Labour now falling so deep into the anti-immigration hole that they're telling bare-faced lies we'd sooner associate with Reform or the Tories.

The Home Secretary says "we have become the destination of choice in Europe, clearly visible to every people smuggler and would-be illegal migrant across the world" That is a factually untrue claim: the Home Office shows that the UK is fifth, getting 1/10 claims, while Germany gets 1/5 claims

In case you writers out there have ever felt imposter syndrome, "From his mouth the bullet theoretical launched the bullet possible" is an actual sentence in whatever this is.

Wow, much unity

...has anyone considered that the worm is in *Nuzzi's* brain?

It's no time for political infighting. The stakes are too high. The UK Government must deliver for working people and fast. @rozfoyer.bsky.social / @heraldscotland.bsky.social

Do you think the government was right or wrong to decide not to raise income tax at the Budget? Right: 58% Wrong: 21% yougov.co.uk/topics/polit...

I think the conventional wisdom that switching to PR, even explicitly to block Reform, would delegitimise the system is completely wrong. You would get buy-in from every other party, bar maybe the Tories, and it's historically the main reason electoral reform happens. www.jstor.org/stable/2585577

Tice is a complete and utter ghoul.

I think you can get the measure of the deadness of someone's soul from the fact they kick up a stink about [checks notes] autistic kids wearing ear defenders

Been busy looking at YouGov's new data on likelihood to consider voting for each party at the upcoming ScotParl elections, but this is also troubling for Labour. Their best issue is the NHS, but trail the SNP. Their average score is 7.3% across the 12 issues, v. the SNP's 17.4% and Reform's 8.8%.

The overall mean likelihood of considering voting for each party results in similar rankings to the net scores, but means among the 'likely to consider' and 'unlikely to consider' groups are interesting. SNP support doesn't look particularly soft, and Reform are (predictably) the most polarising.

Learning lessons from the successful suppression of that obscure promoter of witchcraft, Harry Potter.

Amazing

THEY DID WHAT

Good Afternoon, “Your Party” was a six month sociological study conducted by Royal Holloway, University of London. We are now complete with our study. Thank you for your time.

The overall mean likelihood of considering voting for each party results in similar rankings to the net scores, but means among the 'likely to consider' and 'unlikely to consider' groups are interesting. SNP support doesn't look particularly soft, and Reform are (predictably) the most polarising.

Slightly difficult to read this without either it broken down by constituency and list vote, or as a matrix so we can see e.g. who is considering voting SNP who is also considerinin the Greens. But, what I do thinkk we can take away is that the SNP are polling near their ceiling (1/2)

🧵 / With less than six months until the Scottish Parliament election, the SNP are the party Scots are most likely to consider voting for SNP: 37% would consider Greens: 27% Lib Dems: 26% Labour: 23% Reform UK: 21% Conservatives: 15% 'Your Party': 15% Alba: 8% yougov.co.uk/politics/art...

The problem being that Burry - as with so many others - might be ultimately right but wrong on the timescales. Again.

The vein of contrarianism on here is a bit absurd. We all know that an increase in income tax/NI/VAT was going to be necessary and would inevitably be unpopular, doubly so if govt promises not to do so, and pretending that that promise wasn't central to the election campaign doesn't change that.

With trust in politics and satisfaction with government already at rock bottom, Labour breaking its standout election pledge wouldn't just undermine trust, but likely animate the significant political anger we're starting to see on the political fringes. My latest for @heraldscotland.bsky.social

I understand the pushback on this, but the tax promises were hammered home by Labour and undermined by the Tories repeatedly, so they were covered as a central plank of the campaign, and the folk memory of the campaign has that promise at its centre. Breaking them would be breaking a key promise.

A lot of the commentary on this Ipsos work on nostalgia, which found that e.g. 63% of Brits think 1975 was a happier time, is tut-tutting about people's lack of historical memory/literacy, as if this is a history exam. It's not, it's a reflection of how shit people think life is *right now*.

By "the left" Goodwin could more accurately say that it is "84-95% of the white British" who reject Goodwin's drift into ethnonationalism

NEW Policy Insights: Next steps for city-region policy in Scotland 💡📝 Where does policy need to go next and what opportunities are there to strengthen regional working? @davidwglasgow.bsky.social @graemeroy.bsky.social @stuartgmcintyre.bsky.social, Niall MacKenzie 🔗 www.gla.ac.uk/research/az/...

My column in today’s FT: a government with no real vision is reverting to its comfort zone of launching campaigns and drawing dividing lines - against Wes Streeting, on tax. Meanwhile in the real world its position keeps getting worse:

I understand the pushback on this, but the tax promises were hammered home by Labour and undermined by the Tories repeatedly, so they were covered as a central plank of the campaign, and the folk memory of the campaign has that promise at its centre. Breaking them would be breaking a key promise.

Two things seem to be true this morning - 1/ That the politics of breaking the manifesto pledge was too difficult 2/ Reeves has received much more optimistic forecasts, likely to he wage growth and inflation related The combination means they can reverse their plans

With trust in politics and satisfaction with government already at rock bottom, Labour breaking its standout election pledge wouldn't just undermine trust, but likely animate the significant political anger we're starting to see on the political fringes. My latest for @heraldscotland.bsky.social

*UK Government Does A Thing* *It hurt itself in its confusion*

Really easy to view this through the prism of Labour leadership manoeuvring, and it may be right to do so. But bodies articulating the voices of patients and their families have value, and there's a good argument against cutting them.

Although Scotland just got the same credit rating as the UK, there will inevitably be some kind of premium on kilts over gilts (even if small) Scotland is a fiscally constrained devolved government, whereas the UK is the sovereign entity backed by the BoE

I get the politics of issuing Scottish bonds, but not convinced by the economics Issuing ‘kilts’ will not unlock any new funding, but it may well make borrowing more expensive In other words: it could mean less investment, not more 🧵 www.heraldscotland.com/news/2561868...

Oh god I forgot they nicknamed their bond, 'kilts'. Revenge of the Cringe.

Something absolutely perfect about Larry Summers riffing about the scourge of woke cancel culture being unfair to predatory men in a friendly email to his pal JEFFREY EPSTEIN.

I have to warn you all, right now I'm hearing ancestral voices prophesying killing a woolly mammoth, and in lieu of that possibility who knows what might happen?

“They heard ancestral voices” WTAF

This is so besides the point, but...what is the deal with Epstein's punctuation? All his emails have deranged punctuation like this.

toy company CEOs: "at long last, we have created the Sinister Talking Doll Factory from the acclaimed movie 'Don't Create the Sinister Talking Doll Factory'" futurism.com/artificial-i...

Time for Chaos With Ed Miliband

At what point does the cost-benefit calculation of lobby journalists who received those briefings against Ministers from No10 flip from keeping stum, for access, to just accusing No10 of lying for the content and buzz?

I can't imagine how bizarre it must feel to have your career prospects almost entirely in the hands of such a dysfunctional operation into which you have very little input.

NEW: Anas Sarwar has said he "absolutely" has confidence in Keir Starmer, and describes briefings against him and other ministers as "deeply unhelpful".

The sheer number of political and business leaders who kept up correspondence with Epstein well into the 2010s is mind-boggling. How is your instinctive and final response not "you're the world's most famous paedophile and I can't be seen within a hundred miles of you even if I wanted to be"?

Being interested in a policy area is a conflict of interest if you're responsible for that policy area.

I've now seen everything from allegations that No 10 insiders are secretely conducting a 4D move to get Wes into No 10 to actuall, No 10 insiders have pivoted to attacking women in the Cabinet to Wes because he's openly gay. How about this: they're behaving like political morons because they are?