Trump says Putin has to ‘get moving’ on ceasefire

US president Donald Trump has warned that “Russia has to get moving” as his envoy Steve Witkoff prepared to meet Vladimir Putin.

He posted on his social media platform: “Russia has to get moving. Too many people ere DYING, thousands a week, in a terrible and senseless war.”

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s Western allies have agreed a record £18 billion (€21bn) of military support for Kyiv, Britain has announced.

UK defence secretary John Healey opened the meeting of the Ukraine Defence Contact Group (UDCG) in Brussels with a plea to his fellow defence ministers to “step up our support for Ukraine in the fight”. Mr Healey added: “2025 is the critical year for the war in Ukraine, and this is the critical moment.”

Top US diplomatic envoy Steve Witkoff has travelled to Russia for a meeting with Russian president Vladimir Putin. The Kremlin has confirmed Mr Witkoff and Mr Putin are set to meet for talks, according to Russian news agency Tass.

US president Donald Trump has pledged that officials will look at evidence that Chinese mercenaries are fighting alongside Russian forces against Ukraine.

From Gove to Cleverly: Who is on Sunak’s resignation honours list?

Rishi Sunak has unveiled his resignation honours list, with former Cabinet minister Michael Gove, ex-chief whip Simon Hart and former Scottish secretary Sir Alister Jack all receiving gongs from the former prime minister.

It is a well-established tradition for outgoing prime ministers to hand peerages and other gongs to key allies after they leave office.

Mr Sunak has already awarded honours to a number of close aides, including a peerage for his former chief of staff Liam Booth-Smith and a knighthood for deputy prime minister Oliver Dowden, which were handed out in a separate dissolution honours list to mark the end of the last parliament following the general election.

But who features on today’s list, and why have they made the cut?

Michael Gove has been handed a peerage in Rishi Sunak’s resignation honours. He held multiple cabinet posts over his political career, including education, environment, and housing secretary, but never held one of the UK’s three great offices of state.

However, he was a highly influential figure in successive Conservative governments and built a reputation for being able to make or break leadership bids or campaigns. He ran for the party leadership himself in 2016, scuppering Boris Johnson’s bid and sparking a long-standing rift between the pair.

Mr Gove went on to serve in Mr Johnson’s cabinet but was sacked in the final hours of his time in office after calls for him to resign. He is also said to have betrayed David Cameron by taking a more prominent role in the 2016 Vote Leave campaign than he was ever expected to.

Asked about Gove’s ennoblement, a close ally of Mr Johnson’s told The Times he is a “more worthy recipient than many”, but dubbed him “one of the most treacherous people in politics”.

Alister Jack, also handed a peerage, was secretary of state for Scotland under Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak – serving in the post from July 2019 up until the 2024 general election, when he stood down as an MP. He served as the Scottish Conservative MP for Dumfries and Galloway from 2017 to 2024.

He was previously expected to be offered a peerage in Boris Johnson’s resignation honours list, but declined to step down as an MP early, ruling him out of the running. He received a knighthood in Mr Sunak’s previous round of honours in July 2024, which were handed out to mark the end of the last parliament following the general election.

Sir Alister’s nomination is controversial as he was the most senior politician caught up in the general election betting scandal. In April 2024, the former MP placed a successful bet that the election would fall between July and September, after losing two similar bets in March.

Simon Hart – who served as an MP from 2010 to 2024 – was chief whip under Rishi Sunak from October 2022 to 5 July 2024, serving as the main point of contact between MPs and No 10 and becoming a close ally of the then prime minister. Before that, he served as secretary of state for Wales from December 2019 to July 2022.

But more recently, the former chief whip – who has now been given a peerage – made a name for himself after publishing a scandalous account of his time in Westminster.

The memoir offers a behind-the-scenes account of life inside the Conservative government during one of its most chaotic periods, offering up stories about MPs being extracted from brothels and aides attending sex parties.

Mark Harper, who served as transport secretary in Rishi Sunak’s government, also featured on the former prime minister’s resignation peerages list. Mr Harper served as MP for the Forest of Dean from 2005 to 2024 and became a close ally of Mr Sunak, regularly going out to bat for the Tory leader in the more turbulent periods of his premiership. Before his time in Rishi Sunak’s government, he served as chief whip in the final year of David Cameron’s premiership.

Victoria Prentis, who was a Tory MP for almost a decade before standing down at the last general election, was Attorney General under Rishi Sunak, serving in the role from October 2022, and has now been handed a peerage.

She said it is a “huge privilege” to have been recognised in Mr Sunak’s resignation peerages list, adding: “In the Lords, I hope to focus on my areas of interest: the law and the countryside, and to continue to support justice for Ukraine.”

Eleanor Shawcross, who has been given a peerage, served as director of No 10’s policy unit while Rishi Sunak was prime minister, responsible for shaping the party’s approach in the leadup to the general election. Ahead of her appointment, she donated £20,000 to Mr Sunak’s Tory leadership campaign.

She is married to Lord Simon Wolfson, CEO of clothing retailer Next and a Tory peer, elevated to the House of Lords in 2010 by David Cameron. He has also made significant donations to the party over the years, amounting to more than £100,000 in total.

Stephen Massey is a more unknown figure on Rishi Sunak’s resignation peerages list, having previously served as CEO of the Conservative Party headquarters. He announced his departure from the role in December, after Kemi Badenoch took over as party leader, having served in the position for two years.

He had been involved in the Tory party for more than 50 years, and notably handed a generous £25,000 donation to Mr Sunak’s failed campaign to become leader of the party when he went up against Liz Truss.

James Cleverly, who has held two of the great offices of state and served as both home secretary and foreign secretary under Rishi Sunak, has been awarded a knighthood. He has been the MP for Braintree since 2015, and came third in the race to succeed the former Tory leader. He unexpectedly crashed out of the race in a vote of MPs, leaving Robert Jenrick and Kemi Badenoch to battle it out.

Jeremy Hunt served as chancellor under Rishi Sunak, after being brought in at the end of Liz Truss’ disastrous premiership to steady the ship following her mini budget. He became a key figure in the Sunak administration, presiding over record increases to the overall tax burden in the UK. He has been handed a knighthood.

Mel Stride, who served as work and pensions secretary in Rishi Sunak’s government, has been awarded a knighthood in the former prime minister’s resignation honours list. The now shadow chancellor became a key figure in Mr Sunak’s failed election campaign, being wheeled out almost every week to defend the government’s record on the morning broadcast round. He stood for the party’s leadership following Sunak’s resignation, but was knocked out in the first round.

Mother who murdered her two young sons, 2 and 5, in the bath is jailed

A mother who killed her two young sons while in a psychotic state has been jailed for life.

Kara Alexander, 47, of Dagenham, east London, was found guilty of murdering Elijah Thomas, two, and Marley Thomas, five, in the bath at their home on Cornwallis Road in December 2022.

At Kingston Crown Court on Friday, Mr Justice Bennathan sentenced Alexander to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 21 years and 252 days.

Emergency services were called at around 3pm on 16 December 2022 after the bodies of the two boys were found by their father when he went to collect them for the weekend after Alexander had failed to return his messages.

He found his two sons together, dressed in pyjamas, in the lower bunk of their shared bunk bed. When the boys’ father came downstairs to call for help, Alexander had run away through the gardens into a neighbouring street.

She was found and arrested a short time later. The two boys were pronounced dead at the scene and a post-mortem examination established that both boys’ cause of death was either drowning or suffocation. Alexander denied murdering her children, claiming they had drowned in the bath while she was asleep.

Sentencing Alexander, the judge said: “You drowned them both by your deliberate acts.”

The judge remarked that she had been smoking “skunk” on the evening of the incident, as she had been doing every night for weeks.

He said he could not reach any conclusion but that in her state at that time she intended to kill the boys, pointing out that she had “unspeakably” held the boys under water for “up to a minute or two”.

The judge said that afterwards, Alexander had dried the boys and put them in clean pyjamas and laid them together in bed.

“The bath was probably still run from their normal evening routine and I do not think for a moment that your dreadful acts were pre-meditated,” he said.

While the judge saw every sign that Alexander was a “caring and affectionate mother” to both children before the events, he said she was clearly in a cannabis-induced psychotic state.

Alexander had previously had a psychotic episode in 2016, according to the judge, who said cannabis likely played a part there, but that he could not be sure if she was aware it could trigger another psychotic state.

The judge noted that in the same month of the incident, Alexander had spoken to two members of her social circle about her cannabis use. They knew she was looking after two small children and at least one knew of her previous psychotic episode.

“Yet neither of them warned you of any risk or sounded any note of caution at all,” he said.

He said Alexander would mourn her sons for the rest of her life.

In his closing remarks, the judge warned of the dangers of drugs: “The heavy use of skunk or other hyper-strong strains of cannabis can plunge people into a mental health crisis in which they may harm themselves or others.

“If any drug user does not know that, it’s about time they did”, he added. “At your trial, Kara Alexander, the three psychiatrists who gave evidence disagreed about a number of things, but on that they were unanimous.”

Detective Chief Inspector Paul Waller of the Metropolitan Police, who led the investigation, said: “This is an incredibly tragic case, which has left a father without his two beloved boys and a family without two young brothers.

“Kara Alexander will spend the next two decades behind bars, where the memory of what she has done will haunt her forever.

“To the family and friends of Elijah and Marley, while no amount of time will erase the pain of such a loss, I hope this sentence serves to bring some semblance of justice.

“I hope you can now move on with your life, remembering the boys as you knew them, and treasuring the happy times you spent with them.”

Handmaid’s Tale fans ‘cannot believe’ ending of first episode of season six

The Handmaid’s Tale has finally premiered its sixth and final season. But even after a nearly three-year pause, fans have found the new season to be well worth the wait.

Hulu’s hit dystopian show, based on Margaret Atwood’s best-selling book series about a totalitarian society, Gilead, ruled by a fundamentalist regime that sees women as property of the state, debuted the first three episodes of season six on April 8 in the U.S. The final season won’t premiere in the U.K. until May 3 on Channel 4 and on Amazon Prime Video.

*Warning — Spoilers for ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ season six to follow*

The new season welcomes the return of Elisabeth Moss as lead character June, whose “unyielding spirit and determination pull her back into the fight to take down Gilead,” according to an official logline.

“This final chapter of June’s journey highlights the importance of hope, courage, solidarity, and resilience in the pursuit of justice and freedom,” the synopsis adds.

The first episode of season six, titled “Train,” picks up right where the fifth season ended with June and her frenemy Serena (Yvonne Strahovski) and their babies unexpectedly thrown on a refugee train together heading westbound out of Toronto.

As the two women catch up, Serena — who, with her late husband Commander Waterford, previously forced June into servitude as a handmaid — seeks to turn over a new leaf with June.

Serena continually offers to June help, who resentfully accepts. At one point, Serena finds a doctor onboard to treat the arm injury June sustained in the season five finale. Eventually, June comes around, and when Serena gathers all the pregnant women in a train car to be treated, the former opens up about the violent abduction of her oldest daughter, Hannah.

It doesn’t take long for the doctor to recognize Serena, the widow of Commander Waterford, as a war criminal. After he notifies an onboard police officer — whose wife and son were casualties of Gilead — an angry mob forms. Soon June is the only person standing in the way of the mob. In order to protect Serena and her son, June pulls the train’s emergency brake and shoves the two off into the night. An ostracized June then retreats to the floor of the train car.

Once the train resumes its journey and arrives at its final destination of Alaska, June and her baby Nichole are taken into a refugee camp. While June is waiting around with the other new arrivals, a medic completing intake forms drops her clipboard in shock. “June, June Osborne,” the woman shouts, “Sweetheart!”

It’s at that moment that viewers learn June’s mother (played by Cherry Jones), who was originally believed to be dead, is indeed alive. The scene ends with the two tearfully embracing.

Several fans have since flocked to X to share their reactions to the episode’s heartwarming ending.

“Me after the first episode of season 6 of the handmaid’s tale!!!” one wrote, alongside a picture of Tituss Burgess looking completely stunned. “i can’t believe that ending!!! It was so worth the wait, this is truly the greatest show ever.”

Next to a series of screenshots of June and her mother hugging, a second commented: “I am sobbing uncontrollably.”

“No two people deserved this more than them,” a third added. “This is june’s light at the end of the tunnel and the beginning of a newfound sense of hope.”

The remaining seven episodes of season six of The Handmaid’s Tale will be released Tuesdays on Hulu, before concluding on May 27. The final season premieres in the U.K. on May 3 on Channel 4 and on Amazon Prime Video.

McIlroy mounts Masters fightback with Rose leading at Augusta

Rory McIlroy will try to salvage his bid to win the Masters on a crucial Friday at Augusta National after he fell apart towards the end of his first round to leave himself an uphill climb in pursuit of a first green jacket.

Justin Rose rolled back the years on Thursday to storm into a first-round lead but McIlroy’s pursuit of his Ryder Cup teammate unravelled in extraordinary fashion with four dropped shots on his final four holes to finish seven off the pace.

Rose, who came close to winning the green jacket in 2015 and 2017, carded a remarkable first-round score of 65 to mark his 20th appearance at Augusta, leaving the 44-year-old three clear at the top of the leaderboard. Rose made eight birdies, with a dropped shot at the 18th his only bogey of the day.

Earlier, Scottie Scheffler, the defending champion, made an ominous start with a calm and controlled bogey-free round of -4. But McIlroy, looking to complete a career grand slam, continued his excellent pre-tournament form as he caught the world No 1, joining him on -4 in a share of second place with four holes to play. However, McIlroy’s hopes of gaining further ground on Rose were thwarted when he found the water on the par-five 15th, with his chip across the green running over and down into Rae’s Creek. It was followed by another double bogey on the 17th as McIlroy somehow finished at even-par, and a tie for 26th.

Follow all the latest scores, updates and the evolving leaderboard from the Masters at Augusta below:

The global event bringing fresh energy to planet-positive solutions

As we navigate significant environmental and social challenges, the return of ChangeNOW, the world’s biggest expo of solutions for the planet, is much needed to reinvigorate climate action. The 2025 edition, which will take place from April 24th to 26th, will host 140 countries, 40,000 attendees, 10,000 companies and 1,200 investors.

Visionary leaders, established businesses and start-ups alike will gather to showcase over 1,000 sustainable solutions and groundbreaking innovations in key sectors such as clean energy, biodiversity, sustainable cities and the circular economy.

The ChangeNOW 2025 summit will be held at the iconic Grand Palais in Paris, a nod to the 10th anniversary of the Paris Agreement. Reuniting for the occasion will be guest speakers Mary Robinson, the former (and first female) president of Ireland, Laurent Fabius, former French prime minister, Patricia Espinosa, former UN climate chief and diplomat and Diána Ürge-Vorsatz, leading climate scientist and professor – all of whom were in the French capital a decade earlier to help shape the Paris Agreement at COP21.

There may have been obvious setbacks to environmental policy around the world of late, the United States’ recent withdrawal from the Paris Agreement being a notable one. However ChangeNOW 2025 intends to reaffirm the spirit of Paris, while serving as a catalyst for progress ahead of COP30 and the United Nations Ocean Conference (UNOC). “Ten years after COP21, ChangeNOW is where leaders and changemakers converge to accelerate the ecological and social transition,” states Santiago Lefebvre, founder and president of ChangeNOW. “Thousands of solutions will be showcased demonstrating that meaningful progress is within reach.”

His message of positive climate action will be supported by a multitude of world famous faces who will be in attendance at the auspicious event. Natalie Portman, Academy award-winning actress, director, author, activist, and producer; Captain Paul Watson, Founder of Sea Shepherd and Ocean Conservationist; Hannah Jones, CEO of The Earthshot Prize and Olympic champion boxer and gender equality advocate Imane Khelif are just a few of the names set to appear at ChangeNOW 2025.

With over 500 speakers and 250 conference sessions exploring climate action, biodiversity protection, resource management, and social inclusion, ChangeNOW 2025 will also hear the insights of acclaimed corporate leaders from Accor, Bouygues, Henkel, Lidl, Nexans, and Saint-Gobain, who will explain how businesses can be the ones to drive real change.

And the event will not only be an opportunity for global policymakers to discuss next steps in climate action, it will also be a platform for nations to showcase local innovations through their country pavilions. Expect impactful solutions from countries including South Africa, The Netherlands, and Ukraine – demonstrating international collaboration on the topic of climate.

In addition to the packed program of speakers, workshops, exhibits and networking opportunities, ChangeNOW 2025 will host the Impact Job Fair on Saturday, 26 April, with over 150 recruiters and training organisations offering in excess of 600 roles. Dedicated to the public and young professionals, the interactive workshops, educational activities, and career opportunities in sustainable sectors on offer aim to inspire the next generation of changemakers.

The summit will also present the annual Women for Change conference and the accompanying portrait exhibition, which showcases 25 women who are set to have a significant positive impact on their communities, countries or on a global scale over the next 10 years. Created in 2021, the Women for Change initiative aims to platform and provide opportunities for women who are leading change around the world but require further recognition or investment to continue their work. The annual flagship event, which takes place on the afternoon of April 24th, offers women the chance to discuss new ideas, network with likeminded people, and also acquire funding to help solidify their leadership, and amplify their impact.

Step outside the Grand Palais and take a few steps to the Port des Champs Elysées, on the bank of the Seine, where the The Water Odyssey village awaits. One of the event’s standout features, the immersive 1,000 m² exhibition is open to the public and highlights solutions to maritime and river sustainability challenges – offering a mix of conferences, interactive displays, and sensory experiences to engage all ages.

For three days, ChangeNOW will transform Paris into the global capital of impact, bringing together policymakers, entrepreneurs, investors, and the public in the pursuit of sustainable progress.

Book your ChangeNOW 2025 ticket here

What Tony Blair told Keir Starmer about how to deal with Donald Trump

Keir Starmer needs an “even more powerful No 10 than it was in my day”, Tony Blair told students at King’s College London last week – the day after Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs announcement. “When I was prime minister people wanted the system improved,” he said. “We did improve it. Public services got better. Today they want the system changed. That is a fundamental difference, and you’re not going to be able to do that without a really strong No 10.”

Voters are more impatient with politicians today, he said, and argued that new technology is the only way of meeting those demands: “Today you’ve got to have a strong centre, and you’ve got to be driving this application of technology to government and public services from the centre.”

He said: “You’ve got a choice today if you are in politics – you’re either a disruptor or you’re going to get disrupted.” It is a mark of his influence over the current prime minister that this phrase appeared in Starmer’s address to a special political meeting of the cabinet in February. “Right now you can see with the Doge experiment in the US: that is a disruption – you punch a hole in the wall and see what happens,” Blair said, referring to Elon Musk’s controversial appointment to head the Department of Government Efficiency.

Blair did not seem to think much of it – “Let’s see what happens with it” – but he went on: “If conventional politics wants to get traction today it needs to provide a way of really changing the system, and I think technology is the instrument to do that, but it has to be driven from No 10, an even more powerful [government] than it was in my day. And it was by the end of it quite powerful. A lot of people didn’t like it, but if you don’t drive it from the top it never gets done.”

Funnily enough, the official briefing to journalists of what Starmer told the cabinet on Tuesday sounded as if it had been dictated by Blair: “He [the prime minister] emphasised digital reform would be critical in transforming the state.”

However, Trump’s declaration of a trade war the day before the class complicated the advice that Blair offered his successor: “I don’t really understand the intellectual argument behind the tariff policy. But I think we have to wait and see how it settles down – if it does settle down…”

He appeared to echo Starmer’s “cool heads” approach: “For the UK we are going to have to decide whether to retaliate or not. Probably not. I don’t think it is in the UK’s interest to do that. The risk is if you end up with a trade war [involving] Europe, America and … countries of the far east, I don’t know where it ends. I’m hoping somewhere in there is a plan.”

Having dealt with the first Trump administration over the Abraham Accords (the normalisation of relations between Israel, the UAE and Bahrain in 2020) and over the Balkans, Blair reflected, “I have to say I found them very easy to deal with”. He said: “I made it my business to get with whoever was American president because that was part of my job. I also found getting on with the first Trump administration very easy. But obviously the tariff thing is going to be a disagreement.”

Answering students’ questions, Blair claimed to have foreshadowed Trump’s withdrawal of support for Ukraine. The former prime minister explained that a large part of managing the war in Kosovo in 1999 involved negotiating with Bill Clinton, “because the Americans did not want to get involved”.

He said: “It’s of contemporary interest that I began European defence with the French government at St Malo, after the Kosovo war, precisely because it became clear to me that we could never have done it without the Americans, and that 90 per cent of the assets were American. I took the view after that that, ‘This is crazy: what happens if the Americans decide they don’t want to be part of something? Then where do we go? We wouldn’t be able to do anything.’ But European defence got caught up in a whole lot of Eurosceptic arguments. So it didn’t go where it should have gone, which is how do we create the capabilities that are needed if for any reason America decides to step aside.”

While some of the lessons from his time in government are relevant today, others are now slipping into history. He was asked about the causes of the intelligence failures in Iraq. “People forget this,” he said. “There had been a huge build-up of intelligence about Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction for a long time, and the first military action that I took was with Bill Clinton in Iraq in 1998. There were UN inspectors going in and out. It was the only country that had used chemical weapons since the Second World War, both in the Iran-Iraq war [and against its own people].

“The intelligence failures were a combination of the strong belief that people had that because he had used them he would use them again, and people feeding information out of Iraq because they wanted military intervention that would topple the dictatorship.”

He was also asked to give a “definitive answer” to a question that has engaged our students since Professor Jon Davis and I set up the course in 2008: did he really want to join the euro? “The definitive answer is this,” said Blair. “I wanted Britain to be at the heart of Europe, to be a key leader in Europe. I would have been happy to be part of the euro – provided that the economic case was what we used to call a compelling case.

“And the trouble was because the British economy moved in different synchronicity from the French and German economies, it was never clear that that compelling case was there. And I never thought that we could win a referendum. I didn’t think it was possible to take Britain into the euro without a referendum – and I didn’t think it was possible to win it unless you were able to say the economic case was overwhelming. Now, in time that might have changed. And in time it might have been that it became clear that it was in Britain’s interest to be part of the single currency. But I thought that what was important was that we were always in principle in favour of joining if the economics were right.

“So that is the situation. If the economic case had been there, so that we were able to go out and tell people that economically it’s clear that this is the right thing to do, a bit like the original case for joining the European community, we could have done it, and maybe even won it – although the reason for saying there should be a referendum was simply because I thought it was politically impossible to do it any other way. Do I believe that referendums are a very good idea in deciding things like that? No, frankly. But I couldn’t even have got it through cabinet if I tried to do it without a referendum.”

This account by Blair of his own views seems consistent to me with the analysis offered by Ed Balls – now also a professor at King’s – that Blair wanted to keep his options open, and had to appear to want to join if Britain was to be “at the heart of Europe”, but knew a referendum was unwinnable. The difference between Blair and Gordon Brown on the euro was therefore more about the difference between sounding positive or negative than it was about the issue itself (on that, Blair seems lukewarm: he would have been “happy” to have been part of the euro).

But Blair insists that there were policy differences between him and Brown, and that these hold a lesson for Labour today: “Historically, I have a very clear view of what the problem for Labour has been. Labour in government has usually been brought down by itself and by opposition to having to make difficult decisions, because all governments do. Labour now forgets that, thinking of some nirvana where no difficult decisions have to be taken. And opposition to the leadership is usually outside the tent.

“Gordon wasn’t ‘opposition’, but he was a focal point for a different approach, more traditional Labour than New Labour, or real Labour as people sometimes called it, and it was better it was him, highly intelligent, himself a very effective political force, inside, than it would have been if he had been outside altogether, or it had been someone else that had emerged and took that mantle and was constantly battering the government.

“And so, it was a coalition and we did more or less keep it together. It was difficult. Believe it or not, I didn’t resent it as much as a lot of the people around me – I thought, ‘It’s politics.’ But the difference between old and new Labour was important, and it was ultimately a policy issue, because my view was and is that it’s only a version of that political position that can win power sustainably.”

It was a coalition that did not survive Brown’s defeat in 2010. “What I’m absolutely sure about is that if Labour had chosen the other Miliband brother I don’t think Brexit would have occurred. Because we would have had a Labour Party that was a credible contender in the 2015 election,” Blair said. “Not that I don’t like Ed [Miliband], because I do – I think he showed a lot of character in the 2015 election, with all the attack he was under, but I think he was not in the right policy place to win.”

Blair argued that the position adopted by New Labour was and remains the only way to win, but accepted that the environment has changed, and that it has become harder for “conventional politics” to offer solutions that satisfy the voters. Part of this is the change wrought by social media, which he said “is really hard”. He mused that “maybe in the end, communication on social media is just the same thing, it’s just a different medium, but I do think that makes it a lot harder”. A problem of social media, he said, is the tendency to frame decisions “in terms of deception or conspiracy, rather than: you’ve got to decide what to do”, he said.

He traced the rising distrust of the motives of leaders back to the 1970s: “In my view, Watergate did a lot of damage. In the sense that it was bad enough but the sense of what happened was actually worse than what happened. And you ended up in a situation where for ever afterwards everyone wants to find a conspiracy.”

John Rentoul is a visiting professor at King’s College London; he teaches the ‘New Labour Years’ module with Dr Michelle Clement, as part of the MA in government studies under the leadership of Professor Jon Davis

Has your pension value dropped? Here’s why you shouldn’t worry

If you’ve avoided the news over the past week surrounding stock markets plummeting and then phoenix-like rises, you’ve done well.

An immediate consequence of greater-than-expected tariffs put in place by US president Donald Trump was a rapid fall in global equities. Trillions was wiped off the combined value of companies around the world in a matter of days before a sharp rise across Wednesday night and Thursday, following the announcement of a 90-day pause.

However, those who have investments in an ISA or other share-dealing account, would likely have seen a significant drop compared to even a few weeks ago – and the same goes for those who don’t actively invest themselves, but have been casting a worried eye over their pensions.

Given that workplace or private pensions (and Self-Invested Personal Pensions) will be invested in several of the markets which have been falling of late, it’s likely that the values within those pensions will have dropped plenty too. This can cause alarm or uncertainty for people who might not have been expecting to be affected by something as abstract as US-China trade relations.

The funds paid into pensions – such as from salary sacrifice, employer contributions – are put into different investments. Sometimes you can select which type of investments you want to focus on, others might leave them as they are when they join a company.

Regardless, the money will be invested in equities (stocks and shares in companies) and funds, in commodities (such as gold), in bonds (national debt which pays a dividend) and potentially other assets such as cash, property or others.

Over long periods of time, investing generally offers more reward, in exchange for taking on more risk, than holding cash does, which is how your pension pot grows. But it’s rarely a straight line and dips are part and parcel of it.

Pensions are a long-term game, as most investments should be.

While it’s natural to have jitters when you notice as much as a 10 per cent fall-off, you don’t need to be concerned that you’ll “miss out” on that money or that it has “disappeared”, particularly if you are still decades away from retiring.

For those whose job is investing, these falls in equity prices are often an opportunity to secure greater returns for the long haul, making them potentially beneficial to your pension pot. So you shouldn’t be looking to make sweeping alterations or selling your portfolio solely based on these drops.

Fergus McDonald, associate financial planner at Evelyn Partners, explained how much difference it can make between panic-selling and simply doing nothing.

“It’s best not to take too much notice of short-term swings in the market,” The Independent.

“When stocks plunge a natural impulse can be to hit the sell button or not invest, but the best market days often follow the biggest drops, so panic selling or waiting for a recovery can significantly lower returns for longer-term investors.

“Looking back at FTSE 100 market data over 26 years from December 1998 to December 2024, if an investor just simply bought and held the index over this period their return would be 246.6 per cent.

“However, if they missed the ten best days of market returns over nearly three decades of market data, their return would drop down to 74.5 per cent.”

There will always be significant falls in value and surges higher along the way. Big swings shouldn’t sway you into doing something dramatic or worrying over your retirement fund.

However, there are things you can do to maximise your chances of wealth building for the future. You should check you’re getting tax relief on pensions contributions and it’s also wise to assess your pension schemes periodically to ensure you aren’t paying over the top in fees.

It’s also important to note that this is all regarding personal pensions, not your state pension. The amount you get from that is unaffected by stock markets.

There is, of course, one notable exception to the above, which is if you expect to retire or call upon your pension fund soon.

If that’s the case there are several options. The most obvious, if it’s possible, is to delay it. While nobody can predict the future, including in markets, historically they have always recovered from recessions, crashes and other significant losses in value.

Take Covid, for example: most markets declined in excess of 20 per cent when nations went into lockdown and the future looked uncertain. Within two years, many had surpassed where they were before the pandemic. Investing during that lower period would of course have yielded even further gains, rather than merely waiting two years for portfolio values to get back to where they started.

If waiting isn’t an option, you can talk through alternatives with an advisor.

“Approaching retirement is a very good time to seek professional financial planning and investment advice, especially if you have amassed a significant pot,” Mr McDonald explained.

“This is because the balance of your portfolio in terms of asset allocation becomes crucial as you near the point where you want to start using your pension saving.

“Advice that carries on into retirement can be very reassuring to make sure your investments are fit-for-purpose – those close to accessing their pensions who have looked on with dismay recently will be largely those whose investments were not well diversified and not structured to take account of the fact that cash would soon be needed. It’s best to make preparations years in advance of pension access, ideally with the help of professional advice.”