Proof, too, that how you are towards trans people is compelling evidence of whether you are a good quality human being.

Serfs, Karen, the word you're looking for is serfs.

With these measures Labour has joined the “dark forces … stirring up anger” over migration.

I feel physically sick. In one fell swoop, the Labour Government have legitimised the whole racist, right wing narrative. Bravo you bunch of clueless cowards👏

It's hard to find words to capture quite how revolting, steeped in bigotry, irresponsible, morally unmoored, Labour has become. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

"People who owe no tax are statistically the most likely to be fined." Nobody should face a late filing penalty when they don’t owe any tax. It really is impossible to resist this suggestion from @danneidle.bsky.social. www.politicshome.com/news/article...

The sad thing is, on reading this line, it will be fist bumps all around in Shabana Mahmood's office. Because becoming Reform is their plan to beat it.

I hope every Labour MP considering whether to support Shabana Mahmood's asylum plans remembers Nigel Farage's assessment that the “Home Secretary sounds like a Reform supporter.” If they support them they will too.

I'm pretty old (71), so I remember clearly the National Front in the 1970s. They were pariahs that the main political parties wouldn't touch with a 10ft pole. What is shocking is that the LABOUR party is now coming out with the same policies. What on earth would the likes of Benn, Foot etc. think?

Her portrayal of asylum seekers doesn't just respond to the racist narratives of the Far Right: by othering asylum seekers as unworthy winners of riches, in implicit contrast to struggling families, Shabana Mahmood actively promotes and feeds those Far Right lies.

For Shabana Mahmood to attack some of the most cruelly treated people in the world as having won a "golden ticket" because they manage to get to and claim asylum in Britain is unforgiveable. A new, far right, low for which I can think of no precedent, by any UK Government.

To suggest that having lived a life so grim that even an English tribunal will grant you asylum, and to have somehow managed to get here at great risk to life, is a "golden ticket" is absolutely fucking contemptible. Shame on this so-called Labour Party.

No, I'd say it's racists and those pandering to them.

Thank you to @tricksterprince.bsky.social for his amazing guided tour of 'Song of Seven Dials' (which I highly recommend).

I’m sure the hung parliament that is likely to follow the next election will be able to make a decision 👍

Maybe a little bit less time playing politics and a little bit more time looking after the NHS wouldn't go amiss, Wesley? www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Also, a question for Justin Webb: would you still say Donald Trump is "making America normal again"?

Question for The Times. Given undocumented immigrants are being given hysterectomies and then deported by ICE when they complain would you still call Donald Trump a "feminist hero"? www.npr.org/2020/12/22/9...

I am remembering a BBC correspondent who quit the BBC after transphobes changed his copy after he filed it, and without his permission.

The reason it's important is that it raises a question about the independence of Ofcom. We've only looked in detail at the bits of the Prescott report that relate to trans issues but they're weak and partial and it's hard to imagine how a genuinely independent regulator could take them seriously.

When even Alistair Campbell is calling out the BBC's constant blatant prejudice and discrimination against transgender people, maybe it's time call out the BBC & it's journalists have become. action.goodlawproject.org/tell-the-BBC...

But well done on your sneery 'well, I'm not a'. The thing you are not is someone who has experienced street racism under this government, only to have it hailed as a great day for free speech by ministers. Would be great if more people on here showed some sign of understanding the stakes.

One bit of the BBC story that needs more scrutiny - and which might be the most important - is, why did Michael Grade look at the 'report' produced by Michael Prescott and demand the BBC act rather than, as an independent regulator would have done, toss it in the bin?

The BBC, quite consciously, sets out to demean and belittle trans people. This is both morally contemptible and in breach of its Charter obligations. We've made it super easy for you to write to the BBC and tell it to stop. Please use - and share with your networks. goodlaw.social/2j5q

Was it only yesterday that BBC Radio 4 claimed there was no evidence of any Epstein related wrongdoing by Donald Trump?

Raising interest rates and cutting NICs would have taxed unearned income more and earned income less. Freezing or cutting income tax thresholds brings more income into tax, and hits lower and middle income taxpayers hardest. So the change is regressive.

There's a difference between nominal and substantive representation. I want to see people of colour like me in high office to the extent that their life experience imbues them with a substantive understanding of racism and a substantive opposition to it. Who is Mahmood representing here? Its not us.

Thinking about Brianna Ghey while reading this article on screen time and bullying. Labour are using her name to push for a crackdown on phone use among teens. But this research indicates increased screen time does *not* correlate with increased bullying for trans kids - unlike their cis peers.

70% of trans people believe BBC News is hostile. (And anyone who has listened to Justin Webb knows they are clearly right.) goodlaw.social/kyxv

A Labour Party has jettisoned plans to increase taxes on unearned income - disproportionately enjoyed by the wealthy - and is increasing them instead on the earned income of normal people. What a shocking indictment.

Turns out that bond markets think there should be more to fiscal policy than looking behind the sofa for loose change. Every day's a school day.

A terrible, regressive compared to what they've ditched, change in tax policy. And the bond markets hate it too, tending to make the deficit even larger. And all for political reasons. If Starmer and Reeves can't govern in the national interest perhaps they shouldn't govern at all.

Of course the right wing attack dogs at the misnamed Office for Students will do nothing about this speech being banned. No swingeing fines for UCL, unlike University of Sussex which banned no one. Revolting hypocrisy, which Labour will ignore for fear of upsetting our rabid press.

University free speech latest. This sounds* pretty grim and I'm pleased Jewish students don't have to put up with it on their campus. But why are students from other minoritised groups not entitled to the same consideration? Why must they endure appalling attacks on their humanity?

Quite depressing, this. Super high earners already pay higher rates on ~ all of their income. Freezing or cutting thresholds, Labour's alternative, is all but irrelevant to them but will disproportionately whack the take home pay of the squeezed middle. on.ft.com/4o1gfLf

He'll be dragged out of Number 10, inside Keir Starmer's hearse.

Interesting and true - this was once a UKIP policy.

The hearing in our judicial review challenge to the EHRC's (now withdrawn) Interim Guidance has finished. Judgment will follow later. No indication given as to when but he's usually pretty efficient and I would be surprised if we didn't get a judgment before Christmas.

@alastaircampbell.bsky.social speaks openly about SENIOR members of the BBC being “so far over in the JK Rowling (read: ‘gender critical’ obsessive transphobe) camp” Let’s just stop and think about this for a moment…

I feel so blessed to have so many brilliant and committed and lovely people working with me at @goodlawproject.bsky.social - and, my goodness, @jessothomson.co.uk is one of them. Thanks - and Happy Birthday!

The Charity Commission has just opened an investigation into the hideous transphobic lobbyists at Policy Exchange. 👇

Nothing to see here. www.wesforleader.com

And needless to say, briefed out Government policy has subsequently been tilted to favour horseracing.

This is a pretty staggering conflict of interest for Tim Allan - more or less the same as the conflict of interest Peter Mandelson had. He works for the Government but benefits personally financially if Government policy favours, e.g. horse-racing. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

The Guardian (and every other media outlet) knows whether this really important story is true or not - but they won't say because of (I assume) source protection. My question is, how does this serve the public?

"GLP’s 27-page complaint filed last month about Policy Exchange, a charity co-founded by former justice secretary Michael Gove in 2002, alleged that it was in breach of charity law by showing 'an unhealthy obsession with trans issues.'" www.civilsociety.co.uk/news/charity...

“We think it’s long past time that the Charity Commission created real disincentives to breaches of this nature. In effect they amount to a misuse of public money, and if the Commission fails to do so we will not hesitate to challenge it in court.” goodlaw.social/9azv

Back in September, Banksy painted a powerful image of a judge striking down a protester on the Royal Courts of Justice. They scrubbed it off, but they can’t make us forget. And they can’t stop us from wearing it. Buy a t-shirt and join the movement 👇 https://bit.ly/488U2pH

Every journalist briefed by No 10 re Streeting knows who did it but now maintains the fiction it’s not clear who did. Treating government as a political campaign feeds journalists but it is bad government eg the huge number of leaks re Budget options has chilled the economy.

I'm doing some walking tours of Seven Dials with @stanfordstravel.bsky.social on Saturday Nov 15. Come for coffee, cheese, & overpriced street food, stay for overexcited historian, whistle stop tour of the Dials, & sideways look at 1920s and 1930s London. www.stanfords.co.uk/event-songs-...