Thanks for following - very best Xmas wishes from here in Durham City.

‘Reform UK isn’t undermined by bad apples, it’s actively harvesting them’…more brilliant writing from @bearlypolitics.co.uk… open.substack.com/pub/iratusur...

Land of Free Speech bans people it disagrees with…hypocrisy without limits in Trump’s America… www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

Winter Fuel Allowance, disability benefits, now this…why is policy-making so flawed in Number 10? www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Top diva Cher has a little word with Trump’s Press Secretary - wonderful!

Too timid by half but still a force for good? Polly Toynbee weighs up HM Government’s record. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Wise words from Neil Kinnock here - worth ten minutes of your day. open.substack.com/pub/alanrusb...

Ditch the red lines Keir!! www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

There’s a spectre at the Xmas feast.

The damage wreaked by Thatcher is incalculable. Here’s one of the worst examples 👇

Today Venezuela. Tomorrow Greenland. Trump thinks he’s entitled to do whatever the hell he wants…

Underfunded, kicked into the long grass, a care market devoid of strategy and oversight. Social care is a forty year political failure. Shameful neglect.

Maybe not, but it would be good for the country and put him on the right side of history.

This bandwagon is gathering real momentum - and not before time. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Can’t grumble at that - well played lads. Sitting 5th in the Premiership at Xmas 👏👏👏

Very good, whoever came up with this 👏👏👏

The EU Referendum was a maelstrom of misinformation. Why is it excluded from the review of foreign interference in our elections? As ever @bylinetimes.bsky.social asks the right questions… bylinetimes.com/2025/12/19/r...

How many ‘rotten apples’ does it take until we realise the entire barrel is the problem? www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Quelle Surprise! Trump disappears behind a redacted black wall… www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

This verdict on Starmer by @iandunt.bsky.social rings true. He would, for example, be an excellent Foreign Secretary or Home Secretary…

Reform in Durham - a voter speaks (no, it’s not me).

An obscure (and short-lived) 60s nightclub in Sunderland. Still amazed at how they got these acts booked. Those were the days!

‘Brexit Betrayal’ bleats the Telegraph. Gibraltar voted overwhelmingly to stay in the EU - Brexit itself was their betrayal.

‘When did we lose the art of nuance and reasonable discussion?’ - @alanrusbridger.bsky.social tries to answer one of the most pressing questions of our times… open.substack.com/pub/alanrusb...

Trump is dishonest and unreliable. Who’d have thought!? www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Everything is a cost to these rags, nothing ever brings benefits. What a miserable, insular little world they want us to inhabit.

Defeat for a Labour ally; victory for a Starmer critic. And all on a 7% turnout… labourlist.org/2025/12/andr...

Is Starmer’s timidity over Brexit damaging his survival chances? His biographer @tombaldwin66.bsky.social reckons so… www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Staggeringly bad for Labour if true!

Reform’s review of SEND provision is going off half-cocked isn’t it?

The Telegraph reckons the public ‘understands the NHS will have to go’…no, I don’t think so!

The FT reports important news. The Mail rants and postures.

A welcome move but *not* including interference in Brexit referendum. Why not? www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Good news - well done Nick Thomas-Symonds. But it’s hard not to be reminded of the stupidity of leaving in the first place isn’t it? www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Taking Back Control…Trump is exposing the emptiness of that for Little Brexit Britain. Great blog as ever by @bearlypolitics.co.uk. open.substack.com/pub/iratusur...

Could Trump’s authoritarian populism happen here? Yes, frighteningly easily says @alanrusbridger.bsky.social. Read and worry! open.substack.com/pub/alanrusb...

330,000 migrants to be ‘expelled with only the clothes on their backs’…another Trump-style charmer wins power… www.theguardian.com/world/2025/d...

‘It’s the way I tell ‘em…’

Put out the flags! We’ve replicated a deal we already had as an EU member… www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

He’s not a friend. He’s not an ally. He can never be relied on. And he’s despicable.

How much longer are we supposed to say ‘Oh it’s just Trump being Trump’? Is he to go to his grave without challenge? www.newsweek.com/trump-rob-re...

This dude lacks the requisite qualities to join the human race… news.sky.com/story/donald...

389 mass shootings this year alone in the US. Meanwhile Trump claims violent crime in London is out of control… www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

In praise of bureaucracy! We need to hear this case more often. www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

The spectre at the feast…

It doesn’t get much better than this does it? 😀

A hostile right-wing media, fake social media videos - Labour gets so little credit for what it has achieved.

No political message here…no siree!

Very emotional day in prospect at Stadium of Light 😢

The consequences of Osborne’s unnecessary austerity will be playing out for decades. Why is he now treated as an elder statesman? www.mirror.co.uk/news/politic...