Latest news with #UK
Daily Mail
17 minutes ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
EXCLUSIVE Shocking moment student brands Prince Harry a 'ginger f***' while William visits college
Despite living 5,462 miles apart, Prince William has been dogged by his brother ever since Megxit and a recent visit to meet south coast students was no different, MailOnline can reveal today. The Prince of Wales waved and was cheered wildly as he left Bournemouth and Poole College where the crowd left him in no doubt where they stood on the row between the rival brothers. A new video has emerged online and reveals that one rowdy student took his support for William too far - launching into an expletive-filled rant aimed at Prince Harry that his older brother probably heard through his open car window. The unnamed heckler can be heard yelling: 'Go on Will. I never liked Harry, the ginger f***'. Shocked people around him can be heard taking a sharp intake of breath, one spectator was visibly agog and a male voice, likely to be a teacher, said loudly: 'Don't you dare talk like that. Go inside. That's not on'. One woman said angrily to the sweary-student: 'Oi. Get in there now'. A third voice says: 'That is diabolical' as the convoy containing the future king sweeps away into the Dorset sunshine. William's visit was in the spring but has only just emerged on social media. The abuse aimed at Harry came at a time when he resigned 'in shock' from Sentebale, the African charity he founded in 2006 in memory of his mother Princess Diana. The student called Harry a 'f***' during a trip to Dorset by the Prince of Wales in March where he made a young royal fan's day after he gave her a warm hug. William, 43, embraced young Natasha Gorry as he visited Bournemouth and Poole College - just before the swearing about Harry. He was on his trip to the south of England, where was launching a new partnership between the Homewards programme, which he founded through the Royal Foundation, and Lloyds Banking Group, which aims to deliver homes in the region. Meeting Natasha Gorry, 24, outside the College, the Prince of Wales chatted to the royal fan who appeared starstruck. The future King then reached out to embrace Natasha, after which she seemed overwhelmed with joy. 'Go on, give me a hug. So nice to see you but you've got some lessons to go to now. I'm going to get you in trouble for keeping you out of your lessons now. You've got a free period now? When's lunch break? You've brought the sun out today, it's lovely,' he said. She said afterwards: 'I am so happy. He gave me a hug. I love it. I'm excited. It's my first time. I told him what course I was doing. He's an amazing guy.' William also met people who have experienced homelessness after suffering from mental health struggles. There, he joined CEO of Lloyds Banking Group Charlie Nunn who showed him around the 11-bed housing scheme. He also met with current residents supported by the organisation, who are being encouraged to develop skills that will help them live independently in safe and healthy spaces. Lloyds has pumped £50million into the project, which will go towards small and medium-sized housing providers and charities in areas where Homewards operates. William's solo visit came just a few days after he and the Princess of Wales embarked upon their first joint engagement in over a year after her cancer battle as they visited Pontypridd in Wales in early St David's Day celebrations.
Yahoo
20 minutes ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Liz Hurley helping beau Billy Ray Cyrus 'fix toxic family feud' after startling realisation
Elizabeth Hurley and her country legend beau Billy Ray Cyrus have been cosying up at glamorous events since going public in April – but their romance runs far deeper than red carpet appearances together, a source close to Liz has claimed. They told OK! that Liz, 60, is also helping mend the 63-year-old singer's heartache, by gently encouraging him to fix his fractured relationships with his children, including singers Miley and Noah, after he 'pushed them all away'. 'Liz is the love of Billy Ray's life – that's what he calls her,' claimed the source. 'Her friends are saying she's never been happier and that she feels she can totally turn his life around. He's seen how close she is to her own son, Damian and she is helping him mend those sometimes difficult relationships with his daughter and the rest of the family. They add: "She's helping him reconnect with his family and mend those relationships. She knows how important it is, as she's very close with Damian and she wants the same for Billy Ray. They're stronger than ever – he's fallen for her in every possible way. She's hoping she will be the guiding light and bring out the best in him.' Achy Breaky Heart singer Billy Ray has described Liz as 'a great human being' and credited her with bringing joy back into his life. The couple have appeared together at several high-profile events, from the Orizzonti/Rosso exhibition in Rome to various fundraising galas in London. They sent shockwaves through the showbiz world when they went public in April, following one of the most difficult chapters in Billy Ray's life. The American singer had been dealing with the fallout from his split from second wife Tish – who he had been married to for 30 years in 2022. This was followed by his subsequent brief marriage to third wife Firerose, who he married in 2023 and divorced in 2024. There were rumours of tension, following his split from Tish, among his six children – Miley, Noah and Braison (who he had with Tish), Brandi and Trace (who he adopted during his marriage to their mother, Tish) and Christopher (who he had with former girlfriend Kristin Luckey). Trace, 36, posted an open letter to his dad on Instagram in January to say the family were 'genuinely worried' about him. He wrote, 'Since my earliest memories, all I can remember is being obsessed with you and thinking you were the coolest person ever. I wanted to be just like you. The day you adopted me was the happiest day of my life. "Sadly, the man that I wanted so desperately to be just like I barely recognise now. It seems this world has beaten you down and it's become obvious to everyone but you. You may be upset with me for posting this but I really couldn't care less at this point. Me and the girls have been genuinely worried about you for years but you've pushed all of us away.' While Miley didn't respond to her brother's statement, there were rumours she had fallen out with her dad too. However, since Billy Ray started dating Liz, the family appear to be coming back together. The pair headed out to support Miley at the premiere of her new film Something Beautiful in London last month. 'Billy Ray has been on the wrong track and was previously hitting the bottle and struggling,' said our source. 'Liz leads a super clean lifestyle – she's very fit, super into what she eats and keeping in top shape, and she's trying to help him in every area of his life, from his health to his family.' Billy Ray and Liz's friendship began when they filmed the 2022 festive flick Christmas In Paradise together. Billy Ray previously revealed that Liz had contacted him while he was experiencing difficulties in his personal life, which became the trigger for their romance. Appearing on Apple Music Country's The Ty Bentli Show , Billy Ray recalled, 'I felt like, 'Wow, can life get any harder? Can it get any tougher?' For me, at a certain point, it was like, you can't get knocked down any flatter than lying on your back when life is kicking you. And in this moment a friend reached out.' Billy Ray said Liz's message said something like, 'Hey, it looks like life might be a little bit tough and just wanted you to know I'm in your corner – you've got a friend in your corner.' Billy explained that he didn't have Liz's number saved in his mobile and was baffled by who was behind the message. 'So, I text back, 'Who is this?' And it's like, 'Elizabeth Hurley.' Of all the people to reach out to me in that second that maybe I needed most – this friend who made me laugh.' READ MORE: Shoppers say 'two sprays' of Gucci's £26 floral perfume is enough 'for all-day'
Yahoo
21 minutes ago
- Sport
- Yahoo
Albion kit team completes 35-mile charity walk
The team walked 35 miles to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the club's charity foundation [Johnny Cantor/BBC] The team which looks after the kit for Brighton and Hove Albion's players has completed a 35-mile (56km) charity walk. Alex Burrows, Harry Wood and the club's media manager Matt Bishop set off from the village of Rustington in West Sussex on Wednesday and arrived at the Amex Stadium on Friday afternoon. Advertisement The event was to mark the 35th anniversary of the Brighton and Hove Albion FC charity foundation, with a fundraising target of £35,000. Mr Burrows said "the support was incredible all along the route". Known as Buzz, he is raising money for The Brain Tumour Charity after his son was diagnosed with a tumour. He said: "As a kit team, we work closely with the foundation and we all know the amazing work they have done in the local area to change lives through football over the last 35 years. "We're hoping to raise some money to help them over the next 35." The team members were joined on the first day of the walk by DJ and Seagulls fan Norman Cook, known as Fatboy Slim, and 2013 Masterchef: The Professionals winner Steven Edwards, a Hove restaurateur. Advertisement Mr Burrows told BBC Radio Sussex: "The first two and a half days were predominantly flat, but we hit some inclines on Friday which was tough. "I'm glad we got them on the last day rather than the first." Fatboy Slim (second from right) joined the team on day one of the challenge [Brighton & Hove Albion FC] Seagulls player Lewis Dunk joined the walkers on Friday. He said: "I've grown up here and I've always tried to get involved with the community and help as much as I can. "It has been a good day." The team handed out sports kit to local schools on the way. Fabian Hürzeler, Brighton manager, said: "It's a great opportunity to say thank you to the kit team. They do an unbelievable job." Advertisement Follow BBC Sussex on Facebook, on X, and on Instagram. Send your story ideas to southeasttoday@ or WhatsApp us on 08081 002250. More on this story Related internet links
The Guardian
22 minutes ago
- Politics
- The Guardian
‘Unless you see it, you can't believe how bad it is': the peer demanding a minister for porn
When the Conservative peer Gabby Bertin arrived for a meeting with the the science and technology secretary, Peter Kyle, earlier this year she startled him by laying out an array of pornographic images across his desk. 'They were screengrabs showing little girls, their hair in bunches, and massive, grown men grabbing little girls' throats,' she says. She had selected images which appeared to depict child abuse, and yet were easily and legally available on a popular website. 'Unless you see it, you can't quite believe how bad it is.' The minister appeared shocked and upset by the images, she recalls, so she quickly tidied them away and later shredded them. Bertin has noticed that her desire to talk frequently and openly about extreme pornography is not shared by all her Westminster colleagues. 'I've definitely seen people swerve at lunch, not wanting to sit next to me for fear of what they're going to hear coming from my mouth,' she told fellow delegates at the launch meeting of her pornography taskforce this week, prompting a flutter of sympathetic laughter. Since being appointed by the former prime minister Rishi Sunak to lead an independent review into the regulation of online pornography in December 2023, Bertin has observed how a double taboo has made most politicians extremely reluctant to engage. Some simply find the subject hugely embarrassing; others stay silent because they do not wish to appear prudish by criticising the proliferation of extreme and often illegal pornographic material online. She is frustrated by this reticence. 'You can't leave the pitch on this stuff just because you're worried about being accused of being too strait-laced,' she says. The government needs urgently to appoint a minister for porn, she recommends, to ensure that the issue gets the attention it deserves, rather than being passed reluctantly between the Home Office and the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology. A former adviser to David Cameron, Bertin has gathered cross-party support for her work and says she emails Keir Starmer so regularly about the issue that she has 'practically become his pen pal' (if you can have a pen pal who delegates to officials the responsibility of replying). 'We're really British about it so we don't want to have a graphic conversation about sex and porn,' she says, in an interview in the Westminster office she shares with several other peers. 'But you've got to shout about it as loudly as possible. The reason why we've got into this mess is because nobody has really wanted to talk about it.' By mess she means a situation whereby online pornography (which is viewed by an estimated 13.8 million UK adults every month) is not regulated to the same degree as pornography watched in cinemas or videos, despite the fact that videos have been redundant for decades and vanishingly few people now visit cinemas to watch porn. The absence of scrutiny has created an environment where much of the content created is, she says, 'violent, degrading, abusive, and misogynistic'. She also means a situation where a member of her own party had to resign after twice watching porn (perplexingly tractor-themed) on his phone, as he whiled away time on the green benches in the House of Commons. 'People have slightly lost the plot on porn. Would someone 20 years ago have just taken Playboy into the Commons, and had it lying on their lap? It just shows what an extraordinary place we've got to,' she says. 'You can do what you like in your private life – I don't have a problem with that – but you can't watch porn in the House of Commons, and you shouldn't be watching porn at your desk. There's a place for these things and it's not in the office.' Her review, published in February, made 32 recommendations. Last week the first of these became government policy, when officials announced that pornography depicting strangulation would be made illegal. Her new taskforce of 17 people, bringing together representatives from the police, the advertising industry, anti-trafficking organisations and violence against women charities, will focus on how to ensure harmful online content is better regulated, trying to bring parity between the scrutiny of offline and online content. She pays tribute to the 'hugely innovative side' of the porn industry, which has long driven technological advances in webcams and internet speeds, fuelled by the sector's enormous capacity to turn profit, but she has not invited any representatives on to the taskforce, wary of anything that might let the industry 'mark their own homework'. This week Ofcom announced that major online providers, including the UK's most popular pornography site, Pornhub, had agreed to implement stronger age-verification measures in compliance with the Online Safety Act, to prevent under-18s from accessing adult material. Those platforms that do not comply with the measures face being fined 10% of global turnover or being blocked in the UK. Ofcom is also responsible for monitoring whether sites distributing user-generated pornography are protecting UK viewers from encountering illegal material involving child sexual abuse and extreme content (showing rape, bestiality and necrophilia, for example). However, other forms of harmful pornography that are regulated in physical formats are not subject to similar restrictions online. It is this grey, unscrutinised area that Bertin's panel will focus on, as well as calling for better processes to respond to stolen content, working out how people depicted in pornographic videos can request that the clips be removed from sites, and how to build safety mechanisms into AI tools that create sexually explicit content. Officials at the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) guided her through short clips of extreme material to help her understand the nature of easily available harmful content. She remains disturbed by the material she saw – content designed to appear to be child sexual abuse, set in children's bedrooms – roles played by young girls, who may be over 18 but are acting as children. 'The titles are very problematic, things like: 'Daddy's going to come home and give his daughter a good seeing to' or 'Oops I've gone too far and now she's dead' or 'Kidnap and kill a hooker.'' This content would be prohibited by the BBFC in the offline world, but is unregulated online. During research for her review, she met representatives from global tech companies, and told them how when Volvo invented the three-point safety belt they gifted the patent to the rest of the industry because staff realised the innovation was so vital to raising safety standards. 'My pitch was that they have a duty and responsibility to double down on trying to get technology that can clean up these situations, and they should share that technology,' she says. 'Taylor Swift can whip a song off a website as soon as anyone tries to pirate it. There's no reason why the firms can't come up with technology to sort this out.' Sign up to First Edition Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion Posing for photographs, she edges away from a watercolour of Margaret Thatcher hung on the wall by one of her colleagues. 'Let's do it without Thatcher in the background. That's not my doing by the way – I share the office,' she says semi-apologetically, before rapidly adding: 'I mean I love Thatcher, obviously.' But she may be making an important distinction. In a 1970 Woman's Hour interview, Thatcher said the rise of pornography was a 'frightening' manifestation of a newly permissive society that she believed was undermining family life. Bertin describes herself as a liberal conservative and wants to be clear she is neither anti-porn nor running a moral crusade. 'Consenting adults should be able to do what they want; I have no desire to stop any kind of sexual freedom. But restricting people from seeing a woman being choked, called a whore, and having several men stamp on her – for example – is not ending someone's sexual freedom. This is the kind of content we want to end.'
The Sun
25 minutes ago
- Business
- The Sun
High street giant to shut UK store TODAY after announcing 33 shop closures with hundreds of jobs at risk
A MAJOR clothing retailer is set to shut down a branch today - ahead of 33 more store closures. It comes as part of a proposed restructuring plan that aims to save the company from insolvency. River Island in Banbury, Oxfordshire is set to close on June 28, as shoppers will now have to travel to Rugby or Oxford to visit a brick-and-mortar shop. It's part of a wider plan to close 33 branches across the UK, affecting hundreds of jobs. River Island also wants its landlords to cut rent at an additional 71 stores that are struggling. The restructuring plan, developed with PricewaterhouseCoopers, will be put to creditors in August. A restructuring plan should help keep the company afloat and avoid insolvency. The decision was due to a shift in customers shopping online, as well as increased running costs. Ben Lewis, chief executive of River Island said: "River Island is a much-loved retailer, with a decades-long history on the British high street. "However the well-documented migration of shoppers from the high street to online has left the business with a large portfolio of stores that is no longer aligned to our customers' needs. "The sharp rise in the cost of doing business over the last few years has only added to the financial burden. 'We have a clear strategy to transform the business to ensure its long-term viability. "Recent improvements in our fashion offer and in-store shopping experience are already showing very positive results, but it is only with a restructuring plan that we will be able to see this strategy through and secure River Island's future as a profitable retail business. "We regret any job losses as a result of store closures, and we will try to keep these to a minimum.' River Island was founded in 1948 by Bernard Lewis and currently operates in around 230 stores, employing 5,500 people. It suffered losses of £33.2 million in 2023 after sales fell 19% according to the most recent set of accounts. The proposals will not affect trade creditors, employees at unaffected stores, or customers. Staff will be redeployed where possible to reduce job losses. The majority of the closures will come in January 2026. It comes as several major retailers struggle to survive on the high street. Popular clothing retailer New Look has already closed ten stores this year, with another two set to close in the coming weeks. Several banks have also undergone major restructuring plans - as NatWest is closing 55 stores this year, and Santander closes 95. After Poundland sold for £1 earlier this month, the company announced an upcoming 68 store closures. 2
