The five, ten, twenty and fifty pound notes are changing their design. Where previously, on the reverse, there was the face of Churchill, Jane Austen, Turner and Alan Turing, respectively, there will now be an animal from the British wildlife chosen from a pre-selection of eighteen, selected by a panel of experts. On June 3rd, a public consultation was opened for this purpose, which will close on July 3rd. The public can opt for, among others, the hedgehog, the puffin, the badger, the marten, the red fox or the bumblebee. The candidates to appear on the new paper money have been divided into three categories: mammals, birds and a third group that includes amphibians, insects and fish. "Can you lend me a beaver?" may soon mean "can you lend me five pounds?". And "can you pass me a bumblebee?", perhaps it will mean "can you pass me 50?" Mysteries of slang.

If in a country the central bank governor has to publicly deny having carried out a covert coup d'état to overthrow a democratic government, it is logical to think that the country may have a problem with its central bank – and with the governor in question. This is exactly what Andrew Bailey, governor of the Bank of England, had to do in November 2022, following the resignation of Liz Truss as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, only 44 days after taking office. As if Truss's bad luck were not enough, during her brief term, Queen Elizabeth II died.