Gerry Hassan

@gerryhassan.bsky.social

1.7K followers 320 following 2.2K posts

Writer commentator academic. Books Editor, Bella Caledonia; Co-founder Kirkcudbright Fringe Festival; Co-editor, 'Britain Needs Change: The Politics of Hope & Labour's Challenge', pub. Nov. 28 2024.

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Gerry Hassan is a Scottish writer, commentator and academic. He currently holds an Honorary Professor title at Glasgow Caledonian University for Social Change, having previously worked at the University of Dundee and the University of the West of Scotland, where he completed his doctorate. He has also previously worked for the Institute for Public Policy Research and Demos where he led their Scotland 2020 and Glasgow 2020 programmes and OpenDemocracy. He has written for the Scottish and UK press, including The Spectator, The Scotsman, The Herald, Holyrood, Sunday Mail, The Guardian and The National (Scotland) on topics and issues related to the United Kingdom, particularly Scotland and Scottish Independence. .. more

Political science 50%

History 39%

Posts Replies Media Videos

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 2h

Ex-Brexit Party MEP Lucy Harris on #BBC #PoliticsLive. She describes the Rachel Reeves budget as "ideological" & Labour as "anti-democratic" & "anti-people." Obviously she does not think of Brexit & hard right-wing economics which she supports as "ideological."

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 15h

The evoking of 'Middle England' to defend the financial interests of the richest households in England who are a tiny group of 0.5% of households heavily clustered in London & the South East.

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 16h

Trump's latest plan for his new ballroom. It will dwarf the White House and is rather similar to the megalomanic architectural visions of despots the world over such as Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi and Nicolae Ceaușescu. In its vulgarity & blatant corruption it says much about Trump's America

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 21h

V good analysis of the political cowardice of Starmer's Labour by @premnsikka.bsky.social. One of its many failures is the fiscal assault on young people freezing the repayment threshold for student loans at £29,385 leaving graduates with a 37% marginal tax rate. leftfootforward.org/2025/11/the-...

The government’s budget is simply managing decline

The budget does little to improve living standards or facilitate sustained economic growth

leftfootforward.org

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 22h

Your Party members have decided to name their fledgling entity Your Party. Meanwhile the right-wing propaganda machine continues its campaign to destroy the last vestiges of the social contract between government & citizens. Maybe resisting that should be a priority for any serious left?

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 1d

Jeremy Seabrook died one year ago today aged 85. One of the most original & pioneering voices for social justice, human rights & dignity in post-war Britain. He asked: “Why is it that the rich must become immeasurably more rich before the poor can become even fractionally less poor?”

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 1d

Mainstream politics are broken in the UK. Labour, Tories & Reform cling to the same discredited economic & social model. There was a constituency for the Corbyn-Sultana Your Party but they have blown it with ego & SWP entryism. Sad but a good day for the Greens.
www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Your Party conference thrown into chaos as Zarah Sultana boycotts first day

Sultana skips Saturday’s proceeding in solidarity with delegates expelled over links to other parties

www.theguardian.com

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 2d

Good to see the media highlighting the case of real hardship in today's Britain:
88 year old worried about the tax bill on her six bedroom Kensington house.
Home purchased for £4k in 1970.
Now worth £4 million.
£3,945,000 more than if it had just increased with inflation.

Reposted by Ben H. Ansell, Mel Bartley, Charles West , and 4 more Ben H. Ansell, Mel Bartley, Charles West, Ailsa Cameron, Julian R. Betts, Vaughan S. Roberts, Gerry Hassan

Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 2d

Huge respect to the papers for finding both an 88 year old worried about the tax bill on her 6 bedroom Kensington house and a 20 year old fretting about only being able to save £12k a year tax free.
Top work all around. These are not easy case studies to find.

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 2d

The #BBC's strange notion of "balance" continues on #Newsnight which means a disproportionate bias & representation of the right. Two media reps & one Labour MP: the former from the Murdoch Times & Sun. Hardly neutral on Labour or the Corbyn-Sultana party.

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 2d

Link: www.thejc.com/opinion/the-...

The Guardian, the BBC and the weaponisation of antisemitism against Nigel Farage - The Jewish Chronicle

It’s an effort to cast the Reform UK leader as far right when he and his party are mainstream. He should be judged on his actions today, not on schoolboy insults from half a century ago

www.thejc.com

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 2d

The contortions of defending Nigel Farage. Stephen Pollard in the Jewish Chronicle makes the judgement that Farage probably did say terrible things including "Hitler was right" & "Gas them." But his defence is that everyone was saying antisemitic things at private schools then.

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 2d

Has the Reform bandwagon stalled? Reform vote falls & lead cut from 15% to 8%. Greens surging.
Westminster Voting Intention:
REF: 30% (-5)
LAB: 22% (+2)
CON: 20% (+3)
GRN: 12% (+5)
LDEM: 12% (-1)
SNP: 2% (=)
Via BMG Research
Sample: 25-27 Nov.
Changes w/ 26-28 Aug.

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 2d

Nigel Farage's dark past has come back to haunt him. He has even lost The Spectator under Michael Gove.

Reposted by Will Jennings, Scott L. Greer, Gerry Hassan

Eric Michael Garcia @ericmgarcia.bsky.social · 2d

New Gallup poll shows Trump's approval hit a new low for his second term:
-36% approve
-60% disapprove

His approval among Republicans went from 91% in January to 84% in November
news.gallup.com/poll/699221/...

Trump's Approval Rating Drops to 36%, New Second-Term Low

President Donald Trump's job approval rating has slipped to a new second-term low point and is approaching his all-time low of 34%.

news.gallup.com

Reposted by Mark Priestley, Andrew Perchard

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 3d

Why do so many prominent Brexiteers live in France? Nigel Lawson; Andrew Neil; and former Brexit Party & UKIP MEP David Coburn. Asked to account for himself in the Nathan Gill story it turns out he lives in a French chateau. The brazen hypocrisy of this lot is just staggering!

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 3d

This is the future for UK Royal Mail if people let it. On 30 December the Danish postal service PostNord will end its collection & delivery of letters entirely. All aided by dramatically putting the price of domestic letters & next-day delivery through the roof.
www.economist.com/europe/2025/...

Denmark gets ready to cancel Christmas cards

The Danish post is the first to end letter collection, but others will follow

www.economist.com

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 4d

#BBC #PoliticsLive continues its strange idea of what "balance" is. A party which consistently is polling under 20% has two out of the three political pundits: 67%. Sebastian Payne of The Times being a Tory member who was not introduced with that info.

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 4d

Trumpian true believer calls for the end of the USA as a constitutional republic. How unAmerican & typical of Trumpian authoritarianism.

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 4d

The bankruptcy of conventional economics. Andy Haldane, Chief Economist, BOE for seven years mentions nothing on the structural weaknesses of the UK economy & capitalism. All short-term & supply side & ignoring fundamentals & hence part of the problem. #Budget2025 #Newsnight

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 4d

Endless superficial commentary on #Budget2025. Little on the political economy of UK capitalism. The short-term speculative nature of the City; how finance capitalism crowds out real business; lack of public & private investment; the lamentable record on R&D all contributing to the productivity gap.

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 4d

Reeves ends the two child benefit cap: taking 450,000 children out of poverty representing the largest reduction in child poverty in a single Parliament. If this is to be sustained the case has to be continually made to reduce child poverty. Have Reeves & Labour got the courage? #budget2025

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 4d

This is a total bonkers take from Matt Goodwin on the #Budget2025. For starters half the welfare figure he cites is taken up by UK pensions; then there is the questionable selective list of countries ignoring the fact the UK needs to raise its fertility rate.

Reposted by Gerry Hassan

FarageWatch @faragewatch.bsky.social · 4d

👇 FULL LIST OF NIGEL FARAGE'S JOBS AND EARNINGS SINCE BECOMING AN MP

TOTAL: ~£1.2m (Jun 24-Oct 25)

Does not include rental income from his £3m portfolio of 3 buy-to-let houses.

-
Source links: faragewatch.media/is-farage-a-...

From the forthcoming issue 1 of #Faragewatch: faragewatch.media/about

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 5d

Rachel Reeves announcement of a so-called mansion tax will only apply to England. Will we see the Tories & right-wing media talk about the spectre of multi-millionaires & property magnets fleeing to Scotland, Wales & Northern Ireland? #Budget2025

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 5d

Right that Reeves has finally ended the two child benefit cap bringing 450,000 children out of poverty. But why did Reeves wait 18 months? And why were Labour MPs suspended for supporting its abolition last year? No conviction or moral high ground from Reeves. #Budget2025

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 5d

UK politics loves talking the talk. But consistently fails to address the big issues. An example being the failure to act on local govt finance & council tax bands. The below is tinkering with a broken system & strengthening central govt control over local govt.

Duncan Weldon @duncanweldon.bsky.social · 6d

A ‘mansion tax’ on homes worth over £2m to raise about £400/450m a year is everything wrong with a ‘smorgasbord’ approach.
Lots of potential political pain for a public finances rounding error. Coupled with a new weird cliffedges.
Either reform property tax to raise proper money or don’t.

Financial Times @financialtimes.com · 6d

Homes worth more than £2mn set to be hit by Budget raid on.ft.com/4rocFhe

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 5d

Take it you are asking a rhetorical question.

Gerry Hassan @gerryhassan.bsky.social · 5d

A typical 'calm down, nothing to see here' take from the Westminster political commentariat. The British state's capacity to do the basics is falling apart all across society. That is the big takeaway from the latest fiasco.

Lewis Goodall @lewisgoodall.com · 5d

Everyone needs to calm down a bit. It’s an embarrassing and stupid leak. But we knew all the detail anyway- the Treasury had leaked it. Markets have reacted well. This bit of process won’t be anything close to the most politically difficult thing about today.

Lewis Goodall @lewisgoodall.com · 5d

Keir Starmer: "The Chancellor will set out the Budget in just a few minutes time."

In fact, the OBR did it just a few minutes ago.

Reposted by Ben H. Ansell, Gerry Hassan

Lewis Goodall @lewisgoodall.com · 5d

Keir Starmer: "The Chancellor will set out the Budget in just a few minutes time."

In fact, the OBR did it just a few minutes ago.

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