Sunday, August 31, 2025
Losing the plot with the local media
Reform councillors on Nottingham County Council have no such qualms. As the Guardian reports, the editor of the Nottingham Post has accused the council's Reform leader’s decision to ban his councillors from engaging with the prominent local newspaper as a “massive attack on local democracy” and a sign of things to come should the party form the next government.
The criticism comes as Nottinghamshire county council’s four-month-old Reform administration said it will no longer deal with the Nottingham Post, its online edition and a team of BBC-funded local democracy journalists that it manages:
Nigel Farage is already facing calls to intervene in the row, with local MPs accusing Reform of “rank hypocrisy” over its previous claims to support free speech and transparency. Lee Anderson, the Reform MP for Ashfield, Nottinghamshire, has said he will join in the boycott.
In an interview with the Guardian, Natalie Fahy, the editor of the Nottingham Post and Nottinghamshire Live, said the ban had come from Mick Barton, the county council’s leader, after a story about plans for a restructuring of local government. She said it was a worrying sign of Reform’s approach to the free press.
“It’s a massive attack on local democracy,” she said. “I’ve been a journalist for 20 years. We have had our ups and downs with all kinds of councils. We managed to get along fine, because most elected officials accept this is par for the course. You are going to get some negative press. What you don’t do is shut the shop up.
“This is a worrying sign of potentially things to come if Reform wins the next election. What you’re seeing here in Nottinghamshire is probably a microcosm of how it will be across the whole of the UK if Nigel Farage becomes prime minister. You are just going to see this kind of shutting down of questioning.
“They need to be answerable to the people who elected them. We don’t take a political stance. We’re not anti-Reform. We’re just trying to find out what’s going on.”
The move has already caused concern among other parties. The Lib Dems have written to Farage to demand that he step in to reverse the “dangerous and chilling” decision. They also suggested that the move may have breached local government’s code of conduct, which calls on elected officials to “submit themselves to the scrutiny”.
The row in Nottinghamshire has been rumbling since a clip of an interview in June with a local councillor, in which they appeared to have only a loose grasp of their brief, went viral online.
Relations appeared to improve and Reform figures were engaging with the local reporters. However, Barton cut access after raising objections to a story examining plans for a reorganisation of local government, which included alleged disagreements within the Reform group of councillors.
Under the ban, none of the 41 Reform councillors will speak to Nottinghamshire Live and local democracy reporters. The outlet has been told press officers have also been instructed to take Nottinghamshire Live off council media distribution lists, meaning it will not receive some press releases or be invited to events.
The media perform an important role within the democratic process in scrutinising and reporting on what politicians are up to. If Reform councillors feel that they can't cope with that then they should step aside so more competent candidates can do the job instead.
Saturday, August 30, 2025
Perched on a cliff
If you happen to be in the area, then walk from the car park at Southgate to your left as you face the sea. Once you get to the last house on the cliff, walk at a 90 degree angle to the edge and step down to a ledge just below it. That is where the memorial stone has been placed. There are more detailed instructions in this blogpost by Andrew Green.. Green writes of Watkins and the memmorial stone as follows:
The stone’s near-invisibility might be a mirror – perhaps a deliberate one – of the nature of Vernon Watkins the man. By all accounts he was a self-contained and undeclarative person, unlike his close friend Dylan Thomas, and might have been averse to a public drawing attention to himself. It’s true, there’s a plaque commemorating him in Pennard Church, a small, slightly crooked plaque on the outside wall of the care home at Southgate where his house once stood, and a third on the wall of the old Lloyds Bank in St Helen’s Road, Swansea, where he worked. But he’d have been more embarrassed than flattered, you sense, if he’d been accorded the equivalent of the Dylanolatry that litters Swansea, Laugharne and other Thomas locations. Hunts Bay, with its modest, bowl-like valley sweeping down to the rocks and the sea, would have been enough for him.
The stone gives his dates (1906-67), below his name and the phrase, ‘Poet of Gower’. This epithet grounds him in his beloved adopted homeland, though it also makes him sound a ‘local’ or ‘regional’ poet, like William Barnes or George Crabbe, whereas the claims he makes in his poems are not primarily about locality but about wider themes of life and (especially) death.
The inscription carries a line, carved by Ronald Cour, from one of Watkins’s best-known poems, the long-line ‘Taliesin in Gower’: ‘I have been taught the script of the stones, and I know the tongue of the wave’.
In my view, Watkins was a more substantial poet than his contemporary Dylan Thomas, though I also agree with Andrew Green that Nigel Jenkins lays better claim to be the 'poet of Gower'.
Vernon Watkins was born in Maesteg in Glamorgan, and brought up mainly in Swansea, living with his family in a large Victorian house in Caswell. He met Dylan Thomas, who was to be a close friend, in 1935 when Watkins had returned to a job in Lloyds bank in Swansea.
The building that once housed that bank in Walter Street, is now a betting shop. It did at one stage boast a blue plaque to commemorate Watkins, but according to the council website, that is now situated on the St. Helen's Road wall of the Common Meeple board game cafe.
With Dylan Thomas, Watkins was one of a group of Swansea artists known as the "Kardomah boys" (because they frequented the Kardomah Café in Castle Street). Others among this Swansea Group were the composer Daniel Jenkyn Jones, writer Charles Fisher and the artists Alfred Janes and Mervyn Levy.
Watkins met his wife, Gwen, who came from Harborne, Birmingham, at Bletchley Park, where he worked during the Second World War as a cryptographer, and she, as a member of the WAAF. They were both engaged in breaking the Luftwaffe AuKa tactical codes in Block F.
With Dylan Thomas, Watkins was one of a group of Swansea artists known as the "Kardomah boys" (because they frequented the Kardomah Café in Castle Street). Others among this Swansea Group were the composer Daniel Jenkyn Jones, writer Charles Fisher and the artists Alfred Janes and Mervyn Levy.
Watkins met his wife, Gwen, who came from Harborne, Birmingham, at Bletchley Park, where he worked during the Second World War as a cryptographer, and she, as a member of the WAAF. They were both engaged in breaking the Luftwaffe AuKa tactical codes in Block F.
Gwen was the author of several books, including Dylan Thomas: Portrait of a Friend (1983), Dickens in Search of Himself (1987), and Cracking the Luftwaffe Codes: The Secrets of Bletchley Park (2006). She passed away on 14th January this year at the age of 101.
Friday, August 29, 2025
Reform's masterplan starts to fall apart
Nigel Farage wants you to believe that Reform UK can round up and deport up to 600,000 people within the lifetime of a single Parliament. It cannot. This is not a serious policy. It is an unworkable plan built on political theatre, not reality.
Reform claims it can create secure facilities to hold 24,000 people every month for deportation, equal to 288,000 removals a year. That would require building 24,000 detention spaces in just 18 months. No government has ever come close to delivering anything of that scale. For comparison, Boris Johnson’s government promised 20,000 new prison places and managed to open just one prison in five years, largely because of planning disputes and delays.
Even if Reform somehow built these facilities, the cost would be astronomical. At £500,000 per bed for secure, escape-proof centres, the price tag would be around £12 billion before a single person is removed. Reform claims it can cut costs with “modular accommodation” in remote areas, but such sites would struggle to meet basic security standards and would face fierce local opposition.
The logistics are even worse. Reform says it will remove 6,000 people every week, requiring five full flights every single day, all year round, with around 158 people per plane. That figure is three times higher than the current capacity of the most heavily packed deportation flights. The Home Office does not have the aircraft, the staff, the infrastructure, or the international agreements to make this possible.
To deliver this, Reform would also need sweeping new laws to fast-track people into detention and override their right to a fair hearing. Similar schemes have already been tried and ruled unlawful by the courts. Even if they tore up the European Convention on Human Rights and other international treaties, drafting watertight legislation of this scale would take years. And without international agreements, there is nowhere for these planes to land.
Reform’s plan is not credible. It is an extreme and unworkable fantasy designed to inflame division and distract from the real issues this country faces. It will waste billions, damage Britain’s standing in the world, and unleash untold chaos without fixing a single problem.
And indeed, even Farage has accepted that he might have gone too far with his little masterplan. As the Independent reports, he has rowed back on plans to deport children as part of Reform UK’s strategy to tackle illegal migration.
The paper says that the Reform leader had pledged on Tuesday to detain and deport up to 600,000 people with no right to be in the UK, including anyone who arrived in Britain after crossing the Channel in a small boat.
When asked if this number would include women and children, Mr Farage said: “Yes, women and children, everybody on arrival, will be detained.” But this is no longer the case:
Mr Farage said he accepted that “how we deal with children is a much more complicated and difficult issue” and acknowledged that those protesting across the UK were not doing so “because of the few children coming”, but added that the “only way we will stop the boats is by detaining and deporting absolutely anyone” who crosses the Channel.
“If you come to the UK illegally, you will be detained and deported and never, ever allowed to stay, period. That is our big message from today,” he said.
But on Wednesday, Mr Farage insisted at a press conference in Broxburn, West Lothian that he had been “very, very clear” that the party was focused on “illegal males” and “not even discussing women and children at this stage”.
He added: “The news reports that said that after my conference yesterday were wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.”
Pressed on whether he now meant women and children would be “exempt”, he said: “I didn’t say exempt forever, but at this stage it’s not part of our plan for the next five years.”
Mr Farage later sought to clarify his comments, saying there had been a “slight confusion” and he had not understood the “context” of the question.
He told broadcasters: “Deporting children is a very difficult thing to do. Who do they go to, what are the wards of care? Women and children, intimating families that have been here illegally for some years, are they top of our list? No.”
Asked again if women and children would be deported, he said: “If a single woman etc comes to Britain, they will be detained and deported. If a woman comes with children, we will work out the best thing to do.”
As the Liberal Democrats commented, the U-turn shows that Farage has “taken as much time reading his own plan as he does his constituents’ emails”. His undeliverable right-wing wet dream is falling apart already.
Mr Farage said he accepted that “how we deal with children is a much more complicated and difficult issue” and acknowledged that those protesting across the UK were not doing so “because of the few children coming”, but added that the “only way we will stop the boats is by detaining and deporting absolutely anyone” who crosses the Channel.
“If you come to the UK illegally, you will be detained and deported and never, ever allowed to stay, period. That is our big message from today,” he said.
But on Wednesday, Mr Farage insisted at a press conference in Broxburn, West Lothian that he had been “very, very clear” that the party was focused on “illegal males” and “not even discussing women and children at this stage”.
He added: “The news reports that said that after my conference yesterday were wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.”
Pressed on whether he now meant women and children would be “exempt”, he said: “I didn’t say exempt forever, but at this stage it’s not part of our plan for the next five years.”
Mr Farage later sought to clarify his comments, saying there had been a “slight confusion” and he had not understood the “context” of the question.
He told broadcasters: “Deporting children is a very difficult thing to do. Who do they go to, what are the wards of care? Women and children, intimating families that have been here illegally for some years, are they top of our list? No.”
Asked again if women and children would be deported, he said: “If a single woman etc comes to Britain, they will be detained and deported. If a woman comes with children, we will work out the best thing to do.”
As the Liberal Democrats commented, the U-turn shows that Farage has “taken as much time reading his own plan as he does his constituents’ emails”. His undeliverable right-wing wet dream is falling apart already.
Thursday, August 28, 2025
The continuing insidious cost of Brexit to our economy
The paper says that Nick Thomas-Symonds, the Cabinet Office minister in charge of European negotiations, has pledged to eliminate such costs as by promising a new agreement with the EU in the next 18 months:
Keir Starmer announced a new agreement with the EU in May, as part of which ministers agreed to pursue a series of specific deals, including one on food and agricultural products.
The prime minister was attacked at the time by the Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, who argued that the UK was “being dragged back” into the EU, and Farage, the Reform leader, who called it a “Brexit betrayal”.
Labour ministers have been keen to avoid any perception that they are reintroducing a customs union or free movement by the back door. But Thomas-Symonds’ speech on Wednesday indicates they are feeling more confident about making a pro-EU case for removing trade barriers.
He will say the government is “putting in the hard yards, not resting on empty slogans” and that its policy is based on “sovereignty, in the national interest”.
Labour says its new agricultural deal will mean fewer checks on meat, fish, fruit and vegetables imported from the EU, and an end to the current export-licensing scheme.
A report on Tuesday from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said these costs had been particularly burdensome for smaller business, warning: “These firms often lack the capacity and economies of scale to manage the administrative and compliance demands associated with NTMs (non-tariff measures).
“This has created a competitive disadvantage between smaller firms and larger operators with in-house capability – although all stakeholders report increased costs.”
In April, British supermarkets and food producers, including Marks & Spencer and Sainsbury’s, urged the EU to complete the proposed goods and agricultural deal, saying the existing arrangement had led to “unnecessary red tape”.
This new approach is very welcome of course, but the government is still skating around what need to be done, which is to rejoin the single market as the earliest possible opportunity.
Wednesday, August 27, 2025
Farage to pay Taliban to take back persecuted women and children
Farage's rhetoric, the proposed mass deportations, the call to arms which risks further unrest and violence outside hotels, and the proposed rejection of human rights legislation and international obligations are all reminiscent of 1930s Germany.
The culture of protest that Reform and their Tory helpers have unleashed will lead to people being judged on the colour of their skin, with authorities harrassing UK citizens for proof of residency because of the way they look.
The Independent reports that Farage has claimed that some 600,000 asylum seekers, including women and unaccompanied children, could be deported in the first parliament of a Reform UK government. In outlining his programme, I believe that the Reform leader's language borders on racism and incitement:
“But you know what the people protesting outside the Bell Hotel and at 30 migrant hotels on Saturday around the country weren't doing it because of the few children coming.
“They were doing it because over three quarters of those that come are young undocumented males who come from cultures that are entirely different from ours, who are very unlikely to assimilate into our community, who pose a risk to women and girls, and some of them, I'm afraid, pose a risk to national security. So it’s pretty clear, I think, what our priorities are.”
He has pledged to scale up detention capacity for asylum seekers to 24,000 and secure deals with countries such as Afghanistan, Eritrea and Iran to return migrants to their countries, claiming that the plan will cost £10 billion to implement but save £7 billion currently spent on illegal migration during the first five years.
He proposes to leave the European Convention on Human Rights and replace the Human Rights Act with a British Bill of Rights, which would apply only to British citizens and those who have a legal right to live in the UK. Will there be a purification programme as well?
It is little wonder that there has been widespread condemnation:
Liberal Democrat deputy leader Daisy Cooper said Mr Farage’s plan “crumbles under the most basic scrutiny”.
“The idea that Reform UK is going to magic up some new places to detain people and deport them to, but don’t have a clue where those places would be, is taking the public for fools”.
She claimed that “Winston Churchill would be turning in his grave” over the plan to rip up the human rights convention.
Kolbassia Haoussou, from charity Freedom from Torture, reacted to Reform’s announcements saying: “This is not who we are as a country. Men, women and children are coming to the UK looking for safety. They are fleeing the unimaginable horrors of torture in places like Afghanistan, Sudan and Iran. And they desperately need our protection.”
Responding to Reform saying it would disapply the Refugee Convention and the Convention Against Torture, he added: “These laws were created in the aftermath of the second world war to protect us all. If Britain were to abandon this legacy it would hand repressive regimes around the world a gift.”
On potential payments to the Taliban to take back Afghan migrants, Daisy Cooper added:
Reform’s Taliban tribute plan would send British taxpayers’ cash to fund their oppressive regime, fuelling the persecution of Afghan women and children and betraying our brave armed forces who sacrificed so much fighting the Taliban. Clearly British values mean nothing to Farage and his band of plastic patriots.
Farage's proposals would isolate the UK and place us on a par with Putin's Russia and Belarus. They are a disgrace.
The Independent reports that Farage has claimed that some 600,000 asylum seekers, including women and unaccompanied children, could be deported in the first parliament of a Reform UK government. In outlining his programme, I believe that the Reform leader's language borders on racism and incitement:
“But you know what the people protesting outside the Bell Hotel and at 30 migrant hotels on Saturday around the country weren't doing it because of the few children coming.
“They were doing it because over three quarters of those that come are young undocumented males who come from cultures that are entirely different from ours, who are very unlikely to assimilate into our community, who pose a risk to women and girls, and some of them, I'm afraid, pose a risk to national security. So it’s pretty clear, I think, what our priorities are.”
He has pledged to scale up detention capacity for asylum seekers to 24,000 and secure deals with countries such as Afghanistan, Eritrea and Iran to return migrants to their countries, claiming that the plan will cost £10 billion to implement but save £7 billion currently spent on illegal migration during the first five years.
He proposes to leave the European Convention on Human Rights and replace the Human Rights Act with a British Bill of Rights, which would apply only to British citizens and those who have a legal right to live in the UK. Will there be a purification programme as well?
It is little wonder that there has been widespread condemnation:
Liberal Democrat deputy leader Daisy Cooper said Mr Farage’s plan “crumbles under the most basic scrutiny”.
“The idea that Reform UK is going to magic up some new places to detain people and deport them to, but don’t have a clue where those places would be, is taking the public for fools”.
She claimed that “Winston Churchill would be turning in his grave” over the plan to rip up the human rights convention.
Kolbassia Haoussou, from charity Freedom from Torture, reacted to Reform’s announcements saying: “This is not who we are as a country. Men, women and children are coming to the UK looking for safety. They are fleeing the unimaginable horrors of torture in places like Afghanistan, Sudan and Iran. And they desperately need our protection.”
Responding to Reform saying it would disapply the Refugee Convention and the Convention Against Torture, he added: “These laws were created in the aftermath of the second world war to protect us all. If Britain were to abandon this legacy it would hand repressive regimes around the world a gift.”
On potential payments to the Taliban to take back Afghan migrants, Daisy Cooper added:
Reform’s Taliban tribute plan would send British taxpayers’ cash to fund their oppressive regime, fuelling the persecution of Afghan women and children and betraying our brave armed forces who sacrificed so much fighting the Taliban. Clearly British values mean nothing to Farage and his band of plastic patriots.
Farage's proposals would isolate the UK and place us on a par with Putin's Russia and Belarus. They are a disgrace.
Tuesday, August 26, 2025
Winter fuel cuts to hit 600,000 disabled pensioners this year
The paper says that the prime minister’s decision to restrict the payment to those earning £35,000 or less will see more than two million pensioners miss out on the allowance, worth up to £300. Of those, more than a quarter are disabled and will be forced to hand back the £300 payment through the tax system:
It comes despite the government’s U-turn on its original decision to strip winter fuel payments from millions more pensioners, with the cuts now restricted to those earning more than £35,000.
Critics said the threshold is too low, particularly for disabled pensioners who will be hit by the change.
Dennis Reed, of over-60s campaign group Silver Voices, told The Sunday Telegraph: “An annual income of £35,000 is not a king’s ransom under any circumstances – let alone for a disabled pensioner. This shows the crudeness of having a means-tested cut-off because it doesn’t take into account the individual circumstances.
“There are usually extra costs involved with having a disability. You might have to heat the house more than you otherwise would, or have to charge medical equipment such as electric wheelchairs, for example.”
It seems that the action taken by Ministers to rescue the situation has not proven to be enough, while the compromise they've come up with is a complete mess.
As the Institute for Fiscal Studies points out, a rich pensioner couple – where one partner has an income of £100,000, while the other has £30,000 – will still get money. By contrast, a couple where both partners have income of £36,000 will get nothing.
Th government's problems over this policy are not going to go away soon.
Th government's problems over this policy are not going to go away soon.
Monday, August 25, 2025
Farage's many jobs highlight need for more clarity on MPs' register of interests
The issue arises after Nigel Farage, who tops the list of high-earning MPs, was paid £280,000 by Direct Bullion, his second-highest set of earnings after the £402,000 he has earned from his work for GB News.
Direct Bullion, which was founded by Paul Withers, a former Royal Navy electronic warfare technician, encourages savers and investors to buy gold, and has been advertising on multiple channels.
The paper says that an archived version of the company's website, dating from after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, shows that it has advertised on TV news network RT, formerly known as Russia Today:
The Reform UK leader has filmed several promotional videos for Direct Bullion, which has offices in London, Florida and California, and operates on “slivering margins”, said Withers.
The company’s most recent set of accounts, covering the year to January 2024, shows assets of about £2.6m.
The entries in Farage’s parliamentary register of interests, while clear about the value of the payments from Direct Bullion, are less clear about the work he has done for the company, stating it is for an “estimated maximum” of four hours worked a month.
This lack of clarity raises questions for the Reform leader, say transparency campaigners.
“The public have a right to know how much time parliamentarians spend on second jobs, and how much they’re paid,” said Steve Goodrich, head of research and investigations at Transparency International. “When MPs are vague about the terms of their outside employment, it prevents scrutiny of their finances, including whether these are genuinely commercial engagements or donations by another name.
“Labour has pledged to tighten the rules on moonlighting by MPs, which is often a distraction from their public duties. Until it does, those with second jobs could at least be clear about how much they’re being paid, when and for what work.”
A Labour spokesperson said: “The public deserves to know what [Farage is] really being paid for here.”
Reform did not respond to requests for a comment.
For Withers, the commercial deal has secured him enviable access to a man who many are tipping as a possible prime minister.
The paper adds that Farage has also earned £134,000 from a series of recordings for the video-greeting app Cameo, plus five-figure sums from Elon Musk’s X Corp, Google, the Telegraph group and Rupert Murdoch’s Australian media network News Pty:
Two five-figure sums totalling £60,000 appear from Thailand-based businessman and former supporter of Boris Johnson, Christopher Harborne – although only one of them has made its way on to the Electoral Commission’s parallel database.
‘Nigel is happy, we’re happy, and his constituents are happy because he can run Reform while doing it’
Farage has also endorsed a short-lived “community cashback” retailer called UK We Save, recording a video in which he said: “We are facing a cost of living crisis in the United Kingdom and I have decided to do something about it.” Explaining the concept – in which consumers bulk buy nappies to reduce costs – he added: “The more people that join, the cheaper they will be … click that link, it’s free to join. It’s going to save you a lot of money.”
The website has since been taken down but the group’s X page still exists – complete with a picture of the Reform leader as its banner. The parent company, Chaching Ltd, which is run by the business executive Christopher Sugrue, is still active, although its accounts are six months overdue. There is no reference to this work on Farage’s register, and he has previously said it was unpaid.
Farage's approach to being a part-time MP, while accumulating vast wealth, raises serious questions about whether constituents are being properly served by the present system, and whether MPs should be further constrained from taking on second jobs.
The paper says that an archived version of the company's website, dating from after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, shows that it has advertised on TV news network RT, formerly known as Russia Today:
The Reform UK leader has filmed several promotional videos for Direct Bullion, which has offices in London, Florida and California, and operates on “slivering margins”, said Withers.
The company’s most recent set of accounts, covering the year to January 2024, shows assets of about £2.6m.
The entries in Farage’s parliamentary register of interests, while clear about the value of the payments from Direct Bullion, are less clear about the work he has done for the company, stating it is for an “estimated maximum” of four hours worked a month.
This lack of clarity raises questions for the Reform leader, say transparency campaigners.
“The public have a right to know how much time parliamentarians spend on second jobs, and how much they’re paid,” said Steve Goodrich, head of research and investigations at Transparency International. “When MPs are vague about the terms of their outside employment, it prevents scrutiny of their finances, including whether these are genuinely commercial engagements or donations by another name.
“Labour has pledged to tighten the rules on moonlighting by MPs, which is often a distraction from their public duties. Until it does, those with second jobs could at least be clear about how much they’re being paid, when and for what work.”
A Labour spokesperson said: “The public deserves to know what [Farage is] really being paid for here.”
Reform did not respond to requests for a comment.
For Withers, the commercial deal has secured him enviable access to a man who many are tipping as a possible prime minister.
The paper adds that Farage has also earned £134,000 from a series of recordings for the video-greeting app Cameo, plus five-figure sums from Elon Musk’s X Corp, Google, the Telegraph group and Rupert Murdoch’s Australian media network News Pty:
Two five-figure sums totalling £60,000 appear from Thailand-based businessman and former supporter of Boris Johnson, Christopher Harborne – although only one of them has made its way on to the Electoral Commission’s parallel database.
‘Nigel is happy, we’re happy, and his constituents are happy because he can run Reform while doing it’
Farage has also endorsed a short-lived “community cashback” retailer called UK We Save, recording a video in which he said: “We are facing a cost of living crisis in the United Kingdom and I have decided to do something about it.” Explaining the concept – in which consumers bulk buy nappies to reduce costs – he added: “The more people that join, the cheaper they will be … click that link, it’s free to join. It’s going to save you a lot of money.”
The website has since been taken down but the group’s X page still exists – complete with a picture of the Reform leader as its banner. The parent company, Chaching Ltd, which is run by the business executive Christopher Sugrue, is still active, although its accounts are six months overdue. There is no reference to this work on Farage’s register, and he has previously said it was unpaid.
Farage's approach to being a part-time MP, while accumulating vast wealth, raises serious questions about whether constituents are being properly served by the present system, and whether MPs should be further constrained from taking on second jobs.
Sunday, August 24, 2025
Tory hypocrites
The criticism came after Badenoch said in a letter on Wednesday that she was encouraging councils to take the same steps as Epping Forest District Council “if your legal advice supports it”, with a Labour spokesperson accusing her of spouting “desperate and hypocritical nonsense”, given the Conservative’s own record with asylum hotels:
At the peak of their use in the summer of 2023 under the Conservative government, there were more than 400 asylum hotels in use.
Figures on those staying in hotels date back to December 2022 and showed numbers hit a peak at the end of September 2023, when there were 56,042 asylum seekers in hotels.
The Essex council secured a temporary injunction from the High Court on Tuesday, blocking the use of Epping’s Bell Hotel as accommodation for asylum seekers on planning grounds.
Speaking on Thursday, shadow home secretary Chris Philp said there “should not have been 56,000 people in hotels” under the Conservatives, but echoed Ms Badenoch’s call for councils to take legal action.
Mr Philp said: “Kemi’s letter yesterday [Wednesday] said she would support and encourage Conservative councils to follow what Conservative-led Epping started in fighting the use of asylum hotels, where there is a legal basis to challenge them.
'''
A Labour spokesperson said Ms Badenoch’s letter was a “pathetic stunt” and “desperate and hypocritical nonsense from the architects of the broken asylum system”, saying there were now “20,000 fewer asylum seekers in hotels than at their peak under the Tories”.
Whatever the situation, both the Tories and Reform are playing this issue for all it's worth in an effort to stir up unrest when they have been a huge part of the problem in the first place, preparing to play out scare stories instead of properly processing legitimate asylum seekers.
Saturday, August 23, 2025
Lucky Jim in Swansea
As the Swansea University Alumni site says, Amis published his first novel in 1954 while lecturing at the university:
It was called Lucky Jim and it was a comic satire on higher education, set in a provincial university. There are obvious parallels with Swansea, although Amis always said that he based the story more on Leicester where his friend Phillip Larkin had been working at the time. It is hard to imagine that working in Swansea did not impact the way Amis crafted Lucky Jim. Many of his subsequent novels, including That Uncertain Feeling were based on south Wales, as was The Old Devils, for which Amis won the Booker Prize in 1986.
When interviewed for the BBC’s Desert Island Discs programme in 1986, Amis repeated something he had often written, which was that the best work of his life had been conducted whilst at Swansea. Despite the reputation he had in some quarters, there is plenty of evidence to show that Amis was an engaged and likeable lecturer who connected with his students and gave his time generously. Classes were often held in the pub, students were invited to parties at his house, but he also gave a lot of time to activities such as judging student short story competitions.
At least one of his books was filmed in the city. In 1961, That Uncertain Feeling was made into a film starring Peter Sellers, with the title changed to Only Two Can Play, to avoid confusion with similar contemporary titles. It was also adapted by the BBC in 1986 as a television series, starring Denis Lawson and Sheila Gish, this time with the original title.
That was also filmed in Swansea, with some interesting use of locations. In one scene the leading characters are in Rhossili and get into a car to drive back to the city. However, the vehicle instead, heads out in the opposite direction towards Worms Head. It looked good on the screen though.
The book is a satire on life and culture in a Welsh seaside town, involving a married librarian who begins an affair with the bored wife of a local bigwig. Amis, who was of course, an English incomer to Swansea, mocks Wales's devotion to culture and learning as false and pretentious.
Amis's last novel, The Old Devils is also set in Swansea, with the television adaptation being filmed in Mumbles.
At the time I started at Swansea in 1978, Crefft, the student newspaper had just ceased to exist. I was involved a few years late in founding a replacement student newspaper called DoubleTake, that lasted a few years after I graduated before being replaced by the Waterfront newspaper. The illustration above is an interview with Kingsley Amis in Crefft in 1954
The book is a satire on life and culture in a Welsh seaside town, involving a married librarian who begins an affair with the bored wife of a local bigwig. Amis, who was of course, an English incomer to Swansea, mocks Wales's devotion to culture and learning as false and pretentious.
Amis's last novel, The Old Devils is also set in Swansea, with the television adaptation being filmed in Mumbles.
At the time I started at Swansea in 1978, Crefft, the student newspaper had just ceased to exist. I was involved a few years late in founding a replacement student newspaper called DoubleTake, that lasted a few years after I graduated before being replaced by the Waterfront newspaper. The illustration above is an interview with Kingsley Amis in Crefft in 1954
Friday, August 22, 2025
The debate we should be having on asylum
Completely absent in this debate – which apparently we are all too frightened to have, yet we have constantly – is any sense of a better idea. If the problem with refugees is that they arrive illegally, would it help to have more legal routes? If the hotels are the issue, could we not work towards dispersal in the first instance, and much faster processing of claims? Is there no world in which we could engage imaginatively with the violence and upheaval that people are fleeing, and pull together to support them until they’re legally able to support themselves? That seems to be the reasonable expectation with Ukrainian refugees: if we can’t extend the same empathy to those from Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran and Bangladesh, can anyone at least explain why? Would a refresher in the political context of those countries help? If the problem is the numbers, can anyone explain how many asylum seekers they would like instead? We currently rank fifth when compared to European nations in the absolute number of asylum claims received, and 17th when numbers are adjusted for population – should we be 20th?
Does anyone want to resile from the 1951 UN refugee convention? That would seem to be implicit in Reform UK’s promise to leave the European convention on human rights, but would any party or organisation that doesn’t want that care to explain how it is executing its duty towards refugees, and plans to do so in the future? The problem with anger as a political instrument – well, one of the problems, alongside the violence – is that it’s never called upon to be articulate or constructive. It would undermine its own strength if it were.
There was another element of the campaign that led to this ruling, which is subtle but important: the erasure of the category of refugee and asylum seeker. When you make the focus of your argument a hotel and its planning status, on the surface this is a battle over place. But if you take away the refuge someone is seeking, are they a refugee? If you take away the protection granted to them by the state, there is no asylum to claim. How, then, do we define these people? Without a political definition, do they exist? Even though the issue is very different, it’s not tactically dissimilar to the legal campaign waged against trans people, resulting in April’s ruling that everyone has to use the toilets and other facilities of their biological sex. It doesn’t say you have no right to live as trans; it’s just unfortunately impractical for you to do so unless you stay at home. Do you still exist, do you still have rights?
The problem with anger in politics is that combustion is the only way to expend the built-up energy. It’s much easier to keep things humane and civilised in the first place. But it’s too late to wish we had done that – an injection of humanity is the only way to cool things down.
Somebody needs to start answering these questions.
Thursday, August 21, 2025
Police use of facial recognition could fall foul of law
The paper says that as the UK’s biggest force prepares to use instant face-matching cameras at this weekend’s Notting Hill carnival, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) said its use was intrusive and could have a “chilling effect” on individuals’ rights:
The development will be a blow to Mark Rowley, the Metropolitan police commissioner, who has backed the use of the technology at mass events such as this weekend’s carnival, when 2 million people are expected to descend upon west London.
The EHRC has been given permission to intervene in a judicial review launched last month by the anti-knife campaigner Shaun Thompson. Thompson, a Black British man, was wrongly identified by live facial recognition (LFR) as a criminal, held by police, then faced demands from officers for his fingerprints.
Data seen by the EHRC shows that the number of black men triggering an “alert” by the technology is higher than would be expected proportionally when compared with the population of London, it said.
A letter last week from 11 anti-racist and civil liberty organisations, disclosed in the Guardian, urged the Met to scrap the use of the technology over concerns of racial bias and the impending legal challenge.
LFR technology captures and analyses the faces of individuals passing in front of real-time CCTV cameras. It extracts unique biometric data from each face and compares it against a “watchlist” of thousands of people sought by the police.
There is at present no specific domestic legislation regulating police use of LFR, with police using common law powers instead. The Met insists that the Equality Act 2010 places legal obligations upon them to eliminate discrimination.
The EHRC said that the claim brought forward by Thompson “raises issues of significant public importance” and will provide submissions “on the intrusive nature of LFR technology” which focus on the way in which the technology has been used by the police.
The Met’s policy on LFR technology was unlawful because it was incompatible with articles 8 (right to privacy), 10 (freedom of expression), and 11 (freedom of assembly and association) of the European convention on human rights, the watchdog said.
Rebecca Vincent, the interim director of Big Brother Watch, said the EHRC’s intervention was “hugely welcome”.
She added: “The rapid proliferation of invasive live facial recognition technology without any legislation governing its use is one of the most pressing human rights concerns in the UK today. Live facial recognition surveillance turns our faces into barcodes and makes us a nation of suspects who, as we’ve seen in Shaun’s case, can be falsely accused, grossly mistreated and forced to prove our innocence to authorities.”
John Kirkpatrick, the chief executive of the EHRC, said: “There must be clear rules which guarantee that live facial recognition technology is used only where necessary, proportionate and constrained by appropriate safeguards. We believe that the Metropolitan police’s current policy falls short of this standard.”
If this technology is to be used then there needs to be a common standard regulatory regime across the UK that ensures that it is used fairly and is subject to scrutiny. Without that the system will not command public confidence and there will continue to be doubts as to how it is being used.
Wednesday, August 20, 2025
Labour walking away from a green agenda
The paper says that experts have said ministers are choosing to use Brexit to “actively go backwards” in some cases, though there are also areas where the UK has improved nature laws such as by banning sand eel fishing:
Analysis by the Guardian and the Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP) has found the UK is falling behind the EU in terms of protecting rare creatures such as red squirrels, cleaning up the air and water, removing dangerous chemicals from products, and making consumer products more recyclable and energy efficient.
Since Brexit, the analysis has found the EU has brought forward 28 new, revised or upgraded pieces of environmental legislation that the UK has not adopted, and the UK has actively chosen to regress by changing four different pieces of legislation including on protected habitats, pesticides and fisheries.
Areas of concern include:
* The planning and infrastructure bill, which overrides the EU’s habitats directive and allows developers to pay into a general nature fund rather than keeping or creating new habitat nearby to make up for what is destroyed.
* The UK falling behind on water policy, with the EU implementing stronger legislation to clean rivers of chemicals and microplastics and making polluters pay to clean up.
* Air pollution, as the EU is legislating to clean up the air while the UK has removed EU air pollution laws from the statute book.
Recycling and the circular economy, as the EU enforces strict new standards for designer goods that could leave the UK as a “dumping ground” for substandard, hard-to-recycle products.
Last year, the Guardian and IEEP found 17 environmental areas in which the UK was falling behind the EU. As the government fails to keep up with EU environmental legislation, the chasm has widened to 28.
There are a couple of “bright spots” identified by IEEP in which the UK has begun to improve its environmental protections compared with the EU, including the ban on sand eel fishing that could stop puffins from starving. The UK has also designated more marine protected areas than the EU, and is making farming payments contingent on protecting areas for nature.
However, these are outweighed by the lack of regulation around some of the most important environmental areas, experts said.
Of most concern is the decision of the UK government to overrule the EU-derived habitats regulations that protect the habitats of rare creatures including dormice, red squirrels and nightingales. The Office for Environmental Protection has warned that the planning and infrastructure bill, which contains the legislation that would overrule the habitats regulations, is a “regression” of environmental law. The OEP is the watchdog set up after Brexit to replace EU oversight of the implementation of environmental regulations in the UK. However, although Labour promised in its 2024 manifesto to “unlock the building of homes … without weakening environmental protections”, the government has ignored its recommendations.
Michael Nicholson, the head of UK environmental policy at IEEP, said: “It is one thing deciding not to keep pace with the EU in actively strengthening our environmental laws but quite another to actively go backwards and remove environmental protections that we inherited from our EU membership.”
The EU has also been rolling back some of its planned environmental legislation, as politicians globally deprioritise environment and climate action. In the first six months of the new European Commission mandate, the EU delayed a law to stop deforestation in supply chains by one year, gave carmakers two extra years to meet pollution targets and downgraded the protection status of wolves. Environmental NGOs have found themselves in the crosshairs of a funding freeze they argue undermines democracy. After farmers’ protests swept across Europe last year, lawmakers and member states nearly killed off a nature restoration law that EU institutions had already negotiated.
Nicholson added: “Five years on from Brexit, we can now see that the UK has chosen not to keep pace with the EU in strengthening its environmental laws and policies.
“The EU is no nirvana for environmental protection, but the UK is falling behind and should be looking to use its post-Brexit independent policymaking powers to go above and beyond what the EU is doing. Sadly, it is losing this race to the top and has ceded leadership to the EU.”
All the evidence is that Labour no longer value the environment, are abandoning nature for so-called growth policies and are lukewarm about climate change. Brexit has put us in a worse position environmentally than before, and Labour are facilitating that regression.
Tuesday, August 19, 2025
Are Labour abandoning the environment to developers?
The paper says that the chancellor is considering major reforms that would make it more difficult for wildlife concerns to hold up developments as part of a planning reform bill being drafted by treasury officials:
The move reportedly involves tearing up parts of European environmental rules, which developers have argued slow down crucial projects.
While Labour ministers have previously insisted their current planning overhaul would balance growth with nature, Ms Reeves is understood to believe that the government must go further.
The Planning and Infrastructure Bill going through Parliament overrides existing habitat and nature protections, which, if passed, would allow developers to make general environmental improvements and pay into a nature restoration fund that improves habitats on other sites.
But Ms Reeves is considering more contentious reforms that are likely to trigger further backlash from environmental groups, according to The Times.
Among the changes under discussion are plans for a smaller, UK-only list of protected species, which would give less weight to wildlife considered rare across Europe but relatively common in Britain, The Times said.
Ms Reeves is also reportedly considering abolishing the EU “precautionary principle” that forces developers to prove projects will have no impact on protected natural sites. Instead, a new test would assess the risks and benefits of building.
The chancellor is also exploring limits on legal challenges from environmental campaigners. She has repeatedly criticised bats and newts as obstacles to economic growth, and is now said to believe the government must go further and faster in removing protections.
Speaking to the House of Lords economic affairs committee last month, Ms Reeves said: “The reason that HS2 is not coming to my city of Leeds anymore anytime soon, is because I’m afraid, as a country, we’ve cared more about the bats than we have about the commuter times for people in Leeds and West Yorkshire, and we’ve got to change that.
“Because I care more about a young family getting on the housing ladder than I do about protecting some snails, and I care more about my energy bills and my constituents than I do about the views of people from their windows.”
High-profile examples of costly protections include the £100m Buckinghamshire “bat tunnel” built to protect wildlife from HS2 trains and the so-called “fish disco” at Hinkley Point C nuclear plant, which uses sound to deter fish from cooling system intakes.
The existing Planning and Infrastructure Bill already proposes a “nature restoration fund” under which developers could offset environmental damage by paying for conservation schemes elsewhere.
But the bill has faced criticism from both environmental groups and developers, who fear it will fail to speed up construction.
Paul Miner of the countryside charity CPRE told The Times that targeting habitats regulations would “take us backwards rather than forwards on nature recovery”.
I'm sure that this gungho approach to nature will go down well with many but it is significant in that it moves the government even further away from its climate change and nature recovery agenda. We do need new homes, but I'm not convinced that we have to compromise our natural environment to get them.
Monday, August 18, 2025
Tractor Tax will hit working farmers worse
The paper says that the Centre for the Analysis of Taxation (CenTax), which has been broadly supportive of the idea of a so called ‘tractor tax’, warned that landowners were “less likely to be impacted by the reform than working farmers”. The changes mean that farms valued at £1m or more will be liable for 20 per cent inheritance tax:
CenTax found just 20 per cent of landowner estates would be hit by the tax, compared to 25 per cent of tenant farmer estates, 45 per cent of owner-farmer estates, and 67 per cent mixed tenure estates.
CenTax said: “Landowners are less likely to be impacted by the reform than working farmers, representing 64 per cent of all farm estates but 42 per cent of impacted farm estates. Owner-farmers represent 17 per cent of all farm estates but 37 per cent of impacted farm estates.”
Mo Metcalf-Fisher, from the Countryside Alliance, said: “Labour ministers repeatedly say they want to protect genuine family farming businesses, while tackling tax avoidance, through inheritance tax changes.
“The evidence, however, points to it being these very families and their farms that will be badly impacted by the policy, as it stands.
“There is still time to listen to experts from the farming sector and rethink the policy before it’s too late.”
Ministers said that the change was brought in to prevent tax avoidance, but it seems that those who said it will hit farmers worse were correct. Yet another misstep by the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Sunday, August 17, 2025
Heavy-handed policing of Palestine protests under attack
The paper says that in the letter to Yvette Cooper, the home secretary, and Mark Rowley, the head of the Metropolitan police, the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) said the perception that peaceful protest could attract disproportionate police attention “undermines confidence in our human rights protections”:
Kishwer Falkner, the EHRC chair, wrote that it was vital that any policing of protests was both proportionate and based on clear legal tests.
The letter raised concerns about “reports of police engagement with individuals participating in forms of protest that are not linked to any proscribed organisation”.
It cited as an example the case of Laura Murton, first revealed by the Guardian. Kent police threatened her with arrest under the Terrorism Act for holding a Palestinian flag and having signs saying “Free Gaza” and “Israel is committing genocide”.
Murton filmed police telling her that even such general statements “all come under proscribed groups, which are terror groups that have been dictated by the government”.
During the exchange, one officer said the phrase “Free Gaza” was “supportive of Palestine Action”, that it was illegal “to express an opinion or belief that is supportive of a proscribed organisation”, and that she had committed that offence with her signs.
Falkner wrote: “Whilst we acknowledge police expertise in assessing security risks, we want to emphasise that any interference with protest rights must be lawful and assessed case by case.
“Heavy-handed policing or blanket approaches risk creating a chilling effect, deterring citizens from exercising their fundamental rights to freedom of expression and assembly through fear of possible consequences.
“This concern extends beyond those directly affected by police engagement to the broader health of our democracy, because the perception that peaceful protest may attract disproportionate police attention undermines confidence in our human rights protections.”
Falkner urged ministers and police to make sure all officers were given “clear and consistent guidance on their human rights obligations in relation to protest”, which should “ensure that the appropriate balance is maintained between public safety and the protection of essential human rights”.
Murton told the Guardian last week that her solicitors had issued a letter of claim on her behalf to the chief constable of Kent police, in what was also said to be a move to remind other police forces of their responsibilities towards peaceful protests.
Falkner said in a statement: “The right to peaceful protest is fundamental to our democracy and must be protected even when dealing with complex and sensitive issues.
“We recognise the genuine challenges the police face in maintaining public safety, but we are concerned that some recent responses may not strike the right balance between security and fundamental rights.
“Our role as the national human rights institution is to uphold the laws that safeguard everyone’s right to fairness, dignity and respect. When we see reports of people being questioned or prevented from peaceful protests that don’t support proscribed organisations, we have a duty to speak out.”
This suppression of legitimate protest and the undermining of democratic rights is the responsibiity of Labour ministers and their unjustified proscription of Palestine Action. Labour have always had an authoritarian streak and it is becoming more evident in their actions since coming to power.
Saturday, August 16, 2025
A fortified home in a stunning location
The only problem was that whoever had put together the itinerary had obviously never been to Gower, because there is no way that a 52-seater coach can get anywhere near the castle on the narrow roads in that part of peninsular.
The castle is located in a dramatic location on the windswept coast of the Gower peninsula,` overlooking marshes and mudflats with the wild Llwchwr estuary beyond.
This fortified manor house was raised in stages by the wealthy de la Bere family, stewards to the lords of Gower, 700 years ago.
As the Cadw site says, mostly the de La Beres wanted to create an elegant family home in which to entertain high society guests:
The grand hall, guest chambers with indoor latrines and the lord’s solar, or private withdrawing room, all suggest considerable splendour.
But the watchtower, military-style crenellated wall-tops and a south-west tower raised to battlement height show that these were still dangerous times. Luxury and defence had to go hand in hand.
Nevertheless it was a century later before Weobley suffered serious damage during the uprising of Owain Glyndŵr in the early 15th century.
Welsh soldier Rhys ap Thomas picked the right side at the Battle of Bosworth when he placed his army of 2,000 men at the disposal of Henry Tudor, soon to become Henry VII.
His reward was a knighthood and a reputation as one of the up-and-coming men in the Tudor court. Weobley passed to the powerful Sir Rhys at the end of the 15th century. Although his main seat was at nearby Carew Castle, he still found the time to upgrade his manor house beside the mudflats.
In particular he added the two-storey porch block to provide a more stately entrance to the hall and private quarters. His lofty position in society demanded no less.
But the family’s influence was short-lived. His grandson Rhys ap Gruffudd was executed for treason in the reign of Henry VIII and the castle reverted to the Crown.
Nowadays, the castle is a visitor attraction, open all year round, even boasting a gift shop. It is also the home of the Gower Folk Festival in the second weekend of June. And the nearby beaches and pubs are well worth visiting as well.
Friday, August 15, 2025
Claims of an exodus not substantiated
That was certainly suggested when the current government scrapped the non-domiciled tax status, which allowed wealthy individuals with connections abroad to avoid paying full UK tax on their overseas earnings. In fact, there were predictions that so many would leave that the Treasury would actually be worse off.
The Guardian reports that claims of an exodus of wealthy “non-doms” in response to tax rises may be overblown, according to a report that suggests the number leaving the country is in line with official forecasts.
The paper says that early monthly payroll data from HM Revenue and Customs appears to indicate that the number of non-dom departures is in line with official predictions, according to sources cited by the Financial Times:
The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) forecast in January that 25% of non-doms with trusts would leave the UK in response to the abolition of the tax status, while 10% of those without trusts would leave. Official data suggests this prediction was broadly correct, people briefed on the findings told the FT.
Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor’s Conservative predecessor, first announced moves to phase out the 225-year-old non-dom status that protected overseas earnings from being taxed in exchange for a flat annual fee. However, Labour took the proposals a step further by replacing them with a regime that will include overseas assets in the UK’s 40% inheritance tax rate.
Many non-doms earn income from work or their pensions in the UK, which means they appear in the PAYE (pay as you earn) figures in the payroll data that businesses send to the tax office each month. If they fall off PAYE figures, that suggests they have left the country.
The FT reported that some of those briefed on early HMRC data said payroll figures suggested that fewer people were leaving than projected by the OBR, while others said the departures were in line with forecasts.
The numbers do not capture the movements of those non-doms who do not work in the UK, which could include some of the richest, but with a shortage of reliable data they will provide some relief to Reeves amid a debate about whether the policy could backfire.
Payroll data is now a more helpful indicator of potential non-dom movement as more than 120 days have passed since the start of the tax year, which started on 6 April. It is likely that anyone who did not want to be considered as a UK tax resident would have left the country.
HMRC has said previously that it will not have official data on how many non-doms who earn UK income have left until January 2027, when people submit self-assessment tax returns for the year 2025-26.
So now that those predictions have been debunked, how about that wealth tax?
The Guardian reports that claims of an exodus of wealthy “non-doms” in response to tax rises may be overblown, according to a report that suggests the number leaving the country is in line with official forecasts.
The paper says that early monthly payroll data from HM Revenue and Customs appears to indicate that the number of non-dom departures is in line with official predictions, according to sources cited by the Financial Times:
The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) forecast in January that 25% of non-doms with trusts would leave the UK in response to the abolition of the tax status, while 10% of those without trusts would leave. Official data suggests this prediction was broadly correct, people briefed on the findings told the FT.
Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor’s Conservative predecessor, first announced moves to phase out the 225-year-old non-dom status that protected overseas earnings from being taxed in exchange for a flat annual fee. However, Labour took the proposals a step further by replacing them with a regime that will include overseas assets in the UK’s 40% inheritance tax rate.
Many non-doms earn income from work or their pensions in the UK, which means they appear in the PAYE (pay as you earn) figures in the payroll data that businesses send to the tax office each month. If they fall off PAYE figures, that suggests they have left the country.
The FT reported that some of those briefed on early HMRC data said payroll figures suggested that fewer people were leaving than projected by the OBR, while others said the departures were in line with forecasts.
The numbers do not capture the movements of those non-doms who do not work in the UK, which could include some of the richest, but with a shortage of reliable data they will provide some relief to Reeves amid a debate about whether the policy could backfire.
Payroll data is now a more helpful indicator of potential non-dom movement as more than 120 days have passed since the start of the tax year, which started on 6 April. It is likely that anyone who did not want to be considered as a UK tax resident would have left the country.
HMRC has said previously that it will not have official data on how many non-doms who earn UK income have left until January 2027, when people submit self-assessment tax returns for the year 2025-26.
So now that those predictions have been debunked, how about that wealth tax?
Thursday, August 14, 2025
Are the Labour government in a hole on Palestine Action?
The paper says that the warning by Peter Hain, who opposed proscription, came as a Labour backbencher who supported it said the issue would arise again when parliament returned in September:
Lord Hain, who was a leader of the anti-apartheid movement and the Anti-Nazi League in Britain during the 1970s and 1980s, was lacerating about the response to recent protests in support of Palestine Action.
“It will end in tears for the government,” he said. “We are seeing retired magistrates, retired and serving doctors and all sorts of people being arrested and now effectively being equated with terrorists such as al-Qaida, which is absolutely wrong.”
He said if a legal challenge to the proscription was successful, it “would be a mercy to all concerned, including the government”.
The peer was one of three Labour members of the Lords to vote against banning the group in July. Lord John Hendy, the barrister and employment law expert, and Frances O’Grady, the former TUC general secretary, also opposed the move, as did 10 Labour MPs.
“It’s going to get worse [for the government] because I don’t see people from that ‘middle Britain’ background who have joined these protests in such large numbers to suddenly decide that all is OK,” he said.
“In fact, I think more are going to come out and face arrest because the approach to Palestine Action is contrary to every form of peaceful protest in British history, whether that’s the chartists and suffragettes or anti-apartheid and anti-fascist protesters.”
The government has come under pressure to justify the detention of 532 people arrested over the weekend under the Terrorism Act – half of whom were 60 or older – on suspicion of showing support for Palestine Action.
He cited his experience as a secretary of state for Northern Ireland and cabinet minister to challenge the equation of the group with terrorists.
“There is a battery of other crimes that could be applied to Palestine Action but terrorism is not one of them, while you also devalue the charge of terrorism by equating it with the protests we have seen,” Hain said.
“I … worked with the intelligence services and others to stop dissident IRA groups from killing. I have signed warrants to stop other real terrorists, Islamist terrorists, bombing London. So I am not soft on terrorism. But I am a strong believer that you have to know what it looks like.”
Hain said that a lot of Labour MPs and peers were now having “second thoughts” about proscribing Palestine Action.
With more demonstrations planned against this proscription, in addition to the legal challenge, and with heavyweights like Peter Hain speaking out against the government's action, it is clear that Ministers are coming under increasing pressure over this ban. They are in a hole and digging. Surely, it is time for a rethink.
Wednesday, August 13, 2025
UK Government digs its heels in
They say that the Crown Estate is a collection of marine and land assets and holdings that belong to the monarch. It includes the seabed out to 12 nautical miles, which is around 65% of the Welsh foreshore and riverbed, and a number of ports and marinas. On land the Crown Estates owns 50,000 acres of common land in Wales. The value of the estate in Wales is more than £603m of land.
Since 2019 responsibility for management of the Crown Estate’s assets in Scotland has been devolved but that is not the case in Wales. The Independent Commission on the Constitutional Future of Wales, the Welsh Government and all twenty-two Welsh councils want the estate devolved to Wales. However, the UK Government has ruled it out:
In response to a letter sent by campaigners Yes Cymru to Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Welsh secretary Jo Stevens has said that is not the position of her party colleagues in London.
In it, she writes: "It is this government's view that devolving the Crown Estate and introducing a new entity would risk market fragmentation, complicate existing processes, and delay further development offshore.
"Furthermore, devolution would mean Wales losing access to Crown Estate investment that comes from its revenues in England. It would also risk undermining investment in floating offshore wind, which is needed to provide lower bills, cleaner energy, and better jobs. This government is focussed on delivering these objectives and so does not support the devolution of the Crown Estate in Wales," the Cardiff East MP says.
"Even if devolution could be done without risking the revenues the Crown Estate generates, this would not automatically lead to an increase in the funding available to the Welsh Government. This is because any revenues retained by the Welsh Government in a devolved system would likely be offset through reductions to their block grant as is currently the case in Scotland.
"Creating an artificial border through the Celtic Sea would also complicate crucially important work to develop the floating offshore wind industry, particularly as floating offshore wind lease areas straddle the Wales/England border."
YesCymru has pledged to intensify the campaign in response to Westminster’s refusal, which started with a protest at the Eisteddfod.
Chair Phyl Griffiths said: "The Crown Estate proves that the practice of extraction is still alive in 21st century Wales and has resulted in all 22 authorities speaking with one voice, underlining the fact we're a nation.
"The London government's response to our call to transfer control of the Crown Estate to Wales, however, only proves that they see us as nothing more than a region of the UK."
So much for two Labour governments working together for the common good.
Tuesday, August 12, 2025
Labour reaps consequences of NI rise
The paper says that the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) has said that just 57 per cent of private sector employers plan to recruit staff in the next three months, down from 65 per cent last autumn, as they battle rising costs:
The influential monthly report by accountants KPMG and the Recruitment and Employment Federation (REC) also showed a "further steep decline" in permanent worker appointments last month, with recruiters blaming weak confidence in the economy and higher payroll costs.
Anna Leach, the chief economist at the Institute of Directors, warned the trend “could undermine the UK’s weak growth outlook further, hitting both living standards and tax revenues”.
The CIPD survey of 2000 employers found 84 per cent of UK businesses said their employment costs had risen since changes to NICs took effect in April 2025, while half of care and hospitality employers said those costs had risen to a large extent.
Ben Caswell, senior economist at leading think tank the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR), said the findings suggest firms are dealing with the NI hike by cutting staff rather than raising prices, but warned these were now being driven upwards by the chancellor’s minimum wage rise, which came in in April.
The news will come as a blow to Ms Reeves just days after the Bank of England warned the public of months of sharp price increases ahead, driven by higher food costs.
The central bank also blamed Ms Reeves’s NI raid and the rise in the minimum wage for helping to push up the cost of the supermarket shop, as it slashed interest rates to 4 per cent in a bid to boost the UK’s sluggish economy.
Ms Reeves has also been warned of a £50bn black hole in the government’s finances, which leading economists say means she may have to raise taxes, cut public spending, or tear up her fiscal rules in order to fill.
Labour are asking us to be patient, but that is not going to put food on the table. This is not a something they inherited, it is situation they created with their first budget.
Monday, August 11, 2025
Proposed change to court guidance risks fuelling “reactionary politics”
The Trust has claimed that “hostile language” from politicians and the media towards immigration is fuelling “reactionary politics”, and say that the proposals risk framing violence against women and girls as an issue of ethnicity instead of misogyny:
The debate was reignited after George Finch, the Reform UK leader of Warwickshire county council, accused police of a “cover-up” over the migration status of two suspects charged after the alleged rape of the child, claiming they were asylum seekers. The force strongly denies a cover-up, saying it merely acted in line with national guidance.
The details of suspects before trials are routinely limited to ensure the fairness and legal safety of proceedings. But Downing Street has called for “transparency” to rebuild public trust after false rumours spread after 2024’s Southport murders.
However, campaigners warn that politicians and media are emboldening the far right by linking migration to crime.
This month, the Runnymede Trust released a report that – after analysing more than 63m words from 52,990 news articles and 317 House of Commons debates on immigration between 2019 and July 2024 – found the word most strongly associated with migrants was “illegal”.
After Cooper’s remarks that “more information should be provided … including on some of those asylum issues”, Dr Shabna Begum, the chief executive of the Runnymede Trust, said: “These proposals do nothing to address the urgent issues of male sexual violence, divert attention away from women and girls and fixate on nationality and asylum status – as part of an increasingly aggressive far-right agenda.
“Instead of recycling age-old tropes about men of colour as inherently threatening to white British women, we should be centring victims and survivors of all backgrounds.
“We all deserve better than this pantomime politics that offers us easy villains but deals with none of the wider conditions where misogyny has increased.”
Runnymede’s recent report said there were “many” examples of media “stories about distressing crimes that emphasise the immigration status of the perpetrator”, claiming they were used to frame asylum seekers as a potential threat to women and “the British way of life”.
The report also cited comments made by the former home secretary Suella Braverman, in the context of 2023’s illegal migration bill, which linked people arriving on boats to “heightened levels of criminality” and Robert Jenrick’s X post this year that spoke of “importing hundreds of thousands of people from alien cultures, who possess medieval attitudes towards women”.
Runnymede’s report said the “long-term effects” of such claims would be to “normalise” violence against women and girls by making it seem as if it is “determined by ethnicity rather than the perpetuation of misogynist practices in society”.
In my view, releasing this sort of information would just add to the hysterical anti-immigrant rhetoric that is pervading public debate in this country. It would also undermine the fairness of the justice system. There is no legal reason for such information to be made public.
This effort by Labour ministers to try and assuage the far right is only going to make things worse.
Sunday, August 10, 2025
MPs under fire over rental properties
Their warning comes after Guardian analysis revealed four cabinet ministers – including the chancellor, Rachel Reeves – have declared rental income from property in the MPs’ register of interests:
The disclosure, which comes after the resignation of the homelessness minister Rushanara Ali over the eviction of tenants from her London property, has drawn strong criticism from campaigners and backbenchers.
One senior MP said the fact that frontbenchers made money from private property ownership undermined the government’s credibility when it comes to reforming the rental sector.
One said: “The perception that MPs are profiting from the same system we’re supposed to reform isn’t helping … there’s a real risk voters will see this as hypocrisy and question our credibility on renters’ rights.”
Alongside Reeves, the foreign secretary, David Lammy, and the Scotland secretary, Ian Murray, have declared rental income exceeding £10,000 in the most recent register of members’ interests.
Lucy Powell, the leader of the House of Commons, is also included but is understood to have a single lodger and receives less than £10,000 in rent.
Reeves’s disclosure relates to a London house jointly owned with her partner, meaning at least some of the rent is paid to another person. Hers is one of 31 properties listed by MPs where at least some portion of the rent was paid to another person.
The Guardian’s analysis found one in eight Westminster MPs – including 10 with government posts – declared a rental income from property in the last year.
This includes almost a quarter of the Conservative parliamentary party (27 MPs), just 11% of Labour MPs (43 MPs) and 10% of Liberal Democrats (7 MPs).
The two MPs with the largest declared property incomes are both from Labour. Jas Athwal, MP for Ilford South, rents out 15 residential and three commercial properties in London. Last year, he was criticised by Keir Starmer after he was accused of renting out flats with black mould and ant infestations.
Athwal was followed by the former chancellor Jeremy Hunt, who rents out seven flats in Southampton, and has half a share in a holiday home in Italy and an office building in London.
Most of the 169 properties rented out by MPs were residential, but some MPs also let out business and commercial premises. More than two in five (43%) of the properties rented out by MPs were in London.
The figures have intensified scrutiny of Ali’s case, which has cast new light on the debate over landlord interests in parliament. Ali resigned on Thursday night after it was revealed she had ended her tenants’ fixed-term contract in order to sell the property, but re-listed it for rent at a higher price within six months.
The practice is one the Labour government is seeking to ban under its flagship renters’ rights bill. The bill will end “no fault” evictions under section 21, which allows landlords to throw out tenants without reason.
Since the policy was first proposed in April 2019 under Theresa May, 123,889 section 21 claims have progressed to court, and 124,360 households in England have been threatened with homelessness as a result of being served a notice.
The paper quotes one senior figure on the left of the Labour party as saying: “We can’t claim to fight for renters while half the PLP are landlords collecting rent from people struggling through the housing crisis. Rushanara’s case is only the tip of the iceberg. Voters see the hypocrisy and it’s killing our credibility on housing.”
Exactly.
Saturday, August 09, 2025
Badfinger
He will probably be best remembered for writing "Without You" which enjoyed world-wide success when recorded by Harry Nilsson in 1972.
The plaque was attached to the exterior of High Street Train Station because of its proximity to the adjacent Ivey Place where the band would meet to practice. Before they became Badfinger the band took the name The Iveys after this place name.
Wikipedia records that Ham grew up in Gwent Gardens, at the foot of the Townhill estate:
He attended Gors Junior School, and showed early signs of musical talent. He frequently played harmonica on the school playground. His older brother John was a jazz trumpeter, and encouraged young Ham to enter the Swansea music scene. One of Pete's first jobs was as an apprentice television and radio engineer.
He formed a local rock group called The Panthers circa 1961. This group would undergo several name and line-up changes before it became The Iveys in 1965. In 1968, The Iveys came to the attention of Mal Evans (The Beatles' personal assistant) and were eventually signed to the Beatles' Apple Records label after approval from all four Beatles, who were reportedly impressed by the band's songwriting abilities.
The Iveys changed their name to Badfinger with the single release of "Come and Get It", a composition written by Paul McCartney that became a worldwide top-ten hit.
Ham had initially protested against using a non-original to promote the band, as he had gained confidence in the group's compositions, but he was quickly convinced of the springboard effect of having a likely hit single. His own creative perseverance paid off eventually, as his "No Matter What" became another top-ten worldwide hit in late 1970. He followed up with two more worldwide hits in "Day After Day" and "Baby Blue".
Ham's greatest songwriting success came with his co-written composition with bandmate Tom Evans called "Without You" – a worldwide number-one when it was later covered by Harry Nilsson and released in 1971. The song has since become a standard and has been covered by hundreds of singers, most notably Mariah Carey who made it a worldwide hit again in 1994. An Ivor Novello award for Song of the Year was issued in 1973 along with Grammy nominations.
George Harrison used Ham's talents for a number of album sessions, including on the All Things Must Pass album and for other Apple Records artist's recordings. This friendship culminated with Ham's acoustic guitar duet on "Here Comes the Sun" with Harrison at The Concert for Bangladesh in 1971, documented in the theatrical film of the concert.
I met Pete Ham's brother John once, I believe in Pentrehafod Comprehensive School, which serves my community. For years, the Ham name lived on in Swansea through the John Ham Music Shop on Mansel Street, which sold musical instruments.
Friday, August 08, 2025
UK Homelessness minister resigns after embarrassing claims
An earlier report said that Rushanara Ali, who has previously criticised "unreasonable rent increases" reportedly gave the renters four months notice that their lease would not be renewed. They say that it has been subsequently claimed that the East London home was subsequently re-listed for rent within weeks of them moving out at a massively increased price:
The four were sent an email saying they would have to leave in November last year, the i newspaper reports. But it is understood they were offered the opportunity to stay on a rolling basis while the house was on the market. When it failed to sell, it was re-listed for rent, it is believed. Ms Ali, MP for Bethnal Green and Stepney, faces calls to step down.
One of the tenants, Laura Jackson, told the newspaper that she saw the four-bedroom townhouse had been put up for rent at nearly £4,000 a month shortly after moving out. Previously Ms Ali charged £3,300 a month for the home close to London's Olympic Park, it is claimed.
Ms Jackson said: “It’s an absolute joke. Trying to get that much money from renters is extortion”. Shadow Housing Secretary James Cleverly said the allegations "would be an example of the most extreme hypocrisy and she should not have the job as homelessness minister”.
However sources close to the minister say it was a fixed-term contract, and the house was put on the market for sale while the tenants were there. The people living there were told they could stay on a rolling basis, but opted to leave, the BBC reports. It was only re-listed for rent because it did not sell, according to the i.
A spokesperson for Ms Ali said: “Rushanara takes her responsibilities seriously and complied with all relevant legal requirements.”
The house, one of two rental properties Ms Ali has declared in her register of interests, is currently listed for sale at £894,995. It had originally gone up for £914,995 last November - but the price was reduced in February.
Under the Renters Rights Bill, which is making its way through Parliament, landlords who end a tenancy to sell a home will be banned from re-listing it for six months. The Bill will also end fixed-term tenancies. Landlords will also be required to give four months' notice if they plan to move tenants out in order to sell it.
In September last year Ms Ali said renters would be given more powers to challenge "unreasonable" increases. In a written answer she said: "More widely, we are taking action to tackle the root causes of homelessness.
Ali has now resigned saying in a letter to the Prime Minister that remaining in the role would be “a distraction from the ambitious work of this Government”.
