Singer and actress Marianne Faithfull has died at the age of 78.

A spokesperson for her music promotion company Republic Media said: “It is with deep sadness that we announce the death of the singer, songwriter and actress Marianne Faithfull.

“Marianne passed away peacefully in London today, in the company of her loving family.

“She will be dearly missed.”

Faithfull was best known for her 1964 hit As Tears Go By, written by Sir Mick Jagger, with whom she had a well-publicised relationship, and fellow Rolling Stones star Keith Richards.

She also starred in films including The Girl On A Motorcycle and 2007’s Irina Palm, for which she was nominated for a European Film Award for Best Actress.

In recent years, she provided voice work for the 2021 remake of Dune and 2023’s Wild Summon.

She and Sir Mick began seeing each other in 1966 and became one of the most glamorous couples of Swinging London.

He paid tribute to his “wonderful friend and beautiful singer and a great actress”, and said he was “so saddened” by her death, as “she was so much part of my life for so long”.

Next to a picture of the pair arm in arm on Instagram, Sir Mick said Faithfull “will always be remembered”.

His Stones bandmates Ronnie Wood and Keith Richards also paid tribute, with Richards posting on Instagram that he was “so sad and will miss her.”

His post was accompanied by a picture of the pair enjoying a drink together.

Wood wrote on Jagger’s post: “Farewell dear Marianne.”

Born in 1946, Faithfull started her singing career in 1964 after being discovered by the Stones’ manager Andrew Loog Oldham.

Her self-titled debut album was released a year later, with As Tears Go By reaching number nine on the UK singles chart.

She went on to have a string of successful singles, including Come And Stay With Me, This Little Bird, and Summer Nights, and famously dated Sir Mick from 1966 to 1970.

Faithfull was prolific throughout the 60s, releasing six albums – some only in the UK and some for the US – as well as contributing backing vocals to the Beatles’ Yellow Submarine and inspiring the Stones’ Sympathy For The Devil.

That decade also saw her star in films like 1967’s I’ll Never Forget What’s’isname – where she was one of the first people to say f*** in a mainstream studio film – 1968’s The Girl On A Motorcycle, and Tony Richardson’s 1969 adaptation of Hamlet.

Her affair with Sir Mick was notorious, with the couple being arrested in 1968 for possession of cannabis.

She was also infamously found by police wearing only a bear skin rug when they arrived for a drugs raid at Richards’ home in 1967.

After breaking up with the Stones frontman, Faithfull spent two years homeless in Soho while suffering from anorexia and heroin addiction, before she started living in a squat.

She wrote in her 1994 autobiography: “For me, being a junkie was an admirable life. It was total anonymity, something I hadn’t known since I was 17.

“As a street addict in London, I finally found it. I had no telephone, no address.”

Read more from Sky News:
Badenoch disavows comments from Priti Patel
Harvey Weinstein begs judge for earlier retrial

In 1979, following success in Ireland with the country-themed Dreamin’ My Dreams, Faithfull released the Grammy-nominated Broken English – widely considered her best album.

She later achieved critical acclaim as a jazz and blues singer with 1987’s Strange Weather and went to rehab that same decade.

Faithfull released a total of 21 solo albums throughout her career. Her most recent was the spoken word album She Walks In Beauty from 2021, which saw her work with frequent Nick Cave collaborator Warren Ellis.

She made a full recovery from breast cancer in 2006.

The Home Office’s efforts to address violence against women and girls have not yet improved outcomes for victims, according to the public spending watchdog.

Described as a “significant and growing problem”, the National Audit Office (NAO) says one in 12 women can expect to experience some form of gender-based violence each year.

Around one in four women will be a victim of sexual or attempted assault in their lifetime.

Louise*, whose identity we have protected, says she suffered sexual and violent abuse at the hands of her former partner for seven years.

“He was a very jealous and controlling man,” she says.

The abuse would come in “different forms”, Louise explained. “Sometimes it was straight beatings. Other times it would be restraining and threatening with knives etc. And of course, there was the mental abuse.”

It’s been a few decades since her traumatising experience, and she says: “It’s incredibly depressing to hear things haven’t changed or moved on. I find that shocking.”

She now has three children who have more awareness about gender-based abuse and “understand things like gaslighting and coercive control”.

But she says now the culture has shifted, action needs to be implemented.

“Stop doing more research or yet another report which never gets acted on… We want action. My advice is you need to talk to victims, you need a victim-led solution,” Louise says.

Read more from Sky News:
Airport tower staffing ‘wasn’t normal’ during DC plane crash
Singer Marianne Faithfull dies
Bishop of Liverpool retires amid misconduct allegations

Home Office did not lead ‘effective cross-government response’

After multiple high-profile cases of women and girls who died at the hands of abusers, the previous Conservative government introduced the Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy in 2021 and the Domestic Abuse Plan in 2022, both led by the Home Office.

However, a report by the NAO says the department did not lead an “effective cross-government response”.

Caroline Harper, who led the report, says this is partly due to the fact the Home Office “struggled to get other government departments on board”.

“There hasn’t been sufficient focus on prevention,” she adds.

She says while “supporting victims is really, really important, it would be much better if they didn’t become victims in the first place”.

Ministerial oversight group ‘only met four times in three years’

The report highlights a ministerial oversight group responsible for setting out the strategy “only met four times in three years”.

The prevalence of sexual assault against women aged 16 to 59 in England and Wales was 4.3% in 2023-24, up from 3.4% in 2009-10, the NAO said.

In that same period, incidents of rape and sexual assault against women and girls recorded by police rose from 34,000 to 123,000, although the NAO said this could partly be explained by improved recording of such crimes.

Past focus ‘not on measuring outcomes’

Isabelle Younane, head of external affairs at the Women’s Aid charity, says: “We really do welcome the intention of government and the strategy of ensuring a strong focus is on prevention and cross-government working.”

However, she adds: “We have not yet seen this translate into meaningful outcomes for women and girls on the ground.”

Ms Younane says in the past the focus has been on “measuring activities and whether those activities had been completed, not on measuring outcomes”.

A Home Office spokesperson highlighted that the NAO report looked at the “previous government’s work” and its “failure to deliver systemic change to deal with these devastating crimes”.

“We are delivering a step-change in the government’s response, as we work to deliver our unprecedented manifesto commitment to halve violence against women and girls in a decade,” they added.

* Not her actual name.

Net Zero Secretary Ed Miliband will find the government’s support for a third Heathrow runway “uncomfortable” but he won’t cause any “disruption”, Harriet Harman has said.

The Labour peer told Sky News political editor Beth Rigby on the Electoral Dysfunction podcast Mr Miliband is a “green conscience” in the cabinet “but we’ve been here before”.

Baroness Harman was a cabinet minister alongside Mr Miliband in Gordon Brown’s government when they approved an expansion in 2009, saying it was needed for economic reasons.

Mr Miliband had threatened to resign as energy and climate secretary over the plans but, in the end, he did not do so.

👉 Click here to follow Electoral Dysfunction wherever you get your podcasts 👈

Ahead of Chancellor Rachel Reeves announcing the government’s support of a third runway on Wednesday, Mr Miliband had said he would not resign if they backed an expansion.

“Ed Miliband really is the sort of green conscience in cabinet,” she said.

“But we’ve been here. Ed Miliband has been in this situation before.

“Obviously it’s no secret to anybody that Ed Miliband was against it at that time.

“But he stuck with collective responsibility when it came to a free vote on Heathrow.

“Later, when we were in opposition, Ed Miliband, you know, voted against it. But he’s very collaborative and he will remain part of the team.”

Read more:
The long history of Heathrow’s third runway plans
Plans to drill UK’s largest untapped oilfield obstructed in court

She added Mr Miliband “actually brought Keir Starmer into politics” and supported him for the leadership.

He will find the support for a third runway “uncomfortable”, Baroness Harman said.

“But he will be saying ‘if you’re going to do Heathrow, we better flipping well actually improve a lot of the other green things we’re doing and bring them forward’,” she added.

“So, I think he will stay in government, play a very important role for the green agenda, and I don’t think there will be a disruption.”