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Reposted by Seb Schmoller

Dan HIll @cityofsound.bsky.social · 6h

"Architect Duncan Baker-Brown answers your questions on adaptive re-use" (very good ... including interesting insight on the impact of replacing cork in wine bottles with plastics, a decision increasingly being reversed, increasingly. Also, nice tiles.) youtu.be/3u5uZRuT1H4?...

Architect Duncan Baker-Brown answers your questions on adaptive re-use

YouTube video by The Modern House & Inigo

youtu.be

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Tim Leunig @timleunig.bsky.social · 15h

I agree we should make housing transactions easier, but houses are cheap in the North East despite the same rules. Housing supply (lack thereof) is what makes prices high in the South East. Nothing else. Build more houses, solve the problem. Nothing else will solve it.

Giles Wilkes @gilesyb.bsky.social · 1d

Brilliant and depressing piece on how hard it is to transact property

on.ft.com/4nHDf2m

I know some people think housing policy is simple - just build more! And to do that just have less planning! - but most appreciate the more complex tangles in life.

Moving home is maddening — here’s how the system needs to change

A new government consultation promises to speed up the conveyancing process in England and Wales. But will it work?

on.ft.com

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Glen O'Hara @gsoh31.bsky.social · 17h

Reading this by m'learned colleague, and the nostalgia for 50s Britain is a crock. Much of the country was an exhausted dump. The Potteries were described as 'seven miles of concentrated ugliness and dirt'. Stoke was full of 'old clay working, old coal dumps, canal and industrial waste'. (1/2)

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Prof Christina Pagel @chrischirp.bsky.social · 21h

After a long pause, I've just done another England Covid & NHS update as we head into the autumn/winter season.

TLDR: we're in a significant Covid wave now, the NHS is stretched, get boosted if you're eligible.

christinapagel.substack.com/p/england-is...

England is now experiencing a significant Covid wave, after 10 months of relative quiet

The latest Covid situation in England and a look at where NHS services are as we head into winter

christinapagel.substack.com

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New York Attorney General Letitia James @newyorkstateag.bsky.social · 1d

This is nothing more than a continuation of the president’s desperate weaponization of our justice system.

I am not fearful — I am fearless.

We will fight these baseless charges aggressively, and my office will continue to fiercely protect New Yorkers and their rights..

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Seb Schmoller @schmoller.net · 21h

A freely available AI literacy self-study tutorial from @sheffielduni.bsky.social about: rise.articulate.com/share/ckJWIi... via @altuk.bsky.social

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Dr Ellie Murray, ScD @epiellie.bsky.social · 22h

make. the. proof.

cool cool cool

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 1d

RFK Jr on Tylenol and autism: "It is not proof. We're doing the studies to make the proof."

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Seb Schmoller @schmoller.net · 23h

Informative as ever, by @julesbirch.bsky.social:
julesbirch.com/2025/09/22/m...

A year into the government’s five-year target to build 1.5 million additional homes and signs of progress are thin on the ground.

Indicators of new supply published on Friday estimate that 231,300 net additional homes were delivered in the just over 14 months between the start of the parliament on 9 July 2024 and 14 September 2025.

At this rate, the government will struggle to hit one million additional homes in this parliamentary term, let alone 1.5 million.

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Ufi VocTech Trust @ufitrust.bsky.social · 1d

If digital badging is to reach its full potential, we need a clear, coordinated strategy to guide it

The Digital Badging Commission, led by Ufi and The RSA will launch their digital badging recommendations on Monday at 2:30pm

Join us in-person or online to learn more: https://bit.ly/46DdzOl

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Roland Smith @rolandmcs.bsky.social · 1d

I see Robert Jenrick is supporting Hamit Coskun who is appealing his conviction by reference to the ECHR (which Jenrick wants to withdraw from).

Who knew that the ECHR could be useful, even to the anti-ECHR Hard Right?

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Seb Schmoller @schmoller.net · 2d

Race and the Conservative New Order. Really good piece by @davidsonofaaron.bsky.social, highlighting the similarities between history graduate Robert Jenrick's language and Oswald Mosley's: davidaaronovitch.substack.com/p/not-anothe...

"Not another white face"

Race and the Conservative New Order

davidaaronovitch.substack.com

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Dan Neidle @danneidle.bsky.social · 1d

Who benefits from the abolition of stamp duty land tax?

The first answer: people buying very expensive homes. Average saving for someone buying a £10m+ home is £1.7m. Average saving for someone buying a £250k-£500k home is £5k.

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Seb Schmoller @schmoller.net · 1d

"Welcome, protect, promote and integrate." Pope Leo's first Apostolic Exhortation, published on 4 October has a terrific section on migrants and refugees. www.vatican.va/content/leo-... [I've no religion.] Indirectly via @alexvont.bsky.social.

75. The Church’s tradition of working for and with migrants continues, and today this service is expressed in initiatives such as refugee reception centers, border missions and the efforts of Caritas Internationalis and other institutions. Contemporary teaching clearly reaffirms this commitment. Pope Francis has recalled that the Church’s mission to migrants and refugees is even broader, insisting that “our response to the challenges posed by contemporary migration can be summed up in four verbs: welcome, protect, promote and integrate. Yet these verbs do not apply only to migrants and refugees. They describe the Church’s mission to all those living in the existential peripheries, who need to be welcomed, protected, promoted and integrated.”

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Seb Schmoller @schmoller.net · 1d

I'm all in favour of Ethio-Jazz.

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Seb Schmoller @schmoller.net · 1d

"Welcome, protect, promote and integrate." Pope Leo's first Apostolic Exhortation, published on 4 October has a terrific section on migrants and refugees. www.vatican.va/content/leo-... [I've no religion.] Indirectly via @alexvont.bsky.social.

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Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · 1d

Marvellous column by @rafaelbehr.bsky.social that absolutely nails Kemi Badenoch - who clearly very deeply believes that the mere act of 'well, I'm saying it' means that something must be thoughtful, even if it is just a more innumerate and caustic echo of Nigel Farage:

Badenoch’s ‘thoughtful Conservatism’ turns out to be just the slower road to Faragism | Rafael Behr

The Tory leader’s intellectual meanderings have shrunk her party into little more than a holding pen for future Reform party candidates, says Guardian columnist Rafael Behr

www.theguardian.com

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Seb Schmoller @schmoller.net · 1d

A Yorkshire Sculpture Park miniature?

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Stephen Bush @stephenkb.bsky.social · 2d

I really don't know what to do about a situation where a plurality of the group that (rightly!) takes up most government spending thinks that it is unrepresented in politics.

Rachel Cunliffe @rmcunliffe.bsky.social · 2d

Hollow laughter

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David Higham @oldtrotter.bsky.social · 1d

Once you retire, you realise that you were never important to the organisation you worked for. That’s the reality that everyone discovers.

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Seb Schmoller @schmoller.net · 2d

Race and the Conservative New Order. Really good piece by @davidsonofaaron.bsky.social, highlighting the similarities between history graduate Robert Jenrick's language and Oswald Mosley's: davidaaronovitch.substack.com/p/not-anothe...

"Not another white face"

Race and the Conservative New Order

davidaaronovitch.substack.com

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Reposted by Seb Schmoller

George Peretz KC @georgeperetzkc.bsky.social · 2d

Great piece by @paulnowaktuc.bsky.social in support of the ECHR: exactly the points I and others in @soclablaw.bsky.social have been making. labourlist.org/2025/10/paul...

Paul Nowak Column: 'The Left has a political and moral duty to defend the ECHR' - LabourList

In his barnstorming regular column TUC General Secretary Paul Nowak says all MPs have a moral and political duty o defend the ECHR.

labourlist.org

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Seb Schmoller @schmoller.net · 2d

".. carefully framed domestic legislation could be used as a legitimate attempt to nudge or shape the ECHR caselaw, if it were done as a good faith attempt to work within the Convention, rather than to breach or disregard it." By @sirjjkc.bsky.social
www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/comment/keir...

What does Keir Starmer mean by “looking again” at international law? | Institute for Government

The government plans to remain in the ECHR but change how it is interpreted.

www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk

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The i Paper @theipaper.com · 2d

Opinion | Starmer has not prioritised growth, not really. He has done what British governments have been doing for over a decade: prioritising anti-immigration policy and focusing on growth only where it does not interfere with it

🖋 @iandunt.bsky.social

Read more: trib.al/HHn51XN

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Tim Sharp @timsharp.bsky.social · 2d

A really welcome announcement on employment tribunal fees.

www.theguardian.com/money/2025/o...

David Lammy rules out charging workers for employment tribunal claims

Justice secretary says right to challenge unfair work behaviour is core to Labour work plan after union backlash

www.theguardian.com

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Eryk Salvaggio @eryk.bsky.social · 2d

I’ve just learned that John Searle, whose Chinese Room thought experiment is often used to challenge ideas of “understanding” in LLMs, died at age 93 on Sunday. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/o...

John Searle obituary

American philosopher whose Chinese Room thought experiment rebuts the idea that computers can think as humans do

www.theguardian.com

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