Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has demanded the prosecution of rap trio Kneecap after video emerged of the band allegedly advocating for the death of Tory MPs.
Footage of the group at a November 2023 gig appears to show one member saying: “The only good Tory is a dead Tory. Kill your local MP.”
Downing Street has described the alleged comments as “completely unacceptable”.
Police are investigating – and are also assessing footage reportedly from a gig a year later in London’s Kentish Town Forum.
In the November 2024 video, a member of the band appears to shout “up Hamas, up Hezbollah” – referencing groups which are banned as terrorist organisations in the UK.
A Metropolitan Police spokesman said: “We were made aware of a video on 22 April, believed to be from an event in November 2024, and it has been referred to the counter-terrorism internet referral unit for assessment and to determine whether any further police investigation may be required.
“We have also been made aware of another video believed to be from an event in November 2023.”
Mrs Badenoch said it was “good” the police were looking into the allegations, adding: “Kneecap’s glorification of terrorism and anti-British hatred has no place in our society.
“Now footage shows one of them saying: ‘The only good Tory is a dead Tory. Kill your local MP’.
“After the murder of Sir David Amess, this demands prosecution.”
Image: Kemi Badenoch. Pic: PA
Conservative MP Sir David was stabbed to death while meeting constituents in Leigh-on-Sea, Essex, in 2021.
Kneecap, made up of Liam Og O Hannaidh, Naoise O Caireallain and JJ O Dochartaigh, have said they are facing a “co-ordinated smear campaign” after speaking out about “the ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people”.
Mrs Badenoch and Kneecap are already known to each other.
The Tory leader blocked a government grant to the bilingual Belfast group while she was business secretary.
But last November, Kneecap won a discrimination challenge over the decision to refuse them a £14,250 funding award after the UK government conceded it was “unlawful”.
Downing Street condemned the alleged comments.
“We do not think individuals expressing those views should be receiving government funding,” the prime minister’s official spokesman said.
Asked if the money should be returned, the spokesman added: “That’s up to the group, but clearly the PM rejects the views expressed … does not shy away from condemning them.”
BST Hyde Park festival has cancelled its final night after Jeff Lynne’s Electric Light Orchestra pulled out of the headline slot.
Lynne, 77, was due to play alongside his band on Sunday but has been forced to withdraw from the event following a “systemic infection”.
The London show was supposed to be a “final goodbye” from ELO following their farewell US tour.
Organisers said on Saturday that Lynne was “heartbroken” at being unable to perform.
A statement read: “Jeff has been battling a systemic infection and is currently in the care of a team of doctors who have advised him that performing is simply not possible at this time nor will he be able to reschedule.
“The legacy of the band and his longtime fans are foremost in Jeff’s mind today – and while he is so sorry that he cannot perform, he knows that he must focus on his health and rehabilitation at this time.”
They later confirmed the whole of Sunday’s event would be cancelled.
“Ticket holders will be refunded and contacted directly by their ticket agent with further details,” another statement said.
Stevie Wonder played the festival on Saturday – now its final event of 2025.
US rock band The Doobie Brothers and blues rock singer Steve Winwood were among those who had been due to perform to before ELO’s headline performance.
The cancellation comes after the band, best known for their hit Mr Blue Sky, pulled out of a performance due to take place at Manchester’s Co-Op Live Arena on Thursday.
ELO was formed in Birmingham in 1970 by Lynne, multi-instrumentalist Roy Wood and drummer Bev Bevan.
They first split in 1986, before frontman Lynne resurrected the band in 2014.
Donald Trump has said he is considering “taking away” the US citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, despite a Supreme Court ruling that expressly prohibits a government from doing so.
In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, the US president said: “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”
He also labelled O’Donnell, who has moved to Ireland, as a “threat to humanity” and said she should “remain in the wonderful country of Ireland, if they want her”.
O’Donnell responded on Instagram by posting a photograph of Mr Trump with Jeffrey Epstein.
“You are everything that is wrong with America and I’m everything you hate about what’s still right with it,” she wrote in the caption.
“I’m not yours to silence. I never was.”
Image: Rosie O’Donnell moved to Ireland after Donald Trump secured a second term. Pic: AP
O’Donnell moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old son in January after Mr Trump had secured a second term.
She has said she’s in the process of obtaining Irish citizenship based on family lineage and that she would only return to the US “when it is safe for all citizens to have equal rights there in America”.
O’Donnell and the US president have criticised each other publicly for years, in an often-bitter back-and-forth that predates Mr Trump’s move into politics.
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This is just the latest threat by the president to revoke the citizenship of someone he has disagreed with, most recently his former ally Elon Musk.
But the two situations are different as while Musk was born in South Africa, O’Donnell was born in the US and has a constitutional right to American citizenship.
Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, said the Supreme Court ruled in a 1967 case that the fourteenth amendment of the constitution prevents the government from taking away citizenship.
“The president has no authority to take away the citizenship of a native-born US citizen,” he added.
“In short, we are nation founded on the principle that the people choose the government; the government cannot choose the people.”
The Salt Path author Raynor Winn’s fourth book has been delayed by her publisher.
It comes amid claims that the author lied about her story in her hit first book. Winn previously described the claims as “highly misleading” and called suggestions that her husband had Moth made up his illness “utterly vile”.
In a statement, Penguin Michael Joseph, said it had delayed the publication of Winn’s latest book On Winter Hill – which had been set for release 23 October.
The publisher said the decision had been made in light of “recent events, in particular intrusive conjecture around Moth’s health”, which it said had caused “considerable distress” to the author and her family.
“It is our priority to support the author at this time,” the publisher said.
“With this in mind, Penguin Michael Joseph, together with the author, has made the decision to delay the publication of On Winter Hill from this October.”
A new release date will be announced in due course, the publisher added.
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Winn’s first book, released in 2018, detailed the journey she and husband took along the South West Coast Path – familiarly known as The Salt Path – after they lost their family farm and Moth received a terminal health diagnosis of Corticobasal Degeneration (CBD).
But a report in The Observer disputed key aspects of the 2018 “true” story – which was recently turned into a film starring Jason Isaacs and Gillian Anderson.
Image: Raynor and husband Moth (centre) with actors Jason Isaacs (L) and Gillian Anderson (R). Pic: Steve Tanner/Black Bear
Experts ‘sceptical of health claims’
As part of the article, published last weekend, The Observer claimed to have spoken to experts who were “sceptical” about elements of Moth’s terminal diagnosis, such as a “lack of acute symptoms and his apparent ability to reverse them”.
In the ensuing controversy, PSPA, a charity that supports people with CBD, cut ties with the couple.
The Observer article also claimed the portrayal of a failed investment in a friend’s business wasn’t true, but said the couple – whose names are Sally and Tim Walker – lost their home after Raynor Winn embezzled money from her employer and had to borrow to pay it back and avoid police action.
Image: Anderson played Winn in a movie about the couple’s journey. Pic: Steve Tanner/Black Bear
It also said that, rather than being homeless, the couple had owned a house in France since 2007.
Winn’s statement said the dispute with her employer wasn’t the reason the couple lost their home – but admitted she may have made “mistakes” while in the job.
“For me it was a pressured time,” she wrote. “It was also a time when mistakes were being made in the business. Any mistakes I made during the years in that office, I deeply regret, and I am truly sorry.”
She admitted being questioned by police but said she wasn’t charged.
The author also said accusations that Moth lied about having CBD/CBS were false and had “emotionally devastated” him.
“I have charted Moth’s condition with such a level of honesty, that this is the most unbearable of the allegations,” Winn wrote on her website.