My own answer to this pretty odd question would be that I wouldn’t choose to taser anyone.

Who would? And framing this around political opponents is really problematic.

There's a weirdness to Mahmood's approach which is basically "I get a lot of death threats, and if I don't do some of what they demand then they'll win, ergo, you are racist for defending immigration against me, a brown woman."

🚨 Experts warn Select Committee that First Past risks an election that is "simply indefensible".

Speaking to the Housing, Communities & Local Government Committee, Professors Toby James, Maria Sobolewska and Alan Renwick say government should now be looking seriously at electoral reform.

Cover of book “How Not to Die (Too Soon). By Devi Sridhar with a pic of a large red apple.

“Policy, not personal choice, is the biggest influence on life expectancy”

BBC Scotland interviewing @profdevisridhar.bsky.social just now about her new book.

#MedSky
#PublicHealth
#LifeExpectancy
#SDOH

David Attenborough takes on PHEASANTS!

“Native to Asia, but now released into our countryside on an industrial scale, over 30 million every year… eating vast numbers of insects, reptiles and amphibians every day.”

Time for the Government to regulate this out-of-control industry

#SecretGarden

Yes, the media holds Labour to higher standards than the Tories and Reform.

So do I. I expect higher standards from Labour. That should be part of the main point of Labour. We expect Tories to be self-serving, corrupt and nasty. We expect Reform to be bigots and racists. Labour, not so much.

Cover of The Names by Florence Knapp

This inventive, moving book examines the ripple effects of our choices by imagining the story of an abused woman and her 2 children in three different ways. The reader gets pieces of each version in a series of timeline jumps. It was a little tricky to follow but worth it.TW domestic abuse #booksky

An open letter to UK Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy Ukraine Solidarity Campaign has sent the following to UK Deputy Prime Minister and Labour MP for Tottenham David Lammy. Dear David, On 13 April you tweeted a photo with US Vice President JD Vance, saying: “Great to catch up with my friend @JDVance today in DC following his talks in Pakistan. “It is vital that the ceasefire continues and we get shipping flowing freely again through the Straits of Hormuz.

An open letter to UK Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy

Ukraine Solidarity Campaign has sent the following to UK Deputy Prime Minister and Labour MP for Tottenham David Lammy. Dear David, On 13 April you tweeted a photo with US Vice President JD Vance, saying: “Great to catch up with my friend…

In my mid teens if someone had said to me “when you are middle aged, the leader of the opposition is a black woman and the leader of the party polling in third is Jewish”, I really would have had a much more optimistic idea of how the future was panning out.

⚠️Sir John Curtice says Labour and the Conservatives can no longer rely on First Past the Post

Asked by @danbloom1.bsky.social of @politico.com if Westminster's electoral system was tenable, Britain's leading polling expert said “Those who live by the sword can die by the sword”

#ElectoralReform

Sharon Osbourne indicates she will join Tommy Robinson's anti-immigration march Sharon Osbourne has suggested she will be joining Tommy Robinson's anti-immigration 'Unite the Kingdom' march.

Sharon Osborne was
▶️an immigrant into the USA in the late 1970s
▶️an immigrant into Ireland in the mid 1990s
▶️an immigrant into the USA again from 2002 to 2005
▶️and then again from 2010 to 2020

She has been an immigrant for approx 48 of her 73 years

www.nme.com/news/tv/shar...

Reform, in theory, could have been a gift to Labour: they divided the Right-wing vote. All Labour had to do was govern in a way that held their Center-Left coalition together

Instead, they chose to act foolishly and blow up their own coalition in pursuit of a voting base with no interest in them

Reminder: there's no point doing a deal with him, no matter how advantageous, because you have no way of trusting he will stick to his word.

Hungary's new PM urges Starmer to rejoin EU amid push to unwind Brexit Péter Magyar, who defeated Viktor Orbán in a stunning result overnight, said he 'hoped' the UK would become a member state again.

This Mail poll is now at 72% for Rejoin.
I'd love to see the faces on the Mail's right wing owners and readers right now.
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article...

Talking about Donald Trump having dementia just gives a sympathetic excuse for inexcusable preexisting conditions. Donald has *always* been a mean, self-centered, incoherent fool who says stupid and ignorant things.

Remember: There is nothing natural or inevitable about extreme inequality; it’s the result of an economic system that values wealth and power over human dignity and justice.

It doesn't have to be this way.

AOC: What law would you want to make?

Don’t mean to be an alarmist, but lately Trump has been showing signs of being exactly the person he’s always been.

Our political views are diverse. That's a good thing.

No one party speaks for the whole country, and our opinions cannot be reduced to a choice between two options.

It's time for a voting system that recognises this. It's time for Proportional Representation.

We're really proud to be working with @unlockdemocracy.bsky.social as the joint secretariat for the biggest All-Party Parliamentary Group in Westminster.

Check out the APPG's new website👇

School canteen with meals being served. ‘Cost‑cutting, private contracts and tight budgets leave school staff and kitchens overstretched’

Media debate on school meals often misses the bigger picture. 

Many schools have contracted-out their catering to private sector firms who profit from providing poor quality food, cutting staff pay and cutting the resources that school kitchens need.

When Viktor Orbán changed Hungary's voting system - making it easier for the biggest party to win supermajorities with a minority of votes - it was understandably criticised as authoritarian.

So why is it that in the UK we accept an even more disproportional system as the norm?

The Scientology building in milan

Passed the Scientology building on the way to a parkrun in Milan this morning. This evangelising cult with thousands of obsessive adherents worldwide was started in bushy park in London and arranges free, friendly 5k events every Saturday.

In search of longevity, you could expose yourself to sunlight first thing every morning or take an ice bath, but if the air you are breathing is not clean, the water you are drinking is dirty, the roads you walk or drive on are unsafe, or many people you meet in the street carry military-grade weapons ... well, your gratitude journal isn't going to do much. We have been focusing on the wrong thing: namely, we have been focusing on ourselves. Devi Sridhar How Not to Die (Too Soon): The Lies We've Been Sold and the Policies That Can Save Us #kindlequotes

In search of longevity?

Read @profdevisridhar.bsky.social’s books for tips.

You (we) may be focusing on the wrong things…

#MedSky
#BookSky
#PublicHealth

I didn’t “take advantage” of Freedom of Movement.

I studied abroad.
I worked abroad.
I built a life across countries.

It wasn’t a loophole.
It was normal.

Now it isn’t.

And that should concern far more people than it does.

youtu.be/JYA3gVGxlnw

A WHOLE CIVILIZATION WILL DIE TONIGHT My son needs lunch, and I have to put his backpack together, but a whole civilization will die tonight, so I'm wondering if they've closed their schools. Like, a snow day, maybe, except instead of snow it's "keep your children home so if you die, you die together" — instead of "well open back up once the plows have cleared" it's "we don't know if we'll be here tomorrow, hold your babies tight." It's just "talk" I'm told, which I've been told before. "It's how the president makes his deals." But I've never heard anyone talk about other human beings this way, and I'm not certain I can look my son in the eyes if we all agree to stomach it one more time. A civilization will die tonight, but as I zip up his backpack and kiss him off to school I think: if this is what we call leadership then I'm not entirely sure ours isn't already dead. @michaelfdubois Mukad A QuBoy @michacifdubois

Brutal.

Pedro Sanchez, Spanish PM,

"And I say to the right and the far-right, that they cannot be supporting those who set the world on fire and then complain about the smoke caused by that fire"

"You can't have your cake and eat it too"