- “EU plans to overhaul policy forcing nations to take in asylum seekers” – The EU is planning to overhaul the 1951 Refugee Convention that forces nations to take in asylum seekers, reports the Mail.
- “Burning a Quran shouldn’t be a crime” – A man has been arrested on suspicion of a “racially aggravated public order offence”. That’s a lot of words to say “blasphemy”, says Brendan O’Neill in the Spectator.
- “Man admits burning the Koran in Manchester, ‘triggered’ by his daughter’s death in the Middle East” – A man has admitted a racially and religiously aggravated public order offence after setting fire to a Koran which was live-streamed on social media, according to Rayo. He’s been released on bail is due to be sentenced in April.
- “Angela Rayner to set rules on Islam and free speech” – Angela Rayner is planning to create a council on Islamophobia and is lining up a former Tory minister to lead it, reveals the Telegraph.
- “Donald Trump hints UK might escape US trade tariffs” – The US President has fuelled fears of a global trade war, vowing levies on the “atrocious” EU and forcing Starmer to choose between Washington and Brussels, reports the Mail.
- “Starmer refuses to side with Europe after Trump trade war threat” – The PM says choosing between Brussels or Washington is not an “either/or” question in the wake of a US threat to impose tariffs on EU, reports the Telegraph.
- “Reeves to review £700 million tech tax as trade war looms” – Rachel Reeves is gearing up to review a £700 million tax on American tech giants as Trump escalates a global trade war, says the Telegraph.
- “Jaguar Land Rover EU factory move backfires as tariffs loom” – Jaguar Land Rover’s decision to build its Defender model in the EU after Brexit is at risk of backfiring as Trump threatens Brussels with sweeping tariffs, reports the Telegraph.
- “The era of free trade is well and truly over. We must look out for Britain first” – Trump’s tariffs may backfire domestically, but in the meantime we must do everything in our power to protect ourselves, says Robert Tombs in the Telegraph.
- “Britain’s growth forecast slashed after tax rises shatter business confidence” – Britain’s growth outlook has been slashed for 2025 as the economy struggles with tax rises, high borrowing costs and a slump in business confidence, reports the Telegraph.
- “Starmer voice coach travelled between lockdown tiers in new rule-breaking row” – Keir Starmer’s personal voice coach appears to have travelled more than 50 miles between lockdown tiers to meet him while Stay at Home orders were in place, says the Sun.
- “Pity poor Leonie Mellinger, voice coach to Keir Starmer” – Some jobs are from Hell. Voice coach to Sir Keir Starmer is one of them, writes Quentin Letts in the Mail.
- “Starmer hands prisoners pay rise at cost of £4.4 million” – Labour has handed prisoners their first pay rise in eight years at a cost of £4.4 million, according to the Telegraph.
- “Angela Rayner signs off on council tax rises of up to 10%” – The Deputy PM has given six councils permission to raise bills beyond the ‘maximum’ 5% and without the need for a local referendum, reports the Express.
- “Reform UK leads Labour in YouGov poll for first time” – For the first time, Reform UK leads Labour in a YouGov poll, hitting 25% as Labour drops to 24% and the Tories to 21%, according to GB News.
- “Turn the clock back and scrap the Supreme Court” – In the Telegraph, Charles Moore argues that Britain should reverse Blair’s reforms by restoring the Lord Chancellor to power and abolishing the Supreme Court’s constitutional role.
- “Ed Miliband will crucify your savings along with the economy” – The ‘high priest of Net Zero’ is importing hardship and poverty – and doing nothing to ameliorate climate change, says Brian Monteith in the Telegraph.
- “CDC holds no evidence for claim that Covid vaccines do not alter DNA” – The CDC and Australia’s TGA claim Covid vaccines don’t alter DNA – but they have no evidence, and internal emails show they knew it was possible but stayed silent, writes Rebekah Barnett on her Substack.
- “Vaccine injury groups – Anna Morris KC’s closing statement” – The UK Medical Freedom Alliance highlights Anna Morris KC’s fierce closing statement at the Covid Inquiry, slamming the broken social contract and demanding justice, compensation and care for the vaccine-injured.
- “Dirty deeds done dirt cheap” – On the WATN? Substack, Profs Martin Neil, Norman Fenton and Mr Law expose the rejection of their paper on the “cheap trick” – a long-standing statistical sleight-of-hand misclassifying the vaccinated as unvaccinated – as proof that peer review remains as captured as ever.
- “Surrogacy is a huge business – and an exploitative one” – Surrogacy is a booming $18 billion baby trade where the rich buy, the poor sell and mothers are mere waste products in a world where every part of a woman is up for grabs, says Suzanne Moore in the Telegraph.
- “Take Trump’s plan to relocate Gazans seriously, not literally” – The US President is trying to force Middle Eastern leaders to take more responsibility for the Palestinians, writes David Christopher Kaufman in the Telegraph. And that’s a good thing.
- “Canada folds to Trump’s demands and strikes $1.3 billion border deal” – Canadian PM Justin Trudeau has announced a 30-day pause on swingeing tit-for-tat tariffs and said he would push ahead with a massive round of border security measures after crisis talks with President Trump, reports the Mail.
- “Trump’s tariffs are already bearing fruit” – The US President seems to be using the tariffs for coercive rather than revenue-raising purposes, notes Tim Stanley in the Telegraph.
- “All the shocking ways USAID spent your money” – The Mail breaks down some of the most shocking ways the Agency for International Development has spent US taxpayer money.
- “Trump sets Government dark with web pages stripped from internet” – More than 8,000 web pages from across the Government have been taken down as President Trump demands the federal workforce comply with new orders destroying DEI, reports the Mail.
- “The railway blob has taken virtue-signalling to extremes” – Rather than fix abysmal service failures, Network Rail is putting on a spectacular display of navel-gazing nonsense, says Ben Marlow in the Telegraph.
- “This ruin reveals everything that’s wrong with the National Trust” – After it was gutted by a fire ten years ago, Clandon Park has been left half-destroyed. Why has the National Trust refused to rebuild it? asks Simon Heffer in the Telegraph.
- “Even the Green party is shunning Stonewall” – At long last, Stonewall’s toxic influence on free speech, equality law and government policy is coming to an end, says Julie Bindel in the Spectator.
- “Ibram Kendi moves from Boston University to Howard University” – The Why Evolution Is True blog tracks Ibram X Kendi’s move from his struggling Antiracist Center at Boston University to Howard University, where he will lead a new institute, despite questions over his leadership.
- “The BBC always knew that Russell Brand was a lout” – If you regret having sex with Russell Brand in a disabled lavatory, then perhaps don’t go into a disabled lavatory with Russell Brand and take all your clothes off, says Rod Liddle in the Spectator.
- “SNP drops idea of cat ban after mockery” – John Swinney has insisted that the Scottish Government “is not going to be banning cats or restricting cats”, according to the Herald.
- “Columnist Sarah Vine’s car ‘rammed by Porsche in road rage attack’” – Sarah Vine says her car was rammed by another driver in a road rage incident while driving through South West London with her daughter, reports the Standard.
- “This one is for you” – Keir Starmer and his wife Victoria dutifully clapped at the height of the pandemic. But were they clapping for ‘essential workers’ such as voice coaches?
— TimForAlI(@timmyvoe) February 3, 2025
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” It seems like almost any kind of coalition is possible – except the Right-wing government that Germans actually voted for, says Elisabeth Dampier in the Spectator.”
Give it a rest. Did anyone who voted CDU/CSU/FDP think they would get a “right wing” government. About 20% voted for a “right wing” government – the rest are idiots or lefties.
Yep, older people, young women and the migrants who can vote are hardly likely to have voted AfD. What a let down, despite the significant gains AfD have made this election it doesn’t make any difference going forward. It’s obviously a case of, ”Meet the new boss, same as the old boss…”
”Following his party’s victory in federal elections on Sunday, Friedrich Merz, the likely next Chancellor of Germany, rejected overtures from President Donald Trump while calling for “independence” from the United States and accusing Washington of election interference.
On Sunday, German voters firmly rejected the former leftist governing coalition of Social Democrats and Greens in favour of the supposedly conservative Christian Democrats and the populist-right Alternative for Germany (AfD).
However, the successor to Angela Merkel and likely incoming chancellor Friedrich Merz, whose party came first in Sunday’s vote but fell well short of a majority with just 28.5 per cent of the vote, was quick to reject a right-wing alliance with the AfD in favour of a left-wing coalition and to distance himself from Trump and America in general.
“I am communicating closely with a lot of prime ministers and heads of EU states, and for me, it is an absolute priority to strengthen Europe as quickly as possible so that we achieve independence from the U.S., step by step,” Merz said per state broadcaster DW.
“I never thought that I would ever need to say something like that, on television, but after the latest statements made by Donald Trump last week, it is clear, that the Americans — at any case these Americans, this administration — mostly don’t care about the fate of Europe one way or another,” the CDU leader added.
Merz went on to accuse the Trump administration of having committed election interference, likely hinting at key Trump ally Elon Musk, a vocal supporter of the anti-mass migration Alternative for Germany party,
He said that the “interventions from Washington were no less drastic, dramatic, and ultimately no less brazen, than the intervention that we have seen from Moscow.”
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2025/02/24/likely-german-chancellor-rejects-trump-accuses-u-s-of-russian-style-election-interference-calls-for-independence-from-america/
One of the problems that I see with western democracies is that there is a large part of the population, typically older people who consider themselves to be moderate and “centrist”, who are failing to understand what is going on.
They don’t realise that the people who run the main parties are not the same kind of people that used to run them. These new leaders are not the sensible, reasonable, post war, early boomer generation that used to lead these parties. They are completely different. More detached from reality, more self self.serving and more mediocre.
So these snoozing oldies as one might call them, just don’t realise what is being done and less so the harm that is coming down the line. They think that if they carry on voting for the same parties they have always voted for, life will carry on as it has, not realising it’s the complete opposite.
Their once sensible parties have the most radical transformative.policies – radical socal agenda, net zero, mass immigration, mass censorship, and warmongering..
Western civilisation is being driven off a cliff because a big chunk of our population is completely asleep at the back oblivious to it all.
100%
And there is a appreciable part of the population, typically younger people, that still believe in this stuff, the stuff that has been shown to be unrealistic, causing catastrophe.
There are a lot of snoozing oldies but have you tried to engage with the young. Too many have become depoliticised or else they mouth whatever they last heard from a D-class celeb (probably with her tits hanging out at the time).
I find young people to be fairly clued in and therefore a bit cynical. But on the whole not much different to when I was young a good few decades ago now.
This.
Boris Johnson calls for 3% defence spending
Mr Johnson demonstrates, yet again, that he has no clue…….
As we stand, today, we are effectively defenceless as a country and I am not alone in saying that.
‘The last time the UK spent more than 5% of its GDP on defence was in the height of the cold war……Each defence review since 1957 has led to cuts to the defence budget in real terms. Reductions in the military budget continue because, previously, nothing presented a sufficient sub-nuclear threat to the nation deemed significant enough to reverse them. Those cuts are now so deep that the nation is on the edge of being unable to defend itself’
Kenton White, The Defence Journal
The MoD says 3.6%
‘The UK needs to spend 3.6 per cent of GDP on defence if it wants to modernise its military while protecting its nuclear deterrent and meeting Nato obligations, according to internal Ministry of Defence calculations.’
‘The 3.6 per cent figure would raise spending to about £93bn and take the UK closer to Poland, which shares a border with Ukraine and spends more than 4 per cent of its GDP on defence annually.’
‘…with any conceivable budget, even if it is a little bit more than 2.5 per cent . . . we will not be able to address [the UK military’s] lack of readiness, war stocks and so on’
https://www.ft.com/content/42912734-5688-41ea-9194-d759c321da52
But 3.6% is nowhere near enough.
‘In 2015, the British Army’s headmark output was to be a warfighting division…….The current British Army actually fields half of one heavy brigade’s worth of equipment, split between two, and one regiment of artillery.’
‘Today, the UK promises to provide a UK Strategic Reserve Corps. A corps is formed of a minimum of two divisions, plus corps echelon troops that collectively amount to a third division’s worth of equipment…….With one UK brigade already committed to Estonia, the actual forces available for this corps appear to consist of one under-strength brigade which is short of enablers, and a deep recce-strike brigade double-hatted as both the divisional and corps fires group.’
https://rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/commentary/closing-saydo-gap-uk-land-power
And that is before we even think about war stocks of combat supplies and the ‘industrial resilience’ to sustain and replenish those stocks.
The Royal Ordnance Factories comprised thirteen industrial sites in 1984. BAE Land Systems now has only one such site.
This country, if it wishes to protect its own borders let alone muster a forward defence based conventional deterrent now requires to spend at least 5% of its GDP annually on defence.
It will not.
We are defenceless……..
We are a little bit more diverse though, and much more LGBTQXYZEIEIO friendly, and that’s what really matters.
We also have a massive cadre of very senior officers, so our leadership must also the best, because we’ve got (much) more of it.
Glad I binned it when I did, it was farcical 13 years ago, I dread to think what it’s like these days…
Didn’t you know, politicians only have to proclaim a vision, and it’s done!
Well, that’s been the idea, but it doesn’t appear to be working any more: Ukraine, Jabs, Scottish Independence, Heat Pumps, Cheap Electricity, an overwhelming love of EVs!
The demise of MAGA. And SHE should have won, in 2016.
There are all sorts of tricks the government can play with numbers. Cameron-Clegg added the cost of security services to defence spending to try to get to 2% but comparative numbers were not updated, of course.
The 2023/4 Tory increase in defence spending plans hod to cover military aim to Ukraine as well as a number of unfunded commitments.
For honest budgeting we need more detail and numerate MPs. We need journos interested in reporting the truth, but we all know how unlikely that is!!!
This is where you get the money from and the SDR is looking at it:
‘….greater investment in digital transformation, listing three urgent tasks for digital decision makers: replacing antiquated IT systems; improving the quality and shareability of data; and recruiting and retaining scarce, in-demand skills.
“The challenge is vast. Defra spends more than three quarters of its digital budget maintaining ageing systems. The MoD in part relies on kit dating back to the Cold War for defence inventory management,” he will say.
However, the Passport Office’s response to its post-lockdown backlog, improving its systems and operational management, show “it can be done”‘
“He will argue that issuing and collecting Council Tax via a Netflix-style digital platform would eliminate the duplication of effort and costs across local authorities, making for a more streamlined system and reducing annual spending from £1.11bn to around £8.5m.
He identifies other public services that could make savings and efficiencies – registrars could reduce annual spending from £110m to £0.85m through the introduction of identity verification platforms which would eliminate the current requirement for each of the 1.5 million births, deaths and marriages across England and Wales each year to be registered face-to-face.
Professor Thompson will also target Housing Associations, which manage nearly a fifth of the UK’s housing stock, arguing that a sector-wide payments and arrears service could reduce annual expenditure from £200m to £1.5m, and allow staff across the sector to be redeployed in front line customer facing roles.
“Public services are heading towards a cliff – staying the same isn’t an option anymore,” Professor Thompson said.
“Part of the problem is the massive duplication of corporate activity between public services, which wastes many billions each year, prevents our services from working effectively together, and directly defunds crucial front line services such as social housing, teachers, doctors and nurses, social care, and police on the street.
“But there is a way to for government to persuade public service organisations to adopt common ways of doing some things – by working with the private sector to develop standardised, digitally-enabled services’
https://news.exeter.ac.uk/research/exeter-expert-to-outline-radical-reforms-to-uk-public-services-that-could-save-millions/
The easy part is the spending as Viv Nicholson showed sixty years ago. The part that governments of any colour never do is to spend wisely and that’s assuming all the kickbacks are within “reasonable” limits. So carrying on about percentages is in fact simply bullshit.
It’s a start:
‘Among the new measures will be a new military strategic headquarters, chief of the defence staff, who will formally command the individual service chiefs for the first time and will “now be central to investment decisions between the services, along with the defence secretary and permanent secretary”, the MoD said.
The ministry has opened recruitment for a new standalone national armaments director (NAD) to help fix the “broken” defence procurement system and enable the MoD to better invest in new weapons and other technologies.
The NAD will be responsible for reforming defence procurement and delivering a new defence industrial strategy. They will be asked to “ensure the armed forces are properly equipped to defend Britain, to build up the British defence industry and to crack down on waste”
https://www.publictechnology.net/2024/10/30/defence-and-security/government-pledges-biggest-reform-of-mod-in-over-50-years/
“Germans won’t get the Right-wing government they voted for”
Government of the Left, by the Left, for the Left.
You can have any government you like, as long as it’s Left, Far Left, Extreme Left, Green Left, Bonkers, Schizoid or Bat-Shit Crazy.
Sorted until the next voodoo election.
Ve haf vays to make you suffer
I find it somewhat amusing.
Something like schadenfreude, I expect.
Anyone who voted for any of the Uniparty parties expecting a “right wing” government is deluded. I’m not even convinced that a lot of the people who nominally right-leaning parties are actually that “right wing” – I think of the six million who voted Tory here, lots of them are “soft left” at the least. The rich world, with maybe the exception of the US which is more polarised, has moved left.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/2018802/Parliament-restoration-riverside-thames
Floating barge? Seaworthy or not, let it ‘float’ away with the
criminals / shysterpoliticians on board, as far away from our shores as possible! That’s what they did in the good old days, shipping them off to the likes of Australia…or better still, dump them down the salt mines of Siberia. They could try an honest, hard days graft for once!Sink it?
Brutally simple – I love it!
How much better to represent selling the nation down the river.
Nailed it.
I will gladly second.
Of course if said barge was to inexplicably loose its moorings and a disaster occur, well… accidents happen.
“BBC bias is not just inept, it’s becoming sinister”
The People’s Commentariat is deepest Red, Rainbow and Gaza-Green.
Someone please pull the plug pronto on this state-sponsored panderer to international terrorism.
“On Substack, Dean V. Williamson argues that while the ‘Deep State’ might sound plausible, it’s actually political appointees at the top of administrative agencies who truly shape policy.”
Of course there’s an element of the bureaucracy wanting to perpetuate itself but I don’t buy all the hand wringing from politicians- I reckon in general they are quite happy with what the agencies do. Something to hide behind and blame.
“Britain’s woeful smart meter rollout can be traced back to a decision made by Labour during Ed Miliband’s first stint as Energy Secretary, says Tom Haynes in theTelegraph.”
I can’t read the Telegraph (actually not sure I’d want to) but I presume they mean that the rollout has not proceeded fast enough – the assumption being that dumb smart meters are solving some problem or other. I’m sick of the Telegraph.
“Jonathan Reynolds apologises for describing himself as a solicitor”
Next up, Sir Two-Tier apologising for being described as a Prime Minister.
Dream on.
Now hang on – he doesn’t know he is the prime minister now, he keeps calling the leader of the opposition PM! Must be quite alarming for him to be in that ‘illustrious’ position – it’s certainly frightening for us!
Another step towards the Truth about COVID Jabs:
https://open.substack.com/pub/lionessofjudah/p/wealthy-french-businessman-died-from?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=3hvv8j
Who runs administrative agencies?
How do you know when the public sector is far too large?
This is how you know:
‘The Environment Agency asked the Trent Valley Internal Drainage Board to cut weeds and de-silt parts of the River Smite in Nottinghamshire last year following complaints from residents and businesses about flooding.
But a week after the work began, the agency visited, ordered it to be halted and told the drainage board to refer itself to police for a potential breach of environment regulations.
The Environment Agency said while it was not clear if water voles were present at the time of the work – because a survey had not completed – their presence could not be ruled out.’
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cqly3549gxro.amp
I’m from the government and I’m here to help….or not really…..
“Hamas official admits he would not support October 7th attack now”
And what did he expect while he was supporting it? Israel to agree to mass suicide and abandonment of the land in return for releasing the hostages?
“Furious Zelensky ‘screamed at Trump’s envoy’ over woeful mineral deal”
He’ll be screaming even more today, after this:
Ukrainian parliament rejects resolution supporting Zelensky