Just wrote this for the @theguardian.com about the ongoing war between Reform and Restore and the increasing racialisation of our politics. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

In November 2023, police discovered the decayed corpse of Tracey Turnell in Walthamstow Market. She had no phone, job, passport, friends or lovers. There wasn’t a single photo of her. It was as if, in her far too public death, she entered the public record for the first time. Who was she?

The Home Office has today announced it will use AI to ‘clamp down on fake age claims at the border and increase removals’ In the same breath it admits this AI tool has an error margin of at least 2.5 years for teenagers, and higher rates of error for females + some ethnicities What could go wrong?

If I’m understanding the Home Office’s trial age assessment tech, it gets people’s ages wrong by an *average* of 2.5-3 years, is inaccurate for the most crucial cohort (teenagers) and is worse in assessing women/girls and non-white people (umm…) but they’re going for it anyway, because computer

Most European citizens will likely never have heard of VFS Global. But across much of Africa, Asia and the Middle East, the visa giant has become notorious An investigation coordinated by @lighthousereports.com has found that VFS has made huge profits by subjecting people to exploitative practices

And the Home Office provides virtually zero routes through which these nationalities can claim asylum in the UK without making the dangerous and illegal crossings that it so hates 🫠

Of course no one from *checks notes* Sudan or Afghanistan could be in genuine danger.

Interesting read www.theguardian.com/news/2026/ma...

The use of AI in asylum decision-making is likely unlawful. These tools rewrite interviews, choosing what to include and exclude. Without knowing this, asylum applicants can't be sure accurate information is used to inform decisions. 📺️ ORG's @sarahalsherif.bsky.social explains the legal opinion.

For all of the excitement in Westminster around the Danish model of social democracy the Danish Labour Party is heading for its worst election result since 1901. They’ll likely remain in power but the red bloc won’t have a majority. Meanwhile radical left and right parties gain.

Since Ofcom seems to have given up, we asked 20 experienced journalists from a range of backgrounds to watch multiple hours of @gbnewsonline.bsky.social . Their conclusion: the channel has, in effect, become Reform TV. How did it happen? www.thenewworld.co.uk/alan-rusbrid...

Meanwhile, refugee family reunion continues to be paused, the Afghan schemes have been shut, and only 537 people came through the UK's flagship resettlement scheme last year.

As the analysis starts of the Gorton and Denton result, I wanted to flag some aspects that my experience yesterday suggests are being over or under-played (Caveats - I went to Longsight, Gorton and Denton town centres and spoke to as many people as I could, but it was mostly during the working day)

Quite amazed at how the Today Programme just grilled Zack Polanski then had Reform’s chairman on immediately after and asked him zero difficult questions

Lobbyists for the Tony Blair Institute privately urged the EU to support and join Donald Trump’s Board of Peace, an initiative which started life as a council to oversee Gaza & sprawled since into a rival to the UN

It's not often we get to report on hopeful news Alaa Hamoudi won in the EU's top court against Frontex! This opens doors for many survivors of Frontex pushbacks. @bdeeb.bsky.social tells how he reported on Alaa's case back in 2020 with @bellingcat.com. And how this evidence ended up in court.

Pls read whole piece. Neither Mandelson or Mosley were asked about Mandelson’s role in fixing Starmer’s visit to Palantir & subsequent £240m deal. It finally made headlines on Weds when a q was asked in Parliament. But honestly, BBC also has qs to answer open.substack.com/pub/broligar...

I've been doing some reporting on conditions inside Brook House IRC. I'm keen to speak to anyone who's been held there or who has worked there. Please get in touch if you might be able to help. Story based on accounts of force used in a month last year: www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home...

Another absolute must-read on what looks a lot like the Oracleisation of the Tony Blair Institute

ICYMI: The Tony Blair Institute is building its own AI tools with the view of selling them to authoritarian govts, in what insiders describe as a bid to rival controversial US tech firm Palantir democracyforsale.substack.com/p/blair-bids... Note the wild response we got from TBI's press team ⬇️

🚨 Exclusive: Tony Blair isn’t just a big fan of AI — he's now trying to build and sell AI tools to governments Tony Blair Institute staff have described the plan as 'insane' and compared it to Palantir New by D4S and @lighthousereports.com 🧵 democracyforsale.substack.com/p/blair-bids...

Where have we got to when a European govt is telling Afghans who are at risk of being killed for work they did for said govt that they will not be brought to safety as promised because there’s “no longer any political interest” in helping them? Terrifying shift www.theguardian.com/world/2025/d...

🚨EMERGENCY AT THE UK-FRANCE BORDER 🚨 Today we are launching our new collaborative report reveals that people attempting to cross the UK-France border are subjected to horrifying levels of state violence. www.humansforrights.org/state-violence

NEW: French police will use nets to try to stop small boats crossing the Channel – despite warnings this could be deadly As UK pressure on France mounts, sources tell @lighthousereports.com and @lemonde.fr interceptions at sea will now take place, with nets www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/poli...

It will clearly make it harder for refugees to feel safe, to be able to secure employment, to try and fulfil their potential. At the same time it will be massive bureaucratic headache for the Home Office. On top of processing asylum claims, they'll need to review all the ones they done previously.

It’s actually mad that me and the far-right have exactly the same take. No notes.

Thought the plan was to smash the smuggling gangs not emulate them.

BBC News bulletins leading on the story of an Algerian man being mistakenly released by the prison service. Funnily enough I don't remember these cases ever leading the bulletins when an average of ten prisoners were mistakenly released a month in the final year of the last Government

"REVEALED: TERRIBLE REVENGE OF TALIBAN THAT SHAMES BRITAIN" Full Story: t.ly/lgf5h #Afghan Security Forces are still being hunted down. #TheIndependent #TomorrowsPapersToday #IBPAPERS @the-independent.com @hollybancroft.bsky.social @fahimabed.bsky.social @maybulman.bsky.social

It’s hard to believe that 4 years on from the fall of Kabul, Afghans who served with UK troops are still waiting to be relocated to safety Now a painstaking analysis by @lighthousereports.com and partners reveals the extent of the peril they're facing, with 110+ ex-security forces killed since 2023

Many of these “illustrations” aren’t based on verified intelligence at all. Our analysis of 43 official IDF videos found recycled 3D environments, spatial inaccuracies, and assets lifted from unrelated artists and institutions.

🔴 The global far-right is brainwashing a town near you Fascist memes are changing Britain, and the government is totally out of its depth.

The richest man on earth owns X. The second richest man on earth is about to be a major owner of TikTok. The third richest man owns Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. The fourth richest man owns The Washington Post. See the problem here?

The idea that being a refugee is somehow a “golden ticket” is genuinely awful. These are people who the government have recognised are in need of protection. Do they think people chose that? That that’s what people wanted? www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

Larry Ellison's £257m patronage has reshaped the Tony Blair Institute (TBI) into a well-funded engine of techno-solutionism. Our essay of the week tracks the symbiotic relationship between the TBI and Oracle. By @petergeoghegan.bsky.social & @maybulman.bsky.social buff.ly/rt5ONlT

Authoritarianism is on the rise globally. Join us at #Lab25 to understand this challenge & build a movement to resist. @labourlewis.bsky.social, @minnierahman.bsky.social, Shabna Begum, Amna Abdullatif, @maybulman.bsky.social (@lighthousereports.com) & @joemulhall.bsky.social (@hopenothate.org.uk).

Estimates of the size of the "shadow economy" France 7% Germany 7% Italy 8% ..even Estonia 7% UK: 5% Idea that ID cards are some kind of panacea... www.ey.com/content/dam/...

This. We have had ID cards in Italy since always and people can readily see how the shadow economy is doing there

The idea that digital ID cards will stop people working in the shadow economy and thus reduce small boat crossings is baffling The very nature of the shadow economy (the only way asylum seekers can find work) is employers don’t check documents.. That would obviously continue with ID cards

afaict the evidence base that digital ID will reduce the number of people migrating to the UK is "Macron says so". I hope he is duly flattered. Digital ID will be useful for many people, unusable for others, but fundamentally the issue here is with employers who don't do right to work checks

🔴 NEW: Larry Ellison’s £257m bet on Tony Blair Our investigation with @lighthousereports.com reveals how the Tony Blair Institute has been accused of pushing the interests of tech tycoon Ellison — Trump’s “CEO of everything” — and his company Oracle democracyforsale.substack.com/p/inside-the...

Great (read scary) investigation into the Tony Blair Institute, its relationship with a US tech billionaire & efforts to get NHS health data opened up for AI I also had no idea TBI was so big: 900 staff! HT @petergeoghegan.bsky.social @maybulman.bsky.social www.newstatesman.com/politics/202...

Glad to have got this over the line How Tony Blair is lobbying on behalf of Big Tech His Institute (TBI) is pushing AI solutionism on Starmer’s govt, which is embracing it w open arms, as TBI donor & tech billionaire Larry Ellison is set to reap the benefits www.newstatesman.com/politics/202...

Let's get some facts right. There is absolutely no evidence that migrants "abuse" the NRM. Want to know how many bad faith applications were made in the last quarter? 1, according to the government's own data. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

NEW: French police have caused the deaths of dozens of people by intercepting small boats at sea These violent tactics are deployed now off the French overseas island of Mayotte Under pressure from the UK, France now plans to start intercepting boats in the Channel This is where that could lead ⬇️

Pendant un an, avec @lemonde.fr @spiegel.de @thetimes.com @artefr.bsky.social, nous avons enquêté à Mayotte sur la manière dont la police arrête les #kwassas, ces petits bateaux qui tentent de rejoindre l’île Nous révélons l'utilisation de tactiques dont les conséquences peuvent être mortelles 🧵

NEW: French police have caused the deaths of dozens of people by intercepting small boats at sea These violent tactics are deployed now off the French overseas island of Mayotte Under pressure from the UK, France now plans to start intercepting boats in the Channel This is where that could lead ⬇️

REVEALED: French police have caused dozens of drownings by violently intercepting small boats trying to reach overseas territory Mayotte. Similar tactics are being proposed for the Channel, to try to stop people from reaching the UK.

Today, 100s of families are still searching for answers about their missing children. Our 9 month investigation, interviewing over 100 witnesses, survivors, and staff, and gathering official documents to reveal how Syria’s children were stolen and how international silence enabled this tragedy.