Ukip denies criticism of new ‘concerning’ logo likened to Nazi symbol

The UK Independence Party (Ukip) logo has denied claims that its planned new logo resembles a symbol used by the Nazis.

The far-right party, led by Nick Tenconi, has submitted a new logo to replace its current yellow and purple pound emblem.

The new black and white logo, which will need to be approved by the Electoral Commission, features a shield and spear as well as a slogan branding the party “the new right”.

However, the cross on the logo has drawn criticism from those who say it resembles the Iron Cross, which was used as a military medal in the Kingdom of Prussia and later by the Nazis.

The party has denied that the symbol is an Iron Cross, instead insisting it is a Cross Pattée, a Christian symbol.

The logo was described as “ever so slightly concerning” on social media, with many noting the similarities between the logo and the Nazi symbol.

Sunder Katwala, the director of the British Future think tank, wrote on BlueSky: “Ukip have submitted a new logo and slogan to the Electoral Commission, swapping the £ pound sterling symbol for a cross, that looks very much like it is modelled on the Iron Cross used by Prussia & Germany 1871-1918 and Hitler’s Nazi regime from 1933-45.”

One person wrote on X (Twitter): “It is proposing to change its party logo from what looks like a £ sign to an iron cross, which looks very much like Nazi Germany.”

“The Iron Cross returns,” another wrote, while others described it as “sinister”.

A Ukip spokesperson denied the claim, and said: “The Cross Pattée has been featured throughout British history and is used as the Victoria Cross, sits on the crown of our monarch, and is also found within the parliamentary logo. Are critics suggesting that the King, parliament and our war heroes are all Nazis?

“It is outright offensive, ignorant and Christophobic to suggest that the Cross Pattée is a ‘Nazi symbol’. The Cross Pattée is displayed throughout Christian religious texts, and these efforts to slander us with vile allegations is simply religious bigotry and discrimination.”

The logo has already been seen on flags at the party’s demonstrations, but still needs to be approved for use by the Electoral Commission.

The party, which was previously led by Nigel Farage, is now led by Mr Tenconi.

In October last year, supporters of the party were due to gather in London’s Tower Hamlets, but were banned from doing so by the Metropolitan Police because of what officers called a “realistic prospect of serious disorder” due to the area’s large Muslim population.

The demonstration was part of a series of events taking place across the UK, which were promoted as a “mass deportations tour”, with organisers calling on attendees to “reclaim Whitechapel from the Islamists”, Ukip’s X profile said.

Anger grows at South East Water CEO as thousands without water

Calls for the resignation of South East Water chief executive David Hinton have grown from a trickle to a roar as tens of thousands of homes across Kent and Sussex are without water for the fourth day in a row, with no clear end to the crisis in sight.

Sir Keir Starmer has been urged to send in the army, and an investigation has been launched, as the failure comes just two weeks after another outage in the area affected 24,000 homes in Tunbridge Wells.

Now, many of the same people face further disruption, which may not be rectified until “at least the weekend”, The Independent understands.

South East Water has set up water distribution sites and staff told The Independent around 1,000 cars an hour were arriving to collect bottled water.

Mike Martin, the LibDem MP for Tunbridge Wells, who previously called for Mr Hinton’s resignation has said the government “needs to grow a pair, and call for him to go” too.

These calls have been backed by the leader of Kent County Council, Reform UK’s Linden Kemkaran, who has also written to the board of South East Water calling for Mr Hinton to be fired.

Mr Martin told The Independent: “I’m absolutely livid, along with all my constituents. We had two weeks without drinking water in December, and now we’ve got it again. Nothing that we learnt the first time round has been picked up this time round.

“There’s been really poor communication, poor crisis management, and it’s a shambles.

“I’ve written today to NatWest, which own 25 per cent of South East Water to ask if they think this is acceptable.

“Quite simply Dave Hinton needs to go. The company is beset by groupthink and they can’t see all of the problems that they face.”

He said the government should go “much further” in terms of holding South East Water to account, and said “the government needs to grow a pair, and call for him to go”.

The water “is going to be on and off until at least this weekend”, Mr Martin told The Independent, adding, “just ignore what South East Water are saying – they don’t know what they’re doing”.

“Not only is the infrastructure depleted, but the leadership is rubbish and it’s that double whammy that’s causing all these issues.”

On Tuesday the Parliamentary Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Efra) committee, to which Mr Hinton gave evidence last week, recalled him to parliament after the committee chairman, Alistair Carmichael said he and his colleagues remained “deeply sceptical” about the water company’s version of events.

Mr Martin said Mr Hinton’s evidence last week amounted to “misleading parliament and holding the House of Commons in contempt”.

Reform UK’s Ms Kemkaran said the local situation was “really bad”, and went beyond affecting domestic concerns.

“This is day number four that people have been without water,” she told The Independent. “The problem has been moving around. One area would go off, then come back on, then a different area, and another, it’s been absolutely appalling. And I’m afraid the communication from South East Water has been absolutely abysmal. It’s not good enough.”

“It’s not just, ‘can I have a shower before I leave for work’, it’s affecting agriculture too. We have many many farms here. I was speaking to a dairy farmer who didn’t have the water to flush out his milking equipment, so therefore all the milk he took from the cows the next morning had to be thrown away.”

She added: “Hair dressers can’t wash the die out of anyone’s hair. Restaurants and cafés have all had to shut their doors. The problem stems from South East Water not investing and fixing the infrastructure. Dave Hinton’s position has become completely untenable. He’s been missing in action too many times now. He’s got to go.””

Across the area of Tunbridge Wells affected by the current outage, people are furious with the response from South East Water.

Chrissie Bayley, who runs a beauty salon, said the previous outage had meant she’d cancelled some clients, and said the ongoing uncertainty was impacting her business.

“You can’t actually rely on the water. I need to flush the toilet and allow clients to go only for a wee. I’ve had to wash people’s faces in Evian. It’s crazy.”

John Oliver, a local resident, told The Independent the current outage was even more frustrating than the last one: “Everything is intermittent. We had water today for 45 minutes. Then it went off, and that’s it. We had an hour yesterday.”

He said “the buck stops with [Mr Hinton]. His account at the select committee was so inconsistent. Hopefully he’ll be fired.”

David Ayre, who said he lives “just round the corner”, said: “We can’t wash, and it’s been going on such a long time, and the guy who runs it all is earning £500,000 a year. I’d like to see him (Mr Hinton) fired. He’s got to be held responsible for his actions.”

Another local resident, Niamh Taylor, said that Mr Martin was “really fighting our corner”, but that “in all honesty we just want to see (Mr Hinton) fired. We’ve been thinking of coming together and maybe involving solicitors. It’s been disgusting.”

The Independent has contacted South East Water for further comment.

Birmingham-Manchester rail line planned two years after HS2 scrapped

Keir Starmer is set to announce plans to build a new railway line between Birmingham and Manchester, the Independent understands, just over two years after the HS2 expansion was scrapped.

Rishi Sunak cancelled building the high-speed network between the two cities in October 2023 in order to save money.

But now ministers are expected to set out plans as they confirm proposals for new and improved rail links across the North of England, as part of a scheme known as Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR).

The moves come as Labour tries to see off the threat of Nigel Farage’s Reform, with Sir Keir’s at risk of losing dozens of parliamentary seats across the north of England at the next general election.

Mr Farage’s deputy Richard Tice has said that a Reform government would axe any high-speed rail schemes earmarked for the north.

With Labour trailing Reform in the polls, the party hopes that delivering on issues like public services and infrastructure can help it woo disgruntled voters in constituencies across the area.

Sir Keir has promised people across Britain will feel “positive change” this year, amid growing questions over his premiership and speculation he will face a leadership challenge after difficult elections in May.

Before he became prime minister Sir Keir said he could not promise a Labour government would reverse the government’s decision to scrap HS2, despite calls for a pledge from Labour’s Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham.

His comments came after Mr Sunak was criticised by two former prime ministers, David Cameron and Boris Johnson, for cancelling the rail link north to Manchester.

And the National Audit Office warned that the scrapping of HS2 would cost £100m and take up to three years.

At the time, Mr Sunak said he had been forced to act when costs “doubled”, but insisted that the money saved would be spent improving rail and road links in England and Wales instead.

NPR was originally suggested by the then Conservative chancellor George Osborne in 2014.

At that stage he said that he wanted to create highspeed rail links between the major cities across the North.

The plans have suffered from the chaos that affected the Tory governments in the later years of that decade and into the 2020s.

Anne Boleyn painting is ‘actually a different royal’, claims historian

A portrait of Anne Boleyn held by the National Portrait Gallery may have been painted to show major similarities between Henry VIII’s second wife and their daughter, who became Elizabeth I.

Researchers have suggested that the painting, done in 1584, almost five decades after Boleyn’s execution, was specifically painted with a resemblance to Elizabeth I as a key feature, to help give additional legitimacy to Elizabeth as monarch.

“This is definitely a portrait of Anne Boleyn, and that is what the artist intended it to be. But it’s more important than a likeness of her, because it carries political weight,” said Dr Owen Emmerson, the co-curator of a new exhibition at Hever Castle – the Boleyn family’s ancestral home.

“This is a very deliberate act and not done retrospectively. It’s been commissioned like this – there’s intention here. It’s serving a purpose.”

“If you look at the context of when it was created, this is a really pivotal moment in Elizabeth’s reign. That’s chiefly due to the fact she’s under increasing pressure because of the many Catholic plots that are threatening her rule,” he told The Independent.

“She’s been excommunicated, so the pope’s given licence to her subjects to challenge and overthrow her, and it’s compounded by the fact that she’s no longer of child-bearing age, she’s unmarried… so she cannot look to the future to promote her legitimacy.”

He said that at this time, a pattern emerged in several portraits of Anne Boleyn in which she appears to particularly resemble her daughter, which Dr Emmerson suggested was a canny move to “promote her legitimacy by looking to the past to try and solidify her claim to the throne”.

“This is a clever way of doing that,” he said. The reason she needs to look like her ancestors is that her mother was executed for treason and adultery – there are widespread rumours [Elizabeth] is not Henry VIII’s daughter, so retrospectively she’s made to look like a Tudor.”

Despite the decades since her mother’s death, Elizabeth I was keen to use imagery as a kind of propaganda as she faced mounting concerns about her grip on the throne.

“This wasn’t a carefully orchestrated effort,” Dr Emmerson said. “Anne Boleyn shouldn’t look like a Tudor – she married one – but that’s beside the point. It’s a very visual way of showing Elizabeth’s legitimacy.”

He said the painting would most likely have been commissioned by one of her courtiers for public display to show allegiance to Elizabeth. “This is a very bold way of proclaiming her legitimacy,” he said.

In the 16th century, literacy rates were low, so society was particularly driven by a visual language – “a lot of imagery was conveyed through portraiture”.

“These weren’t cheap things to produce; they were quite expensive.”

The individual artist who painted the 1584 painting has been recognised through their specific way of painting pearls.

The art historian Lawrence Hendra, who works for gallerist and TV presenter Philip Mould, identified several paintings done by the same artist, largely due to their paint handling when it came to depicting pearls, and in lieu of a name, they have come to be known as “the pearl painter”.

Mr Hendra drew Dr Emmerson’s attention to the paintings by this artist, of Anne Boleyn and another of Catherine of Aragon, also held at Hever Castle. This was when Dr Emmerson first spotted the mother-daughter resemblance in the paintings.

Dr Emmerson’s new book, Capturing the Queen: The Image of Anne Boleyn, is co-authored with Kate McCaffrey, the assistant curator at Hever Castle.

An exhibition of the same name at Hever Castle opens on 11 February 2026, and presents the largest collection of artwork and artefacts associated with Anne Boleyn ever shown in one place.

Who is attending Davos? Trump to lead largest US delegation ever

President Donald Trump is set to return to the World Economic Forum‘s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, next week, leading a record-sized US delegation, organisers announced on Tuesday.

The Geneva-based think tank, which organises the prestigious gathering, noted that Mr Trump’s assertive foreign policy, particularly on issues such as Venezuela and Greenland in recent months, has stirred concerns among both allies and adversaries. He will be joined by five Cabinet secretaries and other senior officials for the event, running from Monday until 23 January.

The Alpine resort is preparing to host 3,000 participants from 130 countries, including 850 chief executives and chairs of the world’s top companies, the forum confirmed.

Forum President Borge Brende stated that six leaders from the Group of Seven nations, including Mr Trump, are expected to attend. They will be joined by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Syria’s Ahmad al-Sharaa, among other prominent global figures.

A total of 64 heads of state or government are expected so far — also a record — though that number could increase before the start of the event, he said.

China’s delegation will be headed by Vice Premier He Lifeng, Beijing’s top trade official, Brende said.

Among the scores of other high-profile attendees expected are European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, World Trade Organization Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala as well as tech industry titans Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, and Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.

Brende said the U.S. delegation will include Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, along with Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and special envoy Steve Witkoff.

The forum, which held its first annual meeting in 1971, has long been a hub of dialogue, debate and deal-making. Trump has already attended twice while president, and was beamed in by video last year just days after being inaugurated for his second term.

Critics call it a venue for the world’s elites to hobnob and do business that sometimes comes at the expense of workers, the impoverished or people on the margins of society. The forum counters that its stated goal is “improving the state of the world” and insists many advocacy groups, academics and cultural leaders have an important role too.

This year’s edition will be the first annual meeting not headed by forum founder Klaus Schwab, who resigned last year. He’s been succeeded by interim co-chairs Larry Fink, chairman and CEO of New York-based investment management company BlackRock, and Andre Hoffmann, the vice chairman of Swiss pharmaceuticals company Roche Holdings.

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‘Container ship captain ‘did nothing’ to prevent Humber estuary crash’

A Russian ship captain was “negligent” and did “absolutely nothing” to prevent the deadly Humber Estuary crash, a court has heard.

Vladimir Motin, 59, was charged after his container ship, Solong, collided with US oil tanker the Stena Immaculate in the North Sea on March 10 last year, while he was on sole watch duty and responsible for navigating the ship.

Mark Angelo Pernia, 38, died in the collision off the East Yorkshire coast, but Motin the defendant from Primorsky, St Petersburg, has denied the manslaughter of his crew member.

Opening his Old Bailey trial on Tuesday, prosecutor Tom Little KC said the case involved the “entirely avoidable death” of one of his crew.

He told jurors: “Ultimately, he would still be alive if it was not for the grossly negligent conduct of the man in the dock, the defendant, and who was the captain of the very vessel upon which the seaman who lost his life was working.

“The captain owed him a duty of care to keep him safe and the defendant, we say, manifestly breached that duty of care and caused his death. The risk of death was serious and obvious and negligence was so bad that it was gross.”

On the morning of March 10 2025, the Solong was in the North Sea approaching an area where other ships, including the Stena Immaculate, were anchored.

At about 9.47am, the front of the Solong crashed into the side of the anchored Stena Immaculate.

The US registered tanker was carrying large quantities of aviation fuel which leaked out, causing fire to spread across both ships, jurors were told.

Mr Pernia was working at the front of the Solong and died in the collision, although his body has never been found, Mr Little said.

Mr Little said the Solong was on a direct collision course with the Stena Immaculate for more than 30 minutes and it was “obvious” a crash was possible, both when the vessel became visible to the naked eye and from information displayed on computer equipment available to Motin.

The prosecutor told jurors that, despite warning signs that he needed to act, the “highly-trained” Motin “did precisely the opposite, and he did nothing to avoid the collision”.

“He could and should have acted differently,” Mr Little said.

There were a number of things the “highly trained” captain “could and should have done”, Mr Little said.

“It is this gross breach of duty to the man he killed, and indeed to his own crew, that led inexorably to a death and to him being on trial before you at the Old Bailey,” the prosecutor said.

Mr Justice Andrew Baker told jurors they must be “blind” to the nationalities of sea farers involved in the collision between the two ships.

He said: “This case is brought here, by which I mean, in this country, because this maritime collision occurred in English waters.

“It is not in any way unusual to find that the sea farers involved came from a range of different nationalities.”

He added this fact is “entirely irrelevant” to the issue jurors must consider and urged them to be “blind” to where various mariners may have come from.

Motin has denied manslaughter. The trial continues.

DWP reveals two new payments to support cost of living in 2026

Millions of households will soon be able to benefit from cash payments, rent support, food vouchers and more under a new scheme set to be launched by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).

From April, councils will be able to administer Labour’s new ‘Crisis and Resilience Fund’, designed to support low-income households at times when affording the essentials becomes a struggle.

This is a scenario many are facing, with recent research by the Trussell Trust finding that 14 million adults are going without food because they cannot afford it. At the same time, stubbornly high household bills mean many are finding it difficult to balance their finances.

The government has pledged £1 billion a year for at least three years to local authorities through the new fund. It will replace the Household Support Fund, which has previously had its continuation and exact funding confirmed yearly.

Responding to the funding, the Local Government Association welcomed the long-term commitment, but told The Independent in October that many councils do not feel it will meet local needs. While nearly two-thirds (63 per cent) surveyed said it would help to at least a small extent, just two per cent said that it will to a great extent.

On Tuesday, the DWP revealed more information about the scheme in guidance to councils, confirming what households across the UK can expect come April.

Alongside provision to bolster local support services, two new payments will be introduced under the fund: the crisis payment and the housing payment. These both serve different purposes, and will have different eligibility.

The new ‘crisis payment’ – as it will be known across the UK – is designed to offer payments to “individuals in crisis,” the DWP said.

Like the Household Support Fund, councils will continue to have discretion over the exact eligibility criteria. However, the government’s guidance says it should not be limited just to those in receipt of benefits.

Authorities will use the crisis payment to support low-income households that have experienced a financial shock, or are at risk of entering crisis.

This could include people going without essentials like food, shelter or heating, or items like furniture and appliances. It covers the many reasons this could occur, such as disasters, health issues, theft, leaving an abusive relationship, or a gap in regular income.

The DWP has asked that councils take a ‘cash-first’ approach to the crisis payment, meaning cash payments should be awarded unless there is a fair reason not to do so. This could be in the form of food vouchers, or directly provided the required items.

A crisis payment is designed to meet occasional or short-term need, the department adds, and not become a supplement to regular income.

Some local authorities will also use the funding to provide parents of children eligible for free school meals with food vouchers over the summer.

A new ‘housing payment’ will also be introduced across the UK, aimed at providing financial support towards housing costs for those in need. It will replace the discretionary housing payment for claimants from April.

This will usually be related to rent, such as needing rent in advance, a rental deposit, or shortfall. It could also cover a lump sum associated with housing, like the cost of moving.

Unlike the crisis payment, the housing payment will be restricted to those in receipt of certain benefits. These are either housing benefit, or universal credit with the housing element for rental costs. However, DWP says those who do not qualify but are still in need could be considered for a crisis payment instead.

It will also have the scope to be longer-term, and paid more regularly. For instance, someone seeking work and currently facing a rental shortfall could apply for a regular housing payment until they are able to increase their income or find somewhere else to live.

The DWP was approached for comment.