Steve Rayson

This is a story that has really cut through in Australia - seen as UK adopting hostile attitude to their citizens. Raised spontaneously in conversation.. In papers. Affects those who have been Irish citizens too ..

I do wonder about anyone who thinks McSweeney single-handedly won Labour its majority. They do realise they were up against a catastrophically unpopular government? The 2024 result was very much an underperformance against the fundamentals.

The system we have now quite literally embeds the income and wealth inequalities HE is supposed to alleviate. It is outrageous and incredible that a progressive govt could describe it in any way as “fair.” Too many senior politicians today think we have Plan 1 loans. They just don’t understand it.

the FT had by Saturday night broken two stories showing that the Mandelsons had taken over $100,000 from the world’s most famous paedophile

by Monday we were all writing various stories about him leaking sensitive state secrets to Epstein

they could have easily pulled this puff piece in time

Quite funny that Starmer's allies are waking up to this point now …

Cuts to Winter Fuel… not in the manifesto
Disability benefit cuts… not in there either
Cutting jury trials… also not there
Digital ID… no mention
Raising employers NI… nope
Freezing tax threholds… nah
Contracts with Palantir… no

This is an interesting by-election. Reform up 27, Con down 27. Green & Libs up 25, Labour down 25. Feels like two bloc left/right politics where people are moving within their bloc but not between blocs.

Marginal tax rates for graduates with student loans – add interest and another 6% for postgrads.

£25,000: 37%
£50,270: 51%
£100,000: 71%

Jeffrey Epstein sent £10,000 to Mandelson’s husband, emails show Epstein sent Reinaldo Avila da Silva payment in 2009

I'm not prone to exaggeration but this is probably the biggest scoop I've ever been involved in

Mandelson's partner took £10,000 from Epstein to pay for his osteopath course while Mandelson was de facto UK deputy prime minister, according to new files

more to follow

www.ft.com/content/c950...

My first remarks since being arrested last night.

How has Keir Starmer's political power been spent so quickly? | The News Agents Author and academic David Runciman tells Lewis Goodall why he thinks Keir Starmer has plummeted in public opinion since coming to power – and where the PM’s strategy has failed.

"People sense something fraudulent in the mismatch between his sense of authority – and the complete absence in reality," author David Runciman tells Lewis Goodall.

From historic win to record low polling, how has it gone so wrong, so fast, for Starmer?

www.thenewsagents.co.uk/article/how-...

This is such a facile argument. Sure, let's have a conversation about how universities should be funded. But let's also talk interest rates, debt that functions like an extra tax, repayment thresholds, and what that's actually doing to millions of young people who did everything they were told to do

YouTube video by LBC Student loans are 'fair', says Rachel Reeves, amid backlash | LBC

Spoke to Shleagh Fogarty yesterday sbout why the Chancellor is wrong: our “student loan” system is not remotely fair. It’s regressive and embedding inter and intra generational wealth inequality. It’s not a loan system, it’s a bad grad tax in all but name.

youtu.be/uOC6Arrf2us?...

Pollsters shouldn't put this sort of thing out there, it's irresponsible.

Labour has its work cut out avoiding a rural wipeout A general election held tomorrow could see Labour win zero rural constituencies. Why has the British countryside fallen out so badly with Keir Star...

At the 2024 election, Labour won 135 rural or semi-rural seats — nearly a third of its Commons force

If an election were held tomorrow, our research shows the party would win just two semi-rural seats, and not one fully rural seat, writes More in Common's Louis O'Geran

What's gone so badly wrong?

Not the sort of letter committed to paper by a well man. "Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace"

In their budget Labour decided to raise billions from graduates despite the challenges this group already faces. It is just vindictive, why would young graduates ever vote Labour?

I didn’t think the current government could make things worse but they have. A whole generation of working class kids who went to university are being devastated. How do Labour justify this on top of low wages, limited graduate jobs and high rents. Extending repayments to 40 years is just appalling

The single biggest thing (in cost terms) I’ve changed my mind about is UK tuition fees. Dreadful system, need to scrap it.

Comparison of pension costs across European countries

Great piece on pressures on European state pension schemes including this chart showing comparative cost now and projection to 2070. UK costs relatively low in comparison to most others www.ft.com/content/9c3c...

Half the picture: what ‘The British General Election of 2024’ doesn’t reveal This 22nd book in the series lacks something that made its predecessors so compelling—an understanding of the people involved in the campaign, not jus...

Great review by @PeterKellner1 of The British General Election of 2024 www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/culture/7209...

Can Britain succeed where France has failed? Needed: a fair, affordable plan for pensions. It will take guts, but might be on the way

In their hearts, MPs from all parties know that Britain needs a new, fair and affordable plan for pensions. My Substack (subscriptions are free) argues that It will take guts, but one might be on the way

kellnerp.substack.com/p/can-britai...

Slashing jury trials could clear courts backlog within a decade, says Lammy Exclusive: Lord chancellor urges MPs to back judge-only trials in thousands of criminal cases in England and Wales

Properly funding the court system would clear the backlog even more quickly.

www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Elon Musk’s xAI restricts Grok after outcry over sexualised images Start-up limits use of image generation system to paid users following spread of deepfakes and child sex abuse material

ladies, it's ok because only paying subscribers can make/distribute deepfake porn of you and your children now www.ft.com/content/c24d...

How is this any better?

So many reasons I could not cut it in politics, but one is I would just laugh inappropriately too much. Imagine, you’re at a meeting of senior leaders and the CEO comes out with this crap.

Who’s who at X, the deepfake porn site formerly known as Twitter

During Fiona Hill's testimony to Congress on Oct 14, 2019, she described how Trump and Putin discussed exchanging Ukraine for Venezuela. The quid pro quo was if Trump refuses to help Ukraine fight off a Russian invasion, Putin would not help Venezuela (a Russian ally) resist a US takeover.

Katie Miller tweet with text that reads “SOON” and a map of Greenland with an American flag overlayed

These freaks want territorial expansion and they know Trump will do everything he can to deliver.

This isn’t just a tweet from some random asshole either. This is Stephen Miller’s wife. Miller was in the room with Trump during the kidnapping of Maduro.

European weakness on full display by these horribly contorted responses from Merz, Macron and Starmer - neither condoning nor condemning US actions in Venezuela

Such weakness only risks making the Europeans more vulnerable (ie Greenland)