Best Of

🟢NEW: Zack Polanski has suggested he did not pay council tax while living on a narrowboat because of living arrangements resulting from “financial hardship”

In a witness statement to the Greater London Authority (GLA), the Green Party leader also admitted that he should have taken “greater care” over his tax arrangements while living on the vessel in an east London marina

City Hall has decided not to launch an investigation into Polanski's council tax arrangements

The monitoring officer said that the matter related to "private circumstances" rather the Polanski's role as a London Assembly member

They said the decision "does not make any finding on the merits of the underlying concerns”

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/06/18/zack-polanski-financial-hardship-council-tax-green-party-uk/

Morning all! Let us hope that this time tomorrow Restore and Reform are tearing at each other and Burnham is on (yet another) train to London!

Just for interest, but do London Assembly members get paid?

The Mayor’s salary is £170,282. The salary of an Assembly Member is currently £66,390 per year, except for the Statutory Deputy Mayor which is £118,124 and the Chair of the Assembly which is £79,617.

https://www.london.gov.uk/who-we-are/governance-and-spending/spending-money-wisely/salaries-expenses-benefits-and-workforce-information

Trump favourably compares the president of Syria with Netanyahu (whom he also called "very much the junior partner"0.

“The president of #Syria. He’s done a tremendous job… He’d love to go in [to #Lebanon]… he wouldn’t knock down buildings every time he hears there’s someone there, he’d just go in with precision.”..
https://x.com/Charles_Lister/status/2067311287126647194

Of course this is (even for someone like me who thinks Julani/Ahmed al-Sharaa is, on balance, probably now a force for stability in Syria) objectively insane. But it shows which way Trump is leaning.

Bib has joined the Pantheon of those who Trump feels have personally betrayed him. Quite difficult to come back from that. Couldn't happen to a nicer bloke.

Haven't found the Tweet but some MAGA influencers want Trump to bomb Israel if Bibi betrays Trump over the Iran deal.

And their doppelgängers in Israel are raging about Trump's 'betrayal'. Time for Israel to go it alone and perhaps bust out one of their nuclear weapons (which they may or may not possess) in a relatively uninhabited area is some of what I've read.

If there is ever any point in Israel having nuclear weapons, it is to use them destroying their nemesis before thei nemesis can get them and use them against Israel.

Expect Israel to threaten Iran with nuclear destruction if they consider they are close to making a bomb.

Meanwhile, Iran has new-found economic clout (plus it took on and beat Israel and the US combined). Why do they need a bomb?

Iran's 'economic clout' is the ability to restrict oil flows through Hormuz while simultaneously having its own oil flows restricted.

A mutually assured destruction of oil flows.

Iran needed a fake agreement and the oil flowing again as much as Trump did.

Meanwhile the Arabs are building new pipelines to bypass Hormuz at which point Iran's half of the oil flows MAD becomes much feebler.

People keep saying that pipelines will stiff Iran but Ukraine has shown pipelines can be destroyed and Ukraine, Iran and indeed the United States have shown that oil infrastructure is vulnerable.

🟢NEW: Zack Polanski has suggested he did not pay council tax while living on a narrowboat because of living arrangements resulting from “financial hardship”

In a witness statement to the Greater London Authority (GLA), the Green Party leader also admitted that he should have taken “greater care” over his tax arrangements while living on the vessel in an east London marina

City Hall has decided not to launch an investigation into Polanski's council tax arrangements

The monitoring officer said that the matter related to "private circumstances" rather the Polanski's role as a London Assembly member

They said the decision "does not make any finding on the merits of the underlying concerns”

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/06/18/zack-polanski-financial-hardship-council-tax-green-party-uk/

Morning all! Let us hope that this time tomorrow Restore and Reform are tearing at each other and Burnham is on (yet another) train to London!

Just for interest, but do London Assembly members get paid?

The Mayor’s salary is £170,282. The salary of an Assembly Member is currently £66,390 per year, except for the Statutory Deputy Mayor which is £118,124 and the Chair of the Assembly which is £79,617.

https://www.london.gov.uk/who-we-are/governance-and-spending/spending-money-wisely/salaries-expenses-benefits-and-workforce-information

Always good supping at the public trough

I like to mock archeologists as the make extravagant claims about civilizations based on tiny pottery shards but this is a stretch.

https://bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyxw8550y8o

"Simpler, older version of Stonehenge found three miles from famous site"

"Archaeologists believe they have discovered an earlier, much simpler version of Stonehenge about 3 miles (5km) away from the prehistoric monument.

All that remains of the older structure is two holes in the ground, but the team says they held wooden posts that lined up with the Sun on the summer and winter solstices - the longest and shortest days of the year - in the same way as Stonehenge."

Extrapolate much?