Charlie Goldsmith

Badenoch: “When will you do X?”

Starmer: “Tomorrow”

Badenoch: “But when exactly will you do X?”

Starmer: “Tomorrow at 12”

Badenoch: “We really need to know when, so when will it be?”

Starmer: “Tomorrow, 12 noon”

Badenoch: “But when exactly?”

Every week

#PMQs #PoliticsLive

Huh: I thought more hospitals were moving to having seniors on 'take'/triage (but handing off less serious cases very quickly), which matches the national Modern General Practice approach where GP triages the demand (which is basically more structured than triage-by-receptionist-vibes).

International Nurses' Day (just about) 2025: in praise of Howie Belated greetings for Monday’s International Nurses’ Day 2025 from Lusaka, Zambia.

...if they are also, @lgilbert.co, nurses or midwives, so much the better: charliegoldsmith.substack.com/p/internatio...

A points-based immigration system that prioritises tenors...

"Connex South Eastern" was there for the taking.

The University of Connex South Eastern

Yep - bc it's Heaney, not Fat Tim...

Yep, but Seamus Heaney's, not fat Tim's...

Shippers is not very bright, which is why he managed to libel Baroness Chapman, costing his employers $$$$...

On Angela Rayner and tax law

- a brief post by me

Substack - emptycity.substack.com/p/on-angela-...

Own blog: davidallengreen.com/2025/09/on-a...

This is an argument for falling population, falling GDP, and an employment crisis.

In that context, it would seem reasonable, not to say desireable, that her most recent piece of work for government - the report on Aid commissioned by SoS Lammy - be released.

He had spent the preceding decade moving remarkably fast from job to job.

H'egg Dies...

[PS thank you for your lovely column - it reminded me, in Lusaka far away, of culturally-Irish West London parish where I grew up...]

1 Samuel 25:22 has the same style of aggression-through-circumlocution - "So and more also do God unto the enemies of David, if I leave of all that pertain to him by the morning light any that pisseth against the wall".

Lee Cain (it is said) in a chicken suit.

[not strictly age-related, but Jubilee 2000/Drop the Debt seemed like a moment when the energies of people then in their 60s and 70s were pretty engagingly harnessed]

Private school exodus of 13,000 dwarfs ministers’ predictions The drop in pupil numbers, being blamed on VAT being added to fees, is the biggest since the Independent Schools Council began tracking the figures in 2012

ISC census shows a drop of 2.4% in pupil numbers. The Times tries to hype this up but the ISC previous claimed numbers would drop by 25%.

My estimate was 3-5% by next year.

www.thetimes.com/article/893e...

Thanks Lee, and thank you to @p-pieterse.bsky.social and @lgilbert.co for the evidence. @samfr.bsky.social you may be interested in what Young Midwives of Essex tells us about policy about nurse migration - & why the WHO 'Red List' is counterproductive for most of the 40 (!) African countries on it.

Yep - and now you can get the 129 bus to South of the River. Also, outbound, security is exceptionally quick (and you can leave laptop in case etc).

Yet nicer to go through than any other London airport...

My colleague and I returned to Sierra Leone to share our research findings last week. Due to a lack of funding for health (low priority + minimal tax income) health worker graduates are engaged in public health sector jobs on ‘voluntary’ = unsalaried basis. In primary care half of all staff is…

… unsalaried. At hospital level perhaps even more. Negative consequences include reduced access to care due to informal charging, staff selling privately bought meds thus prioritizing sales over accurate diagnosis, and absenteeism of salaried staff. Many of SL’s health outcomes are worst than…

fragile state averages, worst than Somalia, despite being 23 yrs post-war. Providing unsalaried jobs suits many, facilities are well staffed, health workers are blamed for ‘misbehaviour’. Public +private health worker training is lucrative business, training women for non-existing jobs #publichealth

It's the Holywell Music Room, innit?!

Hi Dr Pieterse this looks really interesting (I was involved in Salone health workforce things in the 2010s), and relevant to some things I'm working on atm re the 42% (!) of nurses on the #Zambia -n register: is there any chance we could talk? charlie.goldsmith@abyrint.com

Very proper: "non vos me elegistis, sed ego elegi vos" Jn 15.16...

Semi-seriously, Sir Jonathan Phillips has the History PhD and, for obvious reasons, knows quite a lot about this...