Best Of

"Middle-class white men banned from public sector internship
National Audit Office’s six-week paid programme only accepts female, black heritage or lower socio-economic applicants" (£)

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/06/06/middle-class-white-men-banned-from-public-sector-internship/

Thames Water hosting a refugee only recruitment day !!

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/insight/thames-water-defends-refugee-only-careers-day-amid-backlash/gm-GM8D04174F?gemSnapshotKey=GM8D04174F-snapshot-1

Poor bastards.

I wouldn't wish Thames Water on my worst enemy.

Thames Water are looking for workers from countries that have unsafe water, Cholera and Dysentery. They want workers who will be used to Thames Water’s current standards.

Scotland was probably after London one of the better results for the Tories in May. Although the Scottish Tories still lost MSPs whereas London Tories made net gains of council seats, they held most of their Holyrood constituencies. Whereas in provincial England outside London lots of Tory councillors lost their seats particularly to Reform and Scottish Tories got a higher voteshare in the Holyrood vote than Welsh Tories did in the Senedd.

Kemi also still has a reasonable 20% favourable rating in Scotland. The Aberdeen Deeside and North Kincardine Holyrood seat which largely overlaps with the Aberdeen South Westminster seat was also one of a minority of constituencies in Scotland where the Tories beat Reform and were still in the top 2 against the SNP. Indeed the Tories were just 4% behind the SNP so if they squeeze the 17% who voted Reform then they could beat the SNP and win the seat.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aberdeen_Deeside_and_North_Kincardine

Arbroath is the type of seat Labour might win back if Burnham wins the Makerfield by election and replaces Starmer as Labour leader and PM but it won't while Starmer remains PM which he still will be when the by elections are held

Good analysis HYUFD, in fact my Scottish Conservative MSP increased his majority in the North East in the Holyrood election and speaking to activist friends during the campaign Kemi Badenoch's increasingly positive personal polling was starting to be picked up on the doorsteps. She was back campaigning in Aberdeen South yesterday.

And as I posted yesterday, Harriet Cross gained the new neighbouring Westminster seat of Gordon and Buchan for the Scottish Conservatives against the political tide in 2024 and the losing SNP incumbent MP is now standing for the SNP in the Aberdeen South by-election.

I've put a few pennies on the Tories at Aberdeen South at 3.0 based on this.

It's win win for Kemi really. If the Tories win it's evidence of her growing popularity. If they lose, well of course they lost, it's Scotland.

I wouldn't say losing is a win, but the big news of the night will be whatever happens in Makerfield Tories losing wouldn't really register much.

O/T with apologies for diverting a thread right away but the Guardian have now published their readers' list of 100 greatest novels and it looks a lot better to me than the authors' and critics' list from a few weeks ago:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/ng-interactive/2026/jun/06/readers-top-100-novels-of-all-time

Amazed to see Memoirs of Hadrian on there. And deservedly. I thought I was the only person that had read it.

Not at all. A stunningly good book and an incredibly moving one. I rate it even higher than I Claudius as the foremost example of the genre. Read it when I was in my late teens and never forgot it.

Oooohhhh... I love I, Claudius. I reread (for the third time) last year, and it was every bit as good as I remembered.

I must try Memoirs of Hadrian.

Livia was the absolute star, even more in the book than she was in the TV series. What a character.

She reminds me very much of my wife.

As far as her virtues, obviously. My wife doesn't murder quite as many people as Livia.

"Middle-class white men banned from public sector internship
National Audit Office’s six-week paid programme only accepts female, black heritage or lower socio-economic applicants" (£)

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/06/06/middle-class-white-men-banned-from-public-sector-internship/

Are white, middle-class heterosexual men the most put upon cohort in UK society?

That's not the point. This is officially sanctioned discrimination by sex and race, and that will create injustice.

If you play this game, you create social division.

I think most people would look at the situation and say that giving an occasional helping hand up to historically marginalised groups helps undo existing injustices. But some white middle class heterosexual men are snowflakes and easily triggered when their familiar advantages are reduced in the slightest.

I think most people would look at the situation and say that discriminating against anyone is wrong.

Two wrongs do not make a right.

"Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces launched a mass overnight strike on June 5 against a deployment site of Russia’s 90th Engineer-Sapper Regiment in occupied Pionerske, Donetsk region. The unit was involved in mining and building the Surovikin Line in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia sectors, and carried out engineer tasks near Bakhmut and Avdiivka. Trucks, logistics sites and substations also burned, including toward Mariupol port."

https://t.me/noel_reports/47380

There's been quite a few of these attacks by Ukraine on Russian units far behind the front line recently. Another sign, along with the attacks on Russian logistics, of Ukraine's growing middle-range strike capacity, and the inability of Russia to find a way to counter it.

Russia has a way to end these strikes immediately.

Withdraw out of Crimea and the Donbas, pull back to their own border and end the war.

"Middle-class white men banned from public sector internship
National Audit Office’s six-week paid programme only accepts female, black heritage or lower socio-economic applicants" (£)

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/06/06/middle-class-white-men-banned-from-public-sector-internship/

Thames Water hosting a refugee only recruitment day !!

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/insight/thames-water-defends-refugee-only-careers-day-amid-backlash/gm-GM8D04174F?gemSnapshotKey=GM8D04174F-snapshot-1

Good post.

Just as good as the first time it was posted several days ago infact.

By me.

I’ll be sure to tag you every time I post it as you seem to like it. 👍

"Middle-class white men banned from public sector internship
National Audit Office’s six-week paid programme only accepts female, black heritage or lower socio-economic applicants" (£)

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/06/06/middle-class-white-men-banned-from-public-sector-internship/

Are white, middle-class heterosexual men the most put upon cohort in UK society?

That's not the point. This is officially sanctioned discrimination by sex and race, and that will create injustice.

If you play this game, you create social division.

I don't agree with discrimination of any description, positive or negative. The narrative of white, heterosexual men being disadvantaged by positive discrimination remains largely untrue in my opinion. Doubtless you could find me one or two examples, but by and large I would rather take my chances with figures of authority as a white, heterosexual male than I would anyone else.

But this is about individuals. It is active discrimination against a set of individuals based on the colour of their skin, their gender and their sexuality. So yes, those white heterosexual males are bring disadvantaged. In any other examples of race or sexuality this would be illegal.

But the likes of Farage are selling a narrative that in general white men are being disadvantaged to the benefit of non white men. Clearly on ocassion it happens. I would argue it happened to Henry Nowak. That shouldn't have been the case. I would hope that the error was not the system but the individual policeman. Of course I could be wrong, but I don't think so.