FWIW, this is roughly how I think Starmer's speech will go tomorrow.....

1/ The Tories ruined it all. £22bn blackhole. OBR says they hid it all. Tories can't be trusted ever again. We have to sort out mess and this will need tough choices. 2/ We have started on those tough choices, because we are tough. We've announced discretionary winter fuel allowance cannot go ahead because tough choices.

But we absolutely hear what people say. While for some winter will be ok, we need to look at protecting most vulnerable.

1/ This from rightwing grifter Murray is an interesting example of how the far right in general looks to be consciously developing an approach to language and argument which fits its authoritarian-cum-fascist well, and which the rest of need to consciously resist. Quick thread... 2/ His argument, such as it is in a throw away tweet, is based on what I'll call for now 'hyper definitionalism' i.e. the argument that because a term has not been defined to the extent and in the way the rightwing grifter-controversialist demands, it is to seen as invalid.

1/ Just over 100 days to go to most likely date of General Election, and one Labour manifesto pledge I'd like to see is a near-straight copy from the Tory 2019 manifesto. 2/ "In our first year we will set up a Constitution, Democracy & Rights Commission that will examine these issues in depth, and come up with proposals to restore trust in our institutions and in how our democracy operates."

(p.48)conservatives.com/our-plan/conse…

1/ News that the Home Affairs Select Committee (Commons) has asked the govt to find space this month to hold a debate on a motion that the UK-Rwanda treaty should NOT be ratified suggests we may be in a for a mini-constitutional crisis of the govt's making

https://twitter.com/Arabella_Law/status/1745930153480352204

2/ as @Arabella_Law kindly sets out, this would be the first ever use of the provisions in s.20 the Constitutional Reform & Governance Act 2010, if he government does allow this debate and vote.

1/ I'm intrigued by the unusual 'private meeting' to be hled tomorrow of the Lords' International Agreements Committee, on the same day as the Commons passes (or not) the Safety of Rwanda Bill at second reading committees.parliament.uk/committee/448/… 2/ The International Agreements Committee has the power, under the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010, to scrutinize treaties laid before parliament, including the Rwanda one laid by the Home Secretary, so I wonder if the private meeting is about that.

1/ I was intrigued by, and suspicious of, this claim in the HMT Autumn statement press release earlier that the govt had ended lowpay for people on the NMW in line with its manifesto pledge, not least cos I remembered no such pledge. 2/ The full Autumn statement, released later, gives a bit more detail on what is now called a "commitment", setting out how ending low pay for those on minimum wage is making it two thirds or more of a median salary.

1/ It isn't entirely true to say, As Aaron does here, that "global market prices' dictate all consumer prices, and I think it's important to be clear why, if we're to make progress.

https://twitter.com/AaronBastani/status/1707016742537441744

2/ While everyday prices are indeed a product of the global market, a really important aspect of energy security is the national level capacity market (CM) auction process managed by the National Grid Operator.

1/ Can't help feeling that's Sunak's "I've scrapped the 7 bins thing" may turn out to be quite a large constitutional faux pas, and bigger than the more general ministerial code breaking complained about by @RhonddaBryant here

https://twitter.com/RhonddaBryant/status/1704523780003869036

2/ To recap from earlier, this scrapping commitment is not about something entirely made up, but a reference to sec 57 of the Environment Act 2021, which amends Section 45 of the Environment Act.

1/ Tend to agree with @andrewmarr9 that the election will come in May 2024, but I think the idea that "success" in sending people to Rwanda over the winter will be a key determinant is completely off mark, irrespective of the Supreme Court judgment this Autumn

https://twitter.com/Anoosh_C/status/1704152701452312871

2/ This section, in particular, suggesting people arriving on the south coast will be on planes to Rwanda in days, seems to be misunderstand completely the nature of the UK-Rwanda deal signed in Kigali in April 2022.

What this ongoing to and fro about racism comparisons sadly misses is that antisemitism under capitalism, especially as used by the hard right, is qualitatively different from other forms because its roots lie, as Moishe Postone set out, in commodity fetishism.

https://twitter.com/AyoCaesar/status/1594782215841452037

I wrote about that difference in my review of Baddiel's book when it came out bickerrecord.medium.com/how-to-make-je…

1/ As sure as night follows day, Farage & coterie are up in arms at government testing reaction to the idea of a "Swiss-style" approach to future relations with the EU. 2/ And just as surely, in an immediate return to the Brexit politics of 2017-2019, any 'Remainer' (e.g. me) who recognizes that the govt even testing the waters like this might offer a glimmer of hope is accused of ignoring the realities of Brexit, or even welcoming them.

Hurrah for 'eco rules' telegraph.co.uk/property/buy-t… More seriously, it's in this kind of context that we need to push for a Scotland-style community right to buy by persuading local authorities to coordinate Sustainable Communities Act applications for change to primary legislation.

On to the bit of NW regional Labour conference at which I should be on the panel. Ho hum. It's an hour long. First 10 mins has been preaching to converted. So Labour conferencey.

1/ The defenders of OMOV for the election of the Labour leader seem, in their righteous anger at the Starmerites plotting to make the party less democratic, to be missing the bigger point. 2/ The bigger point is this.

From 1906 onwards, arguably right through arguably to the early 1980s, when Michael Meacher was defending an electoral college because he thought it would help Benn win, that system could be justified democratically.....

1/ The transgender issue within Labour is starting to have a Homeric feel to it, in the way a sense of honour besmirched on the part of one notable person threatens to wreak bloody havoc amongst enemies and supposed allies alike, and the rank and file, men & women, suffer most. 2/ The Iliad opens with the tale of how Achilles, outraged at the dishonour done to him by the haught Agamemnon, refuses henceforth to fight the Trojans, leading to mass carnage on his own side.

1/ As two new stations open on London Underground, it's good to see that the Strategic Outline Business Case for the Skelmersdale rail link has also been submitted lancashire.gov.uk/media/926976/1… 2/ My calls, letters and meetings aimed at getting this on the agenda seem half a lifetime ago, so I dug back into my fairly messy & incomplete archive to see when it actually was.

1/ This is of course an outstandingly stupid thing to write in the context of e,g, the Treasury move to Darlington, but it is also a very neat encapsulation of the way the 'ideal type' of neoliberalism has morphed into a new reverse Schumpeter ideal type heroic entrepreneur.

https://twitter.com/ProfTimBale/status/1439267027483602946

2/ Schumpeter's view of capitalism was essentially negative, because he believes that all enterpreneurism will eventually be bureaucratized, but in the 1980s, the newly popular George Gilder, of who both Reagan and Thatcher were big fans, inverted this.

1/ I find it strange that so little notice has been taken of one fairly simple thing when it comes to the Indian variant: that from mid-February, as the second wave subisided, test & trace performance also fell dramatically. 2/ Between mid February and mid April, close contacts reached within three days fell from 90% of all contacts reached to just 58%, possibly as a result of mass redundancies of staff by the big firms in that period.

1/ In not surprising news if you follow this kind of thing, an amendment to the regulations, excluding private Covid testing provision for the long term from regulation under the NHS Act 2006, has been published, just one working day before Johnson's announcement on June 14th 2/ It's a bit technical, but essentially it looks like the govt is gearing up for long term Covid certification, all provided for non-NHS firms at profit, and with no long-term oversight by the Care Quality Commission, which had this function stripped from it in November 2002

It's bit technical, but this is the Statutory Instrument (amendment), quietly laid the other day, which appears to give cut-off dates for who can be in the private Covid testing cartel for the long term legislation.gov.uk/ukdsi/2020/978… I suspect it will be a lot harder to enter the market after these dates, though possible. More importantly, it signals that there is no intention post-pandemic to revert these testing & lab services back to Care Quality Commission oversight, where they were until late 2020.

1/ Interesting enough column from Owen Jones on what might be Labour's way of winning back older people who are now voting Conservative theguardian.com/commentisfree/… 2/ In the end, though, the concrete offer he recommends are a) a pension hike b) a National Care Service. This is wrong/inadequate for two main reasons.