"Stupid, spurious and absurd." @peterjukes.bsky.social @bylinetimes.bsky.social reacts to claims that #Farage barely knew Russian stooge Nathan Gill - the former #ReformUK leader in Wales With @goldbergradio.bsky.social podfollow.com/byline-times...

It’s worth watching this from the US. Then thinking about Jenrick’s words about skin colour. Then thinking about UK politicians and commentators who fantasize about creating ICE-like bodies. Then thinking about the demonisation of judges. They are all linked.

Privatised water companies are putting your bills up AGAIN. As if the already agreed £104bn in rises by 2030 wasn't enough, companies have asked for up to 18% more in your bills. Public ownership is the only option. The arguments against are drying up.

ME/CFS is a devastating condition that has long been denied, dismissed, psychologised and underdiagnosed. Research is at last starting to catch up with it, with glimmers of hope for those who have been left untreated for so long. There's a huge BUT coming ...🧵 www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

According to Human Right's Watch 'Saudi authorities had executed at least 241 people in 2025 as of August 5, with 22 executions in the previous week alone'. Make a joke out of that.

This is what we're up against. On just a single project a far right billionaire can spaff £33 million up the wall. Likely multitudes more than the entire progressive policy space receives in a single year for work on making the country a better place. www.business-live.co.uk/enterprise/g...

And I’ll say it again - even if every Jewish person in Britain were 100% behind Netanyahu (which statistically the majority are not) they’d still deserve to feel safe here in their home country. Which is why the whole conflation was so toxic in the first place.

I’ve just realised something - the same mentality which holds all Palestinian people responsible for the actions of h*m*s will blame anyone who advocated for an end to a genocide responsible for the man who perpetrated a terror attack last Thursday.

Reform UK are out of step with the British public. The public are opposed to withdrawing from the ECHR by 46% to 29%

29 'missing' Hen Harriers & nearly 40 birds of prey poisoned, trapped or shot in Yorkshire Dales National Park since 2015. Not so much a National Park - more of a National Disgrace. #RaptorResearch #WildlifeCrime #Ornithology #Yorkshire raptorpersecutionuk.org/2025/10/04/2...

Let's take our water into public ownership. Sign the petition: weownit.org.uk/act-now/lets...

WE are being forced to pay more for the privilege of being ripped off by water companies. They've not invested. Instead they've taken out £80 billion in dividends and loaded up those companies with £70 billion in debt. Now they are being allowed to hike our water bills.

Via Danny Shaw: ‘NEW Religious hate crime in England/Wales increased by 3% to record 7,164 offences, 2024/25. Police data from @ukhomeoffice shows 19% rise in anti-Muslim crime. Muslims+Jews are targets of 74% of religious hate. Jews are targeted more than any other religious group, per head.’ 1/

I really buy the theory that this is about a loss of social and cultural power, rather than political power. If you were e.g. in upper management, or a senior public servant, or an experienced teacher, you are used to having people listen to you. Gradually, the music stops.

I really don't know what to do about a situation where a plurality of the group that (rightly!) takes up most government spending thinks that it is unrepresented in politics.

Twelve Jobs Nigel has earned over £1 million in additional income since the general election. To understand the scale of it, since the July 2024 election he's earned roughly £100k more as a brand ambassador for Direct Bullion than Starmer gets as PM. www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news...

‘Race hate up 6% to 82,490 offences, near-record level Asian victims 33% White 30% Black 23% Mixed race 8% (Where ethnicity is known) Hate crime data comparing 2024/25 with previous years exclude @metpoliceuk because counting methods changed. Analysis of 2024/25 include Met data’

Doing the right thing, rather than the politically convenient thing, can reap rewards at many levels.

Big presence on the beaches of Normandy in 1944 too.

In @thetimes.com letters page today

Remember that, throughout history, fascism isn’t sustainable. They always end up overplaying their hand.

Today is a day when arts degrees are worthless, but the product of those degrees is so valuable it would kill an entire industry if they were made to pay for it.

Sathnam Sanghera, challenging Robert Jenrick, is also for integration as a two-way street, which depends on recognising the equal status of those who want to integrate.

I really believe that huge majorities of Americans don’t want masked soldiers shooting priests in the street. They don’t want naked children ripped out out of their apartments in the middle of the night and handcuffed. We win by making sure these stories get told.

Remembering when Venice Allen proudly posted a video of herself haranguing the WOMEN at the Kenwood Pond meeting because they DIDN’T agree with her transphobia, and voted down the trans-exclusionary motion. ‘Gender critical’ transphobes resort to legal bullying when they don’t get their own way! 😖

Here's the relevant chart from the above report. It's rare to see such a clear, consistent slope in any social trend. That segregation is decreasing is perhaps the best evidence, least controversial social fact of modern Britain

This statistical fact is also obvious across so many domains: politicians, sport, economics, media, neighbours, partners, children Does any adult in Britain (20, 40, 60 or 80) really think, has genuinely experienced, *less* interactions across ethnicity than they did as a child or younger afult?

Lethal skewering this, in particular this paragraph skewering the idea that Handswortg is an integration failure when it is a multi-ethnic integration success story. As Mrs Merton might say “what is it about this 9% white ward that led you to frame it as an integration failure?”

...when you're such an awful person Eli Valley draws you representationally.

There's also something disgusting about a qualified solicitor, so it can't have been said from ignorance, suggesting, as Jenrick did today, that barristers' beliefs and values can be deduced from those of their clients.

This is a really important point from @robfordmancs.bsky.social. Local government should be a source of and focus for local pride. It should be doing bold, visible stuff that enhances and reflects community. Instead, currently, it is almost literally reduced to ambulance work.

Oh, go on, whack your signature on this one too! Let's get our voices heard everywhere. See the link in the post below. 🏊‍♂️🏊🏊‍♀️ And if you can possibly help with legal costs (via @translucent.org.uk), please do donate here: translucent.org.uk/keep-hampste...

I don't want to get all Chesterton's Fence here, but if you don't understand that a "microscopic snail" is an indicator species that's protected for the health of the entire ecosystem, you probably shouldn't be forming "good relationships" with developers www.theguardian.com/environment/...

The UAE is an authoritarian autocracy, a petro-state with no income tax for citizens, to bribe them for the lack of democratic voice or free speech It is 85% migrant, a segregated society with a ban on integration in principle and practice, few rights, equal opportunities, nor voice for incomers

Of course at one level: who cares what the Tories do any more? But at another, apparently wildly insane ideas like “put judges under the control of politicians” have a habit of becoming mainstream political thinking these days

All these people really want is to pay no taxes and be treated with floor scraping deference. Everything else is just bullshit in pursuit of that goal.

I know statistics are poorly understood and are misused. But facts matter Between the 1991, 2001, 2011 and 2021 Census *every* ethnic group in the UK has become *less* geographically segregated and *all* groups, majority and minorities, are more likely to interact with people not like them

Private companies incentivised to put asylum seekers in hotels rather than bedsits as they could earn EIGHT TIMES as much profit, says @paulkohlersw19.bsky.social Hotel owners and private companies benefiting despite allegations of terrible conditions www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Finally!!! The real scandal of the asylum hotels. Why, instead of shining the light on these parasites, months were spent on demonising vulnerable people at their mercy? www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Clearsprings Ready Homes, a company providing accommodation to asylum seekers, has made nearly £187m in profits since being awarded lucrative government contracts, despite allegations of terrible conditions at the hotels it uses www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Stamford Hill exists and co-exists because Handsworth exists and co-exists. Stamford Hill is only safe if Handsworth is safe too.

As Jews we beg you: do not let the Manchester attack be weaponised I was humbled to be invited to sign this letter as a strong ally of the Scottish Universities Jewish Staff Network and thank all colleagues here for their tireless commitment to peace www.heraldscotland.com/opinion/2552...

Heaton Park synagogue, where my grandparents got married and where my father had his barmitzvah, is only safe if every church, mosque, temple and gurudwara is also safe.

I don't think Robert Jenrick realises that the people clapping along to him when he talks about Handsworth would clap along if he said the same about Stamford Hill. I'd hope that would give him pause for thought.

If you’re an Islamophobe you don’t get to complain about antisemitism And if you’re an antisemite you don’t get to complain about Islamophobia. It’s really that simple. (So many shameless hypocrites around.)

What should be ‘un-British’ is the heavy-handed policing and proscription of Palestine Action. Sadly, however, if follows a longstanding British tradition, from the suppression of the Peasants’ Revolt via the Peterloo massacre to the Battle of Orgreave.

Scaling up Seattle Jonathan Rosenblum introduces his new book, published today. Anyone with a shred of humanity and a degree of political engagement must be wondering today, “What’s the way forward? How do we fight in the political arena?” In my country, Trump and the billionaires control the…

This is a lie. There are many criticisms you might sensibly and truthfully make of the Sentencing Council and the Sentencing Guidelines. I’ve been making them for years. But this is an outright lie. Pure fabrication. A fraud on the public.

Anyone reporting on Conservative proposals on this topic should ask a) why Lam felt the need to make things up to justify them b) whether they have made their proposals/claimed their "savings" based on her false claims