UK Politics

Three years ago, the UK entered what was supposed to be a new era - one where we had learned from the pandemic, adapted, and built a future where health and safety coexisted with normal life. Instead, 'Learning to Live with Covid' became a euphemism for abandoning any real learning at all.

Despite the suggestion of change, little has been done to protect people in workplaces, schools, hospitals, or public spaces. Instead of solutions grounded in science, we were given advice about flimsy homemade 'face coverings' and difficult to adhere to 'social distancing' guidance while the fundamental issue - airborne transmission - was ignored. And for those who were (and remain) Clinically Vulnerable, this failure to 'learn' has developed into a glaring equality issue, creating systemic disadvantages in work, education, healthcare, and often basic participation in society.

The leadership of both main parties seem to think the only thing Reform supporters get worked up about is immigration. They may be right, but the conclusion that they can only win them over by out Reforming Reform is based on some alarmingly naive assumptions about the people they are trying to convert.

So, I thought I’d help Keir Starmer and Kemi Badenoch out by attempting to discover what your average Reform supporter actually wants.

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So, I took to the internet and joined a raft of Reform-supporting groups to see what their followers were thinking. I have to say, this was not a pleasant task. Scrolling through hundreds of posts filled with ugly sentiments was like stumbling upon the world’s worst online dating site.

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Among all this impotent fury there are genuine concerns about the health service, cost of living, crime, housing and all the other things the rest of us worry about. However, these people have fallen for the ancient lie that their problems aren’t caused by the people with the power to change them, but by “the others”.

And this is where the slope gets really slippery. Lee Anderson’s sympathy for the thugs involved in the Southport riots is widely shared and despite official disapproval from the party’s leadership the jailed Stephen Yaxley-Lennon (Tommy Robinson) is often lauded as true patriot and political prisoner.

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As opinion polls regularly confirm, the queues at food banks and A&E matter more to most voters than the ones at the border. Surely the way to dissuade people from abandoning the British traditions of tolerance and democracy is to deal with real issues rather than pandering to the fairy tale that everything would be okay if it wasn’t for “that lot”.

But, with Reform style—ads and videos of poor souls arrested after being forced to work in nail bars, Labour risk legitimising the racism they’re trying to undermine. If you tell Farage’s supporters, “See, you can vote for us after all,” they may just hear, “See, you were right all along”.

As the Democrats found out in November, if you don’t take the chance to improve people’s lives, they might just dump you for the nearest narcissistic crackpot and while the Conservative‘s collapse allowed Reform to creep onto the wings of the political stage, Labour’s failure to address everyday concerns risks thrusting them into the spotlight.

The two most common complaints on the Reform supporters’ websites are that immigrants are bad and the Government doesn’t care about ordinary people. If Labour can’t demonstrate that the latter is as much a lie as the former, we might all get what Reform supporters really want… President Farage.

“The inquest into my daughter’s death showed me that the system is almost entirely broken

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“What is the point of investigating avoidable deaths — of making bereaved families relive their trauma, of spending millions of public pounds — unless we are prepared to learn how to avoid similar fatal errors?

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The UK and Ukraine have agreed a £2.26bn loan to support Ukraine's defence capabilities, Finance Minister Serhiy Marchenko says.

Volodymyr Zelensky and Sir Keir Starmer, together with Chancellor Rachel Reeves, held a video call with Marchenko this evening.

Marchenko wrote on social media, external that the funds are "ensured by frozen Russian assets".

He added that he was "grateful" to the UK for "holding the aggressor accountable for the war".
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Posting on X in the last few moments, Zelensky wrote: "This loan will enhance Ukraine’s defence capabilities and will be repaid using revenues from frozen Russian assets.

"The funds will be directed toward weapons production in Ukraine. This is true justice - the one who started the war must be the one to pay.

"I thank the people and government of the United Kingdom for their tremendous support from the very beginning of this war.

"We are happy to have such strategic partners and to share the same vision of what a secure future should look like for all."

The shitshow in the Whitehouse yesterday really brought it to light - the U.S. can no longer be trusted with our secrets. Its time to leave 5 eyes. I would create a new intelligence sharing union with the other 3 members, on condition that they also leave. Inviting France and other EU states might also make sense.

The University of Cambridge has lost a High Court bid to secure “a draconian” five-year ban on pro-Palestine protests on some of its sites, rights groups have said.

The University of Cambridge attempted to argue that the injunction until 2030 was urgently required before graduation ceremonies this weekend, but the judge dismissed this application, saying he would grant only a “very narrow and limited court order” until tomorrow.

All the talk now is of how we might defend ourselves without the US. But almost everyone with a voice in public life appears to be avoiding a much bigger and more troubling question: how we might defend ourselves against the US.

As Keir Starmer visits the orange emperor’s court in Washington, let’s first consider the possibilities. I can’t comment on their likelihood, and I fervently hope that people with more knowledge and power than me are gaming them. One is that Donald Trump will not only clear the path for Vladimir Putin in Ukraine, but will actively assist him.

Now consider our vulnerabilities. Through the “Five Eyes” partnership, the UK automatically shares signals intelligence, human intelligence and defence intelligence with the US government. Edward Snowden’s revelations showed that the US, with the agreement of our government, conducts wholesale espionage on innocent UK citizens. The two governments, with other western nations, run a wide range of joint intelligence programmes, such as Prism, Echelon, Tempora and XKeyscore. The US National Security Agency (NSA) uses the UK agency GCHQ as a subcontractor.

cross-posted from: https://lazysoci.al/post/22556077

The BBC have consistently been on the wrong side when it comes to Palestine.

Two of Britain’s best-loved museums have been forced to defend their financial ties to BP after the company announced this week that it was abandoning its climate targets to focus on growing fossil fuel production.

The British Museum and the Science Museum, which have sponsorship deals with BP, said the company’s decision to grow its investments in oil and gas by cutting back on green spending would not alter their relationship with it.

The two museums have come under fire from campaigners for their ongoing association with the company, which said this week that its optimism in the green transition had been “misplaced” and it would now invest the vast majority of its capital in fossil fuels.

In Donald Trump's White House the vibes really matter. The personal relationships he develops with other leaders can affect how those nations are treated.

So it was vital for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer to not only master the details of their discussions but to build a rapport with the US president.

The invitation from King Charles clearly set the right tone. Trump looked truly flattered that he would become the first person to enjoy a second state visit to the UK.

"And that's a great honour, because it's never happened before," the president said at the start of their joint news conference. "I really do call it an honour, but it's not for me, it's for our country. It's respect for our country."

The very diplomatic language deployed by Sir Keir over Ukraine – like praising Trump for creating the conditions in which a ceasefire is being discussed – could not disguise the disagreements over what a peace deal may end up looking like.

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The warm atmosphere and friendly body language we saw when the two men first met in the Oval Office just before lunch did not seem quite so pronounced when they emerged after talks about three hours later.

"You are a very tough negotiator… I'm not sure I like that, but okay," Trump told Sir Keir as they appeared before reporters after their meeting. And he did not seem to be entirely joking.

On the prospect of trade tariffs being imposed on UK exports to the US, the prime minister did seem to have made some progress.

Trump said Sir Keir had worked hard and "earned whatever they pay him over there" when he made the case for a trade deal between the two countries instead of tariffs. That would count as a significant victory for Britain, though any proposed deal would inevitably require lengthy and detailed negotiations.

A United Nations rapporteur has criticised the University of Cambridge for seeking a High Court injunction to ban pro-Palestinian protesters from entering or interfering with access to key university sites.

Gina Romero, the UN special rapporteur for Freedom of Assembly, on Thursday urged Cambridge to refrain from "regulations that contravene international standards [on] human rights protection, and to stop harassing and stigmatising the university-based pro-Palestine solidarity movement".

The UK is in talks with Mauritius about handing over the territory but continuing to lease one of the islands, Diego Garcia, which contains a UK-US military airbase.

However, progress has been delayed to allow the new US administration to look at the details of the deal.

It comes as Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer heads to Washington for talks with Trump, where the focus is expected to be on the Ukraine war.

Asked if Trump had a veto on the Chagos deal, Lammy, who is also in the US for the visit, told ITV: "If President Trump doesn't like the deal, the deal will not go forward and the reason for that is because we have a shared military and intelligence interest with the United States and of course they've got to be happy with the deal or there is no deal."

The foreign secretary added that he still believed "it's the best deal".

Downing Street is consulting Boris Johnson's former policy chief, who described institutional racism as a myth and defended the former prime minister likening Muslim women who wear veils to "letterboxes", on multiculturalism.

It comes amid suggestions that Keir Starmer's Labour government could adopt a more right-wing approach to immigration and multiculturalism in response to the rise of Nigel Farage's Reform party.

In 2010, Mirza argued that "the more we seek to measure racism, the more it seems to grow".

She worked closely with Johnson when he was mayor of London, and strongly criticised now-Foreign Secretary David Lammy's review of racism in the criminal justice system, which found widespread racial bias, in 2017. Mirza dismissed institutional racism as a "myth".

In 2018 she publicly defended Johnson after he claimed Muslim women wearing face veils "look like letter boxes".

Poorer families are being denied millions of pounds in compensation from the NHS for maternity care failings compared with wealthier families, The Independent can reveal.

Families whose babies experience brain damage due to negligent maternity care can receive multimillion-pound payouts to cover costs relating to the child’s future care and accommodation, based on their medical need.

But a separate element covering the child’s predicted “loss of future earnings” is calculated on the basis of their family’s existing income and education levels, meaning that more affluent families get more cash.

Critics have condemned the system as “unfair”, highlighting the fact that it gives the least financial support to the families who “need it the most”, and have called for earnings payments to be linked to the average wage.

Campaigners say the retailer’s decision to advertise on the channel, contradicts its claims to be “celebrating the LGBTQ+ community” and “making M&S a place where all LGBTQ+ people feel they belong.”

Over 10,000 supporters of the ‘Stop Funding Hate’ campaign have now contacted M&S or signed a petition to ask them to pull their ad spending with the right-wing broadcaster, following incidents which included a presenter saying the LGBT+ movement included “paedos”.

Last month GB News presenter and ‘comedian’ Josh Howie referred to a statement by the Episcopalian Church calling for the “full inclusion of LGBTQ+ persons” before adding “I just want to say that that includes paedos,” while shouting the last word.

Other comments have included a discussion on trans issues on Friday 24th January, in which presenter Michelle Dewberry said: “Some of these fellas that go around dressed as women with their fake bits in their bras, they are deviants, quite frankly.”

GB News also aired claims that the trans-inclusive Progress Pride flag is associated with a “misogynistic ideology that has proven to be a direct threat to human rights” (supposedly for including trans people). A spokesperson for Stop Funding Hate told Byline Times: “Marks & Spencer has been advertising on GB News Radio… despite having made strong positive statements on both LGBTQ+ inclusion and climate. It’s had a big response from our supporters so far.”

Journalists working at Britain’s most prestigious newspapers and TV channels have expressed concern at pro-Israel bias inside their organisations. Speaking exclusively to Declassified, half a dozen current and former staff at the BBC, Sky, ITN, the Guardian and the Times have disclosed the extent of anti-Palestinian prejudice in their newsrooms.

A reporter from the right-wing Times newspaper said: “I literally cried in the bathroom so many times because of the uphill battle of trying to get things reported.”

Disgruntled staff at the liberal Guardian have compiled an “exhaustive spreadsheet” with a “mountain of examples” of the paper “amplifying unchallenged Israeli propaganda…or treating clearly false statements by Israeli spokespeople as credible”.

At the BBC, when it comes to reporting accurately on the nature of Israeli conduct in Gaza, a journalist said “the use of the word genocide is effectively banned, and any contributor who uses this word is immediately shut down.”

The former leader of Reform UK in Wales has appeared in court accused of accepting bribes for making statements in the European Parliament that would benefit Russia.

Nathan Gill, 51, from Llangefni on Anglesey, is facing eight counts of bribery and one count of conspiracy to commit bribery.

The court heard that Mr Gill, who was a UKIP and later a Brexit Party MEP between 2014 and 2020, was alleged to have received money from his co-defendant and former Ukrainian politician Oleg Voloshyn.

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The defendant is alleged to have been tasked by Mr Voloshyn on at least eight occasions to make specific statements in return for money.

The court heard the statements, made in the European Parliament and in opinion pieces to news outlets such as 112 Ukraine, were "supportive of a particular narrative" which would "benefit Russia regarding events in Ukraine".

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A lawyer for the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) told the court that Mr Gill was stopped at Manchester Airport on 13 September 2021 under anti-terror legislation.

His mobile phone was seized and evidence was found that he was in a professional relationship with Mr Valoshyn and had agreed to "receive or accept monies in return for him performing activities as an MEP", the court heard.

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He served as UKIP's leader for Wales and was briefly an independent before joining Reform's predecessor organisation, the Brexit Party, in 2019.

The north Wales politician led Reform's 2021 Welsh Parliament election campaign.

It is not clear precisely when Gill ceased being leader of Reform UK Wales, but the job has not existed for some time.