Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Do you have the courage of your convictions like @RochdalePioneers? Will you stand for election?
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
No Reform aren't old school Tories, Churchill, Macmillan or Baldwin or Disraeli are not who Reform are emulating.
What they are is a populist party of the nationalist right primarily, combining some of the jingiostic British patriotism and suspicion of foreigners which could occasionally be found in some Tory leaders like Salisbury and Thatcher with some of the small state, low tax policies of Thatcher on economics. Thatcher was more of a pragmatist than Farage on issues like the EEA though and nor would be she have gone in for removing the 2 child benefit cap as a sop to working class voters with children on benefits funded by middle class taxpayers and she was never as anti immigrant as many in Reform are either, indeed she welcomed immigrants who contributed to our country regardless of their ethnicity or religion who worked hard
On cancer, royal or not. Several on pb have had brushes with one or more of the myriad forms of cancer.* My reaction, and I suspect this is common was to ask why did I get cancer? In my case, at 39 and pretty healthy in general (one of the reasons I thought I was ill was not being able to train as normal). I know a fair bit about cancer as I teach it to pharmacy students. It's unbelievably complex. Some cancers are caused by viruses (such as HPV). Others by environmental factors over time (smoking and lung cancer etc). Some of us have genetic risk factirs But many have, as yet, no none cause other than being alive long enough and being unlucky. Could mRNA vaccines cause cancer? I wouldn't rule it out but I don't know if a mechanism yet. Simple association of a man in his later years getting cancer (unknown but rumoured to be prostate cancer) and a woman in her middle years with COVID vaccines is as rubbish a bit of science as you can go. As @bondegezou we have huge databases of anonymised data that will show up any links between vaccination and cancer. I've seen nothing yet.
*I question the idea of cancer as one disease. It's a collection of diseases with features in common. It's confusing for the lay person to think about as to often they can assume that all cancer is the same, and treatment will be the same. Very difficult to shift this, though.
One also has to ask if Covid itself causes cancer.
We were in the car at the time of the alarm. Genuinely alarming. Very much the point, I suppose. We quickly got stuck in a traffic jam - I wonder if someone had crashed as a result? Interestingly, daughter #1's ohone sounded a good 45 seconds before everyone else's. She then got a follow up alarm a little later which none of the rest of us got.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
No Reform aren't old school Tories, Churchill, Macmillan or Baldwin or Disraeli are not who Reform are emulating.
What they are is a populist party of the nationalist right primarily, combining some of the jingiostic British patriotism and suspicion of foreigners which could occasionally be found in some Tory leaders like Salisbury and Thatcher with some of the small state, low tax policies of Thatcher on economics. Thatcher was more of a pragmatist than Farage on issues like the EEA though and nor would be she have gone in for removing the 2 child benefit cap as a sop to working class voters with children on benefits funded by middle class taxpayers and she was never as anti immigrant as many in Reform are either, indeed she welcomed immigrants who contributed to our country regardless of their ethnicity or religion who worked hard
A few months ago you seemed Reform adjacent. You now seem more critical of Reform. Is that a fair assumption?
There were 890 people arrested at a demonstration against the ban on the group Palestine Action in London on Saturday, the Metropolitan Police say.
The majority of the arrests were for supporting a proscribed group under the Terrorism Act, while police said 17 were also arrested for assaults on police officers "after the protest turned violent".
I think there is some talk of the accused refusing the bail conditions and therefore clogging up remand with thousands of pensioners.
The excuse Government ministers are now giving for the arrests that there is something that they are unable to disclose to us something that makes supporting Palestine Action a genuinely awful terrorist activity. Now, there might be something some members of the core group have planned to do, like killing a soldier or burning a synagogue, but how the hell are these protestors supposed to know that?
There are going to be loads of pensioners coming up in front of a judge who - for the first time - finally find out the nature of the group they are supporting as the CPS/Crown Office makes a case behind closed doors. Surely there is something for the defence there? Or worse - ministers have simply made this up and there is no real underlying reason for it, and they are just trying to scare people into not protesting with these vague allusions.
I don't actually get what they are protesting about. It's not Palestine/Gaza per se, because you can protest about that just fine, every day of the week and twice on Sunday. Is it free speech? I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly. Is it government overstepping the mark? I can understand if people don't trust the government. The Southport case had huge issues with that. I also sense that even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care, just as many reformers are in love with Connolly.
You don’t know if anyone “cared a fig” about Connolly because, as you admit yourself, you don’t “get it”.
What's your point? I genuinely don't understand if it's the Gaza angle, and this just misplaced or the free speech. No, I have no idea of their opinion about Connolly but I am drawing an inference.
My point is simply that you don’t like these people and are simply setting up various straw men that you have “inferred” they are guilty of.
Why are you suggesting I don't like them? I think them foolish, and I'm not sure what they are trying to achieve.
Quoting you,
“ I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly... even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care”
Yes, it's a guess. May be wrong. What's your point?
Do you honestly believe that the nearly 900 people arrested yesterday would excuse “genuine” acts of terror?
Labour (Yvette Cooper, who ought to have been sacked rather than promoted), have brought the anti-terror laws into disrepute.
Don't know. Do you think they all think the government is lying?
you think our intelligence has improved since the 45 minutes WMD claim days?
Righties are still as gullible as ever. Can’t comment on their intelligence.
I still don't understand why we aren't stockpiling huge quantities of PA's magic paint if its such an effective weapon.
According to data from the FBI, Chicago and Boston have lower crime rates than cities in red states, including Memphis and Tennessee. The data shows that Chicago has 17.5 murders per 100K people and Boston has 3.6, while Memphis and St. Louis have crime rates of 40.6 and 54.1, respectively, per 100K people.
The worst states by murder rate - except New Mexico - are all Republican Strongholds. And, in reverse, the safest States are (Utah excepted) all Democrat.
Some of that is presumably population age, though. Dermocrat states tend to be older, and older people commit fewer murders.
But the murders are driven by the rates in the large cities, and in those states are often Democrat though e.g. Memphis, New Orleans, St Louis.
Chiacgo in absolute terms year after year has a lot of murders. Outside of downtown (which is all most tourists see), Chicago gets very iffy, very fast.
There are few things to consider, St Louis is a very small city, so 100 people being murdered is a very high per capita. But, I think there is probably something interesting going on here, I presume this is gang driven, why St Louis, Memphis, Kansas City, etc. For example, Kansas City traditionally is the one of the most boring nothingness cities in America.
There were 890 people arrested at a demonstration against the ban on the group Palestine Action in London on Saturday, the Metropolitan Police say.
The majority of the arrests were for supporting a proscribed group under the Terrorism Act, while police said 17 were also arrested for assaults on police officers "after the protest turned violent".
I think there is some talk of the accused refusing the bail conditions and therefore clogging up remand with thousands of pensioners.
The excuse Government ministers are now giving for the arrests that there is something that they are unable to disclose to us something that makes supporting Palestine Action a genuinely awful terrorist activity. Now, there might be something some members of the core group have planned to do, like killing a soldier or burning a synagogue, but how the hell are these protestors supposed to know that?
There are going to be loads of pensioners coming up in front of a judge who - for the first time - finally find out the nature of the group they are supporting as the CPS/Crown Office makes a case behind closed doors. Surely there is something for the defence there? Or worse - ministers have simply made this up and there is no real underlying reason for it, and they are just trying to scare people into not protesting with these vague allusions.
I don't actually get what they are protesting about. It's not Palestine/Gaza per se, because you can protest about that just fine, every day of the week and twice on Sunday. Is it free speech? I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly. Is it government overstepping the mark? I can understand if people don't trust the government. The Southport case had huge issues with that. I also sense that even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care, just as many reformers are in love with Connolly.
You don’t know if anyone “cared a fig” about Connolly because, as you admit yourself, you don’t “get it”.
What's your point? I genuinely don't understand if it's the Gaza angle, and this just misplaced or the free speech. No, I have no idea of their opinion about Connolly but I am drawing an inference.
My point is simply that you don’t like these people and are simply setting up various straw men that you have “inferred” they are guilty of.
Why are you suggesting I don't like them? I think them foolish, and I'm not sure what they are trying to achieve.
Quoting you,
“ I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly... even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care”
Yes, it's a guess. May be wrong. What's your point?
Do you honestly believe that the nearly 900 people arrested yesterday would excuse “genuine” acts of terror?
Labour (Yvette Cooper, who ought to have been sacked rather than promoted), have brought the anti-terror laws into disrepute.
Don't know. Do you think they all think the government is lying?
you think our intelligence has improved since the 45 minutes WMD claim days?
Righties are still as gullible as ever. Can’t comment on their intelligence.
I still don't understand why we aren't stockpiling huge quantities of PA's magic paint if its such an effective weapon.
If you think it's that harmless, next time you fly get them to paint the engine turbines and prove it for us all.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
There were 890 people arrested at a demonstration against the ban on the group Palestine Action in London on Saturday, the Metropolitan Police say.
The majority of the arrests were for supporting a proscribed group under the Terrorism Act, while police said 17 were also arrested for assaults on police officers "after the protest turned violent".
I think there is some talk of the accused refusing the bail conditions and therefore clogging up remand with thousands of pensioners.
The excuse Government ministers are now giving for the arrests that there is something that they are unable to disclose to us something that makes supporting Palestine Action a genuinely awful terrorist activity. Now, there might be something some members of the core group have planned to do, like killing a soldier or burning a synagogue, but how the hell are these protestors supposed to know that?
There are going to be loads of pensioners coming up in front of a judge who - for the first time - finally find out the nature of the group they are supporting as the CPS/Crown Office makes a case behind closed doors. Surely there is something for the defence there? Or worse - ministers have simply made this up and there is no real underlying reason for it, and they are just trying to scare people into not protesting with these vague allusions.
I don't actually get what they are protesting about. It's not Palestine/Gaza per se, because you can protest about that just fine, every day of the week and twice on Sunday. Is it free speech? I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly. Is it government overstepping the mark? I can understand if people don't trust the government. The Southport case had huge issues with that. I also sense that even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care, just as many reformers are in love with Connolly.
You don’t know if anyone “cared a fig” about Connolly because, as you admit yourself, you don’t “get it”.
What's your point? I genuinely don't understand if it's the Gaza angle, and this just misplaced or the free speech. No, I have no idea of their opinion about Connolly but I am drawing an inference.
My point is simply that you don’t like these people and are simply setting up various straw men that you have “inferred” they are guilty of.
Why are you suggesting I don't like them? I think them foolish, and I'm not sure what they are trying to achieve.
Quoting you,
“ I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly... even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care”
Yes, it's a guess. May be wrong. What's your point?
Do you honestly believe that the nearly 900 people arrested yesterday would excuse “genuine” acts of terror?
Labour (Yvette Cooper, who ought to have been sacked rather than promoted), have brought the anti-terror laws into disrepute.
Don't know. Do you think they all think the government is lying?
you think our intelligence has improved since the 45 minutes WMD claim days?
Righties are still as gullible as ever. Can’t comment on their intelligence.
I still don't understand why we aren't stockpiling huge quantities of PA's magic paint if its such an effective weapon.
If you think it's that harmless, next time you fly get them to paint the engine turbines and prove it for us all.
I'm going to start some crowdfunding - paint supplies for the SAS.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
No Reform aren't old school Tories, Churchill, Macmillan or Baldwin or Disraeli are not who Reform are emulating.
What they are is a populist party of the nationalist right primarily, combining some of the jingiostic British patriotism and suspicion of foreigners which could occasionally be found in some Tory leaders like Salisbury and Thatcher with some of the small state, low tax policies of Thatcher on economics. Thatcher was more of a pragmatist than Farage on issues like the EEA though and nor would be she have gone in for removing the 2 child benefit cap as a sop to working class voters with children on benefits funded by middle class taxpayers and she was never as anti immigrant as many in Reform are either, indeed she welcomed immigrants who contributed to our country regardless of their ethnicity or religion who worked hard
I don’t understand why people from ethnic minorities, whether black, brown, Scots or Welsh support a party that despises them. It’s like the BBC supporting Reform even though Reform purport to be anti BBC.
Britain’s most senior police officer is to present the new Home Secretary with proposed law changes “within weeks” aimed at stopping officers from policing tweets, the Telegraph can disclose.
Sir Mark Rowley, the head of the Met Police, is proposing a shake-up of legislation that would give officers greater discretion to use “common sense” when deciding whether to record and investigate complaints about comments on social media.
These claims remind me a bit of the boxers a weigh in being "restrained" by some weedy trainer guy from filling in their opponent. If only you let me go, I would have had him.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
They should be focusing all their resources on a cure for stupidity
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
They should be focusing all their resources on a cure for stupidity
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
They should be focusing all their resources on a cure for stupidity
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
No Reform aren't old school Tories, Churchill, Macmillan or Baldwin or Disraeli are not who Reform are emulating.
What they are is a populist party of the nationalist right primarily, combining some of the jingiostic British patriotism and suspicion of foreigners which could occasionally be found in some Tory leaders like Salisbury and Thatcher with some of the small state, low tax policies of Thatcher on economics. Thatcher was more of a pragmatist than Farage on issues like the EEA though and nor would be she have gone in for removing the 2 child benefit cap as a sop to working class voters with children on benefits funded by middle class taxpayers and she was never as anti immigrant as many in Reform are either, indeed she welcomed immigrants who contributed to our country regardless of their ethnicity or religion who worked hard
I don’t understand why people from ethnic minorities, whether black, brown, Scots or Welsh support a party that despises them. It’s like the BBC supporting Reform even though Reform purport to be anti BBC.
To be honest Reform prefer the Welsh and Scots to Londoners even if otherwise you may have a point.
The BBC are Starmer Labour, they may have to give Reform airtime but they are not pro Reform like GB News
Britain’s most senior police officer is to present the new Home Secretary with proposed law changes “within weeks” aimed at stopping officers from policing tweets, the Telegraph can disclose.
Sir Mark Rowley, the head of the Met Police, is proposing a shake-up of legislation that would give officers greater discretion to use “common sense” when deciding whether to record and investigate complaints about comments on social media.
These claims remind me a bit of the boxers a weigh in being "restrained" by some weedy trainer guy from filling in their opponent. If only you let me go, I would have had him.
Home Office civil servants and ambitious DCCs will be trying to undermine him as we speak.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Some suggesting Baron is autistic, he had a very old father for starters
There were 890 people arrested at a demonstration against the ban on the group Palestine Action in London on Saturday, the Metropolitan Police say.
The majority of the arrests were for supporting a proscribed group under the Terrorism Act, while police said 17 were also arrested for assaults on police officers "after the protest turned violent".
I think there is some talk of the accused refusing the bail conditions and therefore clogging up remand with thousands of pensioners.
The excuse Government ministers are now giving for the arrests that there is something that they are unable to disclose to us something that makes supporting Palestine Action a genuinely awful terrorist activity. Now, there might be something some members of the core group have planned to do, like killing a soldier or burning a synagogue, but how the hell are these protestors supposed to know that?
There are going to be loads of pensioners coming up in front of a judge who - for the first time - finally find out the nature of the group they are supporting as the CPS/Crown Office makes a case behind closed doors. Surely there is something for the defence there? Or worse - ministers have simply made this up and there is no real underlying reason for it, and they are just trying to scare people into not protesting with these vague allusions.
I don't actually get what they are protesting about. It's not Palestine/Gaza per se, because you can protest about that just fine, every day of the week and twice on Sunday. Is it free speech? I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly. Is it government overstepping the mark? I can understand if people don't trust the government. The Southport case had huge issues with that. I also sense that even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care, just as many reformers are in love with Connolly.
The perception is the government is using the Terrorism Act to suppress peaceful protest for Gaza. There is nothing special about Palestine Action themselves - there are n+1 pro-Palestine action groups in the UK, so the whole point is to protest the gross mischaracterisation of peaceful protest as terrorism.
The Connolly case is a silly comparison. She incited people to kill - read the tweet - something that has been an offence in E&W for centuries. The PA protestors are wearing t-shirts with the name of a group that the government has banned but has refused to explain why.
To say that the government is suppressing peaceful protest on Gaza is just weird. Is that what it's about? Connolly did a stupid thing and has been punished. My point was that some free speech means different things. Is what she posted fine and dandy? No, of course not. But neither are millions of other tweets that don't get persued by the police.
Frankly I think anyone deliberately getting arrested for supporting PA is guilty of wasting police time.
I'm sure we are all curious as to government reasons. It must come out at some point. But if people are required not to know facts in criminal trials as it may endanger the process then we must wait, no matter how frustrating it is.
I do not know why the government prescribed PA, but I assume it was intelligence led and decided at the highest levels
I understand it is being challenged in the courts which is the right place to take the argument to
For nearly 900 people to deliberately defy the ban in an attempt to overwhelm the police and courts is a very serious thing to do, and the police have no choice to arrest them and place them before the law as anything else leads to anarchy
Police should be going after shoplifters.
Of course they should, but they are also required to keep law and order
The appeal against the prescribing of PA is in the courts and a legal response will be forthcomng
However, nearly 900 people trying to overwhelm the law and the police is simply not correct irrespective of who they were
Once we become a nation where large groups of people, for whatever cause, can successfully overwhelm the police, courts and the law we are in a very dangerous place
What if the police forces become Nigel's personal Stasi?
If there is a reason that this group have been proscribed then let us know what it is. Their dark hints of sinister activity doesn't cut it.
They engaged in terrorism at RAF Brize Norton.
There should, I think, be a separate offence of Damaging National Infrastructure (or something like that).
Perhaps there should be, but under the terms of the Terrorism Act 2000 what they did absolutely was terrorism.
Worth hearing the opinions of the original 2000 act. Even Jack Sraw would have bauked at this nonsense
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
They should be focusing all their resources on a cure for stupidity
I’m not so sure. A clever Trump may be even more dangerous than a stupid Trump.
I do find it perplexing how some posters rage at Trump, Farage and others about their alleged illegal acts and attack those who may want to leave the ECHR, but are supporting acts in our country by large groups of people who want to overwhelm our police and courts because they do not like a particular law
It may be the courts will overturn precribing PA, but until then the law needs to be respected otherwise we are no better than those on the right who want to disapply laws they do not like
Agreed.
Some people take leave of their senses when the word “Palestine” is mentioned. To me, the protection of UK military bases and defence assets is of paramount importance.
And some people can't distinguish between the right to peaceful protest and actually carrying out treasonable acts.
Let's cut all the crap. People are being charged with terrorism for wearing a t-shirt.
But they deliberately provoked the law in full knowledge of the consquences
You know as well as I do it was not for wearing a t-shirt, but the provocative writing on it and indeed many just holding cardboard notices with the same law defying words
Yeah, I know. I'm not suggesting they have been falsely arrested.
But it's completely indefensible in a liberal democracy so we've got people desperately clinging to "but it's the law" because they can't abide defending loony lefties.
I would say the same if it was from the right
It is the law and is being challenged in the courts
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
They should be focusing all their resources on a cure for stupidity
I’m not so sure. A clever Trump may be even more dangerous than a stupid Trump.
See also keeping Hitler live in WW2 to hasten allied victory.
There were 890 people arrested at a demonstration against the ban on the group Palestine Action in London on Saturday, the Metropolitan Police say.
The majority of the arrests were for supporting a proscribed group under the Terrorism Act, while police said 17 were also arrested for assaults on police officers "after the protest turned violent".
I think there is some talk of the accused refusing the bail conditions and therefore clogging up remand with thousands of pensioners.
The excuse Government ministers are now giving for the arrests that there is something that they are unable to disclose to us something that makes supporting Palestine Action a genuinely awful terrorist activity. Now, there might be something some members of the core group have planned to do, like killing a soldier or burning a synagogue, but how the hell are these protestors supposed to know that?
There are going to be loads of pensioners coming up in front of a judge who - for the first time - finally find out the nature of the group they are supporting as the CPS/Crown Office makes a case behind closed doors. Surely there is something for the defence there? Or worse - ministers have simply made this up and there is no real underlying reason for it, and they are just trying to scare people into not protesting with these vague allusions.
I don't actually get what they are protesting about. It's not Palestine/Gaza per se, because you can protest about that just fine, every day of the week and twice on Sunday. Is it free speech? I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly. Is it government overstepping the mark? I can understand if people don't trust the government. The Southport case had huge issues with that. I also sense that even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care, just as many reformers are in love with Connolly.
You don’t know if anyone “cared a fig” about Connolly because, as you admit yourself, you don’t “get it”.
What's your point? I genuinely don't understand if it's the Gaza angle, and this just misplaced or the free speech. No, I have no idea of their opinion about Connolly but I am drawing an inference.
My point is simply that you don’t like these people and are simply setting up various straw men that you have “inferred” they are guilty of.
Why are you suggesting I don't like them? I think them foolish, and I'm not sure what they are trying to achieve.
Quoting you,
“ I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly... even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care”
Yes, it's a guess. May be wrong. What's your point?
Do you honestly believe that the nearly 900 people arrested yesterday would excuse “genuine” acts of terror?
Labour (Yvette Cooper, who ought to have been sacked rather than promoted), have brought the anti-terror laws into disrepute.
Don't know. Do you think they all think the government is lying?
you think our intelligence has improved since the 45 minutes WMD claim days?
Righties are still as gullible as ever. Can’t comment on their intelligence.
I still don't understand why we aren't stockpiling huge quantities of PA's magic paint if its such an effective weapon.
If you think it's that harmless, next time you fly get them to paint the engine turbines and prove it for us all.
I'm going to start some crowdfunding - paint supplies for the SAS.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
We were in the car at the time of the alarm. Genuinely alarming. Very much the point, I suppose. We quickly got stuck in a traffic jam - I wonder if someone had crashed as a result? Interestingly, daughter #1's ohone sounded a good 45 seconds before everyone else's. She then got a follow up alarm a little later which none of the rest of us got.
Some arsehole in the outside line in a BMW no doubt checking his messages with an Audi too close in front and a Tesla too close behind.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
No Reform aren't old school Tories, Churchill, Macmillan or Baldwin or Disraeli are not who Reform are emulating.
What they are is a populist party of the nationalist right primarily, combining some of the jingiostic British patriotism and suspicion of foreigners which could occasionally be found in some Tory leaders like Salisbury and Thatcher with some of the small state, low tax policies of Thatcher on economics. Thatcher was more of a pragmatist than Farage on issues like the EEA though and nor would be she have gone in for removing the 2 child benefit cap as a sop to working class voters with children on benefits funded by middle class taxpayers and she was never as anti immigrant as many in Reform are either, indeed she welcomed immigrants who contributed to our country regardless of their ethnicity or religion who worked hard
I don’t understand why people from ethnic minorities, whether black, brown, Scots or Welsh support a party that despises them. It’s like the BBC supporting Reform even though Reform purport to be anti BBC.
Most likely answer is that- at the moment- Reform are a magic mirror that lets you see whatever you wish in it. Rich globalists and poor nationalists, as long as you don't like the status quo, Nigel will fix it.
It very probably falls to pieces if you turn it into a concrete pan of action, but that isn't today's problem.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
They should be focusing all their resources on a cure for stupidity
I’m not so sure. A clever Trump may be even more dangerous than a stupid Trump.
You'd hope if he was clever he wouldn't be "Trump".
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
I don't think the party of scientist Margaret Thatcher would have had a vaccine conspiracy theorist headline a Conservative Party conference.
Reform are political and economic revolutionaries. A dash of Thatcher's outriders in 1981, a dash of Maga, some of the financial profile and structure of Berlusconi's Forza Italia, and at the organising end some more local touches of rural and small town Toryism.
There were 890 people arrested at a demonstration against the ban on the group Palestine Action in London on Saturday, the Metropolitan Police say.
The majority of the arrests were for supporting a proscribed group under the Terrorism Act, while police said 17 were also arrested for assaults on police officers "after the protest turned violent".
I think there is some talk of the accused refusing the bail conditions and therefore clogging up remand with thousands of pensioners.
The excuse Government ministers are now giving for the arrests that there is something that they are unable to disclose to us something that makes supporting Palestine Action a genuinely awful terrorist activity. Now, there might be something some members of the core group have planned to do, like killing a soldier or burning a synagogue, but how the hell are these protestors supposed to know that?
There are going to be loads of pensioners coming up in front of a judge who - for the first time - finally find out the nature of the group they are supporting as the CPS/Crown Office makes a case behind closed doors. Surely there is something for the defence there? Or worse - ministers have simply made this up and there is no real underlying reason for it, and they are just trying to scare people into not protesting with these vague allusions.
I don't actually get what they are protesting about. It's not Palestine/Gaza per se, because you can protest about that just fine, every day of the week and twice on Sunday. Is it free speech? I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly. Is it government overstepping the mark? I can understand if people don't trust the government. The Southport case had huge issues with that. I also sense that even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care, just as many reformers are in love with Connolly.
You don’t know if anyone “cared a fig” about Connolly because, as you admit yourself, you don’t “get it”.
What's your point? I genuinely don't understand if it's the Gaza angle, and this just misplaced or the free speech. No, I have no idea of their opinion about Connolly but I am drawing an inference.
My point is simply that you don’t like these people and are simply setting up various straw men that you have “inferred” they are guilty of.
Why are you suggesting I don't like them? I think them foolish, and I'm not sure what they are trying to achieve.
Quoting you,
“ I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly... even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care”
Yes, it's a guess. May be wrong. What's your point?
Do you honestly believe that the nearly 900 people arrested yesterday would excuse “genuine” acts of terror?
Labour (Yvette Cooper, who ought to have been sacked rather than promoted), have brought the anti-terror laws into disrepute.
Don't know. Do you think they all think the government is lying?
you think our intelligence has improved since the 45 minutes WMD claim days?
Righties are still as gullible as ever. Can’t comment on their intelligence.
I still don't understand why we aren't stockpiling huge quantities of PA's magic paint if its such an effective weapon.
If you think it's that harmless, next time you fly get them to paint the engine turbines and prove it for us all.
I'm going to start some crowdfunding - paint supplies for the SAS.
Along with offensive T-shirts ?
I did see a lot of plasticine action shirts when I was wandering around London yesterday.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
I suspect many of us would have been on the spectrum if it had been invented when we were young.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Some suggesting Baron is autistic, he had a very old father for starters
There were 890 people arrested at a demonstration against the ban on the group Palestine Action in London on Saturday, the Metropolitan Police say.
The majority of the arrests were for supporting a proscribed group under the Terrorism Act, while police said 17 were also arrested for assaults on police officers "after the protest turned violent".
I think there is some talk of the accused refusing the bail conditions and therefore clogging up remand with thousands of pensioners.
The excuse Government ministers are now giving for the arrests that there is something that they are unable to disclose to us something that makes supporting Palestine Action a genuinely awful terrorist activity. Now, there might be something some members of the core group have planned to do, like killing a soldier or burning a synagogue, but how the hell are these protestors supposed to know that?
There are going to be loads of pensioners coming up in front of a judge who - for the first time - finally find out the nature of the group they are supporting as the CPS/Crown Office makes a case behind closed doors. Surely there is something for the defence there? Or worse - ministers have simply made this up and there is no real underlying reason for it, and they are just trying to scare people into not protesting with these vague allusions.
I don't actually get what they are protesting about. It's not Palestine/Gaza per se, because you can protest about that just fine, every day of the week and twice on Sunday. Is it free speech? I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly. Is it government overstepping the mark? I can understand if people don't trust the government. The Southport case had huge issues with that. I also sense that even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care, just as many reformers are in love with Connolly.
You don’t know if anyone “cared a fig” about Connolly because, as you admit yourself, you don’t “get it”.
What's your point? I genuinely don't understand if it's the Gaza angle, and this just misplaced or the free speech. No, I have no idea of their opinion about Connolly but I am drawing an inference.
My point is simply that you don’t like these people and are simply setting up various straw men that you have “inferred” they are guilty of.
Why are you suggesting I don't like them? I think them foolish, and I'm not sure what they are trying to achieve.
Quoting you,
“ I bet none of them cared a fig for Connolly... even if it does come out that P A were planning a 'genuine' act a lot of this mob wouldn't care”
Yes, it's a guess. May be wrong. What's your point?
Do you honestly believe that the nearly 900 people arrested yesterday would excuse “genuine” acts of terror?
Labour (Yvette Cooper, who ought to have been sacked rather than promoted), have brought the anti-terror laws into disrepute.
Don't know. Do you think they all think the government is lying?
you think our intelligence has improved since the 45 minutes WMD claim days?
Righties are still as gullible as ever. Can’t comment on their intelligence.
I still don't understand why we aren't stockpiling huge quantities of PA's magic paint if its such an effective weapon.
If you think it's that harmless, next time you fly get them to paint the engine turbines and prove it for us all.
I'm going to start some crowdfunding - paint supplies for the SAS.
Students used to paint ban the bomb symbols on Polaris submarines during Rag Week.
What a lilley livered bunch they've turned into these days........
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
They should be focusing all their resources on a cure for stupidity
I’m not so sure. A clever Trump may be even more dangerous than a stupid Trump.
You'd hope if he was clever he wouldn't be "Trump".
I do find it perplexing how some posters rage at Trump, Farage and others about their alleged illegal acts and attack those who may want to leave the ECHR, but are supporting acts in our country by large groups of people who want to overwhelm our police and courts because they do not like a particular law
It may be the courts will overturn precribing PA, but until then the law needs to be respected otherwise we are no better than those on the right who want to disapply laws they do not like
Agreed.
Some people take leave of their senses when the word “Palestine” is mentioned. To me, the protection of UK military bases and defence assets is of paramount importance.
And some people can't distinguish between the right to peaceful protest and actually carrying out treasonable acts.
Let's cut all the crap. People are being charged with terrorism for wearing a t-shirt.
But they deliberately provoked the law in full knowledge of the consquences
You know as well as I do it was not for wearing a t-shirt, but the provocative writing on it and indeed many just holding cardboard notices with the same law defying words
Chap in Glasgow almost gotr done for wearing a Plasticine Action T-shirt (he genuinely opposes AI for animation and is a purist for hand-created work such as Shaun the Sheep and Wallace and Gromit).
Very fortunately the fairly senior officer wanting to bang him up was told to piss off by a custody sergeant ot similar who pointed out that the law referred not at all to Plasticine Action.
We were in the car at the time of the alarm. Genuinely alarming. Very much the point, I suppose. We quickly got stuck in a traffic jam - I wonder if someone had crashed as a result? Interestingly, daughter #1's ohone sounded a good 45 seconds before everyone else's. She then got a follow up alarm a little later which none of the rest of us got.
I was at a play, 15 - 20 minutes of peoples' phones going off! FFS just put it in airplane mode for 5 minutes.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I return from holiday to see that some nutters have been backing Lammy as next deputy leader. The whole point of him being Deputy PM is that he's not Deputy Leader too. Madness!
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I don't think you can take diagnostic rates going up as evidence for it actually going up as eg schools etc now are trained to diagnose it and can get extra funding for doing so, for things that either weren't diagnosed or tested for in the past.
If you start looking for something and find it that doesn't mean its become more common.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Some suggesting Baron is autistic, he had a very old father for starters
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Some suggesting Baron is autistic, he had a very old father for starters
What has an older father to do with autism?
Best guess is that autism is mostly genetic, and a chap's little chaps are more likely to misbehave as a chap gets older. (Translation: sperm are more likely to have mutations on them) So it's not uncommon for the risk of genetic diseases to increase.
More speculatively, has the expansion of higher education and IT industries made it easier for spectrumy boy to meet spectrumy girl and have babies? Seem to remember that Cambridge area schools got a small dollop of extra funding because of that effect.
We were in the car at the time of the alarm. Genuinely alarming. Very much the point, I suppose. We quickly got stuck in a traffic jam - I wonder if someone had crashed as a result? Interestingly, daughter #1's ohone sounded a good 45 seconds before everyone else's. She then got a follow up alarm a little later which none of the rest of us got.
I was at a play, 15 - 20 minutes of peoples' phones going off! FFS just put it in airplane mode for 5 minutes.
What kind of dickhead doesn't turn their phone off by the start of the play?
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Some suggesting Baron is autistic, he had a very old father for starters
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I'd suggest it has almost become fashionable too. Endless magazine articles, usually women, how I realised why I was the way I was at forty... (Autism, natch).
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
I still wonder how well defended (I suspect I can guess...) our undersea comms lines are - not to mention the lines coming in from off-shore wind turbines.
Not as important as small boats, or whether Kemi did well on social media I realise. But still. Maybe worth a passing thought by the government.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I'd suggest it has almost become fashionable too. Endless magazine articles, usually women, how I realised why I was the way I was at forty... (Autism, natch).
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
I am a little suspicious of upper middle class friends who suddenly find their kid has ADHD / are on the autistic spectrum after a private assessment when they hit their A-Levels and tell me all about how useful all the extra time little Timmy will be getting in exams.
Apropos of nothing, Wings over Scotland has 108 posts in two days following his latest post. A few years ago it would have been approaching 1000 posts.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I don't think you can take diagnostic rates going up as evidence for it actually going up as eg schools etc now are trained to diagnose it and can get extra funding for doing so, for things that either weren't diagnosed or tested for in the past.
If you start looking for something and find it that doesn't mean its become more common.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I'd suggest it has almost become fashionable too. Endless magazine articles, usually women, how I realised why I was the way I was at forty... (Autism, natch).
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
I am a little suspicious of upper middle class friends who suddenly find their kid has ADHD / are on the autistic spectrum after a private assessment when they hit their A-Levels and tell me all about how useful all the extra time little Timmy will be getting in exams.
Whereas working class parents will have found their child being held back because of the same diagnosis.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I don't think you can take diagnostic rates going up as evidence for it actually going up as eg schools etc now are trained to diagnose it and can get extra funding for doing so, for things that either weren't diagnosed or tested for in the past.
If you start looking for something and find it that doesn't mean its become more common.
It is happening in America too, hence Trump/RFK.
No shit, its popular to look for it now there too, so of course it is.
Apropos of nothing, Wings over Scotland has 108 posts in two days following his latest post. A few years ago it would have been approaching 1000 posts.
Apropos of nothing, Wings over Scotland has 108 posts in two days following his latest post. A few years ago it would have been approaching 1000 posts.
He's another one gone down the anti trans rabbit hole.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I'd suggest it has almost become fashionable too. Endless magazine articles, usually women, how I realised why I was the way I was at forty... (Autism, natch).
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
I am a little suspicious of upper middle class friends who suddenly find their kid has ADHD / are on the autistic spectrum after a private assessment when they hit their A-Levels and tell me all about how useful all the extra time little Timmy will be getting in exams.
Is it so odd? It passes the sniff test aka order of magnitude check. Prevalence in children is about 1-2%, so maybe 2-4% of families.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I'd suggest it has almost become fashionable too. Endless magazine articles, usually women, how I realised why I was the way I was at forty... (Autism, natch).
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
I am a little suspicious of upper middle class friends who suddenly find their kid has ADHD / are on the autistic spectrum after a private assessment when they hit their A-Levels and tell me all about how useful all the extra time little Timmy will be getting in exams.
Whereas working class parents will have found their child being held back because of the same diagnosis.
I remember a friend of mine who was told that because he had dyslexia he could never pursue the career he wanted in being an electrician (colour-blindness). He was the best sparky I ever came across. Ended up working in a warehouse shifting pallets around. Still did amazing sparky stuff in his spare time - but it was 'just' a hobby.
I was listening to a programming podcast last week - UK guy who now works (by near-fluke) for a very successful US tech company as a programmer. Was told - again for dyslexia - that he could never 'be clever' or do anything that involved reading - why not go stack shelves in a supermarket, eh lad?
After about 20 years of it he taught himself programming - realised he was good at it - and ended up working where he is now.
Kinda grim how much talent we're throwing down the toilet.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I don't think you can take diagnostic rates going up as evidence for it actually going up as eg schools etc now are trained to diagnose it and can get extra funding for doing so, for things that either weren't diagnosed or tested for in the past.
If you start looking for something and find it that doesn't mean its become more common.
It is happening in America too, hence Trump/RFK.
No shit, its popular to look for it now there too, so of course it is.
Yes but America is not chasing the pupil or SEND premium.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I don't think you can take diagnostic rates going up as evidence for it actually going up as eg schools etc now are trained to diagnose it and can get extra funding for doing so, for things that either weren't diagnosed or tested for in the past.
If you start looking for something and find it that doesn't mean its become more common.
It is happening in America too, hence Trump/RFK.
No shit, its popular to look for it now there too, so of course it is.
Yes but America is not chasing the pupil premium.
Yes they are, America has Federal programs such as the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act that incorporate autism and give extra support to those with diagnoses.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I'd suggest it has almost become fashionable too. Endless magazine articles, usually women, how I realised why I was the way I was at forty... (Autism, natch).
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
I am a little suspicious of upper middle class friends who suddenly find their kid has ADHD / are on the autistic spectrum after a private assessment when they hit their A-Levels and tell me all about how useful all the extra time little Timmy will be getting in exams.
Is it so odd? It passes the sniff test aka order of magnitude check. Prevalence in children is about 1-2%, so maybe 2-4% of families.
I had extra time in University exams because of RSI. Didn't help a damn.
This, though, is because university exams are hard, so the natural limit often comes before the time is exhausted. School exams on the other hand...
Britain’s most senior police officer is to present the new Home Secretary with proposed law changes “within weeks” aimed at stopping officers from policing tweets, the Telegraph can disclose.
Sir Mark Rowley, the head of the Met Police, is proposing a shake-up of legislation that would give officers greater discretion to use “common sense” when deciding whether to record and investigate complaints about comments on social media.
These claims remind me a bit of the boxers a weigh in being "restrained" by some weedy trainer guy from filling in their opponent. If only you let me go, I would have had him.
One hopes that they'll also be given greater discretion to use "common sense" when it comes to policing comments on pensioners' T-shirts.
If exam performance is limited by time rather than talent, perhaps the exams could have the same content, but one-and-a-half times as much time for everyone. Let pupils walk out when they're done.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
I don't think the party of scientist Margaret Thatcher would have had a vaccine conspiracy theorist headline a Conservative Party conference.
It's very easy to impute views and actions to people when they're dead. Margaret Thatcher seems to get that more than most.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
They've been courting anti-vax for a while now. When are they going to course correct on that one?
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
I don't think the party of scientist Margaret Thatcher would have had a vaccine conspiracy theorist headline a Conservative Party conference.
It's very easy to impute views and actions to people when they're dead. Margaret Thatcher seems to get that more than most.
Fortunately, her views on science and policymaking are well known. And when -as with AIDS- science clashed with her personal morality, she chose science.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I'd suggest it has almost become fashionable too. Endless magazine articles, usually women, how I realised why I was the way I was at forty... (Autism, natch).
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
I am a little suspicious of upper middle class friends who suddenly find their kid has ADHD / are on the autistic spectrum after a private assessment when they hit their A-Levels and tell me all about how useful all the extra time little Timmy will be getting in exams.
Whereas working class parents will have found their child being held back because of the same diagnosis.
I remember a friend of mine who was told that because he had dyslexia he could never pursue the career he wanted in being an electrician (colour-blindness). He was the best sparky I ever came across. Ended up working in a warehouse shifting pallets around. Still did amazing sparky stuff in his spare time - but it was 'just' a hobby.
I was listening to a programming podcast last week - UK guy who now works (by near-fluke) for a very successful US tech company as a programmer. Was told - again for dyslexia - that he could never 'be clever' or do anything that involved reading - why not go stack shelves in a supermarket, eh lad?
After about 20 years of it he taught himself programming - realised he was good at it - and ended up working where he is now.
Kinda grim how much talent we're throwing down the toilet.
Our son was diagnosed with dyslexia, very late. I suppose we’re the sort of sickening middle class parents who get a diagnosis and act on it when we should just shut up.
But anyway, things didn’t really improve until we took him to an optometrist who tested his reading of nonsense passages under different light and colour conditions. Turned out he read 20% faster if words were printed on mint green, or if he wore green tinted glasses. Which he now has. It transformed his A-Level revision. He got his exam papers printed on green paper.
I’m glad this was properly diagnosed. I hope others don’t feel that following up on things like this makes them middle class busybodies with privileged Timmies.
"Labour is dead" says Zara Sultana "Tories are dead" says Nadine Dorries
That's a lot of dead, if true. Along with many of the British virtues: moderation, unflappability, and a contempt for conmen, blowhards and toad-eaters.
Christine Keeler applies, perhaps.
Do you mean Mandy Rice-Davies?
Fun fact, Christine Keeler shared a peter with Wes Streeting's granny. (Translation: they were in HMP Holloway together.)
I'm sure Christine Keeler said something that fits, too.
You will have to remind me.
Unfortunately I am in @Leon mode, minus the illusions, the ranting, the drugs, and the impressionist sex-cafe interior design scheme.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Do you have the courage of your convictions like @RochdalePioneers? Will you stand for election?
As far as I know, Rochdale Pioneers wishes to become an MP. Good for him. I do not.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
On the mention of Mozart, there is a new version of Shaffer’s play Amadeus coming out this year as a series. I loved the film and look forward to a “bigger” version of it. I think Will Sharpe as Mozart will definitely do it justice and hope Paul Bettany does even half as good a job as F Murray Abraham did.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
I don't think the party of scientist Margaret Thatcher would have had a vaccine conspiracy theorist headline a Conservative Party conference.
It's very easy to impute views and actions to people when they're dead. Margaret Thatcher seems to get that more than most.
"Vaccinating Britain: Mass vaccination and the public since the Second World War", chapter 4:
As with pertussis, the DHSS took the JCVI’s advice that it should intensify the anti-CRS [Congenital Rubella Syndrome] campaign, but that it should do so by getting local Area Health Authorities to work with women, rather than through a ‘crash’ national campaign. Implementation was delayed by the general election, but the plans were carried through by the new Thatcher administration in June 1979. As an interim measure, the government tried to ensure that immunisation rates remained as high as possible among school girls by distributing information leaflets through the Health Education Council in November 1978. The DHSS also made a concerted effort to target immigrant communities where the rates of rubella were known to be higher and potential mothers were much less likely to have come through the school system or to have been in contact with health services before and during the early stages of pregnancy.
Looks to me like @rcs1000 's imputation was spot on.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
I don't think the party of scientist Margaret Thatcher would have had a vaccine conspiracy theorist headline a Conservative Party conference.
It's very easy to impute views and actions to people when they're dead. Margaret Thatcher seems to get that more than most.
Or you could just look at what she actually did. Taking science seriously, and following where that led was one of those things.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I'd suggest it has almost become fashionable too. Endless magazine articles, usually women, how I realised why I was the way I was at forty... (Autism, natch).
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
I am a little suspicious of upper middle class friends who suddenly find their kid has ADHD / are on the autistic spectrum after a private assessment when they hit their A-Levels and tell me all about how useful all the extra time little Timmy will be getting in exams.
Whereas working class parents will have found their child being held back because of the same diagnosis.
I remember a friend of mine who was told that because he had dyslexia he could never pursue the career he wanted in being an electrician (colour-blindness). He was the best sparky I ever came across. Ended up working in a warehouse shifting pallets around. Still did amazing sparky stuff in his spare time - but it was 'just' a hobby.
I was listening to a programming podcast last week - UK guy who now works (by near-fluke) for a very successful US tech company as a programmer. Was told - again for dyslexia - that he could never 'be clever' or do anything that involved reading - why not go stack shelves in a supermarket, eh lad?
After about 20 years of it he taught himself programming - realised he was good at it - and ended up working where he is now.
Kinda grim how much talent we're throwing down the toilet.
We have gone from putting people down because of autism, dyslexia, etc., to putting them down because of disagreements on social media or perceptions of social acceptability. Neither view is acceptable IMHO.
Britain’s most senior police officer is to present the new Home Secretary with proposed law changes “within weeks” aimed at stopping officers from policing tweets, the Telegraph can disclose.
Sir Mark Rowley, the head of the Met Police, is proposing a shake-up of legislation that would give officers greater discretion to use “common sense” when deciding whether to record and investigate complaints about comments on social media.
These claims remind me a bit of the boxers a weigh in being "restrained" by some weedy trainer guy from filling in their opponent. If only you let me go, I would have had him.
One hopes that they'll also be given greater discretion to use "common sense" when it comes to policing comments on pensioners' T-shirts.
It's curious how they can use discretion to completely ignore some crimes.
For example, concerning The Thing We Can't discuss, police officers on multiple occasions witnessed the commission of a serious crime, one that gets you lots of jail time. They managed to not even detain the criminals, much lest arrest them.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
On the mention of Mozart, there is a new version of Shaffer’s play Amadeus coming out this year as a series. I loved the film and look forward to a “bigger” version of it. I think Will Sharpe as Mozart will definitely do it justice and hope Paul Bettany does even half as good a job as F Murray Abraham did.
It will be extremely hard for them to outdo the movie, which was pretty much perfect - thanks in part to that astonishing performance by Abraham
But then who knew that Netflix would completely outmatch, with a TV drama series, Visconti’s iconic movie of The Leopard? But so it is
Sadly I was not able to catch much of the Reform conference footage.
Was it established whether it is official policy that vaccines gave the King and Princess of Wales cancer?
I don't think it is. They put Dr Assem Malhotra on the platform. Here's his speech (the Telegraph have the whole thing recorded live). 15 mniutes long.
Britain’s most senior police officer is to present the new Home Secretary with proposed law changes “within weeks” aimed at stopping officers from policing tweets, the Telegraph can disclose.
Sir Mark Rowley, the head of the Met Police, is proposing a shake-up of legislation that would give officers greater discretion to use “common sense” when deciding whether to record and investigate complaints about comments on social media.
These claims remind me a bit of the boxers a weigh in being "restrained" by some weedy trainer guy from filling in their opponent. If only you let me go, I would have had him.
One hopes that they'll also be given greater discretion to use "common sense" when it comes to policing comments on pensioners' T-shirts.
There are two separate issues here.
Is damaging a plane a terrorist offence? According to the Act, it seems to be so.
Is "supporting" a proscribed terrorist organisation a terrorist offence? The ACT speaks of "supporting" but what does supporting mean? I suspect the legislators meant actually providing support to a terrorist organisation in committing terrorist offences not holding pieces of cardboard merely expressing support. To call that a terrorist offence debases the meaning of the word terrorist and cannot have been intended.
The police and Mark Rowley are at fault here. They shouldn't have been provoked into taking action. They should simply have ignored the protestors. Job done. No police time wasted. Point made. Everybody happy.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
Fear can be about things other than death in a concentration camp. After all I’m a straight white British born male so I’m not in anyone’s sights. No, the fear is of the sort of slow (or fast) erosion of the rule of law, of evidence based policy on health or the environment, and the rights of minorities or less fortunate people in society, that equivalents of Reform have overseen in Turkey, Hungary, Slovakia, India, Israel, Belarus and Georgia. And, as we’re seeing slowly unfold, in the USA.
Might be misplaced, might not, but again I need more than others’ enthusiasm to convince me. I need living examples of populist right wing movements actually doing good for a developed country rather than following the usual playbook. Argentina and Italy are ones to watch, but Argentina is not a developed country (and needed radical, destructive reform) and Italy remains TBD.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
On the mention of Mozart, there is a new version of Shaffer’s play Amadeus coming out this year as a series. I loved the film and look forward to a “bigger” version of it. I think Will Sharpe as Mozart will definitely do it justice and hope Paul Bettany does even half as good a job as F Murray Abraham did.
It will be extremely hard for them to outdo the movie, which was pretty much perfect - thanks in part to that astonishing performance by Abraham
But then who knew that Netflix would completely outmatch, with a TV drama series, Visconti’s iconic movie of The Leopard? But so it is
The Netflix Leopard is the best show I have seen in years.
Current rates of ASD amongst children are 1 in 46. It really isn't surprising that middle aged women are being diagnosed now. It wasn't on the DSM for girls till 1994! Schools can't "diagnose" anything. Nor can your GP. Training for teachers is woefully inadequate. Even in the SEN sector a lot of it is out of date. It's really difficult to get a diagnosis. Yes, you can go private but it isn't always recognized. And that is before we get to the fact that ASD and ADHD have only just been accepted as being able to exist in the same person. When the reality is that if you have one you're highly likely to have the other, too. The manifestations often counteract each other. The extent to which these conditions are hereditary are only just being understood. We are massively under diagnosing, not over. The answer isn't money. It's reasonable adjustments. Most workplaces and schools simply can't be arsed.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Reform would benefit from a critical media. They need to be able to argue their ideas in debate so they can amend and test them if necessary before an election. Otherwise, they may have some nasty shocks when first in power. They need the BBC, the Telegraph, the Mail and the Express to be critical friends, rather than just fanbois.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I'd suggest it has almost become fashionable too. Endless magazine articles, usually women, how I realised why I was the way I was at forty... (Autism, natch).
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
I am a little suspicious of upper middle class friends who suddenly find their kid has ADHD / are on the autistic spectrum after a private assessment when they hit their A-Levels and tell me all about how useful all the extra time little Timmy will be getting in exams.
Is it so odd? It passes the sniff test aka order of magnitude check. Prevalence in children is about 1-2%, so maybe 2-4% of families.
I've related on pb before just how many of my pharmacy students get extra time in exams for one thing or another. Not all autism for sure, but anxiety, and other conditions. Many hard to prove. It's not 1-2 percent. For all reasons id say 20 percent are getting extra time for 'reasons'. My belief is most are gaming a very lenient system.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
On the mention of Mozart, there is a new version of Shaffer’s play Amadeus coming out this year as a series. I loved the film and look forward to a “bigger” version of it. I think Will Sharpe as Mozart will definitely do it justice and hope Paul Bettany does even half as good a job as F Murray Abraham did.
It will be extremely hard for them to outdo the movie, which was pretty much perfect - thanks in part to that astonishing performance by Abraham
But then who knew that Netflix would completely outmatch, with a TV drama series, Visconti’s iconic movie of The Leopard? But so it is
The Netflix Leopard is a pathetic, pale imitation of the Visconti movie.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
Fear can be about things other than death in a concentration camp. After all I’m a straight white British born male so I’m not in anyone’s sights. No, the fear is of the sort of slow (or fast) erosion of the rule of law, of evidence based policy on health or the environment, and the rights of minorities or less fortunate people in society, that equivalents of Reform have overseen in Turkey, Hungary, Slovakia, India, Israel, Belarus and Georgia. And, as we’re seeing slowly unfold, in the USA.
Might be misplaced, might not, but again I need more than others’ enthusiasm to convince me. I need living examples of populist right wing movements actually doing good for a developed country rather than following the usual playbook. Argentina and Italy are ones to watch, but Argentina is not a developed country (and needed radical, destructive reform) and Italy remains TBD.
Many in this country are already rightly fearful of the grotesque, malignant, destructive policies of the Woke left, which have already done tremendous damage to the nation, and to millions of citizens
So forgive us for not being as frit of Farage as you, you pathetically effete bourgeois twerp
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
I don't think the party of scientist Margaret Thatcher would have had a vaccine conspiracy theorist headline a Conservative Party conference.
It's very easy to impute views and actions to people when they're dead. Margaret Thatcher seems to get that more than most.
Fortunately, her views on science and policymaking are well known. And when -as with AIDS- science clashed with her personal morality, she chose science.
Did you watch the speech? If you didn't, your critique feels somewhat baseless.
Theories about cancers aside, we know of some adverse reactions to the vaccines in some - that would be be expected with any new treatment given to a huge amount of people. Malhotra's attack on the vaccines wasn't really about vaccine harm, it was about lack of vaccine efficacy. He pointed to data that he claimed showed vanishingly little impact on hospitalisations in those given the vaccine, even when over a certain age. If that is correct, it certainly appears to undermine the case for us going as ham on vaccinations as we did.
Someone arguing against you might just as well say that Thatcher would have been brave enough to demand answers and ask the right questions, and follow the science where it led, rather than where pressure from public health bodies was coming from. But at the end of the day, we cannot know her thoughts.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Some suggesting Baron is autistic, he had a very old father for starters
If you read the whole article it shoots it's own evidence to shreds. It's the fault of older parents but then teenage pregnancies also generate autistic babies. Anecdotally I don't see the evidence.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
On the mention of Mozart, there is a new version of Shaffer’s play Amadeus coming out this year as a series. I loved the film and look forward to a “bigger” version of it. I think Will Sharpe as Mozart will definitely do it justice and hope Paul Bettany does even half as good a job as F Murray Abraham did.
It will be extremely hard for them to outdo the movie, which was pretty much perfect - thanks in part to that astonishing performance by Abraham
But then who knew that Netflix would completely outmatch, with a TV drama series, Visconti’s iconic movie of The Leopard? But so it is
The Netflix Leopard is a pathetic, pale imitation of the Visconti movie.
I now know to ignore all your future opinions on anything artistic, so thanks
Britain’s most senior police officer is to present the new Home Secretary with proposed law changes “within weeks” aimed at stopping officers from policing tweets, the Telegraph can disclose.
Sir Mark Rowley, the head of the Met Police, is proposing a shake-up of legislation that would give officers greater discretion to use “common sense” when deciding whether to record and investigate complaints about comments on social media.
These claims remind me a bit of the boxers a weigh in being "restrained" by some weedy trainer guy from filling in their opponent. If only you let me go, I would have had him.
One hopes that they'll also be given greater discretion to use "common sense" when it comes to policing comments on pensioners' T-shirts.
They already have enough discretion. The complainer in the Linehan case is well known to the police. A sensible copper would tell them to go away and stop wasting everyone's time. They chose not to. It's not even clear that Linehan has committed an offence in the UK. Utterly ludicrous. Seeking new discretion is arse covering as they got it so badly wrong.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
Fear can be about things other than death in a concentration camp. After all I’m a straight white British born male so I’m not in anyone’s sights. No, the fear is of the sort of slow (or fast) erosion of the rule of law, of evidence based policy on health or the environment, and the rights of minorities or less fortunate people in society, that equivalents of Reform have overseen in Turkey, Hungary, Slovakia, India, Israel, Belarus and Georgia. And, as we’re seeing slowly unfold, in the USA.
Might be misplaced, might not, but again I need more than others’ enthusiasm to convince me. I need living examples of populist right wing movements actually doing good for a developed country rather than following the usual playbook. Argentina and Italy are ones to watch, but Argentina is not a developed country (and needed radical, destructive reform) and Italy remains TBD.
And all the fear of what has happened in Trump's USA is entirely reasonable. Because Farage explicity portrays Trump as a model to follow, and is happy to present himself as his biggest fan.
So, what else could people reasonably think? There is a lot of self-delusion at large currently on this, both in the media, and in wider society.
Britain’s most senior police officer is to present the new Home Secretary with proposed law changes “within weeks” aimed at stopping officers from policing tweets, the Telegraph can disclose.
Sir Mark Rowley, the head of the Met Police, is proposing a shake-up of legislation that would give officers greater discretion to use “common sense” when deciding whether to record and investigate complaints about comments on social media.
These claims remind me a bit of the boxers a weigh in being "restrained" by some weedy trainer guy from filling in their opponent. If only you let me go, I would have had him.
One hopes that they'll also be given greater discretion to use "common sense" when it comes to policing comments on pensioners' T-shirts.
There are two separate issues here.
Is damaging a plane a terrorist offence? According to the Act, it seems to be so.
Is "supporting" a proscribed terrorist organisation a terrorist offence? The ACT speaks of "supporting" but what does supporting mean? I suspect the legislators meant actually providing support to a terrorist organisation in committing terrorist offences not holding pieces of cardboard merely expressing support. To call that a terrorist offence debases the meaning of the word terrorist and cannot have been intended.
The police and Mark Rowley are at fault here. They shouldn't have been provoked into taking action. They should simply have ignored the protestors. Job done. No police time wasted. Point made. Everybody happy.
I think it was intended for simple expressions of support to be criminalised. The point, AIUI, was to create laws that are easy to prosecute.
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
Fear can be about things other than death in a concentration camp. After all I’m a straight white British born male so I’m not in anyone’s sights. No, the fear is of the sort of slow (or fast) erosion of the rule of law, of evidence based policy on health or the environment, and the rights of minorities or less fortunate people in society, that equivalents of Reform have overseen in Turkey, Hungary, Slovakia, India, Israel, Belarus and Georgia. And, as we’re seeing slowly unfold, in the USA.
Might be misplaced, might not, but again I need more than others’ enthusiasm to convince me. I need living examples of populist right wing movements actually doing good for a developed country rather than following the usual playbook. Argentina and Italy are ones to watch, but Argentina is not a developed country (and needed radical, destructive reform) and Italy remains TBD.
Many in this country are already rightly fearful of the grotesque, malignant, destructive policies of the Woke left, which have already done tremendous damage to the nation, and to millions of citizens
So forgive us for not being as frit of Farage as you, you pathetically effete bourgeois twerp
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
On the mention of Mozart, there is a new version of Shaffer’s play Amadeus coming out this year as a series. I loved the film and look forward to a “bigger” version of it. I think Will Sharpe as Mozart will definitely do it justice and hope Paul Bettany does even half as good a job as F Murray Abraham did.
It will be extremely hard for them to outdo the movie, which was pretty much perfect - thanks in part to that astonishing performance by Abraham
But then who knew that Netflix would completely outmatch, with a TV drama series, Visconti’s iconic movie of The Leopard? But so it is
The Netflix Leopard is a pathetic, pale imitation of the Visconti movie.
I now know to ignore all your future opinions on anything artistic, so thanks
I’ve long realised yours are cringeingly midwit, tbh.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I'd suggest it has almost become fashionable too. Endless magazine articles, usually women, how I realised why I was the way I was at forty... (Autism, natch).
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
I am a little suspicious of upper middle class friends who suddenly find their kid has ADHD / are on the autistic spectrum after a private assessment when they hit their A-Levels and tell me all about how useful all the extra time little Timmy will be getting in exams.
Is it so odd? It passes the sniff test aka order of magnitude check. Prevalence in children is about 1-2%, so maybe 2-4% of families.
I've related on pb before just how many of my pharmacy students get extra time in exams for one thing or another. Not all autism for sure, but anxiety, and other conditions. Many hard to prove. It's not 1-2 percent. For all reasons id say 20 percent are getting extra time for 'reasons'. My belief is most are gaming a very lenient system.
If exam performance is limited by time rather than talent, perhaps the exams could have the same content, but one-and-a-half times as much time for everyone. Let pupils walk out when they're done.
I tend to agree. It boils down to what you are trying to actually assess. If it's time restricted then you should expect worse performance than if it's as much time as you like.
However there does not to be a limit. During the first COVID exam cycle we gave students a 24 hour window for each exam. Anecdotally many actually used the whole time, even if just for fettling their answers.
Trump has a cure for autism? That really is fantastic news. My autistic son will be relieved.
To be fair to President Trump, at least he is questioning why autism rates have rocketed. It has been reported that RFK blames paracetamol in pregnancy, and a report is expected soon.
Are autism rates rocketing?
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
Yes and yes. The definition of autism is now much wider than it was in the past. Think Sherlock Holmes (or any character really) as played by Benedict Cumberbatch, rather than the Rain Man. But even allowing for that, diagnostic rates have been rocketing.
I'd suggest it has almost become fashionable too. Endless magazine articles, usually women, how I realised why I was the way I was at forty... (Autism, natch).
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
I am a little suspicious of upper middle class friends who suddenly find their kid has ADHD / are on the autistic spectrum after a private assessment when they hit their A-Levels and tell me all about how useful all the extra time little Timmy will be getting in exams.
Is it so odd? It passes the sniff test aka order of magnitude check. Prevalence in children is about 1-2%, so maybe 2-4% of families.
I've related on pb before just how many of my pharmacy students get extra time in exams for one thing or another. Not all autism for sure, but anxiety, and other conditions. Many hard to prove. It's not 1-2 percent. For all reasons id say 20 percent are getting extra time for 'reasons'. My belief is most are gaming a very lenient system.
Shouldn't pharamacists take as much time as needed to be right? Why not give 'em all the extra time and see what happens...
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
On the mention of Mozart, there is a new version of Shaffer’s play Amadeus coming out this year as a series. I loved the film and look forward to a “bigger” version of it. I think Will Sharpe as Mozart will definitely do it justice and hope Paul Bettany does even half as good a job as F Murray Abraham did.
It will be extremely hard for them to outdo the movie, which was pretty much perfect - thanks in part to that astonishing performance by Abraham
But then who knew that Netflix would completely outmatch, with a TV drama series, Visconti’s iconic movie of The Leopard? But so it is
The Netflix Leopard is a pathetic, pale imitation of the Visconti movie.
I now know to ignore all your future opinions on anything artistic, so thanks
I’ve long realised yours are cringeingly midwit, tbh.
Aren’t you some kind of middle manager finance dude?
Evening all. Been with Pa Woolie this afternoon. You'll be pleased to know he has proclaimed we have passed peak Reform. Pa Woolie for the win.
We are always passing peak Reform. We've passed it here at least 5 times.
You’re feeling, shall we say, bullish? Enjoy it. Reform will end either with a squib-like polling slump, or electoral success and the destruction of our nation.
Show me an example of a populist right wing movement in history bringing about national renewal and happiness in a developed country and I might change my mind, but I’m struggling for good creds.
Bullish, no. Genuinely optimistic about the country for the first time for ages, yes.
Reform are old school Tories - their policies are simply what worked in the UK before the country became enshittified by the Blairite consensus. It will be a huge relief to get sensible Government in the national interest again.
Inexperience is an issue, and I hope they will need Tory support, as that will be a Government with a real democratic mandate as well as a hopefully a significant parliamentary majority.
Don't be fooled by Andrea Jenkins singing and Jeremy Kyle hyping the crowds - they are serious about governing. Last week they had a press conference about billions of waste in Local Government pensions for goodness sake. Sometimes their tries are outside the line and they course correct. This is the mistake Kemi is making, possibly out of necessity. She wants a policy that is absolutely bullet proof from every angle, but sometimes you have to put a policy out and it gets tested and then develops in public.
Fair play, an earnest response. I feel differently, of course: a mixture of fear and frustration.
Fear of what?! Reform aren’t Nazis. The knicker-wetting is absurd
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
Where does Freeland call essentially for Starmer to quit?
He says Rayner's loss is a fucking nightmare for Labour and it is.
Comments
What they are is a populist party of the nationalist right primarily, combining some of the jingiostic British patriotism and suspicion of foreigners which could occasionally be found in some Tory leaders like Salisbury and Thatcher with some of the small state, low tax policies of Thatcher on economics. Thatcher was more of a pragmatist than Farage on issues like the EEA though and nor would be she have gone in for removing the 2 child benefit cap as a sop to working class voters with children on benefits funded by middle class taxpayers and she was never as anti immigrant as many in Reform are either, indeed she welcomed immigrants who contributed to our country regardless of their ethnicity or religion who worked hard
Interestingly, daughter #1's ohone sounded a good 45 seconds before everyone else's. She then got a follow up alarm a little later which none of the rest of us got.
Chiacgo in absolute terms year after year has a lot of murders. Outside of downtown (which is all most tourists see), Chicago gets very iffy, very fast.
There are few things to consider, St Louis is a very small city, so 100 people being murdered is a very high per capita. But, I think there is probably something interesting going on here, I presume this is gang driven, why St Louis, Memphis, Kansas City, etc. For example, Kansas City traditionally is the one of the most boring nothingness cities in America.
Sir Mark Rowley, the head of the Met Police, is proposing a shake-up of legislation that would give officers greater discretion to use “common sense” when deciding whether to record and investigate complaints about comments on social media.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/09/07/mark-rowley-change-law-stop-policing-tweets-met-chief/
These claims remind me a bit of the boxers a weigh in being "restrained" by some weedy trainer guy from filling in their opponent. If only you let me go, I would have had him.
The BBC are Starmer Labour, they may have to give Reform airtime but they are not pro Reform like GB News
Action falls within this subsection if it—
(a)involves serious violence against a person,
(b)involves serious damage to property,
(c)endangers a person’s life, other than that of the person committing the action,
(d)creates a serious risk to the health or safety of the public or a section of the public, or
(e)is designed seriously to interfere with or seriously to disrupt an electronic system.
Did the attack on RAF Brize Norton meet any of those subsections? Yes.
If the law was intended to be different, it should be written differently.
It is the law and is being challenged in the courts
Let the courts decide
Or do we just diagnose it now when it wouldn't have been in the past?
It very probably falls to pieces if you turn it into a concrete pan of action, but that isn't today's problem.
What a lilley livered bunch they've turned into these days........
Very fortunately the fairly senior officer wanting to bang him up was told to piss off by a custody sergeant ot similar who pointed out that the law referred not at all to Plasticine Action.
Greg Jackson is quite Labour friendly, only a couple of weeks was asked to join Cabinet Office Board.
If you start looking for something and find it that doesn't mean its become more common.
Musk autistic too of course
More speculatively, has the expansion of higher education and IT industries made it easier for spectrumy boy to meet spectrumy girl and have babies? Seem to remember that Cambridge area schools got a small dollop of extra funding because of that effect.
A bit like being gluten I tolerant be ame very much a fashionable thing. Helpful for those who are genuinely gluten intolerant.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3rvx470yg8o
I still wonder how well defended (I suspect I can guess...) our undersea comms lines are - not to mention the lines coming in from off-shore wind turbines.
Not as important as small boats, or whether Kemi did well on social media I realise. But still. Maybe worth a passing thought by the government.
I was listening to a programming podcast last week - UK guy who now works (by near-fluke) for a very successful US tech company as a programmer. Was told - again for dyslexia - that he could never 'be clever' or do anything that involved reading - why not go stack shelves in a supermarket, eh lad?
After about 20 years of it he taught himself programming - realised he was good at it - and ended up working where he is now.
Kinda grim how much talent we're throwing down the toilet.
This, though, is because university exams are hard, so the natural limit often comes before the time is exhausted. School exams on the other hand...
As for Labour I note that both John Harris and J Freedland are essentially calling for Starmer to quit, in today’s Groaniad. The main story is “Labour figures tell Starmer to stop making mistakes” (which is a bit like telling Mozart to “stop being musical”)
He’s completely lost the main organ of the Left. I wonder if he will last beyond 2026
But anyway, things didn’t really improve until we took him to an optometrist who tested his reading of nonsense passages under different light and colour conditions. Turned out he read 20% faster if words were printed on mint green, or if he wore green tinted glasses. Which he now has. It transformed his A-Level revision. He got his exam papers printed on green paper.
I’m glad this was properly diagnosed. I hope others don’t feel that following up on things like this makes them middle class busybodies with privileged Timmies.
I have gin taken.
You're on your own.
As with pertussis, the DHSS took the JCVI’s advice that it should intensify the anti-CRS [Congenital Rubella Syndrome] campaign, but that it should do so by getting local Area Health Authorities to work with women, rather than through a ‘crash’ national campaign. Implementation was delayed by the general election, but the plans were carried through by the new Thatcher administration in June 1979. As an interim measure, the government tried to ensure that immunisation rates remained as high as possible among school girls by distributing information leaflets through the Health Education Council in November 1978. The DHSS also made a concerted effort to target immigrant communities where the rates of rubella were known to be higher and potential mothers were much less likely to have come through the school system or to have been in contact with health services before and during the early stages of pregnancy.
Looks to me like @rcs1000 's imputation was spot on.
Taking science seriously, and following where that led was one of those things.
Were you around at the time ?
For example, concerning The Thing We Can't discuss, police officers on multiple occasions witnessed the commission of a serious crime, one that gets you lots of jail time. They managed to not even detain the criminals, much lest arrest them.
But then who knew that Netflix would completely outmatch, with a TV drama series, Visconti’s iconic movie of The Leopard? But so it is
(In other new, yes - the Pink Ladies *are* a further right outfit.)
Is damaging a plane a terrorist offence? According to the Act, it seems to be so.
Is "supporting" a proscribed terrorist organisation a terrorist offence?
The ACT speaks of "supporting" but what does supporting mean? I suspect the legislators meant actually providing support to a terrorist organisation in committing terrorist offences not holding pieces of cardboard merely expressing support. To call that a terrorist offence debases the meaning of the word terrorist and cannot have been intended.
The police and Mark Rowley are at fault here. They shouldn't have been provoked into taking action. They should simply have ignored the protestors. Job done. No police time wasted. Point made. Everybody happy.
Might be misplaced, might not, but again I need more than others’ enthusiasm to convince me. I need living examples of populist right wing movements actually doing good for a developed country rather than following the usual playbook. Argentina and Italy are ones to watch, but Argentina is not a developed country (and needed radical, destructive reform) and Italy remains TBD.
Highly recommended.
It really isn't surprising that middle aged women are being diagnosed now. It wasn't on the DSM for girls till 1994!
Schools can't "diagnose" anything. Nor can your GP. Training for teachers is woefully inadequate. Even in the SEN sector a lot of it is out of date. It's really difficult to get a diagnosis. Yes, you can go private but it isn't always recognized.
And that is before we get to the fact that ASD and ADHD have only just been accepted as being able to exist in the same person. When the reality is that if you have one you're highly likely to have the other, too.
The manifestations often counteract each other.
The extent to which these conditions are hereditary are only just being understood.
We are massively under diagnosing, not over.
The answer isn't money. It's reasonable adjustments.
Most workplaces and schools simply can't be arsed.
My belief is most are gaming a very lenient system.
So forgive us for not being as frit of Farage as you, you pathetically effete bourgeois twerp
Theories about cancers aside, we know of some adverse reactions to the vaccines in some - that would be be expected with any new treatment given to a huge amount of people. Malhotra's attack on the vaccines wasn't really about vaccine harm, it was about lack of vaccine efficacy. He pointed to data that he claimed showed vanishingly little impact on hospitalisations in those given the vaccine, even when over a certain age. If that is correct, it certainly appears to undermine the case for us going as ham on vaccinations as we did.
Someone arguing against you might just as well say that Thatcher would have been brave enough to demand answers and ask the right questions, and follow the science where it led, rather than where pressure from public health bodies was coming from. But at the end of the day, we cannot know her thoughts.
It's not even clear that Linehan has committed an offence in the UK. Utterly ludicrous.
Seeking new discretion is arse covering as they got it so badly wrong.
So, what else could people reasonably think? There is a lot of self-delusion at large currently on this, both in the media, and in wider society.
However there does not to be a limit. During the first COVID exam cycle we gave students a 24 hour window for each exam. Anecdotally many actually used the whole time, even if just for fettling their answers.
lol
He says Rayner's loss is a fucking nightmare for Labour and it is.