Martin O'Neill

Yes, but it would need some political guts to do it.

No, no, no. *Britain* does *not* “back war with Iran”.

Instead, Britain has been thrown into an illegal war with Iran by an idiotic Prime Minister with who has no backbone, no ideas, and no clue.

Britain’s involvement in this destructive lunacy is on one man - Keir Starmer.

Always good to hear from our former students! 😊

There is such a concentration of spin, blather and nonsense in the “resignation” letter from Josh Simons.

Exhibit A:
Simons claims: “I talked to my board”

Exhibit B:
Baroness Sally Morgan, *Chair of the Board at Labour Together*, apparently takes a different view.

How very puzzling.

The Josh Simons "resignation" letter really is a piece of work.

Warm words for establishment journalists, alongside aggressive dismissal of independent journalism.

Deference to power; contempt for those on the outside.

This is exactly why Labour is now so terminally unpopular.

This is terrible from Starmer. Just absolute trash. And any normal voter looking at the new MP and then reading this description will think him mad.

JUSTLA - INITAL CONFERENCE Justice in the XXI Century: New Challenges, New Directions of InquiryFebruary 25-27, 2026Department of Political and Social SciencesUniversity of Catania, Italy

JUSTLA conference website here:
www.justla.eu/initial-conf...

JUSTLA conference poster

Delighted to be in Catania — my very first visit to Sicily — for what should be an amazing conference on “Justice in the XXI Century”, bringing together participants from across Europe and Latin America.

But it is not for the Cabinet Office — or for Josh Simons himself — to pre-empt the outcome of a Ministerial Code investigation.

Sir Laurie Magnus must be able to reach his own independent judgment on the facts, without the process being prejudged.

@catneilan.bsky.social @direthoughts.com

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x post from Dan Bloom, detailing Josh Simon’s message to a WhatsApp group, revealing that he is under investigation

What is more disturbing is that Josh Simons, in WhatsApp messages sent to fellow MPs yesterday, appears to prejudge the outcome of the investigation, and to claim that he has been told that he has already been cleared.

This raises questions of credibility of the process.

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I welcome the news the Prime Minister has referred Josh Simons to Sir Laurie Magnus, the Independent Adviser on Ministerial Standards.

As I show in my letter to Sir Laurie of 21 February 2026, Simons's public statements of 6 February 2026 appear to breach the code.

🧵 1/3

bsky.app/profile/mart...

👇
@catneilan.bsky.social @dansabbagh.bsky.social @direthoughts.com

Harold Wilson’s modest holiday home on St Mary’s

Here’s Harold Wilson’s holiday home on St Mary’s in the Scilly Isles.

The kind of modest place that a committed public servant might go to relax with his family.

Compare this to the insatiable avarice of many politicians today.

Something has gone deeply wrong in our politics.

Letter to Sir Laurie Magnus. Full text available in accessible form from me on request.

Letter to Sir Laurie Magnus. Full text available in accessible form from me on request.

I have today written to Sir Laurie Magnus, Independent Adviser on Ministerial Standards, requesting consideration of whether public statements made by Josh Simons MP on 6 February 2026 constitute a breach of the Ministerial Code.

Letter attached.

Given the way Starmer functions, the latter does seem more likely.

Today’s editorial in the @thetimes.com calls on Josh Simons to resign as a minister.

It quotes in its concluding paragraph his curious and incoherent late night response to me on that other platform, from 6 February 2026.

As Josh Simons himself might say, “HOWZATT?” 😂

And you can laugh at Josh Simons's shameless and incoherent late night Twitter response when I raised these issues earlier this month here.

HOWZATT? 😂😂

bsky.app/profile/mart...

🧵 4/4

Labour Together’s Smear Operation Made This Government The Labour Together spying scandal shows how Britain’s mainstream press looked the other way when dirty tricks were deployed against the Left — allowing a culture of surveillance and paranoia to take ...

My own @tribunemagazine.bsky.social piece, giving a quick introduction to these issues, and discussing the huge harm that Labour Together have done to British democracy is here:

tribunemag.co.uk/2026/02/smea...

🧵​ 3/4

‘Labour Together broke the law’ The think tank that propelled Starmer to power hired private investigators to shut down scrutiny of its dark money - I speak to one of its targets, journalist Paul Holden

Also worth watching this excellent interview on *The Fraud* on the 'Democracy for Sale' Substack, as @petergeoghegan.bsky.social speaks with Paul Holden, from 7 February 2026:

democracyforsale.substack.com/p/labour-tog...

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The Fraud Using a cache of hitherto unseen documents and exclusive insider accounts, this sensational new book tells the story of how a shadowy group, Labour Together, came to the cusp of delivering Sir Keir St...

The world is starting to see the disgraceful, underhand & undemocratic behaviour of Josh Simons & Labour Together.

This is largely thanks to the courageous journalism of Paul Holden.

Buy his excellent book, The Fraud @orbooks.bsky.social here:

orbooks.com/catalog/the-...

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This new article by @martinoneill.bsky.social lays bare the extent to which Labour Together are operating in very dangerous territory - through undeclared funding, paying private firms to investigate journalists and entangling the state with Palantir.

Read it below🔽:

😂👏👏

Well, it leaves me confused too. @chrisbrooke.bsky.social and @crookedfootball.bsky.social tell us that it might be something to do with cricket, but apparently it fails as fully meaningful speech even in that perplexing idiom. 🤷‍♂️

Labour Together’s Smear Operation Made This Government The Labour Together spying scandal shows how Britain’s mainstream press looked the other way when dirty tricks were deployed against the Left — allowing a culture of surveillance and paranoia to take ...

In my @tribunemagazine.bsky.social article of 18 February, I explored how the cover-up at Labour Together is as revealing as their original offences.

Paul Holden’s account has been vindicated.

And Josh Simons’s position as a minister and MP is now untenable.

tribunemag.co.uk/2026/02/smea...

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Josh Simons claimed this was just about checking whether private material had been obtained illegally.

The agreement with APCO tells a very different story.

It includes:
• OSINT and HUMINT investigations
• Financial forensic work
• “Media packaging and dissemination”

🧵2/3

Josh Simons's response to O'Neill: "Exactly. A think tank paid a PR firm to find out if it's private were obtained through an illegal hack. HOWZATT"

Details of APCO contract with Labour Together.

I first posted (on that other platform) about the Labour Together smear campaign on 6 Feb.

Exhibit 1: the (barely coherent) response I received from Josh Simons late that night, denying any wrongdoing.

Exhibit 2: the *actual content* of the deal made with the private investigators at APCO

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That is a great turn of phrase, Nikhil!

And you're 100% correct on the substance too.

Labour Together’s Smear Operation Made This Government The Labour Together spying scandal shows how Britain’s mainstream press looked the other way when dirty tricks were deployed against the Left — allowing a culture of surveillance and paranoia to take ...

As I have said before, you can't do a popular front if you're also doing McCarthyism. Great piece from philosophy's own @martinoneill.bsky.social tribunemag.co.uk/2026/02/smea...

Hi everyone, I earned my PhD from the Department of Child Study and Human Development. My studies, research, and professional work focus on how positive media use among children and young people… |... Hi everyone, I earned my PhD from the Department of Child Study and Human Development. My studies, research, and professional work focus on how positive media use among children and young people ca...

DOCTOR Rümeysa Öztürk has earned her PhD!!

Labour Together’s Smear Operation Made This Government The Labour Together spying scandal shows how Britain’s mainstream press looked the other way when dirty tricks were deployed against the Left — allowing a culture of surveillance and paranoia to take ...

You can't build a political operation on surveillance, smears, and hidden money — and then govern any other way.

If Labour is to survive, it will need existential change.

My full argument is in @tribunemagazine.bsky.social here:

tribunemag.co.uk/2026/02/smea...

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