I can remember when it was a scandal if the 18 weeks wait figure dropped below 95%. It was only about 10-12 years ago. The collapse in NHS performance under the last government was truly staggering, and went well beyond the pandemic.

The official investigation into the January 6 riots concluded Trump “summoned the mob, assembled the mob, and lit the flame of this attack" in an effort to halt the peaceful transfer of power. No billion dollar lawsuit can change reality. The BBC should call this convicted criminal’s bluff.

We’re trying to see if we can watch “Angel Falls Christmas” every year as part of a terrible new Christmas tradition…

Good God, someone's just uploaded to YouTube a nearly 2-hour long video of one of the original Vic Reeves Big Night Out live shows at the Albany Empire from 1989. www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKPU...

If you've ever needed a reason to rally behind the BBC then this is it.

Once every 20 years or so, the director-general of the BBC is forced to resign for being insufficiently rightwing. Alastair Milne in 1987. Greg Dyke in 2004. Tim Davie in 2025. The great irony is that the BBC was in all cases profoundly biased towards established power. But just not biased enough …

100% this - though please forgive me a mention of “Amateur”

New: Conde Nast fired four employees who were among a group that confronted the company's head of human resources on Wednesday over the decision to fold Teen Vogue into Vogue/recent cuts. Employees who were fired included journalists from the New Yorker, Wired, and Bon Appétit.

Will Klein in a "Rapinoe/Kaepernick 2020" shirt

1 episode to go …

So to Sunday, and off to the cinema for the final instalment in their screening of Twin Peaks S2. Fair play to them for doing this as a tribute to David Lynch - seeing episodes on a big screen has absolutely brought out their quality and I’m delighted to have had the chance to see them like this.

Donald Trump knocked down the White House East Wing without notice and before approvals —a developer move known as ‘anticipatory demolition,’ where you tear down a building before the preservationists can intervene. His dad did it too.

Watching the Brookside appearances in Hollyoaks this evening - it occurs to me that it just needs a Tapehead column in Saturday’s Guide to really cap it off.

Trying to imagine what the reaction would have been if the Govt had casually announced they were replacing A-levels with no details, as they have done with post-16 vocational qualifcations today. Probably not total indifference.

ICYMI Green Party membership numbers have now overtaken the Conservative Party's! 🎉 📈 125,000 members and counting.

good morning

Idlewild were immense last night- so good to seem them still so vital and up for it after 30 years as a band.

As I sit on a very busy and very hot late train back to Northampton, I fondly remember the days when trains had windows that passengers were alllowed to open to cool themselves down. Why can’t we do that any more ?

Sugar is back! New music at sugarcopperblue.com PLUS May 2026 live shows in NYC and London. All the info is here!

Sugar are back!!! First new song in over 30 years: youtu.be/-S72djtUIFk?... So far just 4 shows, May 2nd and 3rd in NYC at Webster Hall, May 23rd and 24th in London

An already bad bill just got a whole lot worse for wildlife. This dreadful government's attitude towards nature is contemptuous. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Can you believe it! The highest number of voters so far (a staggering 38) and including my vote for Culture Club, this ended up a tie at 19 votes each! So the fairest way to do this IS, the next vote in will decide it once and for all. Must be someone who hadn't voted already though.

Crowds at Royal Parks Half Marathon were amazing - however Parkrun has taught me to be super-polite to encouragement, so I thanked everybody who said “Go on Steve!” and I almost lost my voice.

We need your help. 💙 Salt is fighting to keep indie publishing alive — discovering new writers, nurturing voices that matter. Every pound helps us publish more books. Please donate or share today. #SupportIndie #KeepBooksAlive #Books #Writers #IndiePress

What’s that? Moonlighting is on the STV player? Back in a bit.

⏰ Don't miss @zackpolanski.bsky.social on BBC Question Time tonight. 💻 BBC iPlayer at 9pm 📺 BBC One at 10.40pm.

I’m running the Royal Parks Half Marathon this Sunday, raising funds for @mndassoc.bsky.social - if yr able to help by sponsoring, sharing, or just by crossing yr fingers, that would be brilliant thank you. www.justgiving.com/page/predata...

If you want to win over younger voters, telling them they can't go to university is probably not going to help.

Just watching this weeks episode of Mastermind - turns out there’s a new third way to pronounce “Nene” …

Hey! Lots more fun here now. Original versions of the title images from Cheers: UPDATED. open.substack.com/pub/joelmorr...

Got a text to say my Blood Transfusion appt this evening has had to be cancelled. I’m sure there’s a valid reason but it’s still annoying - feels like when you miss a Parkrun!

Superb reunion gig for Gene at the Hammersmith Apollo - hearing their songs belted out by a huge audience is just the tonic.

The Sunday the Miki Berenyi Trio make a welcome return to Esquires, with support from hotly tipped dream poppers Swallowtail. It's a 5pm start, so you won't be knackered for work the next day. Limited tickets still available from Seetickets. @mikiberenyi.bsky.social

I hear *someone* is having a sale next week. I guess they have to try and recoup some of that $2.5 billion they’re forking over for *checks notes* being deceptive? Who would’ve thought? Feels like Oct 7 & 8 will be prime days to support independent bookstores. 😌

What a fantastic window display created by Oxfam Books in Oundle to support my next event on 03/10 with the fab Antony Johnston. www.authorsinoundle.co.uk/aio-event/an... If you'd like to test your detective skills, come along, book in teams of up to 6 people, or just come along and join a team.

#80sTop30 Starts 1st October. Select your favourite thirty songs released in the 1980s. They don’t have to be ranked but you can rank them if you want to. Post one song per day throughout October.

Keir Starmer's aides are reportedly telling him not to go to the COP30 climate conference, because Reform would attack him for it. Yes, they might. And he should wear it as a badge of honour. Standing up for humanity, for science and a habitable planet. Where's the hazard in that?

This ought to be engraved somewhere.

Snakes! youtu.be/IAxqFo59TBs

Summer’s fading.

Off to see Twin Peaks at the cinema again - what a treat!

You know what, yeah, people have concerns. They're concerned about paying bills, renting or buying a house, buying food, getting an NHS appointment etc. None of that's down to migrants. If you attend a rally organised by Tommy Robinson, don't play the "legitimate concerns" card. You're a racist. 1/

Violent right wingers stormed the Capitol on live television and beat the shit out of cops to try to stop the peaceful transfer of power after Trump lost. The fuck is he on about

If I were the UK Government I would simply not route all my communications through the platform whose owner just called for regime change in Britain and said "fight back or die"

Almost like allowing private equity to take over the children's home market was a terrible idea. Someone should have written about that in a book.... samf.substack.com/p/contract-k...

Awesome time at the Filmhouse this afternoon watching the start of their Twin Peaks S2 showings - we won’t make every week but it was a treat to experience the first 2 episodes on a big screen.

What a loss. observer.co.uk/news/columni...

Further excellent reporting on Asif Aziz, the landlord who has been trying to evict the Prince Charles cinema, and lets out his properties to dodgy sweet shops and Harry Potter tat stores to fronts who pay no tax & disappear - in Edinburgh as well as the Capital open.substack.com/pub/londonce...

A little bit of perspective on Angela Rayner: www.theguardian.com/uk-news/arti...