One of the Conservative party's contributions to our country has been keeping people who think you can measure integration through skin colour out of office - what next, are they only going to be lukewarm on the property-owning democracy?

"while we were arguing about what a woman is, china was building five nuclear reactors" Yes but that is very explicitly your fault, more than most, kemi. She's such a strange perception of herself

"We used to ring up our GP and get an appointment on the same day," says Kemi Badenoch. She does not add: we're all looking for the guy who did this!

Keir Starmer's luck is up again.

This is my basic theory for a lot of what is going on with the centre right atm The ideas failed utterly and now there is a total crisis of intellectual confidence

It nags at me that people are dancing around the fact that one reason centre-right think-tanks are in an intellectual crisis moment is because we've spent over a decade where lots of their ideas were tried out and didn't pan out as advertised.

Must be a short speech if Kemi is laying out the "successes of the last 14 years".

Whereas stealing artists’ work is killing their industry, so…

Jenrick being the loudest member of the Conservative party has already been a huge contributor to the poisoning of our politics. We really don't need any four-dimensional chess about him becoming leader. When it happens, it will be a terrible day for our country.

So are we meant to just be ok with the Conservative Party now seemingly believing people who don’t have white faces can’t possibly be British and haven’t integrated? We used to call this something but I’m assuming if we were to say that we’d all be problematic wokeists?…

“It’s not about the colour of someone’s skin.” — Robert Jenrick after yet again bringing up the colour of people's skin

Incredibly fun day with Williams Racing 🏁

Routledge was much more than just Mrs Bucket, of course. A fantastic singer and actor and by all accounts one of the nicest figures in the industry. Just a real class act.

Someone who cut across so many generations. Very sad news, but an incredible life and legacy.

This album next week is gonna be one of the best of the year without a doubt. Latest single another absolute masterpiece. #newmusicfriday music.apple.com/gb/album/suc...

Sarah Mullally is named as first female archbishop of Canterbury

Thank you to the GMP officers who, it seems, prevented the terrorist hurting anyone else. And thank you to the CST volunteers who protect British Jews every day. For those doing so, wishing them an easy fast.

Fucking hell - awful. On top of a serious racial assault in Bristol last night as well. Feels like things are very much spinning out: we need to take this shit on in every way.

Love The Rest is Entertainment talking about the back story of their theme tune. Just wish the show was called That’s Entertainment.

A great reminder of the bubble.

The right are allowed to say whatever they want; the left is not. That’s the new argument. Only the left incites, the dehumanising language used against everyone else is fine. We can’t duck from this absolutely ridiculous double standard.

The biggest danger is that it took so long to get here (here being a vague agenda, argument and confidence). Conference a nice moment to regroup. Can they continue this with the speed of government and actually get a grip on the narrative and comms?....

This is true. But it makes the contrast between this new rhetoric and the actual reality of the government's approach even starker.

"Economic growth is our central mission" - ok, then why isn't that everywhere at the conference. Like, Growing The Economy to Renew Britain' would actually give distinctive clarity....

Good thread, this. (Tho IE hits on the answer in the replies: what Labour think the immigration system for is getting people to shut up and stop talking about immigration)

Really good piece this from @stephenkb.bsky.social. Hilariously brutal on the “What did we learn on our summer holidays?”memo. "The title sounds like it was written by an eight-year-old, which would surely have been preferable to the actual content."

God I love a good Jenrick take-down piece.

With Congress at an impasse over federal spending, Republicans have emerged with a new and misleading talking point: Democrats are shutting down the government to fund free health care for unauthorized immigrants.

This is what I mean when I say govt comms needs to *be different* in practice. On Day 1 this government needed to exemplify the change it talked about. It's failed so far in that task, which is why nobody sees it as different. It's the same old same old. This is so good from @jamesomalley.co.uk

After Anthony Albanese appeared alongside Keir Starmer in Liverpool yesterday, re-posting one of my @prospectmagazine.co.uk pieces comparing the two. They’re remarkably similar—except that one regained electoral ground, while the other is still losing it. www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/world/asia/a...

One of the biggest issues is the slowness of it all. When you come in as the change government, you actually have to embody that change not just do things as normal. I can’t believe a year in they’re still trapped in the status quo of the lectern.

Someone in the Labour top brass is obsessed with set-piece events. Using Conference to attempt a jarring change of tone in comms, as if no one will have noticed the last fortnight...

Burnham not backing down: “I've launched a debate on our direction because I think we need it at this moment, because I want this government to be a success… “I think we need to go further, and we do need to have a debate about our direction, and and I, for one, won't be shying away from that.”

sir, thank you for the memories. they will endure.

‘Renew Britain’ is a pretty pathetic slogan for a party in government, a year in. At the very least renewing would be better. Why so damn passive? Sums everything up.

You don’t say gizmodo.com/cracker-barr...

Ok so I started Hostage on the plane but like wtf was that early twist with the President and her step son. Did they run out of ideas that quickly?!

🚨 BREAKING: The former leader of Reform UK in Wales, Nathan Gill, has pleaded guilty to #bribery, admitting he received corrupt payments as a Brexit Party MEP in exchange for making statements in the European Parliament to promote Russia’s interests in #Ukraine.

Yes.

Good @robertshrimsley.bsky.social piece. And agree v much with this bit in particular. www.ft.com/content/e895...

EXC from @pippacrerar.bsky.social - Keir Starmer’s head of communications Steph Driver, has announced she is leaving, the latest in a series who have left No 10 in recent months. Driver had been with Starmer for many years in opposition and was one of his closest and most trusted advisors.

Ash Sarkar saying "there was going to be a display of unity ahead of launching the membership portal" is genuinely hilarious. What a totally, predictable, shit show.

that canal street gay who has become a wannabe oswald mosley is actually insaneeee

Oh so his relationship with Putin *can’t* stop the war after all. Almost like it wasn’t Joe Biden’s fault. And also the US apparently shouldn’t have pulled out of Afghanistan - despite it being Trump’s own deal to leave. Who’d have thought.

😵‍💫

like in a fun quirky way or

He’s now talking about how bad the UN building is because they didn’t engage Trump to build it …

To paraphrase George W. Bush, this is some weird shit

Excited to hear that you can cure autism by buying Trumpcoin

From the man who brought us intravenous bleach as a Covid cure…