Man missing at sea after Christmas Day swim in Devon is named

One of the two men who were swept away at sea during a Christmas Day swim in Devon has been named by his family.

Local antiques shop owner Matthew Upham was reported missing on Thursday morning after a “truly tragic incident” in Budleigh Salterton.

Emergency services were called to the scene after several people were reported struggling among large waves at the beach. Several were escorted to safety, but a man in his forties and a man in his sixties remain missing as of Boxing Day and have not been located.

After an extensive search, the operation was concluded on Thursday afternoon and the families of those missing were informed.

Mr Upham’s family wrote in a statement on his company’s Instagram page on Friday: “Our family is heartbroken by the loss of our beloved family member, Matthew Upham, who was reported missing on Christmas morning.

“Matthew is deeply loved and will be forever missed.”

It continued: “We would like to express our sincere and heartfelt thanks to the emergency services who responded, particularly the RNLI and coastguard for their dedication, professionalism, and tireless efforts during this extremely difficult time.

“We are profoundly grateful for their compassion and support. As we grieve and support one another, we kindly ask that our family’s privacy is respected. We thank everyone for their understanding, kindness, and condolences.”

He ran the appointment-only Matthew Upham Antiques on Budleigh Salterton’s high street, offering “a captivating assortment of chandeliers sourced from various regions across Europe”.

His website also stated that the chandeliers offered by the business “beautifully complement our collection of 18th-century furniture, creating a harmonious blend of timeless elegance”.

The shop had originally been based in London for four decades before moving to the seaside town.

Tributes poured in for the businessman, with commenters describing him as “the kindest person” and a “shining star”.

The incident came amid a Met Office yellow weather warning for wind, which was in place for parts of southwest England and Wales on Thursday. Police urged members of the public to avoid swimming in the water on Boxing Day.

Footage from the day shows several people struggling to get out of the water as large waves crash against the shore.

Mike Brown, 60, who does the Christmas Day swim in Budleigh Salterton most years, told the BBC that the conditions on Thursday were the “worst” he had ever seen.

The local resident said that he was “unable to get out” after entering the sea and was helped by “two very brave men”.

Detective Superintendent Hayley Costar, of Devon and Cornwall Police, said: “Today, emergency services have been responding to a truly tragic incident in Budleigh Salterton.

“Our thoughts remain firmly with the families and friends of the two men who are currently missing and to all who may have witnessed and be impacted by the incident. The local community will have seen a significant amount of emergency services in the area throughout the day as extensive enquiries have been ongoing.

“As dark falls, a number of these searches have been stood down, with some police enquiries on land continuing this evening.”

Coastguard rescue teams from surrounding areas were assisted by search and rescue helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft, along with police and ambulance personnel.

The Cure guitarist Perry Bamonte dies aged 65

Perry Bamonte, guitarist for rock band The Cure, has died aged 65.

Bamonte died after a short illness over Christmas, the band confirmed Friday. He was the band’s guitarist from 1990 through 2005, and then from 2022 until the time of his death.

“Teddy was a warm hearted and vital part of The Cure story,” the band’s statement read.

“‘Looking after the band’ from 1984 through 1989, he became a full time member of The Cure in 1990, playing guitar, six string bass and keyboard on ‘The Wish,’ ‘Wild Mood Swings,’ ‘Bloodflowers,’ acoustic hits and The Cure albums, as well as performing more than 400 shows over 14 years,” the statement continued.

“He rejoined The Cure in 2022, playing another 90 shows, some of the best in the band’s history, culminating with ‘The Show of a Lost World’ concert in London 1st November 2024. Our thoughts and condolences are with all his family. He will be very greatly missed.”

Born in 1960, Bamonte joined The Cure’s road crew in 1980 through his brother, Daryl, who was the band’s tour manager at the time.

After a stint as frontman Robert Smith’s personal assistant and guitar technician, Bamonte officially joined the band as the guitarist in 1990. He remained with the group until 2005, when Smith reimagined the group as a trio.

Bamonte went on to join the band Love Amongst Ruin in 2012.

He later reunited with The Cure in 2019 when the band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. After rejoining the band in 2022, Bamonte slated to continue touring with the group through 2026.

Bamonte was included on the band’s 2024 album — Songs of a Lost World — its first in 16 years.

At the time of its release, The Independent’s Helen Brown wrote: “Songs of a Lost World is just eight tracks long, although it’s so immersive you’ll lose track of time. The album begins with four minutes of shoegaze instrumental before Smith’s vocals appear in the final third of ‘Alone’ – a disorienting warning at the start of the album that ‘this is the end… hopes and dreams have gone.’

“At times Smith has written songs of noise and dirge, but here he’s dialled into some lovely melodies, arcing upward, plunging downward and smearing their way into the creases of your brain like mucky kohl – all the while Smith is ‘staring at the blood red moon, remembering that boy and the world he called his own’ and lamenting ‘it’s all gone, it’s all gone.’”

‘I wore a face veil for the first time. Then a man tried to hit me’

Fatima Mahmoud* decided to wear a niqab, a face veil, for the first time this summer while getting on the Tube in London. A man on the platform at Whitechapel station stared and shook his head, before shouting and pretending to punch the air at her.

The man mimicked the niqab by putting his fingers over his eyes like goggles. Her friend took a picture of him, which led to the man running up to them and attempting to hit them, while witnesses confronted him.

Despite being a British-born and raised Muslim, the 23-year-old told The Independent: “I don’t feel safe at all here in the UK. I drive as much as I can and try to be wary of my surroundings. Public transport scares me now, especially because this incident happened in the afternoon. It wasn’t dark outside.

“I was scared to wear the niqab again until I rebuilt my confidence. I constantly look over my shoulder in case someone punches me from behind.”

Her story comes at a time when almost half of Muslim women (45 per cent) feel unsafe on public transport, compared to just 8 per cent of women nationally, according to a new report by Muslim Census.

More than one in three (34 per cent) of Muslim women said they have experienced Islamophobic or racist abuse whilst travelling, the survey of 1,155 people in November 2025 found.

These experiences range from assault, verbal abuse, being spat at, having their headscarf pulled, and even being urinated on, the study said.

Ms Mahmoud said she reported the incident to the police but has seen no progress. The British Transport Police (BTP) said the investigation has been closed pending new evidence coming to light, as all current lines of enquiry have been followed.

Nearly two-thirds of Muslim women believe they are targeted because they wear the hijab, niqab or other visible markers of Muslim identity.

Data from Tell MAMA, which stands for Measuring Anti-Muslim Attacks, reveals that many visibly Muslim women “suffer repeat and multiple incidents of anti-Muslim hate throughout their lives”, and many have even removed their identifying clothing out of fear.

Tell MAMA director Iman Atta added: “We had cases reported where Muslim women wearing the niqab were denied access to services, and where bus drivers would not stop for them at bus stops.”

Furvah Shah was left shocked, confused and in pain at a Tube station after being physically assaulted by a total stranger.

The 26-year-old hijab-wearing woman told The Independent she was just entering Marble Arch station when a young blonde woman kicked her and said, “You deserved that.”

Ms Shah was kicked in early September, a week before the “Unite the Kingdom” rally in London attended by 150,000 people. This follows a wave of summer anti-migrant protests over hotels used to accommodate asylum seekers.

During far-right demonstrations, nearly all Muslims (93.8 per cent) feel less safe, and 84.9 per cent actively adjust their travel behaviour, according to the survey. For women, the figures are even higher, with 96.3 per cent feeling less safe and 90.7 per cent changing their travel plans.

Ms Shah said: “This is a symptom of rising far-right sentiment. People feel emboldened to do things like this, and we’re the ones who suffer. I’ve been more cautious of public transport and also on edge in general because I fear it is not a one-off incident.”

Ms Atta said far-right protests have psychological impacts and can “trigger feelings of fear and trauma effects”, particularly on Muslim women and young people.

Ms Shah reported the incident to the police as a hate crime, but in the end, she decided not to escalate the case.

Sumaiya Khan*, 24, was six months pregnant when she said she was subjected to a racial slur in August 2024, amid the Southport riots.

Ms Khan was waiting at a Luton station bus stop when a middle-aged white man sat next to her. She said he started saying “there were too many ‘brownies’ around. He then looked at me and called me an ‘f***ing P***’”.

She described feeling “angry” and “fearful to go out in public”, after assuming slurs like that were outdated from her parents’ generation. She did not report the incident to the police.

The survey found only 12.5 per cent of incidents are reported to BTP, local police or transport staff. Of those reported, 69 per cent felt unconfident that it would be taken seriously.

A majority of Muslims, 83.1 per cent, believe Islamophobia is treated less seriously than other hate crimes, as Home Office findings of prosecution rates for religiously aggravated offences remain low.

Ms Atta said: “Anti-Muslim hate or Islamophobia is on the significant rise and the rhetoric around Muslim migrants is adding to this. It gives settled British Muslims the impression that they are ‘the other’ and that they are not accepted.

“This can have real-world impacts for social cohesion, integration and extremism and also divides communities in the ‘culture war’ debates. Some politicians have a lot to answer for in the pursuit of power.”

Mandy McGregor, Transport for London’s head of policing, said: “We are absolutely appalled to hear of these horrendous incidents. Islamophobia and all forms of hate crime are completely unacceptable and we are deeply sorry [they] have experienced this on our network. We work closely with the police to stamp out hate crime on our network and we are following up with the police about these incidents.”

A BTP spokesperson said: “Abuse, intimidation, and violence – especially that which is motivated by hate – will never be tolerated, and we have acted swiftly and decisively when we receive reports of hate crimes on the network.”

Hate crime victims or witnesses are encouraged to report via text on 61016 or call 0800 405040.

The Home Office declined to comment further.

* Names have been changed

Trump’s defence secretary warns ‘more strikes to come’ on Nigeria after IS targets hit

President Donald Trump’s Defense Secretary has warned of further U.S. strikes against ISIS targets in Nigeria after the group was accused of targeting Christians.

The U.S. military said that camps by the group in Sokoto state, near the border with Niger, were hit during the strikes with an initial assessment suggesting “multiple fatalities”.

Hegseth said in a post on X: “The President was clear last month: the killing of innocent Christians in Nigeria (and elsewhere) must end. The @DeptofWar is always ready, so ISIS found out tonight — on Christmas.”

The secretary added, “Grateful for Nigerian government support & cooperation. Merry Christmas!”

He then wrote: “More to come…”

Trump announced the strikes in a post on his Truth Social platform on Christmas Day, writing: “Tonight, at my direction as Commander in Chief, the United States launched a powerful and deadly strike against ISIS Terrorist Scum in Northwest Nigeria, who have been targeting and viciously killing, primarily, innocent Christians, at levels not seen for many years, and even Centuries!”

“I have previously warned these Terrorists that if they did not stop the slaughtering of Christians, there would be hell to pay, and tonight, there was,” Trump continued.

“The Department of War executed numerous perfect strikes, as only the United States is capable of doing. Under my leadership, our Country will not allow Radical Islamic Terrorism to prosper. May God Bless our Military, and MERRY CHRISTMAS to all, including the dead Terrorists, of which there will be many more if their slaughter of Christians continues.”

A Defense Department official told The Independent the U.S. worked with Nigeria to carry out the strikes and they’d been approved by that country’s government.

The Associated Press reports Nigeria’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the cooperation included exchange of intelligence and strategic coordination in ways “consistent with international law, mutual respect for sovereignty and shared commitments to regional and global security.”

“Terrorist violence in any form, whether directed at Christians, Muslims or other communities, remains an affront to Nigeria’s values and to international peace and security,” the ministry said in a statement.

Nigeria’s government has previously said in response to Trump’s criticisms that people of many faiths, not just Christians, have suffered attacks at the hands of extremists groups.

The Defense Department, which Trump has pushed to rename the Department of War, posted video on X alongside a copy of the president’s comments.

U.S Africa Command said in a post on X, “At the direction of the President of the United States and the Secretary of War, and in coordination with Nigerian authorities, U.S. Africa Command conducted strikes against ISIS terrorists in Nigeria on Dec. 25, 2025, in Sokoto State.”

The Independent has reached out to the White House for more information about the strikes.

Last month, Trump said he was instructing the Defense Department to “prepare for possible action” in Nigeria, claiming the nation’s government “continues to allow the killing of Christians.”

He also declared Nigeria is a “country of particular concern.” The U.S. government uses this designation for nations determined to have committed “particularly severe violations of religious freedom,” according to the State Department’s website.

Trump said in November, “If the Nigerian Government continues to allow the killing of Christians, the U.S.A. will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria, and may very well go into that now disgraced country, ‘guns-a-blazing,’ to completely wipe out the Islamic Terrorists who are committing these horrible atrocities.”

Nigeria’s population of 220 million people is mostly split between Christians and Muslims. There are also armed insurgent groups operating in the nation, including the Islamic extremist organization Boko Haram, which has also targeted Muslims, The AP reported.

Much of northern Nigeria has been struck by conflict in an ongoing security crisis and Trump has singled the country out for what he calls “the killing of Christians” by “radical Islamists.”

Victims and church leaders have reiterated Trump’s claims that Christians are persecuted, saying they’ve long been attacked, kidnapped or killed over their faith.

But many insist the reality isn’t that simple, with experts and residents saying most attacks emphasize the widespread violence that has long plagued the West African nation, where everyone is a potential victim, regardless of background or belief.

With reporting from the Associated Press.

Mixed sex wards used record 5,000 times in a month despite ban

The use of mixed-sex wards in hospitals in England has soared to the highest number in a single month for nearly 15 years – despite health secretary Wes Streeting slamming the practice under the last Conservative government.

Official figures from NHS England show strict rules against their use were breached more than 5,000 times in January, for the first time since 2011.

The most recent month for which there is data available, October, saw 4,801 breaches, higher than the 3,953 recorded during the same month when the Tories were in charge of the health service in 2023.

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) hit out at the practice, which it said was “undignified and unsafe” as it called for urgent investment to increase both bed capacity and the ability for people to be treated at home and away from overwhelmed hospitals.

In response to inquiries from The Independent, the government said it was “not acceptable” for patients to share sleeping accommodation with members of the opposite sex, and it was reminding hospital trusts “robustly” on this point.

Before last year’s general election, Mr Streeting criticised the continued use of mixed-sex wards, which he said had gone “through the roof” under the last Conservative government.

Under official guidance that was updated in 2012, patients should not share wards overnight, share bathroom facilities or have to walk through areas occupied by patients of the opposite sex to get to the toilets.

The shadow health secretary, Stuart Andrew, said: “It is a disgrace that mixed-sex ward breaches are at their highest point in more than a decade.

“No patient should be left feeling exposed or unsafe, yet thousands are.”

Daniel Elkeles, chief executive of NHS Providers, which represents NHS trusts, said that patients’ safety, dignity and clinical needs were always a top priority but added: “Sometimes caring for people in mixed wards can’t be helped as a result of extreme pressure on available beds.”

He said that NHS trusts do everything they can to avoid it but “on occasion it’s better to be looking after a patient in a mixed-sex ward, rather than have to treat someone in a temporary space like a corridor due to a lack of free beds – which can be down to lots of factors, including very high demand or delays discharging some patients well enough to leave hospital but who have nowhere to go.”

The last time the number of breaches was more than 5,000 in a single month was in March 2011, three months after the NHS started to record the numbers in the wake of the mass public outcry. By May of that year, they had fallen to below 2,000 a month and by the end of the year, numbered only in the hundreds.

And that is how they stayed until late 2017, when they began to climb again. Under the last Conservative government, there were a number of months in which the number of breaches totalled more than 4,000.

At the time, Mr Streeting said patients had been left at risk and feeling humiliated, but the first time the figure topped 5,000 in a single month was under Labour, in January, the official figures show. That month, the rules were broken 5,180 times, a breach rate of 2.7 per cent.

A year earlier, before Labour came to power, the figure was 4,404, a rate of 2.6 per cent. In December, the figure was 4,549, also higher than the previous year’s 3,522 (2.7 per cent vs 2.2 per cent). June also saw breaches higher than the same month the previous year, 4,559 to 3,881 (2.5 per cent vs 2.2 per cent).

Even during the Covid pandemic, the highest recorded figure was 4,929 in February 2020, although counting was suspended until October that year as the NHS came under pressure.

The Royal College of Nursing’s chief nursing officer, Lynn Woolsey, said: “Rising mixed-sex ward breaches is a sign of a health service under severe strain, which has too little space and too few beds to meet surging demand. It is common for patients to be placed in corridors and even store cupboards, with understaffed and overworked nursing teams forced to treat patients in crowded environments without easy access to life-saving equipment. The practice is undignified, unsafe and simply cannot go on.

“The secretary of state must act with urgent investment to increase bed capacity and improve nurse staffing levels in hospitals, and, vitally, funding for community teams to enable people to be treated at home and away from overwhelmed hospitals.”

Liberal Democrat health spokesperson Helen Morgan said: “A hospital stay is one of the most stressful and vulnerable situations any one of us can experience. It is utterly unacceptable that patients are being forced into mixed-sex wards – adding fuel to the fire of stress and worry.

“Every patient deserves to be comfortable and to be treated with dignity and respect, not left in inappropriate conditions because wards are overflowing.

“In the face of a winter crisis, this will only get worse. The government needs to bring forward an emergency package of extra social care places and more staffed beds or patients will continue to face unacceptable conditions.”

A government spokesperson said: “The use of mixed-sex wards soared under the Tories, and are another sign of just how damaged the NHS became under their watch.

“As we look to fix the harm they’ve done, we’ve been clear – the safety, dignity and privacy of patients is crucial, and NHS Trusts are expected to eliminate mixed-sex accommodation.

“Even with high flu cases and demand for services at unprecedented levels, it is not acceptable for patients to share sleeping accommodation with members of the opposite sex, and trusts are reminded robustly on this point.”

It’s about experience: Further Education teachers share what it takes

In the modern world, many of us are working longer than ever. Research based on ONS Labour Market data found that there are almost one million more workers aged 65 and above since the millennium and the state pension is set to rise to 67 by 2028 and 68 by the late 2030s. Subsequently, having multiple careers is becoming increasingly popular. And after decades working in a specific industry, sharing the work-based knowledge you have gained via teaching in further education is one of the most rewarding career shifts you can make.

Further Education teaching (defined as any education for people aged 16 and over who aren’t studying for a degree) allows you to switch up your working days and harness the skills and experience you have developed, all while helping shape the next generation of workers in your field.

To find out more about the role, from what it takes to the best parts of the job, we spoke to Further Education teachers who have switched from doing their day job to teaching it…

John Ryan, 51, from Weston Super Mare, worked for more than a decade on site in the construction industry, mainly in bricklaying and supervising roles, before an opportunity to become a Further Education assessor changed his path in his thirties. Travelling nationally to assess the work of new bricklayers in order to sign off their NVQs (National Vocational Qualification), the college John was associated with then started offering him some teaching work.

With no prior teaching qualifications, John completed these alongside his assessing and teaching roles with the fees picked up by the teaching college. “I liked the idea of passing on my knowledge and giving young people the skills and confidence to progress in a trade,” he says. “Teaching in Further Education felt like a natural next step because it would allow me to combine my practical background with coaching and mentoring.” There were practical draws too. “On site in the construction industry you are self-employed so you do not get holidays or sick pay. The stability of income and regular paid holidays was a big draw of Further Education teaching,” he adds.

Since his first assessing role 18 years ago, John has worked between assessing, teaching and jobs back on the construction site and now, he currently teaches bricklaying and groundwork full-time at South Gloucestershire and Stroud College.

John’s extensive site and supervisory experience has proved to be hugely valuable when it comes to teaching his students there. “I can explain not just the ‘how’ but also the ‘why’ behind industry standards,” he explains. “Learners often respond well to hearing about real jobs, site challenges, and the professional behaviours that employers expect. It makes the lessons more relatable and credible,” he shares.

“For example, I can share stories of accidents when teaching site safety, or explain how a mistake of a few millimetres on a construction site can cost you time to rectify, which in turn will cost you money,” he says. “These hands-on, real world experiences make the theory relatable and show learners the real value of getting it right.”

Coral Aspinall, 52, who became a full-time Further Education teacher 12 years ago, agrees. “My experience allows me to put my teaching into context,” she says. Coral started out her engineering career at 16 as an apprentice in a local engineering company. Following a BSc in Engineering and Business Management, she worked for many years in the engineering industry before enrolling on a part-time PGDE (Professional Graduate Diploma in Education) course for teaching. She’s now the Engineering Programme Leader at the Stockport campus of the Trafford and Stockport College Group. Here, they offer qualifications such as Level 2 Performing Engineering Operations as well as engineering-focused Level 3 T Levels and Level 3 Btec Awards. They also offer Level 3 apprenticeships across engineering including Technical Support, Engineering Fitter and Maintenance Management.

“Because I’ve been an engineering apprentice myself, I understand what the student needs to be successful in terms of skills, knowledge and behaviour,” she explains. “I also have contacts in the wider engineering community and understand what an employer is looking for in an apprentice, and can also share insights in terms of how the sector is shifting and evolving to help support their progress.”

Working for an extensive period of time in a field before passing on that knowledge gives teachers maturity and empathy which can be hugely helpful for students, especially those facing complex life situations.

Beyond the practical techniques, a big part of John’s role is helping learners build confidence, teamwork, communication, and problem-solving skills that employers look for. “Many of my learners have different challenges, so they value teachers who are approachable, who believe in them, and who prepare them for real opportunities in work or further study,” he says. For John, his previous work experience has allowed him to do this. “On site, I worked with people facing all sorts of pressures, from work to life issues, which taught me to be patient and supportive,” he explains.

Coral has had a similar experience. “I see my role as more than imparting knowledge; it is about preparing the young person for the next stage of their journey. The students trust me to have their best interests at heart; they come to me for advice on their next steps and how they can achieve their aspirations, and I’ll support them with both practical advice and words of encouragement.”

For Coral, teaching later in life allows her to draw from a mature perspective, and teach her students positive workplace behaviours alongside skills and knowledge. “Students thrive when they have clear unambiguous boundaries, so I’m firm around expectations in terms of timekeeping, attendance and attitude. This is particularly important to succeeding in the workplace as employers value these behaviours as much as, or even more than having specific expertise or know-how (which can generally be developed).”

If you’re looking for a fresh career option, and keen to share your skills with the next generation, Further Education teaching could be a really enriching new phase. Further Education covers a huge range of career sectors including construction, law, engineering, digital, hospitality, tourism, beauty and more. This includes BTECs (Business and Technology Education Council qualifications), T Levels, NVQs (National Vocational Qualifications) or City & Guilds Qualifications.

Teaching in a mixture of colleges (often General Further Education Colleges or Sixth Form Colleges) and Adult and Community Learning Centres as well as workplace and apprenticeship settings, further education teachers share their years of real world industry skills with a diverse mix of people from those straight out of school aged sixteen to those making career switches later in life.

You don’t always need an academic degree or prior teaching qualifications to start teaching in further education. You can undertake teacher training on the job, often funded by your employer, so you can start earning straight away.. Furthermore, it doesn’t mean you have to stop working in your chosen field. Further education offers hybrid opportunities – so you could teach part time alongside your other commitments. This means you could have the best of both worlds, where you are still working in your chosen industry and teaching alongside it at a time that suits your schedule. Find out if it’s the right move for you here.

If, like John and Coral, you see the appeal in sharing the knowledge and skills you’ve developed with the next generation, exploring the option of becoming a Further Education teacher can be a great next step. As John shares, the reward is always worth it: “It never gets old passing on my knowledge to people starting on their journey, knowing I have made a difference and getting a smile and thanks in return!”

Looking for a new role that’s rewarding, flexible and draws on your current career? Why not consider sharing your experience where it matters most – helping inspire the next generation of workers in the field you love? Visit Further Education to find out more

Four arrested after man shot in chest in Sheffield on Christmas Day

Four men have been arrested on suspicion of attempted murder after a man was shot in Sheffield on Christmas Day.

A 20-year-old man is fighting for his life after the shooting.

South Yorkshire Police said officers were called to Wilfred Drive, in the Darnall area of the city, just before midnight following reports a man had been shot in the chest.

People living in the area described how prayers were said for him at the mosque across the road at Friday lunchtime.

One man who lives near the scene said: “It’s such a shock. Nobody deserves this to happen to them, whatever he has got himself mixed-up in.

“This is a safe place. You can go about your business, no problem. But things just get out o hand with disagreements. I don’t understand it.”

On Friday afternoon, Wilfred Drive remained behind a police cordon, along with a 100m stretch of Wilfrid Road, with police cars guarding either end of the scene, which is just off the busy Staniforth Road.

A South Yorkshire Police spokesman said on Friday: “On Christmas Day, just before midnight at 11.27pm, emergency services responded to Wilfred Drive in Darnall after a 20-year-old man was reported to have been shot in his chest.

“The victim was taken to hospital, where he remains in a critical, life-threatening condition.

“Following the incident, detectives immediately began working at pace to understand the circumstances and quickly had four men arrested in connection to the incident.”

The spokesman said four men – aged 20, 22, 28 and 29 – were all arrested on suspicion of attempted murder and remain in custody.

Chief Inspector Andy Knowles said: “This is an abhorrent incident that has left a man fighting for his life.

“Gun crime poses a great threat to the safety and wellbeing of our community, putting innocent people at risk of being caught up in an offender’s actions.

“It will not be tolerated under any circumstances.

“We are committed to taking firm, decisive action against anyone who chooses to engage in violence or carry illegal firearms, but we are stronger with your help – our communities support.

“We are thankful to those who have assisted officers so far in our inquiries and urge anyone who believes they have footage or information to assist to get in touch.”

The senior officer said police would remain in the area to deal with questions or concerns from the community.

25 moments that have shaped the 21st century

At the start of the century, when Tony Blair held hands with the Queen and sang “Auld Lang Syne” in the new Millennium Dome, most people had mobile phones and wrote texts by pressing number keys one, two or three times. The word “internet” was just beginning to take over from the “world wide web” and the “information superhighway”.

New Labour had captured the Geist of the Zeit, and carried all before it, and in the wider world it seemed as if liberal democracy faced no serious challenge to its whiggish advance. Centrists of the world had nothing to lose but their nagging sense that the new century might throw up new problems that they had not foreseen. So how did we get to where we are today?

Fast-forward 25 years, and the biggest change for most people in Britain and the world is probably the advances in technology, the internet and the smartphone. Lives are easier for most people, but politics is more fragmented. At the turn of the century, Blair had subdued the Tories, but it was assumed that when they came back, they would copy New Labour, and Cameron did: gay marriage, pro-EU. All that was blown up by the 2016 referendum, and now it is not obvious that either the Tories or Labour will survive as national parties at all.

Yet the biggest change in politics is the great class inversion: Labour is now the party of the graduate middle class, while the Tories and especially Reform are the parties of the non-graduate working class. All the assumptions of the two-party system 25 years ago are defunct. This is how I think we got here …

2000 Britain’s first home broadband connection was installed in Basildon, Essex. It is hard to recall what life was like when almost all of it was offline. Although there has been a lot of angst about slow pace of economic growth for most of the quarter-century, and about the negative effects of new technology, for most people the quality of life has increased in ways that are not measured by GDP: online shopping (Tesco online grocery deliveries started to take off in 2000), knowledge, and the convenience of life admin.

2001 Planes flew into the twin towers. It became starkly clear early in the new century that liberal democracy was not going to have it all its own way. The whole world united in supporting George W Bush, the new president of the US, although he did not seem to be equal to events, in pursuing the authors of 9/11 to their hiding places in Afghanistan. The whole world, that is, apart from Jeremy Corbyn, a backbench Labour MP, who set up an organisation called Stop the War. The world would not be united for long.

2002 Euro notes and coins were introduced in the eurozone countries. Blair’s energy and leadership helped compensate for Britain being in the EU’s second tier. Many respectable economists thought the new currency would collapse, but the history of the EU took a quite different turn.

2003 Blair supported Bush’s invasion of Iraq. The Labour Party (and the EU) were divided.

2004 The EU expanded from 12 members to 22. The Blair government decided against imposing temporary restrictions on free movement from new members, partly for good liberal reasons, and partly because, as Ed Balls said, “we didn’t think many people would move”. A million Poles came to Britain in the next few years, changing the Europe question in British politics from one about a currency to one about immigration.

2005 Blair was re-elected for a third term, but his party and his country were moving away from him.

2006 Charles Clarke was sacked as home secretary because he promised that every foreign prisoner would be considered for deportation on release – and they were not. The Blair government had gained control of an early wave of asylum applications, but the issue of immigration was threatening Labour in new ways.

2007 The iPhone was launched in November. As soon as I saw one, I knew it would change my life. It did, very much for the better. Partly this was because I was now on a thing called Twitter, which, until Elon Musk bought it in 2022, was a blast.

2008 On the negative side, the financial crisis. On the positive, Barack Obama won the election. It seemed that the politics of calm deliberation, thoughtful courtesy and pragmatic social justice was still alive. And he even served two terms. Yet his mere existence, let alone his historic significance in the American politics of race, had an appalling effect on the Republican side, which coarsened and degraded itself.

2009 The MPs’ expenses scandal. An informal system that, in effect, compensated MPs for their relatively low level of pay looked terrible when exposed to the light of day, and added fuel to the anti-politics fire.

2010 The most important thing that happened in the election, which I still think Labour could have won if Alan Johnson had replaced Gordon Brown, was that Gillian Duffy, a former Labour voter in Rochdale, confronted the prime minister about immigration from eastern Europe and he called her “some bigoted woman”. The Labour Party responded to its loss by electing Ed Miliband as its leader.

2011 The forgotten referendum on changing the voting system. I wouldn’t bother with that again. And, as Nick Clegg himself said, it would have made no difference at all if the vote had been on a truly proportional system.

2012 The London Olympics. A happy time. Not so good: Xi Jinping, authoritarian nationalist, became general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party.

2013 David Cameron delivered his speech at Bloomberg in the City, promising a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU in the first half of the next parliament.

2014 Cameron won the Scottish independence referendum at the cost of blowing up Scottish politics for a generation. Again, he was right in principle, but he should not have conceded the right to decide the question, the date and the franchise to Alex Salmond.

2015 The Labour Party sealed its overreaction to the success of the Blair years by electing Corbyn on the inane grounds that “at least he believes in something, even if it is ‘Imagine’ by John Lennon”.

2016 The EU referendum in Britain and the election of Donald Trump in the US completed the grand slam of the retreat from the sort of politics that had dominated the turn of the century.

2017 Theresa May tried to secure the substantial majority she thought she needed to get Brexit through the Commons and was blindsided by the electorate, which was under the temporary illusion that Corbyn was a decent bloke who believed in traditional Labour things. She should have given up when she lost her majority altogether, having to rely on the DUP, but instead condemned parliament to two years of pointless deadlock over Brexit.

2018 The Salisbury novichok poisoning was the end of Corbyn, whose initial reaction was to take Vladimir Putin’s side in questioning the government’s account and with his reluctance to explicitly hold Russia responsible for the attack.

2019 Boris Johnson, the winner of the EU referendum, finally claimed his prize three-and-a-half years later, becoming leader of the Conservative Party and winning the general election in a landslide.

2020 Johnson had two achievements to his name. First, he took Britain out of the EU, which is what the people voted for; and he delivered a vaccine programme, which started with Margaret Keenan, a 90-year-old grandmother, in December – faster than anyone had believed possible.

2021 A video of Allegra Stratton failing to answer a mock question and joking about a lockdown party in Downing Street, in her audition to be Johnson’s spokesperson, was leaked a year later. That was the end of Johnson’s premiership, although it took several more months of poor decisions before he was finally relieved of his duties.

2022 The Conservative Party had its Corbyn moment in electing Liz Truss – the first time party members of any party had directly chosen a prime minister, and one that MPs would probably not have chosen. The restoration of common sense, in the form of Rishi Sunak, a leader of Obama’s virtues, came too late to save the Tory party.

2023 The Rwanda scheme was ruled unlawful by the Supreme Court in November. Sunak had promised to stop the boats, but failed to do so. Migrants started using dinghies to cross the Channel in numbers in 2020, which had nothing to do with Brexit: once the “ease” of the route was discovered, despite its dangers, the numbers grew.

2024 Keir Starmer fought a brilliant defensive campaign and won an election victory that looked like Blair’s on the numbers, but which was very different in its underlying meaning. Meanwhile, Kamala Harris fought a poor defensive campaign and lost.

2025 Shabana Mahmood was appointed home secretary in Starmer’s September reshuffle. In my view, the Labour government’s fate hangs on her ability to succeed where Sunak failed, in stopping the boats. Although such an appointment would have been unthinkable 25 years ago, Blair’s recent implied endorsement of her suggests that he thinks that her tough approach to immigration is an updating of New Labour’s politics for the second quarter of the 21st century.