James Austin
@JamesDAustin
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Outdoors, politics and sport, maybe not in that order. Labour. Trade Unionist. Trying to do community things. Views are entirely my own.
Bristol, England
Joined November 2009
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British politics is based on a deal: the political class engage with the detail and present coherent, realistic visions to the electorate who make a choice
We've abdicated that responsibility. Yesterdays budget just underlines that.
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It really is notable now how poor, or at least unmodern, a lot of the UK feels compared to countries you visit.
Even somewhere like Krakow, traditionally a spot people head for cheap lads holidays and seen as 'poor', feels considerably more modern than, say, Bristol.
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If you can afford afford private school fees (average: £16k p/a) you aren't middle income.
Middle income families do not use private schools for the absolute love of God. The average household income is less than the annual fee of Sunak's old school.
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While I'm not a fan of it, the Tories have been doing this sort of thing for years.
They have absolutely no moral ground to stand on.
Sliding into? Remember *your literal leader using Saville smears just 2 years ago?*
Is this where UK politics is sliding to?
Belittling your opponent rather than promoting your own policies?
If it’s not addressed
👉 the electorate will disengage
👉 good people will not stand
👉 And our int’l standing will fall
Time for a code of conduct to keep the bar high.
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Genuinely the weirdest attempt to make a culture war.
Yes, of course, I support the idea of having everything I need within 15 minutes walk and a livable neighborhood. Because I'm not a weirdo.
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Why the hell would you need a mandate from those 'whose house values are expected to plummet'.
Nationally important infrastructure shouldn't be held hostage to a few local people.
U.K. - 2,000 acres of glorious countryside in Wiltshire are being converted from land producing food into a solar farm.
England’s green and pleasant land sacrificed with no mandate from those so gravely affected their house values are expected to plummet by 50%
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This is just straight-up vandalism - and those involved should be arrested and charged.
Can you imagine the outrage if, say, Just Stop Oil did the same?
Locals in Hillingdon take down a traffic light with a ULEZ camera on it in their West London neighbourhood.
This is in protest of Sadiq Khan's policy where drivers are charged £12.50 for driving within London with a non-ULEZ compliant car. Police are forced to turn up at the
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Nothing says 'we've failed' like blaming a bloke who left office *checks notes* 17 years ago for 'still ruining Britain'
✍️ 'Tony Blair is still ruining Britain' | Writes
@miriam_cates
Read the full column here ⤵️
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Is this really working out?
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Words cannot describe how much I hate these 'progressive' takes on national teams in sport.
It basically just denies that players from minority backgrounds are 'truly' french or 'truly' English. Just reinforcing far-right narratives.
They're French.
It took a team full of Arab and African migrants to defeat Morocco.
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I preferred the old way of doing a general election when we elected all of the MPs at once rather than one by one.
The Tories' overall majority is now just 43 (down from 80 following the 2019 general election).
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I went to uni in 2008 thinking 'I'll graduate just as the economy is picking up speed post-recession'
It did not pick up speed.
Just caught myself thinking "hmm, I wonder what a boom feels like", great sign for an economy given my age
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It's astonishing. They've somehow managed to make a bill that was intended to extend the rights of tenants one which further protects landlords.
Jokers. Can't wait till we get rid of them all.
Lobbying by landlords on renters reform has worked. Govt will:
-Extend period by which a tenant can end a tenancy from 2 months to 6 months, giving landlords more protection
-Delay abolishing Section 21 while Lord Chancellor writes an assessment of the 'readiness of the courts'
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Insane stat from Dylan down the thread: that the Tories are losing roughly 23k votes p/m through natural turnover (deaths + new voters) and that, assuming demographics hold, delaying from May -> October will cost them 0.5% of their support.
Good grief
Polls currently imply a record 15½-point swing to Labour. But where is this swing coming from and can it be undone?
The largest component is Tory defections to Labour (around a third of the swing), but losses to Reform and Don't Know/Not Voting are also big parts of the story.
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Cameron is, not that quietly, turning out to be a very decent foreign secretary.
👀 David Cameron pops up in The Hill on US funding for Ukraine ... "I am going to drop all diplomatic niceties. I urge Congress to pass it."
"I do not want us to show the weakness displayed against Hitler in the 1930s."
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Good grief. In which case this has gone from 'bad policy decision' to 'wilful act of national vandalism' which is designed to stop Labour restarting the project.
Utterly shameful.
Land acquisition for phase 2a to Crewe suspended immediately…
Government to start reselling properties it bought for hs2 phase 2
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Still stunned that the Tories are apparently genuinely planning, as a plan not a emergency measure, to make 'not building HS2 to Manchester, but building it to London' the part of Rishi's speech tomorrow.
In a railway building in Manchester.
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But you have fantastic modern infrastructure: excellent active travel stuff, trams, good bus network, the public realm is in decent nick and, while its still full of stag dos and cheapish for beer, it's also got a very high end side
Does feel were being caught and falling behind
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This is why I'm very skeptical of the idea that simply adding infra or 'building beautiful' will resolve/placate Nimbyism
Fundamentally, Nimbyism is driven by opposition to change. It's deeply conservative. Most of the 'reasons' found to oppose a development are post-hoc
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Having a few responses from racists: no, the UKs failure to invest in infrastructure and local govt for over a decade isn't the fault of immigrants or multiculturalism.
That's one of our great strengths. You guys have, and will continue, to lose. Toodles.
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For referance, Diane, last year the rural community I grew up in held a 'It's a Sin' draft night raising money for the Terrance Higgins Trust in the town hall.
It sold out and was supported by the entire community.
Rural communities are not full of anti-gay bigots.
Keir Starmer now saying that rural communities are in his DNA. Bet he did not say that when he was running for Holborn and St Pancras.
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One of the things that always strikes me about arriving to and being in central Manchester is how it feels like you're in a major Place.
IMO no other major UK city (aside from London) feels like that. Not Leeds or Birmingham. Manchester feels like a metropolis.
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I'm really struggling to see how Sunak is more able than Brown, Cameron or May. Hell, while he's more competent than Johnson he's a far worse politican.
It's vibes over achievement.
The Conservatives are heading for a long spell in the wilderness. My weekend article for
@Independent
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Genuinely amazing people are trying to treat Labour having its highest share of the vote at a LE since 1997, gaining 600+ councillors and key targets as some sort of defeat and crisis for Starmer. Remarkable.
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People are *massively* underestimating just how radical Labour's 2024 manifesto is looking
With this, the Green New Deal and decarbonising energy by 2030 you've got some very transformative and ambitious policies
The rhetoric is downplaying it but don't be fooled; its big shit
Exclusive:
Keir Starmer to announce generation of new towns as he sets out plans for a 'decade of renewal'
He will pledge to build Georgian-style townhouses in urban areas
Labour will release low-quality green belt for housing - he calls it grey belt
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Well, yes. That's kind of the point.
Given this is what is on the site presently I'd say it'll be an improvement.
Cities shouldn't be preserved in sepia
Warning proposals to demolish a city centre hotel and replace it with a 28-storey tower will “change the face of Bristol”
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4.3 million children are in relative poverty. 3.6 million in absolute poverty.
Politics is about priorities. If we're spending £10.5bn I know what I'd prioritise. It's not people who were given 15 years notice of a pension change.
Don't quite understand why Labour is tying itself in knots over
#WASPI
compensation this AM...
Surely line to take is:
Opening: "The government should honour the PHSO report and compensate these women now"
Would Labour if the Tories don't? "Yes, Govt has a duty to these women"
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@thomas_violence
Certainly shows why we've had the whole 'enshittification of the internet' thing - and why Gen AI is going to make it way worse
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Of the last 7 PMs 4 have been of strong religious faith. Our present PM is a devout Hindu. The other candidate for SNP leadership is a practicing Muslim.
The idea this is 'barring people of faith' from public office is for the birds.
Kate Forbes argues on Today that there's a risk of Scotland moving into "very dangerous days"
Questions if want people of faith "barred" from high office
Repeats she wouldn't have voted for gay marriage because she backs "mainstream Christian teaching"
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Does the deep state include... the entire British public?
Liz Truss has written for Fox News ahead of her CPAC speech tomorrow. Says the "administrative state and the deep state" "sabotaged my efforts in Britain to cut taxes, reduce the size of government and restore democratic accountability"
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It's genuinely fascinating to watch what Labour are willing to get more aggressive on - and what they're backing off.
I'll admit that planning/NIMBYism isn't something I'd expected us to go big on... but I'm very glad we are.
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Also: Krakow is lovely, Poland is great and I'm going to have to visit here at some point when I'm not on a very traditional stag whose main aim is drinking
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Yeah, this.
I don't particularly like it or her. She isn't fit to be a Labour candidate.
But it's entirely the right political move: the Tories wanted to fight the GE on immigration, Rwanda and small boats. She neuters that.
She's basically just a human shield for any attacks on immigration during the election campaign, a one line answer that Starmer can drop in to diffuse any criticism/scepticism.
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I can't put into words just how much I abhor this.
The right to strike is incredibly hard won and workers only real weapon against abusive employers like this government.
To remove it is a huge, awful step and we must fight it every step of the way.
EXCLUSIVE:
Rishi Sunak is poised to announce minimum strike legislation as soon as tomorrow
It will enable employers to sue unions and sack employees if they refuse to accept
Hearing six sectors covered - NHS, schools, rail, borders, fire, nuclear
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It's genuinely remarkable how no one in the govt or commentariat seems to have noted that they delivered very similar tax cuts just 5 months ago *with no political impact.*
Why do they think it'll work this time?
Coverage of the budget just seems utterly impervious to poll after poll after poll showing the public care more about the decline in services.
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It needs to be restated, over and over again, that this is a crisis caused by central government, with cuts mandated by central govt.
And it can only be solved by central govt. Which refuses to do so.
And children will suffer as a result.
Birmingham children's services to be cut by around 25%. First wave of cuts include these. This is a very obvious disaster in the making.
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This is literally what we need to be building in centres like Peckham.
We have a housing crisis. If we are going to address it, without losing huge amounts of green space, we need to build densely.
Places like this, with excellent transport links, should be first up.
Seriously, how can this be allowed? An extremely dense & high rise development plonked down in
#Peckham
town centre. This is for
@BerkeleyGroupUK
shareholders and has NOTHING to do with needs of local people.
#NeedNotGreed
.
@PeckhamVision
@peckhampeculiar
@SouthwarkNotes
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Good example of how the Tories play politics on easy mode.
The govt is only able to afford these tax cuts because of undeliverable spending cuts. But almost no attention on what those will be.
As compared to the opposition being expected to have detailed plans within hours.
Keir Starmer derides Budget as the 'last desperate act of a party that has failed'...
But Labour can't identify a single measure they oppose/wd reverse if they win power
Party faces huge headache now Hunt has nicked policies on non-doms & windfall tax
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A fantastic example of the British planning system in action - and a disgrace
Brownfield site, not far from town, desperately needs redevelopment. 820 potential homes
Blocked for another 2 years by local Nimbys
Meanwhile, average rent in Bristol has increased by 41% in 5 years
BREAKING: Another 2 years of limbo for Broadwalk Shopping Centre as blame game begins.
Read the full story here 👇🏼
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This is entirely shameless and shows a huge amount of disrespect for those who voted for Sian to be a list assembly member.
Just treating the seat as a toy to be passed around among the party elite.
NEW:
Green Party London Assembly Member Sian Berry has resigned her seat just 3 days after winning it.
She is also the Green Party's candidate for Brighton Pavilion in the General Election.
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Labour didn't plough 'infinity money' into the NHS up to 2010 and yet we got very high public satisfaction and decent outcomes.
The story of the NHS since is one of mismanagement, lack of capital investment and failed reform. That's on the Tories.
If only the Tories hadn't decided not to plough infinity money into the NHS because they're evil.
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This is an utterly bizarre way for the BBC to report the recession.
Somehow trying to frame it as a good news story. I mean... what?
BBC verify on the recession numbers - which show mildest start to a recession for 50 years 👇
That means economy not shrinking by as much. And recession not expected to last as long.
via
@BBCNews
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The point here is not that the Tories haven't tried to be small state; it's that they have done it really badly
Demographic pressures means state spending is naturally rising. The Tories salami slicing approach has just led to the enshittification of services not a smaller state
I think you must have been AWOL for the past decade or so if you think that’s what Tory policy has been. The tax burden is now the highest for 70 years. State spending as a share of GDP is the highest since the 1970s, when your approach to the economy took us to the brink of
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Quick reminder that this happened to rents without any discussion of help.
Let's you know who the govt cares about
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Which is why, whenever someone goes on about how we have to cut immigration, the correct response is: What is your solution to our dependency ratio?
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'I support building on brownfield'
'No! Not like that!'
Properly astonishing, rejecting a dilapidated small house being replaced by some pretty nice medium density homes in an area of high housing need.
Notably, everywhere he suggests they're built are outside his constituency
I am pleased that a plan to demolish a family home on Riddlesdown Road, Purley and replace it with a large block of flats has been refused. New homes are needed but the right place for new flats is Croydon town centre, central London and brownfield sites.
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Or you could... just give them better pay and working conditions?
Not a huge amount of point in 'forcing' doctors and nurses to stay a few extra years if... they just leave immediately after that. You're just delaying the issue.
More than 15,000 NHS doctors left Britain last year.
It can cost up to £400,000 to train them.
It’s only fair on the taxpayer that new doctors and nurses should stay here for a given period of time.
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Or, you know, proportional representation. The thing that
A) the Lib Dems properly believe in
B) has relatively little political baggage
C) has strong Labour support (outside of the leadership)
D) would make the single biggest difference to their long term prospects as a party
Lot of speculation this morning about what Ed Davey would want in return for propping up Starmer. If he’s got half a brain the thing that should be top of his list is the abolition of tuition fees.
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It's hard not to conclude, after the past few days, that something isn't pretty fundimentally broken in British journalism. Totally detached from reality.
Thing is... it doesn't even help the Tories. They're killing them through kindness
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'Your council has gone bust, you can't see a doctor and your mortgage has gone up by £500. And we plan to cut public services by another 13% next year...
... but we'll abolish this tax you won't pay for 35 years so vote for us'
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IMO this largely applies to older British people. Younger ones (-40 for example) have a very realistic view of where we stand and the trajectory.
Because, you know, we're actually in work and aren't protected from it by asset wealth.
The UK has a totally unrealistic sense of its own prosperity, which is why we are not prepared to do what is necessary to reverse the trend
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Once again I want to say that this is a insane way to run and reform local government in the UK.
Really hoping Labour take a proper look at governing structures when we're in and do something to fix this utter mess
Houchen may be joined by new Conservative mayors in 2025 with elections in Greater Lincolnshire, Suffolk and Hull and East Yorkshire and Norfolk.
Norfolk delayed its election from May 2024 to May 2025.
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The
@JonnElledge
bubble again.
Genuinely, you've lost 1/2 your councillors. Had a huge, 26% swing against you in a by election. Seen basically every target marginal swing massively to the opposition. Lost North Yorkshire.
And you're saying they're mixed results?!?
Have to say I think party a bit more split than this….
There is gloom, but mixed results mean some are getting their fight back
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The obsession with Reform when Labour are hitting 47% in the polls is remarkable.
Talk about missing the wood for the trees
— the play against Sunak is to show that without a change of leader Reform will destroy the Tories
— warning of possibility Reform will crossover in polls if Farage returns
— in that scenario people like Gove, Rees-Mogg could lose seats
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I do love how, whenever we try to think of new regions/local govt, we reach back to the Anglo-Saxons. And they broadly work.
IMO this is too many regions - I'd prefer fewer regions; we aren't big enough geographically to require larger units.
My attempt (roughly 80% serious)
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Damn, how the hell have they done that? Whatever reason could it be?
It's impressive how the Labour Party has pinned high inflation and therefore high interest rates and mortgage spikes on Liz Truss.
It's to the discredit of most media that this obvious lie is widely believed.
Inflation and then interest rates rose across the world.
#PMQs
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@thhamilton
Love the first woman who just happens to have her organisation' roller banner propped up behind her. As you'd expect from your normal work
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As everyone knows, I'm not a fan of Rees-Mogg but this is awful and totally unacceptable.
Imagine if the outcry on the left if the far right did something similar? Rees-Mogg has a right to express his views without this sort of intimidation
🚨 NEW: Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg is surrounded by students after giving a speech at Cardiff University
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It says something about the cheems mindset in the UK that the concept of a cresting a Bristol underground has been reflexively dismissed
There is no reason a city of Bristols size shouldn't have a comprehensive tube/light rail network. Plenty of others do.t
🚇
#Bristol
needs a segregated mass transit system, going underground when needed – as in over 200 other cities
🚧 The alternative, that
@WestOfEnglandCA
must reject next week, is closing/making a number of major roads one-way to cars as shown
✍️
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She isn't, of course, arrested for posting a letter. She's arrested for breaking (and admitting to breaking) bail conditions.
But putting that aside: Thornberry has a consistency office she could post a letter to. Instead she's decided to film and cause a scene outside her home.
🚨 BREAKING: Arrested after Delivering Letter to
@EmilyThornberry
🚔 Phoebe has been arrested for breaking a bail condition stopping them from doing what posties do daily.
🛢️
@UKLabour
would rather young people were arrested than commit to cancelling new Tory oil and gas.
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Just cowardice and idiocy.
I'll defend a lot of compromise to win. Labour still have some properly radical policies.
But this is just cowardice. Abandoning popular policy at the first wiff of criticism.
Labour would do well to learn the lessons of the SDP and Hollande.
Labour to ditch £28bn annual green investment pledge, party sources say
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@jonwillchambers
Quite. I think the lack of investment is the massive theme - and stripping out of local council funding
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This is clearly the trap that the Tories wanted to lay with the HS2 announcement - and they're trying to spring it anyway.
But it doesn't really work when you've nuked it's credibility through that 'illustrative' list of projects
This would mean Labour cancelling the £36bn of transport projects across the country that we can now fund from redirecting resources from HS2…and finding even more money besides.
This would mean more borrowing, more debt and more inflation under Labour.
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This is genuinely embarrassing.
We've spent 20 years trying to build a railway and we can't get it past Brum. Total state failure.
Build it now and build it properly; both legs, into central London and quickly.
HS2 route north of Birmingham in doubt as Sunak and Hunt explore more cost-cuts
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Poll is clearly wrong. Shows the Greens on 5%, Lib Dems on 9% and no local residents groups anywhere. And we know from Thursday they should be sweeping the board.
Miles of Thursday's National Equivalent Share. Rubbish. Gonna be a hung parliament
Labour leads by 23%.
Westminster VI (5 May):
Labour 44% (-1)
Conservative 21% (-1)
Reform UK 15% (+1)
Liberal Democrat 9% (–)
Green 5% (-1)
Scottish National Party 3% (–)
Other 1% (-1)
Changes +/- 28 April
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@TPGRoberts
I can't decide if it's hilarious, sad or deeply concerning.
How dare they advocate... basic caring for each other in society
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Genuinely find it amazing how many friends I have who are in, say, the city or consultancy and just... vote and support Labour. They play rugby! They went to elite unis! They earn big money!
And they hate the Tories.
Totally divorce from their traditional voting bases
I know that my circle isn't Britain. And I can see polls that show I'm missing parts of Britain. And a big missing part is older Britain. But still,... it's amazing to now inhabit what should be quite Tory demographics and no-one is a Tory. Even the Tories are embarrassed of it.
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This should be required reading for any Tory
It's really notable how big the emigration thing is becoming. At both the run club party I went to on Sunday, and a rugby party on Sat, there were multiple chats about emigrating, how to do so and where to go.
'The Conservative party now faces an almost existential problem when it comes to the young'
✍️ John Oxley
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Is it because you picked a terrible, extreme candidate, have badged yourselves as the 'car party' where 46% don't drive and give every impression of hating the city?
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*wearily drags out the meme again*
Just stop guys. And build some houses.
EXC: Government considering a radical scheme to help first-time buyers by backing mortgages which would require just 1% deposits.
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This is an excellent example of how the Tories are trying to fight the opposition they want, rather than the one they actually have.
A Labour govt won't have much money to spend and every social and cultural conservative should brace themselves for a leftist-appeasing barrage of changes on liberty, free speech, 'white privilege', trans, Hospice care/ euthanasia etc
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That's because there isn't any.
What is injustice is luxury businesses being tax exempt while we don't have enough money to fund our wider education system.
Labour's class warriors refuse to see the injustice of imposing VAT on school fees
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The 'free for him' bit seems quite vital here, doesn't it?
Not sure Starmer can really be blamed for what happened to his school or universities after he left or that it shows anything about him being/not being working class
Not a journalist, but...
Reigate Grammar School (free for him, but £22,995 per annum now)
Leeds University (free for him, £9,250 per annum now)
Oxford University (free for him, £9,250 per annum now)
🤷♂️
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*turns on twitter*
*watches Stephen Frys very affecting, reasonable and vital Christmas message*
*scrolls*
JESUS CHRIST WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE
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I reckon having two over 78's running for President, one of whom is a fascist and losing his grip on reality, the other who is clearly declining, is sub optimal
Literally an hour after Biden says the President of Egypt is the President of Mexico Trump says the Prime Minister of Hungary is the President of Turkey. amazing
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Pure cheems mindset.
There is absolutely no reason that a Bristol metro system should be unrealistic; it's exactly the short of long term infrastructure we should be building across UK cities.
Just a complete poverty of ambition.
Bristol's Conservative group leader says that Marvin Rees needs to urgently put a stop to his "completely unrealistic" plan for underground sections of railway
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Caroline, your party won't even back the basics like building mass transport or pylons to transport green energy.
You have absolutely no ground to stand on.
In the face of both a climate emergency and a cost of living crisis where millions of people are struggling to pay energy bills and stay warm, Labour decide to ditch support for home insulation? Unbelievable.
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Genuinely impressive to spend £20bn on two separate lots of tax cuts and end up 4% lower than you were before them.
And to then decide the solution is more tax cuts... genius
🚨 NEW 🚨
After today's polls from Deltapoll and Redfield & Wilton, the Conservative Party is now polling *LOWER* than at any point under Lizz Truss' Premiership, at just 22.9%.
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I've resigned from
@UKLabour
. I wrote a letter because if I'm going to abandon 11 years work I may as well do it properly.
I never thought I'd do this. I thought I'd remain a member, serving a cause I loved, for all of my life. But I can't remain part of what it's become.
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For very obvious reasons I'm not a fan of raising the state pension age to 71.
But equally - we need to find some sort of solution for our aging society and shrinking tax base. And right now I'm not seeing anyone giving a better solution
Raising UK state pension age to 71 will bring ‘misery’ to millions
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@AaronBastani
Yep, that's exactly what all the voters who have left Labour are saying. Can't move for people saying 'I'd vote Labour, but for the lack of mandatory reselection.'
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This chart is genuinely really remarkable - a huge and incredibly rapid cultural change. I'd be really interested as to why, My guess would be;
- less in-person socialising
- drinking not a social norm
- cost
- impact of social media, the cost/benefit has changed
Non-drinking rapidly increasing among young English people
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The worst thing about this is that, rather than making politicians and the state rethinking how we run large projects and manage trade offs, it'll just scare us off trying anything ambitious ever again.
Truly a historic achievement to spend £1000 for every man, woman and child in the country to make the trains between Birmingham and Manchester go slower than they did before.
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Literally none of the things he mentions here specifically impact on the specific challenges young people face.
He just doesn't get it... or isn't prepared to do anything to help the young.
“Why would anyone under 45 vote Conservative?” asks
#BBCLauraK
PM Rishi Sunak says addressing the UK’s priorities, such as a well-managed economy, reducing inflation and “stopping the boats” will “make a difference to everybody, whatever age you are”
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Has Rosie, or any of the other NIMBY's, ever really explained why supply/demand doesn't apply to housing?
Or how their 'we have adequate housing if people just move hundreds of miles' approach is supposed to work?
‘It’s a supply obsession’
Rosie Pearson, Co-Founder of Community Planning Alliance, tells
#Newsnight
that the market can’t deliver the 300,000 homes target that the government has set.
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Genuinely amazing, after a by-election where Labour got its 2nd highest swing of all time just a few months out from a GE, to try and do a 'why this is bad news for Labour' line.
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This is entirely the correct approach, but would require Sian to actually build some infrastructure and support things like, you know, HS2.
Which the Greens have consistently opposed, of course.
The best kind of car is the one you don’t need to own because there are so many other choices to reach the places you need to go.
That’s why my mission is to free outer London from forced car ownership. With buses, trains and trams, and safer streets to walk and cycle. 3/end
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211
*stares*
Aye, a party getting a swing of 16% in Tees, a 26% swing in a by-election and sweeping through councils in key marginal areas won't.... get a majority.
Hard to see this as even remotely being in good faith
Sky News projection from Prof Michael Thrasher: Labour on course to be largest party at general election - short of overall majority
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£550k worth of flat.
Yes the bathroom is too small for them to get a camera in properly so they're stood in the door
The last flat I lived in in London was a 60s, 2 bed, ex-council flat above shops on Kentish Town road. Hardly posh, few damp issues
Exactly the sort of property Jarvis Cocker was thinking of when he sang Common People
You'd need a 100k+ income to afford it.
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Strikes me that Owen is *really* missing the key learning from this chart. And from, for example, the 2017 and 2019 general elections.
No good having 31% of people being delighted in you winning if *49%* are dismayed and thus *vote against you*.
Conclusive proof that Labour's lead isn't being driven by any enthusiasm for Keir Starmer, but because millions of people are fed up and furious with the Tories.
216
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2K
13
18
207
It's pretty clear now that there are two sides on this: LOTO and Miliband trying to hold the £28bn line, and Reeves/Ashworths office trying to bounce them off it.
A utter, utter mess and someone needs to make a call.
Keir Starmer has contradicted Labour’s shadow Treasury line on £28bn investment pledge.
This again leaves the policy as Schrödinger's cat: both dead and alive.
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The paradox of right-wing enthusiasm for 'privatisation': wanting former state entities to be privatised, but refusing to allow them any operational independence to actually make decisions.
Worst of all worlds.
Great that Sunak has quashed this awful idea at an early stage.
Ending Saturday post would have been devastating for weekly magazines - but the “quiet quitting” of the Royal Mail in taking 3-5 days to deliver mags posted first class is also a big threat that needs monitored.
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19
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This is pure economic vandalism.
Turning the UK into a sepia-tinged park for the old. No country for young, or even middle aged, people.
We’ve reached an understanding with Gov’t re.
#planning
& we’re discussing with colleagues.
We need a community-led,
#green
& regenerative system.
🏡🏡
#housing
@luhc
@michaelgove
@lucyfrazermp
#iwnews
@10DowningStreet
@Telegraph
@thetimes
@PA
1/17
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This is an absurd decision. 60 homes in one of the most desirable areas of the city rejected because they'd overlook two cottages.
Awful decision by councillors to initially reject it. Meanwhile Bristol rents continue to rocket.
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Aside from the basic issue of them treating women's football differently to mens (as they'd absolutely be there if the men's side went through)...
...this is just awful politics and passing up a massive, easy PR win. Totally misunderstanding the public mood
FA President Prince William and PM Rishi Sunak will not attend the World Cup final in Sydney.
@TheSpurrShow
asks: shouldn't they attend to support the Lionesses?
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