I’m standing outside a Commons committee room where Keir Starmer has walked in to a mass of loud applause from his MPs. It was very loud. Well, that settles it. He’s 100% safe now.

No, we didn’t. Nobody BUT the chaos-loving journalists and self declared journalists and/or punters across the airwaves really wants this sort of instability😡

With Streeting, Rayner pledging support, it looks like Starmer will struggle on. All rests on a massive gear change and some supportive Cabinet members may have to find their focus substantially change. Failing Domestic or successful Foreign, McSweeney or Powell….time to choose differently.

Who am I to judge Scottish politics but the idea that Scottish voters would just run towards Labour, immediately after a massive internal Labour drama brings down the Prime Minister, strikes me as … odd.

Anas Sarwar says he has a "certain level of loyalty" to Keir Starmer, shortly after calling a press conference to demand he resigns

Chris Mason BBC Political Editor is paid circa £270,000 by licence payers. His expertise includes Promoting Farage & Reform at any opportunity ✅ Avoiding challenging Farage/Reform re policies, funding, U-Turns, lies etc ✅ Producing negative PR on Govt/other parties✅ Amplifying Right Wing rhetoric ✅

More top analysis from Mason. 'Let me tell you why this non-story is a big story.' No mention of the huge risks to Reform and Farage. No assessment of the toxic content of Braverman's speech or the cynicism of the move. No acknowledgment that Reform hit a poll ceiling and bounced down. Just gossip.

“If Burnham’s popularity would be useful to hold Gorton and Denton, it surely would be more damaging to lose it in the much larger mayoral by-election. Standing to be an MP makes sense if Burnham is looking to challenge for the leadership, but it doesn’t make sense under any other circumstances.”

*Kemi reading the bible* "suffer little children" well that's enough for today, think I got the gist of it

Their aim is to bankrupt KCC and force a major sell off and convert KCC to a corporate governance region. Remove everything from goverment control. How very trumpian. I'd be scrutinizing every expense claim. I'd put money on the fact councillors & their cronies are lining their pockets. Just saying🤷‍♀️

Liz Truss due to her brief stint as PM receives a lifetime pension worth £100,000 annually and £1 million in 24 hour year round security. Funded by the taxpayer to spend all her time talking down the UK.

We’re going to see more of this ridiculous “they’re cancelling Christmas” narrative. It’s basically Rage-Bait LAW from the 12th November, just as soon as Poppy Rage is over. Try not to get sucked in👍🏼 It’s not good for your blood pressure to get so angry about imaginary problems 12/15

Here’s a link to the fake news Torsten Bell story that the Times had to delete this week. A half-baked attempted hatchet job that was effectively copied from the Daily Mail. A rare chance for outsiders to see how the right-wing media sausage is made

Unclear to me what some of Labour’s critics on here *want*. If you oppose further tax rises, you support the status quo OR further cuts. It’s just that simple.

"An essential condition today for entry into the upper echelons of Conservative party politics is being willing to at least pretend that you think taking Britain out of the EU was a good idea. This is a never-ending lobotomy for the Tories." Excellent by @stephenkb.bsky.social #Giftlink

Between another quick trip to the Algarve and his latest court appearance on Monday, Tommy Robinson has been the guest on a luxury train owned by billionaire right-wing benefactor Jeremy Hosking. Read more here: searchlightmagazine.com/2025/10/tomm...

If Rayner had set out to minimise her tax bill, she could have waited til her son turned 18 before buying the Hove house. She didn't because she wasn't trying to minimise her tax bill.

Ms Rayner took advice, and it was wrong, it does happen, even Lawyers make mistakes. She should not even think of resigning, the trust was an extra layer of complication. @danneidle.bsky.social

The Disappointer Sisters?

There was a 2yr exercise that ran to 7 volumes, painstaking reviewing regulation & consulting industry & consumer bodies on changes that would be helpful . Virtually nothing on close inspection.

Agreed

A symptom of petrol prices being too low? (Even!) Chaps riding motorbikes/driving cars with unlawfully-modified engines that generate noise in breach of noise limits. Many a sunny evening is ruined. 🤬🤬. Why are current enforcement measures so ineffective? No resources? Penalties not a deterrent?

I keep reading this from O'Brien and still can't believe it. The idea that Britain in 2025 must have a 'traditional majority culture' that is 'white British' is just so sad. O'Brien is my age, he grew up in a country with nonwhite comedians, sports stars, newscasters. But apparently they don't count

"Ultimately, every one of Farage's 'savings will ultimately COST taxpayers money in the long run."

The curse of the newspaper opinion columnist - the need to have a take on every subject, the growing need for hotter takes slowly radicalises them. The job needs term limits. Social media turned everybody into them.

This one is for all of those who said there was no point in Labour trying to deepen EU ties with the red lines in place. Economically, there's a lot to gain from regulatory alignment. Why? Because that gives companies the predictably to invest in the UK.

Yes. Sellner is talking about deporting non-white citizens. @rcolvile.bsky.social isn't saying that. Powell, like @rcolvile.bsky.social, was talking about how to get rid of people who came here legally to work in health, social care, transport as well as of course their families and kids.

The Times recently led its front page with an entirely bogus story about VAT on private school fees. What were the facts? | Stephen McNair

Rise of Chris Philp tests the limits of the Peter principle

people say the government haven’t achieved anything yet but they have made Isabel Oakeshott leave the country

And I did not burn down a therapist's office. The implicit logic of the 'why weren't people told more sooner' is that had this attack been the thing it is 75 per cent of the time, some mob justice would have been A-OK!

It’s more about the fragmentation of the media landscape, but yes: the breakdown of norms against this sort of rhetoric is imo one of the 2-3 most important societal shifts of the past couple of decades. Hence my recommendation for best book of 2024!

Kemi Badenoch has attributed a terrible tragedy to a series of gut instincts and ideological prejudices that have no basis in fact, which is what happens when you choose a second rate culture warrior instead of a leader to run a political party. Dismally shallow.

An actually insane position. Brexit has brought nothing but economic harm to the UK and the more it perpetuates because of some fantasy thinking that somehow that harm will go away, the worse we'll all be for it. Labour don't need to refight bad faith Brexit arguments; just re-align.

www.ft.com/content/73b4... Here @stephenkb.bsky.social quietly suggests Badenoch is struggling in the basic task of reading what is before her, rather than what would fit her priors

In case you missed it, a Telegraph columnist is calling for the UK to join a federal superstate with a single currency and free movement of people.

Just watched the Whatever Happened To The Likely Lads 1974 Christmas Special. It's my equivalent of midnight mass. I honestly don't think the banality, lo-fi competiveness and unspoken love of male conversation has ever been better captured. Sublime writing.

In short . UK is fucked AND more of a right royal fucking is coming this coming year  ... as more Brexit slowly, incrementally gets more "done"

In press parlance “comes after” and “following” mean that there is no actual connection between two events but the writer wants to strongly imply one

Do you fancy deleting this now that you know the review did not in fact advocate replacing theatre with graffiti?

One way that the 2019-2024 period has broken everyone’s brains is that everything gets refracted through “does this cut through?”/ “is this electorally salient?” - I mean, no kidding, local government reorganisation is not that sexy!

The way #BBCLauraK interviews Tory politicians v The way #BBCLauraK interviews Labour politicians

Former Conservative MP Paul Scully accidentally says the quiet bit out loud That if developers build houses too quickly, prices drop, and they make less profit

So after five months in office the editor of @thetimes.com is impatient for "delivery" of miracles by the Government. The very same Sunday Times which advocated Brexit and supported several iterations of palpably failing Tory administrations .... 🤦

Well this is awkward isn't it Kemi?

lost track of the number of journalists writing that farmers will get hit with IHT above a £1m threshold *for their entire estate* ignoring the reality that it’s £1m of land per person on top of existing IHT threshold of up to £1m (£3m max) feels like a major comms failure by government as well