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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 3h

Licensing laws in this country are ridiculous, restrictive and based in a mixture of postwar paternalism and victorian moralism.

We should deregulate them as a reclamation of public space and collective joy, not "for growth", but deregulation is absolutely what needs to happen.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 4d

This is dystopian and will consolidate Britain's status as an increasingly authoritarian state when it comes to protest.

It is also stupid, because if your problem is thousands of people showing up to be arrested, threatening them with arrest is unlikely to deter.

Police to get new powers to crack down on repeated protests, says Home Office

Move follows arrest of almost 500 people at latest pro-Palestinian demonstration in London on Saturday

www.theguardian.com

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 4d

Attending my first Green conference as a member, it's remarkable how friendly and curious everyone is.

I think it's a mistake to regard that as unserious. Contrary to what Labour hack school teaches you, being a self-important control freak is not likeable or electable. #gpconf

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 5d

83% of Green Party members back an electoral pact with Your Party.

I've put forward a motion to #gpconf25 that would make it party policy to pursue an alliance. It's amendment 1 to motion D14.

If you're at conference and (big if) if we get to debate it, please support it.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 7d

You've fled torture and death. You've made it across thousands of miles. You've won your asylum claim in a rigged system. You're traumatised.

And the Starmer government says "you can stay, but you'll be alone and your family are staying where the danger is".

Unfathomably evil.

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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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 13d

ID cards are a genius idea because they combine:
- being really expensive
- being really unpopular
- focussing on illegal immigration, I.e. Reform's main talking point

It's a level of strategic genius we haven't seen since the disability benefit cuts.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 16d

It is politics by ego. This is what you get when you place the hopes of the left in the hands of celebrities and their bag-carriers, without nourishing the capacity to self-organise.

The farce of recent days is the logical end point of that political method.

For @novaramedia.com.

The New Party Fallout Shows That Hero-Worship Gets Us Nowhere | Novara Media

The public split between Your Party co-founders Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana shows how building mass movements around leftwing celebrities doesn’t work, argues Michael Chessum.

novaramedia.com

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 18d

Our political class has a special kind of collective psychosis.

Two years into a genocide, after arming the perpetrators, they draw themselves up to their fullest height, clear their throats, and say: "we recognise the existence of the victims".

And we are supposed to stand and applaud.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 19d

One of the few positive things about the events of the past few days is that it blows apart the culture of loyalism that has blighted the British left since 2015.

Blindly defend whatever the leader is doing? Which one? Oh no, guess we'd better organise and think for ourselves.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 19d

It's time to stop messing about:

join.greenparty.org.uk

Join the Green Party

Join the Green Party from just £6 a year. Become a member today - join the only party standing up for people and planet.

join.greenparty.org.uk

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 19d

God it's ridiculous how the left always have these squabbles isn't it.

Blair and Brown would never have done that kind of thing.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 20d

The reason why a lot of prominent people didn't just join the Greens in the first place is that they wouldn't automatically get to be in charge of the Green Party.

Well, it turns out they don't automatically get to be in charge of Your Party either. So what's the point?

Join:

Join the Green Party

Join the Green Party from just £6 a year. Become a member today - join the only party standing up for people and planet.

join.greenparty.org.uk

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Reposted by Michael Chessum

Zack Polanski @zackpolanski.bsky.social · 20d

Really really delighted to see the wonderful former MP join the Green Party!

Huge welcome, Thelma.

And you can follow too:

Join.greenparty.org.uk

Thelma Walker @thelma-2.bsky.social · 20d

I’ve just joined the Green Party.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 20d

If you have to share the join link for your new party alongside a reassurance that "this is not a scam", something has probably gone wrong.

This project really, really matters. All of the history and baggage aside, can you lot please not make this a total farce.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 21d

This is a potentially huge moment and is being woefully under reported by the mainstream media.

Picketers were rammed by a car today. An attempt to murder or seriously hurt striking workers. Was it the far right? Was it just some nutters? Either way, hugely sinister.

Man in hospital after protesters hit by vehicle outside nuclear site | LBC

A man is in a serious condition in hospital after an off-road vehicle collided with a group of workers protesting outside a nuclear site.

www.lbc.co.uk

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 21d

After years of helping to organise it, it feels surreal not to be at the @ukstoptrump.bsky.social protest today

Good luck to everyone marching. Let's use this moment to build something. We can't defeat the far right by calling it names. We need an alternative.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 22d

We are being asked to believe that the leading figures of Your Party have decided to trust the future of their project to a literally random process run by sortitioned delegates.

That doesn't imply a leap of democratic innovation. It implies they have other ways to keep control.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 24d

If I was Morgan McSweeney or Wes Steeeting, I would be trying to shove Keir Starmer out of the door right now so that Burnham doesn't have time to get into the succession process.

At the moment, Starmer is guaranteed to go at some point, and Burnham is guaranteed to replace him.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 25d

Solidarity with everyone opposing the far right today.

That Tommy Robinson can mobilise crowds like this isn't just the fault of the right, but of a "sensible" elite that wrecked living standards and blamed immigration for the results.

We will defeat them, all of them. We have to.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 26d

So what's the bet here? Lucy Powell absolutely smashes the deputy leadeship contest, Starmer limps on until the locals in May 2026, and then we get another roughly similar leader who pursues a marginally softer policy of racism and austerity?

An inspiring prospect, isn't it.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 27d

Peter Mandelson is and always has been an utter liability. One of the most disliked New Labour era politicians, a strategist with a strategy stuck in 1994, mercenary, and at best a bad judge of character.

Don't look at him, look at all the people who've called him a genius.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · 27d

The Labour Deputy leadeship contest is such a classic display of superficial identity politics.

"We need a woman, a northerner, someone working class."

Are we going to address the structural or political issues? No.

And what about a black working class woman who would? Absolutely not.

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · Sep 8

Some personal news.

Ella arrived with us on Tuesday. She's healthy, and beautiful, and home.

Mum doing well.

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Reposted by Michael Chessum

Caroline Lucas @carolinelucas.bsky.social · Aug 29

This should be headline news - the implications are horrifying …

Collapse of critical Atlantic current is no longer low-likelihood, study finds

Scientists say ‘shocking’ discovery shows rapid cuts in carbon emissions are needed to avoid catastrophic fallout

www.theguardian.com

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Michael Chessum @michaelchessum.bsky.social · Aug 30

Capitalism has given us a world advanced enough to rely on technology, but not advanced enough for it to work.

Bus windows don't open because they have air con that breaks down. Electronic plumbing and taps that never works. Trains that can't open their doors.

We had a system for this. It was free

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