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Reposted by Lauren Dobson-Hughes

Henry Mance @henrymance.ft.com · 16h

I know this is uncomfortable to admit, but there is a small area in England's second city where people are just not integrated with the rest of society. Many of them hold views that arguably go against British values.

Yes, we need to talk about the Tory conference in Manchester.

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 18h

Very good profile of Mark Carney, by @stephenmaher.bsky.social. Jives with what the Ottawa bubble says about him and the shoes memo too macleans.ca/politics/mar...

Mark Carney Is a Very Demanding Boss - Macleans.ca

His elbows-up enthusiasm won him the election. Now he’s governing like a Bay Street exec.

macleans.ca

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 19h

I would like to everyone of these complainants named, so they can receive the Most Astonishing Levels Of NIMBY Ever Seen On God's Green Earth www.bbc.com/news/article...

Council demolishes play area after noise complaints

Parents in a Derbyshire town say their children are 'devastated' they have lost the facility.

www.bbc.com

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 20h

There's nobody whose voice I value more on British immigration and cohesion than @sundersays.bsky.social. A national treasure (and my family are from Ellesmere Port too) www.theguardian.com/world/2025/o...

Sunder Katwala on race, patriotism and flag-waving: ‘The far right is vocal and angry because it is shrinking’

The director of British Future has spent his career trying to find common ground when it comes to race and immigration. He describes his own experience of racism – and why he’s still hopeful for the U...

www.theguardian.com

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Reposted by Lauren Dobson-Hughes

Alexander Clarkson @aphclarkson.bsky.social · 23h

It betrays a desperation to reassert stratified class, racial and gender hierarchies through something like UAE's authoritarian structures in the assumption that Conservative and Reform leaders or voters would always be at the top of such a new order

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 23h

Couldn't agree more with @jrobson.bsky.social - human capital is an investment and should be reflected on government books in that way. It's a particular form of bias to believe that only physical infrastructure counts as capital investment robsonj.substack.com/p/budgeting-...

Budgeting for an economy without people

Ever since Mark Carney promised, in the federal campaign, to “balance the operating budget” so government could invest more in “capital”, there has been some mystery about exactly how the PM might be ...

robsonj.substack.com

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 23h

British cities are by and large an integration success story. If anyone has created ghettos and refuses to integrate, it's the 97% white communities who panic when they see someone with a tan www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

I didn’t realise how much I loved my home town until a terrorist attacked it. I pray unity prevails there | Simon Hattenstone

Last week’s attack on the synagogue in Crumpsall, Manchester, was also an assault on a model and diverse community, says Guardian features writer Simon Hattenstone

www.theguardian.com

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

It's odd listening to development experts debate the hotly contested idea of social protection - does it work? How? What's the evidence? - when all global north countries have for decades routinely used social protection in the form of benefits, welfare or other direct cash transfers to citizens

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

Just two African countries are able to fully fund their own social protection schemes without any external financing - Kenya and South Africa. Kenya's scheme gives about $5 a month to 1.7 million vulnerable people

(From an ODI session with Government of Kenya I'm currently listening to)

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

Class-anxious LARPing of a white working class, in order to justify your America-brained racist beliefs bsky.app/profile/samf...

Sam Freedman @samfr.bsky.social · 1d

JFC the man has not one ounce of shame in him.

He went to private school and Cambridge. He owns three homes and rents a fourth!

James Austin @jamesdaustin.bsky.social · 1d

I know plenty of politicians 'working classify' their backgrounds, but this from Jenrick is taking the piss.

His father's linked in is here: uk.linkedin.com/in/bill-jenr...

He was a managing accountant who ended up as the Managing Director of Cannon Industries

Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

There is a class-anxious LARPing by centrist and far right figures of a nostalgic, Disneyfied white working class

Largely wealthy, middle class leaders desperately pretending to be a working class that hasn't existed since the 1970s, projecting on them far right beliefs they generally don't hold

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

‘Are you representing an organisation here? ’, I asked a Muslim attendee at the vigil. “I’m here as a Mancunian mate,’ he replied. “That’s what I’m representing.” www.britishfuture.org/im-here-as-a...

"I'm here as a Mancunian – that's what I'm representing" - British Future

British Future's Avaes Mohammad reports from Friday's vigil in Manchester following the appalling Synagogue attack.

www.britishfuture.org

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

For the next two weeks, this is now an autumn colours appreciation account

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

It was a fringe, far right belief but in just months, the idea of indigenous English as a race is fast becoming mainstream. It’s the latest obsessive talking point - anyone can become British, but you can only be English if you trace ancestry back hundreds of years (ie, be white)

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

The concept of indigenous English was for decades, toxic and clearly racist. Now senior politicians are basically demanding the right not to see Black or ethnic minority people in public www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Robert Jenrick complained of ‘not seeing another white face’ in Birmingham neighbourhood

Shadow justice secretary criticised for suggesting he could tell how integrated Handsworth was based on short visit

www.theguardian.com

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Reposted by Lauren Dobson-Hughes

Matthias Eberl @eberlmat.bsky.social · 6d

And why call it 'golden ticket'?

Disgraceful language. These people have lost everything. Should they also lose their spouses and children?

A reminder that last year 4,671 family reunion visas were granted.

4,671.

Does anyone think this number is a major problem for the UK economy and society?

Zoe Gardner @zoejardiniere.bsky.social · 6d

People recognised as refugees fleeing persecution & granted the right to live in the UK to be denied the right to be joined safely by their spouse & children.

This Labour govt is a moral void, a stinking darkness, an empty hollow of cowardice & contempt. #r4today www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

Starmer to end asylum ‘golden ticket’ of resettlement and family reunion rights

People granted asylum will have to earn right to invite family in plan charities call ‘straight from populist playbook’

www.theguardian.com

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

You’ve lived in Britain for decades, paying into NI and a state pension the whole time, then the govt says it’s seizing your pension and if you don’t like it, you can abandon your family and return to a country you haven’t lived in for 30 years

David Higham @oldtrotter.bsky.social · 1d

The Tory Party has gone mad..

He insisted the Conservatives had a plan to cut spending, including £8bn of annual savings from reducing the civil service, £6.9bn from cutting the aid budget and £23bn from slashing the welfare bill.

Stride told the BBC that to save money, only UK citizens would have access to the welfare system and that people with "low-level" mental health problems would also lose access to benefits.

Asked what would happen to people living legally in Britain who are not UK citizens if they fall into hardship, he said: "They've come from other parts of the world and they would have the option to return."

The Conservatives failed to back the Labour government's proposed £5bn of welfare savings this year. Stride claimed that the Labour plans were rushed and "not considered and principled".

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

“For years, we’ve tried pitching private sector to fund a basic state duty like health or education”

“Has it ever worked?”

“No, it captured all our energy and time, we generated cents for every public dollar, and failed cause there’s no profit feeding hungry children. But it might work this time”

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

Through a combination of tyranny of low expectations and colonialism, global north experts impose development solutions on global south countries that we’d never accept for ourselves

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

There was an article this week titled “Taxes: The solution to aid cuts?” like it was some disputed, groundbreaking idea that a state might collect revenue in a common pool that it uses to provide basic services to its population. This is how we do it in the global north!

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

Sometimes the development sector is like an animal shelter, making our own causes look the cutest and most attractive to philanthropy and private sector in hope we might get picked as a charity case

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

The development sector continually pushes solutions we would never consider in the global north. If French children go hungry, we don’t ask how BNP Paribas can make a massive profit feeding them. We push the state to assume its role

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 1d

The solution to hungry children is a state that provides for children. It is not convincing venture capitalists that somehow they can make oodles of profit by feeding hungry children

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Reposted by Lauren Dobson-Hughes

Defend Our Juries @defendourjuries.bsky.social · 2d

UNLAWFUL ARREST

This woman was arrested for holding a sign with “I do not support the proscription of Palestine Action” on it, a totally lawful statement to make, even under the Labour government’s absurd new laws proscribing the direct action group.

wedonotcomply.org

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Lauren Dobson-Hughes @ldobsonhughes.bsky.social · 2d

Turns out, there were no billion pound diversity programs and the grifters were indeed lying

Financial Times @financialtimes.com · 2d

Reform likely to raise Kent council tax after cost-cutting drive falters on.ft.com/4pTvJ62

Reform likely to raise Kent council tax after cost-cutting drive falters

Nigel Farage’s party promised to revive local authority finances by slashing wasteful spending

on.ft.com

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