Politically incorrect tumble dryers

Traditional tumble dryers to be 'phased out' under Labour

Traditional tumble dryers are set to be “phased out” in favour of green alternatives as the Labour government continues to push to reach net zero.

By gum - this says it all.

Compared to what they should be doing, phasing out politically incorrect tumble dryers must tell us something important about the pointless, meddling mess that is UK government. 

Not even tangentially sane. 

Floaters

Labour plans to blanket lakes with floating solar farms

Ed Miliband is preparing to blanket reservoirs and lakes with solar farms as part of Labour’s push towards net zero.

The Energy Secretary will launch a consultation to make it easier to build floating solar power plants, after a report that hailed their potential as a clean energy source.

Floating solar schemes use the same panels as land-based projects but are mounted on platforms floated in freshwater bodies such as reservoirs, lakes, quarry lakes and industrial ponds.

There is a hint of desperation about this, but also revenge against those who know Net Zero can't work and Ed Miliband is mad or bad and probably both.

I bet he's not even in the union

Health and safety-mad council threatens 'wonderful' Good Samaritan for cleaning gravestones

Ben McGregor, 25, who lost his father and best friend to suicide, voluntarily washes headstones in order to "do his bit for the community".

Mr McGregor manages his cleaning requests through a Facebook page, and said he always ensures he has the permission of the grave owners before embarking on any project...

A spokesman for South Tyneside Council said: "We greatly value the work of volunteers who help care for our cemeteries and work closely with several established Friends of Cemetery groups across the borough.

"A borough‑wide memorial inspection programme is currently underway and not all cemeteries have yet been inspected."

It added that it would be "inappropriate" to allow memorials to be cleaned in areas where standard checks for safety, risk, assessments, insurance and liability have not yet taken place, and has asked all volunteer groups to pause cleaning.

One of those entertaining jobsworth stories we never seem to run out of. We've been cleaning our daughter's grave for over thirty years, but we haven't done a risk assessment, insured ourselves or checked anything to do with liability. 

Don't tell anyone though.

Inside Europe’s propaganda apparatus

Luca Steinmann has a very interesting Brussels Signal piece on Italian journalist Thomas Fazi and his investigations into the EU propaganda apparatus. A familiar issue but well worth reading, particularly in the context of what USAID has been doing in the US.

Inside Europe’s propaganda apparatus: Thomas Fazi exposes how the EU influences media, NGOs, and universities

“The European Union is facing a geopolitical crisis that is difficult to reverse. In response, it has developed a wide-ranging propaganda apparatus to promote narratives favourable to its institutions and policies. This system operates through funding directed towards NGOs, newspapers, news agencies, and think tanks that produce narratives and analyses broadly aligned with the EU’s policy framework”.

This is the view of Thomas Fazi, an Italian journalist, writer and political commentator. He is the author of several books that critically examine the economic and political structure of the European Union. His latest essay, recently published in Italy, is titled The European Propaganda Machine. The Dark Side of NGOs, Media and Universities, in which he analyses the system of funding and relationships through which EU institutions support NGOs, media, and universities in order to build consensus around their policies.

The whole piece is a useful reminder of how far the EU goes and how much it spends to undermine democratically elected governments.

“Since the European Commission is not directly elected by national electorates, this amounts to an attempt to use foreign funding to pressure or weaken democratically elected governments.”

This, Fazi argues, resembles in some respects what USAID has done for decades, where formally independent organisations often pursue political agendas aligned with the interests of their funders. From this perspective, the issue is not simply the promotion of European integration, but the use of public funds to influence domestic political processes and public debate within member states. “From this perspective, the objective is not neutrality but influence over public opinion, particularly in countries with strong eurosceptic political forces”.

YouTube-friendly exaggeration

Disposal EVs? Xiaomi's "Aluminum Replacement" Isn't What You Think

Viral videos claiming that Xiaomi has "replaced aluminum" with a new metal sound like the start of a materials revolution. The reality is more nuanced and, in some ways, more disruptive than the headline suggests. A close look at the 2026 Xiaomi SU7 and SU7 Ultra shows a blend of genuine engineering innovation, aggressive factory design, and YouTube-friendly exaggeration.

This is the video - 

China's INSANE Technology Just Replaced Aluminum! XIAOMI CHASSIS 2026

But -

Where the video comes closer to reality is in its description of Xiaomi's 9100-ton "Hypercasting" cluster. This system replaces roughly 72 stamped and welded components with a single integrated die-cast rear structure. Tesla pioneered this idea with its Gigacasting, but Xiaomi's 2026 implementation uses higher clamping force and a more complex integration of functions into one casting...

On the repair side, the story flips. Because the rear chassis is a single, massive casting, even a moderate rear-end collision can render the car a total loss. The structure cannot be easily straightened, sectioned, or replaced in modules. Insurers in 2026 are already responding with higher premiums for hypercast vehicles, echoing similar concerns seen with Tesla's large castings.

Critics warn that this could distort the used EV market: vehicles that are brilliant when new may have little or no resale value if their structural "spine" is damaged or simply deemed uneconomical to repair.

Rayner to sail back in style?

PM could bring Rayner back to avoid leadership challenge - latest

Sir Keir Starmer has offered Angela Rayner a Cabinet return in an attempt to curtail a challenge to his leadership, according to reports.

Sources have told The Telegraph that amid the threat of a coup, with Ms Rayner, Andy Burnham, Ed Milliband and Wes Streeting among the possible contenders, the prime minister has offered the former deputy prime minister a route back into government to strengthen his leadership.

How about offering Ms Rayner a post where she can do something constructive about the dire state of the Royal Navy?

  

 

 

World War Eleven

 

Ed's Wind-Powered Moral Compass

'Profiting from crisis morally wrong', says Miliband as BP announces huge rise in earnings

The oil and gas producing giant BP has recorded a more than doubling of profits as it benefits from high prices from the Iran war...

Energy Secretary Ed Miliband said, "Profiting from a crisis is morally and economically wrong."

But Ed isn't the only one with a windy moral compass.

Environmental groups have reacted angrily to the results

"The oil industry's capacity to profiteer from human misery is almost limitless," said Greenpeace climate campaigner Maja Darlington.

Oil companies, "destroy the climate, push up the cost of living, and rake in billions in profit while innocent civilians die", said Patrick Galey, the head of news investigations at NGO Global Witness.

The Political Armour of the State

A plausible view of UK politics over recent decades is that we aren’t supposed to take it too seriously. For example, only relatively small numbers of people take the major UK political parties seriously enough to join. Even 0.5% of voters would be a substantial party membership, so what are the parties for? 

Perhaps political parties project an unserious view of democratic politics because voters don’t take them seriously enough to become members. The symbiosis of political doom we might call it –

You don’t take us seriously so we don’t take you seriously.

Maybe it was inevitable that what we end up with is mostly political theatre, attracting actor politicians prepared to cater for that. Over time, voters tire of the performance but politicians know this is their destiny. It’s a gamble they have chosen and what voters voted for.

Ruling political parties expect to be booed off the stage eventually, but there are compensations. Politicians have the prestige of being an MP or Minister, plus salary, expenses, social contacts and further opportunities - compensations their talents would not usually have attracted beyond politics.

Inevitably the State tends to take advantage of unserious political parties. The complexity of government, the brief tenure of Ministers, the lack of experience all allow the State to ensure that its internal functionaries are not too heavily damaged by failure. Politicians end up damaged instead, they absorb the damage, shift the blame and move on if it won't be shifted. Political parties have become the political armour of the State. Voters let it happen.

A lack of realism

Scotland’s political parties accused of ‘lack of realism’ over manifesto plans

Scotland’s political parties have been accused of a “lack of realism” over how commitments made to voters ahead of next week’s election will be funded – with a new report claiming all the major parties do not appreciate “just how tough the fiscal challenges” will be for the next government.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said that a slowdown in cash from the UK Government, combined with growing demands – and costs – for health and social care and devolved Scottish benefits, together with a “hangover from some bad budgeting habits” by the last Scottish government means whoever is in charge after May 7 will find their budget “under significant pressure”.

In a paper published 10 days before polling day, the IFS said that plans to either expand the welfare state, as proposed by both the Scottish Greens and the SNP, or alternatively to cut taxes – as put forward by both Reform UK and the Scottish Conservatives – would require “difficult decisions elsewhere in the Scottish budget”.


It is worth pointing out that a lack of realism is what most voters vote for. If political parties venture out onto the thin ice of realism, they are likely to find out what inadequate support feels like and ease themselves back to the safety of caveats and vague aspirations.

Those “difficult decisions elsewhere in the Scottish budget” are the thin ice. Most voters don't vote for difficult decisions. The Scottish Greens and the SNP wouldn't even exist if they did.

Blame Game

Starmer to chair ministerial meeting focused on economic impact of Iran war

Sir Keir Starmer will lead a meeting of the Iran crisis committee on Tuesday as he warned the impact of the Iran war could continue “for some time”.

The Prime Minister will convene the meeting with representatives from the Bank of England to discuss the war’s economic impact in the shadow of rising oil prices.

He told the Usdaw union’s conference in Lancashire that he had called the meeting “so you can be sure we will stand by working people in this crisis”.


It's theatre because theatre is what political parties do. Behind the theatre there will be a faint sense of relief that a new and moderately plausible script may have arrived in the nick of time.

Until May 7th perhaps, but for voters it's all a bit Scylla and Charybdis.

The Next Move?

Keir Starmer says nobody told him he is UK Prime Minister.

In a jaw-dropping revelation today, it emerges that Sir Keir Starmer claims he was never told about being UK Prime Minister.

“Established systems and procedures were not followed, I was never formally notified that I am the UK Prime Minister,” Sir Keir claimed. “It is an appalling lapse of procedure that this was not done.”

When questioned by further about this remarkable claim, Sir Keir added “The official appointment paperwork never crossed my desk and indeed I never signed a formal appointment contract. I now accept that I am Prime Minister, but those responsible must be investigated.”

Well you never know, could be his next move, there isn't much else left.

No good for commuting though

 

The line from Angela

Rayner says it's now or never to kick out Keir as former deputy plots her No10 putsch with allies

Angela Rayner has told Labour MPs the time to oust Keir Starmer from No 10 is ‘now or never’ as the Prime Minister faces a critical week in his fight for political survival.

With the former Deputy Prime Minister now the frontrunner to succeed the embattled Sir Keir if he is toppled, backbenchers claimed that Ms Rayner and her allies were spending the weekend canvassing support among her colleagues.

One MP said: ‘The line from Angela is that it needs to happen now otherwise this deadly stalemate will drag on forever. That it’s now or never.’

What a choice, surely the party has better options than this. Politics has never seemed closer to a substandard TV soap opera desperate to hang on to a dwindling audience.  

A Sinister Poster in a Doctor's Waiting Room

 

The almost impious pace of twelve miles an hour

All western coaches had been quickened lately by tidings of steam in the North, which would take a man nearly a score of miles in one hour; and though nobody really believed in this, the mere talk of it made the horses go. There was one coach already, known by the rather profane name of Quicksilver, which was said to travel at the almost impious pace of twelve miles an hour.

R. D. Blackmore - Perlycross: A Tale of the Western Hills (1894)


The novel was published in 1894 but set in 1835 to 1836 when Blackmore would have been ten or eleven years old living in the rural Doone country of Exmoor. Imagine his excitement as a boy in an age of horses, carriages and carts when he first heard tales of a magical machine from the North which could carry passengers almost twenty mile in one hour.

Come to think of it, I only averaged about 18 miles per hour for my daily Nottingham commute. Progress I suppose.

Psychodrama

Unpopular Starmer is a hindrance on the doorstep, Labour mayors warn as they fear local elections wipeout

The widespread unpopularity of Sir Keir Starmer and his government – largely fuelled by “psychodrama” in Westminster – is hitting Labour hard on the doorstep, three regional mayors have warned as they brace for major losses in next month's local elections...

Jonathan Brash, the MP for Hartlepool, this week called on the government to “get a grip” as he became the first Labour MP to call for Sir Keir to go over the Madelson saga.

“I am completely fed up to the back teeth of this psychodrama in Westminster, the own goals that are coming from the heart of this government,” he said.

Psychodrama? 

Psychodrama, an experiential form of therapy, allows those in treatment to explore issues through action methods (dramatic actions). This approach incorporates role playing and group dynamics to help people gain greater perspective on emotional concerns, conflicts, or other areas of difficulty in a safe, trusted environment.

BBC Folk

It’s remarkable how easy it has become to guess that certain people rely heavily on BBC News for their grasp of current affairs. They emphasise and de-emphasise as the BBC does, ignore what the BBC ignores, exaggerate what the BBC exaggerates.

The most striking aspect is how easy it is to detect. Not so much a lack of curiosity, but comfortably managed curiosity. Heavily managed in the case of the BBC.

What on Earth is the point of the Lib Dems?

Elliot Keck has an entertaining Critic piece on the Lib Dems and the remarkable level of political irrelevance they have achieved.


What on Earth is the point of the Lib Dems?

With neither power nor principles, the party is an absolute waste of space

Power versus principles — it is the trade off that is at the heart of politics. To what extent should a political party sacrifice its deeply held principles in the pursuit of winning an election?

It is not a new question, or one that has only appeared in the context of democratic politics. It was the central theme in the first part of Sir Thomas More’s Utopia, which was published during the reign of Henry VIII in the 16th century. In a discourse between More and the fictional philosopher Rapheal Hythloday, More argues: “You must not abandon the ship in a storm because you cannot control the winds… You must strive to guide the business as well as you can, and what you cannot turn to good, you must at least make as little bad as you can.”

The whole piece is well worth reading because at the moment, polls suggest that about 12% of UK voters would vote Lib Dem. What do they think are they voting for? More paddle board stunts from Ed Davey?


So what is the excuse of the Liberal Democrats? There is no party in British politics more guilty of slavishly and pathetically following public opinion than Ed Davey’s and his gang of do-gooders. I remember sitting next to one of them on the Politics Live sofa — a bloke called Ben Maguire. In 45 minutes not a single intelligent word came out of his mouth. All he could manage was absurd and unrelated outbursts about Liz Truss, Tufton Street and anything else his staffer had no doubt mentioned to him prior to going on national television to humiliate himself in the belief that these almost Tourette’s-like tics might appeal to a certain slice of middle England.

 

Chinese robots are racing in half marathons and we can't even automate the Tube

James Price has a useful CAPX piece on robots, their rapid development and how Britain is plodding along at the back somewhere. Well worth reading on our meandering journey through the treacherous green swamps of Fabian Mire.

The robot race is on, and Britain is falling behind

• Chinese robots are racing in half marathons and we can't even automate the Tube
• Britain can address its robotics lag in a free market way
• There is an existential fear about the future among today’s political class

Can a robot write a symphony? Can it turn a canvas into a beautiful masterpiece?”
Can you?

This exchange from the film ‘I, Robot’ (and later parodied in a million memes) captures human fears and concerns about coexisting with robots, and what it means to be human. Fast forward 20 years, and artificial intelligence is getting pretty good at composing both music and paintings, while my artistic efforts are worse than Shia LaBeouf’s performance in that film.

It has been weird to see AI become so effective at these skills before machines have become competent in the physical world, where they have long been hopelessly poor. No longer.

Last weekend, the ‘Lightning’ humanoid robot won the Beijing E-Town Humanoid Half Marathon in 50 minutes 26 seconds, beating Jacob Kiplimo’s human world record by nearly seven minutes. Last year, in the inaugural event, the winning robot took 2hrs 40min 42sec, something even I can just about beat. In 12 months of progress, that is a 70% improvement. As impressively, in 2025’s race, only 6 of 21 robots even finished. Last weekend saw more than 300 robots, including entries from all around the world – 40% ran autonomously.

Examination of attitudes

Examination of attitudes when buying a house: Government argues about explosive encroachment on property rights

In Berlin, the dispute over a possible test of conviction when buying a house is escalating. The background is a draft from the Federal Ministry of Construction by Verena Hubertz, who belongs to the SPD. According to the available reports, municipalities should be able to intervene if the buyer is suspected of "anti-constitutional tendencies". In addition, the Office for the Protection of the Constitution and the BKA are to be involved in the examination, while the ministry explains that the text is still being coordinated by the departments. The initiative therefore hits a highly sensitive core of the rule of law, because not only criminal offenses, but already political suspicions could have consequences for the purchase of residential property.

The real scandal, however, lies deeper than in a usual departmental debate. If the state links the purchase of a house to a preliminary examination, it shifts the line between danger prevention and political selection. Property would then no longer be just a question of contract, financing and compliance with the law, but at the same time of the state's assessment of the person of the buyer. This is precisely a pattern that free societies must strictly limit.

Why Is The World Becoming So Ugly?

 

Labour’s dishonesty has become intolerable

Joseph Dinnage has a useful CAPX reminder of Keir Starmer and Labour's underlying problem, dishonesty. Incompetence too, they aren't even competent at hiding the dishonesty. 

A familiar issue of course, but the whole piece is well worth reading because as Dinnage says, the dishonesty is becoming intolerable. Intolerable? This suggests some kind of major upheaval may be lurking on the political horizon, quite apart from the May elections.


Labour’s dishonesty has become intolerable

• Between Peter Mandelson's sinophilia and Chris Pincher's wandering hands, we've suffered sleaze for too long
• Keir Starmer will ultimately leave Britain in an angrier and materially poorer position than when he found it
• Whoever leads Britain into the next decade must be guided by one principle above all: honesty

It takes a special kind of political crisis to make a right-winger agree with Diane Abbott.

As Keir Starmer faced MPs on Monday over his appointment of renowned sinophile and friend of Jeffrey Epstein Peter Mandelson as ambassador to the US, Abbott struck at the heart of the Prime Minister’s weakness. Portraying himself as feeling as hurt, betrayed and confused as the rest of the nation, Starmer insisted time and again that he believed due process had been followed. But as the Hackney MP pointed out, ‘ordinary people don’t really care about process and procedure, they want transparency and they want to know that they have confidence in the words of elected politicians’.

She’s absolutely right, and at one time Starmer seemed to think so too.

Has it had an impact?

Earth Day started as a US 'teach-in' 56 years ago. Now it's a global event

Millions of people around the world will pause Wednesday, at least for a moment, to mark Earth Day. It's an annual event founded by people who hoped to stir activism to clean up and preserve a planet that is now home to some 8 billion humans and assorted trillions of other organisms.

Here are answers to some common questions about Earth Day and how it came to be...

Has it had an impact?


Indeed it has -

 

Hang on - this circus is all clowns

‘Dismissive approach’ from No 10 over Mandelson vetting process, Robbins says

The former top official at the Foreign Office said there was a “dismissive approach” to Peter Mandelson’s security vetting from Sir Keir Starmer’s No 10.

Sir Olly Robbins, who was sacked by the Prime Minister last week over the failure to disclose Lord Mandelson’s failed security checks – but he was granted developed vetting (DV) clearance anyway, said there was pressure from Downing Street to clear the appointment.


Ed Miliband to give major energy speech as fury erupts over 'lunacy'

Ed Miliband's "anti-oil and gas stance" will fuel fresh price hikes for families already struggling with the cost of living crisis, critics warned.

Energy Secretary Mr Miliband will "double down, not back down" on the shift to clean energy, including speeding up the rollout of renewables and electrifying heating and transport to get homes and businesses off fossil fuels.


Reeves’s cash Isa reforms in chaos

Rachel Reeves’s plans to penalise savers who hold cash in investment accounts have stalled despite months of Treasury meetings, The Telegraph understands.

In last year’s Budget, the Chancellor announced the controversial cut to the cash Isa limit from £20,000 to £12,000 for under-65s from April next year.

HMRC said later that it would penalise savers trying to use loopholes to circumvent the limit, including putting cash into stocks and shares Isas.

But industry sources told The Telegraph that after months of talks, the Treasury has not made crucial decisions about how the rules on investment accounts would work in practice.

Quality Accouting Center

With delightful accuracy, Babylon Bee hits yet another nail firmly on the head.

Ilhan Omar Assures Public Her Finances Were Handled Honestly By Professionals At 'Quality Accouting Center'

 

Source

Pylon Men (1956)

 

The reality of the Starmtrooper’s ambition

Felix Hardinge has a fine Critic piece on what he calls Soft-Play Britain, the shallow and superficial urban schemes which go no further than trying to make the place look a bit nicer.

Soft-Play Britain

Britain’s governing class talks of growth and grandeur but focuses on planters and paint schemes

On X, you see the little impulses and fixations that ani§mate [sic] the people who actually run Britain. And time and again, the revelation is the same. The people who speak most grandly about “doing things” and “growth” in practice, to be obsessed with cycling infrastructure, shopfront beautification, pedestrianisation and the general moral necessity of making places look a bit nicer.

No government has embodied this dissonance more perfectly than Starmer’s. The promise was of restored standards in public life fused to technocratic seriousness: growth, competence, a bright (and green) industrial future, perhaps even a faint revival of that old Blairite hum of modernisation. This vision could not, at least initially, be laughed out the room. Unlike the stagnant 2010s, the world has begun to recover some sense of technological momentum, above all in artificial intelligence and in space: NASA’s Artemis II mission launched on 1st April, and this week completed the first crewed lunar flyby since Apollo 17.

Yet the reality of the Starmtrooper’s ambition is far more often the moral and aesthetic world of the municipal functionary: traffic management, frontage improvements, “public realm” tidying, and an endless preoccupation with making everything feel safer, softer, and more convivial. Millennials were the first generation to invent the “kidult”, so it makes sense that they should wish to turn the streetscape into a kind of giant soft-play area.


The whole piece is well worth reading as anyone paying attention here in the UK must see such kidult streetscape schemes all over the place.


That is why these schemes so often feel less like urbanism and more managed irritation: not a positive vision of how to build better places, but a negative politics of making existing habits harder. In practice, as Chris Bayliss notes, the supposed policy substance often dissolves into a motte-and-bailey: the attractive claim that everyone should live near life’s necessities, followed by silence when asked how those amenities are actually to be made economically viable where they do not already exist.

Replica Activists

Greenpeace installs 'wind farm' at Trump's golf resort

Environmental campaigners have staged a renewable energy demonstration at Donald Trump's golf resort in Scotland, installing mock wind turbines on a green to protest his stance on fossil fuels.

Greenpeace confirmed that three activists set up six small, replica wind turbines on the fourth hole green at Trump Turnberry Golf Club in South Ayrshire at approximately 6.30am on Monday.

The demonstrators later removed the turbine models as golfers approached, ensuring their round was not disrupted.


At least we don't have to subsidise them.

Britain is poorer than people think

Matthew Lesh has a useful CAPX piece on an old British problem, the sluggish nature of economic growth. Worth reading, although voting for political charlatans and loons who don't believe in economic growth is also an old British problem. They don't believe in education either. 


Britain is poorer than people think

• New polling shows that growth still matters to the British public
• Britons know something has gone badly wrong – they just need to see how far we’ve fallen
• The public want prosperity, not excuses

Not too long ago Keir Starmer was banging on about how growth is his ‘number one mission’. Now, with the economy once again faltering – real GDP grew by an anaemic 0.1% in the last quarter of 2025, following an equally disappointing 0.1% in the previous quarter – we are hearing a bit less on this topic.

But have no doubt: the British public still dreams of a more prosperous society.

An expansive new public opinion research project, published by the Institute of Economic Affairs and undertaken by Freshwater Strategy, highlights that despite widespread pessimism, few have given up. When asked whether the UK should focus more on growth, an overwhelming 87% agree, compared to just 9% who say the country is already wealthy enough. This view cuts across the usual political divides, with strong support across genders, age groups, educational levels and regions. We may have a more divided politics than at any time in modern history, but there’s at least one thing pretty much everyone agrees on: growth.

Monday to Friday

Monday

Labour put on united front as Starmer, Rayner and Burnham reunite at breakfast club

Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Angela Rayner joined Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham at a visit to a school's breakfast club.


Friday

No invite for Starmer? Rayner and Burnham spotted holding late-night meeting in Manchester fuelling talk of a leadership challenge days after pair were all smiles with PM

Angela Rayner and Andy Burnham have fuelled speculation about a challenge to Keir Starmer after being spotted holding secret late-night talks.

Greater Manchester mayor Mr Burnham was seen leaving Ms Rayner's constituency home in the city late on Friday, days after they played happy families with the PM on the campaign trail.

Ms Rayner is seen as a leading candidate to run for the leadership if Sir Keir is challenged in the wake of a poor showing in the May 7 local elections.

No way Lammy wasn’t told

No way Lammy wasn’t told Mandelson failed vetting, says former foreign secretary

Exclusive: In an interview with The Independent, former foreign secretary James Cleverly sets out the reasons why ministers must have known Peter Mandelson had failed his security vetting

It is “inconceivable” that Sir Keir Starmer and David Lammy were not told about Peter Mandelson failing the security vetting process for the role of US ambassador, a former foreign secretary has claimed, amid growing accusations that the prime minister scapegoated the head of the Foreign Office in order to save himself.

Describing his own recent experience, Sir James Cleverly, who was foreign secretary from 2022 to 2023, said: “I cannot envisage a universe where someone senior in the Foreign Office wouldn’t have sat down with the foreign secretary and said something to warn about this.”

Hmm, so the highest Ministers in the land are not entirely truthful. 

Queen Anne is dead too apparently.

The colour of intolerance

German survey finds Greens voters least tolerant of differing opinions

Supporters of Germany’s Alliance 90/The Greens are the most likely among the country’s main political groups to say they become annoyed when confronted with opinions that differ from their own.

The poll, conducted by the Allensbach Institute for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, asked respondents whether they are often annoyed by people who hold completely different political views or whether they usually have no problem with it.

According to the results published on April 17, 28 per cent of Greens voters said they are often annoyed by differing opinions, the highest figure recorded among the main party electorates.


Probably not a surprise, but given the survey uncertainties there are no dramatic differences overall. This finding is interesting though -


A majority of respondents — 57 per cent — said there was at least one person in their family or circle of friends with whom they believed it made no sense to discuss political topics because opinions were simply too far apart.

The boiling frog effect

AI use causing ‘boiling frog’ effect on human brain, study warns

Turning to AI to complete tasks may be eroding people's ability to make an effort to think for themselves and makes them more likely to give up, new research has found.

This could leave us in a "boiling frog" scenario, in which the capabilities of our brains are progressively compromised as we lean on AI more heavily, the study warns.

An international team of researchers from the University of Oxford, MIT, UCLA and Carnegie Mellon said their research provides evidence for two alarming consequences of using AI to help complete tasks: "Reduced persistence and impairment of unassisted performance.”


It is worth suggesting an alternative view here - that AI and the wider internet may possibly reduce the boiling frog effect for those paying attention. 

Taking it further - it is almost possible to divide people politically into those who notice the boiling frog effect affecting their lives and those who don't. Governments and politicians have always known about it. As the AI explanation says -

Explanation of the Concept

The boiling frog effect is based on an anecdote in which a frog is placed in a pot of water that is slowly heated. The story suggests that if the temperature increases gradually, the frog does not perceive the danger and is eventually boiled alive. While this story is not literally accurate in biology, it serves as a powerful metaphor for human perception and behavior. The key idea is that gradual changes are often overlooked, whereas sudden changes would trigger an immediate response.

We are so doomed

 

Investing in Indulgences

Paraguay expects over US$1 billion in Singapore carbon credit investments

Paraguay's government expects investments from Singapore in carbon credit projects to exceed $1 billion, Environment and Sustainable Development Minister Rolando De Barros said on Wednesday, as a delegation from the Asian nation visited Asunción led by Sustainability and Environment Minister Grace Fu Hai Yen, accompanied by 20 business executives.

De Barros said President Santiago Peña received the delegation and expressed confidence that if “all processes of interest with Singapore are completed, more than $1 billion can be generated between both governments,” without specifying a timeline for the investments, EFE reported.

A chap is bound to wonder if Ed Miliband has looked into this. Would it be cheaper and less destructive to replace the entire UK Net Zero policy with bits of paper purchased from Paraguay?

Starmer faces calls to quit not quitting and just quit

Starmer faces calls to quit after revelation Lord Mandelson failed vetting for US ambassador role

Security concerns about appointing Lord Mandelson as UK’s chief diplomat in Washington were overruled

Sir Keir Starmer is facing calls to resign after it was revealed Lord Mandelson failed security vetting but still became ambassador to the US.

The Prime Minister has been accused of misleading parliament after repeatedly insisting due process was followed in the appointment of the disgraced peer and that he had been vetted in the normal way.


Maybe someone is counting the number of times Keir Starmer has faced calls to quit, but this security vetting malarky does miss the starting point of the whole debacle, the starting point which everyone knows anyway -

How the blue blazes did anyone in government, including Sir Keir Rodney Starmer, how did they ever imagine for one millisecond that Lord Mandelson was a suitable candidate for British ambassador to the United States?

Lens Making in the 1600s

Interesting video on how Antoni van Leeuwenhoek might have made the tiny lenses he used to make hundreds of simple, single lens microscopes using techniques he kept secret.

EU Raises Price of Indulgences

Brussels sets new CO2 price – EU drives up import costs in the middle of the crisis


In the midst of the tense situation surrounding the Iran war, the EU Commission in Brussels has set the first fixed CO2 price for its new border tariff, thus creating an additional cost risk for importers, industry and agriculture. For the first quarter, the reference value is 75.36 euros per certificate of the CO2 border adjustment mechanism CBAM. Imports of steel, aluminum, cement and fertilizers are affected. The fees will apply to imports from January 2026, while the necessary certificates will not have to be purchased until 2027. The critical point, however, lies in the timing of this decision, because supply problems and rising costs are already massively burdening the markets due to the Iran war. The main consequence is therefore clear: companies have to plan for new additional costs, farmers continue to come under price pressure and Europe's dependence on sensitive supply chains remains.


Meanwhile -

Million-dollar fraud with invented wind farms

The German case is so destructive because it hits the core of the business. According to reports on the ARD documentary, Hendrik Holt is said to have obtained around ten million euros with accomplices and relatives. Alleged wind farms were sold to foreign energy companies, although these projects did not actually exist. In addition, according to reports, there were forged documents, bogus structures and bribery. The judiciary sentenced Holt to almost nine years in prison. So the damage did not occur in spite of formal processes, but in the middle of them.

Eco-Dentistry

 

Something Zack Polanski and the Green Party could pursue is dentistry without links to the hated oil industry via local anaesthetics such as lidocaine. 

Unfortunately for eco-zealotry, this is produced via various chemical pathways beginning with such oil-derived compounds as xylene. 

Maybe the Green Party could promote eco-dentistry without anaesthetics at all? 

As an alternative to oil industry pain relief they could promote dentists' chairs with straining bars attached. Eco-patients would take a firm grip of the bars during the more painful eco-procedures.

Alternatively and with Zack's background, hypno-anaesthesia could be promoted as a way to enhance the efficacy of the straining bars.

Beefed-up Becomes Beefed-down

'Corrosive complacency' - Lord Robertson tears into Starmer and Reeves in extraordinary intervention on defence spending 

Labour's ex-defence secretary accuses the prime minister of risking the country's security by dragging his heels on how the government will fund a beefed-up military in the face of the growing threat from Russia.

UK military chiefs asked to find £3.5bn in savings - and get ready for war

Insiders told Sky News that military top brass are meeting to discuss funding pressures - at a time the government also wants to carry out a programme of re-armament.

Okay - but at what age do they grow out of it?

The age at which children begin to exhibit deceptive behaviour

• A new study has explored the age at which children begin to exhibit deceptive behaviour, with some parents reporting recognition of the concept as early as eight months old.
• Published in the Cognitive Development journal, the research involved surveying parents of more than 750 children aged up to 47 months across the UK, US, Canada, and Australia.
• Findings indicate that about a quarter of children understand deception by 10 months, and half by 16 months, becoming more adept fibbers by the age of three.
• Elena Hoicka, the study's lead author from the University of Bristol, highlighted how children's understanding and use of deception evolves significantly in their early years.
• Researchers identified 16 types of deception, noting that younger children's deceit is often action-based, while older children employ more complex tactics like exaggeration, fabrication, or withholding information.

  

The government’s nutrient profiling model

Lidl and Iceland become first retailers to have ads banned under new junk food rules

Lidl and Iceland have become the first retailers to have advertisements banned under the UK’s new rules restricting the promotion of junk food.

The Advertising Standards Authority said ads from the two supermarkets breached regulations introduced on 5 January, which ban HFSS products (foods high in fat, salt and sugar) from being advertised on TV before 9pm and in paid-for online advertising at any time.

Under the regulations, confectionery products such as sweets and chocolates automatically fail the government’s nutrient profiling model and are classed as less healthy, meaning they cannot be promoted through paid online advertising.

Admittedly supermarkets do sell what Mrs H and I see as junk food, but we wouldn't ban supermarkets from advertising it even if we could.

The interesting aspect is the government’s nutrient profiling model which has been around for a while. Interesting because it's yet another example of the mind-boggling depths to which government micro-management has descended. 

The current version is Nutrient profiling model 2004 to 2005 which gives this brief outline of how it works -

The Nutrient Profiling Model 

The nutrient profiling model was developed by the Food Standards Agency (FSA) in 2004 2005 to provide Ofcom, the broadcast regulator, with a tool to differentiate of foods on the basis of their nutritional composition, in the context of television advertising foods to children. The model uses a simple scoring system where points are allocated on the basis of the nutrient content of 100g of a food or drink. Points are awarded for ‘A’ nutrients (energy, saturated fat, total sugar and sodium), and for ‘C’ nutrients (fruit, vegetables and nut content, fibre and protein). The score for ‘C’ nutrients is then subtracted from the score for ‘A’ nutrients to give the final nutrient profile score. Foods scoring 4 or more points, and drinks scoring 1 or more points, are classified as ‘less healthy’ and are subject to Ofcom’s controls on the advertising of foods to children on TV.  

Bad news for ‘annoying people’

Digital ID consultation: Bad news for ‘annoying people’, good news for future governments – and five other things we learned

  

Source

At a Downing Street event launching the consultation, chief secretary to the prime minister Darren Jones (pictured above) told PublicTechnology and other reporters that new forms of identity are key to his administration’s vision of “government-by-app”...

…and levelling the playing field for service users who aren’t ‘annoying’
A world in which citizens can use digital platforms to access government services and information at any time of their choosing is one that will be much more egalitarian, Jones claimed...

“People often end up getting to the front of the queue because they [are] being a bit annoying. And, so, if you’ve got the time to ring and ring and ring and say: ‘Where is the answer? Where am I in the process?’, you do get treated differently to the person who doesn’t have the time to do that. And that’s just inherently unfair, because it means you’re not prioritisng [sic] people in a fair way in terms of their need for support.”


Naturally all this has nothing to do with throttling Freedom of Information requests or anything as annoying as that.

Nothing to do with bureaucrats erecting digital walls between the bureaucracy and those 'service users' who aren't annoying because they no longer have any way to be annoying.

Carney Doubled

 

No issues ever seem to be resolved

Adam James Pollock has a topical Critic piece on the recent round of industrial action by doctors and what it tells us about the many failures of political oversight when faced with powerful bodies such as the BMA.


Why are doctors special?

Doctors have a lot less to complain about than other workers

Britain these days is a crucible of permacrises. No issues ever seem to be resolved; the goalposts for complaints are being constantly moved. One such problem which has reared its ugly head, despite previous assurances that the issue was finished, is that of pay strikes by junior doctors.

They are back. This is the fifteenth round of industrial action by doctors since March 2023. The problem is becoming so severe that the Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, is considering taking a page from the playbook of that classic Labour heroine, Margaret Thatcher, and banning strikes.

The Government’s last offer, which the British Medical Association (BMA) rejected as being wholly inadequate, would have left the average resident doctor 35.2 per cent better off than they were four years ago, according to Streeting. Their pay has already risen by over 30 per cent since 2023, with the majority of this coming under the Labour Government. I would wager that this is a significantly larger pay rise than you, dear reader, or I have experienced in the same period. Why, then, are medics so implacably unhappy?


A familiar issue but the whole piece is worth reading as a reminder that union leverage still matters in certain areas of the public sector. 

The doctors should be paid more. So should the warehouse workers, the small business owners, the weary 30-year-olds who are considering opting out of their pensions in order to add an extra £75 a month into their Lifetime ISAs in the hopes of buying a house. The difference is that none of these people are in a position to shut down an NHS trust for the best part of a week and generate a month of consistent media coverage in order to be given yet more money from the taxpayer.

The question of whether resident doctors are sufficiently compensated is a legitimate one. It is, however, a great deal less urgent than the question of why no other workers seem to matter.

Mark needs a smarter plan

Canadian prime minister Mark Carney may have a plan but past performance tells us it won't be smart enough.

Mark has a Plan

Mark Carney’s party sweeps to victory in three special elections

Canadian prime minister Mark Carney’s Liberal Party has secured a slim majority in parliament after winning three key by-elections and attracting several opposition MPs to switch sides.

The Liberals now hold 174 of 343 seats in the House of Commons, allowing them to pass legislation without relying on other parties and potentially remain in power until 2029.

In a statement, Mr Carney congratulated the three newly elected Liberal MPs and said that the voters “have placed their trust in our new government’s plan”.


His scheme was defeated by the unforeseen and unforeseeable. His failure illustrates the truth of Herbert Spencer’s dictum that social phenomena are too complex for prevision to be possible. But without prevision, no plan can be devised that will certainly produce the effects intended. That is where social reformers and all sorts of other planners fail.

R. Austin Freeman - The Jacob Street Mystery (1942)

Maybe someone has joined the dots

Rachel Reeves’ wealth fund pumps £600m into Rolls-Royce SMR

Rachel Reeves’ flagship wealth fund has announced a fresh heap of financing for Rolls-Royce SMR following its tie-up with Ed Miliband’s state-owned energy company.

The National Wealth Fund has revealed a £599m financing package for Rolls-Royce Small Modular Reactors (SMR) in a bid to kick start delivery on its project with Great British Energy.

The partnership will see the creation of the UK’s first small modular reactors as part of the government’s drive for clean energy.

Small modular reactors are designed to produce up to about one-third the electricity of conventional reactors. Developers argue that small reactors can be constructed more quickly and cost-effectively than larger power reactors, with scalability to meet specific local demands.

Some interesting political language here such as "Rachel Reeves’ flagship wealth fund" plus  "tie-up with Ed Miliband’s state-owned energy company" and "part of the government’s drive for clean energy". 

Maybe someone has joined the dots for Team Reeves while Keir Starmer still whizzes around the international circuit trying to get someone to notice him. 

There won't be any admission that Ed Miliband and Net Zero are both absurd, not yet, but the language has an entertaining touch of lessons learned.

Not Your Party

Your Party 'over' in Scotland following mass resignations

It comes just two months after the Scottish founding conference in Dundee

The leadership of the Scottish branch of Jeremy Corbyn’s Your Party has resigned en masse, citing the “consistent disrespect” shown towards members by the organisation down south.

The 12-strong Interim Scottish Executive Committee (ISEC), which was made up of volunteers, accused the UK leadership of a “dismissive attitude” towards Scotland.

Amusing of course, but worth reminding ourselves that when he was leader of the Labour Party, millions voted for Jeremy Corbyn in his bid to become UK Prime Minister in the 2019 General Election.

A sobering thought, but it is still worth asking if Corbyn would have been worse than Starmer. What a question that is though - I think I'll go for a walk round the garden instead of considering it.

Strained

Streeting admits Trump relations 'strained' after recent attacks

• Wes Streeting, the health secretary, branded Donald Trump's language as "incendiary, provocative, outrageous" but urged people to distinguish between his words and actions.
• Streeting criticised Trump's personal attacks on the Prime Minister, including comparisons to Neville Chamberlain, and his statements about wiping out a civilisation.
• He labelled Nigel Farage a "plastic patriot" and condemned both Farage and Kemi Badenoch for initially supporting Trump's stance on Iran.

Oh dear Wes, your only concern is "strained relations" with voters and you know why those relations have festered since the general election. 

As you know, it's your ghastly, mendacious boss "Sir" Keir Starmer and his "words and actions". Yours too for that matter, although you do seem keen on salvaging something from the mess. 

How are the negotiations with resident doctors going? Strained?

Praise from Ed Davey - can't go lower than that

Starmer 'deserves credit' for handling of Iran war but must do more to help Britons with rising costs, says Sir Ed Davey

The Liberal Democrats leader told LBC the Prime Minister to go further as fuel prices surge.

Speaking to Lewis Goodall on Sunday, the Liberal Democrats leader called on the Prime Minister to do more to support people struggling with rising costs due to the war.

It comes as fuel costs have surged following the outbreak of the Iran war, which has led to the Strait of Hormuz, a vital transit route for much of the global oil supply, being blocked as fighting rages on.

Okay, the headline isn't quite accurate because praise from Jeremy Corbyn would be worse, but even a modest accolade from "Sir" Ed Davey is pretty grim.

Headline and Video

Labour 'turning a blind eye' to Traveller encampments and 'letting communities down'

Labour is accused of "turning a blind eye" to Traveller encampments by ending a requirement for councils to count the number of caravans twice a year. Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp said the Government is "concealing the truth and masking the true scale of the challenge local residents and the police face". The former policing minister claimed Labour is pursuing a "soft-touch approach" which is "letting communities down".

Zack Polanski’s rental populism

Maxwell Marlow has a useful CAPX reminder that the fog of war should not divert our attention from nutters closer to home. This time it's not Keir Starmer's legion of useful idiots, it's Zack Polanski's.

Worth reading as another reminder that most political rhetoric is driven by whatever low information voters can be persuaded to support. It is not aimed at those who pay attention to how political rhetoric is used and why.

Zack Polanski’s rental populism won’t help anyone

• Rent controls will only make our housing crisis worse
• From Berlin to Stockholm, rent controls have failed wherever they have been tried
• If the Greens were serious about helping urban renters, they would be campaigning for planning reform

The Green Party has a new plan to solve the housing crisis that is simple: make it worse. With local elections looming, the Greens are set to offer rent controls and various measures against ‘commercial housebuilders’ as part of their local election offer. It is the political equivalent of treating a fever by smashing the thermometer. It might feel satisfying for a moment, but nobody ends up healthier.

At their 2025 conference, the Greens formally adopted a motion to seek what they called the ‘effective abolition of private landlordism’. They want to end buy-to-let mortgages, impose rent caps and build 150,000 social homes a year through public acquisition and council-led construction. It is the most radical housing platform of any party with elected MPs while also being the most economically illiterate. An impressive feat.

Warning Booster

Warning lights for a coming war are flashing red – and Britain is not prepared

Almost all warnings and indicators that a wider war is coming are flashing red and it is "breathtaking" that the UK government is failing to better prepare, a top academic has warned.

Dr Rob Johnson, director of the Changing Character of Conflict Centre at Oxford University, said China is taking the steps that would be expected to have the ability to attack Taiwan, while Russia could well be readying to launch military operations against a NATO country.

This comes on top of Vladimir Putin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which is in its fifth year, and the US and Israeli war against Iran.

Mr Johnson has compiled a list of 80 "indicators of conflict preparation and coming armed attack" by drawing on the lessons of history, including the run up to the Second World War.


That's odd. Only last month it was climate indicators flashing red. 


'Every indicator is flashing red,' says UN as it warns of record 'climate imbalance'

The Earth is close to breaching the key warming threshold of 1.5C - beyond which increasingly severe and compounding climate impacts are triggered.

The answer of course is startlingly simple. What we need is a warning light warning light. This special warning light would be one which flashes red when the next warning light is about to start flashing red, thus giving us a double dose of warning. 

To be, or not to be, that is the question

How often should you wash your sheets and clothes?

Bath towels absorb moisture and the dead skin cells each time one takes a shower. And when wet, they may easily form habitats to bacteria and mould. It is advisable to wash the towels after use on approximately three occasions to ensure that their hygiene is maintained.

To be Green, or not to be Green, that is the question.

What would Greens say about taking a shower in the first place? There is no way round it, taking a shower involves the feckless pollution of water, whether tap water or rain water. Washing sheets, towels and clothes simply adds to the pollution.

How about not having a shower and regularly bashing clothes with a stick to knock out any unwanted lodgers? Could work and we may as well try to be constructive about the problem. A stick bashing approach does sound reasonably Green.

Moving on to flint kitchen utensils...

Ann Packer 1964 Tokyo Olympics, 800m world record

Commentary by David Coleman who becomes quite excited.

The weight of optimization

An interesting TechRadar piece which embraces a range of assumptions and speculation about the future of the internet.

 
The bifurcation of the internet is coming

We’ve quietly crossed a threshold. For the first time in the internet’s history, bots outnumber humans online. This milestone signals a deeper shift in how the web functions and for whom (or what) it’s designed for. What started as an ecosystem built by and for humans is increasingly becoming one optimized for agents.

There are 8 billion humans today, and there will likely be about 8 billion in a decade. Human growth is linear. Agent growth won’t be. Within the next few years, I believe an 80/20 internet will emerge: 80% agentic traffic, 20% human...


However speculative it may be, the piece is worth reading. The paragraph below for example, where the intriguing phrase 'weight of optimization' is used. It is possible to imagine a development such as this, but where would it take us if AI works as its proponents expect? Perhaps we should hope it doesn't.


Emotion gives way to precision. The internet that was once chaotic, occasionally quirky, and deeply human starts to flatten under the weight of optimization.

Lanyard Class Fiasco

Multimillion-pound push to transform 'broken' UK military is a 'fiasco'

A multimillion-pound push by the defence secretary to transform how the UK rearms and fights is a "fiasco", with too much focus on changing structures instead of preparing for war, according to interviews and conversations with a dozen defence sources.

Time has even been spent inside the Ministry of Defence (MoD) quibbling over the name of a new organisation charged with procuring billions of pounds worth of weapons - despite war gripping both the Middle East and Ukraine, and Donald Trump mocking British military weakness.

Two sources said some people would like to rename the newly established National Armaments Director Group, or NAD Group, as the Royal Armaments Directorate.

One of the sources claimed this was in part because the abbreviation "NAD" also means testicle - an unfortunate source of amusement. The other source said it was because the word "royal" would engender a greater sense of pride.

Sounds serious. If they can't agree on a name then the lanyards won't be ready for the first round of meetings. 

We are not customers

HMRC lifts lid on £1bn-plus programme to ‘create a generational shift in customer service’ with single taxpayer view

HM Revenue and Customs has revealed details of a new major project set to be worth more than £1bn and intended to “create a generational shift in customer service” by creating a single unified view of each citizen’s interaction with the tax system.

The department has revealed that its Enterprise Customer Relationship Management (ECRM) programme is a recent addition to the government’s major projects portfolio. Details of the scheme were contained in a newly issued transparency document formally announcing the appointment of HMRC senior official Mike Beddington as the project’s senior responsible owner.

Surely there are many more accurate words than 'customer'. There are many better words than 'service' too. 

Maybe HMRC should stick 'taxpayers' which is at least accurate, although it may not be so easy to find a more suitable word than 'service'.

Correcting the blunt language shortage

Opposition leader says personal income tax in Spain can drop if government would steal less

Alberto Núñez Feijóo, leader of Spain’s main opposition People’s Party (PP), has promised to cut personal income tax from the first year of a future PP government.

He and staked his political future on the pledge, declaring he would resign as prime minister if Spaniards end up paying as much tax as they do under the current Socialist administration...

In unusually blunt language, Feijóo told the audience that there is “margin” to reduce taxes and improve services “if superfluous spending is eliminated and nobody steals within the government”.

If governments rake in significantly more money than it costs to run the machinery of government then what do we call it? 

If the welfare state becomes so bloated and unaffordable that heavy taxes drive people and businesses away, then we need blunt language to describe what is going on. If politicians don't even know where all the money goes, then we also need blunt language to describe the consequent lack of democratic accountability.

Blunt language is not abuse, but serious problems with the machinery of government have to be described in terms harsh and accurate enough to make political points worth making.

Attack of the Opinion-Page Generals

Peter O'Brien has a topical Quadrant piece on Trump, Iran and the tendency of so many commentators to assume their views should count. As O'Brien points out, that's not Trump's view and there is no reason why it should be.
 

Attack of the Opinion-Page Generals

I watched President Trump’s address to the US nation last week on Sky News. My immediate reaction was that he had done a pretty good job. So, I was startled at the overwhelmingly negative reaction of commentators Laura Jayes and Jonathan Kearsley. It seems that the President had failed to answer their questions. That he had added nothing new to what he had already told them. They seemed genuinely puzzled by this dereliction on the part of the leader of another country. Did it occur them, I wonder, that they were not included in Trump’s intended audience?

A few minutes earlier, Jayes had expressed the view that the Iran incursion might just be the next logical step in a strategy that involved the US becoming even less dependent on the Middle East for oil. The lightbulb glowed, however dimly, with the appreciation that there might be method in his madness. But that thought seemed to evaporate immediately post Trump’s address.


The whole piece is well worth reading as a reminder that Operation Epic Fury was not intended to please anyone Trump and the US do not need to please at this time. This includes numerous journalists, celebrities, pundits,  politicians and national leaders such as Keir Starmer.


If only President Trump had stuck to the ‘rules-based order’ and acted with the steely determination of, say, President Obama or the crystalline moral clarity of, say, President Biden, oil would still be below $100 a barrel. That has been the maysayers’ chorus. Of course, Iran would be that much closer to having a nuclear bomb. But would they use it? Probably not. Maybe not. Fingers crossed.

Knock Knock

Rayner's 'workers' rights police' get powers to arrest, use 'reasonable force' and search buildings

Angela Rayner's 'jobs police' have powers to arrest people, use 'reasonable' force and seize documents while conducting workplace searches, it has been confirmed.

The Fair Work Agency (FWA) is being established as part of Labour's overhaul of workers' rights via the Employment Rights Act.

The legislation, which was spearheaded by Ms Rayner before her resignation as deputy prime minister last year, began to take effect this week.

A new document published by the Government has now detailed the powers that the FWA - dubbed Labour's 'jobs police' - has to enforce workplace laws.


That's Starmer's Labour, the party in love with the notion of policing everything...

Although come to think of it, I don't pay Mrs H for cutting my hair...

Crikey.

Ed's Dream

 

From Dave R

Rodney tries to climb aboard

Starmer heads to Gulf as he says he will ‘support US-Iran ceasefire’

Sir Keir Starmer is set to travel to the Gulf on Wednesday to meet allies in the region and discuss diplomatic efforts to “support and uphold” the ceasefire deal between the US and Iran.

The prime minister welcomed the news of the agreement reached between Washington and Tehran overnight, saying it will “bring a moment of relief to the region and the world”.