Ten Things You Need to Know Today: 15 May 2023

1. Turkey poll ‘goes to second round’

A run-off between President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his main challenger is expected, after Turkey’s tightest election in decades. According to the nation’s Supreme Election Council, Erdogan is on 49.49% of the vote, with his rival Kemal Kilicdaroglu on 44.79%, with nearly all the votes counted. If neither contender manages 50%, there will be a second poll in a fortnight. However, citing unofficial results, the Turkish newspaper Daily Sabah has declared Erdogan the winner.

Turkey’s knife-edge election

2. Braverman to press Sunak

Suella Braverman will argue today that “it’s not xenophobic to say that mass and rapid migration is unsustainable”. In a speech at the National Conservatism Conference, the home secretary will demand that Rishi Sunak delivers the Tory manifesto promise to reduce net migration so that Britain does not forget how to “do things for ourselves”. She will also say more must be done to improve integration, saying that migrants who are allowed to settle in the UK must speak English and embrace British values.

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Suella Braverman - and five of the other most divisive politicians since Brexit

3. Lower energy bills ‘in six weeks’

Energy bills should fall within six weeks, said the energy secretary, Grant Shapps. Appearing on the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme, he acknowledged that wholesale prices are falling. “Now people haven’t seen all that benefit, much of it, or even any of it yet, but about another six weeks, the summer, that should start to feed into people’s electricity bills,” he said. Meanwhile, the head of the National Farmers’ Union has warned that higher food prices are here for the foreseeable future.

Will energy bills go down this year?

4. Boris ‘snatches Gove’s knighthood’

Michael Gove has missed out on a chance to be knighted after Boris Johnson removed him from his honours list, blaming him for blocking his return to No. 10, said The Times. Johnson had planned to nominate Gove for a knighthood to recognise his longstanding service as a cabinet minister but a source familiar with his list said the former PM changed his mind after blaming Gove for persuading Kemi Badenoch to endorse Rishi Sunak in the autumn Tory leadership contest.

A history of the UK’s honours scandals

5. Poll finds gender ambition

The majority of teenagers know someone at their school who wants to change gender, a report has found. A study carried out in March of almost 1,200 teenagers aged between 16 and 18 in England found that 10% said they wanted to change their gender or have already done so, while a further 54% said they knew someone at their school who either wanted to change their gender or had already done so. The report, by the Civitas think tank, also found that most parents want the legal right to see all sex education materials used in school lessons.

How difficult is it to change your gender in the UK?

6. Winslet wins at Baftas

Kate Winslet has picked up a Bafta for best leading actress for her performance in Channel 4’s I Am Ruth while Ben Whishaw won leading actor for playing an under-pressure doctor in This Is Going to Hurt. Reality competition series The Traitors and its host, Claudia Winkleman, were also among the winners at the ceremony at London’s Royal Festival Hall. Other winners included a documentary about Sir Mo Farah which revealed the runner had been illegally trafficked to the UK as a child. It was a “right royal celebration”, said The Sun.

7. Lions killed in Kenya

Ten lions have been killed in southern Kenya in seven days, as “human-wildlife conflict” escalates in the region, said the Kenya Wildlife Service. After six were killed on Saturday alone, a spokesperson for the KWS told CNN that this is “an unusually large number of lions to be killed at one go”. One of Africa’s oldest lions, Loonkiito, was killed at the age of 19 earlier this week. He had ventured out of a protected area and into a livestock pen due to being “starving,” and was killed by the livestock owner, said conservationists.

8. Opposition lands majority in Thai poll

Opposition parties in Thailand have delivered a “damning verdict” to the military-backed government that has ruled the country for nearly a decade, said The Guardian. With 99% of the votes counted in the national election, the progressive Move Forward party and Pheu Thai, the populist party associated with exiled former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, were far ahead of Prayuth Chan-ocha, a former army chief who first came to power in a coup in 2014, and who had run a nationalist campaign. However, what happens next is unclear, as parliamentary rules favour army-backed parties.

9. Tesco CEO calls for apprentice reboot

The boss of Tesco has called for taxpayer-funded apprenticeships to be rebooted to help kick-start the economy. Ken Murphy noted that the number of people completing apprenticeships equivalent to bachelor’s and masters degrees had soared by more than 400%. However, during the same eight-year period, lower-level training equivalent to GCSEs, typically undertaken by the young, had plummeted by 70%. This is “neither fair nor effective”, said the supermarket CEO.

Is it time to rethink the value of a university degree?

10. Andrew ‘refuses to budge’ from Windsor home

Prince Andrew is “refusing to leave Royal Lodge”, putting him on a “collision course” with the King, claimed Mail Online. The Duke of York is believed to be unwilling to vacate the 98-acre Windsor property, his home of more than 20 years, at the request of his brother. Explaining that the prince is “refusing to budge”, a friend said: “He is so fragile. He’s refusing to see anybody. This has been his family home for the past 20 years. Is it really sensible to kick him out?”

Inside the world of Prince Andrew