Check out the poster presentation by our Research Fellow in Systems Thinking / System Dynamics, Dr Mehdi Hafezi, on a Systems Perspective on Access to EHCPs⬇️

Come and work with us @trusselluk.bsky.social! We're hiring a policy manager in our Social Security & Work programme. Help drive policy change to help ensure no one has to turn to a food bank to survive. Closing date 27th July. Please share with your networks. www.trussell.org.uk/jobs/policy-...

5-4 majority in US Supreme Court in favour of what the constitution expressly provides and was intended to provide re birthright citizenship. That is how deep and rotten the partisanship has become.

BREAKING: The Supreme Court in a 6-3 vote UPHOLDS birthright citizenship, affirming the default rule that all persons born in the United States (with narrow exceptions) are U.S. citizens at birth. A total LOSS for President Trump and the effort to rewrite the 14th Amendment.

ooh, i was on the first train affected! I was lucky - only 30 minute delayed and I did indeed see the sheepish cows (ho ho) standing by the tracks as we crawled past

3 minutes on how Trump adminstration has tried to skew the midterm elections over the last 2 weeks youtube.com/shorts/msPZB...

We need what's happening in American science to not happen in UK. Climate.gov previously NOAA's rich climate data site for example: not banned, just defunded, downsized and redirected until inconvenient climate data is effectively gone.

if you are at #HSRUK26, check out our poster on how we are using a huge range of systems methods to tackling improving services for children with complex health needs (across health, education, social care...) in @sprockethub.bsky.social All presented by our fab postdoc Mehdi Hafezi! (PW 4.5)

if you are at #HSRUK26 today or tomorrow, check out our poster of the pain, trials, tribulations - and eventual rewards - of working with linked health care data! All presented by our fab Research Coordinator and data guru Julie Taylor! (poster 43)

No Historic England, but Forestry England, Natural England and Natural Archives. Natural England has high risk for political interference! National Archives low.

This report notes that the statistical system 'is increasingly having to make difficult choices' and that this is a 'core leadership responsibility' but also that there has been no permanent national statistician for over a year osr.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/publication/...

Good piece on the travails of actually trying to collect data from real people to feed into the Labour Force Survey www.thetimes.com/article/b478...

And there are two growing challenges where you need strong statistical leaders in place. 1. The changing nature of statistical methods at a time of digital data and AI etc; 2. Increasing political volatility in the coming period when more than ever we need a set of shared facts.

Why does any of this matter? Good policy requires good data. The labour force survey in particular is not seen as reliable. But also how will the Govt achieve its ambitions for AI in policy without excellent data leadership? www.ft.com/content/dd55...

Good data is essential for policy. Today it’s been a year since we had a permanent National Statistician. No news on what is happening with the current recruitment which began Oct 2025. This is an under the bonnet issue that points to state failure 🧵 uksa.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/news/stateme...

This is a great example of what's called "pluralistic ignorance" -- the phenomenon whereby most people share a particular view, but they *don't think other people share it*. In this case: most people are concerned about climate change but think others aren't.

📢NEW RESOURCE: A new web resource and accompanying report to explore the vulnerabilities to political interference of 33 key UK scientific public bodies & 11 scientific advisory committees! unchecked.uk/public_body_... 1/7

Two weeks in Trump's America: elections, environment, health and corruption youtu.be/Lezcdp34bBs

Really shocked to see how vulnerable to political interference some of our essential regulatory and safety bodies are (e.g., MHRA, APHA). This is hugely important work, thank you @chrischirp.bsky.social and @martinmckee.bsky.social open.substack.com/pub/christin...

The judgments of the US supreme court continue to be exercises in partisanship cosplaying as pieces of judicial reasoning. Two judgments today, for example, Slaughter and Cook, deal with near identical situations, but have very different reasoning for no good objective reason. Sheer politics.

We've now gone into detail for 33 scientific public bodies and 11 scientific advisory committees and scored them for each domain, and assigned an overall vulnerability rating. Each body has a set of key takeaways on its importance, why a govt might want to intefere and how it could. 3/7

The vulnerabilities exist, even if they are not being (very) actively exploited right now. They can also be fixed but this requires will & effort from the Executive and MP. It also requires a public to express their support (in principle they do!) and bodies themselves be worthy of our trust. 6/7

The humble bar graph taking a bold step into 3D here, while never losing sight of its passion: clearly showing which numbers are bigger.

“When you check the weather in the morning, eat breakfast without worrying whether the food is safe, or take a medicine that has been developed, tested and approved, you are relying on a scientific Arm’s-Length Body”. (UK). We take soooo much of this for granted..

The work was done with @martinmckee.bsky.social , two fab research assistants, @uclpolicylab.bsky.social and @unchecked-uk.bsky.social . Thank you also to @instituteforgovernment.org.uk for their input along the way! Substack on it is here: christinapagel.substack.com/p/a-new-guid... 7/7

A very valuable resource. This is the discussion of UKRI unchecked.uk/public_body_...

This is well worth a look if you're interested in the foundations of public body independence, particularly for scientific bodies providing specialist evidence and expertise. The resource builds on extensive UCL research from last year, also referenced in the thread.

This is really important (and excellent). It's for the incoming government to ensure that the Arms Length Bodies are protected from political inteference (after all, that's the whole idea of them being arms-length). Because (and see the US for examples) they - and we - are very vulnerable if not.

📢NEW RESOURCE: A new web resource and accompanying report to explore the vulnerabilities to political interference of 33 key UK scientific public bodies & 11 scientific advisory committees! unchecked.uk/public_body_... 1/7

The White House sought to influence an independent body, the Merit Systems Protection Board, whose purpose is to protect civil servants from politically motivated dismissal. This raises concerns about executive interference in an institution intended to act as an imp... TAT: [Undermining democracy]

An agreement between the U.S. and Kazakhstan has given a group of American investors with ties to the president and the commerce secretary access to one of the world’s largest untapped reserves of tungsten, when a deal was signed in Nov'25. This was preceeded by the Trump admin... TAT: [Corruption]

This is so upsetting

The right takes academia seriously, and is pouring money into neutering it. Would be good to see left wing politicians taking academia equally seriously, and taking action to support it www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

Trump on Friday shared a new rendering of a limited-edition “Patriot Passport” featuring his image for America’s 250th anniversary. The White House’s official social media account reposted the version shared by the president on Friday, adding the capti... TAT: [Corruption | Controlling information]

The UN-sanctioned Board of Peace announced by Donald Trump earlier this year to rule Gaza is planning a sweeping grant of legal immunity for itself, according to a draft of the resolution obtained by the Guardian. The draft language woul... TAT: [Foreign policy | Corruption | Undermining democracy]

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said about migirants in the US under Temporary Protected Status (TPS), that they should seek permanent residence or leave for their home ​countries. TAT: [Nationalism]

A Guardian investigation has found that the National Design Studio (NDS), a department developed following an executive order and staffed by DOGE veterans, has rebuilt and installed visitor-tracking software on some of the federal government’... TAT: [Weakening civil rights | Undermining democracy]

www.newscientist.com/article/2531... www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2026...

All-time high temperatures for June yesterday in Denmark, Czech Republic and Germany where they recorded 41.5C. Water cannon were provided to cool people at the Brandenburg Gate.

"Whenever the World Cup kicks off, I think of Nick lying on his sickbed, punching the air, and am reminded of that internal battle I faced as a 17-year-old. The battle that, to my eternal shame, I won and lost" Some personal reflections on the World Cup open.substack.com/pu...

Quite a lot of people lost someone, maybe an elderly relative, during the heatwave. My Aunt Barbara, very ill with advanced dementia, died yesterday aged 91. She was unmarried, no kids and I had been taking care of her affairs for the past few years. That’s the least interesting thing about her. 1

This is what imperialists always do. They claim to love their country. They feed its people into the machine.

Question: Are Ukraine's strikes on Russian oil infrastructure having a real impact, not only undermining Russia's war machine but also making regular Russians feel costs of war in unignorable ways? Answer: Picture of car line waiting to get fuel, so long that there are port-a-potties along the way.

Health programs receiving federal funding must agree within days to new priorities from the Trump administration, including a focus on “parental authority” in education and a move away from proven overdose-prevention methods like harm reduction, suggesting greater politi... TAT: [Attacking science]

Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is continuing his battle to remake federal vaccine policy, this time by rewriting the charter of a federal committee that wields enormous influence over childhood immunizations to shift its focus beyond vacc... TAT: [Attacking science]

President Donald Trump's ​administration has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to let it detain people arrested in its immigration ‌crackdown without a chance to seek bond, even if they have lived in the country for years. TAT: [Nationalism | Weakening civil rights | Undermining democracy]

Trump threatened to scrap a just-finalized trade deal with the European Union on Friday, saying that any country that levies a digital services tax would be hit immediately with a 100 percent tariff on all exports to the United States. TAT: [Foreign policy]

The Justice Department (DOJ) sued the state of Kansas of a law that allows students without legal immigration status to qualify for in-state tuition at public colleges and universities. TAT: [Nationalism | Weakening civil rights]

A final draft of Trump's Religious Liberties Comission report calls for “building bridges between church and state,” a reversal of a long-standing U.S. legal principle. The argument is a stark reversal of the legal principle that calls for the separation of church an... TAT: [Undermining democracy]

Drowning prevention starts with you. Here are some water safety rules. ⬇️