If anyone has any sense of the history of why the Act of Union happened they should be very, very unfuckingcomfortable with this turn of events.

Have written for the New Statesman about why, if he will not accept an apology, the BBC should welcome a Trump lawsuit. They should show guts and fight it because impartially matters and if they don't, they will have tacitly accepted a rewritten history. www.newstatesman.com/politics/med...

Buried news of the day IMO "Government vows to phase out animal tests as alternative methods come on stream with new strategy welcomed as ‘ambitious’ and ‘timely’ by animal welfare & life sciences organisations." Plus new £75 million funding to bring forward new testing methods for health products

You probably think taking quotes of social media is the same as reading a speech in its entirety

Important to be clear here that the proposed homes wouldn't mean demolishing the 18th century garden - it's just that they might possibly be visible from it. What appallingly selfish behaviour.

Your daily reminder….. what a concept!

Polanski is being disingenuous. The white poppy is sold by the Peace Pledge Union, a strictly pacifist group. Pacifism is opposed to the existence of armed forces, and thus Green Party defence policy.

Andrew Lownie wrote an explosive book about Prince Andrew Then came the backlash. Legal threats. Journalists were told they’d lose Palace access if they spoke to him Anonymous social media accounts accused Lownie of visiting sex workers. This is how ‘the Firm’ works youtu.be/OJHaVsDVv-c?...

Going down a rabbit hole of mistaken prison releases. They've definitely got up recently, but between 40 and 115 offenders were incorrectly released *every year* from 2011 to 2024 (so over 800 while the Tories were in government). It just doesn't normally make the news news.sky.com/story/how-ma...

EU rejoin is a *current* Lib Dem policy and one that we ran on in 2024. Simply announcing it isn't an option for the UK. We don't get to tell the EU that we're rejoining without years of prior steps. It will need a careful pathway, such as the one set out below, to make it a reality.

What an absolute hero Samir Zitouni is - doubtless he saved lives that day www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Amid all the horror of the attack on Saturday we see the very, very best of human beings. The passengers who helped each other, the heroic train worker who put himself in harms way and undoubtedly saved lives. www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/c9...

"In the build up to the 2026 election we need to see all parties commit to full transparency about the scale of pollution in Scotland" theferret.scot/scott...

Nigel Farage says this summer’s Raise the Colours movement was led by ‘ordinary people’ expressing their patriotism. Our reporters in five cities had a look and that’s not what we found.

Isn’t it time for him to face justice?

Having posts prioritised by algorithm is what they do on twitter and Facebook and is one of the reasons we left. If you foist it on us here, it will not be popular.

Amid all the fuss, remember that for much of the 1960s and 1970s, "the Spare" Andrew Windsor was just one unfortunate incident away from being the next king. Hopefully, this appalling saga will lead to a proper national debate on our hereditary monarchy. Long, long overdue.

On #WorldDayForAnimalsInLaboratories, please take action with rescued laboratory dog Betsy and @mrrickygervais.bsky.social. Ask your MP to sign Parliament #EDM187, for a science hearing to stop the false claims about human medicine which fund cruel animal tests: forlifeonearth.eaction.online #Dogs

'it ended up a really good deal for developers and less of a good deal for the taxpayer, and more broadly, for the Scottish economy, Scottish businesses, Scottish workers' www.heraldscotland.com/news... @vickyallan.bsky.social

Hats off and solidarity to @danneidle.bsky.social who is facing an enormous libel claim - arguably a SLAPP - for his investigation into a tax avoidance (& potentially criminal evasion) scheme. He's published the court filings, an important move given how much of this usually happens in darkness:

This is classic Farage, all grievance and no graft. He’d rather play the victim instead of doing his job.

My takeaways from Virginia Guiffre’s new book on the sexual abuse she says she suffered at the hands of Epstein, Maxwell, & Prince Andrew (which he denies)

And sure, we can all disagree. But let's at least have the conversation and end all the fawning in the media. If Andrew Windsor's example serves ANY purpose, it should at least demonstrate why the veil of secrecy and entitlement afforded to this one family purely by dint of birth is not OK.

Broadcast engineer here. When I bought my TV a couple of years ago, I could see a huge difference in the picture between a £400 telly and the £800 one I bought. But if you can’t, get the cheap one! £4k TVs are for the same people as £50 gold HDMI cables though, and those do not make a difference.

Think we’ve crossed a pretty major threshold – and a very bad one – if a journalist working in the lobby for a major newspaper group can tweet like this without professional consequences.

I think it is important to police a legitimate football match, being tough on anti-Arab or antisemitic racism and violence, and police legitimate political protests, being tough on racism & violence. There is a massive downside to giving up & giving narratives about no go zones rocket fuel

What a day for Bluesky, the timing of the arrival of The White House account and other departments is interesting, and no doubt Trump will arrive here soon too. A lot of people are blocking accounts that "follow" the new accounts, but I'd advise against that. Following does not equal endorsement.

I grew up without internet or mobiles, & looking back, both undeniably offer good & bad. As inventions establish themselves in our lives & minds, each becomes apparent, & they continue to evolve with good & bad actors. The only constant: cat videos. 😁 #GoodMorning, everyone

I wrote a lovely poem about the good old days, to go with the nice pink one off Facebook that's quoted below.

Final Destination had nothing on British public information films.

Farage is right to be pleased with 5 year sentence for the man who made a threat to kill him on social media. Makes Lucy Connolly's sentence look leniant by comparison, you know the woman he welcomed on to the Reform UK conference stage and given a standing ovation by the membership.

Glad to see this analysis of the SNP currency plans in @scotnational.bsky.social newsletter from last night: "Upon independence, Scotland is expected to continue losing around 8% to 10% of its GDP [...] this means that the Scottish private sector must shrink by between 5% to 7% each year."

The new trailer for THE RUNNING MAN is up. My IT guy will post it. I don't "get" posting on Bluesky. That's okay. I've seen the movie, and it's a balls-to-the-wall thrill ride. The feel is like a modern-day DIE HARD.

Now boasting about giving "Bibi" all the "best weapons" the US had .... and gets a standing ovation. That's a standing ovation for the murder of tens of thousands of innocent people and Gaza reduced to rubble and a living hell.

I'm not sure McEleny would settle for less than a Kim Il-sung style statue of Salmond outside Holyrood. It's not like Salmond didn't play a disruptive, if not destructive, role in SNP politics after his defeat in 2017. It's understandable that the current leadership didn't want to dwell on that.

Only months ago, Refuk were stuffing Derbyshire letterboxes slagging off the council boss’s pay as a “waste of money,” even comparing it to the PM’s. Now they’re in power, they’ve upped it to £181k + £20k bonus. Classic Farage lies, all talk before the vote, total sellout after.

Easy for you to say in a social media message Martin. A darn sight harder to deliver. Unfortunately we have been conditioned to false promises of quick fixes and there's no such thing.

A rare photo of when Vladimir Putin worked as an informant for Starsky and Hutch.

"I want to see an independent Scotland in the EU with no austerity" is like saying "I want to end poverty at no cost to anyone". There's obviously an admirable aim in there but *it can't be done* and that fact completely trumps anything admirable about the sentiment. When will we stop pandering?

Yes, yes I know I keep banging on about my fucking book! However, if you want one repost this and I’ll do a random winner pick thing by the end of the week because I’m great like that. ♥️📚 #amindofmyown

While the Internet has had an impact, the main cause of the death of high streets is the out-of-town retail park. Any council which gave planning permission to a retail park only has themselves to blame for the destruction of their city centre.

And he’s back!! Sunday isn’t Sunday without Stewart Lee. We were so thrilled at @thenerve.news that Stewart came with us. His satirical columns for the Observer were some of our most-read content: funny, surreal, angry true. Essential weekend reading. www.thenerve.news/p/stewart-le...

Big credit to @andrewlearmonth.bsky.social and the @heraldscotland.bsky.social for choosing to do their own version of this thread (this time regarding the Autumn Budget Revision) as the splash in today’s paper. Imagine a world where budget papers made it clear how taxpayers’ money is being spent.

Teddy Bear Cookie 🏆

1/ According to the latest Scottish Income Tax Outturn Statistics, intermediate + higher + top rate taxpayers were 57% of all taxpayers in Scotland in 2023-24. These bands all pay tax at rates higher than the rUK equivalents. Source: www.gov.uk/government/s...

NEW ACTION: Today on #WorldFarmAnimalDay, please speak up for hens! Ask your MP to attend our #EndTheCageAge Parliamentary reception in November. If you use our online action, it takes less than two minutes ➡️ bit.ly/3Kvh2pS