London
CNN
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Britain’s populist, anti-immigration party Reform UK has beaten Labour by a tiny margin in a by-election, dealing the government a mid-term setback and ruffling the country’s historically resilient two-party hegemony.

Reform, led by the United Kingdom’s disruptor-in-chief Nigel Farage, claimed its fifth Member of Parliament (MP) by winning the industrial northwestern town of Runcorn by just six votes, following a recount.

It marked a stunning reversal in fortunes for center-left Labour, which comfortably claimed the seat on its way to a landslide victory in a general election just 10 months ago.

“It’s been a huge night for Reform,” Farage told reporters on Friday. “This is heartland Labour Party, their vote has collapsed and much of it has come to us.”

Thursday’s vote was triggered when the Labour lawmaker Mike Amesbury resigned earlier this year after he was convicted for punching a man in the street.

Reform also won a mayoral election in Greater Lincolnshire, central England, but Labour held on to retain three other mayoralties.

Prime Minister and Labour leader Keir Starmer conceded to journalists that the results were “disappointing” for his party, but pledged to “go further and faster on the change that people want to see.”

Further results from Thursday’s local elections, which were only held in some regions of England, are expected to be declared on Friday.

The results from Britain’s revolving local electoral calendar are notoriously difficult to extrapolate to the sentiment of the nation as a whole.

But this offers some real evidence behind Reform’s months-long rise in momentum and opinion polling. The party is now regularly graded as the most popular in the country, less than a year on from a national poll in which it placed third.

Sitting governments typically perform worse when facing the electorate during their terms of office, and a general election isn’t due in Britain until 2029.

But these results represent a lukewarm verdict from voters toward Starmer’s government.

While Starmer has proven an adept statesman on the global stage – building a constructive relationship with both US President Donald Trump and European leaders and emerging as a key player in talks over the future of the war in Ukraine – his domestic agenda has failed to energize the public.

Starmer has pledged to revive fiscal growth, infrastructure and house-building projects in a country bogged down by nearly a decade of post-Brexit economic inertia, but his short-term offerings have been more modest and he has been reluctant to throw money toward Britain’s beleaguered public services.

The prime minister has also struggled to significantly reduce the rates of illegal migration to the UK, the issue on which Reform’s surge hinges.

Reform’s rise also came at the expense of the Conservative Party, which was dumped from government last year and has floundered in the months since. The Tories suffered more losses on Thursday, including in regions where they have historically won favor.

Labour and the Conservatives’ domination of British politics has only been challenged on a handful of occasions over the past century, but if Reform were to maintain their momentum over the coming years, that two-party command would be seriously threatened.

London
CNN
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British comedian and actor Russell Brand was granted conditional bail during a court appearance on Friday, after he was charged last month with rape and sexual assault.

London’s Metropolitan Police charged Brand, 49, with one count of rape, one count of indecent assault, and one count of oral rape, as well as two counts of sexual assault. The charges relate to four separate women.

The alleged incidents took place between 1999 and 2005. He has denied the allegations.

The hearing, which gave further details around the allegations that Brand is facing, took place at Westminster Magistrate’s Court in London. Brand spoke only to confirm his name, date of birth, address and that he understood the bail conditions.

He is now due to appear at the Old Bailey court in the British capital on May 30.

The Metropolitan Police described Brand as living in southern England when announcing the charges in April. However British news agency PA Media has previously reported that he is now understood to live in the United States.

Detectives began investigating the comedian, who more recently has repositioned himself as a social commentator, in September 2023 after receiving allegations following a joint investigation led by three British media outlets – The Sunday Times, The Times and Channel 4’s “Dispatches.”

According to the Metropolitan Police, it is alleged that one woman was raped in 1999 in Bournemouth, southern England; one woman was indecently assaulted in London’s Westminster area in 2001; a woman was orally raped and sexually assaulted in Westminster in 2004; and a woman was sexually assaulted between 2004 and 2005, also in Westminster.

Brand has appeared in numerous Hollywood films and hosted radio and TV shows in the United Kingdom. He was married to US pop star Katy Perry between 2010 and 2012.

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CNN
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In our travel roundup this week: secrets of a 1,600-year-old Istanbul megastructure, the British place names you’re probably saying wrong, plus three stories of Americans who left Florida behind for a new life in Spain — with mixed results.

Swapping Florida for Spain should be like trading oranges for oranges, right?

Both of these climate-blessed destinations get around 3,000 hours of sunshine a year, but there are plenty of differences when it comes to day-to-day lifestyles.

Gail and Greg Warner were in their mid-50s when they moved from Florida to Spain, living first in Valencia and then Malaga.

They say that the key to moving to a completely new destination is to fully embrace the experience and accept that your lives likely won’t be the same as they were before. Their only regret, Gail says, is that they “didn’t do it earlier.”

Laura Hamlin and Allan Amer relocated to Spain from Florida in 2022, telling CNN that the “divisive” political environment in the Sunshine State had been wearing them down.

They live in Cartagena, a port city on the Mediterranean coast, and while they’ve hit some major setbacks since the move, they “love the country.”

Cristina Martinez was smitten with Spain after a few vacations there, but when she and her husband sold their house and moved to Santander on the Atlantic coast, it was a different story.

She tells CNN she found Spain “outdated” and, after struggling to adapt, she’s now back in the US. “It left a really bad taste in my mouth, the whole experience,” she says.

If you’re an American considering leaving the US for good, there are a number of things to consider before you move abroad. Here’s our guide to what you should think about before ordering those packing boxes.

Vietnam marked the 50th anniversary of reunification this week and Hanoi’s Metropole Hotel has been highlighting its war heritage. The luxury lodging has an underground bunker, built in 1965, which once sheltered celebs including Joan Baez and Jane Fonda from US air raids. The hotel now offers twice-daily tours.

For Villa Tugendhat in the Czech city of Brno, its starring moment in 20th-century history came in 1992. This UNESCO World Heritage site designed by legendary architect Mies van der Rohe was where the Slovak and Czech prime ministers met to arrange the “Velvet Divorce,” the peaceful separation of Czechoslovakia into two countries.

There are 1,600 years of history to discover in Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia, a spectacular megastructure that has survived the collapse of empires. Over the years it’s been a church, a mosque, a museum and, since 2020, is now a mosque once more.