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stevepo.bsky.social
@stevepo.bsky.social
180 followers 96 following 16 posts
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Reposted
13sarahmurphy.bsky.social
“Farage had an uneasy end to the year”

Where “uneasy” = exposed as racist with corrupt/traitorous links to Russia and useless at running councils.
But no worries. They’ll just join forces with the failed Tories to “end the left wing tyranny.”

They can all go to hell.

(Sunday Times)
Josh Glancy If support for Reform has hit a peak, a Tory pact looks a lot less distant Photo of Farage Extracts: Another danger for Reform is tactical voting and the left uniting to keep Farage out, which is what happened in the Senedd by-election in Caerphilly two months ago.. Put all these factors together and it’s no surprise that there is speculation once again in Westminster about a Reform-Tory pact. If Reform has hit a plateau and can’t get there alone, what about uniting the right by teaming up with the rump of the Tory party? If Farage and Badenoch can’t get along — the pair have barely met and share a mutual antipathy — then perhaps a more Reform-friendly Tory leader, likely Robert Jenrick, could do a deal to ensure an end to left-wing tyranny? Farage had an uneasy end to the year Such an arrangement could take many forms, from an explicit deal not to compete across the board to a quiet, implicit, “gloves-off” agreement in key seats. Publicly, of course, both sides reject this suggestion — to do otherwise would be to admit their own limitations. Farage has called the idea “ludicrous” and insists his party will “swallow” the Tories, not join with them. Grubby deals with the hated Tories would dull Reform’s insurgent sheen. Privately, however, the conversation has a different tone. This month the Financial Times reported that Farage had told donors he expected an election deal to happen (a story he later described as “fake”). Many Tory MPs also privately admit that some form of deal may be their only path to power. “If Tory MPs are faced with a choice of going into coalition with Reform as a moderating force in government, or Britain being governed by some kind of rainbow alliance of the left, they will obviously choose power over five more years in the wilderness,” says the Tory source. “They can be as high-minded as they want in opposition, but if the opportunity arose they would jump at it.”
December 28, 2025 at 8:05 AM
Reposted
lewisgoodall.com
I spoke too soon. We will lose an ongoing anachronistic national embarrassment that we have people who sit by birthright in our legislature. Let them get real jobs, by their own merit.
December 28, 2025 at 9:51 AM
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13sarahmurphy.bsky.social
“None of us can guess how the Trump assault on the BBC will play out, because he wields unprecedented power, unchecked by personal dignity or decency.”

No. We can’t. But we can condemn forever the repulsive British politicians and media gobshites who would side with him instead of us.
We must back BBC to the hilt against Trump Assault on the broadcaster is part of wider game to discredit any news source that is not sympathetic to the president Extracts: . Since Trumps inauguration, national leaders on this side of the Atlantic, including Sir Keir Starmer, have displayed extreme caution in response to American insults and hostile acts. They strive to avert a high noon with the most powerful man on earth. This is probably necessary. Trump is spoiling for a fight with Europe, not least in his impatience to complete the betrayal of Ukraine. Yet none of us, and especially our government, should display indifference to his assaults on both US and foreign media organisations. He identifies the interests of himself and of America with its tech giants, and fights every attempt to restrain their excesses. He is frustrating regulation of Al, even to the point of promoting legislation to prevent states from introducing their own restraining measures. Magas standard-bearers denounce efforts to prevent social media from publishing falsehoods, libels and hate messages as "attacks on free speech". This week five British citizens campaigning for regulation of social media content were denied US visas, after the Trump administration alleged that they were seeking to censor tech companies. Tech investors are pouring hundreds of millions into supporting anti-regulation candidates for next year's midterm elections. None of us can guess how the Trump assault on the BBC will play out, because he wields unprecedented power, unchecked by personal dignity or decency. We should merely recognise that if he is successful in taming or suppressing liberal media at home and abroad, the world as well as the US will become a darker place.
December 27, 2025 at 10:15 AM
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13sarahmurphy.bsky.social
Some people do my head in.
This arse is one of them.
Why TF would we care about his business…? Did he care about all the SMEs bankrupted by Brexit? Does he feel any anxiety or shame about just how much that stupid idea has cost our country and many of us personally.
No.
He can absolutely do one.
The Telegraph • • Sir James Dyson has said he may not be able to pass his business down to his children because of Rachel Reeves's inheritance tax changes.... See more Sir James Dyson: Rachel Reeves has put my family business at risk
December 27, 2025 at 5:05 PM
Reposted
gunnerregretit.bsky.social
This by @writesbright.bsky.social is a succinct assessment of Farage. He’s not a leader. He has no loyalty to his team and, eventually, when they realise, he’ll receive none in return.

writesbright.substack.com/p/farages-to...
December 27, 2025 at 5:29 PM
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kevinmckenna.co.uk
The Telegraph having a perfectly normal one this Boxing Day I see

I’m pretty sure most people can manage a walk in the country without ripping foxes limb from limb by ‘accident’
Absolutely unhinged headline on the front page of the Telegraph newspaper saying “What will Labour ban next… the country walk?” Next to a photo of a foxhound, just to make it clear what they really mean. (Subtexts are for cowards and all that)
December 26, 2025 at 10:27 AM
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jamesbloodworth.bsky.social
As someone who grew up in the countryside the Countryside Alliance has never represented me and my family and honestly fuck them
December 26, 2025 at 4:59 PM
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guyshrubsole.bsky.social
The Countryside Alliance are once again talking out of their (top) hat.

80% of the public, rural & urban, think fox hunting should remain illegal.

The ‘rural culture war’ is a myth, as @jon-moses.bsky.social shows here: national.thelead.uk/p/the-rural-...

bsky.app/profile/theg...
December 26, 2025 at 1:32 PM
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zoegrunewald.bsky.social
Dog-whistle and factually incorrect. Ladies, raise your hand if you were sexually assaulted by a boy at school? I’d wager this or a family member is most women’s first experience of sexual violence
December 18, 2025 at 4:15 PM
Reposted
13sarahmurphy.bsky.social
Letter to the FT that stingingly sums up Brexit and the shit creek we now find ourselves in.
A terrible idea (naive, prejudiced and uninformed) that has deeply divided us and left us poorer and less secure… but unwilling to face up to the damage we’ve done to ourselves. While the EU moves on.
FINANCIAL TIMES I was amused - and saddened - to read the latest instalment of the Brexiters' excuses for the poor performance over recent years of the UK economy and the UK's politics. In "Implementation of Brexit became a business fiasco" (Markets Insight, December 19), Paul Marshall acknowledges the cost of the UK's decision to leave the EU. But rather than acknowledge that his analysis was wrong - cutting ties with your biggest trading partner is never a good idea - Marshall blames bad implementation, and the fact that the EU didn't cut the UK some slack. Implementation of Brexit by the UK has indeed been poor, but that's a direct consequence of the political crisis that everyone should have expected following such a major decision on the back of one simple 52/48 referendum vote at the conclusion of a mind-bogglingly uninformed debate by both sides. That includes the Brexiters' naive insistence that the EU would bend to UK demands and grant it all sorts of privileges not enjoyed by others. So, the roughly 8 per cent of GDP loss in UK output since the Brexit decision in 2016 is easily explained by three perfectly predictable factors: it was a bad economic decision; it has split UK society politically; and the EU27 has moved on. It's time for those who led the UK down this disastrous path to stand up and acknowledge their wrong analysis and naive understanding of Europe. Until that happens, how can one even hope that the UK will begin to heal? Erik Fossing Nielsen Senior Adviser, Independent Economics (a London-based economics advisory firm); Former Chief Economist, UniCredit, and Former Chief European Economist, Goldman Sachs, Berlin, Germany
December 24, 2025 at 8:31 AM
Reposted
goodlawproject.bsky.social
Not all trios of men bearing gifts are wise:

Christopher Harborne, Jeremy Hosking and Richard Tice have provided 75% of Reform’s funding 👀
https://democracyforsale.substack.com/p/75-of-reform-uks-donations-have-come
75% of Reform UK’s donations have come from just three rich men
Calls grow for donation caps as Democracy for Sale research reveals that three-quarters of Reform’s funding comes from a trio of wealthy donors
democracyforsale.substack.com
December 24, 2025 at 8:45 AM
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bestforbritain.org
This is what Reform UK does.

“These closures are nothing short of a betrayal of local people and staff.”

“Derbyshire county council did not stand before the electorate last May pledging to shut care homes."

https://bit.ly/4pOeD9h
Reform council's plan to shut eight care homes ‘a betrayal of local people'
Announcement after proposed sale falls through prompts backlash and union says more than 200 jobs at risk
www.theguardian.com
December 23, 2025 at 7:15 PM
Reposted
13sarahmurphy.bsky.social
“Over half (54%) of exporters in a survey of almost 1,000 businesses – the majority of which were small and medium-sized firms – said the (Brexit) trade deal negotiated by Boris Johnson’s govt… was not helping them”

Paying a v high price for Brexit ‘sovereignty’.
www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
Keir Starmer told closer EU trade ties ‘strategic necessity’ for UK firms
Labour urged to accelerate reset with Brussels as many exporters struggling to trade in the EU after Brexit deal
www.theguardian.com
December 23, 2025 at 7:31 AM
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peterstefanovic.bsky.social
"For the first time, Reform voters are getting the chance to compare
what their new councillors promised – including council tax cuts – with what they’re actually getting, which for many looks likely to be the opposite”

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
My lesson from 2025: Reform is much more vulnerable than it appears | Gaby Hinsliff
The party’s astonishingly speedy growth disguised shallow roots – and its success has brought a level of scrutiny for which it simply isn’t ready, says Guardian columnist Gaby Hinsliff
www.theguardian.com
December 20, 2025 at 10:18 AM
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adambienkov.bsky.social
How showbusiness 'journalism' really works
December 20, 2025 at 11:08 AM
Reposted
writesbright.bsky.social
For all of Farage’s bombast and bravado, Reform is basically just a retirement home for disgraced Tories - and the media should be reporting it as such
Farage’s Tory recycling scheme
And why it will surely backfire...
writesbright.substack.com
December 20, 2025 at 11:16 AM
Reposted
mrjamesob.bsky.social
Jeffrey Epstein & David Walliams leading all the bulletins but Kemi Badenoch knows that only men from ‘different cultures’ pose a threat to women.
December 19, 2025 at 10:04 PM
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oskidarski.bsky.social
This is excellent! (IMO)
writesbright.bsky.social Sam Bright @writesbright.bsky.social · 8d
For all of Farage’s bombast and bravado, Reform is basically just a retirement home for disgraced Tories - and the media should be reporting it as such
Farage’s Tory recycling scheme
And why it will surely backfire...
writesbright.substack.com
December 20, 2025 at 1:46 PM
Reposted
thenerve.news
🎥 Chasing Farage, part two!
@johnsweeneyroar.bsky.social is back on the trail of the Reform UK leader, looking into the long history of racism allegations against him. He visits Dulwich and meets reporter Michael Crick, who first confronted Farage on the subject back in 2013
youtu.be/PVa118JRRSk?...
Chasing Farage part 2: John Sweeney investigates the history of racism claims against Nigel Farage
YouTube video by The Nerve
youtu.be
December 20, 2025 at 11:00 AM
Reposted
13sarahmurphy.bsky.social
The Tory party continues to circle the far right drain; a place where the bigots, the corrupt and the nasty fools gather.
Badenoch doesn’t have the wit or the integrity to drag them back to decency. In fact, she’s a big part of the strong downward current.
However, if you look closer at her poll figures, the slight improvement she has made in her still dire ratings over recent weeks, is almost entirely made up of existing Conservative voters slightly improving their opinion of their own leader, rather than any non-Conservative voters warming towards her. This is not surprising. Since becoming Conservative leader, Badenoch has pursued not just a core-vote strategy, but a core - Reform UK - vote strategy. She now looks intent on trading that down to a core BNP vote strategy instead.
December 20, 2025 at 3:12 PM
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righttoroam.bsky.social
The Roding is London’s largest forgotten river. It endures every modern indignity: scythed by motorways and concrete bridges; choked with sewage and rubbish; canalised, fly-tipped, thickened with the polluted slime of London clay. It is a forbidding place to call home. youtu.be/7sjOGOguq5A
A London barrister declared a river sacred. This is what happened next.
YouTube video by Right To Roam
youtu.be
December 20, 2025 at 5:43 PM
Reposted
guyshrubsole.bsky.social
The authorities stopped the public having access to the River Roding.

It got choked by plastic and shat on by water companies.

A plucky band of trespassers decided to clean it up.

Give the public the right to roam to encourage more acts of wild service:

bsky.app/profile/righ...
righttoroam.bsky.social Right to Roam @righttoroam.bsky.social · 7d
The Roding is London’s largest forgotten river. It endures every modern indignity: scythed by motorways and concrete bridges; choked with sewage and rubbish; canalised, fly-tipped, thickened with the polluted slime of London clay. It is a forbidding place to call home. youtu.be/7sjOGOguq5A
A London barrister declared a river sacred. This is what happened next.
YouTube video by Right To Roam
youtu.be
December 20, 2025 at 6:55 PM
Reposted
bestforbritain.org
"Brexit has brought nothing but barriers to travel, education and work. Opportunities that older generations often took for granted are now more difficult, more expensive or simply out of reach. For young Scots, it feels like a door has been closed."

https://bit.ly/48LcTHU
Brexit stole our future: young people are demanding it back
Scotland’s young people face limited opportunities after Brexit but could their vision for the future re-shape Scotland’s place in Europe?
bit.ly
December 20, 2025 at 8:15 PM
Reposted
adambienkov.bsky.social
A day after the government announces its investigation into foreign financial interference in UK politics...
December 19, 2025 at 7:00 AM
Reposted
13sarahmurphy.bsky.social
Reform tried to dismiss questions on Farage’s racism, saying they should be asked about the ‘substance’ of their policies instead.
Unsurprisingly, their policies are shit too.

“The trouble with power is that it’s exposing, both politically and personally”
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
My lesson from 2025: Reform is much more vulnerable than it appears | Gaby Hinsliff
The party’s astonishingly speedy growth disguised shallow roots – and its success has brought a level of scrutiny for which it simply isn’t ready, says Guardian columnist Gaby Hinsliff
www.theguardian.com
December 19, 2025 at 7:29 AM