Thousands turn out for paddle out protests over ‘sewage scandal’
Thousands of people voiced their anger of the spilling sewage into UK waters at dozens of “paddle out” protests held across the country.
At more than 40 beaches, rivers and lakes across the UK, people armed with boards and placards take to the water to demand urgent reform of the water industry in events organised by the campaign group Surfers Against Sewage.
It comes as new Opinium polling suggested that fewer than one in five people believe they will able to swim safely at their local bathing spot by 2030 without risking their health as a result of sewage pollution.
And the survey of 2,000 people found just 21 per cent of respondents trusted the government to ensure water suppliers reduce sewage spills, with more than half a million discharges into our seas, lakes and rivers in 2024.
Data released by the Environment Agency in March showed water companies released a record amount of raw sewage into England’s rivers and seas last year. The Independent Water Commission is currently reviewing its evidence before making recommendations to government on reforming the water industry.
Stuart Davies, an organiser of the Brighton protest, said: “We are paddling out because we seem to be in the same place each year. We see record levels of sewage pollution in our blue spaces, especially here on the south coast.
“Many a time, I have been personally affected. I can’t go sea swimming. I can’t go surfing. I also volunteer for the Wave Project which provides surf therapy for young people. That’s been cancelled a few times, and we couldn’t go in the water. It makes me extremely angry.
“We are paddling out in protest of the scandal and to call for total reform of the water industry.”
The Independent recently donated £20,000 to Surfers Against Sewage to help support the group’s work, as new figures revealed the number of beauty spots deemed unfit for swimming because of sewage had doubled in a year.
Of England’s 451 protected bathing spots, 37 are now rated as poor – the lowest category – because they contain unsafe levels of potentially deadly bacteria, including E coli and intestinal enterococci, due to sewage spills.
Ship crashes into Brooklyn Bridge, snapping masts and killing two
A three-masted Mexican Navy sailing ship, the Cuauhtémoc, reportedly carrying around 277 people, has struck the Brooklyn Bridge on New York City’s East River.
The collision occurred just before 9 p.m., with all three of the ship’s 147-feet-tall masts striking the bridge and snapping as the vessel appeared to be moving backward.
Pictures quickly emerged online, appearing to show multiple sailors clinging to rigging high up on the masts in the aftermath. At a press conference held by New York City Mayor Eric Adams, it was confirmed that there were 19 people injured, five critically, and contrary to earlier reports, no one fell into the water.
The mayor later said on X that two of the injured had passed away.
Bystanders on the Brooklyn waterfront caught the incident on video. The ship appears to strike some type of scaffolding or gantry on the underside of the bridge, which can then be seen swinging.
Debris can be seen falling toward the deck of the ship, including portions of the masts, lights, and rigging. The sails were not up at the time.
Hamilton ‘devastated’ after Ferrari qualifying failure at Imola GP
Lewis Hamilton was “devastated” after suffering another blow in his first season at Ferrari during a captivating qualifying session at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix on Saturday.
Hamilton, who admitted this week he wasn’t expecting his first season at Ferrari to be so “tough”, and teammate Charles Leclerc missed the opportunity to fight for pole in Imola, with both drivers knocked out of contention in Q2.
The pair will start alongside each other on the grid for Sunday’s race, with Leclerc a place ahead in 11th and Hamilton in 12th.
Oscar Piastri claimed pole position for McLaren, with Max Verstappen in second and Hamilton’s former teammate George Russell in third for Mercedes. Piastri’s teammate Lando Norris will start a disappointing fourth on the grid.
“Tough one, tough one,” said Hamilton, who has only managed one top-five finish in the first six races of the season and currently lies 90 points behind championship leader Piastri.
“Ultimately, I feel super gutted, devastated, that we weren’t able to get through. I really feel we’ve made many positive steps over the weekend.
“When we put the new tyres on, we didn’t have any more grip, couldn’t go any faster, everyone else managed to switch on the tyres. To be in front of the Italian fans, first time for Ferrari, to not manage to get to Q3 is bittersweet.”
Asked about his prospects for Sunday’s race, Hamilton replied: “It’s all big ifs, it’s a very difficult track to overtake at.
“We’ll have to battle hard to figure a way to progress forward – just getting into the top 10 and further into the top 10 will be tough.”
Hometown hero Kimi Antonelli, the Mercedes 18-year-old rookie, also endured an afternoon to forget as he could only manage P13.
Qualifying on Saturday, the first in Europe this season, started in dramatic circumstances as Yuki Tsunoda – in just his fourth race for Red Bull – suffered a huge crash.
Losing control of his car at the Villeneuve chicane, Tsunoda spun violently into the gravel before his car flipped heavily into the catch fencing surrounding the racetrack.
Fortunately, Tsunoda walked away from the incident but was taken to the on-site medical centre.
A matter of minutes later, Alpine debutant Franco Colapinto spun at Tamburello corner, hitting the tyre barrier. The 21-year-old, brought in to replace Jack Doohan by de facto Alpine boss Flavio Briatore, quickly apologised but stated he was OK.
The drama did not stop there, with the shock double Ferrari elimination following in Q2 to the dismay of the thousands of red-clad fans in the grandstands.
Afterwards, Leclerc was dejected and insisted he is unable to perform “miracles” as the Scuderia target a strong race on Sunday.
“You can always do a bit more with a lap, but we are just nowhere at the moment,” Leclerc said. “There’s not enough performance in the car, I keep repeating myself. We need to be better.
“Very hard [for the race], I can fight as much as I want but I cannot do miracles. This is what there is in the car, I’m trying to extract the maximum out of it.”
The fight for pole position was intriguing, with Verstappen initially in the driving seat before Piastri snatched top spot with his final run by 0.034 seconds.
Russell, opting for a medium tyre, came home third with Norris’s title hopes receiving a further blow. He will start in P4.
The race on Sunday is at 2pm (BST).
Hundreds of MPs and peers call for Starmer to ban Iranian army
Sir Keir Starmer is facing calls from hundreds of MPs and peers to ban Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) amid a deteriorating human rights picture in the UK and after three Iranian men were charged with spying in London.
Former Labour leader Lord Kinnock is among those urging the prime minister to outlaw the IRGC, warning “the human rights crisis in Iran continues to worsen”.
It came as three Iranian men living in London were charged under the National Security Act, accused of engaging in conduct likely to assist a foreign intelligence service.
More than 550 MPs and peers, also including former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith and ex-home secretary Suella Braverman, signed a letter criticising Iran’s “hijab and chastity law”.
They said it “mandatory hijab, suppressing women who lead the protest and resistance movement to prevent future uprisings”.
“Appeasing this faltering regime betrays democratic values, emboldens its repressive policies, and undermines global security as Tehran continues its nuclear ambitions and terrorism,” the letter said.
It added: “Given the regime’s complete blockade of all avenues for political activity, the international community must recognise the Iranian people’s right to regime change.
“The IRGC should be designated as a terrorist organisation,” the letter said.
The UK has previously resisted calls to ban the IRGC over fears it could sever the country’s diplomatic link with Tehran.
But Tory MP Bob Blackman, chairman of the influential backbench 1922 Committee, said “it’s time to change course on our Iran policy”.
Mr Blackman, who coordinated the letter, said: “Our ally, the US, rightly designated the IRGC as a terrorist entity several years ago. While the regime has never been weaker, we must set aside all wrong-headed political and diplomatic calculations and proscribe the IRGC as a terrorist entity — an action long overdue.”
Following the recent arrests and charging of the Iranian men, Mr Blackman said: ““Iranian terrorism has reached our soil. A serious terror plot, involving several Iranians, was recently thwarted in the UK.”
The letter came as Mostafa Sepahvand, Farhad Javadi Manesh and Shapoor Qalehali Khani Noori were charged with engaging in conduct likely to assist the Iranian foreign intelligence service between last August and February.
Sepahvand was also charged with engaging in surveillance, reconnaissance and open-source research, intending to commit serious violence against a person in the UK.
Manesh and Noori have also been charged with engaging in surveillance and reconnaissance, with the intention that serious violence against a person in the UK would be committed by others.
Former Tory MP and minister David Jones said there is a “growing consensus among UK politicians that the time for a new policy on Iran has arrived”.
The MPs backed Iranian opposition group the National Council of Resistance of Iran’s 10-point plan to “end the religious dictatorship and transfer sovereignty to the people’s representatives”.
The group calls for an end to compulsory hijab and religion, an end to dictatorship and executions and a democratic Iranian state. The Foreign Office was asked to comment.
Following the charges brought against the three Iranian men, Yvette Cooper promised to strengthen national security powers.
The home secretary said: “I want to thank the police and security services for their continuing work on this very serious investigation, and for their immense dedication to protecting our national security and the safety of our communities.
“The charges that have been laid against these three individuals must now take their course through the criminal justice system and nothing must be done to prejudice the outcome of those proceedings.
“But we will also take separate action to address the very serious wider issues raised by this case.
“The police have confirmed that the foreign state to which these charges relate is Iran, and Iran must be held to account for its actions.
“We must also strengthen our powers to protect our national security as we will not tolerate growing state threats on our soil.”
You don’t speak for middle England, Mr Farage, and here’s why
How many people, I wonder, seriously think that Keir Starmer has much in common with Enoch Powell? It’s true that whoever came up with the phrase “island of strangers” was, at best, naive. But those three words don’t do justice to his whole speech. Powell was a (proud) racialist. Starmer is not.
But, somehow, in modern Britain as elsewhere, we are more comfortable with pigeonholes. Not so long ago, Starmer was typecast as weak-kneed and woke-minded on the issue of immigration. Now he apparently spies the River Thames foaming with much blood. Maybe his views aren’t so extreme, but he has simply been persuaded to nudge a little to the right to undermine the threat from Reform. In other words, perhaps Starmer is, at heart, that most ridiculed of creatures: a centrist dad.
But aren’t most of us somewhere in the middle on most of the big issues of the day? The common wisdom is that we’re living in an age of great polarity, which is true up to a point. But, increasingly, I suspect, most of us aren’t attracted to extremes. We are repelled by pigeonholes and huddle for warmth somewhere in the middle instead.
I am no John Curtice, so what follows is a gut feeling rather than a psephological revelation. But that feeling, when it comes to immigration, is that most people appreciate that, as a country, we do benefit from migration, and that we also need controls on who – and how many people – should be allowed in.
In other words, we do buy the argument that migrants bring considerable benefits and are probably necessary for growth, but we also understand those who fear that, wrongly handled, there could be a risk to social cohesion – and that unskilled workers, in particular, feel threatened by the lower pay rates that an excessive number of foreign workers can cause.
In other words, Starmer was right two years ago when he spoke up in favour of migration and also right today in wanting to set boundaries. He’s more or less in tune with most people, who are not in favour of uncontrolled migration any more than they share a cruel obsession with denying sanctuary to those most in need.
See also Israel-Palestine. Most people surely agree that Israel had to defend itself after the barbarous 7 October attacks by Hamas. But many, if not most, people now consider that Israel’s response has been wildly, possibly criminally, disproportionate. By holding these two thoughts, they are not siding with either the Islamist radicals or the ethno-nationalist hardmen propping up Benjamin Netanyahu. Stop the killing, end the famine, and get around a table and talk. That’s where most people are.
On trans issues, the majority probably feel sympathy and understanding towards people who feel trapped in the wrong body. They probably believe that such people should be free to live whatever lives they want – including self-identifying in terms of gender. They simultaneously acknowledge that, in a tiny proportion of cases, there might be issues to resolve sensitively around toilets, prisons and sport. Anyone with any personal knowledge of trans people will know that 99.9 per cent are not in prison, don’t compete in sport and quietly resolve any issues around bathrooms. The obsessive vitriol and noise about the 0.1 per cent leaves most of us cold.
And then Brexit. Most people could see there were some sovereignty issues with “rule from Brussels”, but that there were also huge economic benefits from being part of a trading bloc. It was, literally, a trade-off: freedom of movement brought advantages as well as disadvantages.
Self-evidently and by a small margin, it transpired that we were relaxed about a form of decoupling. But support for the most extreme version of severance was limited and is declining now the economic (and security) consequences are becoming icily apparent.
That leaves climate change. Most people accept that it is very real – and that we need to move fast to try and mitigate the damage that a significant rise in warming will cause. Most support an energy transition, though they are up for a constructive argument about how fast and at what cost. The majority of people don’t want to go back to coal or maintain our reliance on fossil fuels for longer than we have to. If there’s a cleaner way of generating energy, bring it on.
Moderation in all things. But contrast that instinctive moderation with how most of these issues are presented and discussed as either/or rather than a bit of both. When did we lose the art of nuance and reasonable discussion? The easy response is to blame it all on social media algorithms, which do, indeed, favour the shouters and the polarisers. But is that the only explanation?
Some argue that a fairer voting system would change the nature of the debate so that we could discuss in shades of grey rather than the prevailing black and white. We’re tired of the adversarial approach to everything.
Does the mainstream media have to accept some responsibility for the way we force people to take more eye-catching positions than those they actually believe in? Or have we simply lost the art of nuance? Keir Starmer as Enoch Powell – really?
Our instinct for moderation was once considered a defining British – or, at least, English trait. We didn’t fall for fascism or communism in the Thirties because we – well, because we huddled somewhere in the middle.
George Orwell, famously writing under the hail of Nazi bombs in February 1941, said: “Like all other modern people, the English are in process of being numbered, labelled, conscripted, ‘coordinated’. But the pull of their impulses is in the other direction, and the kind of regimentation that can be imposed on them will be modified in consequence. No party rallies, no youth movements, no coloured shirts, no Jew-baiting or ‘spontaneous’ demonstrations. No Gestapo either, in all probability.”
And so it turned out. Which makes it all the stranger that Nigel Farage, with his Mr Toad flat cap and yellow cords, has managed to brand himself as the epitome of Englishness. Speak for England, Nigel? I don’t think so. Let’s hear it for the neglected middle.