Dave

🪫 Unite report: UK energy companies making £30 billion a year in profits

Energy bills up by 42% since 2021, whilst energy companies made £30 billion profit in just one year. The govt is turning a blind eye to these excessive profits. That must change. Everyday people cannot continue to pay.

⚡ @unitetheunion.bsky.social have commissioned our own energy report which clearly shows that £500 of our yearly £1,700 bill lands directly into the pockets of energy companies who made £30 billion in a single year!

Tywyn sea front - looking moody! #tywyn #seaviews #wales

Happy sparrows with Welsh hills as the backdrop! #sparrows #wales #smallbirds

Where’s Barney? 😁

Beautiful sunset at Tywyn, Wales

Please open the door, I want to go out! 

Environment secretary ‘furious’ about England and Wales water bills Steve Reed says he is unable to rule out further above-inflation rises and any decision would be up to regulators

It's performative. If Steve Reed were really "furious" about water bills, he wouldn't have ruled out renationalisation, or forbidden the Independent Water Commission to recommend it. He enables the filthiest, most parasitic capital to defeat the public interest.
www.theguardian.com/business/202...

Spent a few days in Barmouth, Wales. A photo from where we were staying 😀

Private water companies have been dumping sewage and letting infrastructure crumble for over 30 years. Sign the petition to bring water into public ownership #WeOwnIt

weownit.org.uk/act-now/lets...

Is Rachel Reeves constrained by the City? Is the City really stopping Rachel Reeves from doing what Labour wants, or is she just using it as a convenient excuse for her neoliberal austerity? This is the audio version: This is the transc...

A narrative is recited almost everywhere: that Rachel Reeves is being "forced" to cut benefits, and is faced with "hard choices" or "no choice". This story, a staple of neoliberal doctrine, is completely false, as @richardjmurphy.bsky.social explains: www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2025/03...

Barney enjoys the football!

Many said the Starmer era would be just Tory-lite – now it’s worse than that. Time to stop the pretence He’ll be radical, the PM’s allies claimed. Well, look now, as the poor are targeted and ministers boast of wearing Tory clothes better than the Tories, says Guardian columnist Nesrine Malik

Brilliant column by @nesrinemalik.bsky.social, which everyone in the UK should read. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Our latest Double Down News video, explaining just how billionaire power now operates and what it's doing to us.
And why we need to create billionaire-free societies.

Some on benefits are 'taking the mickey', says minister The work and pensions minister says the welfare system needs reforming to encourage young people to work if they can.

Some on benefits are 'taking the mickey', says UK minister.

Some may do so, millions do not but will be victimised by cuts.

What about those abusing the tax system, govt procurement, buying honours, impoverishing people with profiteering, selling dud products, crashing companies?

Your Water Bills going up by an average of £123 a year across England in April, and by £228 for Thames Water Customers.

The Government could have Nationalised the Water Companies and used these bill increases to pay for it all within 5 years.

MPs to review pensioner poverty after winter fuel payment cut Sir Keir Starmer remained insistent the cut needed to happen to help fund the £22bn black hole he says was left by the Conservative government.

MPs have launched a review into pensioner poverty after the government admitted the cut to winter fuel payments could force 100,000 people into poverty

Surely this is exactly the sort of review which should have taken place before MP’s were asked to vote?
news.sky.com/story/mps-to...

Wealth growth since 1970

Average - 8%
Top 10% - 85%
Top 1% - 320%
Top 0.01% - 4000%
Billionaires - 32000%

Can you see the problem?

Work and Pensions Committee - Summary - Committees - UK Parliament Summary for Work and Pensions Committee

Government admits that 50,000 to 100,000 more pensioners will be in relative or absolute poverty as a result of means-testing the winter fuel payment and it knew that at the time of the decision It has taken nearly four months to admit it bit.ly/3CCgISb click get file to read it

The engagement on BlueSky is just incredible. I go to my news feed & find posts from all the accounts I followed on X but never saw over there. And best of all no dumb arse content from Elon Musk forced on me & no bots. It’s seriously looking like the dream platform we’ve all been waiting for

Nearly two million people have joined #Bluesky since yesterday. It's growing by 10.5 users every second.

Turns out that when you turn a social media platform into a far-right propaganda machine & personal bully pulpit, a lot of people go looking for something better.

Ah, Bluesky - feels like the Twitter I joined in 2017. Good to be back!

There seem to be two qualifications for high office under Trump:
Sexual assault allegations and climate science denial.

Barney helping us decorate. He insisted that the paint for the walls must match his eyes!

Barney loves the classics!

Meet Barney, my British shorthair cat.