All posts tagged: Britain

Country diary: A jaw-dropping bounty of wildlife – and a reminder of what Britain has lost | Poland

Country diary: A jaw-dropping bounty of wildlife – and a reminder of what Britain has lost | Poland

Published by Sam Flores

Have I made a mistake in visiting Biebrza national park? Not that I mind encountering more bird species in a day than I do in a year at home. Nor do I regret meeting a young elk, all gangle and improbable proportions; or kneeling before a clump of lady’s slipper orchid in jaw-droppingly ostentatious bloom among Solomon’s seal and a carpet of lily of the valley. I definitely appreciate the homely clatter of the neighbourhood white storks, and the constant soundtrack of cuckoos and golden orioles. I certainly have no objection to watching the sunset from a wood-fired hot tub, listening to corncrakes as bats emerge and a beaver cruises past. But something shifts in me when, in the space of a few minutes in an observation tower, we watch three species of marsh tern hanging like precision-engineered angels to tweezer insects from the water’s surface, and a white-tailed eagle hunting greylag geese then settling with its mate in a dead tree to watch a train of common cranes in the field below meeting a …

The House Article | Battle For Britain – How Reform Plans To Take On Andy Burnham

The House Article | Battle For Britain – How Reform Plans To Take On Andy Burnham

Published by Sam Flores

Robert Kenyon 6 min read2 hr The outcome of the Makerfield by-election will determine the direction of Britain. Harriet Symonds explores how Nigel Farage’s Reform are taking the fight to the King of the North Reform has been burned once and knows it needs a different tack. In a marked change from the Gorton and Denton by-election strategy earlier in the year, in which the party was seen to underperform, the party will lean heavily into local issues to win in Makerfield. It is set to be a test not just of the party’s growing reach in Labour heartlands, but of whether Andy Burnham’s personal popularity in Greater Manchester will be enough for Labour to beat Nigel Farage’s party. Those familiar with the strategy claim keeping the campaign as local as possible will play well against Burnham in such a consequential by-election, which could see him become the next Prime Minister. Their thinking is that any increased interest in Burnham’s national policy platform will draw attention away from local issues in …

Britain Preparing for Mission That Could Clear Strait of Hormuz

Britain Preparing for Mission That Could Clear Strait of Hormuz

Published by Sam Flores

President Trump has fumed repeatedly about Britain’s failing to help the U.S. wage war on Iran. The United Kingdom responded by allowing U.S. bombers to strike Iran from southern England, while Britain’s fighter jets have flown thousands of defensive missions across the region. Now the British military is embarking on yet another phase: to secure the Strait of Hormuz if the war comes to an end, dispatching an advanced destroyer to the region and another ship armed with autonomous mine-hunting equipment. The move to remove mines from the waterway could also serve to deflect further criticism from Mr. Trump. The war with Iran was not Britain’s making, but the country cannot escape the conflict’s far-reaching effects. Halted traffic in the strait has crippled international shipping and driven up energy prices in the United States and around the world. The British military took a handful of reporters on Friday to Gibraltar, a small patch of British territory at the tip of Spain. The trip seemed like an effort to highlight its military capabilities and resolve, and …

Britain braces for long, hot traffic queues amid extra border checks | Transport

Britain braces for long, hot traffic queues amid extra border checks | Transport

Published by Jenni Sidey

An especially hot late May bank holiday weekend is expected to bring more traffic to the roads than usual at the start of the half-term break taking place in parts of the UK, motoring organisations have warned. With temperatures forecast to pass 30C in places by Monday, coastal roads are predicted to be among the busiest, with long queues expected towards seaside resorts and the Port of Dover, where delays in border checks are compounding the holiday rush. The RAC expects almost 19 million drivers to hit Britain’s roads over the long weekend, 1 million more than the same holiday period in 2025. Its polling found almost four in 10 drivers intend to take a leisure trip, with the heaviest traffic likely to be on Friday and Saturday, although about 5% of drivers said high fuel prices would keep them at home. The average price of petrol across the UK is 158.52p, the highest since December 2022, according to the RAC. The AA said its polling suggested that day trips to the coast would account …

The House | China And Clean Energy: Is Britain Swapping One Dependency For Another?

The House | China And Clean Energy: Is Britain Swapping One Dependency For Another?

Published by Sam Flores

Illustration by Tracy Worrall 10 min read5 hr As the conflict in Iran highlights Britain’s exposure to fossil fuel markets, Zoe Crowther examines fears UK’s shift towards clean energy might mean replacing one dependency with another For years, the political logic of the energy transition has rested partly on the promise of greater sovereignty and less economic exposure to volatile oil markets, unstable regimes and geopolitical shocks. But as countries race to electrify transport systems, build offshore wind farms and expand solar generation, another dependency is becoming harder to ignore: China’s dominance in the clean energy supply chain. In a surprisingly hawkish speech in Brussels earlier this month, EU commissioner for climate, net zero and clean growth Wopke Hoekstra said that the EU had been “too naïve for too long” over the role of China in Europe’s energy sector. He warned of the danger of creating a new reliance on Chinese cleantech after the negative impact of dependencies on Russian gas, and imported liquefied natural gas from the Middle East and …

Episode four: Born of Mary | LGBT rights and humanism in Britain

Episode four: Born of Mary | LGBT rights and humanism in Britain

Published by Sam Flores

In 1977, the campaigner Mary Whitehouse won a private prosecution against Gay News for blasphemous libel, after the paper published a poem imagining a Roman centurion’s love for the crucified Christ. It was the first successful blasphemy case in England for more than fifty years. In the backlash that followed, Whitehouse blamed her critics on an ‘intellectual gay humanist lobby’ working against her. There was no such group. Two years later, in 1979, a handful of activists decided that, if such a lobby did not exist, perhaps it should – and the Gay Humanist Group was born. Its founders called themselves, born of Mary. The phrase captures something of the long, often surprising relationship between humanism and the movement for sexual freedom that this week’s episode of Unholy Histories sets out to explore. The fourth episode of our podcast focuses on the entangled histories of humanism and LGBT rights activism in Britain; tracing how, time and again, the fights for freedom of conscience and freedom of sexuality have drawn on the same arguments, the same …

Weird Britain: 10 glorious oddities to visit and marvel at | United Kingdom holidays

Weird Britain: 10 glorious oddities to visit and marvel at | United Kingdom holidays

Published by Sam Flores

One thing unites the British more than anything else. It stands there in plain sight but is rarely spoken about. We may try to hide it; we may not admit it to ourselves; but under the surface, deep down, in the nicest possible way, we are all a little odd. Not in a sinister way, just eccentric, weird, unpredictable and downright wonderful. As a nation we have an artistic and creative zest and boffin-like inventiveness. In fields of innovation, we led the tech world with some of our brave and crazy inventions. Even our landscapes are damn weird, with some of the oldest, most mysterious and diverse geological oddities in Europe, and plentiful legends too. I spent years exploring the enchanting strangeness of Britain, discovering follies, eccentric public art, strange buildings, mysterious ruins and eerie landscapes for my Weird Guide, which features about 300 of these curiosities. Here are some of my favourites. The Yoxman, Suffolk In a field not far from the A12 in Yoxford, Suffolk, stands the Yoxman, an artwork of colossal proportions. …

Migratory bird numbers fall in Britain despite last year’s warm spring | Birds

Migratory bird numbers fall in Britain despite last year’s warm spring | Birds

Published by Jenni Sidey

After a mild, wet and stormy winter in the UK, spring 2025 was one of the warmest and driest ever, while the summer was the hottest since records began, most particularly in England and Wales. Good news, you might think, for migratory birds – especially for eight species of warblers that travel here from their winter quarters in Africa. Yet according to data from bird ringers, collated by the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO), last year’s breeding season was pretty disastrous. Four species – willow warbler, blackcap, garden warbler and common whitethroat – showed significant falls. Three others – sedge and reed warblers and lesser whitethroat – also declined, though less seriously. Only the chiffchaff, which winters closer to home in north Africa and Iberia, with some staying put in southern Britain, showed a rise in numbers. The BTO’s other major annual study, the breeding bird survey, revealed similarly mixed fortunes, notably for pigeons and doves. While woodpigeon and stock dove numbers continued to rise, the two smaller species, collared and turtle doves, continued their …

Even insiders don’t know what Burnham has planned for Britain – POLITICO

Even insiders don’t know what Burnham has planned for Britain – POLITICO

Published by Sam Flores

A fourth person who has worked with Burnham said that might be a plus when it comes to winning the next general election against the insurgent Reform Party. “I know it’s a banal thing, but we’ve not had a northern prime minister for a really long time, unless you count Rishi Sunak,” this person said. (Sunak represented a leafy Yorkshire constituency but is from the south of England.) “It does matter, because every weekend conversation … will be migration, housing, cost of living, dirty high streets, antisocial behaviour. Great — we win on those, we win the country.” The first person who has worked with Burnham said it is deeper than raw electoral politics. This person said Burnham sees many policy issues through two main lenses — rewiring the economy and bringing communities together. As such, he is not totally off the world stage. As mayor, he has carved out time in his diary to see diplomats — in part because Manchester has the most consulates of any English city apart from London. And he …

Why running Britain is so hard, no matter who does it – POLITICO

Why running Britain is so hard, no matter who does it – POLITICO

Published by Sam Flores

Things can’t only get better  It wasn’t always like this.  The last Labour prime minister to win big before Starmer was Tony Blair. When he came to power in 1997, the U.K. had a bigger economy than China’s, was a leading member of the growing European Union trade bloc, and was approaching peak oil and gas production in the North Sea. Blair led Britain for 10 years.  Nearly three decades on, Starmer inherited a country that has never really recovered from the economic shock of the 2008 financial crisis, is menaced by Russia, and now relies on imports for its energy security.  Keir Starmer celebrates winning the 2024 general election with a speech at Tate Modern in London on July 5, 2024. | Ricky Vigil/Getty Images It has found no lasting remedy for the resentment felt by many communities (outside London, the still-flourishing finance capital) who — over several decades — have seen traditional manufacturing roles move inexorably overseas. as the global economy tilts towards China and other rising powers.  “We had a pretty incredible run from the mid-to late-1980s, through the 1990s, until the [2008] crash,” said Jim O’Neill, a former chief economist at Goldman Sachs and an ex-Treasury …