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Richard Bates

@discript.com

4.6K followers 4.3K following 1.7K posts

Publisher – fiction and non-fiction. Friend to writers. Dementia carer. Cyclist. Activist. Cat parent. Liberal Democrat 🔶 elected to Chichester District Council (UK) in 2023, also on West Sussex County Council Health & Adult Social Care Scrutiny Committee.

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Richard Bates @discript.com · Jan 23

The reason we annually mark #HolocaustMemorialDay is so we never forget.

Baron of Booze @baronofbooze.bsky.social · Jan 22

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 10h

It’s all about his voodoo economics.

Richard Bates @discript.com · 10h

#California voters #GOTV

Stacey Williams @staceywilliams.bsky.social · 12h

Richard Bates @discript.com · 10h

Don’t let them!
Keep borrowing books. They count borrowers and we make it harder for them to close.

Richard Bates @discript.com · 13h

Fine weather for a cycle ride up Centurion Way today to see the newly opened section to former railway station at Singleton.
Advice to cyclists and pedestrians: “Left Is Best”. Couldn’t agree more!
www.chichester.gov.uk/media/9541/C...

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 13h

Unlike the USA, we don’t ban books here in the United Kingdom. Please use your #PublicLibrary to borrow some dangerous books!
📕📗📘📙

Nick Knudsen @nickknudsenus.bsky.social · 14h

Fascists and authoritarians want to control what books we have access to. Ideas are a threat to them.

We have to stand up to these evil people.

It's #BannedBooksWeek! Share from our social media toolkit in support of literature & art! (While we still can.):
social.demcast.com/toolkit/e58b...

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 3d

A well-run #dementia care home, New Tyne, in West Sussex is threatened with closure, potentially impacting residents who are vulnerable.
Mortality and morbidity rates for people with dementia after they are moved are very high.
Please consider adding your name to this petition:
chng.it/HWqP5xjKNd

Can you spare a minute to help this campaign?

Save New Tyne dementia care home in Worthing

chng.it

Richard Bates @discript.com · 4d

No one working in #LocalGovernment will be surprised.

James Ball @jamesrball.com · 4d

*gasp*

“Everyone thought we’d come in and there were going to be these huge costs we could cut away but there just aren’t,” said a third senior Reform cabinet member in Kent.

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Reposted by Richard Bates

Kiwi Medic 🏥 🇧🇷 @kiwimedic.bsky.social · 4d

There isn’t an immigration problem in UK it has an aging population with dying economy. It needs anyone who can get there to help.

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 5d

Can you see the the economic elephant in the room? #Brexit

AdyBee 🐝 @adybee.bsky.social · Apr 3

Brexit.

We must mention Brexit

….

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 5d

Too many #billionaires: Blackstone boss Stephen Schwarzman, Citadel hedge fund founder Ken Griffin and WhatsApp founder Jan Koum have all bought homes at the site in Belgravia, London.
Gift 🎁 link:
on.ft.com/4pVrMOg Luxury London apartment building draws influx of US billionaires

Luxury London apartment building draws influx of US billionaires

Stephen Schwarzman and Ken Griffin among owners of residences inside five-star Peninsula hotel

on.ft.com

Richard Bates @discript.com · 5d

What would Stefan Zweig, a humanist and pacifist whose memoirs inspired the 2014 Wes Anderson film “The Grand Budapest Hotel”, have said about Wolfgang Porsche’s hole?

German at Portsmouth @germanatportsmouth.bsky.social · 5d

‘One rule for the rich’: the Salzburg mansion, the Porsche heir and the writer Stefan Zweig www.theguardian.com/world/2025/o... via @theguardian.com @kateconnolly.bsky.social

‘One rule for the rich’: the Salzburg mansion, the Porsche heir and the writer Stefan Zweig

The car magnate, who is restoring the Jewish author’s former villa, has been given permission to dig out a 500-metre road leading to a garage, causing consternation in the city

www.theguardian.com

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 5d

Shocking and disturbing, this article explains the usage of the words “peon” and “peonage”, another form of human trafficking. Of course it still occurs in our own times, as the #EpsteinFiles would further reveal.
www.oed.com/dictionary/p...

Oxford English Dictionary

The OED is the definitive record of the English language, featuring 600,000 words, 3 million quotations, and over 1,000 years of English.

www.oed.com

Richard Bates @discript.com · 5d

Happy #Caturday from our smiling #Bengal #Cat curled upside down in a warm bed.

Smiling Bengal cat happily curled upside down in a warm bed.

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 5d

I am an #immigrant.
My mum was an immigrant to the USA.
My dad was an immigrant to Britain.
We were welcomed, not deported.
#Racism is inhumane.
We must fight for social justice.

bmcarthur17 @bmcarthur17.bsky.social · 6d

As someone who cares about the written word and how we use it to address injustice, this is everything.

WATCH:

#Resist

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 5d

Thank you Patty for the invitation to your #FridayNightParty. Let’s never go over to the Republican Party!

Ronald Reagan and his cabinet laughing uproariously when the Acting President says, ‘THEY ACTUALLY BELIEVED US WHEN WE CALLED IT “TRICKLE DOWN ECONOMICS”’

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 6d

Liked the staging, reminiscent of Peter Brook’s The Empty Space. Visually surreal. Performances by the cast of very young men (schoolboys) were full-on, though somewhat un”professional” but impressive. Great direction.
Didn’t get to Hamlet, sadly.

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 6d

And yes, after the cast took their bow, the lead paid tribute to Patricia Routledge and all she had contributed to the theatre, including to The Nest.
Then we all gave *her* a round of applause 👏 👏 👏

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 6d

We’re at Chichester Festival Theatre tonight, to see Lord Of The Flies, but before the performance begins I’m sure they will celebrate the life of Dame #PatriciaRoutledge whose performances we enjoyed here so many times.
www.cft.org.uk/news/dame-pa...

Dame Patricia Routledge DBE 1929 - 2025 | Chichester Festival Theatre

Chichester Festival Theatre is mourning the loss of Dame Patricia Routledge DBE, who has died at the age of 96. She first appeared at the Festival Theatre

www.cft.org.uk

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 6d

We met many years ago over Sunday lunch at the home of our mutual friend in Covent Garden. She was very down to earth, open and friendly, so where she derived her characterisation of Hyacinth Bucket (pronounced bouquet), who knows.

Richard Bates @discript.com · 6d

‘Market researchers Savanta say so-called “bill shock”, or going out for a meal that’s nothing terribly fancy and reeling at the card reader, is measurably on the rise.. Bill shock is normally what happens when our inbuilt sense of what things “ought” to cost can’t quite keep up with #inflation.’

The Guardian @theguardian.com · 7d

What a £5 coffee (or a £100 Pizza Express) tells us about a changing Britain | Gaby Hinsliff

For many Gen Xers, it feels like we’re sliding back towards the land of our childhoods: where eating out was for special occasions, and Thermoses were king, says Guardian columnist Gaby Hinsliff

www.theguardian.com

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 7d

Sarah Mullally was England’s chief nursing officer from 1999 to 2004 and was made a Dame in 2005 for her contribution to nursing and midwifery. She has welcomed plans to allow priests to offer blessings to gay couples in church.
www.theguardian.com/world/2025/o...

Sarah Mullally is named as first female archbishop of Canterbury

No 10 announces decision although role will not legally be taken on until January, before an enthronement service

www.theguardian.com

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 7d

We just visited #UKHarvest at a Chichester community centre where we met the team of volunteers. For £5, they filled our bag with groceries that otherwise would have gone into landfill.
These community hubs reduce #FoodWaste and feed the hungry. Impressive, important & valuable.
www.ukharvest.org.uk

UKHarvest

We are on a mission to eliminate hunger and food waste through the redistribution of quality surplus food. Likewise, to provide a framework for food rescue that can be replicated.

www.ukharvest.org.uk

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 7d

#GreenToGrey: “Very soon if we continue to allow piecemeal developments across areas of outstanding natural beauty, they are going to cease to have any landscape value,” says Jackie Copley of @cprecountryside.bsky.social
www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Bluesky

ofcprecountryside.bsky.social

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 8d

Good environmental policy for residents. #ActiveTravel has become healthier, particularly for pedestrians and cyclists.

Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan @london.gov.uk · 8d

184 years earlier than predicted, London has met the legal limits for toxic NO2 for the first time.

This historic milestone proves that bold action like expanding ULEZ works, protecting children’s health and giving millions cleaner air to breathe.

London Ulez reduced nitrogen dioxide to legal limit, mayor says

The mayor of London says the fall in airborne toxins is due to the Ultra low emission zone expansion.

www.bbc.co.uk

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Richard Bates @discript.com · 8d

“For anyone that’s been in the military, he’s not qualified to be secretary of defense. He’s barely qualified to be a host on Fox News.
“But to say these things in front of the preeminent generals and admirals leading our military?”
– Tamara Stevens
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Veterans react to Hegseth’s ‘insulting’ address to generals and admirals

Defense secretary’s speech touching on physical fitness and doctrine of lethality was seen as ‘egotistical’ and ‘dangerous’