Today’s labour market statistics show that the labour market is weakening on multiple fronts, with unemployment reaching 5 per cent for the first time in almost a decade (pandemic period aside). Here’s our @resolutionfoundation.org thread, from @nyecominetti.bsky.social and me.

Evan Davis with quite the example of current UK Establishment delusion.

“lol, as if” as the kids used to say

One of the long term problems with commentary about the BBC is most print journalists uncritically soaked up their employer’s beliefs that the BBC needs to be shrunk.

A reminder here of mainstream predictions: www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/sites/defaul...

Ethiopia last year banned the import of new gasoline-powered cars. Nepal reduced import duties on EVs so much that they are now cheaper than cars with internal combustion engines. Brazil raised tariffs on car imports to compel Chinese automakers to set up plants inside Brazil. Etc

Prediction: The true unit of local government is going to end up being river catchment areas @celestialweasel.bsky.social @oldtrotter.bsky.social

Stumbled upon this screenshot I took like 2 years ago. Did anyone ever go to see this? Are there reviews?

I fear we are seeing in the UK what has become abundantly clear in the US: for all their power and privilege, elites and institutions are absolute cowards in the face of right-wing authoritarianism. Weak, weak, weak, as Tony Blair once said

New version of Tinker, Tailor dropped, only Robbie Gibb is the mole in the BBC, everyone knows it and carries on regardless?

Can’t say I’m looking forward to Robbie Gibb getting veto approval over every Doctor Who script.

Interestingly this appears to be part of a push to get Paul Dacre in as DG

Clearly, the only responsible thing the government can do is remove Robbie Gibb from the BBC.

Long shot, but does anyone know anyone in Leeds/ W. Yorks more generally who could fix an old hifi amp for me? DMs open....

Stealing an articulation from Dustin Moskovitz, but Labour's over-usage of polls/focus groups is a great example of Goodhart's Law in action.

Some kind of irony is that Labour finally recognise the electoral threat of the Greens and instead of seeing it as an outcome of trying to cosplay being Reform, double down on themselves as the party of sustainable racism, misery and spite.

@whenisbirths.bsky.social weird question for the pop music expert, but why does "Welcome to the Jungle" sound a little slow and not full of sound? What has the evolution of pop music since done to my brain?

And now, 37 seconds of Tusk, @whenisbirths.bsky.social

I'd forgotten that Relax was built on the riff from Dire Straits' Why Worry @whenisbirths.bsky.social #totp

Reminded by a mutual that one way to think about this is just to watch the UK TV comedies that my cousins grew up with. If this is part of your formative years, is it any wonder you end up drifting towards Farage?

This was always going to happen - and it's worth making a note of how many financial and economics commentators will go along with it.

This is why the "Reform support will decline as people see what they do in local government" idea was always misguided. Local government was already failing (due to central gov't policy choices.)

For me, any article that wants to explore the topic of politics - particularly within towns, villages or more rural locations - in an authentic and thorough way - cannot afford to ignore the role of the internet in these places.

To be clearer - you don't have a consensus because some ASI guy signed up to your manifesto, you have a consensus when Tufton St is prepared to go out to bat for your manifesto.

What if none of the policy experts had put any effort at all into influencing the key opposition parties supported by the majority of the press?

Obviously easier in Aus climate, but a great reminder that UK economists helped create our current inflation crisis by declaring that investing in renewables was too much of a long term response to the energy price spike from the invasion of Ukraine.

🚨 BREAKING: The government has tabled their plan to restrict repeat protests. Demonstrations could now banned based on the 'cumulative disruption' that previous protests have caused in the area - regardless of if they have been organised by the same people or not. This is worse than we feared.

One for @foundationsofthedigitalstate.com

cc @zatapatique.bsky.social

Small reminder of the voters Starmer wants to pander to.

We had a go on this merry go round where the advisor is desperate to be hailed as a genius (DCummings) - it appears no lessons were learned.

As people are talking about NY, time to mention my and @indy.bsky.social 's idea for a mariachi themed Cornershop cover band, Bodega

This is the one, the quote for the banners I reckon

In theory the advantage of the British political system is the government doesn't need a charismatic leader to take on Farage, a charismatic Cabinet member could do the job.

Very much in the spirit of the post-2010 - "the facts don't matter, only the feelings of right-wingers"

This won’t be the big thing everyone’s talking about today, but shows how little ministers believe in empowering English local government. Ministers decide where funding goes and MPs want a say in how it’s spent. Local government as delivery agents rather than instruments of local democracy.

I keep seeing supposedly progressive podcasts saying “the problem is that people feel like they just can’t talk about these issues” while these issues are frequently the *only* thing that people are talking about 😩

So this kind of normalisation is actually really bad and the fact that people can’t see it illustrates why we’re on the slide towards a very bad place (at least for those of us who aren’t white, ironically including Sarwar).

This seems like a suboptimal development.

Anyone know more about this petition? www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Can anyone recommend contemporary French tech historians who are accessible in English? Looking at the last 40-50 years of computing in France.

Academics in Assyria in the 7th c BC complain that admin is preventing them from doing research and teaching

The grim bit of course is that Goodwin’s entire project is to crash the economy to soothe the anxiety of the people he classifies as important.

Within 10 years the same people who have spent years making this country as unappealing as possible for people to come to will be bloviating about how it's all the left's fault and the left should be urgently doing more to get people to come here

Anyone who follows @majnouna.com knows she is a phenomenal artist and scholar at the cutting edge of experimental archaeology. This book holds illustrated guides to all the medieval ink recipes she's managed to recreate. I really want a copy, so please support her kickstarter to print a new edition!

This is why pushback matters. When forced to actually defend racism they get into a muddle. (See also Tory ILR plans).

This feels like the kind of thing you could track back to work out more about the info diet of the president.

Today I Learned