This is not the closer relationship with the EU that Starmer promised us.
07.03.2026 16:06
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This is not the closer relationship with the EU that Starmer promised us.
No legal basis. No clear objective. No exit. And much of Britain’s political class spent the week calling Starmer a coward for noticing.
Latest substack from me.
open.substack.com/pub/goodalla...
Iceland takes another step towards EU membership 🇮🇸 🇪🇺
www.ruv.is/english/2026...
So frustrating that, when framed correctly as a reciprocal right (instead of being conflated with immigration), FoM was hugely popular in the UK, as Eurobarometer surveys consistently showed.
Headline from the Guardian website: "Israeli military tells hundreds of thousands to flee Beirut "
This is not okay, in the same way that Russian attacks on civilian infrastructure in Ukraine are not okay.
Ben Lake is right, and it's hard to see why 🏴 voters should support Labour in May when Starmer refused to devolve policing and Crown Estate powers and give Wales parity with Scotland. Labour's an anglocentric party that no longer takes devolution seriously, and treats the Senedd with contempt.
Curious that BBC News is repeating his remarks without commenting on how unhinged they sound; and how far beyond the norms of diplomatic discourse much of this US administration's outpourings have gone.
I see the papers which screamed ‘tAKe bACK ConTRol’ now want the UK to be nothing but an obedient servant of the USA
Labour are still digging.
Does Starmer want Labour to poll at single digits?
Surely there is a strong case for condemnation from academic schools of journalism, the Society of Editors, unions, and other professional bodies?
Daffodils against a blue sky (photo from Pixabay)
Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus!
Also, why is science fiction so good at creating a whole range of possible futures? Entertaining essay from Ken Liu.
Feck off, occupational stereotyper.
lan Byrne MP Liverpool West Derby 27.02.2026 Statement re: Gorton and Denton By-election It takes some doing to turn a 13,000+ majority in 2024 into a catastrophic loss today. This is not an isolated trend - Labour MPs across the country are told every week by lifelong Labour voters that they won't be voting for the party again under the current leadership & direction. I have been urging the leadership to change direction since the General Election as a series of dreadful political choices & a monumental effort to chase the Reform vote has led to this. The leadership has taken its base for granted, despite constant warnings from backbenchers & unions not to. The lines from PM and Cabinet today essentially labelling the Green Party as extremist is appalling, desperate and frankly embarrassing. It also makes very clear that the leadership has zero understanding of where it has been going wrong. The party is being destroyed & an urgent change of direction is needed.
When your own MPs are openly calling your response to the Green win an embarrassment then you've got problems
Really shocked to hear you say this. But it's true.
And I joined Labour in time to vote for Starmer as Leader.
Using boilerplate messaging that would use for George Galloway about Hannah Spencer personally & how she will approach being an MP is tin eared, graceless, implausible to the immediate audience (Labour MPs) and esp the broader one (Labour waverers/switchers) underpinned by the wrong strategy
Starmer's letter is also an infuriating and demoralising message for many Labour members, I suspect, who will rightly fear that the leadership is incapable of reflecting and learning.
This is not a reasoned political response. Labour has spent two years making all the voting groups who backed the Greens feel unwelcome and unheard, and now attacks them for daring to back someone else. They believe Labour isn’t listening and Starmer seems determined to prove them right
Are they seeking to have the result annulled?
Thanks for this, but I don't think it's enough. I've been an election agent, and I'd never heard of them. Stating this is not "trashing" them. The "about us" on their website is opaque about their funding and origins. And why announce their findings now, in the heat of the immediate aftermath?
Our party has just come third in Gorton and Denton, a previously safe Labour seat - an area where we haven't lost an election since 1931.
It is those running our party who are to blame. We need change at the top and serious lessons need to be learnt:
Most people probably have never heard of DV. Who are they? How are they funded and organised? What exactly do they mean by "family voting"? And why have they chosen this moment to release their report?
Labour's swing toward racism is perhaps the biggest unforced error in British political history; burnt their base to ashes and won them not a single vote on the right.
He's right about this, though
You can tell Reform are a serious party of power because their justice spokesperson is rising young talent Anne Widdecombe... currently on LBC and responsible for my neighbours' children learning a whole fresh vocabulary of four letter words.
This is really interesting.
These word clouds from a recent @moreincommonuk.bsky.social looking at Wales.
It lists the 16 words most associated with Labour, Plaid, the Tories and Reform.
There is a lot to say on this.
For the full analysis see the link in comments.
University of Cambridge: Prime Minister of Ireland in Cambridge to announce first Childers Professor of Irish History
www.cam.ac.uk/news/prime-m...
It's as though we've forgotten that SARS-CoV-2 seemed an existential threat for a while; and that 280,000 Brits actually *died* (many of those thanks to the negligence of Johnson, but anyway). This lawsuit should be struck out.
This lawsuit seems appalling to me, honestly. I feel for people whose student experience was lousy due to Covid but that's not the fault of universities. "I wanted in-person study." I'm sure you did. Nobody gets what they want in a global pandemic