Hettie O’Brien

The Guardian Long Read A better place to buy your books. Support independent journalism with everything you buy. Free UK P&P on online orders over £25

Excited to say that the beautiful Guardian Long Read Magazine is out now, ft. work by @mrkocnnll.bsky.social, @imogenwk.bsky.social, @jackgoulder.bsky.social, @tessairini.bsky.social, @hettieobrien.bsky.social + many other brilliant writers. Order your copy here guardianbookshop.com/long-read-50...

There are so many interesting threads in this piece - the explosion in fraud over the last decade, the rise of private policing, the former CPS lawyers and police officers spotting the business opportunities that austerity presented. Plus a con artist brought down by his furious ex-girlfriends.

‘The police weren’t interested’: what’s driving the rise in private prosecutions? The long read: As the police and courts continue to struggle with the legacy of austerity, many people are seeking alternative routes to justice – but it could be making matters worse

My latest Guardian Long Read is about a shadowy area of criminal law that has exploded since austerity, and what “two tier justice” really means in Britain: www.theguardian.com/news/ng-inte...

Why Tony Blair just can’t kick the habit of imperial interference in the Middle East | Oliver Eagleton The Blair-Trump fantasy for postwar Gaza shows the former PM still thinks that free enterprise can solve all the world’s ills, says associate editor at the New Left Review Oliver Eagleton

“Blair may be creating new realities, but few would want to inhabit them.” - excellent piece from Oliver Eagleton on Tony Blair’s imperial fantasies www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Why We’re Getting Poorer: With Cahal Moran - The Conduit Thurs 2 Oct, 6pm - 7:30pm Economist and Unlearning Economics creator Cahal Moran reveals why our economy is failing us—and what we can do about it.

I’ll be interviewing Cahal Moran (that’s @unlearnecon.bsky.social to people on here) at the Conduit Club next Thursday about his new book, Why We’re Getting Poorer - you can sign up here: www.theconduit.com/upcoming-eve...

(research by @cmmonwealth.bsky.social)

UK public has paid £200bn to shareholders of key industries since privatisation Analysis reveals ‘privatisation premium’ of £250 per household per year paid to owners of water, rail, bus, energy and mail services since 2010

We hear a lot about privatisation, but rarely are the numbers laid out so starkly: £193bn paid to shareholders and private equity firms, a £250 premium for every citizen. Only Russia, Hungary and the Czech Republic have shed public wealth faster than Britain www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

This is a great story.

Daniel Trilling · Is this fascism? As the historian Ian Kershaw says, trying to define fascism is ‘like trying to nail jelly to a wall’, yet for all...

New piece: been working on this for the best part of a year. But really it's trying to draw on everything I've seen and thought about since I first started reporting on far right politics in the late 2000s. Online now and in tomorrow's LRB.
www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

thanks Alice!

An English gentleman, a crooked lawyer: the secrets of Stephen David Jones The long read: With his brilliant mind and impeccable credentials, it’s little wonder that wealthy clients trusted him with their fortunes. Then they started to get suspicious

“I felt there was a need to bring to third world countries God’s principles of running an economy” is just one of many jaw-dropping lines and plot twists in this gripping @hettieobrien.bsky.social long read www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

An English gentleman, a crooked lawyer: the secrets of Stephen David Jones The long read: With his brilliant mind and impeccable credentials, it’s little wonder that wealthy clients trusted him with their fortunes. Then they started to get suspicious

if i were very very rich i would be so terrified by this piece i'd hire a private investigator. happily i am not so i can enjoy it for the brilliant piece of writing it is @hettieobrien.bsky.social
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

An English gentleman, a crooked lawyer: the secrets of Stephen David Jones The long read: With his brilliant mind and impeccable credentials, it’s little wonder that wealthy clients trusted him with their fortunes. Then they started to get suspicious

I’ve been piecing together this Guardian long read for over a year - about a thoroughly plausible, utterly crooked lawyer who pretended to be the perfect gentleman while he spun a web of deceit. Thanks to @davidedgarwolf.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

An English gentleman, a crooked lawyer: the secrets of Stephen David Jones The long read: With his brilliant mind and impeccable credentials, it’s little wonder that wealthy clients trusted him with their fortunes. Then they started to get suspicious

Today’s Guardian long read is an absolutely stunning piece of reporting and storytelling by @hettieobrien.bsky.social about a gentleman lawyer who was not what he seemed…

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

Brilliant piece. Some fine lunchtime reading

Thanks Henry!

An English gentleman, a crooked lawyer: the secrets of Stephen David Jones The long read: With his brilliant mind and impeccable credentials, it’s little wonder that wealthy clients trusted him with their fortunes. Then they started to get suspicious

Take some time today and read this incredible story, by @hettieobrien.bsky.social and then tell me you don’t want to read a whole book about it.
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

An English gentleman, a crooked lawyer: the secrets of Stephen David Jones The long read: With his brilliant mind and impeccable credentials, it’s little wonder that wealthy clients trusted him with their fortunes. Then they started to get suspicious

You should read this fantastic article by @hettieobrien.bsky.social. It's got it all: crooked lawyer, inept British police, sordid offshore behaviour.

theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

An English gentleman, a crooked lawyer: the secrets of Stephen David Jones The long read: With his brilliant mind and impeccable credentials, it’s little wonder that wealthy clients trusted him with their fortunes. Then they started to get suspicious

I’ve been piecing together this Guardian long read for over a year - about a thoroughly plausible, utterly crooked lawyer who pretended to be the perfect gentleman while he spun a web of deceit. Thanks to @davidedgarwolf.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

if i hear the word “playbook” once more, i’m gonna explode

Brett Christophers · So much for Paris: Climate Overshoot All fossil fuel projects are politically constituted. Either they are state projects, controlled and administered by...

“I have lost count of the number of times a self-identified climate progressive has explained to me that our individual consumption and emissions are irrelevant” - this excellent piece from @brettchristophers.bsky.social is worth your time:
www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

FT headline: Private equity to lobby Trump for access to savers’ retirement funds Industry hopes incoming administration will open long-restricted private investments to individual investors

Figure showing US retirement assets by plan type. IRAs and 401ks account for more than USD 20 trillion of the USD 35 trillion total. Chart by Benjamin Braun.

"Industry executives told the Financial Times the deregulatory push was akin to “doubling demand” for the private capital industry..."

Currently state plans (pink) are the main conduit for retirement capital to get into PE hands. Now they're eying green and orange. Prize is huge, and they'll win.

Many months spent reading + meeting + emailing + party planning @whitingfoundation.bsky.social have led to the best part of the job - announcing a terrific cohort of nonfiction writers at work on books that will change lives. Read all about it! whiting.org/nonfiction

it really delivers!

two pints for £5.80? Even if the beer sucks, I’ll drink to that!

Humphrey’s world: how the Samuel Smith beer baron built Britain’s strangest pub chain Since the 1970s, Humphrey Smith has acquired scores of pubs and historic properties around the UK. But time after time, he has left the buildings empty. Why has he allowed his empire to moulder?

"It is a strange kind of businessman who avidly accrues property, only to let much of it moulder – but Smith has a strong claim to being Britain’s strangest businessman" - this long read on the Sam Smith pub empire is an absolute delight: www.theguardian.com/news/2024/de...

The main thing I’ve learned from having flu? The haters are wrong about the godfather 3

thank you!!!