Beyond boring to keep being told by EU citizens how happy we’d all be if we just accepted our destiny and embraced the 🇪🇺. Constantly telling people they’d be happier if they thought differently is not quite the persuasive sales pitch some seem to think it is.

Women messing with men's heads du jour #4 (I think): triumphant Judith with head of Holofernes, painted by Louis Finson. It's his day.

A lot of talk about joining the 💶 the last few days and all I can say is pro join are on a hiding to nowhere on this issue. The arguments for are lamentable, and the more I read the replies the more I’m convinced 🇬🇧 is never going back. This discussion is dead before it’s even began.

Having read most of the replies in this 🧵 a few days later again, it’s clear to see that the people on this site at least (pro rejoin/FBPE) don’t get it. All lazy arguments about digitisation, young people not caring, nostalgia for empire. Pro join in for an absolute hiding when they bring this up

*Walks into the kitchen for a glass of water* *Returns with a bowl of ice cream*

Two years of tax rises have done nothing to solve Britain's budget deficit. With public sector borrowing hitting £24 billion in April alone, historical analysis shows that raising taxes is no substitute for fiscal responsibility. Full piece below: ⬇️ www.edrith.co.uk/p/does-incre...

I’ll take this post here than gum up a thread. Saying “other countries do it” doesn’t actually engage with whether it is economically or politically suitable for 🇬🇧 context. It just assumes convergence is inherently desirable and resistance must therefore be irrational or exceptionalist.

When the conversation actually gets going in the coming months, it’ll be dead before it begins because the reality is these are very different terms to 2016. I do not foresee 🇬🇧 ever joining the EU again as a full member given the public dislike of 💶, Schengen and migrant quotas would nail it 💀

I realise that this isn't a hill worth dying on but "enshittification", once upon a time, had a very specific and useful meaning, it didn't mean "thing used to be good: now thing bad", I know it's a fight we've all lost but still

This has to give at some point and the OU kick and WM will have to accept that things like the triple lock and unfettered spending on welfare will have to be reviewed.

Rachel Reeves under pressure as UK borrowing hits £24.3bn in April

Days later, in the UK, we’re still in a place where the shadow chancellor of the exchequer, various purported experts, and numerous journalists, are continuing to claim the government relaxed sanctions against Russia, when the truth is the precise opposite. What should be done?

This is the only optimistic case I can make for Burnham right now, that he will speak and act human as PM, and thus seem to be more in touch with people than an incumbent who can't even convince that he is genuinely a football fan.

Any ch ace someone could come up with something similar for Reform?

I'll say this again regarding any €uro membership debate... It's not about the cash in your pocket, which scarcely exists anyway these days.

UK needs ‘national consensus’ over rejoining EU, David Miliband says www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Behind a paywall so can’t see full article but if this is the idea we should all lay an annual tax to live on the homes we pay for already then it’s a truly awful idea and should be binned immediately along with the other ridiculous ideas from the current Chancellor of the exchequer

I can see where this is leading. Inevitable that next GE will be fought on rejoin and reform/conservative response will be “Tell them again”. Why they won’t look at moving the UK into a more stable SM relationship but outside full A49 is beyond me. This psychodrama really needs putting to bed.

“irksome” truly one of the most beautiful English words

Yesterday two European institutions published this extremely good paper on future UK-EU ties. It deserves proper attention coming from there so to speak and being based on serious engagement with experts on both sides. Some key points follow... www.bertelsmann-stiftung.de/en/publicati...

Big exclusive tonight The UK government pitched the creation of a single market for goods with the EU. But EU officials rejected the idea – and instead suggested a customs union or the European Economic Area. by @jenniferrankin.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

EU rejects UK push to create a single market for goods ft.trib.al/mCvng8B

Streeting has suggested two sensible policies that together would raise tax revenues and growth www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

If you don’t want to read Agatha Christie together by candlelight in a humble cottage in the Scottish Highlands during a thunderstorm whilst sharing tea and scones, then please don’t tell me you’re “open to trying new things."

I love how Gen Z are just starting to pick up the mantle from Millennials and realise that boomers and early Gen X have completely screwed us…… it’s not going to get any better I know that!!!

Certainly not surprised by this, been saying it for months but people on both sides of the debate need to accept the UK is not going back to the EU so we can actually get a more pragmatic deal. This endless wanting for the impossible is pointless

I regret to inform you that we will be publishing a detailed analysis this week of the £5m payment to Nigel Farage, and whether it's taxable. It is likely to annoy *everybody*. (except tax advisers, which is all that matters)

Couple of notes on Labour leadership candidates and the EU. When Wes Streeting says special relationship that isn't quite as cakeist as it seems because Roberta Metsola President of the European Parliament has said similar (maybe the source?) the-president.europarl.europa.eu/home/ep-news...

Food, power and ecology. I am not aware of any initiatives this large and imaginative in the EU. Shouldn’t we be working hard on this as a matter of urgency?

As far as possible, I've refrained from reposting stuff featuring images of certain cretins of the world who already receive wholly undeserved publicity, but this one is a *sound up* peach - Supertanskiii has, to some extent, rectified the wall-to-wall rectum problem.

"Number 10 has had literally no strategic or coordinating capacity, outside of national security, for almost two decades, which is frankly insane." It is bizarre & self-defeating that a number of PM's have chosen not to sort this.

Just patriots who want to show their love for country latest. If communities want to fly the flag great but it shouldn't be down to far right thugs whether they do. Those who vandalise community property and threaten and harm people should be arrested. Basics. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...

Path in the Woods, Pierre-Auguste Renoir 1877

If the actor with British accent is evil then you’re watching Sci fi. If the actor with a British accent is good then it’s Fantasy. If the actor with a British accent knocks something over then it’s a Rom com.

I'm ambivalent about Labour. They 100% deserve the kicking they're getting from challengers on the left. But Makerfield feels like a Martin Bell in Tatton moment, when Green/LD should stand aside to let Burnham defeat Reform. Fight it out after. But don't split the progressive vote and help Farage.

"In among the banners calling for a return to British values and good-old fashioned law and order, they loudly joked about drugs – a singalong of “Sweet Caroline” subversively replaced “touching hands” with “sniffing bags”."

The full itv news interview with Andy Burnham youtu.be/8_NVkozkczg?...

Sneaking a giant screen into the flagshagger march is one of the funniest things @ledbydonkeys.org have ever done. "STAY HYDRATED" 😂🤣😂

Personally, here for the East India Company reference most of all. Because the UK more than anyone else invented the weaponisation of trade...

I will go first. I have read Bridgerton.

When adults read children’s books, they recover “a way of moving through the world with a little more curiosity, a little less certainty, and a greater willingness to be surprised,” Rafaela Jinich writes in The Wonder Reader:

Many fail to accept politics has fundamentally changed. The choice now isn’t between which policies you most like compared to others. It’s between a one way trip into authoritarianism & dictatorship, or not. If you split the vote, anywhere, you’re voting for dictatorship. Get used to it. A 🧵/1.

Only just got to this excellent piece. The ban is both objectionable on democratic grounds and unenforceable. ‘Sending a signal’ is not a justification. We have all known what tobacco does for decades.

Just picking something up from the post office and literally every other customer is dropping ebay / similar packages and once again this economy is not the one of even 10 years ago (and people need post office branches)

There is a tendency to blame Brexit for everything which encourages the savvy to downplay it, but we know that leaving the EU has reduced growth significantly, and hence tax revenue, and public finances are more strained as a result. 1/

Clowns. Fiscal credibility matters. We might have more if MPs knew the difference between percentage points and basis points.

There’s a bunch of folks in online progressive UK politics circles who’ve convinced themselves (in spite of all the evidence to the contrary) that their views on a variety of issues are shared by more than about 10-15% of the population. They’re delusional.

Think some of you are starting to do the Corbyn thing again with Polanski (making an individual the sole paragon for progressive politics despite flaws and dismissing or getting defensive over repeated instances of questionable character or judgement that you wouldn't accept from other politicians)