Andy BECKETT thinks the insurgent leftist party run by a Bennite crank has huge potential? ANDY BECKETT? The Andy Beckett? Well, you could blow me down with a feather.

If you're unhappy with Keir Starmer and you think the answer is Andy Burnham and a wealth tax you're not serious about the state of the country/party and the actual *hard, unpopular decisions* that need to be made to put things right.

Brilliant to see this. Comic Book UK is very happy to work with any communities looking to repurpose empty buildings into places where people can enjoy opportunities to create and celebrate comics together. www.gov.uk/government/n...

I increasingly feel that the lobby has not yet moved on from writing about the catastrophically dysfunctional Tories and is determined to see Labour through the same lens. www.theguardian.com/news/ng-inte...

See also: an MP quoted as saying 'Starmer's not up to the job' without any mention of the fact that said MP thought that Jeremy Corbyn was an absolutely fine choice to put to the electorate.

We don’t yet know what motivated the person who shot and killed Charlie Kirk, but this kind of despicable violence has no place in our democracy. Michelle and I will be praying for Charlie’s family tonight, especially his wife Erika and their two young children.

I'm horrified by the shooting of Charlie Kirk at a college event in Utah. Political violence has no place in our country.

Anyone in any way celebrating or taking satisfaction in a shooting of anyone needs to take a good hard look at themselves.

Would be a good result. Sensible, effective Minister who would use the role to help the Government get things done rather than indulge in performative nonsense.

It is hard to see why a Cabinet minister would take the risk of standing in and losing this contest. Burgon and Whittome and others on the left of the party don't have a path to 80 MPs to nominate them. So the contest is likely to come down to 3 of the 9 centreleft backbenches named in the middle.

“Maybe down to the cafe, they do a lovely all day breakfast there”

The deputy leadership election is going to be very depressing. I don't understand why so few people in Labour are incapable of actually looking at what happened to our tax burden under the last government.

Highly recommend @davewwest.bsky.social on why and how politicians are ‘taking back control’ of the NHS: www.hsj.co.uk/comment/how-...

A very popular opinion, it seems, and I think it's rubbish. It's also interesting how persistently a lot of people underestimate Starmer.

I really worry that so many politcos sneer at "centre-left and centre-right sensibly debate how to tax and spend effectively" that they want four years of Reform being at the centre of our politics because a battle on race, identity and culture is just more novel and exciting to them

Honestly baffled by where this reflexive scepticism to 'the public services should run better and the economy should grow more, and the government would be re-elected if this happens' comes from. 'Deliverism' in the United Kingdom has won whenever it has been tried!

As a purveyor of high-quality satire myself I absolutely adored this parody of the new Corbyn / Sultana party. Very witty, jolly well done to all involved. www.politicshome.com/news/article...

"I don't do implementation" Yes because being a gobshite on YouTube is a lot easier than doing hard policy graft 🙄

13 years on, and this still applies: "Their interest is not in reducing oppression as much as it is in reducing their own participation in it. Above all else, they want to be able to say that they are not oppressing, not that oppression has ended." mattbruenig.com/2012/05/10/p...

Mark Ferguson is pitch perfect, not least because he is obvs simply talking about his relationship with our flag, long before he became an MP. Others can adapt his vg message and tone bsky.app/profile/mark...

Good interview from one of the Gov's most impressive Ministers so far. Pushing forward serious reform in criminal justice and speaks with clarity on the need for similar in welfare. www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/...

Good. It's not the Government's job to offer a running commentary on every bit of nonsense touted by cranks. Just get on with the difficult task of delivering actual results.

The only way Labour can extinguish the nonsense of the populist left and right by the next election is to have delivered on the issue that median voters most care about. They must do whatever it takes to do so. Anything that's gets in the way of that has to be bulldozed.

3 episodes in and I'm prepared to say that Alien Earth is far better than Andor. A gripping, brilliant show in its own right that expands on the lore and is completely consistent in tone with the source material.

What happens when one of the poorest parts of the country has jobs guaranteed for 60 years? I went to Barrow to investigate the government’s defence industrial strategy observer.co.uk/news/nationa...

Is there a competition for maddest non-sequitur that I missed?

Interesting from Paul Mason on the Your Party open.substack.com/pub/htsf/p/c...

Dipping into here for the first time in a while and slightly frustrating to find that a lot of the sentiment on issues of public concern is variations of 'the public need to be made to understand why they are wrong to feel the way they feel!!!!'

If Corbyn and co can help Labour shed these fantasists from its membership they will have done the party a great service.

Brilliant work as ever from @mollyroseorg.bsky.social on what an essential first step the #OnlineSafetyAct is but how it needs to be strengthened. Those arguing for it's abolition need to justify why they want to leave kids at risk in an untamed digital space.

The Lakes International Comic Art Festival has announced the creators forming its latest British Comics Now delegation, who will be heading to Brussels in October for a special weekend of Ninth Art events

I couldn't be more pleased that Comic Book UK is now fully operational! Applying my professional skills to an industry that has given me so much is a dream come true. The UK comics industry has so much untapped potential and team CBUK and I look forward to supporting it!

Toby Young really has turned failing upwards into an art form.

Coffee Britain versus Monster Britain is the true class divide

I'd wondered if the Crush Crime campaign was related to Dom Cummings Start Up Party plans and this article seems to suggest it might be. Worth taking very seriously - despite the panto villain persona Cummings is a very smart guy.

A newish Government means that there are lots of consultations doing the rounds at the moment. A few of my academic clients are asking me about them and i'm seeing a lot of the people I follow on here take an interest, so here's a few thoughts on how to best contribute.

Excellent thread on the WASPI compensation question. It’s just…hard, in my view, to stand up the claim that a blanket *ten billion* is even the best way to compensate the women directly hit by the change in the pension age.

bsky.app/profile/ryan... Since I'm told BlueSky is an echo chamber of woke lefty nonsense, let's give an extra cheer for the seeming arrival of smart people of the Right like Ryan

Ed Davey - FIND ME A GIANT SANDWICH COSTUME & BUNGEE ROPE BY 1PM

This is a really good rundown of what sounds like a fascinating speech.

"Populism isn't the answer to Britain's challenges. Easy answers won't make our country strong... This kind of politics feeds off real concerns." Starmer understands the assignment. He knows the consequences for UK politics if Labour fails to deliver after the UK's other main party also failed.

Exceptional hazing of Claire Coutinho. "You stated 'the climate change lobby have been itching to get this on the statute book for years'. As the person who put it onto the statute book, can you confirm if you are or have ever been a member of the climate change lobby?" @pollybillington.bsky.social

This, by James Frayne, is typically astute - how much danger there is of the Tories actually inwardly digesting and then acting upon its advice is, of course, another matter. conservativehome.com/2024/12/03/j...

I've worked with a lot of people at the top of the Whitehall tree. They are often extraordinary. But they are trained to run a system I don't think serves the country well, and few of them have spent enough time outside to see that. There are reasons to think Wormald might surprise us. Let's see.

This Gregg Wallace story is tough on certain bits of the media torn between wanting to defend a 'bantering' bloke against the 'woke mob' and a prime chance to bash the BBC. Latter seems to be winning at the moment but i bet we see a bit of the former soon.

Time for everyone to crank up their "opinions on someone I've never met/met once/heard about and seen a photo of"-ometer. Come on BlueSky, step up

spot on: the chief of staff said the Plan for Change will have to kill the “political fiction” that politicians can fix everything because raising unrealistic expectations damages public trust. “We have to show people what our priorities are,”

I increasingly get a very positive sense that Morgan McSweeney has all of Cummings obvious talents without the equally obvious shortcomings.

Under recognised impact of Brexit is that the fallout created a 'politics as entertainment' boom. So much of the criticism of the Starmer gov amounts to frustration that it is not being fed.