Retirement used to be a time when you’d kick back and relax. Not so for the boomers spending their golden years getting nicked in the name of ‘intergenerational justice’
“I thought, ‘this is going to be huge. There’s not a person on the planet who doesn’t know Stonehenge’,” says Rajan Naidu, recounting the time when he and fellow Just Stop Oil protestor Niamh Lynch sprayed the iconic prehistoric structure with orange powder (a non-toxic blend of cornflour and food colouring). It was a stunt that went viral.
Naidu was 73, Lynch 21 – at opposite ends of their lives but united in their commitment to a cause they cared about. Afterwards, they sat silently, crosslegged by the stones in the warm June air. Time seemed to slow right down. And then they were arrested. The action didn’t stop there. It continued in every piece of press coverage, every social media post, every conversation, in their eventual acquittal.
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I’m sitting with Naidu (main picture) in the community cafe of The Old Print Works in Birmingham as he recounts all this. It’s mid-November, a fortnight since he, Lynch and Luke Watson, another activist who filmed the Stonehenge protest, were cleared of causing a public nuisance. Rain taps on the large old windows, while reggae wafts through the space. We tuck into steaming piles of chickpea curry. With his warm smile, white beard and colourful cardie, he’s not how the media might have you picture a protestor: young, shouty, looking for trouble. But he’s part of a recent wave of older protesters shifting those stereotypes.
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“Everybody is a potential activist,” Naidu tells me, cradling his coffee. “Everybody has concerns about the world, things they’d like to put right.” Fairness, he says, is an instinct we have from childhood. Growing up in London, where his family moved from India when he was a toddler, Naidu recalls his parents’ generosity, his father’s respect for others, no matter who they were, and his mother’s kindness. He spent his life working and volunteering in education, reforestation, mental health support, with stints at the Post Office and in factories. Only in his late 60s did he get involved in the kind of non-violent civil resistance that would see him led away in handcuffs “many times”.
It used to be a given that when you hit retirement age, you’d earned the right to put your feet up. Do some gentle gardening, join a choir, go on a cruise. But spending the night in a police cell, surely not? There had been grannies at Greenham Common, those silver-haired civil rights leaders, but they were generally the exception. Largely, protest was seen as the preserve of students, not pensioners.
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And yet in campaigns for disability rights, against library closures and historic building demolitions, or opposing the rise of the far right, older people are taking a stand. I’ve been to meetings for these causes where I, at 42, am one of the youngest in the room. The advanced age of placard holders was particularly notable at 2025’s Lift the Ban demonstrations that called on the government to reverse its ban on the protest group Palestine Action. Of 523 people arrested in August, more than 50% were over 60.
One of them was 75-year-old Jonathon Porritt CBE. “I think this is genuinely unique in terms of the history of social movements and campaigning of this kind. I don’t think there’s been that sort of demographic story before,” the lifelong environmentalist and former leader of the Green Party explains.
At 73, Porritt retired from his job focused on corporate sustainability, frustrated with the slow pace of change, and returned to the front line of politics. At the time of writing, he’s been arrested twice at Lift the Ban events and counting. We chat over Zoom from Chichester, where he is on a book tour for Love, Anger and Betrayal, a collection of interviews with young Just Stop Oil campaigners.
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Perhaps it’s inevitable that a generation who came of age at a time of optimism that they would make the world a better place are looking around and seeing work to be done. Porritt, a former teacher, is driven by “intergenerational justice”, the idea that meeting our needs must not come at the expense of our descendants’ ability to meet theirs.
Everybody is a potential activist. Everyone has concerns about the world
Too many older people, he says, “don’t seem to care at all about what is going to happen to young people in the future. That really does anger me, I’ll be honest, because we’ve made an appalling mess of everything,” he adds. “I don’t expect everybody to go and glue themselves to motorways to demonstrate how much they care about the climate, but I do expect them to be more respectful of and supportive of people who are taking those kinds of direct actions to focus politicians on the true nature of the crisis.”
Trudi Warner feels similarly compelled by a sharp sense of responsibility. Warner made headlines and became the inspiration for Defend Our Juries, the group behind the Lift the Ban campaign, after she was prosecuted for contempt of court sitting outside a climate activists’ trial holding a sign that read: “Jurors: you have an absolute right to acquit a defendant according to your conscience.” The charges were eventually dropped. It was with “some trepidation” that Warner, a retired children’s social worker, stepped up as an activist. “I was schooled in obedience,” she says, closing her eyes in concentration before opening them wide. “But it was something I had to do.”
The strategy of sitting with a sign is less physically demanding than other forms of protest such as marching, Warner notes. And though it can take up to eight hours of sitting before an arrest is made – a feat of endurance – older people tend to have spare time. Porritt points out that while the threats of legal sanctions are “still scary, undoubtedly”, they don’t weigh on him as they might other, younger people with fledgling careers or dependent children to consider. But there are real sacrifices, risks and consequences. Tim Hewes, a 73-year-old retired dentist and priest, spent six weeks imprisoned on remand accused of conspiring to shut down the M25 motorway during 2022 Just Stop Oil protests, as chronicled in his book, Finding Beauty Behind Bars.
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Though the prospect of doing press interviews filled her with dread, Warner came to realise that the visibility of older people like herself – former priests, rabbis, war veterans – was powerful.
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“It’s harder for the media to trash us,” she says. Their presence lends the climate and peace movements a credibility, a gravity, a sense that what they’re demanding is mainstream. The calm that older people have brought to the climate and peace movements is distinctive, too. “It’s counter cultural,”adds Warner, “because in our culture, everybody’s rushing about all the time, being noisy, being attention seeking.”
When Union, the northern school for creativity and activism, launched a call out for their first ever residency aimed at ‘elders’, due to take place in January 2026, it was booked out. Union, which had offered similar programmes for early and mid-career people, devised this partly in response to demand, partly to the rise they’d noticed in older activists. The organisation explores the role that ‘elders’ can play, how they might “hold the space” for others, as director Adrian Sinclair puts it, and what they want from this stage.
It’s not a young people’s movement. It’s not an old people’s movement. It’s a people’s movement
“What’s my legacy? What do I pass on? Those questions are important to older people.” There is also a wellbeing element to it. Studies show that a longer, healthier life isn’t just about staying active or eating well, it’s about having purpose and finding social connection, too.
Back in Birmingham, three young men in hoodies recognise Naidu from his Stonehenge coverage and ask if they can join us to chat. They are fans, full of admiration and full of questions, which Naidu answers graciously.
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“When you see me, you see this old man,” he says. “I don’t define myself in this.” But he is reluctant to talk about himself, instead talking about the “beloved community” that Martin Luther King Jr described, a community that forms through shared values, and about friends of all ages and backgrounds who have greeted him as he emerged from police stations, in the cold and dark, with a hug and a snack.
“It’s not a young people’s movement. It’s not an old people’s movement. It’s a people’s movement.”
Main image by Jaskirt Dhaliwal-Boora
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Arsenal will take on Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League with the German side seeing the funny side of their opponent’s quality from corners as they bid to stop them
Bayer Leverkusen has seen the funny side of Arsenal’s set piece genius by placing a sign that said “no corners allowed” ahead of their Champions League clash.
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The German side will host the Premier League leaders on Wednesday, hoping to secure an upset victory that would give them a chance of progressing beyond the last 16. They will need to contain Arsenal and, particularly, their quality from dead ball situations.
Arsenal’s tactics and route to goal has been widely criticised, but the Bundesliga outfit saw the funny side and posted a picture of their sign covering the corner spot and included the words: “Worth a try”.
The north Londoners sit top of the table in England, have a perfect record in Europe and are in contention for both domestic cups. It means the quadruple is still on the cards, even if their methods have proved very divisive.
Nearly 38 percent of their 58 league goals have stemmed from balls into the box, be that from corners of free-kicks. Tottenham frontman Mathys Tel has criticised the tactic and claimed that is makes for very boring viewing.
In an interview with Zack Nani the Spurs star said: “I’ll tell you the truth, yes, it’s not exciting. It’s boring to watch; it’s really just a clash between two teams with their own ideas.
“There’s less spectacle. There’s no Vinicius pulling off a sombrero flick, no dribble, no Kylian [Mbappe] accelerating past you. Here, I’d say it’s more structured, maybe too much so. All those set-pieces, little details that can sometimes make the difference. But sometimes you think it might be too much. I told the assistant coach in charge of set-pieces, ‘Don’t put me on that one,’ because it’s a zoo.”
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Arsenal don’t see it that way with their players hailing the work of set piece coach Nicolas Jover. Ex-Leverkusen star Piero Hincapie said: “We pay attention to the details. Our set-piece strength is talked about all over Europe. That’s the result of daily training with our set-piece coach, Nico Jover.”
The Gunners are favourites to claim the Champions League and have been placed on the so-called easier side of the draw. If they can get past Leverkusen they will face either Sporting Lisbon or Bodo/Glimt in the quarter-final.
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CAIRO (AP) — An explosive-laden drone blamed on Sudanese paramilitaries struck a secondary school and a health care center in southern Sudan Wednesday, killing at least 17 people, mostly schoolgirls, a hospital official and a medical group said.
At least 10 people were wounded in the strike in the village of Shukeiri in the White Nile province, according to Dr. Musa al-Majeri, director of the Douiem Hospital, the nearest major medical facility to the village.
Al-Majeri told The Associated Press three girls suffered serious injuries; two of them underwent surgeries at the hospital while the third was evacuated to the capital, Khartoum.
The war-tracking Sudan Doctors Network reported the strike first, saying those killed included two teachers and a health care worker. The group said there was no military presence in the village.
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Both the medical group and al-Majeri blamed the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces for the strike. The RSF didn’t respond to a request for comment.
“This horrific crime represents a continuation of the violations committed by the RSF in the White Nile,” said Dr. Razan Al-Mahdi, a spokeswoman for the medical group, adding that the paramilitaries attacked several civilian facilities in the past two days, including a student dormitory and a power station.
The strike in the village of Shukeiri in the White Nile province was the latest deadly attack in Sudan’s nearly three-year war.
Sudan slid into chaos in April 2023 when a power struggle between the military and the RSF exploded into open fighting in Khartoum and elsewhere in the country.
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The devastating war has killed more than 40,000 people, according to U.N. figures, but aid groups say that is an undercount and the true number could be many times higher.
The fighting has centered in the sprawling Kordofan region, where deadly attacks, mostly by drones, were reported daily.
The war has been marked by atrocities including mass killings, gang rapes and other crimes, investigated by the International Criminal Court as potential war crimes and crimes against humanity.
The most recent atrocities happened in October when the RSF and its Janjweed allies overran the Darfur city of el-Fasher. The RSF attack there bore “ hallmarks of genocide,” according to United Nations-commissioned experts.
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At least 6,000 people were killed in three days in October in el-Fasher, the U.N.’s Human Rights Office said.
Protesters who lobbied the state of Alabama for clemency for Sonny Burton rejoiced this week (Picture: AP)
A 75-year-old death row inmate in Alabama has just been spared execution — a matter of days before he was due to be killed by the state.
Governor Kay Ivey stepped in to commute the sentence of Charles ‘Sonny’ Burton, who had been scheduled to be executed this week. Burton, who now uses a wheelchair, had spent the past few weeks preparing for his death at Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore.
Officials were already arranging the execution process for tomorrow night (Thursday) until news broke. Burton had even chosen his final meal and had begun writing his last will and testament.
A recent photograph of Charles Lee ‘Sonny’ Burton, who is now wheelchair-bound (Picture: charlessonnyburton.com)
The execution was set to use nitrogen gas, a controversial method Alabama first began using back in 2024, which relies on death by hypoxia. Instead, the governor ruled that Burton will now spend the rest of his life in prison without the possibility of parole.
The decision came after concerns were raised about Burton’s precise role in the 1991 robbery that resulted in the death of Douglas Battle. Burton organised the armed robbery, according to Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, but wasn’t inside the building when the fatal shooting occurred.
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Prosecutors relied on a state law that allows accomplices to receive the death penalty if a killing happens during another serious crime, such as armed robbery.
Another man involved in the crime, Derrick DeBruce, was the person who actually pulled the trigger. Both men were originally convicted of capital murder. However, DeBruce later had his death sentence overturned during an appeal. He was resentenced to life in prison without parole.
DeBruce later died while serving that sentence. The difference in punishments between the two men became central to calls for clemency in Sonny’s case.
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Alabama Governor Kay Ivey decided to use her pardoning powers to grant clemency in a move that’s been widely praised (Picture: Getty Images)
Governor Ivey said she still supports capital punishment but argued that the law must always be applied fairly. In a statement explaining her decision she said the case raised serious concerns about fairness.
‘I believe it would be unjust for one participant in this crime to be executed while the participant who pulled the trigger was not,’ Ivey said. ‘To be clear, Mr. Burton will not be eligible for parole and will rightfully spend the remainder of his life behind bars for his role in the robbery that led to the murder of Doug Battle. He will now receive the same punishment as the triggerman.’
Sonny’s daughter Lois Harris broke down in tears while speaking to the Associated Press shortly after the decision was announced. ‘I’m just so happy, so happy. It’s just tears of joy.’
Burton himself also issued a short message of thanks to the governor through his lawyers. ‘Just saying thank you doesn’t seem like much. But it’s what I can give her.’
A prison mugshot of Charles Lee ‘Sonny’ Burton, who was spared execution (Picture: Alabama Department of Corrections)
Supporters and death penalty abolitionists had pushed for clemency for many months. Several jurors who sat on his original trial in 1992 had also urged the governor to spare his life.
Even members of the victim’s family questioned the decision to carry out Burton’s death sentence.
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Battle’s daughter, Tori, wrote to Governor Ivey asking her to intervene and grant a pardon. She asked ‘how does it legally make sense’ to execute Burton. Her letter became one of several appeals submitted during the clemency campaign. Burton’s legal team argued that carrying out the death penalty against someone who hadn’t carried out the shooting would be grossly unfair.
Matt Schulz, an assistant federal defender who represented Burton, later said that the governor had made the correct decision after reviewing the case.
Schulz said that the contrast between Burton’s sentence and the outcome for the man who fired the fatal shot was impossible to ignore. ‘This was absolutely the right decision for the governor to make for any number of reasons,’ he said.
The William C. Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore, Alabama – where Sonny was all set to face execution (Picture: Getty Images)
‘The biggest one is the fact that this dichotomy of executing a non-shooter who did not even see the shooting take place after the state itself had resentenced the shooter to life without parole.’
Burton had spoken about the robbery during an interview with Associated Press last month. He said the plan had never been for anyone to be harmed during the crime.
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‘I didn’t know anything about nobody getting hurt until we were on the way back. No, nobody supposed to get hurt,’ he said from Holman Correctional Facility.
He also expressed regret over the death of Douglas Battle. Burton said he wanted to apologise to the victim’s relatives for their loss. ‘I’m so sorry. If I had the power to bring him back, I would,’ he said.
Alice Marie Johnson, who was appointed by Donald Trump as a ‘pardon czar’ after receiving clemency herself, praised the governor and her decision on social media.
She said Ivey had ‘showed what courageous and common sense leadership looks like,’ adding: ‘By commuting the death sentence of Charles “Sonny” Burton, she ensured that justice — not technicalities — guides the most serious decision a state can make.’
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‘Pardon Czar’ Alice Marie Johnson welcomed the news (Picture: Getty Images)
Campaign groups also welcomed the decision. Laura Porter from the US Campaign to End the Death Penalty said: ‘We are grateful that Governor Ivey recognized that Charles “Sonny” Burton should not be executed.
‘The death penalty process is deeply flawed when someone who was not present for the killing faces execution, while the person who committed the murder does not. It is uplifting to see that more and more governors across the ideological spectrum are recognising problems with death penalty cases.’
Conservative campaigner Demetrius Minor added: ‘This brings tremendous relief to his family and so many across the country. Conservatives know that government power can be abused and should not be used to execute someone who was not in the building when the murder was committed. Governor Ivey acted on these conservative principles.’
Not everyone welcomed the decision, however. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall criticised the move shortly after it was announced. He said Burton still carried responsibility for the killing. ‘There has never been any doubt that Sonny Burton has Douglas Battle’s blood on his hands,’ Marshall said.
Prosecutors had long argued Burton organised the robbery that led to the shooting. Marshall said Burton had ‘held a gun to the store manager’s head’ before the stolen money was divided among those involved.
Dreaming in Colour, a new exhibition at the Opera Gallery in London, revisits the surrealists of the previous century, more in homage than imitation.
I suspect few of the emerging artists included here – and certainly none of those I spoke to on opening morning – would consciously describe themselves as surrealists. Yet the surrealist aspiration to evoke a sense of the marvellous and mysterious in the everyday is certainly present.
Take Sretenko (2025-2026) by the Spain-based Russian artist Sasha Zimulin, a vivid landscape of his home suburb of Moscow. In this piece, Zimulin conjures up not the sight of the city, but its ambience, and the feelings stirred in someone standing on the edge of the scene.
He is one of 25 international artists showcasing new works in this exhibition. These works are complemented by the inclusion of a range of historic pieces by figures such as Picasso and Ron Arad. Some of them, notably Chagall’s Multicoloured Clown (1974), certainly reflect the exhibition’s theme. Yet there is no attempt to place these in dialogue with the newer works on which I will concentrate here.
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The artists on show
Probably the most consciously surreal work is that which also most directly addresses the exhibition’s theme: Dreaming of the Taste of Colour (2025) by the Dutch artist Arjen. This offers an exuberant expression of synaesthesia – a neurological phenomenon where stimulation of one sense triggers an experience in another sense that isn’t being directly stimulated, such as the sensation of tasting colour.
Exhibited nearby are the two paintings included from the Warsaw-born, Paris-based artist Oh de Laval. Taste has often been foregrounded in her work, as has the influence of Francis Bacon. The latter is palpable here, both in the colour palette used in Untitled (2025) and in the act of violation, minutely captured in a tear.
No Title by Oh de Laval (2025). Courtesy of Opera Gallery
As with surrealism, the artists exhibited here use a range of styles and artistic language. For instance, Break in the Clouds (2025) by US-based Salvadorian artist Daniella Portillo typifies her emotional engagement with landscapes rendered almost abstract by her use of colour and form.
More consciously abstract are pieces such as Paraiso #33 and Paraiso #34 by American-born, Spain-based Adrián Navarro. The ironic titles add to their disturbing allusions to the familiar in unfamiliar settings.
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This unsettling quality is also marked in the more figurative work in the exhibition. Mexican-American artist Anna Ortiz is known for her consciously surreal landscapes evocative of the erased pre-Columbian past, here reflected in the dream-like Jaguar Reflejado (2025). A similar uneasiness is also present in the contribution of London-based May Watson. She specialises in vibrant and humorous art of the everyday, but here is apparently Busy Dreaming (2025) of a shark, albeit one playfully surrounded by multicoloured balls.
Jaguar Reflejado by Anna Ortiz (2025). Courtesy of Opera Gallery
Balls also feature prominently in Red Composition with Butter (2025) by Canadian-born, Los Angeles-based Andy Dixon. This voluptuous image reimagines the historic depiction of the reclining female nude, although this juxtaposition instead seems to ironically recollect seedy sex scenes from the movie Last Tango in Paris (1972).
There are several filmic references. Spanish artist Xevi Sola defines his work as being like “filming a horror movie using relaxing pastel colours”. His work sits squarely within a surrealist tradition in its efforts to provoke a Jungian exploration of the darkest areas of consciousness. Yet here he moves away from the collage-based approach of previous works. Instead, Backstage I (2024) and Backstage II (2024) disturb by depicting awkwardly adjacent figures, with one staring unnervingly straight out of the canvas at the viewer.
Eshu by Gustavo Nazareno (2025). GUSN Studio
Eshu (2025) by the Brazilian artist Gustavo Nazareno is more subtly subversive. He has become rightly celebrated for lush, powerful depictions of Black bodies in works that challenge the canon of western portraiture and religious art. Black spirituality, dignity and beauty are all powerfully evoked in this richly textured painting.
Another artist who subverts historic images is London-based Greek artist Niovi Kafantari. Her work, He Was Already Leaving (2026) reverses the gaze in Titian’s Venus and Adonis (1553-1554) to focus not the energy of the hunter, but the protecting arms flung around him.
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A different kind of subversion is presented in I’m Free Tuesday (2025) by Brazilian-American Jonni Cheatwood. He is noted for using a diverse range of materials and images, yet this is a more muted piece in which the colours of the food on the table recur in the faces of the diners. Capturing mood in the visage is also a feature of several other works here, not least those by Geneva-based Cameroonian artist Maurice Mboa and Nigerian portraitist Collins Obijiaku.
Not all of these works are colourful, particularly the sombre architectural forms of Misty Days (2025) by Spanish artist Borja Colom. Yet that certainly has a dreamlike quality.
Nor are all these works necessarily surreal. Some, such as Conjura (2024) by Spanish artist Miguel Sainz Ojeda, also draw on influences such as street art to create an image that is fantastical and disquieting.
Conjura by Spanish artist Miguel Sainz Ojeda (2024). Courtesy of Opera Gallery
This suggests that another theme of the exhibition is magical realism. More often seen as a literary or cinematic genre, magical realism is nonetheless invoked here in the filmic atmosphere and implicit storytelling embedded in many of these works.
In art, magical realism provides a haunting and distorting perspective that challenges our perceptions. This is most conspicuously the case in Hitchcock’s Glass (2025) by Italian artist Mattia Barbalaco.
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Brilliantly hung to maximum effect as you descend to the lower ground floor, this luminous painting recreates both a scene from Hitchcock’s 1941 thriller Suspicion and conveys the suspenseful, unsettling quality of dreams.
Our Lady of Lourdes Primary School, on Beech Avenue, sent a text out to parents at 9.29am to inform them that local schools had been placed in lockdown.
The message read: “Due to a police incident all local schools are locked down, we will keep you informed of the situation.
“Everyone is safe and we will stay in touch.”
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But just a minute later, at 9.30am, a second text was sent out telling parents that the incident had been resolved and the school was no longer in lockdown.
It read: “Police incident is resolved and school is no longer in lockdown. Sorry for any upset.”
It added that an arrest had been made.
St James CE Primary School, on nearby Hillside Avenue, also let parents know the incident was over in a post to Facebook.
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It stated: “There was an incident nearby and we did an invacuation as a precautionary measure. We have been informed by the police that the incident has now been resolved.”
An invacuation is an emergency procedure used to quickly move students and staff from outside to inside, or to keep them inside.
One parent said: “My son’s school was on lockdown this morning.”
She added that St James’ CE Primary School dealt with the situation ‘amazingly’.
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Greater Manchester Police (GMP) confirmed that they had arrested a man with “some sort of air rifle” who appeared to be shooting rats in the area.
They said schools in the area were notified and may have locked down out of precaution due to the police nearby.
The news is a significant blow for Malachy O’Rourke and comes weeks after star forward Darragh Canavan left for a month-long trip to Australia while former Footballer of the Year Kieran McGeary recently returned to the squad
Tyrone have suffered a huge setback after defender Rory Brennan has stepped away from the squad for the rest of the season.
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The Trillick man is understood to have informed Malachy O’Rourke of his decision earlier this week and he will focus on his club commitments for the rest of 2026.
Brennan won an All-Ireland with Tyrone in 2021 before stepping away from the squad at the end of the 2022 campaign.
On the back of a series of excellent displays for Trillick which included captaining them to the 2023 O’Neill Cup, he returned to the county fold last season and was a regular starter during O’Rourke’s first season as they reached the last four of the Championship, losing to eventual winners Kerry in Croke Park.
The Red Hands are in action in Croke Park this weekend as they face Meath in their penultimate League game. Tyrone eased their relegation concerns with a nine-point win over Offaly in round five in Dungannon earlier this month.
They cannot be overtaken by the Faithful and would only be relegated if they lose to Meath and Cork and Cavan win both their final games and Kildare pick up one more win.
In that scenario, Tyrone could be relegated on scoring difference as they drew with the Lilywhites.
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A political spouse for nearly 50 years, Jill Biden said she has never publicly discussed her feelings about the three-week stretch when her husband ended his political career, instead saving her thoughts for the pages of her soon-to-be-released memoir.
Gallery Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, on Wednesday announced that her book, “View from the East Wing: A Memoir,” is scheduled to be published June 2.
Jill Biden told The Associated Press in a brief telephone interview that the book is a “reflection of my four years as first lady” and that writing it was somewhat healing.
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“It was kind of cathartic for me to write it, and I wrote about all the, you know, sometimes painful — but other times, most of it really beautiful moments that Joe and I shared during his presidency,” she said.
Jill Biden declined on Tuesday to discuss any of those moments, good or bad — including watching her husband work his way to the decision to end his five-decade-long political career by dropping out of the 2024 presidential race.
In an announcement video shared on Instagram, she said she wants to “set the record straight.”
The last chapter of her husband’s political career
In April 2023, then-President Joe Biden was 80 and the oldest president in U.S. history when he announced he was running for a second term. His age and fitness to serve another four years — which would take him to age 86 — became a source of concern for the public. Some fellow Democrats began to pressure him to step aside after he turned in a disastrous debate performance against Trump in June 2024 in which he struggled, in a raspy voice, to land his debating points and often appeared to lose his train of thought. Aides blamed the poor performance on a cold.
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Joe Biden at first insisted that he would stay in the race, but after a few weeks he withdrew from the campaign and endorsed Democrat Kamala Harris, his vice president. Harris became the party’s presidential nominee but lost to Trump in the November 2024 election.
Jill Biden said that, with the book, “I have put things in perspective,” presenting what she describes as a “more balanced view” of her husband’s time as president.
The memoir is also a tribute of the sorts to women who, like herself, juggle multiple roles.
“It’s also a story about my being able to balance life, you know, as a working woman and as a mother, a grandmother, a first lady,” she said.
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During her four years in the role, Jill Biden, 74, made history as the first first lady to continue the career she had before entering the White House. She had taught English and writing for decades at the community college level, and she continued teaching twice a week at a Northern Virginia school while serving as first lady.
Jill Biden said it was “quite a shock getting the diagnosis” for her husband, who’s now 83.
“The fact that it is in his bones means that he will have cancer, you know, all his lifetime,” Jill Biden said. She said the doctors say he will “live out his natural life.”
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“Like most retired couples, he’ll probably drive me crazy till the end of it,” she joked.
The former first lady also writes in the book about serving during a unique period in U.S. history, including the COVID-19 pandemic and the aftermath of the insurrection at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, according to the publisher.
Her husband was sworn into office on the steps of the Capitol on Jan. 20, 2021, just two weeks after a mob of Trump supporters, spurred by his false claims that the Republican lost because of election fraud, stormed the building in a violent attempt to keep lawmakers from certifying Joe Biden’s victory.
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Joe Biden’s first year in office was dominated by the federal response to the pandemic and, while he mostly stayed at the White House, Jill Biden wore face mask and traveled around the country to encourage people to get their vaccinations. She also continued her advocacy on behalf of military families, education and community colleges, cancer prevention and women’s health initiatives.
Before she became first lady, Jill Biden was second lady of the United States from 2009 to 2017, when her husband was Barack Obama’s vice president. She currently chairs the Milken Institute’s Women’s Health Network.
Jill Biden is also the author of “Where the Light Enters,” published in 2019, in which she writes about meeting Joe Biden, then a U.S. senator from Delaware, and marrying and building a life with him. She also has written three children’s books.
Noah was 14 when his naked body was found in a storm drain tunnel in North Belfast in 2020, six days after he left home on his bike to meet two friends
Northwood Park area of North Belfast
Questions have been raised at an inquest as to why the PSNI did not provide a water sample from the storm drain where Noah Donohoe’s body was found.
The pathologist who conducted the 14-year-old’s postmortem examination said an additional test “would be supportive and helpful” but would not have changed her conclusion that Noah drowned.
On Tuesday, two other pathologists told the jury at the inquest into Noah’s death at Belfast Coroner’s Court they agreed that the boy’s cause of death was drowning, and that he had likely died closer to the time of his disappearance than to the discovery of his body.
Noah, a pupil at St Malachy’s College, was 14 when his naked body was found in a storm drain tunnel in north Belfast in June 2020, six days after he left home on his bike to meet two friends in the Cavehill area of the city.
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On Wednesday there was discussion of diatoms, a form of microorganism, that were found in Noah’s lungs, when the pathologists explained to the jury that the presence of these would indicate a person had drowned in natural water, as diatoms wouldn’t be found in treated or tap water.
A sample can be taken from the water a body is found in and tested for diatoms, to see if they match those found in the deceased person.
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Dr Marjorie Turner, who carried out Noah’s post-mortem examination, told the court that a diatom test from a water sample “may have come back negative but that would not change my opinion of cause of death” being drowning.
In questioning, Brenda Campbell KC, representing Fiona Donohoe, posited that in a post-mortem process there is an “opportunity in that autopsy to try and find answers” and that “opportunity might not come again”.
She acknowledged that the absence of that test “doesn’t change anyone’s opinion on the agreed cause of death” but it does “potentially deprive” us of additional information.
Former state pathologist for Northern Ireland Professor Jack Crane agreed, adding “if we had ability to compare diatoms in water and found in Noah’s body it would be supportive evidence” of the theory that he died in the storm drain.
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Dr Turner said it would sometimes be the case that a water sample would be presented at the lab along with the body, with Professor Crane saying that in his experience of dealing with “deaths occurring in rivers and lakes and so forth the expectation was that that water sample would be provided when we did the autopsy”.
Ms Campbell then presented a police document saying a PSNI officer “spoke to pathologist Dr Turner” who requested water samples, and contacted another officer to confirm a water sample was being collected.
A later document claimed officers were informed by former Coroner McCrisken in early July that a water sample was not needed.
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Dr Turner said she was “quite certain” it’s not the case that she directed that no sample was needed.
Later, Donal Lunny KC, representing the PSNI, said the officers believed it wasn’t an “urgent request” to get a water sample, to which Dr Turner said she “probably wouldn’t have used the word urgent” and the sample was “not going to be critical, but would be supportive and helpful in an ideal world”.
The pathologist further reiterated that “no matter what the result would have been it would not have altered” her conclusion of cause of death.
Also continuing to give evidence was Dr Nathaniel Cary, a Home Office registered consultant forensic pathologist, who supported Dr Turner’s prognosis of drowning.
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In a statement read to the court on Tuesday, with the caveat that it would be for an adolescent psychologist to determine, he analysed Noah’s behaviour prior to entering the culvert, when he had been seen on CCTV cycling naked.
The toxicology report on Noah’s post-mortem examination was negative for drugs.
Under questioning on Wednesday from Ms Campbell, Dr Cary said that based on his “analysis of many similar cases”, Noah’s behaviour was typical of an “acute psychotic episode”.
He said he had worked on cases where people had entered a “very strange mental state” as a result of taking drugs like cocaine where they “feel hot”, may remove clothing and “pour water over themselves”, and this behaviour can also be seen with new synthetic drugs like MDMA.
Dr Cary agreed with the proposition of Ms Campbell that analysis of Noah’s behaviour would have to be taken into account with the negative toxicological report from the post-mortem as well as other evidence in the inquest.
Dr Turner said that when asking for a toxicological screen it would check for a “wide range” of drugs but “not entirely exhaustive particularly in relation to new ‘so-called designer’ drugs”.
“In this instance all findings were negative but there are some drugs that they will not have been able to test for,” she said.
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She added that “some drugs are unstable in blood” and can continue to break down after someone has died, meaning they would have “disappeared in his blood therefore we cannot completely exclude that as a possibility, either”.
All three agreed that psychiatrists would be better placed to speak on Noah’s behaviour and toxicologists on the intricacies of that analysis, and possible impact of synthetic drugs, and it was said that the jury will hear from those experts at a later date.
The experts were also in agreement over analysis of potential trauma to Noah’s brain.
Dr Turner said there was “no visible abnormality” to the 14-year-old schoolboy’s brain and “no evidence of any trauma at all” beyond light exterior bruising.
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Prof Crane said there was “no apparent injury to the brain at all”, but it is “theoretically possible” to get a “concussive-type injury without any abnormality being seen”.
Dr Cary said he had “never seen” behaviour like Noah’s before his death, resulting from a head injury “of this nature, especially given there was no injury to the brain apparent”.
Teachers at Llantwit Major High are walking out on Thursday with a second strike next week if talks fail
A Welsh secondary school will be closed to most pupils as teachers go on strike on Thursday. Members of the NEU are walking out in a row over a cut in the time they are given to prepare lessons and mark work.
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The NEU said around 30 members will be on strike with a picket line outside the school first thing. The Vale of Glamorgan Council, which runs the 900-pupil school for 11- to 18-year-olds, confirmed it will be shut to most pupils on March 12.
Union officials said members voted overwhelmingly for strike action after the school and governors confirmed a decision to cut planning, preparation, and assessment time (PPA) to the absolute stautory minimum allowed. For our free daily briefing on the biggest issues facing the nation sign up to the Wales Matters newsletter here.
Those times depend on the number of hours individual teachers are contracted to work.
In Wales teachers are statutorily entitled to a minimum of 10% of their timetabled teaching time for PPA, which must take place during the school day.
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This time is non-contact, must be in blocks of at least 30 minutes, and cannot be used for cover. Some schools offer above the stautory minimum.
“Our members are clear that by taking this action longstanding behavioural issues at the school will get worse as sufficient PPA time is essential for dealing with these issues,” the NEU said.
“Whilst there have been meetings between union officials, the school leadership, and local authority, and despite numerous warnings that taking this action would result in strike action, the school have decided to proceed with this cut regardless.”
Daniel Maney, senior Wales organiser for the National Education Union Cymru, said the mood among those on strike was “resolute” with another walkout planned for March 19 if no resolution is reached.
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He acknowledged pupils were approaching a key exam period.
”NEU members have taken strike action due to a lack of commitment on protecting existing terms and conditions,” Mr Maney said.
“Our members are not asking for anything unreasonable – just to be treated fairly and in keeping with longstanding entitlements. We remain committed to reaching a negotiated outcome but equally will not stand by when they are facing detriment.”
He said there were longstanding behavioural issues at the school including “unruly behaviour and disrespect to teachers”.
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While the union acknowledged the head and school leadership were taking measures to address this he said cutting planning and preparation time would only make these matters worse.
When the school was last inspected in 2017 it was rated ‘good’ – the second-highest outcome possible – by inspectors.
A second teaching union, NASUWT Cymru, was meeting on Wednesday afternoon to discuss its response to the cuts to PPA.
A spokesman for the Vale of Glamorgan Council said: “Llantwit Major School will be closed to most pupils on Thursday, March 12, due to industrial action being taken by some staff.
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“The strike action is being coordinated by the National Education Union (NEU). The school’s leadership team, board of governors, and the Vale of Glamorgan Council have been negotiating with union representatives in the hope of avoiding this strike action but this has not been possible.”
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Sir Billy Connolly, 83, said his baby great-grandchild in Scotland gave him hope when people described the world as “a terrible place”.
Sir Billy Connolly has spoken of his joy at being a great-grandfather and how seeing a new life come into the world gives him hope for the future.
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Connolly, 83, said his baby great-grandchild in Scotland gave him hope when people described the world as “a terrible place”. An image of a baby features in his latest limited edition series of artworks, Born on a Rainy Day, The Collector Series, released today through Castle Fine Art.
The picture, titled “A Peep at the Past”, originally created between 2012-13, shows an infant playing on the floor with a snow globe like those Connolly has loved and collected for much of his life. Speaking from his home in Florida, the comedian, actor and musician who has five children and two grandchildren, said the picture now reflects his own experience of becoming a great-grandfather, and the joy of seeing a new life enter the world.
He said: “It’s a little baby person playing on the floor with one of those lovely crystal balls that change, with the snow. They’re lovely things. I used to collect them (snow globes). It’s wonderful, and these things give babies hours of entertainment and I always wonder what they see when they look in.
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“I have a baby that size in Scotland – I’m its great-grandad. I’m a great-grandfather and it’s a joy. Another life coming into the world and you’re partly to blame. It’s a great thing.
“People say ‘the world’s a terrible place’. I say ‘no it’s not’, That’s the world, up near Loch Lomond, playing with a sparkly ball. That’s the world. That’s the world that’s going to be. It’ll be in their hands.”
Connolly, who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2013, retired from comedy in 2020, and has since concentrated on creating art at his home in Florida.
Connolly has said: “Drawing has given me a new lease of life. I managed to get pictures together and people like them, which surprises me and amazes me and delights me.”
His new collectors’ series features six giclée artworks each in a “boutique edition” run of only 50, priced at £1450 each. The series has a variety of inspirations.
One was titled “Just a Thought”, after a phrase Connolly admitted he dreaded hearing during his long career in stand-up and music, whenever he thought a task was completed and he was ready to go home.
Offering an insight into the picture of a person sitting pondering, he said: “There’s been managers and people in charge of my work on the live stage – the promotion side of things – who seem to think they know what you’re going to do. They always, when they’re talking to you, use little phrases like that – ‘Oh Billy, just a thought’.
“You think you’re finished and you want to go. You’ve got your gear packed and you hear ‘just a thought’. ‘Oh f***’. It’s just a thought – don’t panic‘.”
Other pictures in the series include “The Waving Tree” and “Waiting To Be Discovered”, which was inspired by archaeological excavation programmes Connolly loves watching on TV. Another, “Angel And Pillar Of Salt”, depicts the Biblical tale of Lot’s wife who was turned to salt as a punishment for disobeying the angels’ warning.
And “A Chat At The Gym” depicts two women combining their exercise routine with a chance to laugh, chat and enjoy time away from everyday responsibilities.
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Connolly, who admits gym memberships have not always been the best use of his time or money, added: “If you go to a gym anywhere, you’ll see those two people. These are women, messing about, passing a ball to each other and not really building their bodies or getting fit. They’re having a laugh, having a chat.”
“They’re going through the motions of doing exercises and most of the money spent on gyms is squandered – people do it up to the point where they think they’re looking right, and it’s a good thing. It does you just as much good as going for it.”
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