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A few thoughts on Labour's plan to nationalise parts of BT

1. Wow.

2. Every poll and focus group I've seen would suggest this policy is going to be extremely popular. Not just the free broadband but the tech company tax - people are really angry about that issue
3. Buying BT is the easy bit. The hard part will be working out how this affects all the other firms, which could be hugely threatened by a state provider. I'll be looking forward to seeing more detail on those "access arrangements" McDonnell mentioned
4. A lot of people will say it's unrealistic, and they won't be completely wrong, but in one important way it is realistic - it gets the price and timeline about right

£5bn by 2025 was never going to work. £20bn by 2030 could stand a chance
5. Inevitably the focus will be on the "giveaway", but there's a geopolitical move here to take control of data and tech infrastructure

I wrote in my column this morning that no UK politician was taking tech sovereignty seriously

I was completely wrong
news.sky.com/story/sky-view…
Tech lobbyists... not happy @techUK
Here's the Tory response, which rather strangely comes from Nicky Morgan, who is stepping down at this election
Amazing bit of trivia: incredibly, this isn't the first time Labour has promised a national broadband network.

From the 1983 manifesto. I mean, what even was broadband back then?!
All credit to @willperrin for that spot. Of course, 1983 wasn't a great year for Labour in other respects...
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Rowland Manthorpe
@rowlsmanthorpe
Been digging into the economics of Labour's broadband plan. What's amazing - at least to me - is how much money you save simply by avoiding the costs of competition

According to the govt's own figures, providers fighting for the same customers adds £6.2bn to the total cost
At first I thought Labour had made a mistake, because their number was quite a bit lower than the one given by the National Infrastructure Commission

But this estimate assumes competition, with all the resulting duplication of effort and resources
The government went into this last year in its Future Telecoms Infrastructure Review

Labour have adopted the national monopoly model, which is in the third column
Read 4 tweets
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Rowland Manthorpe
@rowlsmanthorpe
I'm told the cyber attack on Labour was a DDOS attack. Digital vandalism not a "sophisticated" surgical attack
I understand this has not been recorded as a Category 6 attack by NCSC, the lowest level of incident the cybersecurity services respond to
The emails from security PRs are a DDOS attack on my inbox
Read 7 tweets
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Rowland Manthorpe
@rowlsmanthorpe
EXCLUSIVE:

The Liberal Democrats are profiling every voter in the country by scoring their political preferences out of 100

This includes which party they will vote for in the next election and whether they are a Remainer or Leaver
news.sky.com/story/the-lib-…
There at least 42 categories, although we only know the identity of 37

They include:
- whether someone voted Leave or Remain in the 2016 referendum
- how they'd vote if there was a second referendum
- likelihood of voting for any of the major parties
news.sky.com/story/the-lib-…
There's more.

The Liberal Democrats use software which estimates the age and first language of voters by analysing their names

The name Rowland Manthorpe, for instance, is categorised as "older: probably older" 🤔
news.sky.com/story/the-lib-…
Read 8 tweets

Related threads

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russjackson
@docrussjackson
As @UKLabour announce free #broadband for all - or "#BroadbandCommunism" as Tory government propaganda service the @BBC prefer to call it, here's a short THREAD on privatisation in the UK.
Privatisation has been central to the neoliberal project for decades. The 'market' goes deep into spheres of society previously insulated from business: private firms, their owners & senior managers profit from services that should be provided publicly, on the basis of need.
The objective of Thatcher's privatization was to turn British people into a nation of shareholders. It failed. Before Thatche, almost 40% of the shares in British companies were held by individuals. By 1981, it was less than 30%. When she died in 2013, it was under 12%.
Read 18 tweets
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Jennifer Rankin
@JenniferMerode
The British government has decided to stop attending most EU meetings from 1 September. It’s hard to see how this is anything more than a stunt - a few thoughts.
Random example. The UK fisheries councillor - s/he will not be involved in Ag/Fish council in Sept or Oct. Is that person going to be getting rid of WTO backlog instead? Or working on an UK-Japan trade deal? Or alternative arrangements to backstop?
All sorts of practical reasons (logistics, absence of clarity on UK-EU trade, backstop stalemate) that make make meaning personnel changes tricky no matter how good the officials are.
Read 11 tweets
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Tareq Baconi طارق بقعوني
@TareqBaconi
A few thoughts on the economic plan released by the Trump administration last night, despite my instinct to avoid giving this any more air time. Thread. #PeacetoProsperity #Trump #DealOfTheCentury
1/ The 40p doc. is little more than glossy repackaging of recycled economic projects, including the Kerry initiative, that have been in the public sphere for years. Even by the lowest threshold of anticipation – offering innovative economic prospects – this plan fails to impress.
2/ The plan underscores the confusion of the Trump administration: cutting funding to development projects while asking Palestinians to dream of funding amounts that dwarf what has been slashed. Revamped USAID pictures from shut projects add to the absurdity.
Read 12 tweets
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WeThePeople #ForTheMany #DangerousHero #JC4PM2019
@gaurangmorjaria
#poll If there was a Snap General Election, who would you vote for?

(For other parties, please vote them in comments)

Please RT once Voted! 😃
1997: Blair 13.5mn votes
1997-2015: Blairites/ Others lost 180 seats & 5mn voters
2017: Corbyn 12.8mn votes/ Gained 32

2019:

add first time voters (75% of those who vote, vote for Labour)

Subtract 2% of the population, 80% of whom vote Tories!

Labour Landslide on the cards!
Lab’s share of vote could be 14.5+mn

Once we take into account first time voters- 16 or under at 2017

first time voters -never voted before, disenchanted by Blair years whilst

removing Tory support -loss of voters due to old age

=> Lab will gain 100+ seats from Tories alone
Read 32 tweets
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Aaron Maté
@aaronjmate
1/ A lot of excitement today that Mueller alleges Manafort lied about sharing polling data w/ his fixer in Ukraine, Konstantin Kilimnik (hereafter KK), a Russian national. A few thoughts:
2/ According to MSNBC analyst & Russiagate devotee Clint Watts: “This is the closest thing we have seen to collusion.” Wow, this must be big then! nyti.ms/2H0YLzj?smid=n…
3/ Wait, here’s one prob. Per NYT, “most of the data” — polling data that Manafort shares w/ his Russian associate — “was public.” And the rest was still just - polling data. And it was shared in the spring of 2016 — the earliest possible stages of Trump vs. Clinton campaign. 😱
Read 6 tweets
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Paul James Cardwell
@Cardwell_PJ
UK govt claims it wants an EU "deal", with a few weeks left. So, the Foreign Sec compares the EU to a Soviet prison, dashing hopes that the insults of his predecessor will now be replaced by moderation and alienating EU members UK badly needs on side. /1 theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/o…
Today, the Prime Minister doubles down by trying to focus attention on the new post-Brexit migration policy. In doing so, she proudly announces on #r4today that free movement will end. This alone is being blind to the fact that it means no more movt for Brits (if they care?) /2
Insisting on the end of FOM also says to the EU explicitly that their citizens will no longer be able to come to the UK because the UK wants 'high skilled only'. Ergo, EU workers are low-skilled and therefore undesirable. /3
Read 11 tweets

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