Politics
What Did Emma Willis Host Before Strictly Come Dancing? 7 Forgotten Shows
Emma Willis has now been a staple on British TV for more than 20 years.
The presenter is best known for hosting shows like Big Brother, The Voice and The Circle, and was recently introduced to a more international audience when she and her husband Matt Willis began presenting Netflix’s British iteration of the dating series Love Is Blind.
If rumours are to be believed, she’s since landed the biggest gig of her career, as she’s set to take over as the new host of Strictly Come Dancing, taking over from Tess Daly and Claudia Winkleman.
But while you’ve probably watched Emma on some of the UK’s biggest reality shows over the years, there are plenty of other presenting gigs throughout her extensive resume you might have completely forgotten about.
Here are the ones we dug through the archives to find…
The Hot Desk (2008)
Emma got her start on music TV in the early 2000s, presenting segments for MTV as well as the UK version of the iconic TRL.
In 2008, Emma joined another British music show called The Hot Desk, whose other hosts included the likes of All Saints’ Nicole Appleton and Melanie Blatt, Laura Whitmore, Sarah Jane Crawford and Alice Levine.
At the end of each interview, the host would ask their celebrity guest to sign the “Hot Desk” with a pen (isn’t that just oh-so 2010s?).
One of Emma’s biggest interviews from that era was with a young and bright-eyed One Direction on The Hot Desk in 2011, a year after they came third on The X Factor.
Live From Studio Five (2010)
In the peak of 2000s gossip mags and celebrity interview panels, there were plenty of shows out there like Live From Studio Five.
Emma joined a line-up of co-presenters – including Brian Dowling and Ian Wright – who would conduct interviews and discuss topical issues, celebrity gossip and big news stories.
However it didn’t do too well with ratings, and ultimately came off the air after around a year and a half.
Girlfri3nds (2012)
Even as far back as 2012, Emma was clearly discovering that she had a bit of a knack when it came to reality TV.
She presented two seasons of this British show about single women looking for love, which saw three pals searching for their ideal guy out of 100 auditioning men.
Prize Island (2013)
Emma co-presented this sunny series alongside Alexander Armstrong back in 2013.
Prize Island placed four pairs on an Island (obv) off the coast of Mozambique, with each team participating in rounds of games to uncover prizes, ranging from a TV to a luxury holiday.
At the time, there were reports that it might not air at all, after it looked set to rival (ironically) The Voice. The show ultimately only last six episodes across one season.
Prized Apart (2015)
Another oft-overlooked game show from Emma’s TV past was the ambitious Prized Apart.
Prized Apart saw two groups of adventurous hopefuls trying out assorted physical tasks in Morocco (overseen by Emma’s former The Voice co-host Reggie Yates), putting their teamwork to the test in the hope of landing a hefty cash prize of £100K.
After facing criticism due to its convoluted gameplay (not to mention its carbon footprint, as contestants were repeatedly flown backwards and forwards depending on how they’d performed in tasks) it was axed after one season.
The Brit Awards (2017)
Do you remember that time Emma hosted a whole Brit Awards? Honestly, we’d forgotten too.
Back in 2017 she took to the stage for the UK’s biggest night in music alongside co-host Dermot O’Leary.
Dermot and Emma were brought in as somewhat last-minute replacements when the night’s original host, Michael Bublé, was forced to back out due to his son’s illness.
That year’s Brits saw One Direction, Little Mix, The 1975 and more take home awards.
Emma Willis: Delivering Babies (2019)
This one marked a huge change for the presenter as she swapped reality TV and game shows for a hospital maternity unit.
Across the course of four seasons, she worked on a labour ward working NHS hours while training to be a maternity care assistant.
Whether she was making beds, cleaning floors or offering support during births, it made for pretty emotional viewing.
Strictly Come Dancing returns to our screens in the autumn.
Keir Starmer is tonight locked in a Mexican stand-off with his Labour leadership rivals after refusing to quit despite four ministers so far resigning in a bid to force him out.
The prime minister told his cabinet to “get on with governing” rather than plotting his downfall.
“The past 48 hours have been destabilising for government and that has a real economic cost for our country and for families,” Starmer told them at the weekly cabinet meeting
“The Labour Party has a process for challenging a leader and that has not been triggered.”
Starmer made his remarks and then said there would be no discussion of the leadership issue or the fallout from last week’s elections, when Labour were humiliated in England, Scotland and Wales.
Dozens of Labour MPs have now called on the PM to set out a timetable for his departure.
Junior ministers Jess Phillips, Miatta Fahnbulleh, Alex Davies-Jones and Zubir Ahmed also resigned after deciding they could no longer serve in Starmer’s government.
However, cabinet loyalists Steve Reed, Pat McFadden, Liz Kendal and Peter Kyle put on a dramatic display of support for the prime minister.
Leaving 10 Downing Street after this morning’s cabinet meeting, they took the unusual step of addressing the waiting media to say they were backing the PM.
Meanwhile, leadership hopefuls Wes Streeting and Andy Burnham remained tight-lipped as they weighed up their options.
It is understood Streeting, the health secretary, tried to speak to Starmer after the cabinet meeting but was rebuffed.
A government source said: “Keir said in cabinet that he won’t discuss the elections or his leadership, and that he will only speak to cabinet ministers about that individually. Then after the meeting he refused to see cabinet ministers individually.”
Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester, travelled to London but it is still unclear if he has identified a seat to stand in to give him the chance of becoming an MP again.
Despite speculation that a Labour MP in a safe seat has agreed to stand down for him, no announcement is thought to be imminent.
Amid all the turmoil, tomorrow’s King’s Speech will set out the Starmer government’s plans for the parliamentary year ahead.
But it remains highly unlikely that he will be prime minister long enough to deliver it.
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‘It’s nice isn’t it. The quiet.’
These were the words tweeted by political writer Andrew Scott – aka Otto English – shortly after Keir Starmer’s election as UK prime minister in 2024. In the centrist imagination, Labour’s return to power represented a long-awaited return to ‘normalcy’ after 14 years of chaos at the hands of Brexiteers and Conservatives. Like hobbits being delivered from the fires of Mordor, the people of Britain were finally back in the Shire.
Scott’s statement sounds utterly preposterous now, as Starmer’s premiership disintegrates in the wake of last week’s disastrous local elections. So far, three of his ministers have resigned. At the time of writing, 89 MPs have called on him to step down.
In fact, those now widely mocked remarks went out of date barely a few months after Starmer came to power. Such talk of ‘quiet’ seemed risible when three little girls were murdered in Southport, sparking riots across the UK. Indeed, summer 2024 shaped up to be the biggest wave of unrest the nation had experienced in more than a decade. What followed was a series of unprecedented crackdowns on civil liberties and on free speech.
Public anger has repeatedly boiled over during Starmer’s tenure, as the PM has sought to gaslight the nation over everything from the rape gangs to the never-ending outrages linked to illegal immigration. If the 2024 election had in fact ushered in a period of peace and quiet, this was certainly over well before the rest of us could take stock.
Scott, of course, was not the only member of the media class to wildly overestimate Keir Starmer. Labour’s victory prompted a nauseating stream of gushing from the media establishment. The arrival of this mediocre, personality-free PM was treated as akin to the second coming of Christ.
‘After years of personality-driven and chaotic, shallow politics coverage across much of the media’, intoned Channel 4 News presenter Krishnan Guru-Murthy, ‘we now have a government with [a] massive majority, widespread internal agreement and no likelihood of massive instability anytime soon’. Appearing on Question Time on the day after the General Election, ex-BBC man Andrew Marr insisted: ‘For the first time in many of our lives, Britain actually looks like a little haven of peace and stability.’
‘This is how serious government behaves’, sighed i paper columnist Ian Dunt, one day after Starmer took office, adding that:
‘Know-nothings have been replaced by people with expertise. Ignorance has been replaced by specialism. Incomprehension has been replaced by deep domain knowledge.’
Such statements seem more than a little jarring in light of recent events, as Starmer – the most unpopular prime minister in UK history, no less – is defending his premiership with the passion of a wet flannel. Whatever his ‘expertise’, ‘specialism’ or ‘domain’ knowledge may have been, none of it seems to have helped him in the job.
Boldest among Starmer’s early cheerleaders was surely The Times’ Caitlin Moran, who reported gleefully that the PM’s ‘competency’ had ‘turbocharged [her] arousal levels’. ‘All my friends were watching these arrivals as if we were watching Magic Mike Live’, she wrote of Starmer’s first Cabinet appointments. ‘We were rubbing our thighs.’ Each to their own, I suppose. Many of us will be similarly tingly about seeing the back of the man.
There is a reason why Brits have grown increasingly weary of mainstream journalism in recent years, especially since Brexit. Contrasting the premature Starmer-gasm of the liberal establishment to the howls of anguish that followed the 2016 Leave vote should go some way to explaining things. For centrist media types, Starmer represented a win for the sensible, the moral-minded, the people who ‘know better’. As such, any journalistic duty to scrutinise his policies or his capabilities went out of the window. Instead, we got smug hand-rubbing at the prospect of sticking it to the thicko Brexiteers.
Let’s hope the media aren’t as quick to pull out the pom-poms for whichever lacklustre Labour apparatchik next ends up in Downing Street. But I wouldn’t hold my breath.
Georgina Mumford is a content producer at spiked.
So this is how technocracy ends – not with a bang but with the whimpering of one of its chief proponents as he hunkers down, hiding from the judgement of the people. This is the vision we now have of Keir Starmer: alone, reviled, skulking in his bunker at Downing Street. He’s a dead man blathering, talking about staying the course even though the people and much of his party would rather he didn’t. He’s ‘resolute’, say his dwindling band of apologists, but to the rest of us it just looks like pathological vanity.
These are extraordinary events. Following last week’s local and devolved elections – in which Labour lost vast swathes of territory to Reform UK and others – the heat has been on Sir Keir. As if it wasn’t humiliating enough to lose council seats across England, and control of the Senedd in Wales, and four seats in the Scottish parliament, polls now suggest 70 per cent of Brits view Starmer ‘unfavourably’. Things feel so parlous for Labour that you find yourself wondering who the hell the 30 per cent are – what have they smoked?
Knives are being sharpened. Scores of Labour MPs have called on Starmer to set out a timetable for his vacation of Downing Street. Party aides have resigned. In a highly rare act with at least a faint whiff of political principle, Jess Phillips, Labour’s safeguarding minister, has resigned. Even the home secretary, Shabana Mahmood, thinks Sir Keir needs to set out a plan for slinging his hook. Yet in his echo chamber of one, cloth-eared to criticism, he clings on.
The reason being given by his half-hearted backers is that the last thing Britain needs is the ‘chaos’ of a Labour leadership election and the ‘disorder’ of a potential General Election. So he’s only being stubborn to save us from yet more mayhem. There’s a deep streak of anti-democracy in this cosplaying as a modern-day Louis XV, staying put to stave off the ‘deluge’ that would inevitably follow his departure. Picking a new party leader is not chaos. An early General Election is not bedlam. It’s democracy. If Starmer’s only justification for staying is that the devil you know is better than a democratic process you can’t predict, then he really does need to bugger off.
He is now the physical embodiment of the technocratic philosophy, which is to insulate politics from the grubby reach of the masses. His bunker mentality is managerialism repeated as farce. The only thing that might save his skin is the moral cowardice of the knackered party he leads. Limp as it is, the pro-Starmer wing of Labour is an inglorious exercise in arse-covering – these MPs know working-class voters are biting at the bit to replace them with someone from Reform. They rally around a deeply unpopular PM to avoid facing the demos. They prefer the safety of stasis to the horror of public decision-making.
One doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry reading about the apparent showdown at the Cabinet meeting this morning. Henry Zeffman at the BBC says Starmer’s message to his ministers was essentially ‘Come and have a go if you think you’re hard enough’. But it was ‘directed at one person’ in particular, says Zeffman – Wes Streeting, the health secretary, who’s said to be behind much of the anti-Starmer plotting. Can you think of anything lamer than a clash for the throne between the tweedle dee and tweedle dum of technocracy?
What an ignominious end to the historic English taste for intrigue. The country that gave the world regicides and revolutions and factional spats of real depth now gives it Starmer vs Streeting. A contest between the two wettest men in British politics, almost as if Starmer had gone back in time to scrap with his younger, plumper self. It’s Shakespearean skullduggery but completely bereft of character, poetry or substance. It’s proof that Labour’s problems extend far beyond Sir Keir. This is a party without vision, without shame, and without serious contenders. Putting a ‘fresh’ face in Downing Street would be the political equivalent of buffing a turd.
Some are now saying they feel sorry for Starmer. He’s getting too much flak, back off, say media saps. Nah, you’re all right. I think I’ll save my concern for the pensioners he forced to choose between heating and eating, and the victims of the rape gangs whose gruelling ordeal he called a ‘far-right bandwagon’, and the young women abused by illegal arrivals that he did nothing to stop, and the Jewish communities who’ve been beleagured by hate on his watch. Just go, Sir Keir – feel sorry for yourself on your own dime.
Brendan O’Neill is spiked’s chief political writer and host of the spiked podcast, The Brendan O’Neill Show. Subscribe to the podcast here. His latest book – After the Pogrom: 7 October, Israel and the Crisis of Civilisation – is available to order on Amazon UK and Amazon US now. And find Brendan on Instagram: @burntoakboy.
The European Union (EU) has agreed to impose sanctions on illegal Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank.
This comes after Hungary’s new government lifted the country’s veto, which Viktor Orban, the former Prime Minister, had imposed.
According to the Peace Now settlement watchdog, the organisations the EU will sanction are: Amana, HaShomer Yosh, Regavim, and Nachala. Alongside these organisations, the EU is also sanctioning three settlers who lead these groups – Avichai Suissa, Meir Deutsch, and Daniela Weiss.
Weiss is already sanctioned by the UK and is known as the “godmother” of the settler movement.
The US sanctioned Suissa in 2024; however, Donald Trump removed them from the sanctions list.
All four organisations, and their respective leaders, are collectively responsible for the dispossession, expulsion and murder of Palestinians. Additionally, the organisations work to promote ‘settlements’ in both the West Bank and in Gaza, organising groups and openly boasting about the establishment of new illegal outposts.
West Bank settlers
As expected, Gideon Saar, Israel’s Foreign Minister, slammed the decision.
He would, though, given that he previously lived in both ‘Mitzpe Ramon’ and ‘Sde Boker’, both of which are illegal Israeli settlements in the Negev desert in Occupied Palestine.
Similarly, Ben-Gvir, a seasoned war criminal, claimed the EU was “antisemitic”. Again, he himself is an illegal settler-terrorist. He lives in the occupied West Bank and is known for his extremist views and actions. He has numerous criminal convictions, including eight for offences related to racism, and has promoted racist ideologies against Arabs. Ben Gvir is also arming settlers and calling for the execution of Palestinian prisoners.
In Israel, the rot starts at the top.
An illegal terrorist state
Since Israel launched its genocide on Gaza, illegal settlers have murdered more than 1,000 people in the West Bank.
However, occupation and stealing Palestinian land are a core part of Israeli government policy.
In December 2022, in a post on X, Benjamin Netanyahu stated:
These are the basic lines of the national government under my leadership:
The Jewish people has an exclusive and indisputable right to all spaces of the Land of Israel. The government will promote and develop settlement in all parts of the Land of Israel—in the Galilee, in the Negev, in the Golan, in Judea and Samaria.
There are currently more than 737,000 illegal Israeli settlers living in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. They have the full backing of the state – both ideologically and materially. They are armed by the government and protected by the IOF and the Israeli police.
As the Canary previously reported:
These settlers only aim is to force Palestinians off their land, so their colonial settlements can be built there instead, and they do this by storming villages and terrorising residents, burning homes, killing livestock, and destroying crops and trees.
Currently, Israel is perpetrating its biggest expansion of Jewish settlements in decades across the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
Settlements are illegal under international law.
Article 49 of the Geneva Convention states:
The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.
Additionally, the Hague Regulations (1907) prohibit the seizure and destruction of private property. This means that both the building and the expansion of settlements breach international humanitarian law.
Increasing violence
From settlers expelling an entire Palestinian village, to murdering a farmer, harassing Palestinian shepherds, and stopping children from playing football, there is a clear conscious effort among Israeli settlers to cause physical, emotional, and mental suffering to Palestinians.
The systematic attempts to expel Palestinians from their native land are colonialism with a ‘do not touch, antisemitic’ label plastered to them.
Even the former head of Mossad has compared settler violence to the Holocaust, and who are we to argue with such a man?
Featured image via Al Jazeera English/YouTube
By HG
Ian Wright is to be the focus of a new biopic executive produced by Stormzy.
On Tuesday afternoon, it was announced that a film chronicling the football legend’s journey from a South London housing estate to becoming one of British sport’s most recognisable faces was in the works, produced by Stormzy’s #Merky Films production company.
The currently-untitled movie has been written by Tom Wilton, who is also attached to direct.
Ian enthused: “Telling my story in full for the first time feels surreal and, in some ways, a long time coming. There are parts of my life that will be familiar because they’ve been talked about over the years, but this film is the first time we’re bringing it all together.
“Retelling my story to Tom has also made me realise how much Britain has changed from my parents arriving here on the Windrush, what that meant for me and my brothers, and the experiences that will never leave me. I hope it shows how complicated life can be for a young person and the influence people around you can have – good and bad.”
He added: “My story is one that truly shows how the company you keep can break you down and build you up. There are hard-hitting moments but in the end I want it to give people hope and joy.”
An official press release for the project teased: “Ian’s journey begins on the Honor Oak Estate in Brockley, south London, where football is the young boy’s only escape from his tough home life.
“Schoolteacher Sydney Pigden recognises Ian’s struggles and dares him to believe in who he could be. Despite this spark of hope, by his teens, Ian’s dreams of becoming a footballer are falling apart as rejection, oppression and his own internal rage take their toll.
“By the time he is in his early twenties, Ian’s hope has faded, not least because he strives to be the parent he never had. But with his raw talent finally causing a stir, Ian faces a life-altering choice – risk the only security he has ever known, or take one last shot at the big time.”
Stormzy said of the project: “Wrighty’s journey goes far beyond football – it’s about resilience, family and believing in yourself against the odds.
“He’s inspired generations on and off the pitch and we’re so proud to help bring such an important and powerful story to the screen.”
Over the course of his football career, Ian was best known for playing for Arsenal, Crystal Palace and England’s national team.
Since retiring in 2000, he has become a prolific football pundit and TV personality, and was awarded an OBE for services to football and charity in 2023.
The following is a statement from the Peace & Justice Project. It concerns the actions of insurer Allianz relating to pro-Palestine activists.
The Peace & Justice Project condemns Allianz and its abhorrent use of legal intimidation against pro-Palestine activists it alleges targeted the company over its insurance of Israeli weapons manufacturer Elbit Systems in Britain.
Allianz is claiming nearly £300,000 total in a civil suit against two groups of activists it alleges damaged the company through separate Palestine Action protests in Guildford and London in 2024 and 2025.
In December 2025, Allianz had requested a lower sum before tacking on a further £200,000 in symbolic damages which the six activists have branded a “protest licence fee”, raising the total to £289,604 plus legal representative costs.
The increased demand came after activists wrote to Allianz’s lawyers asking them to wait for criminal proceedings to conclude before continuing their civil case.
Renée Eshel, a tutor who is one of the Allianz6, said:
Allianz ordering us to civil courts while our criminal cases are pending indicates they are using intimidatory fear tactics to bully us into submission and to deter future activists from exposing their complicity in war crimes through Israel’s genocide of the Palestinian people.
The defendants cannot afford legal representation in the civil case, where the standard of proof required is lower than in criminal proceedings. The Allianz6’s lives would be torn apart if forced to pay the enormous symbolic damages, with the money taken from savings and future salaries – potentially causing lifelong financial distress, despite Allianz reporting a 2025 operating profit of £15.2bn.
Featured image via the Canary
By The Canary
Barrister Rajiv Menon has defeated a judge’s attempt to prosecute him for doing his job of defending Palestine Action activists.
Menon was charged with contempt of court for reminding jurors in his closing speech of their legal right to acquit according to conscience. Mr Justice Johnson had ordered this information to be withheld.
In 2024, Judge Saini threw out an attempt to imprison a pensioner for holding up a sign reminding jurors of this ‘jury equity’ right during a different trial. He derided the idea that informing someone of the law could possibly be contempt of court.
However, this has not stopped the Starmer regime and “rogue judges” from continuing to treat the law as an inconvenience to be prevented and prosecuted.
The appeal court’s ruling this morning is a slap to the Starmer regime and its war on our rights to protect Israel.
Defend our Juries has summarised the Menon case, its outcome and its significance on X.
If a jury decides that the person who stands accused of a crime made the morally correct choice in their actions, the jury can find them “not-guilty”, even if the evidence shows that they did carry out the actions they are on trial for
This has been a legal principle since 1670. pic.twitter.com/TlqD6tBoNC
— Defend Our Juries (@DefendOurJuries) May 12, 2026
The court of appeal ruled today that Mr Justice Johnson had no jurisdiction to refer Rajiv Menon KC directly to the High Court. This was unlawful.
It is no coincidence that this attempt to silence a barrister is connected to activists who disrupted Israel’s genocidal war crimes. pic.twitter.com/oxJWDkwmH0
— Defend Our Juries (@DefendOurJuries) May 12, 2026
Rogue judges are attempting to remove any mention of this principle to jurors, blocking their lawful rights.
Labour is attempting to heavily restrict jury trials, preventing access to fair justice.
The attack on juries is an attack on everyone.
Join us: https://t.co/cE6tKTcXBg pic.twitter.com/9hBzv23PJy
— Defend Our Juries (@DefendOurJuries) May 12, 2026
The regime suffered another blow this week with the refusal of a jury to convict anti-genocide activist Majid Freeman. The government has ordered a retrial and is likely to attempt the same tactic of banning mention of jury equity, despite the clear legal precedent.
The Starmer regime is a police state and a rogue one.
Featured image via Garden Court Chambers
By Skwawkbox
For those living in the UK and looking to create a Safety Net for their families back home (in India), the planning process should include both the day-to-day Health Care Costs that come with common chronic/acute Health Conditions and the catastrophic Financial Impact associated with Critical Illnesses. Although generic Health Insurances generally cover the Cost of Hospitalisation in the event of a Health Condition, generic Health Insurance does not account for the Financial Impact created when a Critical Illness is diagnosed (lost income & ongoing rehabilitation, experimental treatments, etc.). Therefore, Critical Illness Plans India (also known as CI Insurance India) provides an added layer of Protection by providing a lump sum payment upon diagnosis of a covered Critical Illness, which can be used as immediate Liquid Money, as well as for any expense incurred at such time.
Decoding the Core Features of a Superior CI Plan
When considering Critical Illness Plans India from the UK, it is essential to not only look at the Premiums and Sum Insured amounts, but to also focus on the following specifics:
Comprehensive/Defined list of covered ailments: The policy should have a comprehensive list of Illnesses (typically covering 15-30+) that are classified as Major types, i.e. Cancer, Heart, Neurological, Organ Transplant. Ultimately, it is mandatory to review the specific Medical Definitions of the various ailments listed in the Policy Document. Many policies have restrictive definitions, which could delay or deny the payment in case of Critical Illness Diagnosis due to having been diagnosed with an ailment that is not specifically defined.
Payment Structure with Lump Sums: It features upon diagnosing a covered illness that matches the policy’s severity level (e.g. Stage 1 cancer), an insurance provider will pay the entire sum to you as a lump sum with no further tax liability when your claim is paid out as per its terms and conditions. This is considered the most beneficial aspect of having these types of products.
Providing Partial Payments: The best Critical Illness (CI) policies in India provide for initially paying out a portion of the sum (25% – 50% depending upon how many years a person has had coverage) for early (or intermediate) stages of any critical illnesses; such as cancer in situ (early stage) where these patients will require added support to assist with the financial impact during the time they must recover from their critical illnesses.
Survivorship Clause: The majority of critical illness plans include a “Survivor Clause” which generally states that once a person has been diagnosed, they will receive their full amount provided they live for a particular number of days after that diagnosis. Receiving the payouts sooner (or at all) if diagnosed early can be very beneficial for those patients, as it will help them start to recover financially.
Waiver of Premium Payments: Upon having a valid claim, the insurance provider should not charge premium payments for the rest of your family’s life while assisting them through recovery.
Lifelong Renewal Options: When purchasing critical illness products, look for companies that offer options for lifetime renewals. This assures you that as your parents/mother/father continues to age, these options will remain in force.
Leading Providers in the Indian CI Market
Numerous insurers in India have strong critical illness plans in place that support NRIs from the UK. These insurers are those that have strong digital infrastructures and a market reputation.
HDFC ERGO (Critical Illness Plan) – Offers comprehensive coverage, policy wordings, and an advanced digital claims experience, which makes this policy a great selection for NRIs.
ICICI Lombard (Critical Illness Protector) – Has a range of plans that include staged payouts and a solid service network. They would make great critical illness plans for NRIs in the UK.
Bajaj Allianz (Critical Illness Care) – Very well established and provides critically structured plans with staged payouts for certain illnesses.
Max Bupa (now Niva Bupa) and Star Health both provide critical illness riders and standalone critical illness plans. Both have received positive feedback for their high level of customer service.
Conclusion
For NRIs living in the UK, planning ahead for potential critical illnesses is a vital step in protecting family well-being in India. Choosing the right critical illness plans in India ensures your family is financially prepared, allowing them to focus on care and recovery rather than the burden of medical expenses during a health crisis.
Within the framework of NRI health insurance, a thoughtfully selected critical illness insurance policy in India provides a lump-sum benefit that gives families true financial agency. This support enables access to the best possible treatment options while also covering ongoing living expenses, ensuring stability and dignity regardless of the diagnosis outcome.
You might have heard of post-dinner “fart walks,” linked to better cardiovascular health, steadier blood sugar, and better ageing.
Perhaps it would be unkind of me to compare the term to Italy’s time-honoured tradition of ‘passeggiata’ strolling. But some research suggests the benefits are similar.
What is a ‘passeggiata’?
The word literally translates to “stroll”.
It’s an evening walk that some Italians make between about 5pm and 8pm. Some people take it multiple times a day, and certain roads may be more associated with the walk than others.
A passeggiata can be as short as 15 minutes or go on for hours. It’s not usually rushed and might not have a clear “point”: it’s just about the joy of moseying about together.
You might stop and talk to a neighbour or meet up with friends.
Just don’t mistake it for a strict exercise regime, orthopaedic surgeon Dr Gbolahan Okubadejo told Real Simple.
″[Italians] stroll through town or along a beachfront promenade. It’s communal, slow-paced, and intentionally not a workout.”
What are the health benefits of the passeggiata?
We already know that, in general, walking is great for our health. One paper found that people who walk 7,000 steps a day saw a 47% risk reduction in all-cause mortality, with a reduced likelihood of developing heart disease, cancer, type 2 diabetes, dementia, and depression.
But that’s not the only benefit here, especially if you take your passeggiata after your evening meal.
A 2016 study involving people with type two diabetes found that 10-minute strolls after each meal seemed to help to regulate their blood sugar better than walking in half-hour blocks. (All walking can be good for blood sugar, though.)
Walking can also make digesting your dinner easier.
Taking an evening walk can be useful for improving your sleep, too.
Then, there are the benefits of “mindful walking,” which can lower your stress, and/or socialising, which is linked to a longer life and a healthier heart.
Every day, my inbox gets clogged by endless marketing, promotional and publicity emails that make it hard to quickly assess which emails are important and which ones aren’t.
When I started noticing the same marketing email addresses land in my inbox each week, I decided to take action. The Federal Trade Commission requires companies to provide an easy way to opt out of email communications and to honour those requests in a timely manner under the CAN-SPAM Act. In reality, opting out can mean hunting for obscured unsubscribe buttons that are barely legible.
But there’s one quick way to clear up a cluttered inbox that doesn’t involve any scrolling: I used a common Gmail hack to review every subscription my email address was subscribed to to see what I could cut. I recommend that you do the same.
Here’s how: Copy and paste this link in your browser and simply replace the word “inbox” in the link https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox with the word “sub.” It should read https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#sub. From there, you can see all your subscriptions and unsubscribe from listservs that no longer serve you. Gmail helpfully lists your subscriptions by the number of emails the subscription has sent you, so you can see your biggest culprits.
When I tried this for myself, I focused on the subscriptions that had sent me over 20 emails recently, and discovered marketing listservs that I had no memory subscribing to on my list. Unsubscribing from all these unwanted mailing lists was quick, easy and satisfying.
And the bonus from doing this is that you will free up valuable storage space. Just know that on this Gmail page, the company states that “it can take senders a few days to stop sending messages” once you unsubscribe.
Going forward, another subscription clutter hack is to stop using the exact same email address to sign up for newsletters. Instead, try using an email address alias that Gmail provides. If you add a plus sign after your email address username, all Gmail will still go to that address.
For example, you can do janesmith+beauty@gmail.com and janesmith+news@gmail.com when you sign up for something, and the emails will still go to janesmith@gmail.com. The difference is that with a specific email address for your beauty subscriptions, like janesmith+beauty@gmail.com, you can create a label and filter rule to clearly sort how certain subscriptions to this email address appear, which inbox they go to, and how these emails get deleted or archived.
Or you can stop using your personal email address when subscribing to newsletters. One way to do this is to use iCloud’s Hide My Email feature, which will generate a random email address when you sign up for services in Apple Mail.
The one Gmail subscription tip I don’t whole-heartedly recommend is using third-party unsubscribe tools because of the potential privacy risks, as seen by a 2019 settlement between email unsubscriber Unroll.me and the FTC over allegations that the company deceived users about how it accessed and used personal emails.
“I’d suggest thinking deeply before granting any third-party tool access to your inbox,” said Thorin Klosowski, a security and privacy activist for the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “Any tool designed to unsubscribe you would likely need full access to your inbox to do its job, and unless you’re going to read the company privacy policy, it’s hard to say what it might do with any information it collects.”
“Instead, I’d recommend sticking to the tools already built into your email provider or email app,” he continued. It’s also potentially safer to do this within Gmail or your email provider over “clicking to unsubscribe” on a spammy email you think is suspicious. Software company DNSFilter actually found in 2025 that one in every 644 “unsubscribe” links went to a malicious site.
Reviewing your current email subscriptions on your own takes a few seconds, but it’s not hard to do, and you won’t risk your digital privacy.
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