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Robert Colvile Profile picture
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27 Aug, 5 tweets, 1 min read
Since we’re talking about children’s books, I was digging about in my mum’s attic and found this Bezos autobiography
But then - shock twist!
It’s basically the Extinction Rebellion manifesto, but in 1972

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More from @rcolvile

Robert Colvile Profile picture
5 Sep
Have written my column on a hugely important new @CPSThinkTank report, which raises the alarming prospect that the NHS could be in for a repeat of the Lansley debacle. Quick thread on thesis/findings. thetimes.co.uk/article/minist…
The immediate problem for the NHS is money. There are still Covid patients taking up a chunky (and increasing) proportion of the bed base. And they need reduce capacity to do other stuff (because staff have to get in and out of heavy-duty PPE, patients need to be isolated etc)
On top of that, Covid has seen waiting lists soar to 5m - which @sajidjavid warns could hit 13m. And then there's social care to fix. So clear that £££ is coming/needed.
Read 22 tweets
Robert Colvile Profile picture
4 Sep
On social care reform, there is a hugely important element which absolutely no one is talking about, which is where funding sits (1/?)
As @DamianGreen pointed out in his @CPSThinkTank paper, the effect of making councils responsible for funding has been to make them utterly allergic to building or investing in care homes or retirement housing - because older people have become a cost they have to pay for.
This is a big reason why we have decrepit care homes, and a scandalously tiny amount of specialist retirement housing (we are building approx 7k a year, we need approx 30k). And why, across social care system, productivity has gone DOWN by 20% in the last 20 years.
Read 5 tweets
Robert Colvile Profile picture
29 Aug
Have written my column about the autumn of discontent that's looming for the govt - chiefly because of the cavernous imbalance between the demands on the Treasury and its ability to meet them thetimes.co.uk/article/sunak-…
The headline talks about Boris's 'wild promises', and there are certainly a few (cough royal yacht cough). But the bigger problem is the sheer number of causes that are highly deserving & that the govt is explicitly committed to, but which each need a few billion (or much more).
Eg:
- Social care
- NHS backlog
- New hospitals
- Levelling up strategy
- Business rates reform
- Net Zero
- Education catch-up
Read 7 tweets
Robert Colvile Profile picture
27 Aug
So am at my mum’s and I found a charity cookbook she co-edited in 1989 (in aid of the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford). Most of the contributors were local but they also approached some distinguished figures of the time and… well, here is haute cuisine a la Ken Clarke.
And, in something of a coup, courgettes a la Maggie.
The book - ‘Friendly Food’ - is now out of print. But it’s a reminder of how late the culinary revolution came to the country - and indeed how long the spirit of deference lingered…
Read 16 tweets
Robert Colvile Profile picture
15 Aug
Have written my column on why Britain's university system is, quite literally, sub-prime - please read whole thing but key points below (with charts!) thetimes.co.uk/article/sub-pr…
First and most obvious disclaimer: Britain still has great universities. For large majority, it's still worth going. (Though financially, the big gains are clustered around a relatively small number of courses/institutions.) ImageImage
But but but - for many students, it really isn't. The IFS estimates that 1 in 5 (70k a year) will lose out financially, and gains to many others are pretty minimal. Image
Read 13 tweets
Robert Colvile Profile picture
14 Aug
Came up with these for the @CPSThinkTank weekly quiz but thought they deserved a wider audience. Each is an anagram of a well-known MP...
Some easy/prominent ones to start:

HAM ICE GLOVE
ZIT SLURS
JOBS HONOR SIN
RAISIN HUSK
HARMS KOALA
Getting a bit harder...

MEDIA BLIND
REMARKS TIRE (or MR STRAINER)
ODD WOLVERINE (or WOODEN DRIVEL)
LEAVERS CHEER
MINOR FART
Read 8 tweets

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