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EuropeanPowell Profile picture
@EuropeanPowell
Jul 15, 2022 • 24 tweets • 8 min read • Read on X
Tories already expanding vocabulary of Freeports by adding 'zones' into the mix, they're not just ports! The #Liverpool zone has a population of 2,3 million! Entire regions under corporate laws dictated and enforced under a privately owned judiciary. Brexit deregulation hell.
Excellent article by @eyes_lilly on Tories post Brexit Charter cities which are well underway as the next ERG PM takes the UK to it's authoritarian corporate run conclusion.
medium.com/@cormack.lawso…
Of course none of this was on the side of a bus, r/w #libertarian policies have for decades proven notoriously unpopular with the public, that's why think tanks were used under a pretext of 'charity status' so r/w ideologues could carry on with their destruction by stealth
Prof.Paul Romer (mentor to Rishi Sunak) who along with Penny Mordaunt is now installing UK’s Charter Cities post Brexit. Once deregulation is hastily done, it's open season for the radical right to do whatever the f*ck they want, privatising whole cities
taxpayersalliance.com/charter_cities…
Great blog here on pros & cons of charter cities, basically when the right have control, it will be awful. Cities have long exercised power over land use and zoning (notice how Tories talk of zones)& they have frequently used this power to exclude needy outsiders #Brexit
verfassungsblog.de/the-danger-zon…
They do this by passing local ordinances that prevent the construction of public and low-income housing. Home-voters fear that the presence of low-income residents will diminish their quality of life and increase the crime rate. Ring any bells on hostile Govt policies?
Don't think that a new Govt can repeal those laws, they will be irreversible and under the jurisdiction of private companies, why do you think Truss, Sunak, Mordaunt, Trevelyan have been back and forth to the US? They are importing r/w charter cities model to UK. ERG's endgame.
@5by5Creativity writes on the whole libertarian package that comes with right wing charter cities now being installed in post brexit UK. Please follow her, she's fantastic
bylinetimes.com/2022/06/30/bor…
@AnnAubert3 I believe has written the first article on UK charter cities, read it here and please give her a follow she's brilliant!
yorkshirebylines.co.uk/news/brexit/br…
@fslconsult wrote this astonishing piece on charter cities 'Beware the Tories New Threat to our Democracy' Please follow him. #CharterCities
pressreader.com/uk/the-sentine…
Tories 'Global Britain, leveling up' slogans belie the truth of what's actually being planned for the 'emerging economy' of 3rd country UK. Frontier capitalism is a form of corporate colonialism, it swoops in when a country's economy is in crisis & severely weakened by disasters.
Cherry on top for Tories was the pandemic, an opportunity to cripple the public sphere by stealing billions via non tendered contracts to mates with no experience in PPE. Lack of competition was copied from the Bush administration during 9/11. 'Ramped up' military funding next.
Tories have for years been emptying public coffers, your taxes intended for public spending stolen for corporate gain & ultimate control of your lives, welfare state will be a thing of the past. R/w revolution took chunks out of public services, next step is ripping out the core.
Need your help in getting this out to the public at large, time is running out, next Tory PM is an ERG libertarian evangelical zealot who will ensure the harshest of r/w policies are unleashed on an unsuspecting UK public. Please read, research and RT before its too late.
unroll @threadreaderapp
Appeal to my followers & anyone alarmed by what the Tories are not saying about their post Brexit plans for privately run cities (charter cities) to please RT/like this thread. I need your help to create momentum and raise awareness in the hope the msm & opposition pick this up.
“Don’t be daft, it couldn’t happen here”
Charter cities are a ploy to enrich the rich even further, increasing inequality. US billionaire Peter Thiel, a key financier of Trump campaign, sees them as a route to replacing the US Govt with corporate power.
thenational.scot/politics/20267…
Honduras perfect example of why Romer’s model is ultimately unrealistic & can be oblivious to particular contexts, cultures -especially a country currently in political and economic turmoil. Ring any bells? Brexit, Covid ravaged UK incoming Sunak/Mordaunt!
faithandpubliclife.com/a-case-against…
Our cost-effectiveness model suggests that over 50-years horizon charter cities would have a 127x return on investment. See that 50 years bit?
'We don’t believe that charter cities are a cost-effective method to lift individuals out of poverty directly'
rethinkpriorities.org/publications/i…
'Laboratories of governance' model means additional risks involved. Corporatised Neocolonialism. Many charter city projects already riskier than traditional real estate investments. Reminder Russia report states: Brit Est compromised beyond prevention, estate agents, lawyers, PR
Honduras, Romer's idea became mired in controversy almost immediately. Residents in the proposed sites complained that officials had not consulted them. The Govt signed an investment deal without the consent of the Transparency Commission. Remind you of anything in UK?
Those who voted for Brexit knew nothing about Tories plans for r/w lawless charter cities, info was scant in the public domain save for @bakerstherald & a few independent/obscure sources, Don't forget that advocates of charter cities leaned on the above report I just shared.
My 🧵on ERG who for 29 years have been shutting down all moderation, taking public money and astronomical sums from private corporate donors and using that to push the most radical libertarian ideologies into Govt policy making under mask of charity status

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More from @EuropeanPowell

EuropeanPowell Profile picture
Aug 21
Hi @zarahsultana
Coventry City Council (your constituency) has just signed a £500k AI contract with Palantir (running 2025–2030), and was set up by Keir Starmer's Govt in June 2025.
Given Palantir’s record (surveillance, ICE, Gaza), many of us in Coventry & beyond are really worried. I know you’ve always stood up for human rights, and that’s why I support the new party you’re building with Jeremy Corbyn.
Your constituents' personal data, including yours, will be in Palantir's hands.
This feels like exactly the kind of issue where your voice could make a real difference, holding power to account locally while connecting it to the global struggle for justice.
Palantir isn’t just another tech supplier: it builds surveillance platforms, powers ICE deportations, and provides software used in drone targeting systems linked to civilian deaths in Gaza.
This deal follows 23 Tory-awarded Palantir contracts, and now Starmer’s government is continuing down the same path, embedding a company with a deeply troubling human rights record into UK public institutions (NHS, police, MoD… and now Coventry City Council).
Given your long record of speaking out for Palestine, against surveillance, and for democratic accountability, and now your call for public involvement in shaping a new party with Jeremy Corbyn, will you commit to challenging Palantir’s presence in Coventry?
Residents deserve to know:
How was this contract awarded?
Why Palantir, despite its record?
What safeguards (if any) exist to stop our data being used for harmful ends?
This is exactly the kind of issue, local, global, and moral that could show how your movement offers a genuine alternative.
Palantir's mass surveillance tools & human rights risks Palantir’s systems are widely used across military, intelligence, and law enforcement agencies. Privacy advocates warn its platforms enable broad, unchecked surveillance, raising concerns about civil liberties and misuse of data.
@zarahsultana Coventry is part of a designated deregulated Investment Zone (IZ) under the Labour government's current economic growth-at-all-costs framework.
The Coventry & Warwick Gigapark, spanning nearly 250 hectares along the border of Coventry and Warwick District, has been officially designated as an Investment Zone under the West Midlands Investment Zone initiative.
As you build a new movement with Jeremy Corbyn rooted in justice, democracy & accountability, I hope you’ll look closely at what’s happening in Coventry with Investment Zones, SEZs, Freeports & now AI Growth Zones.”
These schemes, pushed by Tory govts and now deepened under Starmer, risk repeating the worst impacts of deregulated “special zones”:
Job displacement as secure employment is replaced with precarious, outsourced labour
Environmental damage & pollution from industrial build-outs with weak oversight
Compulsory purchase orders & land grabs displacing communities for corporate projects
Weak transparency as councils strike deals with predatory firms behind closed doors
Threats to workers’ rights & erosion of collective bargaining under deregulated regimes
Council assets & infrastructure captured by corporate interests, undermining local democracy
Tax arbitrage & state aid abuse (made easier post-Brexit) that drain public coffers
Corporate creep by the likes of BP, BlackRock, Blackstone, Vanguard, Chevron — all circling infrastructure “opportunities” in these zones
And in Coventry, we now see Palantir embedded inside City Council via a £500k AI contract (2025–30) — a US surveillance & military tech giant with ties to Gaza drone targeting, ICE deportations, and NHS data.
Investment Zones, Freeports & AI growth clusters are sold as “modernisation.” But in practice they are vehicles for deregulation, extraction, and corporate power — threatening jobs, rights, and the environment.
This is exactly where your leadership matters: linking the local to the global, exposing how corporate capture operates on the ground, and giving people a democratic alternative. Many of us will stand with you in challenging this
Read 5 tweets
EuropeanPowell Profile picture
Aug 15
When Keir Starmer’s government announced its AI Growth Zones in January 2025, I saw zero press coverage of what this actually entailed, just the usual MSM puff pieces parroting Labour's “jobs”, “innovation”, and “future-proofing Britain” bullshit.
But the real story was hidden in plain sight: this wasn’t just about AI, and it wasn’t just about technology. It was about hardwiring a corporate-first model of anti-governance into Britain’s economic geography by stealth.
europeanpowell.substack.com/p/industrial-s…
They arrive silently, no fanfare, no public debate, no parliamentary scrutiny. But across Birmingham, Cornwall, Dorset, Norfolk, Suffolk, and beyond, a corporate takeover is underway. Freeports, Investment Zones (SEZs), and AI Growth Zones are not just coexisting, they’re consolidating into a single threat: Industrial Strategy Zones (ISZs).
AI Growth Zones (AIGZs) are being grafted onto that same legislative machinery. They weren’t created by an Act of Parliament. They don’t have their own dedicated statute. They simply slot into the deregulatory superstructure that Freeports built, this is the perfect Trojan Horse for the post-Brexit corporate coup.
Read 17 tweets
EuropeanPowell Profile picture
Aug 3
This is insane, look at this!
DEFRA is pre-empting a barrage of FOI requests on their Land Use Consultation paper.
The Defra Land Use Consultation paper (February 2025) contains an unusual confidentiality clause that raises serious concerns about transparency.
While framed as procedural, the notice effectively pre-empts a wave of Freedom of Information (FOI) and Environmental Information Regulations (EIR) requests. Stakeholders are invited to mark their submissions as confidential, but the government warns it "cannot provide an assurance that confidentiality can be maintained in all circumstances", a line that appears crafted to discourage disclosures rather than protect openness.
In the context of rising public concern over the financialisation of nature, and amid reports of BlackRock and other private asset managers eyeing "natural capital" as a portfolio class, the clause reads as a defensive legal posture. It suggests the government expects scrutiny around who is influencing land use policy, how "nature's assets" are being defined, and whether financial firms are shaping frameworks behind closed doors.
Such pre-emptive language undermines public trust and transparency, especially as environmental commons face unprecedented commodification.
consult.defra.gov.uk/land-use-frame…Image
I reviewed the UK Government’s February 2025 Land Use Consultation and its Analytical Annex, and there is no mention of BlackRock or any specific financial institutions in either document, despite both paper’s foundational emphasis on natural capital and nature markets, which BlackRock explicitly lists among its strategic investment priorities.
As the government simultaneously pursues a partnership with BlackRock and encourages asset-like valuation of environmental resources, the omission of any corporate stakeholders appears less accidental than strategic.
What are the consequences of Labour's Land Use Consultation paper?
theguardian.com/environment/20…
Over 5000 protected sites of natural beauty in England are to be built over under Labour's 1,5 million new homes policy.
x.com/EuropeanPowell…
Read 6 tweets
EuropeanPowell Profile picture
Jul 25
It is not mentioned in the @guardian article, but it is extremely important to know that on 13 January 2025 Keir Starmer’s government announced the creation of deregulated AI Growth Zones.
Both the US and the UK refused to sign for the EU’s proposed AI regulatory framework at the Paris AI Safety Summit earlier this year.
The UK and US Position: - US Vice President JD Vance emphasised concerns about excessive regulation stifling innovation, warning that stringent regulations could “kill a transformative industry” and criticised European regulatory frameworks for imposing “massive regulations” and creating “endless legal compliance costs”
- A UK spokesperson said “the declaration didn’t provide enough practical clarity on global governance and didn’t sufficiently address harder questions around national security”
The Regulatory Divergence: The contrast is stark when considering that the European Union has already enacted the most comprehensive, broad, overarching law on the use and development of artificial intelligence of any area in the world through the EU AI Act, while the US and UK are pursuing what Vance called a “hands-off” approach to regulation.
My point is about Trump and Starmer are both enabling “impacts prohibited under EU law”. The EU AI Act includes specific prohibitions and risk-based restrictions that wouldn’t apply to AI development and deployment in the UK and US.
This regulatory arbitrage will allow practices that the EU has deemed too risky or ethically problematic.
Starmer's Labour Party are dragging the UK into a big tech deregulated dystopia where zoning carves up Britain into competing corporate feudal enclaves with laws and regulations different from the host country.
Palantir has 24 contracts with UK public institutions, the NHS, the Ministry of Defence, the Police force, the Cabinet Office, and the Department of Levelling Up and Housing and Communities (DLUHC).
Keir Starmer awarded a new contract to Palantir with Coventry City Council this year.
Palantir and the IDF
The Israeli military has developed AI systems like “Lavender”, “Gospel” and “Where’s Daddy?” to process data and generate lists of targets, reshaping modern warfare and illustrating AI’s dual-use nature.
Palantir Technology Inc., whose tech collaboration with Israel long predates October 2023, expanded its support to the Israeli military post-October 2023.
There are reasonable grounds to believe Palantir has provided automatic predictive policing technology, core defence infrastructure for rapid and scaled-up construction and deployment of military software, and its Artificial Intelligence Platform, which allows real-time battlefield data integration for automated decision-making.
theguardian.com/technology/202…Image
Image
It is no coincidence that Starmer is more than willing to allow US Palantir unlimited access to the UK’s public infrastructure.
It is no coincidence that US Palantir are using its tech to massacre Palestinians in Gaza.
It is no coincidence that Blackrock, Palantir, and 58 more of the most powerful corporations in the world are currently prepping Gaza for Trump, Netanyahu, and the Tony Blair Institute's plans for a luxury Gaza Riviera replete with SEZs, while simultaneously building a 'Humanitarian City' (a concentration camp) for all remaining Palestinians.
x.com/EuropeanPowell…Image
Image
I am a volunteer, please consider supporting my research into deregulated Freeports, SEZs, and AIZs.
If you hadn't heard of these deregulated zones before coming across my account, then take a look at what I've uncovered over the last few years, it reveals what the duopoly have planned for the future of the UK.
It is beyond urgent that this corporate coup is exposed to the general public.
The MSM and most of the Independent Media are refusing to investigate the seismic upheavals happening to UK infrastructure via Zone Fever.
ko-fi.com/europeanpowell
Read 4 tweets
EuropeanPowell Profile picture
Jul 24
In June 2025, Keir Starmer's Govt published a policy paper Industrial Strategy Zones Action Plan. The 12 freeports, and 74 SEZS, and no doubt AI Growth Zones will be merged.
gov.uk/government/pub…
It's essentially a rebranding exercise to cover up Labour's collusion on deregulated free zones with the Tories. gov.uk/government/pub…Image
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'The UK government is accelerating efforts to build the infrastructure needed to support AI growth. AI Growth Zones will unlock investment in AI-enabled data centres'.
Musk's data centres are already poisoning the environment and causing surges in asthma cases in Memphis.
politico.com/news/2025/05/0…
Brexit, like the name suggests is about 'exit' from democracy and big govt interventionism.
The UK Government's free zones are the experimental template for massive deregulation conjoined with an elite oligarchical political business model that has carved up the UK into patchworks of corporate sovereignties and tax havens.
Read 4 tweets
EuropeanPowell Profile picture
Jul 11
In 2024 Keir Starmer tweeted about his Government partnership with US Blackrock.
In October 2023, Blackrock is one of many corporations investing and profiting from the genocide in Gaza. Blackrock and Vanguard among the largest investors in arms companies pivotal to Israel’s genocidal arsenal.
@Keir_Starmer obviously knew about Blackrock's lucrative investments in the unfolding genocide in Gaza, yet he and his war-mongering Cabinet kept Blackrock, enablers of textbook disaster capitalism, close to their economic growth plans for the UK.
All of it is beyond obscene.
You can read Francesca Albanese's full report 'FROM ECONOMY OF OCCUPATION TO ECONOMY OF GENOCIDE' on the UN's website
Reminder - Donald Trump has sanctioned Francesca Albanese for publishing this report. About a week earlier Trump sat at a lavish dinner with Benjamin Netanyahu who presented him with a letter recommending Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize...
#PalestineGenocide #Blackrock @FranceskAlbs
un.org/unispal/docume…Image
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The role of corporate entities in sustaining Israel’s illegal occupation and ongoing genocidal campaign in Gaza is the subject of this investigation, which focuses on how corporate interests underpin Israeli settler-colonial the twofold logic of displacement and replacement aimed at dispossessing and erasing Palestinians from their lands. It discusses corporate entities in various sectors: arms manufacturers, tech firms, building and construction companies, extractive and service industries, banks, pension funds, insurers, universities and charities.
These entities enable the denial of self-determination and other structural violations in the occupied Palestinian territory, including occupation, annexation and crimes of apartheid and genocide, as well as a long list of ancillary crimes and human rights violations, from discrimination, wanton destruction, forced displacement and pillage, to extrajudicial killing and starvation.Image
Had proper human rights due diligence been undertaken, corporate entities would have long ago disengaged from Israeli occupation. Instead, post-October 2023, corporate actors have contributed to the acceleration of the displacement-replacement process throughout the military campaign that has pulverized Gaza and displaced the largest number of Palestinians in the West Bank since 1967.
Read 5 tweets

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