Almost one in two Muslims in France say they might consider leaving the country if Marine Le Pen wins the next presidential election, according to a new survey.

Le Pen, the leader of the hard-Right National Rally, is currently ahead in polling for the 2027 presidential race.

The Ifop poll found that 46 per cent of Muslim respondents would think about emigrating if Le Pen became president. One in five said they would “certainly” leave France.

The prospect of a National Rally victory also prompted widespread fears over discrimination. Some 81 per cent of those surveyed believed a Le Pen presidency would bring greater hostility and aggression towards Muslims.

A further 27 per cent said they could consider hiding their religious identity, according to French news outlet Marianne.

Le Pen has faced strong criticism over her proposals to tackle what she describes as “Islamist ideologies” if she enters the Élysée Palace.

Among her suggested measures is a fine for wearing a hijab in public, which she refers to as the “Islamist veil”.

“I will submit to the French people, by referendum, a bill to combat Islamist ideologies with numerous powerful measures, including the banning of the Islamist headscarf in public places,” the presidential candidate wrote on X last month.

Now 58, Le Pen has advocated banning Muslim women from wearing head coverings in public since 2012, when she launched her first of three unsuccessful presidential campaigns.

She put the proposal aside in 2022 as she sought to soften her hard-Right image during her campaign against France’s current president, Emmanuel Macron.

France became the first European nation to prohibit full-face coverings in public places in 2011. Anyone breaching the law can receive a fine or be required to attend a civic education course.

At the time, the French government said face coverings made identification difficult, could create security risks and hindered normal social interaction.

Several other European countries later introduced similar restrictions. Portugal, for example, banned or limited the wearing of burqas and other full-face veils in public last month.

The survey suggests Le Pen’s position broadly reflects existing public opinion in France.

CONTINUE READING: Picturesque Cotswolds River to Be Fenced Off From Tourists

Researchers questioned 9,689 adults and found that a substantial majority supported limits on Islamic clothing and other religious symbols in public settings.

Around 53 per cent said they opposed women wearing the hijab on the street, while approximately 75 per cent supported prohibiting the abaya in state secondary schools.

The abaya, a long, loose-fitting dress worn by some Muslim women, was barred from state schools in 2023 after officials argued that it breached France’s principle of secularism.

The measure received strong backing from Macron, but also intensified debate over France’s strict secularism laws and whether they unfairly target the country’s Muslim minority, estimated to make up about 10 per cent of the population.

Meanwhile, the study found 72 per cent of those surveyed supported a ban on conspicuous religious symbols at sporting events. 

François Kraus, director of the Politics and Current Affairs unit at Ifop, said that Ms Le Pen’s victory ‘risks generating significant blockages and produces high levels of fear and a sense of insecurity’. 

Ms Le Pen has consistently led first-round voting intention surveys for the election on April 18, 2027, typically polling between 30 and 35 per cent.  

Jean-Luc Mélenchon of La France Insoumise and former prime minister Édouard Philippe have alternated in second place, polling between 14 and 19 per cent. 

Ms Le Pen recently stirred tension after accusing Europe of waging a war over energy with Russia and vowed to stop funding Ukraine should she win the presidency.

She pledged to stop financial aid for Kyiv within six months, saying France can no longer afford it. 

And claimed the ‘honest thing’ the EU should do would be to tell Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky it ‘can’t manage’ to financially support his cause any more.

The Eurosceptic party leader has long opposed Ukraine’s membership of the EU and has criticised EU sanctions against Russia, claiming it has allowed an ‘energy war’ to form between the two powers.

Ms Le Pen accused the EU of idiocy over its stance against the Kremlin, telling the Financial Times: ‘We the EU have led an energy war against Russia, when we haven’t got any energy. It is not very smart.’ 

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Constance Marten is reportedly “over the moon” after being transferred to a lower-security prison where inmates have access to acupuncture and therapy, just 13 months into her sentence.

The aristocrat went on the run with her partner, Mark Gordon, and their baby daughter in an attempt to prevent the child from being taken into care.

The couple’s four other children had already been placed in care for their protection. Their disappearance with baby Victoria, while they camped in freezing conditions, triggered a £1.2 million nationwide manhunt.

Marten, 39, and Gordon, 52, were each sentenced to 14 years in prison for gross negligence manslaughter after Victoria was found dead in a disused shed in Brighton, East Sussex. Her body was discovered inside a Lidl bag with a soiled nappy.

Gordon was also given an additional four-year extended sentence after the judge ruled that he posed a danger to the public.

Marten has now been transferred from HMP Bronzefield to Send Prison in Surrey, just 13 months after beginning her sentence. The facility places greater emphasis on prisoners’ wellbeing, rehabilitation and personal development.

Women held at the prison can take courses in gym instruction, beauty therapy and gardening. They can also receive support from the facility’s Psychologically Informed Physical Environment, known as the PIPE unit.

The move came after prison officials classified Marten as a victim of domestic abuse with a “hidden disability”. She was also granted permission to appeal her sentence in August.

“It is a great move for Constance, and she is, not surprisingly, over the moon,” a source told The Sun.

The source highlighted the prison’s therapy, acupuncture and rehabilitation programmes, adding that inmates can grow their own food as a way of supporting their mental wellbeing.

“Although the jail does house killers and serious criminals, it is a much nicer environment than Bronzefield, which is rough and like a cattle market in comparison.”

The source added: “In Constance’s case, the domestic violence and hidden disability, which is usually something like autism or ADHD, have come to light in counselling sessions.”

They said those findings, together with Marten’s successful application for permission to appeal, may have contributed to her transfer to Send, which they described as being “more like a private clinic”.

“Some of the staff think she needs therapy and attention because of her troubled past – but others think she is playing the system.”

The latest report from HM Inspectorate of Prisons praised Send, where former inmates have included Fergie’s killer aide Jane Andrews and killer mother Mairead Philpott, for its “positive learning culture”.

The report said: “A range of meaningful recreational and extracurricular activities was available.”

It added: “The ethos of the prison was overwhelmingly rehabilitative.”

Marten is understood to have been barred from contacting Gordon, who is serving his sentence at HMP Belmarsh in London.

Marten grew up in a stately home with maids and cooks; her father was a page to Queen Elizabeth II, and her grandmother was a playmate of Princess Margaret – but her ex-lover’s background could not be more different.

Experts previously described Gordon as a sociopathic sex offender considered so dangerous that they compared his sadistic crimes to the American serial killer Ted Bundy or Australian-American serial killer Christopher Wilder.

Hooked on violent pornography, Gordon was just 14 when he raped a woman at knifepoint in 1989 after breaking into her home armed with knives and hedge clippers, telling her: ‘Don’t scream or I’ll kill your children.’

Franklin Nooe, treatment director of a sex assault clinic who counselled Gordon’s first victim, described Gordon as a sociopath in the same category as Ted Bundy: ‘That’s the 5 per cent of the rapists, that’s your Ted Bundys, your Wilders that obviously enjoy it. It is something that actually fuels them.

‘They are a progressive kind of rapist that would lead to, I would expect, going from just raping to raping and murdering’.

Within three weeks of carrying out the attack in Florida, where Gordon lived at the time, he broke into the home of a second woman armed with a set of knives.

But as he crept into her bedroom, placing two 7-inch knives outside the door, Gordon was startled to find her husband home. Gordon then battered him around the head with a shovel before fleeing in panic.

When he was sentenced for both attacks, the rape victim pleaded with a judge to never let him free, saying: ‘I ask you to make sure that this man does not have the opportunity to destroy any more lives.

‘Someone who is capable of doing this, a cruel, calculated act at this age, is not going to get better. He is only going to do more harm in society.’

Gordon was jailed for 40 years, serving half of that before being deported back to the UK.

But he hid his appalling criminal history from Marten when they met in 2016, keeping it secret until after they had a spiritual marriage in Peru and had their first child together.

It wasn’t until he assaulted two police officers in hospital after Marten gave birth under a false name that she learnt he was a violent rapist considered at ‘high risk’ of reoffending.

Gordon later attacked Marten when she was pregnant with their third child, throwing her out of their flat window, sending her plunging 18ft to the ground, hitting a car on the way.

As she lay screaming in agony with a shattered spleen and internal bleeding, putting her life and her unborn child at risk, Gordon didn’t call an ambulance and attempted to delay paramedics alerted by concerned neighbours.

Marten would spend the next eight days in hospital recovering from surgery, but Gordon demanded her discharge despite doctors warning this would put her life at risk.

The domestic abuse was the catalyst for a family court judge to rule their four older children should be taken into care for their own protection from a ‘violent sex offender’ whose actions had ‘put her life and the life of their unborn child at serious risk’.

Two years before the death of Victoria, District Judge Madeleine Reardon warned: ‘It is much more likely than not that in the foreseeable future the children will be exposed to serious physical violence between their parents.

‘It is quite possible that they will be injured themselves.’

When the pair were later jailed at the Old Bailey for the manslaughter of their newborn, Victoria, Judge Mark Lucraft KC said: ‘Neither of you gave much thought to the care and welfare of your baby.’

He also said the couple had shown ‘no genuine expression of remorse’.

Marten, who worked as a cleaner at Bronzefield, earned the nickname ‘moaning Myrtle’ after aiding other prisoners in their complaints over issues such as mental health support and childcare.

The 39-year-old has won her right to appeal her conviction and is challenging the length of her 14-year sentence.

A Prison Service spokesperson said: ‘This was an awful crime, and the offender remains behind bars where they belong.’

John Healey is preparing to impose higher taxes on banks, despite describing the sector as a “jewel in the crown of the British economy”.

Industry leaders fear the bank levy could rise from its current 3 per cent rate to 8 per cent. They warn that such an increase would raise borrowing costs for businesses and mortgage holders, while placing further pressure on the wider economy.

There are also concerns that a windfall tax on banks could prompt international lenders to move parts of their London and UK operations abroad.

Speaking on the sidelines of the International Monetary Fund meetings in Bangkok, the Chancellor said banks were “a big contributor to the economy” and “an important part of our business”.

His remarks raised hopes that he might resist calls from trade unions and Labour MPs for tougher taxes on lenders in this month’s Budget.

However, Healey declined to rule out an increase, leaving City investors nervous ahead of his first Budget on October 28.

Speculation is growing that he could raise the levy banks pay on their profits in addition to corporation tax, as mounting pressure builds on him to balance the public finances.

UK Finance, the banking industry’s trade body, said lenders already make a “major contribution to the public finances” and face a “materially higher total tax rate” in Britain than in other leading financial centres.

It warned that any further increase in bank taxation would “weaken the UK’s competitiveness, discourage investment and job creation” and undermine the Government’s goal of delivering economic growth in every postcode.

Shares in major UK banks fell during early trading. Lloyds Banking Group dropped almost 2 per cent, while NatWest fell 0.22 per cent and Barclays slipped 0.16 per cent.

“My observations on the banks are just that people too often see them as big distant financial institutions, when they are hardwired into the economic fabric,” Healey said at the IMF.

“That said, I’ve got decisions to take in the Budget, and I’ll set those out in two weeks’ time.”

The Trades Union Congress has urged the Government to introduce “a windfall tax on bank profits to fund cuts to energy bills for everyone on low and middle incomes”.

The banking industry has strongly opposed the proposal, arguing that it would increase operating costs and ultimately make borrowing more expensive for millions of households and businesses.

In a strongly worded letter to the Chancellor last week, a group of prominent business organisations said a tax raid could have the opposite effect to that intended by triggering an exodus from the UK.

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“As well as weakening investor confidence and damaging UK attractiveness, a higher tax burden may not necessarily generate higher tax receipts if capital, people and businesses move elsewhere,” the letter said.

The warning echoed comments by JP Morgan chief executive Jamie Dimon, who said he would abandon the bank’s plan to build a £3 billion headquarters in Canary Wharf.

The bank surcharge was reduced from 8 per cent to 3 per cent under Rishi Sunak, alongside an increase in corporation tax from 19 per cent to 25 per cent.

Returning the surcharge to 8 per cent is estimated to raise about £2 billion a year.

As well as praising the banks, Healey sought to calm jitters on the bond markets that have pushed UK government borrowing costs to the highest level for 28 years in recent weeks.

He insisted he will ‘meet’ the fiscal rules ‘in full’ while also hinting at support for families and businesses in the Budget.

‘I’ve been very clear, also, the Prime Minister talked about recognising the cost of business, not just the cost of living,’ said Healey.

‘And so, I want the Budget to be a Budget that gets Britain a bit of breathing space. But also, reinforces the strength of our fiscal plans.’

A river in the village often called “the most beautiful in England” could soon be fenced off after huge numbers of tourists were seen paddling in the water and leaving rubbish behind, raising concerns about damage to local wildlife.

Thousands of visitors travelled to picturesque Bibury in the Cotswolds during the summer, with many making their way to the River Coln to cool down during the heatwave.

Residents have previously said they now avoid the village, which can attract as many as 20,000 visitors a day during peak periods, because of the sheer volume of tourists and coaches.

Councillors have now voiced particular concern over the growing number of visitors entering the river, which flows through the village beneath the historic stone Swan Bridge.

Locals have described the quantity of waste left floating in the water, including bottles and coffee cups, as “unbelievable”.

Bibury is home to around 600 people and draws visitors to its renowned 17th-century weavers’ cottages, which have appeared in films including Stardust and Bridget Jones’s Diary.

The village first gained wider fame through textile designer and writer William Morris, who described it in the 19th century as “the most beautiful village in England”.

However, many residents believe the number of visiting coaches is no longer sustainable. The narrow country road regularly becomes gridlocked, while parking has also led to disputes.

The large crowds are believed to have created several problems for wildlife, prompting Bibury Parish Council to consider the drastic step of fencing off sections of the river.

Craig Chapman, the council’s chair, said new fences had been approved to protect swans, ducks, water voles and fish living in and around the River Coln.

He said tourists had increasingly been “doing what they want” in the village in recent months.

Speaking to the BBC, he said: “In the hot weather over the summer tourists were sitting on the riverbank with their feet in the river, walking in the river and even setting up tables and chairs in the river. That’s highly detrimental to the wildlife.”

Mr Chapman called fencing off the area a “drastic measure”, adding that it was “absolutely not what we want to do”.

“It seems it’s what we have to do to protect the environment around the River Coln,” he said.

Kris Watts, 71, said that daily life in the picture-perfect village had become increasingly difficult as visitor numbers continued to rise.

She said: “We’ve had people paddling in the river, which is a protected site because we’ve got water voles. You just think – for goodness’ sake.”

Gloucestershire County Council has launched a trial involving designated coach drop-off points to ease congestion. Residents, however, claim some drivers continue to stop at other locations around the village.

Ms Watts, who has been a resident for ten years, said: ‘I don’t go into the village at weekends now, it’s that bad.

‘We knew it was a touristy village when we moved here, but since Covid it’s just got worse and worse.

‘A big part of it is social media influencers advertising how beautiful the village is.’

Victoria Summerley, 70, who has lived in Bibury for 14 years, added: ‘The Coln River is a trout stream. It’s supposed to be a really clean river.

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‘The amount of litter that ends up in the river in terms of drinks, bottles, coffee cups and so on, just unbelievable,’ she added.

The increase in visitors is partly driven by so-called influencers promoting the tiny village.

Locals also complain of tourists walking through their homes and enjoying picnics in their gardens, with some having put up ‘private, no entry’ signs translated into Chinese, Japanese and Korean.

It has caused such frustration for Brian Skarda, a parish councillor in nearby Cirencester, who wrote in the village newsletter that he and his wife, Jill, were leaving after 14 years.

He said they put up with ‘door banging, window peeping and general interference in our private lives’ from swathes of tourists coming off coaches.

Earlier this month, Mr Skarda said: ‘More inconsiderate and the sheer numbers of tourists this year have meant that, on occasions, we have virtually been unable to get out of our front door or move our car along the row.

‘This is a beautiful village and, sadly, it is being ruined by the very people who come to see it,’ he said.

Ms Summerley told The Times she suspects the couple are leaving after ‘a hand came through the letterbox holding a phone so they could film inside.’

Speaking of her own experience, she said she once sprayed an ‘entitled’ driver with her hose through his window because he was blocking the drive while waiting for visitors. 

‘I sprayed him through the window and he burst into tears… His attitude was so offensive I thought it would teach him a lesson,’ she said. 

Frustrated owners of gorgeous stone cottages claim that coaches stop in the middle of the road to dump tourists outside of their doors.

They then line up and take photographs outside of people’s homes before moving on.

Claire Perrin, 64, said: ‘It’s crazy and we just feel like it’s not going to change because it’s the age of Instagram. It makes you question staying here.’  

Japanese tourists have also flocked to Bibury after the future Emperor Hirohito, then the Crown Prince, visited in 1921 and called it ‘one of the happiest’ times of his life.

There has also been a surge in middle-class Chinese tourists who say they’ve travelled across the world after seeing Bibury posted on Chinese Instagram.

The parish council wants there to be a limit on the huge daily coaches that come in, but locals don’t have much hope for any regulation.

Last year, Bibury villagers called for action and formed a working group that included councillors and the police, which saw Gloucestershire County Council announce plans to tackle the problem.

A trial scheme was implemented in May 2025, which temporarily closed existing coach bays and created designated, safer drop-off and pick-up points for coaches.

But the plans have not been permanently implemented since the trial, with the county council holding formal public consultations over the future of the restrictions in place.

Last year Bibury topped the list of Forbes Magazine’s 50 most beautiful villages in the world, boosting tourist visits even further.