Cold weather Q&A: Experts answer your questions

Published

3 years ago

December 10, 2022

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Eye-watering energy price rises have left millions of people worried about the cost of turning on their heating as sub-zero temperatures hit Britain this winter.

Sky News presenter Jonathan Samuels is joined by a panel to answer viewers’ questions. The experts are: GP Dr Helen Salisbury; personal finance expert Jasmine Birtles; and Helen Barnard from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, a charity which conducts and funds research aimed at ending poverty in Britain.

What’s your advice to vulnerable people who are really concerned about the cost of heating their homes?

Dr Helen Salisbury: It’s a really, really difficult time, but it’s important to remember that being in a cold home is actually not good for your health at all.

So we recommend that you keep the room that you’re in at about 18C, particularly if you’re over 65, particularly if you have mobility problems.

Ideally get up and move around every hour-or-so, because if you’re sitting still, you’re more likely to get cold.

What are the best settings to use for central heating to heat your home? Is it better to have a timer on and have big bursts at those moments in the day when you really need it, or is it better to perhaps have it on a lower setting, but keep it on all day?

Jasmine Birtles: This has come up a lot recently. I checked with the Energy Savings Trust and they said it’s better to do it here and there, as and when you need it, not have it on all the time.

I have it on for an hour-or-so and once it’s sort of warmed up a bit I’ve got my jumpers on, layers, sheepskin boots, sheepskin and wool are the best ways of staying warm.

Another thing that I have is a heated overblanket. That means that, frankly it doesn’t matter what’s happening in the rest of the room – you’re warm.

We know the government is helping, and there have been lots of headlines recently… but just remind us what help is available?

Helen Barnard: There has been help, there have been the cost-of-living packages with one-off grants and so on.

When we get to next April there will be a significant rise in benefits, but there isn’t more help coming this winter.

We’ve just done new research and we’ve found that three million low-income households can’t afford to heat their homes and actually 2.5 million can’t afford to eat properly or heat their homes.

So all the things the health experts are telling people to do – to have hot drinks, to keep the room warm – people simply can’t afford to do those things because the support is just inadequate to meet the situation we are in.

If I can’t afford to turn on the heating are there places I can go – especially if there are power cuts this winter?

Helen Barnard: There are quite a lot of people in communities who have started doing “warm hubs” so it’s worth looking on your local community page. I’ve heard there are some bakers actually, because they have got their ovens on all the time, who are opening up rooms.

But there is actually quite a lot of financial support some people may not be getting, so an awful lot of people don’t claim the benefits they could, and that would really help.

It’s worth going on to a website like the Turn 2 Us charity where you can do a benefit check and there is also a tool where you can find local grants.

The other thing is to talk to your energy supplier – they are legally obliged to help you come to a solution if you’re struggling to pay the bills.

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People get very scared and they don’t want to ask for help. This is a moment to absolutely ask for help, ask local charities, local authorities, and your energy supplier.

Cost of living calendar – reveal a different story every day

One thing people really worry about is being cut off – can you reassure people that won’t happen?

Jasmine Birtles: Yes, it won’t happen – particularly if you are on a contract, a direct debit.

Of course if you are on a pay-as-you-go meter then obviously if you are paying it, it’s not going to come out.

But if you are on direct debit, or if you are supposed to be on a contract and you can’t pay, they are not going to cut you off. However, those debts will mount.

Actually, a lot of them do have money to help. It tends to be one-off payments, but all the major energy suppliers they have, frankly, a few hundred pounds to give in certain circumstances if you qualify, so go first to your supplier and, as Helen says, try Turn 2 Us.

Also, try your local council. Some local councils – not all – have some discretionary money they use to help people who are suffering.

And if I can just add to what Helen said about the warm hubs, there is a website called warmwelcome.uk, which has a really helpful map of the UK, with all the various warm hubs that they are aware of, and I think more are being added.

Dr Helen, what are your patients telling you? I’m sure you have seen people who have come to you in a real state, because it is not just your physical wellbeing but it is your mental wellbeing as well?

Absolutely, and people are very worried. And I think sometimes it is the fear that is so harmful to their health. They are thinking about looking after themselves, they are thinking about looking after their families.

I would quite like to add that there has been lots of talk here about going on websites, but a lot of people might not have that capacity, they might not be people who use sites on their mobile phones, they might not have mobile phones.

I think we also need to think about our neighbours, our friends, elderly people we know might need checking up on, just to make sure they have turned their heating on and they are not sitting there scared of the bills and not turning on the heating.

Being in too cold of an environment really increases your risk of strokes and heart attacks and it is just not worth it, so we need to be checking up on people and unfortunately sometimes we may get bills much higher than wanted, but we do need to keep warm.

People with underlying health conditions need to be careful in cold weather, don’t they?

Dr Helen Salisbury: Absolutely, and partly that is about being unable to move about, but also you have lung diseases like COPD, that makes them more vulnerable and you are more likely to get inflections like flu and probably COVID-19 too, so you are less likely to be able to fight things off if you are cold and breathe in cold air.

The other thing that is quite worrying is people who are reliant on electricity for aids around the home for medical machinery, I think that is a real concern for some people with prices going so high.

Is it better to have a smart meter? If you don’t should you be taking regular meter readings?

Jasmine Birtles: There are two schools of thought with this.

On the one hand smart meters can be useful, particularly as a number of energy companies have apps that work with them. For example, there is one called Ivy Bud and you can find out how much you are using, when you are using it. You can also find out which appliances are using more than others.

But I’m hearing quite a number of people who are rather concerned about control – a lot of their information being known by goodness knows who.

If you are not keen on having a smart meter, I think it is a good idea to take some meter readings, once a month, so you are clear how much you are using and if you are not sure about your bills, or you don’t think the bills and readings match, you can complain to your supplier.

What are the benefits of having a smart meter?

Jasmine Birtles: You can see what you’re using quite quickly, you can connect it to various apps and gizmos that will give you more control and knowledge of what you are using in real time.

You can look at one of these apps or one of these gizmos and it will say you are using up a lot of electricity and you will find you have left the iron on or something like that, so that’s useful.

But primarily it is useful to the energy company.

Energy companies tell me that smart meters enable them to see when people are using electricity and that means they can sort out the grid better and have less wastage. So I would say it is useful to the companies and the country as a whole, rather than individuals.

What is being done for homeless people?

Helen Barnard: “Of course, we have got local authorities who are re-upping their policies to try and get people in during these very cold nights. But of course we have a problem in that we don’t have enough affordable homes, so what we often find is that people are brought in for a night or two and then finding themselves a sustainable place to live is very difficult.

I do think we need to be slightly careful because some of the advice we are giving to use apps can ring quite hollow for people who are out there who simply don’t have the money to turn the lights on, turn the heating on.

I think we need to get to grips with the fact that we have allowed our basic social security to fail so woefully.

UK

Ozzy Osbourne dies just weeks after farewell show

Published

3 hours ago

July 22, 2025

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Ozzy Osbourne dies just weeks after farewell show

Heavy metal star Ozzy Osbourne has died aged 76, just weeks after reuniting with his Black Sabbath bandmates and performing a huge farewell concert for fans.

In a statement, his family said: “It is with more sadness than mere words can convey that we have to report that our beloved Ozzy Osbourne has passed away this morning. He was with his family and surrounded by love.”

Latest: Tributes paid to Ozzy Osbourne

As he performed from a throne on stage at Villa Park less than three weeks ago, Osbourne told 42,000 fans: “You’ve no idea how I feel – thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

It was a gig put together with performances from some of his favourite acts, including Metallica and Guns N’ Roses, for the star’s “final bow”.

Osbourne and his fellow original Black Sabbath members – Tony Iommi, Terence “Geezer” Butler and Bill Ward – reunited for the first time in 20 years and were the last to appear on stage for the Back To The Beginning concert on 5 July.

Following his death, Metallica posted a photo on X of the band with Osbourne, along with a broken heart emoji.

Ronnie Wood, of The Rolling Stones, wrote: “I am so very sad to hear of the death of Ozzy Osbourne. What a lovely goodbye concert he had at Back To The Beginning in Birmingham.”

Black Sabbath’s account on X posted a photo of Osbourne from the gig with the caption: “Ozzy Forever!”

And Ali Campbell, singer with Birmingham band UB40, wrote: “Rest In Peace Ozzy. The Prince of Darkness. A true Birmingham legend. The undisputed king of heavy metal. You didn’t just shape a culture, you defined it. You led from the front and never looked back. My thoughts are with Sharon and the entire Osbourne family during this time.”

Sir Elton John described his “dear friend” as a “huge trailblazer” who “secured his place in the pantheon of rock gods”.

“He was also one of the funniest people I’ve ever met,” the singer also wrote on Instagram.

Born John Michael Osbourne on 3 December 1948 in Aston, Birmingham, he became known as the godfather of heavy metal.

The self-styled Prince of Darkness pioneered the music genre with Black Sabbath before going on to have huge success in his own right. He was famous for hits including Iron Man, Paranoid, War Pigs, Crazy Train and Changes, both with the band and as a solo star.

Black Sabbath’s eponymous debut album in 1970 made the UK top 10 and paved the way for a string of tracks.

They went on to become one of the most influential and successful metal bands of all time, selling more than 75 million albums worldwide.

The singer also found a different kind of fame thanks to noughties MTV reality show The Osbournes, which followed the Birmingham-raised star’s somewhat chaotic life in Los Angeles with wife Sharon and two of their children, Kelly and Jack.

And he was also known for the famous anecdotes of hellraising during his rock star heyday – most infamously, the tale of how he bit the head off a bat while on stage.

Black Sabbath fired Osbourne in 1979 for his legendary excesses, like showing up late for rehearsals and missing gigs.

“We knew we didn’t really have a choice but to sack him because he was just so out of control. But we were all very down about the situation,” wrote bassist Terry “Geezer” Butler in his memoir Into The Void.

Osbourne re-emerged the next year as a solo artist with his album Blizzard of Ozz. In 1981, he released his second album Diary Of A Madman – both were hard rock classics that went multiplatinum.

He had Parkinson’s disease and had suffered other health problems in recent years, including complications from injuries sustained in a fall in 2019.

After being forced to cancel tour shows, he made a one-off surprise appearance on stage in Birmingham to close the Commonwealth Games in 2022. The Villa Park gig was announced earlier this year by Sharon, who said he was determined to give fans the “perfect farewell”.

During his career, Osbourne was inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame and the US Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame – twice for both, with Black Sabbath and as a solo artist.

He also has a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame – as well as in Birmingham’s Broad Street – an Ivor Novello, and five Grammy wins from 12 nominations.

Plus, he received other honours such as the NME’s Godlike Genius award, and Classic Rock’s Living Legend prize, over the years.

Osbourne leaves behind his wife, Sharon, and their children, Aimee, Kelly and Jack, as well his two older children, Jessica and Louis, from his first marriage to Thelma Riley, and grandchildren.

UK

Ozzy Osbourne obituary: Heavy metal, reality TV, and biting bats – the wild life of Birmingham’s Prince Of Darkness

Published

5 hours ago

July 22, 2025

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Ozzy Osbourne obituary: Heavy metal, reality TV, and biting bats – the wild life of Birmingham's Prince Of Darkness

“You’ve no idea how I feel – thank you from the bottom of my heart,” an emotional Ozzy Osbourne told fans as he performed from a throne on stage at his beloved Villa Park, reunited with Black Sabbath, less than three weeks ago.

It was an exit on his own terms by heavy metal’s biggest character, with a supporting line-up of hard rock luminaries including Slayer, Metallica and Guns’n’Roses, all inspired by his music.

With Black Sabbath, Osbourne was at the forefront of heavy metal. As Ozzy, he was one of the biggest rock stars in the world. Nowhere was this more evident than at the Back To The Beginning in his home city, where 40,000 fans gathered to see the show billed as his “final bow”.

“Without Sabbath, there would be no Metallica,” frontman James Hetfield told the crowd in Birmingham.

It was a sentiment echoed by many of the other acts who performed on stage. Announced by his wife Sharon earlier this year, the show was a chance for the performer to reunite with Black Sabbath and say thank you and farewell to fans after years of health problems, including Parkinson’s disease, which had forced him to cancel recent tour shows.

Other celebrities, from Sir Elton John to Dolly Parton, sent video messages of support. Fans knew it would be his last performance, but could not have known his death, at the age of 76, would come so soon.

It was a truly metal goodbye.

‘I think there’s a wild man in everybody’

John Michael Osbourne was born in Solihull in December 1948 and grew up in the Aston area of the West Midlands city.

As a teenager, he was bullied at school. Drink and drugs later became a way to escape his fears, he said in interviews, and after leaving school at 15, he worked several jobs, including labouring and in an abattoir.

It was hearing The Beatles, he said, that made him want to be a musician.

“I think there’s a wild man in everybody,” he says in a resurfaced interview clip. “Ozzy Osbourne and John Osbourne is two different people. John Osbourne is talking to you now.” His eyes widen a little manically, he grins, the voice cranks up. “But if you want to be Ozzy Osbourne, it’s like… it just takes over you.”

In 1967, he was recruited to the band that two years later would become Black Sabbath, inspired by a film of the same title. This was a line-up of four working-class schoolfriends – Tony Iommi, Bill Ward and Geezer Butler, alongside Ozzy – who twisted heavy blues into something darker, creating a sound and otherworldly image that felt new, exciting and rebellious.

A self-titled debut album was released in 1970 and made the Top 10 in the UK. The follow-up, Paranoid, released just seven months later, topped the charts after the single of the same name became their big breakthrough. The album also included the unforgettable Iron Man and the anti-war protest song War Pigs – its unmistakeable riff inspiring the Arctic Monkeys’ 2014 single, Arabella.

Black Sabbath went on to release six more albums with Osbourne at the helm before he was fired in 1979 due to his drinking and substance use, something he claimed was no better or worse than other members at the time.

In 1980, he returned with his debut solo album, Blizzard Of Oz, and the lead single Crazy Train. As a solo artist, he went on to release 13 studio albums – the last being Patient Number 9, in 2022 – and had hits with songs including Mr Crowley, Diary Of A Madman, No More Tears, Bark At The Moon and Shot In The Dark.

His first UK number one was a re-recording of the Black Sabbath ballad Changes, as a duet with his daughter, Kelly, in 2003, and his collaborations over the years included everyone from Alice Cooper (Hey Stoopid in 1991) and Post Malone (Take What You Want in 2019) to, in a somewhat unusual move, Hollywood star Kim Basinger for a re-recording of the dance hit Shake Your Head by Was (Not Was) in 1992.

With Black Sabbath and as a solo star, he is estimated to have sold 100 million records throughout his career – for context, this is reportedly on a par with Sir Paul McCartney’s solo sales – so the numbers speak for themselves.

Biting the bat

Osbourne was also a huge personality and played up to his hellraising image – the Prince of Darkness.

The most famous Ozzy story goes like this.

The singer was on stage in Des Moines, Iowa, 1982, when the bat appeared. He assumed it was a toy. So, like any good hellraiser would do, he bit its head off.

For more than 40 years, he found himself jokily fielding questions about bats. What do they taste like? (Salty). What happened afterwards? (Headline news, painful rabies shots). Do you have any pets? (Yes. They’re all dead).
“I get a lot of weird people at my concerts,” he told David Letterman in 1982, of how the animal came to appear in front of him. “It’s rock ‘n’ roll, y’know”.

He was sometimes irritated by the bat connection. But he also played up to the image, recounting the story in interviews, offering plush bat toys among his merch, and appearing as himself, biting a bat, in the 2000 Adam Sandler comedy Little Nicky, about the son of Satan.

Known for catapulting raw meat at fans during gigs, there were plenty of other tales of darkness and debauchery. Osbourne’s wild persona and on-stage theatrics always went hand-in-hand with the music.

From Prince of Darkness to reality TV

He was famously managed by his wife, Sharon, whom he first met when her dad, Don Arden, was managing Black Sabbath. As well as the music, Sharon and Ozzy together founded the Ozzfest festival tours in 1996 – and in 2002 came his second act.

It’s hard to imagine it now, but before the perfectly coiffed Kardashians it was a scruffy 50-something rocker from Birmingham and his family who ruled the Hollywood reality TV scene. As with his music, he was a pioneer – this time round of a new era of addictive viewing.

The Osbournes followed the lives of Ozzy and Sharon and two of their children, Kelly and Jack (their eldest daughter, Aimee, famously had nothing to do with the show), and the family fallouts and sunny California culture clash proved to be a ratings winner. The MTV series catapulted the metal star to global mainstream celebrity heights.

His marriage to Sharon was tumultuous but the pair always stayed together, and they renewed their wedding vows in 2017. Sharon was the driving force behind Ozzy’s successes, to him eventually getting clean, and behind his farewell show.

Despite weathering the storm of drink and drug use, Osbourne’s air of indestructibility was challenged when a quad bike accident left him with a broken collar bone and ribs, as well as short-term memory loss, in 2003.

The 2020 documentary Biography: The Nine Lives Of Ozzy Osbourne, had summed up with its title the performer’s seeming ability to defy the odds. However, the health problems started to mount up. Scheduled tours were postponed, and in 2023 he told fans holding on to tickets that he had come to the realisation he was “not physically capable” of dealing with life on the road.

But there was one gig he couldn’t miss – a surprise appearance to close the Commonwealth Games in his home city in 2022, just weeks after undergoing surgery.

Now, fans will remember the shows they did get to see, the music that ushered in a new genre – and especially his most recent gig, which was said to have raised around £140m for charities. Just a few days afterwards, his new memoir, Last Rites, was announced. It will be released in October.

During his career, Osbourne was inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame and the US Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame – twice for both, with Black Sabbath and as a solo artist. “Countless artists from many genres have credited Ozzy as a major influence, including Metallica, Lita Ford, Rage Against The Machine, and Busta Rhymes,” reads his US citation. “With his longevity, impact, and iconic persona, Ozzy Osbourne is a phenomenon unlike any other.”

He also has a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame – as well as in Birmingham’s Broad Street – an Ivor Novello, and five Grammy wins from 12 nominations.

But other honours, such as the NME’s Godlike Genius award, and Classic Rock’s Living Legend, also give a sense of how much his personality played a part in why he is so beloved by fans and critics alike. In the Nine Lives documentary, daughter Kelly describes him as “the most irresistible mad man you will ever meet in your life”.

Osbourne’s was an unlikely journey from Birmingham to LA. He was a working-class hero of heavy metal, a reality TV favourite – forever the Prince of Darkness.

“People say to me, if you could do it all again, knowing what you know now, would you change anything?” he once said. “I’m like, f*** no… If I’d done normal, sensible things, I wouldn’t be Ozzy.”

UK

Conservative Senedd member Laura Anne Jones announces defection to Reform UK

Published

12 hours ago

July 22, 2025

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Conservative Senedd member Laura Anne Jones announces defection to Reform UK

Conservative Senedd member Laura Anne Jones has joined Reform UK, the party has announced.

The announcement of the party’s first member of the Senedd was made on Tuesday at the Royal Welsh Show in Builth Wells, Powys.

The annual event is Europe’s largest agricultural show and attracts thousands of visitors every year.

Laura Anne Jones was initially a member of the Senedd for the South Wales East region between 2003 and 2007, before returning in 2020.

She is the second high-profile defection from the Conservative party, after former cabinet minister David Jones joined the party earlier this month.

Reform leader Nigel Farage said the latest defection was a “big step forward for Reform UK in Wales”.

Speaking at the news conference, Ms Jones said she had been a member of the Conservative party for for 31 years but that the party was now “unrecognisable to [her]”.

She said the Conservative Party “wasn’t the party that [she] joined over three decades ago” and that she could “no longer justify” party policy on the doorstep.

Ms Jones said Wales was “a complete mess” and that she now wanted to be “part of the solution not the problem”.

Reform is still without a leader in Wales, but Ms Jones did not rule herself out of the running for that position.

The defection comes with less than a year to go until the Senedd election, when voters in Wales will elect 96 members to the Welsh parliament for the first time – an increase of more than 50%.

Recent opinion polls have shown Reform UK and Plaid Cymru vying for pole position, with Labour in third and the Conservatives in fourth.

Ms Jones said she had not notified the Conservative Party of her defection before the announcement.

The party’s Senedd leader Darren Millar said he was “disappointed” with the announcement and that Conservative members and voters would feel “very let down by her announcement”.

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