Best Of

On some of the key points in the Blair Essay as mentioned by Shipman.

welfare spending is too high and is throwing good people on the scrapheap- I don't understand.

defence spending is too low - I don't agree. I think the "threat" from Russia is being overstated to create a climate in which increased defence spending (especially simultaenous with cuts in welfare) can be sold. Yes, we can move a little higher but whan I see 5% of GDP being mentioned, no, not sustainable.

the triple lock is unsustainable yes but as we all know pensioners vote and turkeys rarely vote for Christmas. It can be sold within the context of a general belt tightening.

without cheap energy we cannot exploit the AI revolution - we can do a lot with cheap energy but from where is that cheap energy coming? I'd argue if we could get back to the kind of energy pricing we enjoyed in the early 2000s we'd see economic growth resume. I'd also question the amount of energy wr use to store all the data we are creating and look at data de-carbonisation.

we should be investing in EVERY form of energy: renewables, nuclear and the North Sea - quite right.

migration needs to be controlled to boost social cohesion and because the boats look like a huge failure of the state
- like everyone else, he has no answer to the "small boats" but at least he isn't talking about wide scale deportation.

any new relationship with the EU will be imposed on us until we are stronger and cannot involve the closeness some desire without freedom of movement - I'm afraid those who want us to Rejoin miss this point. FoM and the Single Currency have never been popular and until they become so we will be outside the EU.

I’m at a loss as to why we need to host AI here - data centers don’t create many jobs, use stupid amounts of energy and there is something called the internet which means I can use minimax in China from my desk at home

My viewpoint is that hosting data centers for AI is a fools game unless you have sovereignty over the AI company (and we currently don’t).

Countries want AI hosting because:

* compute capacity is becoming strategic infrastructure,
* AI companies cluster around compute availability,
* energy availability attracts investment,
* low-latency domestic hosting matters for some industries,
* sovereignty matters for defence, finance, healthcare and government workloads,
* and whoever controls the infrastructure tends to capture more of the value chain.

Governments, banks, defence contractors and regulated industries are not going to happily pipe sensitive workloads through random overseas infrastructure indefinitely. Data sovereignty, regulation, sanctions risk, resilience, espionage concerns, latency and legal jurisdiction all matter.

R is for Reform, R is for Russia

Reform Makerfield candidate: Russia ‘within their rights’ to take Crimea

Robert Kenyon compared Putin’s 2014 invasion to Britain’s action in Falklands

Reform UK’s candidate in the Makerfield by-election said Russia was “within their rights” to invade Crimea in 2014.

In an online forum, Robert Kenyon agreed with a post that described the annexation of Crimea as “democracy in action”.

Under a post titled “Hypocrisy of the West regarding Ukraine in the sin bin”, one forum member wrote: “The people of the Crimea want to be in Russia, for me that is democracy in action.

“The government should work for the people, not the other way round. The people have spoken and they have what they want. The Falklands and Gibraltar, they want to stay British, so be it.”

Mr Kenyon replied: “I agree totally, Russia are well within their rights to do what they have done, as we did with the Falklands. However, will Latvia be next?”

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2026/05/27/reform-makerfield-candidate-russia-within-rights-crimea/

From what we have seen, it is a common view in "Reform". The fact that Farage used to take a large salary from Putin's "Russia Today" propaganda mouthpiece is just part of a pattern. The B&%#@rds are bought and sold for Rusdian gold, with the moral compass of Goebbels.

Morning everyone.

The Blair Essay is a lot better than the headlines about it would suggest.

For example, the headlines say, "Blair tells Labour to ditch net zero and drill in the North Sea," but what the essay actually says is, "We must prioritise cheaper energy and electrification over net zero and use what is left of our North Sea oil and gas resources."

"Electrification" is the process of replacing fossil fuels with renewable electricity. It's the principle means by which net zero is delivered. The continued technological development of renewables makes them the cheap energy option in an age of geopolitical instability and fossil fuel supply disruption.

I wouldn't see this as abandoning net zero, but choosing a carrot-led approach - of concentrating on better technology to replace fossil fuels - rather than a stick-reliant approach - of restricting fossil fuel use to force adoption of other technologies. This is a long way from Trump's ideological opposition to renewables, for example.

I think Blair's Essay is weakest on Trump. He is in denial of Trump's weakness in relation to, and adulation of, Putin, Xi and other dictators, and the stark consequences this has for democracies. But I think that, as a starting point for a serious discussion about Britain's future it has a lot of merit, and is a more useful contribution than anything that has emerged from Labour's leadership wrangling, the Tories, or the Lib Dems.

Blair has to continue arguing for sticking close to the Americans regardless of how idiotic or egregious they become, as his lifetime quest to try and escape from the prison of his own tragic misjudgement.

Always guesswork reading a person's psyche - inc one's own - but I think this is probably right. It's otherwise impossible to explain why he'd completely lose his analysis/judgment chops when it comes to Donald Trump. His stuff on AI and the economy and public services, agree or not, is cogent. You can understand where he's coming from. But his take on the US under Trump2 is utterly ludicrous. Nobody with his brain could seriously think it. Ergo he doesn't. He should have left all that out. It would have made for a better product.

The Blair Essay is a lot better than the headlines about it would suggest.

For example, the headlines say, "Blair tells Labour to ditch net zero and drill in the North Sea," but what the essay actually says is, "We must prioritise cheaper energy and electrification over net zero and use what is left of our North Sea oil and gas resources."

"Electrification" is the process of replacing fossil fuels with renewable electricity. It's the principle means by which net zero is delivered. The continued technological development of renewables makes them the cheap energy option in an age of geopolitical instability and fossil fuel supply disruption.

I wouldn't see this as abandoning net zero, but choosing a carrot-led approach - of concentrating on better technology to replace fossil fuels - rather than a stick-reliant approach - of restricting fossil fuel use to force adoption of other technologies. This is a long way from Trump's ideological opposition to renewables, for example.

I think Blair's Essay is weakest on Trump. He is in denial of Trump's weakness in relation to, and adulation of, Putin, Xi and other dictators, and the stark consequences this has for democracies. But I think that, as a starting point for a serious discussion about Britain's future it has a lot of merit, and is a more useful contribution than anything that has emerged from Labour's leadership wrangling, the Tories, or the Lib Dems.

On some of the key points in the Blair Essay as mentioned by Shipman.

welfare spending is too high and is throwing good people on the scrapheap- I don't understand.

Lots of these are worth discussing, but I'll just pick out the first.

In order to qualify for disability benefits you have to emphasize what you cannot do, and so the system encourages people to minimise their capabilities and become dependent on government handouts.

The system will then tend to penalise people for trying to stretch their capabilities - they have to stay within the disabled box to continue to qualify for help.

I'd characterise it as a very binary system with a high barrier to qualification, but generous support once you're on the inside. But a lot of people exist in the grey in between, and categorising them as either black or white either penalises them or infantilises them.

Have we noted that the Pope has put out an encyclical about AI - Magnifica humanitas?

By all accounts it is a serious and thoughtful document - no less than ~40,000 words.

The Grown Ups have arrived at the party.

Here's a thoughtful commentary which touches on it from Mallen Baker, whom I appreciate (16 minutes):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7cKK7R61Ts

Since when have the Catholic Church been the Grown Ups when it comes to science and technology?

If you're talking science and technology as themselves, not so great.

If you're talking the interaction between fast-changing technology and slow-changing people, then religious traditions have an awful lot to say, some of it pretty wise. No institution survives that long without applying some insight into the human condition.

You don't have to agree with all of this, but there are some good points clearly made in this official summary;

https://www.cbcew.org.uk/magnifica-humanitas-overview/

And famously the Big Bang theory of the origin of the universe was due to the Belgian priest Georges Lemaître. Perhaps not so odd that the Church should welcome a theory that allows a moment of creation, perhaps even a creator!
https://www.amnh.org/learn-teach/curriculum-collections/cosmic-horizons-book/georges-lemaitre-big-bang

@ShippersUnbound
Further to Blair. Literally every honest sensible person in all the main parties privately agrees with all these propositions:

- welfare spending is too high and is throwing good people on the scrapheap
- defence spending is too low
- the triple lock is unsustainable
- without cheap energy we cannot exploit the AI revolution
- we should be investing in EVERY form of energy: renewables, nuclear and the North Sea
- migration needs to be controlled to boost social cohesion and because the boats look like a huge failure of the state
- any new relationship with the EU will be imposed on us until we are stronger and cannot involve the closeness some desire without freedom of movement
- we are deeply embedded with America in ways which the public does not understand and cannot be told and however joyous it makes us feel to hate Trump, disengagement at the deep state level is not only wholly unrealistic but also undesirable
- Whitehall needs a total overhaul so specific project expertise and political appointees can be brought in quickly

Blair basically says all that.

The one thing he doesn’t say and which the same group of people agree on is this and it’s something Blair left behind:

https://x.com/ShippersUnbound/status/2059540987995705567?s=20

Good morning

I have not posted much recently, probably because there is so much division and discourse I just cannot see a solution

However, Blair reminds me why I voted for him twice and everything he highlights is spot on

Instead of engaging with his thoughts we have labour going into a tailspin over Irag and Blair's millions/billions whilst seeking to drift to the left that will result in simply more failure

Blair at least has opened a debate that is long overdue and maybe listen to the message rather than deflect by raising Blair's failures as an excuse to dismiss his opinions

The problem with the boats is that although they are highly visible it restricts the number who arrive here and apply for asylum.

Attach that to the fact that most (well over 50%) of those applying will get asylum and every other option is worse because while it would remove the visible boats it will increase the total number of people arriving with valid claims.

So there is no fix without changing global asylum rules and while most of Europe agree the practical side is rather difficult

Somebody made the point yesterday (I think) that we've not had figures (guesstimates?) for illegal crossings for some time. Of course, it's ben a bit breezy (here anyway) so that might have put people off.

The figures are published at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/migrants-detected-crossing-the-english-channel-in-small-boats/migrants-detected-crossing-the-english-channel-in-small-boats-last-7-days over 1000 over the past 4 days but none in the weeks before that