The resounding victories in recent elections by Democrats Zohran Mamdani in New York, Abigail Spanberger in Virginia and Mikie Sherrill in New Jersey has reinvigorated the party after a dismal year since Donald Trump became president.
The victories were not a mandate for a sharp ideological shift to the left. This may be true for Mamdani, but it is not for Spanberger and Sherrill, since both are mainstream centrist Democrats. The main reason for the victories can be seen in the chart below.
Trends in presidential job approval and Donald Trump’s handling of the economy 2025:
The data comes from successive polls in the United States conducted by YouGov on behalf of the Economist magazine. All three candidates focused on the issue of the US economy which proved to be a winning strategy since it is clear the economy strongly affects Donald Trump’s job approval ratings.
As the president’s ratings on the economy decline, so does his job approval ratings. The result is that the Republicans took the blame for failing to deal with the issue.
The midterm Congressional elections in the US are due to take place in November 2026. Given the strong relationship between the economy and support for the president, it is interesting to examine how the economy is likely to influence support for the Democrats in those elections.
To investigate this, we can look at elections to the House of Representatives over a long period, given that they occur every two years.
The graph below compares the number of House seats won by the Democrats and economic growth in the US in all 40 House elections since 1946. Economic growth is weighted so that the Democrats benefit from high growth when they control the House but are penalised by this when the Republicans are in control.
This also works in reverse with low growth producing a poor electoral performance for the party when Democrats are in charge and a good performance when the Republicans are in control.
The relationship between economic growth and House seats won by Democrats 1946 to 2024:
The impact of the economy on voting in these elections is clearly quite strong, but the number of House seats won declines as the party’s majority gets larger. This is what is known as a “ceiling” effect meaning that when the majority is very large it is difficult to win more seats even in a thriving economy.
But this relationship can nonetheless be used to develop a forecasting model of the seats likely to be captured by the party in midterm elections next year.
When forecasting seats, an additional factor to consider is the inertia of party support over successive elections. If the Democrats did well in one year, they were likely to do well two years later.
For example, in 2008 when Barack Obama won the presidential election, the Democrats captured 233 House seats and the Republicans 202. In the following midterm election in 2010 the party won 257 seats while the Republicans won 178 and so the Democrats retained control of the House.
At the moment the House has a Republican majority of 219 against 213 Democrats. So Republican control is quite vulnerable to a surge in support for the Democrats.
Multiple regression analysis
The forecasting model involves a multiple regression analysis. This uses several variables to predict the behaviour of a specific variable – in this case the number of House seats won by the Democrats.
In addition to the two variables already mentioned, approval ratings and the performance of the economy, the fact that the incumbent president is a Republican is included in the modelling as well since this influences the vote for the Democrats.
We know the number of House seats from the 2024 election and the fact that Trump is a Republican, so to forecast Democrat House seats we need a prediction for economic growth in 2026.
The Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis provides data which forecasts growth in the US economy up to 2028. It predicts that growth in real terms will be 1.8% in 2026 – and when this is included in the modelling, the overall forecast from these variables is 80% accurate.
If a variable is a perfect predictor of House seats it would score 1.0 and if it failed to predict any seats at all it would score 0. The impact of growth on seats when the Democrats controlled the House was 0.75, the inertia effect of past Democrat seats was 0.26 and Trump’s presidency was 0.19.
Low growth boosts Democrats’ prospects
Clearly economic growth dominates the picture showing that low growth rates next year will strengthen the Democrat challenge. This is likely to happen since a recent IMF report suggests that US growth is likely to slow next year.
Actual and predicted House seats in elections 1946 to 2026:
The third chart shows the relationship between Democratic House seats predicted by the model and the actual number of seats won by the party. The predictions track the actual number of Democrat House seats fairly closely and so the forecast should be reasonably accurate
It should be noted that all forecasting models are subject to significant errors. As the chart shows, the predicted number of seats is not the same as the actual number and if something unforeseen happens the predictions could be wrong. That said, however, the forecast is that the Democrats will win 223 seats – an increase of ten over their performance in 2024. This will give them enough to hand them control of the House.
Paul Whiteley has received funding from the British Academy and the ESRC.
The pancreas is essential for staying alive and healthy. This small organ sits behind the stomach and has two main jobs. It produces digestive enzymes that break down food and hormones such as insulin and glucagon that control blood sugar.
Everyday habits such as heavy drinking and unhealthy eating can gradually damage the pancreas. Once injured, the consequences can be serious and include inflammation, diabetes and, in some cases, cancer.
Several common lifestyle factors can put the pancreas under strain:
1. Alcohol
Regular heavy drinking is one of the leading causes of pancreatitis. Acute pancreatitis causes severe abdominal pain, nausea and vomiting and often needs hospital care. Repeated episodes can develop into chronic pancreatitis, where long-lasting inflammation and scarring permanently reduce pancreatic function. This can lead to malabsorption of fats, vitamins and other nutrients, diabetes and a higher risk of pancreatic cancer. Researchers have several theories about how this damage occurs.
Alcohol can cause digestive enzymes such as trypsin, which normally work in the small intestine, to activate inside the pancreas before they reach the gut. Instead of digesting food, they digest pancreatic tissue and trigger severe inflammation.
Alcohol also makes pancreatic juices thicker and stickier. These thicker fluids can form protein plugs that harden into stones and block tiny ducts. Over time this causes irritation, scarring and the loss of pancreatic cells. When the pancreas breaks down alcohol it produces a toxic chemical called acetaldehyde that irritates and damages cells and triggers inflammation.
Alcohol also encourages the release of chemical messengers that switch on inflammation and keep it active. This makes tissue damage more likely.
Guidelines recommend drinking no more than 14 units of alcohol per week. It is safest to spread this across several days and to avoid binge drinking.
2. Smoking
Smoking increases the risk of both acute and chronic pancreatitis. Acute pancreatitis develops suddenly with severe pain and sickness. Chronic pancreatitis develops over many years and repeated inflammation causes permanent damage. Several studies show that the more someone smokes, the higher the risk. Another study found that quitting significantly reduces risk, and after about 15 years the risk can fall close to that of a non smoker.
Smoking is also strongly linked to pancreatic cancer. Scientists do not yet fully understand every mechanism, but laboratory studies show that nicotine can trigger sudden increases in calcium inside pancreatic cells. Too much calcium harms cells and worsens inflammation. Tobacco smoke also contains carcinogens that damage DNA.
One of the earliest genetic changes in pancreatic cancer involves a gene called Kras, which acts like a switch that controls how cells grow. In more than 90 percent of pancreatic cancers this gene is mutated, which locks the growth switch in the on position and encourages uncontrolled cell growth.
3. Diet
Diet affects the pancreas in several ways. Eating a lot of saturated fat, processed meat or refined carbohydrates raises the risk of pancreatic problems.
One major cause of acute pancreatitis is gallstones. Gallstones can block the bile duct and trap digestive enzymes inside the pancreas. When enzymes build up they begin to damage the organ. Diet contributes to gallstone formation because high cholesterol levels make bile more likely to form stones.
Another type of fat in the blood is triglycerides. When triglycerides rise to very high levels, large fat particles known as chylomicrons can clog tiny blood vessels in the pancreas. This reduces oxygen supply and triggers the release of harmful fatty acids that irritate pancreatic tissue.
Frequent spikes in blood sugar from high sugar foods also strain the pancreas. Constant surges in insulin over time reduce insulin sensitivity and may increase the risk of pancreatic cancer.
4. Obesity
Obesity increases the risk of acute pancreatitis, chronic pancreatitis and pancreatic cancer. Fat can accumulate in and around the pancreas, a condition called pancreatic steatosis or non-alcoholic fatty pancreatic disease. This build up can replace healthy cells and weaken the organ.
Excess body fat also increases levels of pro-inflammatory molecules such as TNF-alpha and IL-6, creating long-lasting inflammation that supports tumour growth. Obesity disrupts insulin sensitivity and hormone signals from fat tissue. Gallstones are more common in people who are obese and can increase the risk of pancreatitis.
5. Physical inactivity
A sedentary lifestyle worsens insulin resistance and forces the pancreas to produce more insulin. Without activity to help muscles absorb glucose, the pancreas remains under constant strain. This metabolic stress increases susceptibility to diabetes and pancreatic cancer.
Physical activity may lower pancreatic cancer risk both directly and indirectly. It supports immune function, improves cell health, reduces obesity and lowers type 2 diabetes risk. Regular movement strengthens antioxidant defences and increases the activity of disease fighting immune cells.
Adults are encouraged to include strength training at least twice a week and to aim for 150 minutes of moderate activity or 75 minutes of vigorous activity each week.
Because pancreatic conditions can be life threatening, recognising early symptoms is important. Seek medical advice if you have persistent abdominal pain, unexplained weight loss, loss of appetite, nausea or vomiting that do not settle, jaundice, greasy or foul smelling stools or chronic fatigue.
Many risks are modifiable. Limiting alcohol intake, quitting smoking, eating a diet rich in fruit, vegetables and whole grains and being physically active all reduce the likelihood of pancreatic disease. Even small changes such as choosing plant-based protein or cutting back on sugary drinks help lighten the load on this vital organ.
By understanding how the pancreas becomes damaged and by noticing symptoms early, you can take simple steps to protect it. Look after your pancreas and it will look after you.
Dipa Kamdar does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The scandal of the religious-run Magdalene laundries, where young women deemed to have offended the moral code of the Catholic Church were incarcerated and put to work, is a stain on the public history of the Irish state. It has taken years of campaigning to bring this injustice to light.
Even now, it is more than feasible that further revelations will emerge. They did in 2012, when amateur historian Catherine Corliss uncovered evidence of a mass grave containing the remains of 796 infants at St Mary’s mother-and-baby home in Tuam, Co Galway.
Overall, it is estimated that a minimum of 10,000 women were sent to the institutions in the years from the founding of the state in 1922 to the closure of the final Magdalene laundry in 1996. Most were forced into unpaid, brutalising work in the profitable laundry system.
The new documentary, Testimony, directed by Aoife Kelleher, takes up where earlier campaigning films left off. Its most notable progenitor is Sex in a Cold Climate (1998), in which four women narrated to-camera their memories of the laundries. It was as shocking then as now to see elderly, dignified, smartly dressed women weeping at the memory of having their children taken from them.
The trauma they endured is unimaginable. Sex in a Cold Climate was the inspiration for The Magdalene Sisters in 2002. Since then, Philomena (2013), based on the real story of Philomena Lee, who also speaks in Testimony, shone a light on the trade in babies, many of them to homes in the US, perpetrated by the Magdalene institutions in collusion with the Irish state.
Most recently, Small Things Like These (2024), adapted from the novella by Claire Keegan, asked its viewers what they would have done if they had been confronted with the truth of what was going on in those grim buildings.
The trailer for Testimony.
Testimony alternates to-camera interviews with survivors with the history of how the group, Justice for Magdalenes, was founded. We follow this collection of determined campaigners as they take on the Irish government and force them to acknowledge their historic complicity in this story.
Recognising that descriptions of slow, detailed legal work do not make for dynamic viewing, the filmmakers rely on explaining the legal process through the key figure of the Irish human rights lawyer, Maeve O’Rourke, an articulate, engaging presence on screen.
At the same time, the documentary acknowledges that the true heroes are the women whose stories of abuse and exploitation are as harrowing as when they were first heard. Regrettably, now as previously, the religious orders declined to participate.
Testimony is effectively a two-part film. One “ending” comes in at around the 55-minute mark with the triumphant arrival of a group of 220 Magdalene survivors and their families to a civic reception in Dublin. As the coaches roll in, they are greeted by cheering members of the public. This deeply moving sequence draws its strength from the women’s own emotions as they take in the faces and placards among the crowds. As one says: “That for me was my healing.”
The film then restarts with the stories of the children who were trafficked out of the state, interweaving this with the campaigners’ attempts to force the government into offering appropriate recompense. This segment opens with footage of the discovery of the Tuam burials and again returns to the voices of survivors, both mothers and children, including Philomena Lee. It also touches on the illegal vaccine trials conducted on children born in the homes.
Deprived of a similarly cathartic ending to the first segment, the film concludes by imploring the Irish government and the religious institutions to make available all the records held on the Magdalene laundries.
Testimony will never reach the audiences that fictional films on the subject can. At the same time, this campaigning documentary is an essential reminder of a society’s efforts to contain female sexuality, particularly that of its most vulnerable members. It is equally a demonstration of how the law can be used to fight injustice. We needn’t be so complacent as to assume none of this could happen again.
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Ruth Barton does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Estrella Luna-Diez, Associate Professor in Plant Pathology, School of Biosciences, University of Birmingham
The mighty Feanedock Oak in Derbyshire has provided an anchor habitat for many lifeforms, including people, for more than 200 years.Lucy Neal, CC BY-NC-SA
The Feanedock Oak stands out so clearly in Derbyshire’s section of the National Forest, you’d think it was calling to you. Surrounded by open fields, hawthorn hedges and young beech forest, a majestic old oak like this anchors the English countryside.
As the highest expression of our woodlands, oaks support more life in the UK than any other native tree. At the foot of the Feanedock oak, you can hear and see – at a glance – wrens, blackbirds, spiders, squirrels, song thrush, hoverflies, butterflies, blackcaps, woodlouse, ants and chiffchaffs. For more than two centuries, it has provided an anchor habitat, including for humans – a tumbled-down dwelling lies under its shade.
How well any English oak (Quercus robur) thrives affects everything living on and around it, from canopy to soil. In recent years of heat and drought, the Feanedock Oak has lost two large boughs.
In the summer of 2023, dendrochronologists – who research and date trees through their growth rings – took samples from the tree’s trunk to study its “healthy” and “poor” years of growth. They counted 195 rings but did not get to the centre of the tree – so it was probably seeded in the early 19th century, if not earlier. As a sapling, it would have greeted Derbyshire miners walking across the fields from nearby villages to work in the newly-dug coal shafts or the many industrial potteries in the area.
More than 200 years later, in July 2023, the Feanedock Oak (now measuring around 120 feet) played a central role in Ring of Truth. This creative collaboration between tree scientists and artists from the Walking Forest collective imagined a legal case set in the year 2030 between a claimant, the oak (in whose shadow the case was heard), and the UK government.
Ring of Truth’s imagined court case is heard at the Timber Festival, July 2023. RB Films, CC BY-NC-SA
The counsel for the claimant – real-life rights of nature lawyer Paul Powlesland – set out his argument to the judge and jury, claiming the government had breached legal obligations set out in the 2008 Climate Change Act. Scientists from the University of Birmingham – including one of us (Bruno) – acted as expert witnesses, bringing evidence of the threats posed to the tree from increased heat, atmospheric CO₂, soil damage and disease.
After hearing all the evidence, the assembled audience – in the role of jury – voted for their verdict. Many were acutely conscious that the claimant had been standing in this spot far longer than anyone else present – a silent witness to the damage done by humans on the environment and landscape. They ordered the secretary of state for climate and ecological breakdown (as the job is known in 2030) to cease breaching legal obligations to protect this and all “anchor oaks”, and the communities that thrive or suffer with them.
That powerful moment under the Feanedock Oak opened a door to a deeper question: how and what do trees remember?
Until recently, little was known about how memory might function in long-lived organisms like trees which experience decades, even centuries, of shifting environmental pressures. So this is what our multidisciplinary research collaboration – featuring artworks, performances and even a musical composition as well as groundbreaking science – set out to discover.
On the Memory of Trees, by Scott Wilson, was composed using data collated by the Membra project.
How trees’ memories work
For trees, memory is not a metaphor but a biological reality, written into their cells. One of the most remarkable forms this takes is epigenetic memory: the ability of a tree to record its life experiences and allow those experiences to shape its future, without changing the sequence of its DNA.
As Membra (full name: Understanding Memory of UK Treescapes for Better Resilience and Adaptation), we’ve studied a number of ecologically vital and culturally significant UK species including oak, ash, hazel, beech and birch. Together, they have helped us understand how trees register and respond to environmental stress, offering a powerful glimpse into how their memories are carried through woodlands.
At the heart of this process is DNA methylation, where chemical tags known as methyl groups are added to the tree’s DNA over time. While not rewriting the genetic code, they do alter how it is read. These chemical signatures can turn genes on or off, dial responses up or down, and fundamentally shift how a tree grows, adapts, or defends itself. In oaks, for example, long-term drought exposure over decades is associated with changes in DNA methylation, suggesting that trees may adjust their gene expression in response to repeated stress.
These epigenetic memories may allow trees to respond more quickly to drought, disease or climate extremes, and could even be passed to the next generation. In some plant species, this kind of inheritance is well documented, but in long-lived trees, it remains an open question – one with critical implications for forest regeneration and resilience.
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So far, our research has shown trees respond to stress in ways that can extend well beyond the immediate event. Exposure to drought or high CO₂, for example, can leave lasting marks on a tree’s growth and internal chemistry, and may shape how it responds to future conditions. But the strength of this memory appears to depend on the nature of the stress: it is more pronounced when the stress is particularly strong, such as disease, or when it occurs repeatedly over time, such as chronic drought.
A surprising result came from oak, where we observed that DNA methylation itself changes depending on the time of year – with methylation levels lowest in early spring, then increasing as the seasons progress. This suggests the imprinting of memory in trees may be far more dynamic than previously thought, and that the timing of stress events within the growing season could influence how strongly that memory is encoded.
All our studied species and associated environmental conditions have now been sequenced. In every case, we have found evidence of these memories of past stresses. In ash trees, for example, we’ve begun to detect methylation changes linked to ash dieback pressure, offering clues as to how trees regulate their defences over time as a disease progresses.
Trees are certainly resilient. They bend, adapt and endure, holding the memory of storms and seasons within their very bodies. But even their deep-rooted strength has limits. The challenges they now face are faster, more frequent and more severe than at any point in their evolutionary history.
This means what we are learning from their memories is not just a story of survival, but a warning. They are telling us there could come a point when they can no longer cope.
Even young trees remember
It is easy to be awed by a centuries-old oak. But what often goes unnoticed is the quiet crisis beneath the canopy. Across many UK woodlands, the next generation is missing.
Surveys show steep declines in most species of young trees (seedlings and saplings) due to a growing list of pressures: prolonged drought, warming temperatures, shifting herbivore populations, and an expanding wave of pests and pathogens. According to a study of nine sites in England and Scotland, co-authored by one of us (Bruno) and currently under review, the sapling mortality rate has increased from 16.2% in the period up to 2000 to 30.9% two decades later.
In some species such as elm and now ash, diseases have brought populations close to the point of lack of regeneration – when a woodland can no longer sustain itself. To counter this threat, young trees must be highly adaptable – not just in form, but at the molecular level. At Membra, scientists are exploring whether young trees imprint environmental stress more readily than older ones, and whether that memory, recorded through changes in DNA methylation, influences their survival.
One way we have tested such transgenerational changes is to expose trees (oak and hazel) to the elevated levels of CO₂ that are expected in the UK by 2050. This was done in the Birmingham Institute for Forest Research (Bifor) facility in a Staffordshire woodland – one of the world’s largest climate change experiments, where tree “arrays” (circular patches of woodland) are exposed to 150 parts per million (ppm) of CO₂ above ambient concentrations.
Membra’s research there has found that the offspring of trees exposed to these CO₂ levels respond very differently to further environmental stressors – in ways that can make them more resilient. For example, acorns from CO₂-exposed oaks were notably larger and their seedlings showed both faster growth and improved resistance to pathogens like powdery mildew – a strong sign that environmental conditions experienced by parent trees can shape offspring resilience.
To date, molecular analysis shows the inherited memory of this exposure is imprinted in the tree genes that are involved in defence mechanisms. The direct link with resilience should be identified in the next few years as our data analysis progresses.
Strikingly, these beneficial effects were most pronounced during “mast” years, when trees produce a bumper crop of seeds, suggesting that the reproductive cycles of mature oaks as well as resource availability are key to the oaks’ successful inheritance of stress-adaptive traits. Similarly, seedlings from oak trees that had undergone repeated drought exposure have shown increased drought tolerance – which suggests some trees may “prime” their offspring to be more resilient in the face of repeated climate stress.
Our work also shows that young trees can be artificially primed for resilience. For instance, early treatment with certain natural compounds enhances oak seedlings’ resistance to powdery mildew disease, triggering biochemical and transcriptional responses that allow them to mount a faster and stronger defence. This priming acts like a kind of immunological memory – in this case not inherited but induced – and could potentially open up new avenues for improving forest health and regeneration.
Importantly, species differ widely in how they pass on environmental experiences to their progeny. Hazel trees subjected to the same elevated CO₂ conditions in the Bifor woodland produced both smaller nuts and seedlings that often failed to thrive after germination. So, rather than assuming a one-size-fits-all strategy for seed sourcing, forestry managers may need to tailor decisions based on species-specific responses to past environmental stresses. Recognising the importance of parental environmental history, especially for stressors like drought, could shape how we select and prepare the next generation of trees.
This may also mean rethinking how and when we collect seeds. In species such as oak, collecting from mast years may improve the odds of transmitting beneficial adaptive traits. In all cases, understanding how trees’ memory works, not just within a tree’s lifetime but across generations, offers a crucial tool for building more adaptive, resilient treescapes in this rapidly changing world.
Tree rings such as those sampled from the Feanedock Oak record much more than just a tree’s age. They hold evidence of how trees respond to changing climates, rising carbon levels and extreme events.
Studies using these natural archives (the rings) have shown that rising atmospheric CO₂ is already changing how trees grow and photosynthesise. In some oaks, it has led to faster growth and more carbon being stored – a hopeful sign.
But this acceleration may come with hidden costs. Trees that grow quickly not only reach maturity sooner but may also die younger, potentially limiting the long-term stability of forest carbon storage.
And these shifts are not just a concern for the trees themselves – they ripple outward. Faster growth can alter forest structure, affecting biodiversity and resilience. In the UK and globally, trees face an escalating cascade of challenges including pollution, drought, storms and disease – and increasingly, these pressures overlap.
Understanding how different trees’ memories will mediate their responses to new, more stressful conditions is key to predicting which species will thrive, adapt or decline. Artificially priming young trees by exposing them early to stress may enhance their memory and survival.
In recent years, a wave of tree planting, often tied to carbon offsetting schemes, is rapidly reshaping landscapes across much of the UK. National and local governments have launched large-scale initiatives such as the England Tree Action Plan. These programmes aim to restore canopy cover, improve biodiversity and contribute to net-zero goals. Local authorities, environmental charities, landowners and corporate offsetting partners are among those overseeing the planting, with guidance and funding provided by the Forestry Commission and Defra.
However, the choice of species is often constrained by budget and availability, which can result in limited diversity and mismatches between trees and local ecological conditions. Fast-growing species like sycamore, alder, and hybrid poplar are frequently used, while slower-growing native species with deeper ecological value may be underrepresented.
Planting trees without understanding their long-term ecological roles – or their capacity to remember and adapt – also risks repeating old mistakes that could compromise long-term resilience. Selecting the right trees to face future climate threats requires more than just numbers. A forest full of fast-growing, short-lived trees may have a very different effect on the local ecosystem than one with long-lived, memory-bearing individuals. In the worst-case scenario, such woodlands will fail to regenerate and die out.
Climate models indicate a future of warmer, wetter winters and hotter, drier summers in the UK, which will challenge many native species. Diseases such as ash dieback have already transformed landscapes, with over 80% of ash trees expected to be lost in many areas. This is not just a loss of a species but a loss of the biodiversity that depends on it.
Our work highlights the value of sourcing seed from trees that have survived historic drought and understanding how memory, resilience and adaptation are embedded in the biology of many older individuals. Future woodlands will need to blend ancient wisdom with modern science, combining genetic diversity, environmental memory and community stewardship to thrive.
This legal shift complements the scientific insight from Membra: that mature woodlands, with deep memory and biodiversity, are not replaceable. And as Ring of Truth’s imagined court case made clear, it is a travesty if trees such as the Feanedock Oak are thought of as little more than machines to extract human-created carbon from the atmosphere.
Their social, cultural and ecological roles are vast. Listening to Indigenous and local communities with long-held tree knowledge, and empowering tree guardians in cities and villages alike, is vital to fostering a meaningful public practice of tree stewardship.
As one Walking Forest participant put it, time spent with trees creates space and renewed agency for surviving the climate and nature crises: “We are like trees. The stronger we root and allow ourselves, like them, to be nurtured by those around us, the better we are at withstanding the strongest of storms”.
Another said: “I see the bigger picture now, of how we are related to the forest – at one with nature because we too are part of the ecosystem.”
By weaving together artistic performance, scientific insight and ancestral knowledge, the Walking Forest collective has sought to expand how we understand our relationship with woodlands – connecting women, trees and ecological justice across time.
One powerful example is the 107-year-old Monterey Pine planted by suffragette Rose Lamartine Yates, the last known survivor of a historic arboretum planted by women activists at Eagle House in Batheaston, Somerset. A place of recovery for women who were politically active as part of the suffrage movement, this was the home of the Blathwayt family – and known as the Suffragettes’ Retreat.
Suffragettes Adela Pankhurst and Annie Kenney at Eagle House in Batheaston, Somerset, in 1910. Linley Blathwayt/Wikimedia
Between April 1909 and July 1911, at least 47 trees were planted in the grounds of Eagle House to commemorate individual suffragists and suffragettes, many of whom had been imprisoned and tortured. The arboretum afforded the suffragettes an opportunity to imagine the future into which their young trees would grow.
The trees were all bulldozed in the late 1960s to make way for a housing estate – other than Lamartine Yates’s Monterey Pine, planted in 1909, which survives to this day, protected in a private garden. The seeds of this tree are a touchstone of Walking Forest: we have gathered and propagated them, shared them with communities, and created performances and ceremonies that honour the tree’s legacy – connecting past and future generations (of trees and people) in a project to create a woodland that mirrors the original Eagle House arboretum.
Since 2018, Walking Forest artists have travelled overland to UN climate talks to gift seeds from the Monterey Pine to women and youth activists, climate negotiators, Indigenous community leaders and environmental campaigners – connecting with them in this story of resilience and renewal.
In another act of collective mourning and protest, a 100-year-old silver birch cut down for the HS2 rail link was carried through Coventry by more than 40 women during Coventry’s year as City of Culture in 2021. The act made visible the loss of ancient woodland and connected it with human grief, resistance and care.
These stories are not isolated. Across the UK, trees have become flashpoints for protest and protection – from the Sycamore Gap tree at Hadrian’s Wall to Sheffield Council’s felling of more than 5,000 healthy street trees between 2014 and 2018 as part of road maintenance.
Walking Forest has collaborated with Membra not only to share scientific knowledge but to offer new ways of knowing through storytelling, ritual and creative action. As climate pressures grow, so too does public awareness of how irreplaceable mature trees are.
We are still only beginning to uncover the complexity of tree memory. Future research may reveal exactly how memory is transferred between generations, how trees prepare for challenges they’ve never seen, and how entire forests might adapt together.
But our collaboration between scientists, artists and communities is already helping to shift how people think about trees, from passive backdrop to learning beings. Through this work, we understand that trees are not just survivors – they are storytellers, record keepers and even teachers.
As our understanding of their memory deepens, so too does our responsibility to listen, learn and act. The future of forests depends not just on what trees can remember, but on what we choose not to forget.
A recent return to the Feanedock Oak, two years after its case was argued in Ring of Truth, found the tree still standing but visibly altered. Its two large, fallen limbs lay cloaked in bramble and nettle. But under its canopy, foxes burrowed, birds sang and fruit trees flowered.
Though imbalanced, this grand old oak holds its ground – a tree of memory and now a symbol of care. We will return again and again to honour its survival, and admire its provision for so many other species in the natural world. The tree reminds us that people need ways to anchor ourselves too, as we navigate uncertain times ahead.
Estrella Luna-Diez receives funding from UK Research & Innovation (UKRI) and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC).
Anne-Marie Culhane receives funding from UKRI and the NERC.
Bruno Barcante Ladvocat Cintra receives funding from the NERC.
Additional thanks to Lucy Neal, member of the Walking Forest collective, for her written and photographic contributions to this article. Lucy was the creator of Ring of Truth, performed at the Timber Festival in July 2023.
Amid growing public concern over migration and a political threat from Reform UK, the Labour government has proposed sweeping reforms to the asylum and refugee system. The home secretary, Shabana Mahmood, says the plans will address an “out of control” asylum system.
By restricting the rights of refugees, the proposals aim to make Britain a “less attractive” destination for people who arrive without documentation. But they also risk making an already-bureaucratic system even harder for refugees to navigate – and for an overstretched Home Office to administer.
Central to the proposals are changes to refugees’ rights to settle in the UK. Currently, people who are granted asylum (recognised by the government as refugees) can apply for settled status after five years, giving them a pathway to potential citizenship and a stable future. Under the new plans, the wait to apply for settled status will be extended to 20 years. Refugees would need to reapply to remain in Britain every two and a half years.
The precise conditions for such “earned settlement” are still to come, but these plans indicate that being in work or education will be central.
The potential for family reunification, the route through which refugees can sponsor close family members to join them in Britain, will be restricted to those in work or study and even then reunification is not guaranteed.
These proposals mean that people who have been recognised as needing humanitarian protection will be under constant review. For a Home Office already struggling to manage an application backlog, the addition of a sizeable number of reviews each year will add even further pressure and expense. The Refugee Council estimates that were this policy in place today, it would mean potentially reviewing the status of “1.4 million people between now and 2035” at a cost of £730 million.
For refugees, this change will increase their insecurity and hinder integration. Finding housing, employment and education opportunities are all made harder with insecure status. The emotional burden of that insecurity – two decades of trying to integrate, with the threat of removal hanging over them throughout – is considerable.
A hardline stance on deportation
Mahmood is proposing changes to legal frameworks and the asylum appeals system, to make it easier to remove “failed” asylum seekers. This “hard-headed approach” introduces the possibility of deporting families “who have a safe home country they can return to”.
With Reform UK proposing a widespread deportation programme if elected, the current government risks legitimising the detention and removal of children who may have spent their childhood in the UK.
The question remains of how far a Labour government is willing to go in to order to apply such a policy. Will they (and their voters) be happy to see images of families and young children detained and deported? Will this be seen by ministers as an acceptable cost in order to claim the government has “restored order” to the UK’s borders?
Removing support for asylum seekers
The government is currently legally obligated to support asylum seekers who would otherwise be destitute. This obligation is partly what’s led to the controversial reliance on hotels to house people awaiting a decision on their claims.
The government wants to revoke this duty and make it a discretionary “power” of government.
Support and accommodation will be removed from asylum seekers found to have committed a crime, including illegal working. It will also be revoked if asylum seekers refuse to be moved or are found to be “disruptive in accommodation”. It is unclear if the government will want to pursue this path and remove all support from people who cannot legally be removed from the country. Adding to street homelessness is not the sign of an effective policy.
The government will also “require individuals to contribute towards the cost of their asylum support where they have some assets or income”. With ministers adamant that this will not mean confiscating family heirlooms, as was the case in Denmark, the effect of this is likely to be minimal. Very few people fleeing conflict and persecution travel with considerable assets.
A more significant contribution is expected from those with the right to work. The main problem here is that most asylum seekers in Britain are currently denied the right to work, with the exception of those who have been in the asylum system for over 12 months and who fit a limited range of skilled roles. Extending the right to work further would mean a reduced reliance on the state for housing and greater pathways to integration. But this is not part of the proposals.
The message of these proposals is clear – asylum seekers should be docile guests with no right to complain about the conditions of their accommodation (which have been notably horrific) or about the denial of their rights.
Safe and legal routes
The government has restated its commitment to “safe and legal routes” to Britain, and will introduce an annual cap on the number of arrivals. Communities would also have the opportunity to sponsor specific refugees, and there would be a limited route for highly-skilled refugees. Refugees arriving through these routes would have a ten-year path to settled status.
These proposals expand the possibility of safe and legal routes beyond current schemes for groups from Afghanistan, Hong Kong and Ukraine.
They also show a renewed emphasis on refugee sponsorship, making the case that communities should have a say in supporting refugees. In a divisive political climate, this is a positive move that will encourage integration.
But there’s a risk it could operate in place of, rather than alongside, government support to protect the rights of refugees. And that developing more safe and legal routes could be used to justify hardline measures directed towards asylum seekers already in Britain.
Home Office research has indicated that social networks, language and cultural connections are the most significant factors influencing decisions and that deterrent measures have little effect on number arriving in the UK.
Rising asylum applications are an indication of the unstable world we live in. Seeking to evade responsibilities for supporting refugees will not change that.
Then there are the political challenges to navigate. Will the British public be supportive of the removal of people who have been neighbours and community members for a decade?
As the last Conservative government found, talking tough does not in itself fix the asylum system. It very often exacerbates the failures of the system, distracts attention and drives resentment towards asylum seekers and refugees.
Jonathan Darling receives funding from the Economic and Social Research Council. He is a trustee of the No Accommodation Network.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Estrella Luna-Diez, Associate Professor in Plant Pathology, School of Biosciences, University of Birmingham
The mighty Feanedock Oak in Derbyshire has provided an anchor habitat for many lifeforms, including people, for more than 200 years.Lucy Neal, CC BY-NC-SA
The Feanedock Oak stands out so clearly in Derbyshire’s section of the National Forest, you’d think it was calling to you. Surrounded by open fields, hawthorn hedges and young beech forest, a majestic old oak like this anchors the English countryside.
As the highest expression of our woodlands, oaks support more life in the UK than any other native tree. At the foot of the Feanedock oak, you can hear and see – at a glance – wrens, blackbirds, spiders, squirrels, song thrush, hoverflies, butterflies, blackcaps, woodlouse, ants and chiffchaffs. For more than two centuries, it has provided an anchor habitat, including for humans – a tumbled-down dwelling lies under its shade.
How well any English oak (Quercus robur) thrives affects everything living on and around it, from canopy to soil. In recent years of heat and drought, the Feanedock Oak has lost two large boughs.
In the summer of 2023, dendrochronologists – who research and date trees through their growth rings – took samples from the tree’s trunk to study its “healthy” and “poor” years of growth. They counted 195 rings but did not get to the centre of the tree – so it was probably seeded in the early 19th century, if not earlier. As a sapling, it would have greeted Derbyshire miners walking across the fields from nearby villages to work in the newly-dug coal shafts or the many industrial potteries in the area.
More than 200 years later, in July 2023, the Feanedock Oak (now measuring around 120 feet) played a central role in Ring of Truth. This creative collaboration between tree scientists and artists from the Walking Forest collective imagined a legal case set in the year 2030 between a claimant, the oak (in whose shadow the case was heard), and the UK government.
Ring of Truth’s imagined court case is heard at the Timber Festival, July 2023. RB Films, CC BY-NC-SA
The counsel for the claimant – real-life rights of nature lawyer Paul Powlesland – set out his argument to the judge and jury, claiming the government had breached legal obligations set out in the 2008 Climate Change Act. Scientists from the University of Birmingham – including one of us (Bruno) – acted as expert witnesses, bringing evidence of the threats posed to the tree from increased heat, atmospheric CO₂, soil damage and disease.
After hearing all the evidence, the assembled audience – in the role of jury – voted for their verdict. Many were acutely conscious that the claimant had been standing in this spot far longer than anyone else present – a silent witness to the damage done by humans on the environment and landscape. They ordered the secretary of state for climate and ecological breakdown (as the job is known in 2030) to cease breaching legal obligations to protect this and all “anchor oaks”, and the communities that thrive or suffer with them.
That powerful moment under the Feanedock Oak opened a door to a deeper question: how and what do trees remember?
Until recently, little was known about how memory might function in long-lived organisms like trees which experience decades, even centuries, of shifting environmental pressures. So this is what our multidisciplinary research collaboration – featuring artworks, performances and even a musical composition as well as groundbreaking science – set out to discover.
On the Memory of Trees, by Scott Wilson, was composed using data collated by the Membra project.
How trees’ memories work
For trees, memory is not a metaphor but a biological reality, written into their cells. One of the most remarkable forms this takes is epigenetic memory: the ability of a tree to record its life experiences and allow those experiences to shape its future, without changing the sequence of its DNA.
As Membra (full name: Understanding Memory of UK Treescapes for Better Resilience and Adaptation), we’ve studied a number of ecologically vital and culturally significant UK species including oak, ash, hazel, beech and birch. Together, they have helped us understand how trees register and respond to environmental stress, offering a powerful glimpse into how their memories are carried through woodlands.
At the heart of this process is DNA methylation, where chemical tags known as methyl groups are added to the tree’s DNA over time. While not rewriting the genetic code, they do alter how it is read. These chemical signatures can turn genes on or off, dial responses up or down, and fundamentally shift how a tree grows, adapts, or defends itself. In oaks, for example, long-term drought exposure over decades is associated with changes in DNA methylation, suggesting that trees may adjust their gene expression in response to repeated stress.
These epigenetic memories may allow trees to respond more quickly to drought, disease or climate extremes, and could even be passed to the next generation. In some plant species, this kind of inheritance is well documented, but in long-lived trees, it remains an open question – one with critical implications for forest regeneration and resilience.
The Insights section is committed to high-quality longform journalism. Our editors work with academics from many different backgrounds who are tackling a wide range of societal and scientific challenges.
So far, our research has shown trees respond to stress in ways that can extend well beyond the immediate event. Exposure to drought or high CO₂, for example, can leave lasting marks on a tree’s growth and internal chemistry, and may shape how it responds to future conditions. But the strength of this memory appears to depend on the nature of the stress: it is more pronounced when the stress is particularly strong, such as disease, or when it occurs repeatedly over time, such as chronic drought.
A surprising result came from oak, where we observed that DNA methylation itself changes depending on the time of year – with methylation levels lowest in early spring, then increasing as the seasons progress. This suggests the imprinting of memory in trees may be far more dynamic than previously thought, and that the timing of stress events within the growing season could influence how strongly that memory is encoded.
All our studied species and associated environmental conditions have now been sequenced. In every case, we have found evidence of these memories of past stresses. In ash trees, for example, we’ve begun to detect methylation changes linked to ash dieback pressure, offering clues as to how trees regulate their defences over time as a disease progresses.
Trees are certainly resilient. They bend, adapt and endure, holding the memory of storms and seasons within their very bodies. But even their deep-rooted strength has limits. The challenges they now face are faster, more frequent and more severe than at any point in their evolutionary history.
This means what we are learning from their memories is not just a story of survival, but a warning. They are telling us there could come a point when they can no longer cope.
Even young trees remember
It is easy to be awed by a centuries-old oak. But what often goes unnoticed is the quiet crisis beneath the canopy. Across many UK woodlands, the next generation is missing.
Surveys show steep declines in most species of young trees (seedlings and saplings) due to a growing list of pressures: prolonged drought, warming temperatures, shifting herbivore populations, and an expanding wave of pests and pathogens. According to a study of nine sites in England and Scotland, co-authored by one of us (Bruno) and currently under review, the sapling mortality rate has increased from 16.2% in the period up to 2000 to 30.9% two decades later.
In some species such as elm and now ash, diseases have brought populations close to the point of lack of regeneration – when a woodland can no longer sustain itself. To counter this threat, young trees must be highly adaptable – not just in form, but at the molecular level. At Membra, scientists are exploring whether young trees imprint environmental stress more readily than older ones, and whether that memory, recorded through changes in DNA methylation, influences their survival.
One way we have tested such transgenerational changes is to expose trees (oak and hazel) to the elevated levels of CO₂ that are expected in the UK by 2050. This was done in the Birmingham Institute for Forest Research (Bifor) facility in a Staffordshire woodland – one of the world’s largest climate change experiments, where tree “arrays” (circular patches of woodland) are exposed to 150 parts per million (ppm) of CO₂ above ambient concentrations.
Membra’s research there has found that the offspring of trees exposed to these CO₂ levels respond very differently to further environmental stressors – in ways that can make them more resilient. For example, acorns from CO₂-exposed oaks were notably larger and their seedlings showed both faster growth and improved resistance to pathogens like powdery mildew – a strong sign that environmental conditions experienced by parent trees can shape offspring resilience.
To date, molecular analysis shows the inherited memory of this exposure is imprinted in the tree genes that are involved in defence mechanisms. The direct link with resilience should be identified in the next few years as our data analysis progresses.
Strikingly, these beneficial effects were most pronounced during “mast” years, when trees produce a bumper crop of seeds, suggesting that the reproductive cycles of mature oaks as well as resource availability are key to the oaks’ successful inheritance of stress-adaptive traits. Similarly, seedlings from oak trees that had undergone repeated drought exposure have shown increased drought tolerance – which suggests some trees may “prime” their offspring to be more resilient in the face of repeated climate stress.
Our work also shows that young trees can be artificially primed for resilience. For instance, early treatment with certain natural compounds enhances oak seedlings’ resistance to powdery mildew disease, triggering biochemical and transcriptional responses that allow them to mount a faster and stronger defence. This priming acts like a kind of immunological memory – in this case not inherited but induced – and could potentially open up new avenues for improving forest health and regeneration.
Importantly, species differ widely in how they pass on environmental experiences to their progeny. Hazel trees subjected to the same elevated CO₂ conditions in the Bifor woodland produced both smaller nuts and seedlings that often failed to thrive after germination. So, rather than assuming a one-size-fits-all strategy for seed sourcing, forestry managers may need to tailor decisions based on species-specific responses to past environmental stresses. Recognising the importance of parental environmental history, especially for stressors like drought, could shape how we select and prepare the next generation of trees.
This may also mean rethinking how and when we collect seeds. In species such as oak, collecting from mast years may improve the odds of transmitting beneficial adaptive traits. In all cases, understanding how trees’ memory works, not just within a tree’s lifetime but across generations, offers a crucial tool for building more adaptive, resilient treescapes in this rapidly changing world.
Tree rings such as those sampled from the Feanedock Oak record much more than just a tree’s age. They hold evidence of how trees respond to changing climates, rising carbon levels and extreme events.
Studies using these natural archives (the rings) have shown that rising atmospheric CO₂ is already changing how trees grow and photosynthesise. In some oaks, it has led to faster growth and more carbon being stored – a hopeful sign.
But this acceleration may come with hidden costs. Trees that grow quickly not only reach maturity sooner but may also die younger, potentially limiting the long-term stability of forest carbon storage.
And these shifts are not just a concern for the trees themselves – they ripple outward. Faster growth can alter forest structure, affecting biodiversity and resilience. In the UK and globally, trees face an escalating cascade of challenges including pollution, drought, storms and disease – and increasingly, these pressures overlap.
Understanding how different trees’ memories will mediate their responses to new, more stressful conditions is key to predicting which species will thrive, adapt or decline. Artificially priming young trees by exposing them early to stress may enhance their memory and survival.
In recent years, a wave of tree planting, often tied to carbon offsetting schemes, is rapidly reshaping landscapes across much of the UK. National and local governments have launched large-scale initiatives such as the England Tree Action Plan. These programmes aim to restore canopy cover, improve biodiversity and contribute to net-zero goals. Local authorities, environmental charities, landowners and corporate offsetting partners are among those overseeing the planting, with guidance and funding provided by the Forestry Commission and Defra.
However, the choice of species is often constrained by budget and availability, which can result in limited diversity and mismatches between trees and local ecological conditions. Fast-growing species like sycamore, alder, and hybrid poplar are frequently used, while slower-growing native species with deeper ecological value may be underrepresented.
Planting trees without understanding their long-term ecological roles – or their capacity to remember and adapt – also risks repeating old mistakes that could compromise long-term resilience. Selecting the right trees to face future climate threats requires more than just numbers. A forest full of fast-growing, short-lived trees may have a very different effect on the local ecosystem than one with long-lived, memory-bearing individuals. In the worst-case scenario, such woodlands will fail to regenerate and die out.
Climate models indicate a future of warmer, wetter winters and hotter, drier summers in the UK, which will challenge many native species. Diseases such as ash dieback have already transformed landscapes, with over 80% of ash trees expected to be lost in many areas. This is not just a loss of a species but a loss of the biodiversity that depends on it.
Our work highlights the value of sourcing seed from trees that have survived historic drought and understanding how memory, resilience and adaptation are embedded in the biology of many older individuals. Future woodlands will need to blend ancient wisdom with modern science, combining genetic diversity, environmental memory and community stewardship to thrive.
This legal shift complements the scientific insight from Membra: that mature woodlands, with deep memory and biodiversity, are not replaceable. And as Ring of Truth’s imagined court case made clear, it is a travesty if trees such as the Feanedock Oak are thought of as little more than machines to extract human-created carbon from the atmosphere.
Their social, cultural and ecological roles are vast. Listening to Indigenous and local communities with long-held tree knowledge, and empowering tree guardians in cities and villages alike, is vital to fostering a meaningful public practice of tree stewardship.
As one Walking Forest participant put it, time spent with trees creates space and renewed agency for surviving the climate and nature crises: “We are like trees. The stronger we root and allow ourselves, like them, to be nurtured by those around us, the better we are at withstanding the strongest of storms”.
Another said: “I see the bigger picture now, of how we are related to the forest – at one with nature because we too are part of the ecosystem.”
By weaving together artistic performance, scientific insight and ancestral knowledge, the Walking Forest collective has sought to expand how we understand our relationship with woodlands – connecting women, trees and ecological justice across time.
One powerful example is the 107-year-old Monterey Pine planted by suffragette Rose Lamartine Yates, the last known survivor of a historic arboretum planted by women activists at Eagle House in Batheaston, Somerset. A place of recovery for women who were politically active as part of the suffrage movement, this was the home of the Blathwayt family – and known as the Suffragettes’ Retreat.
Suffragettes Adela Pankhurst and Annie Kenney at Eagle House in Batheaston, Somerset, in 1910. Linley Blathwayt/Wikimedia
Between April 1909 and July 1911, at least 47 trees were planted in the grounds of Eagle House to commemorate individual suffragists and suffragettes, many of whom had been imprisoned and tortured. The arboretum afforded the suffragettes an opportunity to imagine the future into which their young trees would grow.
The trees were all bulldozed in the late 1960s to make way for a housing estate – other than Lamartine Yates’s Monterey Pine, planted in 1909, which survives to this day, protected in a private garden. The seeds of this tree are a touchstone of Walking Forest: we have gathered and propagated them, shared them with communities, and created performances and ceremonies that honour the tree’s legacy – connecting past and future generations (of trees and people) in a project to create a woodland that mirrors the original Eagle House arboretum.
Since 2018, Walking Forest artists have travelled overland to UN climate talks to gift seeds from the Monterey Pine to women and youth activists, climate negotiators, Indigenous community leaders and environmental campaigners – connecting with them in this story of resilience and renewal.
In another act of collective mourning and protest, a 100-year-old silver birch cut down for the HS2 rail link was carried through Coventry by more than 40 women during Coventry’s year as City of Culture in 2021. The act made visible the loss of ancient woodland and connected it with human grief, resistance and care.
These stories are not isolated. Across the UK, trees have become flashpoints for protest and protection – from the Sycamore Gap tree at Hadrian’s Wall to Sheffield Council’s felling of more than 5,000 healthy street trees between 2014 and 2018 as part of road maintenance.
Walking Forest has collaborated with Membra not only to share scientific knowledge but to offer new ways of knowing through storytelling, ritual and creative action. As climate pressures grow, so too does public awareness of how irreplaceable mature trees are.
We are still only beginning to uncover the complexity of tree memory. Future research may reveal exactly how memory is transferred between generations, how trees prepare for challenges they’ve never seen, and how entire forests might adapt together.
But our collaboration between scientists, artists and communities is already helping to shift how people think about trees, from passive backdrop to learning beings. Through this work, we understand that trees are not just survivors – they are storytellers, record keepers and even teachers.
As our understanding of their memory deepens, so too does our responsibility to listen, learn and act. The future of forests depends not just on what trees can remember, but on what we choose not to forget.
A recent return to the Feanedock Oak, two years after its case was argued in Ring of Truth, found the tree still standing but visibly altered. Its two large, fallen limbs lay cloaked in bramble and nettle. But under its canopy, foxes burrowed, birds sang and fruit trees flowered.
Though imbalanced, this grand old oak holds its ground – a tree of memory and now a symbol of care. We will return again and again to honour its survival, and admire its provision for so many other species in the natural world. The tree reminds us that people need ways to anchor ourselves too, as we navigate uncertain times ahead.
Estrella Luna-Diez receives funding from UK Research & Innovation (UKRI) and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC).
Anne-Marie Culhane receives funding from UKRI and the NERC.
Bruno Barcante Ladvocat Cintra receives funding from the NERC.
Additional thanks to Lucy Neal, member of the Walking Forest collective, for her written and photographic contributions to this article. Lucy was the creator of Ring of Truth, performed at the Timber Festival in July 2023.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Parveen Akhtar, Senior Lecturer: Politics, History and International Relations, Aston University
Just 74 days into her new role as home secretary, Shabana Mahmood has unveiled what she calls “the most substantial reform to the UK’s asylum system in a generation”.
Immigration is currently viewed as the most important issue facing the country, followed by the economy. While many, especially within the Labour party, have long found border control an awkward terrain, Mahmood’s stance is unambiguous: “I just don’t know why we’ve got ourselves in a tangle talking about migration controls on the left of politics … it’s really pretty fundamental to the way a lot of our voters think.”
Her proposals are, broadly, intended to deter illegal immigration by making the UK a less attractive destination for asylum seekers. Mahmood has proposed, among other things: making refugee status more temporary, reforming human rights legislation to make it harder for illegal migrants to remain in the UK and suspending UK visas for countries that refuse to accept returned migrants.
Some on the left of Labour have already condemned the proposals. But figures on the political right have applauded Mahmood’s assertion that uncontrolled asylum and immigration are contributing to social division.
Beyond the policy substance, Mahmood’s Commons delivery attracted praise from the right: confident, assured and like a future leader. Former Conservative minister Michael Gove has called Mahmood the “standout figure” of the current government, describing her as having “a totally coherent worldview”.
How did Mahmood, who once stated that she personally supported a general amnesty for all undocumented workers, become the face of a hardline Labour migration policy, lauded by the political right?
Journey of a politician
Born in Birmingham, to Kashmiri Pakistani Muslim parents, Mahmood spent part of her early childhood in Saudi Arabia, where her father worked as a civil engineer, before returning to Birmingham.
Her family life was steeped in politics. Her father chaired the Birmingham Labour Party and was known locally as an honest broker who mediated neighbourhood disputes. Her mother ran the family’s corner shop – giving Mahmood a “shopkeeper’s daughter” background reminiscent of another formidable woman in British politics. She cites Margaret Thatcher as one of her heroes, alongside Benazir Bhutto, Pakistan’s first female prime minister.
Her political consciousness sharpened after 9/11. She found herself being held “accountable” by strangers for events thousands of miles away. She had experienced racism before, her first encounter was at age eight. But the post-9/11 shift was of a different magnitude, which she described as a “shock to the system”.
Elected in 2010 as one of the first female Muslim MPs, she quickly entered the shadow cabinet. She avoided frontbench roles under Jeremy Corbyn, citing incompatible economic views. Under Keir Starmer, she served as national campaign coordinator and worked closely with strategist Morgan McSweeney. She is also seen as having played a significant role in the crucial 2021 Batley and Spen byelection.
Mahmood speaks openly about her British Muslim identity and the sense of responsibility that comes with public visibility. “You have to accept the broader role that you have to play,” she has said, noting that many British Muslims instinctively look to her as a representative figure.
And yet, Mahmood’s own electoral base has shifted dramatically. Her majority in Birmingham Ladywood fell from nearly 30,000 in 2019 – one of the largest in the country – to just 3,400 in 2024, after a strong challenge from an independent pro-Gaza candidate.
She has also faced strong criticism for her abstention from a November 2023 vote on an amendment to the King’s Speech calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.
Mahmood has in recent years assumed a markedly tougher line on immigration. This shift is reflected as much in her language and style, as in the policies she is advocating. Her presentation leans heavily into a no-nonsense, get-the-job-done approach.
She has stressed that she is the “the child of immigrants” whose parents “came here legally” and played by the rules. She establishes a firm boundary between lawful migration and the illegal immigration she argues now defines the broken asylum system.
Reputational shield?
Before becoming home secretary, she had already earned admiration for her handling of what was arguably the most daunting early assignment of the 2024 Labour government. As justice secretary, she faced a prison system running at 99% capacity. She introduced an early release programme that risked perceptions of being “soft on crime,” yet navigated the controversy with minimal turbulence.
A trained barrister who once dreamed of becoming “Kavanagh QC”, Mahmood brings legal expertise and a rule-of-law approach to immigration debates. Themes of “fairness” and “public consent” appear throughout her asylum policy proposals.
Her style is precise, technocratic and intellectually disciplined. These are qualities which help Labour toughen its immigration platform without appearing purely performative.
But Mahmood also plays a symbolic role. When political parties move rightwards on immigration, they often place minority politicians in prominent roles to provide a “reputational shield”. This allows them to advance stricter policies while deflecting accusations of intolerance.
Conservative governments spent more than a decade deploying this strategy in the Home Office. Sajid Javid, Priti Patel and Suella Braverman all embodied the dynamic. Labour, historically, has placed far fewer minorities in top portfolios, which makes Mahmood’s appointment all the more notable. In some respects, Labour now appears to be adopting an approach previously associated with its opponents.
Despite her experience in electoral strategy, Mahmood insists the asylum reforms are not an attempt to win back Reform UK voters or to position Labour tactically. Instead, she frames them as a response to “the genuine concerns of the British people” and an effort to rebuild trust in a system that has lost public confidence. It is a gamble that places the weight of Labour’s promise of competence squarely on the Home Office, and on Mahmood’s ability to deliver it.
Parveen Akhtar has previously received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council and the British Academy
During the first COVID-19 lockdown, we were both mothers trying to stay sane. Our chats often revolved around nappies, feeding, sleep deprivation and motherhood chaos. Between laughter and exhaustion, cloth nappies kept coming up in conversation.
Just the thought of all that laundry was enough to make us tired. Sure they would help reduce the 4,000–6,000 disposable nappies sent to landfill per child each year, but would they be detrimental to our wellbeing?
Perhaps our initial hesitation stemmed from the prevalent narrative that sustainability means sacrifice. You do something because it’s good for the planet, but that often comes at a cost to you: eat less meat, fly less, buy less stuff. When a sustainable choice feels like a daily sacrifice, it’s no surprise people end up quitting.
Yet something about cloth nappies felt different. As we became familiar with the online community of #ClothBumMums, the tone was refreshingly upbeat. These mums were driven to use cloth nappies because they enjoyed doing so, not because they felt guilty about throwing away reusables. They certainly didn’t appear to be missing the convenience of throwaway nappies. If anything, they radiated happiness and beamed with pride.
Curious about this, we set out to explore what was going on behind the scenes. Our study captured the daily experiences of 27 mothers using cloth nappies. Over seven days, participants recorded their routines through visual and verbal diaries, followed by group discussions where they reflected on their journey.
Our findings flipped the sacrifice narrative completely. Yes, the early days might be daunting. As one mum told us: “Sometimes it can be quite a lot of work, and I’ve always said that to people, especially in the early days of having a baby … If it’s too much for you and it’s proving detrimental to your mental health, buy a disposable.”
But once parents developed their own systems over time — figuring out routines, storage and washing hacks — a transformation occurred. This was evident during our focus group conversations following the seven-day diary period, when many mums said they had started to find joy and reassurance in the process. “The rest of the house can be absolute chaos, but my nappy box is tidy,” one told us, “and that makes me really, really happy.”
The joy of reusables
Through these stories, we identified the “wellbeing cycle of sustainable engagement”. This pattern starts with initial motivation, followed by a trial-and-error phase when the challenges can temporarily lower wellbeing.
However, once people establish effective routines — the mastery stage — wellbeing spikes significantly. This cycle often ends with advocacy, where parents become champions of the practice, helping others to get started.
Underpinning this process is what we call the “burden–reward paradox”: chores that once felt like a burden, once under control, can become a source of pride and satisfaction. What once looked like inconvenience transforms into a symbol of capability, care and purpose. Another parent told us:
I love it … I like it when there’s a big pile of nappies and they’re all dry enough, and I’m watching TV stuffing them … [I] definitely enjoy the washing of nappies more than I thought I would – definitely a niche hobby, I think.
Using cloth nappies can be a joyful experience for parents and baby. Soft Light/Shutterstock
In the case of cloth nappies at least, our research challenges the sacrifice-based narrative of eco-environmental messaging. Guilt or pressure might encourage people to start making sustainable choices – but only when these choices bring joy, happiness, pride or a sense of purpose are these actions likely to last.
And the environmental benefits are hard to ignore. UK children go through the equivalent of roughly 700 million car miles a year in disposable nappies. Switching to reusables, even for part of the time, can make a real dent in household emissions.
By flipping the sacrifice-based narrative, brands, campaigners and policymakers can be more serious about sustaining long-term green behaviour. Rather than telling people what to give up, show them what they can gain: wellbeing, confidence and community.
The lesson here goes far beyond nappies. As author Isabel Losada writes in The Joyful Environmentalist, sustainability doesn’t have to be grim or guilt-ridden. It can be creative, empowering – even joyful. The #ClothBumMum community illustrates that positive emotions — pride, mastery, connection — can be more powerful motivators than guilt or sacrifice.
So, perhaps it’s time we stop asking people to sacrifice things for the planet — and start showing them how living sustainably can feel good. Cloth nappies may seem like a niche item, but they hold a powerful insight: when sustainability is joyful not duty, everyone wins.
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The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Watching a film about dementia is, ordinarily, a sobering activity. We watch someone become imprisoned in the temporal chaos of their mind. We empathise with the family members nobly trying their best to do what’s right. We leave the film in a fog of melancholia, having been reminded of how sad the condition is.
And dementia is sad. But the stories we tell about it need not only be a premature elegy for someone still living. There is more for filmmakers to think about here: when does “the rest of our lives” stop mattering? How do we love those profoundly changed by illness? What is it like when the concept of “now” itself becomes unfamiliar?
A Kind of Madness, from director Christiaan Olwagen, examines how love is redefined when dementia shatters a shared sense of reality. The film follows elderly couple Elna (Sandra Prinsloo) and Dan (Ian Roberts) as they flee from the great obstacle to their joint happiness: residential care.
After breaking Elna out of the care home where she was placed by her adult children, the couple escapes across the South African countryside, Elna reliving the exploits of the rebel bride she once was (and sometimes believes she still is), as Dan tries to save them both from a life flattened by loss.
The trailer for A Kind of Madness.
In one moving scene, Elna insists: “We can start over; it’s never too late.” Dan decides she might just be right. His own reality, overburdened by loss, pales beside Elna’s, a world which, though certainly clouded by confusion and fear, is also filled with beauty, affection, playfulness and the hope in a better future that once defined their love.
While the film does not minimise the horrors dementia brings into family life, it also does not linger there. Instead, it turns toward a deeper question: what do we do with the love we have for someone who faces this illness? A Kind of Madness suggests that a person’s wellbeing may depend as much on how that question is answered as on any form of medical care.
Dementia in Rose of Nevada
A Kind of Madness steers clear of the melancholy dread characteristic of many films about dementia. Rose of Nevada, directed by Mark Jenkin, is steeped in it, but in an entirely new and unsettling way.
A casual viewing of the film might consider dementia thematically peripheral to the central storyline, which follows three Cornish fishermen stranded in 1993, a time-slip three decades past. Yet I would argue that Rose of Nevada is less a tale of supernatural time travel and more about what it really means when someone’s relationship to time is dramatically altered through disease or otherwise.
This theme is embodied by Mrs Richards (Mary Woodvine), an elderly woman seemingly affected by dementia. Mrs Richards’s presence primes the viewer to consider the time-slip not simply as a supernatural phenomenon, but as something profoundly human.
When Nick (George MacKay), a young fisherman, finds himself in what should be his home, but isn’t, he understandably protests: “My name is Nick Dyer! I was born in 1996!” Mrs Richards, appearing as her younger self in 1993, regards him with the same pity that will one day be turned on her.
Through this eerie inversion, which sees a young, healthy fisherman entrenched in the same kind of disorientation that often characterises dementia, Jenkin opens a new avenue for relating to dementia – the uncanny sensation of not knowing where, when or who you are, of being a stranger in once-familiar surroundings.
The cast of Rose of Nevada discuss the film.
What makes Jenkin’s new film so unusual is how it takes those experiences and relocates them away from the one character actually suffering from dementia. The young are not treated as outsiders in the same way that the elderly are. Nick and Mrs Richards could not be more different on the surface, but there is a poignant parallel between the two characters.
In showing a young man met with pity as he struggles to assert the basic facts of his identity, the film invites us to set aside our habitual assumptions about dementia and reconsider how we relate to those who live with it. The result is that dementia symptoms are defamiliarised – made strange and unsettling – and a pervasive sense of dread emerges as both characters and audience confront the unsettling possibility that no single, stable reality exists.
Any successful film provides new spaces in which to think about and relate to human experiences. Both A Kind of Madness and Rose of Nevada shift the viewing platform away from the stale master narrative of dementia we know so well, to consider new perspectives.
This is important. How we think about dementia is coloured not only by the stories we see in popular culture, but by the perspectives these stories privilege. These two films are a corrective to a body of cinematic and literary work that has yet to fully recognise the persistent humanity of people living with a disease that renders life non-linear, confounding and painful, but nevertheless resiliently human.
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Andrea Holck does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation – UK – By Nazrul Islam, Professor of Business and Associate Director, Centre of FinTech, University of East London
Leadership and other people skills are only going to rise in value to employers.NoMoreStock/Shutterstock
Across the world, workers are increasingly anxious that artificial intelligence (AI) will make their jobs obsolete. But the evidence from research and industry tells a very different story. AI is not taking over the workplace. Instead, it’s quietly reshaping what human work looks like – and what makes people valuable within it.
In my research on how the workforce is being transformed by AI, I found that the most successful organisations are not the ones replacing employees with algorithms, but those redesigning their workplaces to combine human and machine intelligence.
AI excels at routine, repetitive and data-intensive tasks – scanning through thousands of records, scheduling logistics or identifying errors. Yet it still struggles with what we might call “the human edge”. That is, creativity, empathy, judgement and collaboration.
AI systems depend on people to train and evaluate their outputs. My research found that when humans and AI collaborate, productivity rises – but when humans are excluded or fearful, the benefits collapse.
At cloud software company Workday, for example, nearly 60% of employees use AI tools to automate repetitive tasks. But far from reducing headcount, the company found that AI freed people up to focus on the more thoughtful and creative parts of their job, as well as nurturing relationships with clients.
These findings align with my own research, which demonstrates that worker–AI coexistence makes an organisation more resilient than automation alone.
So why are so many workers still afraid? Part of the reason lies in uncertainty. Organisations might implement AI systems without communicating clearly how they will affect jobs or performance evaluation. This lack of clarity breeds fear, rumours and resistance.
My studies show that when companies are transparent about how and why AI is being adopted – and when they involve employees in shaping its use – workers become more confident. They’re even proud of their contribution to “teaching the machines”. But when employees are left in the dark, they tend to hoard information or disengage – the opposite of what innovation requires.
It’s true that AI will disrupt many traditional roles. But the real challenge is not mass unemployment – it’s misalignment, that is, having the wrong skillsets for the AI age. The labour market must evolve faster to match emerging technological realities.
My previous study on AI and the future of work was cited in a US government policy document. In the study, I described a “perpetual race” between human skills and machine capabilities. As AI automates certain functions, workers must continuously develop new abilities to stay relevant.
In effect, this is a strategic opportunity. The workers who thrive in the AI economy will be those who can interpret, guide and collaborate with intelligent systems.
That means companies must take responsibility for reskilling and upskilling. The UN’s Sustainable Development Goal 8 makes it very clear that AI should benefit workers. If AI becomes a permanent treadmill rather than a partnership for shared progress, there is a risk of deepening inequality.
Social mobility in the age of AI
I recently shared research with social mobility experts on how AI can be a catalyst for inclusion – if managed responsibly. By analysing skills rather than titles, AI-enabled hiring platforms can identify talent in overlooked communities – people who may not have formal qualifications but possess the right competencies to succeed.
Yet this promise comes with a warning. If the same systems are trained on biased data, they risk replicating social inequalities at scale. Responsible AI must embed fairness and human oversight from the start.
Ultimately, the companies that will lead the next decade are those that move from a technology-first to a people-and-purpose-first mindset.
Staff are likely to be less fearful of an AI future if their workplace includes them in the journey. Gorodenkoff/Shutterstock
That means several things. AI literacy must be embedded at all levels – from frontline staff to executives – so everyone understands how it affects their roles. Organisations should also rethink governance – ensuring oversight, accountability and transparency.
Employers should also invest in hybrid skills for their staff – combining technical competence with creativity, empathy and judgement. And they should encourage experimentation and collaboration.
But what does all this mean for workers?
First, the future belongs to the adaptive, not the automated. Second, emotional and conceptual skills such as leadership and empathy are rising in value. Third, lifelong learning is no longer optional. AI literacy, understanding what these systems can and cannot do, will soon be as fundamental as digital literacy was in the 2000s.
AI is neither our enemy nor our saviour. It reflects the priorities, values and biases of the societies that build it. Responsible innovation means embedding human purpose into every algorithm, dataset and decision process. It means designing workplaces where technology amplifies human potential rather than eroding it.
This is a pivotal moment. Decisions about AI in the next five years will define the following 50 – shaping the kind of workplaces, economies and societies our children inherit. Rather than fearing AI as the enemy of human work, we should embrace it as the next stage in human collaboration.
AI won’t take your job – but someone who knows how to use it just might. The challenge is not to compete with machines, but to co-evolve with them – creating a future of work that is intelligent, inclusive and above all, human.
Nazrul Islam is affiliated with Royal Docks School of Business and Law at the University of East London. He serves in editorial roles for Technological Forecasting and Social Change and IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management. He is member of the Board of Directors of International Association for Management of Technology (IAMOT) and Business and Applied Science Academy of North America (BAASANA), USA.
