A small point from the Mandelson/Robbins saga. Refom and many Tories argue for a civil service than can be more easily bent to the will and whims of their elected political masters.
This is precisely what happened here.
Sorry, no. Starmer may be as lacking in wisdom, competence, principle and direction as his critics say, but he can't be bracketed with Johnson—the standout worst recent PM. Nor can May, Sunak or even the bonkers and increasingly unpleasant but apparently sincere Truss be put on the Johnson level.
Yes, this, and who else is there? Can’t think of an obvious successor.
The fact that Jared Kushner derives nearly all his income from the Saudi government while he purports to be negotiating issues of acute interest to the Saudi government allegedly on behalf of the US is simply swept under the rug by US mainstream media.
This isn't really true, re the reset. Britain has a trade deficit in agrifood and electricity. And in other goods sectors in which Reeves wants to go further.
www.ft.com/content/2007...
In spite of all the talk of Claude Code and Codex meaning the end of humans writing code, software job adverts are actually going up, according to @jburnmurdoch.ft.com's crunching of millions of job ads for this week's The AI Shift www.ft.com/content/7325...
Starmer may be in a lot of trouble, but watching Susanna Reid pontificate about it (and talking over her guests) is enough to make me want him to stay. #GMB
STUBB: We need to turn the tide. This is no longer about giving aid to Ukraine. We have to think about it other way around. Can we afford to keep Ukraine 'outside' — in the sense that they now have greatest military know-how? I hope Americans understand this and see it clearly.
From my Twitter archive
This was Sunak ignoring Zahawi's "tax problems", but the "lack of curiosity" seems to be a problem with recent occupants of No 10.
#R4Today
All the talk is of a blue wave in the 2026 Midterms. But Republicans do not need to get more popular to hold the House - they just need to stop enough Democrats voting in key seats.
I've done a deep dive in my latest post.
christinapagel.substack.com/p/how-republ...
Rare sighting of a column chart taking a dip at Hove Beach.
#dataviz
OMFG I had to go and check that this ACTUALLY happened.
Since when does the BBC ever do chyrons with a political party's branding, rather than their own? Not to mention this is during a pre-election campaign purdah.
(h/t @iainsol.bsky.social)
Trying to work out how much wrong coding there would have to be to do that... just a very specifically designed style sheet?
I checked this too.
*20 seconds* of Reform logo display.
*No other* party logo displayed.
In local election purdah.
This is not normal. At all.
From a former Green Party London Assembly member.
Whatever you do, don’t say, ‘Isn’t that in Acton?’
I’m not at all convinced by the methodology here and I think trying to do projections in the current climate is almost impossible.
That said, I wouldn’t be surprised if we wake up on 8 May to something like this. bsky.app/profile/hanw...
Anyone keeping a list of the countries Musk is actually free to travel to? I’m not sure France is the only one to have a welcome committee planned for him
bsky.app/profile/robe...
FT Exclusive: Stockholm’s military intelligence head said Moscow is systematically manipulating data to fool Ukraine’s western allies into believing its economy has withstood the strain of its lavish war spending and western sanctions. ft.trib.al/uloekqX
No one should have sympathy for any fans of clubs like Man City or Arsenal. If they don't win the Premier League this year they'll win it next, or before too long anyway. It is to real football fandom what having a go on a flight simulator is to fighting in the Battle of Britain.
See also their policy on LVT, rent controls and second homes with 'wealth tax will raise 18bn'
I do wonder if the Greens have thought through what the impact of their 1:10 pay ratio thing would be on their other key policy of 'the rich will pay for everything'
Taxing all income at the same rate would be a good start. I thought we were going to see more moves in that direction when @torstenbell.bsky.social joined the government.
James Bembridge, Reform Party election candidate, truly hates the NHS. If he and Nigel Farage get what they want, and win power, can you afford private healthcare?
(Re)Release of Interactive Political Compass Dominance Map:
huggingface.co/spaces/Mario...
Now it runs nicely from a server - i.e. feel free to open on anything, don't worry about it eating memory - and cycle through 2014-2025, repositioning parties as you please.
What should have happened: the REIT paid no tax but the Tice companies holding shares in the REIT paid £98k tax on the dividends they received. What actually happened: none of the companies paid any tax.
Our new report: Richard Tice signed accounts wrongly claiming £98,000 of tax exemptions
A 🧵 with the evidence:
Shocking statistic ⬇️
The hallmark of a generation increasingly unable to achieve the milestones previous generations took for granted..
Its is an issue we discussed in our latest UK Poverty report, one which clearly intersects with low-incomes and lack of opportunity.
Tremendously depressing read. Also: proper reporting.
open.substack.com/pub/londonce...
