Ten Things George Soros is Funding in the UK
What’s US billionaire George Soros funding in the UK? This week a US analyst titled ‘DataRepublican‘ (on X) released a spreadsheet of grants from Soros’s Open Society Foundations (OSF) spelling it all out.
Although individual grants can be found on the OSF grant-finder, it’s the first time everything has been laid out in the same place – providing a fascinating trawl.
Without further ado, here are some examples for Daily Sceptic readers:
Ashden Climate Solutions – $200,000, 2022
Most people will have never heard of Ashden Climate Solutions, but UK taxpayers were charged £1,044,290 from 2019-23, rolled in with its funding from Soros and others. Ashden, a registered charity, runs a climate campaign for schools titled ‘Let’s Go Zero’ and has been endorsed by Green MP Carla Denyer and Labour’s Nadia Whittome. Its other funders include IKEA and BloombergNEF, which also fund C40 Cities along with Soros (Left-wing and green funding networks tend to have a lot of crossover).
Athena Foundation Ltd – $635,775, 2022
The Athena Foundation describes itself as “a non-profit organisation with a vision of a UK financial sector which properly supports society and the planet”, and claims to be a “respected interface between industry, civil society and Parliament”. Accordingly, it provides secretariat services to three All Party Parliamentary Groups (APPGs) on:
The APPG on Anti-Corruption and Responsible Tax partners with Patriotic Millionaires and Tax Justice UK, which have been lobbying hard for a wealth tax in the UK. Soros also funds the Tax Justice Network.
Best for Britain Ltd – approx. £3,946,759
From 2017 onwards – the year after the UK voted to leave the European Union – Soros’s Open Society Foundations have awarded millions to Best for Britain, an organisation that lobbies for membership of the European Union. Its campaigns have been fronted by the likes of Carol Vorderman and EU activist Femi Oluwole.
The European Movement UK – $385,572, 2017-2018
Best for Britain isn’t the only pro-EU organisation that Soros is funding. Another is the European Movement (‘Euromove‘ on X), whose Co-Presidents are Caroline Lucas and Dominic Grieve.
Euromove has access to Parliament via the APPG on Europe, which it also funds:
The European Movement has different international branches, collectively awarded $2,365,950 by Soros:
Mike Galsworthy, the Chair of EuroMove, is also Founder of Scientists For EU, another entity that’s had funding from Soros:
Rockefeller Philanthropy – tens of millions of dollars
Another organisation that’s very involved in Parliamentary affairs is Rockefeller Philanthropy, which funds the All-Party Group for Afrikan Reparations:
Last year the group held a Reparations conference, which was endorsed by Soros’s OSF. Other conference partners include Christian Aid and Operation Black Vote, both of which Soros funds. You might as well cut out the ‘middlemen’ and have the OSF award all the money needed, but I find this pattern quite often in my investigations (of funding being redistributed, and then meeting again at one source):
The Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants – $200,000, 2022-23
The JCWI is one of the most effective organisations when it comes to preventing deportations from the UK. Last year it celebrated stopping flights to Rwanda, posting on Instagram: “SUCCESS! All of our clients who were facing removal to Rwanda have now been released thanks to the tremendous work of our legal team”:
The Guardian Foundation – $515,000, 2020-22
The Guardian Foundation says its purpose “is to promote global press freedom and access to liberal journalism”. It’s received two grants from the Open Society Foundations, one to “support global reporting on vaccine equity” and another to “raise public awareness of harms related to AI and automated decisions during the Coronavirus pandemic”.
The Institute for Public Policy Research – $1,466,809, 2016-23
The IPPR describes itself as “an independent charity working towards a fairer, greener and more prosperous society”. As of this year it has authored reports on ‘How green transport can drive manufacturing growth in the UK‘ and ‘Mission-driven industrial relations: The case for fair pay agreements‘. The Left-wing obsession with ‘missions’ comes from economist Professor Mariana Mazzucato, whom I have previously written about for the Daily Sceptic.
Talking of Professor Marianna Mazzucato…
Soros awarded the UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose, of which she is Founding Director, $3 million in 2020:
So there you have it, a very small sample of some of the things Soros is funding over here.
For more information, head to DataRepublican’s spreadsheet or the Open Society Foundation’s grant finder.
Charlotte Gill regularly publishes about the use of taxpayers’ money to fund Left-wing causes and Left-wing researchers in Woke Waste, her Substack. You can subscribe here.
Chinese ‘Kill Switches’ Found in US Solar Farms
By Will Jones
Chinese ‘kill switches’ have been found hidden in American solar farms, prompting calls for Ed Miliband to halt the rollout of renewables over security concerns. The Telegraph has the story.
On Thursday, the Energy Secretary was urged to impose an “immediate pause” on his green energy blitz to review whether UK solar plants are also at risk.
The components found in the US included cellular radios capable of switching off the equipment remotely, raising serious concerns about grid security, according to Reuters.
They were found inside power inverters manufactured by unnamed Chinese companies.
Power inverters are the key links between solar or wind farms and the rest of the power system, converting their electricity so the wider grid can use it.
One source told Reuters that compromising such equipment would give Beijing the ability to inflict blackouts on the West, claiming it would create “a built-in way to physically destroy the grid”.
China has dismissed the claims as a smear. But the discovery has sounded alarm bells within the US Government and is likely to prompt a similar scramble in Britain.
Andrew Bowie, the Shadow Energy Minister, on Thursday said the “worrying revelations” should spark serious concern for Mr Miliband and called for an urgent investigation.
He said: “We were already aware of concerns being raised by the Ministry of Defence and the security and intelligence services surrounding possible monitoring technology on Chinese-built wind turbines – but given the dominance of China in solar, these developments are equally if not even more worrying.
“Ed Miliband’s Made in China transition – clean power at the expense of everything else – is a threat to our national security and makes a mockery of his claims on energy security.
“It is essential that an immediate pause and review is carried out to ensure the safety and security of our energy system.”
One industry source on Thursday said that British solar farms used inverters from a variety of sources, including Chinese, American, German and Israeli suppliers.
A UK Government spokesman said: “We would never let anything get in the way of our national security, and while we would not comment on individual cases, our energy sector is subject to the highest levels of national security scrutiny.”
Worth reading in full.
Daily Mail Misses the Real Story About Long-Term Stable Antarctica Ice in Dumb Quip About Climate ‘Deniers’
A remarkably silly headline appeared last week in the Daily Mail stating: ‘Shocking Antarctica discovery sends climate change deniers into mass celebration.’ It appears that 100 gigatonnes of ice has been added to the Antarctica ice sheet in a 21-month period to December 2023. Quite how joy will be unconfined in the ranks of the ‘deniers’ over an increase, or decrease, of 0.00041% is not clear. The amount is an ice sheet rounding error and it would be scientifically accurate to refer to it as zero. Even if the figure was a loss, it would take nearly half a million years for all the ice in Antarctica to melt and that does not include any allowance for glacial periods or indeed a new ice age. Unsurprising, in the haste to stick ‘denier’ into the mix, a far more important finding about Antarctica ice was missed. A recent paper undergoing peer review has calculated that around 2,546 gt of ice has been added every year since 1960 to the surface on Antarctica. This would almost certainly have been enough to stabilise any natural losses and it is possible that the ice sheet has been stable or even growing slowly over this period.
The figures for Antarctica’s overall ice mass are difficult to calculate. They must include losses from ice calving and melting and they are thought to total around 2,000 gt a year. Driving ice accumulation in Antarctica is snowfall and there is some evidence that the area is receiving more precipitation than previously thought. The paper led by Dr Christiaan van Dalum of Utrecht University suggests heavy recent accumulations of ice in Antarctica that appear to outweigh any losses at the coast. There is said to be increased precipitation in the mountains of West Antarctica and the Antarctic Peninsula.
It is not always clear in scientific papers just what the authors are comparing. The Daily Mail story arises from a Chinese group whose work on the Antarctica ice sheet appears to concentrate on just four eastern glacial basins. The Chinese findings suggest little or no change while van Dalum points to increases over the entire continent even allowing for significant losses due to natural events. Nevertheless, the key to understanding climate change lies in the length of the observations. Drawing celebratory conclusions over less than two years’ supposed growth is junk science, possibly designed to boost clicks and impress potential advertisers. Assessing results over 60 years as the Dalum paper does offers greater understanding of the dynamics of polar ice.
Try going back not two years but two thousand. Back to the time of the Roman warming period where temperatures were likely higher than they are today. Recent evidence suggests that the limit of Antarctic sea ice was 2,000 kilometres further south between 2,500 to 1,000 years ago than it is today. A paper published recently in Nature notes that DNA remains confirm the presence of elephant seals off Cape Hallett at 72.3°S. Elephant seals breed in sub-Antarctic ice-free waters with the largest colony now resident on Macquarie Island at 54.5°S. The Nature authors note that reduced sea ice extent between 2,500 and 1,000 years ago allowed the seals to breed further south and attain large local populations before facing an extirpation event as the ice grew northwards.
The science blog No Tricks Zone notes a 2019 paper that found evidence of elephant seal remains even further south than Cape Hallett with breeding sites on Inexpressible Island and Marble Point (79.4°S). “Land-fast ice and multi-year sea ice has become much more pronounced in coastal settings over the last millennium,” the paper states.
Perhaps it would be as well not to tell the Daily Mail that gets very excited on behalf of ‘deniers’ about a few months of possible ice movement. Or Clive Cookson of the Financial Times who suggested a couple of years ago that a cyclical downturn in Antarctica sea ice meant the area “faces a catastrophic cascade of extreme environmental events… that will affect the climate around the world”. Shortly afterwards he gave us an hysterical story headlined: ‘It looks like we’ve lost control of our ice sheets.’ Mass celebrations, it might be suggested, broke out among the ranks of mainstream alarmists at the time with headlines around the world trumpeting “mind blowing” low amounts of Antarctica sea ice. Alas, the mind blowing quote came from Dr Walter Meier of the National Snow and Ice Data Centre, who seemed to forget that he had been part of an earlier team that unlocked 1960s Antarctic ice records from early photographs taken by Nimbus weather satellites. These revealed similar highs and lows to those of a couple of years ago, and Meier observed at the time that such variations “are not that unusual”.
In a commentary on recent polar ice academic work, the distinguished science writer Roger Pielke Jr. noted that catastrophising climate change based on the most extreme claims leads to scepticism when the promised apocalypse fails to occur. Climate research is not a scoreboard in a Manichean debate, he added, but instead offers certainties, uncertainties and even areas of total ignorance.
But of course that does not support Net Zero – a politicised fantasy world where the scientific process goes to die, the science is ‘settled’ and imaginary ‘deniers’ go wild over 90 weeks of barely measurable ice growth near the South Pole.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
Chris Packham is the New St Francis of Assisi
By Sallust
Anyone who doubts that we live in a special time, when the holy walk among us to remind us of our sins, will surely have their cynicism laid to rest by the appearance of a new portrait of the environmental campaigner and naturalist Chris Packham.
The picture, commissioned by the Radio Times, shows the well-known TV presenter as the famous Italian nature-loving mystic and friar St Francis of Assisi (1181–1226). Appropriately enough, it is currently on view in a former chapel, now used to display art. The Telegraph has the story:
Chris Packham has posed as St Francis of Assisi in a portrait celebrating him as a ‘living saint’.
The portrait of the presenter and environmental campaigner is now on show on the altar of the Fitzrovia Chapel, central London.
Originally commissioned by Radio Times magazine to mark Earth Day, it is the work of photographic artist Richard Ansett.
Packham is surrounded by images of some of the UK’s most endangered species. Mr Ansett said it also made reference to Packham’s neurodiversity – the presenter was diagnosed with autism in his 40s.
“I hope that every pixel of this portrait offers a safe space for anyone challenged by neurodiversity. Packham’s remarkable connection to the natural world drives him relentlessly to save us from ourselves,” Mr Ansett said.
Packham himself, with his trademark Franciscan-style humility, has no doubt about the importance of the picture and its power to inspire others:
Packham said: “This photo is about a fundamental level of engagement, an engagement of equals. It conveys the importance of nature to heal us, provide us with a sanctuary in times of terrible trouble.
“But the species featured are also rare or declining so it serves to remind us that our one and only home, our Earth, is on a brink too many are refusing to see and act to protect and repair.
“This is a photograph about love, a love of life, all life.”
Worth reading in full.
‘Why Can’t We Talk About This?’
In this segment from Episode 35 of the Sceptic, Laurie is joined by Canadian filmmaker Dean Rainey to discuss his new documentary, Why Can’t We Talk About This?, about the plight of a Canadian man who suffered a debilitating vaccine injury.
Daily Sceptic readers can watch Why Can’t We Talk About This? with an exclusive discount: 1) Use code Sceptic50 for 50% off video stream rental or purchase on Vimeo, OR 2) Use code Sceptic50 for $5 off a DVD purchase by following this link.
Visit Dean’s website here. Donate to Mike’s GoFundMe here.
Subscribe to the Daily Sceptic YouTube Channel here.
Produced by Richard Eldred. Filmed at the Westminster Podcast Studio.
‘Trans Toddlers’ Allowed Gender Treatment on NHS
By Will Jones
The NHS is treating toddlers and nursery-age children who believe they are transgender after watering down its own guidance and removing the under-seven age limit. The Telegraph has the story.
The health service was previously set to introduce a minimum age of seven for children to be seen by its specialist gender clinics, claiming anything less was “just too young”.
The limit was removed after the proposals were put out to consultation, with new guidance due to be published showing that children of any age are eligible.
However, a source close to the consultation process said NHS England had “caved to the pressure” of trans activists to remove the limits.
The children are not given powerful drugs such as puberty blockers at the clinics, but are offered counselling and therapy along with their family.
Up to 10 children of nursery age are being treated, according to new data, while as many as 157 children aged nine or younger have been referred to the clinics.
The NHS previously said that children under seven years old were “just too young” to be considered to have gender dysphoria, citing an example of a young child taking a liking to toys or clothes typical of the opposite sex as normal.
“We know that showing an interest in clothes or toys of the opposite sex – or displaying behaviours more commonly associated with the opposite sex – is reasonably common behaviour in childhood and is usually not indicative of gender incongruence,” it said.
That draft guidance, published in 2023, added that by seven years old, “children may have more developed their cognitive, comprehension and communication skills to an extent that they will be able to engage with health professionals”.
The guidance was drawn up after the Cass review into children’s transgender services, led by the paediatrician Baroness Cass, found the NHS had been sending children on a one-way path to change gender at the Tavistock clinic.
Doctors routinely prescribed puberty blockers despite a lack of evidence to support their safety and effectiveness, and instead of assessing for other conditions.
The clinic was closed as a result and the NHS began opening more ‘holistic’ regional gender clinics as part of plans to move away from a ‘medical model’.
Last month, the Telegraph revealed that these plans included testing all children for neurodevelopmental conditions such as autism and checking their mental health.
The number of nursery-aged children referred to the new services is said to be “fewer than 10”, according to data released by the NHS under freedom of information laws.
The exact number of under-fives was withheld in order to prevent them from being identified, but with 157 children under 10 waiting to be seen, it raises the prospect that dozens of under-sevens have been referred to the clinics as a result of the about-turn.
The NHS said it was following the Cass review’s recommendation not to set an age limit and that any care for children aged under seven would be focused on family support and advice.
The Cass review recommended that children who wanted to socially transition be seen as early as possible by medical professionals in order to identify and address any mental health concerns or neurodevelopmental conditions.
The Government has also thrown its support behind the move, insisting it is following the recommendations of the review.
Worth reading in full.
Renaud Camus on the Destruction of Western Education
For anyone still thinking this Government does not have a problem with free speech, the Home Office’s absurd decision to ban the French writer Renaud Camus from entering our shores ought to be an eye-opener. As Steven Tucker’s two recent articles in the Daily Sceptic have shown, Camus’s talk of a “Great Replacement” is both wider and more subtle than the many critics who have not read the book think it is.
There is much more to Camus, however, than the partly misunderstood The Great Replacement (2011). Two of his other works – The Great Deculturalisation (2008) and De-civilisation (2011) – offer a devastating critique of early 21st century French culture and education. I first came across Camus eight years ago when putting together a book arguing for a traditional ‘liberal’ education based on the transmission of Matthew Arnold’s “the best that has been known and thought”. Camus came across as a writer in the same camp as other educational conservatives such as T.S. Eliot, Michael Oakeshott, Hannah Arendt and Mario Vargas Llosa whose ideas I was studying. What they had in common was a vision of education as the passing on of a cultural inheritance from one generation to the next and a rejection of the idea that it might be used as a vehicle for promoting contemporary causes.
At a time when Bridget Phillipson, the Secretary of State for Education, is threatening a new “modern, inclusive and innovative” school curriculum – we all know what those words are likely to mean – and one of our leading exam boards has urged putting diversity and climate change at the heart of this curriculum, it would be good to try and see through Camus’s acerbic lens what our current elites’ ideas about education can tell us about the underlying forces at work in our society.
Camus’s key thesis is that, since the late 18th century, the custodians of high culture and civilisation have been what he calls la classe cultivée – by which he means the highly educated and ‘cultured’ parts of the bourgeoisie – and that the education system, even when eventually opened up to other social classes, took this class as its model, aiming to pass on ‘the best’ to ‘the rest’. This, however, was only sustainable when the dominance of ‘the best’ was unchallenged. With the creeping egalitarianism of what he calls ‘hyperdemocratic’ societies ‘the rest’ begin to set the tone for the whole of society. Camus is not opposed to democracy, but to the extension of the democratic and egalitarian spirit to all other aspects of life in ways that are culturally and educationally disastrous.
School in this increasingly egalitarian world ceases to be ‘a place apart’ in which one is inducted into worlds very different from home and in which one may need to unlearn some of the things learned at home. In an egalitarian society the barriers around the school are broken down and the world of the outside majority ends up setting the tone. When schools put ‘the disadvantaged’ at the centre of their concerns (as egalitarianism demands) the transmission of high culture inevitably takes second place.
Egalitarianism also requires, says Camus, that ‘those who have’ must have what they have taken from them in the interests of the majority. He does not expand on the point, but would recognise the Labour government’s decisions to cancel funding for Latin classes, remove freedoms from academy trusts and make parents of children in private schools pay twice as textbook examples of what he has in mind.
Camus’s thesis that the collapse of a country’s traditional class system inevitably leads to deep educational and cultural decline is over-simplified big picture stuff – shared by others such as T.S. Eliot, Mario Vargas Llosa and the Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben – but nonetheless a useful heuristic device which, like other grand theses (such as the Marxian dialectic on which it draws) illuminates connections that might otherwise pass unnoticed while failing to fit every situation to which one applies it.
In Camus’s hands it explains a great deal.
First, it helps to explain the nature of the new technocratic class that has superseded the old classe cultivée. It is a class full of what he calls the ‘tragic human type’ that is immensely proud of the number of diplomas it has accumulated since it left school but which lacks any deep culture. Instead of leaders steeped in France’s cultural traditions – de Gaulle and Mitterand setting good examples by their enthusiasm for writers like Chateaubriand and Voltaire respectively – one has politicians like Sarkozy and Macron. For Camus the nadir of the new elite was reached when Sarkozy in 2007 made his first visit as President of France to the USA and, under the cupola of the Capitol in Washington, invoked Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe “to underline the affinity of his generation… with the United States”. Never has cultural proletarisation “been so strikingly manifested”, observed Camus, “as on this occasion from the mouth of a head of state of an old nation of great and high culture”. As for Macron, Camus sees him as the epitome of the derided ‘Davocracy’, the globalist movement committed to wiping out national distinctiveness.
Second, Camus shows how the collapse of the old culture leads to a general dumbing-down of the whole of society. The old culture, whatever its faults, meant manners, restraint, self-control, respect for the achievements of the past and an acceptance of authority. Its collapse has created problems for adult-child relationships in families and in schools. It has led to infantilism and a loss of seriousness. Why else, he asks, has Versailles been reduced to a place full of “Bugs Bunnies, petites souris (little mice) and Manga robotic heroes”?
The changes, he points out, are most noticeable in the use of the word ‘culture’, which has now been reduced to its basic meaning of that which is common to a whole society. The idea of a type of culture which is an aspiration has disappeared. This is illustrated in the role of ministers of culture now seen as a portfolio dealing with sport, digital technology and mass entertainment, not with ‘high culture’. When de Gaulle appointed France’s first Minister of Culture in 1959, he gave the post to André Malraux, famous novelist, art historian and public intellectual. In 2014 under François Hollande the post went to Fleur Pellerin, graduate of the prestigious Sciences Po and ENA, one of Camus’s diplômés sans culture (culture-free graduates), who admitted on appointment she had not read a single book during the preceding two years.
Camus often refers to this cultural desert in which he thinks we now live as the dictatorship of the petite bourgeoisie. This is where my hackles start to rise. Having had a happy lower middle class childhood there is nothing I hate more than the haut bourgeois disdain for ‘the little people’ prevalent among sections of the technocratic and progressive elite by whom we are currently ruled, as it was among some members of the old elite. Camus, however, deploys stereotypes of the petit bourgeois not to sneer at lower social classes but to draw attention to characteristics he sees as prevalent throughout societies that have culturally pushed aside their traditional elites. The new elites, he argues, are as pervaded by petit bourgeois attitudes as the rest of society, maybe even more so.
Among petit bourgeois characteristics, in addition to egalitarianism and infantilism, he also includes a lack of courage, a demand never to be offended, a preoccupation with what people say rather than what they do, a sense of victimhood, a euphemisation of discourse, a pervasive sentimentalism, a refusal to listen to anyone who counters one’s basic beliefs, and a deep distrust of freedom of expression. It is ironic that some of these unattractive characteristics are the very ones likely to have led our Home Office to cancel him.
What then ought we to do to escape from this dictatorship of the lower middle class? Camus does not give us a plan. He is not that kind of writer. All we get in De-civilisation is a reference to the small political party he has set up which advocates the creation of a corps of specially trained educators who will go out and teach France’s cultural heritage to those capable of receiving it but unlikely to acquire it at home. This sounds remarkably like a proposal to set up grammar schools. We had these once in England but most were closed down by the UniParty long ago.
In an interview last autumn, Camus said:
I have almost never been read – at least by those who attack me – and I have been dragged through the mud, defamed, ‘wokipediafied’, blamed for all the sins of the world, dropped by all my publishers, refused appearances everywhere in the media, summoned before all the courts, heavily fined, and even sentenced to prison (a sentence subsequently suspended).
Let’s hope that with the support of the Free Speech Union the ban on his entry into this country is lifted. Perhaps some bold person might invite Renaud Camus to an event over here at which we could ask him to help us respond to the Government’s draft curriculum proposals that ought to be coming our way soon.
Dr Nicholas Tate is the author of The Conservative Case for Education. He was a member of France’s Haut Conseil de l’évaluation de l’école 2001-2007, an advisory body to the French minister of national education.
News Round-Up
- “Woman appeals against Southport tweet jail term” – The Court of Appeal has heard that Lucy Connolly, who was jailed after an online rant on the day of last year’s Southport attacks, “never” intended to incite violence, reports the BBC.
- “Tory councillor‘s wife ‘had no idea what she was admitting’ when she pleaded guilty to online rant” – A former childminder who was jailed after posting an online rant about migrants the day of the Southport massacre says that she had no idea what she was admitting to, according to the Mail.
- “Mother jailed over tweet could have sentence reduced” – A mother jailed for 31 months for a tweet she posted in the wake of the Southport murders has described how news of the massacre triggered memories of the death of her own child, reports the Telegraph.
- “‘Hopefully she’ll be home within a week’: husband of childminder jailed for race hate tweet speaks after appeal hearing” – Lucy Connolly’s husband says that he hopes his wife will return within a week, according to LBC.
- “Help Lucy Connolly rebuild her shattered life and fight two-tier justice” – Democracy 3.0 is providing the opportunity to support Lucy Connolly – a bereaved mother and devoted childminder, unfairly imprisoned over a deleted tweet, while violent offenders walk free. Help her rebuild her life and stand against Britain’s two-tier justice system.
- “Who judges the judges?” – In the Spectator, Jonathan Miller argues that the opaque and politically influenced British judicial system would benefit from some American-style transparency and accountability – perhaps even by letting voters judge the judges.
- “Ukrainian charged over Starmer firebombs” – A 21 year-old Ukrainian man has been charged in connection with a series of arson attacks targeting the Prime Minister, reports Sky News.
- “Starmer humiliated in Albania as PM contradicts migrant plan” – Keir Starmer was left red-faced as he hailed talks over Rwanda-style “return hubs” – minutes before his Albanian counterpart ruled out hosting one, says the Mail.
- “Our deluded elites are still lying to us about the mass migration disaster” – Only net zero immigration can now save Britain, writes Allister Heath in the Telegraph.
- “Starmer on migration – who is he kidding?” – Nobody believes a word of what Sir Keir Starmer said in his speech on uncontrollable migration, says Kathy Gyngell in TCW.
- “How Labour ended up taking on the Boriswave” – With the PM seemingly inaugurating a paradigm shift on immigration, the only question now is where the debate will be pushed next, writes our own Laurie Wastell in the Spectator.
- “Why Denmark’s ‘zero refugee’ policy offers a silver bullet for Starmer” – A tough approach to migration in Denmark has curbed asylum seekers – and neutered the far-Right, says Eir Nolsøe in the Telegraph.
- “Should you be arrested for reading the Spectator?” – The only thing less likely than your call being picked up by Kent Police is that they will do anything about it, says Douglas Murray in the Spectator.
- “Is there something Brexity in your attic?” – In TCW, John Ellwood satirises state overreach and cultural censorship by reimagining classic children’s books as subversively “Brexity” contraband.
- “‘Why was I blocked by Best for Britain?’” – Charlotte Gill has found herself mysteriously blocked by Best for Britain – surely nothing to do with her mention of their multi-million-pound Soros funding, right?
- “Labour ‘underestimated’ impact of VAT raid on private schools as fees surge” – Labour’s VAT policy on private schools is under fire, with critics saying they’ve “underestimated” its impact as fees have shot up by nearly a quarter this year, reports the Telegraph.
- “Reform support surges to record high” – In the Spectator, Steerpike reports that Nigel Farage’s Reform UK has topped 30% in the polls – overtaking Labour and the Tories.
- “Economists have got Reform’s plan to save Britain all wrong” – Criticising sensible policies does little for the millions for whom work and risk-taking don’t pay, says Richard Tice in the Telegraph.
- “Farage is spearheading a political revolution” – A political revolution is now under way, and it looks likely to transform our politics and country, writes Matt Goodwin in TCW.
- “Labour plan to let UAE own Telegraph stake faces ‘fatal motion’ in Lords” – Labour’s plan to allow the United Arab Emirates to own 15% of the Telegraph faces a Lords rebellion, reports the Telegraph.
- “‘If you are silent on Gaza, you are complicit’” – In the Telegraph, Oliver Brown sits down with Gary Lineker to discuss his controversial outbursts, his departure from the BBC next year and his silence on the transgender debate.
- “Lineker’s apology is too little, too late” – The BBC’s best-paid presenter seems to be one of those deluded folk who persuade themselves that the broadcaster has a pro-Israel bias, writes Jake Wallis Simons in the Telegraph.
- “‘A Critique of the Apocalyptic Climate Narrative’” – On Climate Etc. Judith Curry and Harry DeAngelo provide excerpts from their new paper ‘A Critique of the Apocalyptic Climate Narrative’.
- “‘I don’t think I should be God’: Labour MP withdraws support for assisted dying” – A growing number of MPs are raising concerns about the assisted dying Bill, reveals the Telegraph.
- “The assisted suicide Bill isn’t just defective, it’s dangerous” – Labour MPs should ask themselves if they want to be remembered for normalising suicide, writes David Frost in the Telegraph.
- “Is everything for sale?” – On Substack, Dr Tom Jefferson and Prof Carl Heneghan expose the cozy relationship between MPs, fat donations and the dubious push for anti-obesity drugs.
- “‘Trans toddlers’ allowed gender treatment on NHS” – The NHS is treating nursery-age children who believe they are transgender after watering down its own guidance, reports the Telegraph.
- “The Slovakian Prime Minister is being led to scientific slaughter” – On Substack, Anandamide accuses Dr Richard Fleming of sabotaging a Slovakian vaccine study with fraud and plagiarism to discredit research on DNA contamination.
- “HHS to end COVID-19 vaccine recommendations for kids and pregnant women” – On the Focal Points Substack, Nicolas Hulscher reports that the US Health and Human Services – under RFK Jr. – is set to scrap Covid jab guidance for kids and pregnant women amid soaring death tolls, criminal probes and nationwide calls to ban mRNA vaccines.
- “Controversial doctor and new head of MAHA reveals radical plan” – Dr Aseem Malhotra, a British cardiologist and MAHA’s newest leader, has revealed his plans for tackling America’s chronic disease epidemic by the time President Trump leaves office, reports the Mail.
- “Biden had many enablers but his wife Jill was the worst of all” – According to a new book, no one did more to hide Joe Biden’s decline than his wife, Jill, the First Lady, says Rob Crilly in the Telegraph.
- “This shocking Joe Biden cover-up brings shame on the Democrats” – If Biden was as physically and mentally frail as a new book suggests, keeping him in the White House would have been madness, writes Michael Deacon in the Telegraph.
- “Outcry as Falklands War landing craft is decorated for Pride” – Falklands War veterans have hit out after a landing craft used in the conflict was wrapped in a rainbow Pride flag, reports the Sun.
- “‘This is why people aren’t donating any more’: the outcry over charity CEOs’ six-figure salaries” – Amid cut services, disbanded helplines and mass redundancies, the non-profit sector is struggling – but those in charge are still cashing in, says Melissa Twigg in the Telegraph.
- “‘It’s a stretch to say it was inciting racial hatred’” – On TalkTV, Toby explains to Julia Harley-Brewer how the Free Speech Union is paying for Lucy Connolly’s barrister, who has “a good track record in cases like this”.
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