. More people also equals more food waste, bin storage, and ample conditions for rats and rodents to thrive.

“Aside from just populated cities, some regions with higher infestation numbers, like parts of the north west or Scotland, also have large numbers of aging buildings with outdated drainage systems. Once cracks or disused pipes appear, rats only need the smallest access points, and they will then follow the scent of food and warmth straight into homes and the inside of commercial spaces.

“It could also be argued that the regional variations in rat infestations could be down to warmer, wetter weather patterns in certain parts of the UK. Milder seasons mean rats are breeding for longer periods of the year, pushing up numbers. Without proactive maintenance, especially underground, infestations can take hold fast.”

The drainage company conducted the analysis using the 195 useable responses from the 251 FOIs it submitted, specifically requesting data on council-owned buildings. The Independent has mapped the research above, showing the regions with the highest and lowest numbers of rat infestations.

The West Midlands, with 44,762 infestations, and Wales, with 44,388 infestations, came fourth and fifth in the rankings.

Meanwhile, councils across less densely populated regions like the East Midlands and south west England still reported more than 10,000 cases each, suggesting the issue is nationwide rather than just an urban one.

The fresh figures come as a supersized rat thought to be the UK’s biggest has been captured by pest controllers in a home in the north of England. The giant animal, which measured 22 inches long, was found in the Normanby area of Redcar and Cleveland after a resident called in exterminators.

Writing in The Independent, veteran catcher David Parnell admitted that even he was taken aback when he saw images of the rodent, described as “almost the size of a small cat” by councillors.

However, he warned Britons to brace themselves for a worsening vermin problem, saying: “It’s not just a one-off – the rats are getting bigger, bolder and harder to deal with.

“What used to be a couple of callouts a month for rats inside homes has now surged to eight to 10 a week. The vast majority of these infestations trace back to our neglected drainage systems.”

Drain Detectives explained that rats often exploit damaged or aging drainage systems to gain access to buildings, especially via unsealed joints, disused pipework, or toilet backflow in properties lacking rat blockers.

Once inside, they can nest in cavity walls or lofts, chew through wiring, and contaminate insulation leading to fire hazards and severe hygiene risks, according to the company.

Alongside poor sewer management, Mr Parnell also blamed genetics and careless humans for the growing problem.

Mr McGinn warned: “Rats are more than just a nuisance, they’re a threat to public health and infrastructure.

“We’re seeing growing numbers of infestations entering homes via the drains, a route that’s largely hidden from view until it’s too late. Rats are incredibly resourceful. They can travel through underground pipes, bypassing typical surface-level pest control measures. Most people don’t realise that a cracked drain beneath their home can be an open invitation to a full-blown infestation.”

Among the health hazards associated with the rodents is leptospirosis (Weil’s Disease) – a potentially fatal bacterial infection, primarily spread through the urine of infected animals, especially rats – and the deadly hantavirus, which can be caught from breathing in rats’ contaminated waste particles. Others include salmonella, which is spread via contaminated food, and allergies triggered by rat dander and urine.

Mr McGinn said prevention starts below the ground and is urging UK homeowners and property managers to take proactive steps. “If you’re hearing scratching in the walls or noticing unexplained smells, don’t ignore it,” he advised.

An MHCLG spokesperson said: “Rat infestations in people’s homes are completely abhorrent, and all private and social landlords must ensure their properties are fit for human habitation and free from dangerously hazardous conditions including pests.

“We are clamping down on unacceptable conditions so that everyone can live in a safe and secure home. This includes raising standards in social housing by bringing in Awaab’s Law from October as part of a decade of renewal in social housing, with private rented homes to follow. We are also currently consulting on an updated decent homes standard.”