Marisa McVey

This ought to be a huge national news story. But the quiet dismantling of a key sector barely registers outside HE. Maybe someone will care when the local economies that Unis sustain start to go bust too. Important story from @patrickjack.bsky.social & @timeshighered.bsky.social

The state shot &killed people in the uk for decades, colluded with citizens to kill & has frustrated justice in uk courts ever since. Sean Browns widow awaits her day in the Supreme Court. THAT has been a warning siren ringing for decades - the colonial attitude of us being lesser stops them hearing

Mamdani: For too long, those fluent in the good grammar of civility have deployed decorum to mask agendas of cruelty

Just empire doing empire things

Letting hunger strikers die, arresting Greta Thunberg — this is not incompetence or even indifference. The UK state is deliberately making examples of people to ramp up the crushing of basic civil liberties and silence opposition to genocide

‘Catch remaining targets’: Leaked Teneo files pull back curtain on corporate lobbying Internal Teneo documents reveal exactly how oil firms and other big multinationals pushed to dilute EU supply chain rules

As Minister Peter Burke heads to the final #CSDDD trilogue negotiation, @irishtimes.com has published shocking revelations on the corporate campaign to lobby for EU deregulation, undermine democracy and weaken vital protections for people and the planet: www.irishtimes.com/world/europe...

Assessing States’ Obligations under the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights Post‐Brexit Private economic actors wield unprecedented influence over the enjoyment of human rights, yet legal systems remain uneven in their regulation of corporate responsibility. Against this backdrop, this ...

I also look to the unique position of Northern Ireland and the future of business and human rights regulation under the Windsor Framework.

You can read the article here 👇

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

My article comparing the EU and UK’s approach to implementing the UNGPs, post-Brexit is out now in the Modern Law Review. Against a backdrop of escalating corporate influence over human rights, I contrast the EU’s (contested) preventative regulation with the UK’s reliance on a minimalist framework.

‘Risk exiting the market’

what a way to package the complete collapse of higher education

UK university halted human rights research after pressure from China Exclusive: Leading professor at Sheffield Hallam was told to cease research on supply chains and forced labour in China after demands from authorities

Sheffield Hallam University complied with Beijing demand to halt research about human rights abuses in China, leading to a major project on supply chains and forced labour being dropped. It was reinstated after threat of legal action but chilling effect remains www.theguardian.com/education/20...

papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....

There are welcome signs that change is coming in the UK but any changes will need to take into account devolved arrangements too.

There are many people to thank for getting this paper to see the light of day, not least my QUB colleagues. Final article will be out in the new year, preprint below:

I compare the EU's focus on due diligence with the more passive approach taken by the UK (so far). The paper also explores the (often overlooked) role of Northern Ireland and the implications of the Windsor Framework for business and human rights.

While the broader effects of the withdrawal of the UK from the EU have been extensively scrutinised, little attention has been paid to how each jurisdiction has comparatively sought to prevent and mitigate corporate human rights abuses.

🇪🇺 📣 Is everyone bored of Brexit yet? 📣 🇪🇺

📖 If not, I have a forthcoming article in the Modern Law Review on the divergent approaches to implementing the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights post-Brexit.

After submitting a FOIA request UKRI, I obtained success rates by three grant call scheme and I can only say that I am disheartened by the results:

- AHRC Responsive Mode 2025: 2%
- ESRC New Investigator Grant 2025: 1%
- ESRC Research Grant Round 2025: 1%

Not guilty: Soldier F cleared in Bloody Sunday murder trial A former paratrooper has been cleared of two murders during the Bloody Sunday shootings in 1972.

A day where law and justice feel far apart. But criminal law really struggles to function at 53 years of remove, when so many witnesses are dead. Injustice was assured when it took this long for the state to recognise its wrongdoing and start proceedings:

www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/courts/...

From Mexico to Ireland, Fury Mounts Over a Global A.I. Frenzy

“In Ireland, data centers consume more than 20 percent of the country’s electricity. In Chile, precious aquifers are in danger of depletion. In South Africa, where blackouts have long been routine, data centers are further taxing the national grid.”

Gift link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/10/20/t...

Conor Gearty died a month ago yesterday. He was deeply committed to human rights law without idealising it. He recognised its power & value while acknowledging its limitations (& those of the people engaging with it). He was also an exceptional lawyer. This is a fitting final piece in the @lrb.co.uk

The UN Commission of Inquiry (COI) on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel: Israel has committed genocide in Gaza. Absent a court judgment, findings of UN COIs are the most conclusive, thus we should read these findings thoroughly.
www.ohchr.org/sites/defaul...

‘It’s dying in front of our eyes’: how the UK’s largest lake became an ecological disaster Signs tout a natural paradise, but pollution from over-farming has left Northern Ireland’s Lough Neagh choked by toxic algae

"Sinn Féin and the DUP have stalled the nutrients action programme over fears of a farmer backlash."

The *only* thing they'll unite on: ensuring the largest lake ecosystem in Ireland or Britain, Lough Neagh, continues to die of pollution.

What a f**king disgrace.
share.google/cazBTwCid9qR...

It's ok to be a Luddite!

ITV have this headline 100% correct. It was an attempted lynching in broad daylight at a preannounced white supremacist mobilisation.

Despite being MLA for the area, the Justice Minister doesn’t engage with victims of white supremacist terror in her own constituency.

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Headline from Belfast Telegraph: Claims NI peace deal stops UK leaving ECHR ‘entirely groundless’ – think tank

For context: Policy Exchange is among the least transparent think tanks in the UK regarding its funding sources.

Co-founder and first chairman Michael Gove wrote a pamphlet in 2000 comparing the Good Friday Agreement to the appeasement of the Nazis in the 1930s.

People from Northern Ireland listening to English flag discourse

Headline: BBC under pressure to pull Sally Rooney dramas over vow to fund Palestine Action

Headline: Tory minister Robert Jenrick pictured with former Nazi terror chief at far right protest.

Perhaps, one day, schoolkids will study this squalid little chapter in British terror-panic history. When they do, I hope these two headlines from today are printed side by side, with clear annotation of which individual faced more outrage and condemnation.

The whole article is worth reading!

Al Jazeera Media Network condemns the targeted assassination of its correspondents Anas Al Sharif and Mohammeel Qraiqea, along with photographers Ibrahim Al Thaher, and Mohamed Nofal, by Israeli forces.

#JournalismIsNotACrime

‘A million calls an hour’: Israel relying on Microsoft cloud for expansive surveillance of Palestinians Revealed: The Israeli military undertook an ambitious project to store a giant trove of Palestinians’ phone calls on Microsoft’s servers in Europe

“The leaked Microsoft files suggest that a large proportion of the unit’s sensitive data may now be sitting in the company’s datacentres in the Netherlands and Ireland.”

A deadly serious allegation that requires urgent investigation.

www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...