James Ball Profile picture
Political editor @TheNewEuropean | Fellow @Demos | President @TheMediaSociety | Author | Personal account. 🏳️‍🌈
Aug 5 8 tweets 2 min read
Elon Musk has clearly helped fan the flames of the UK’s civil unrest. Accounts he unbanned are inciting violence. Musk himself has posted “civil war is inevitable”.

The far-right is emboldened. That could *easily* blow up in their faces. 🧵 Many closed far-right groups exist – as Telegram channels, WhatsApp groups, closed Facebook groups, or similar.

Agitating in the open is much easier to track, whether it’s people inciting violence or those posting videos from on the street.
Aug 3 6 tweets 2 min read
There’s a lot of effort coming from some quarters on here in trying to claim Starmer called a large group – or those aghast at the tragic events in Southport – “far-right thugs” or similar. There’s a reason these claims aren’t accompanied by links: it didn’t happen. 🧵 The easiest way to check this is to read what he actually said, which is posted in full here. It’s less than 700 words long, so it’s hardly a big job to read the actual remarks.

gov.uk/government/spe…
Jun 12 18 tweets 3 min read
We keep hearing the next government is going to be grim: there's very little money, and many problems to tackle.

So to cut through the gloom @TheNewEuropean asked 15 experts for one small thing – relatively cheap, relatively simple – that would make things better. 🧵 1. @MatthewdAncona: "a warp-speed overhaul of standards in public life"
• Root and branch reform of the Electoral Commission
• Independent report on digital interference in UK elections
• A unified code of conduct for MPs and ministers with truly independent oversight
Oct 11, 2023 10 tweets 2 min read
We have completely and totally screwed up prisons in the UK, to the point where the government is trying to rent prison cells overseas.

Despite everything you hear about the modern system being “soft on crime”, the opposite is true – for those who get convicted. 7 key facts 🧵: 1. In the 1940s, around 30 people in every 100,000 in England were in prison. Today, that’s around 160 – an increase of more than 500%.
Jul 21, 2023 10 tweets 2 min read
Three by-elections, three parties each winning one of them. You're going to see a *lot* of efforts to spin each of them into one result. Here's what I think will be said, the problems with each narrative, and what it actually means: LIKELY TORY SPIN:
By-elections always tricky when you're 13 years into government. It's been a hard few years but we're making progress. No real enthusiasm for Labour – they missed Uxbridge despite throwing everything at it. Rishi's five point plan is working.
Jul 20, 2023 8 tweets 3 min read
It is launch day for my new book – The Other Pandemic: How QAnon Contaminated The World.

It charts the history of a movement that has gone global, and is a threat to us all.

Bookshop:
Amazon: https://t.co/4p6brl84vH…
Waterstones: https://t.co/o2Qyc4U24d https://t.co/BT9nN3s4IVuk.bookshop.org/p/books/the-ot…
amazon.co.uk/Other-Pandemic…
waterstones.com/book/the-other…
Image It also makes for a lovely coffee table if you buy 12 or more copies and lay them out (I did not do that, these are my author copies from @BloomsburyBooks).

Here's what reviewers have said so far:
Jun 30, 2023 8 tweets 2 min read
This is just vile. This implies adoptive mothers, or parents via surrogate, or all sorts of other people aren’t mothers. The issue with which Duffield has become fixated has blinded her to her own new and hateful stance towards many families. This should be grounds for expulsion.
Oct 30, 2022 5 tweets 1 min read
Twitter is a social network desperately reliant on keeping its content creators – who unlike every other social network have no monetisation options – here. This is as predictable as it is hilariously stupid. Goodbye blue tick, you never made me a penny x
Aug 23, 2022 8 tweets 2 min read
Twitter security chief Peiter "Mudge" Zatko has filed a whisteblower complaint! This could be big… washingtonpost.com/technology/int… Zatko: "Twitter is grossly negligent in several areas of information security. If these problems are not corrected, regulators, media and users of the platform will be shocked when they inevitably learn about Twitter’s severe lack of security basics.”
Aug 22, 2022 5 tweets 1 min read
Productivity is about working efficiently (or if we must, 'smart') not about working hard. This is a very basic bit of economics that seems to be completely beyond the favourite candidate to be our next prime minister.

Here, very quickly, is how it works: Factory A has a ton of outdated, inefficient equipment that often breaks down. Its 10 workers have to include people to repair the equipment or work around its shortcomings, and have to do lots of overtime.

On a normal day it produces 1,000 widgets with a 10-hour day.
Apr 17, 2022 4 tweets 1 min read
Accepting a fixed penalty notice is an admission of guilt.

The prime minister has confirmed through his spokesman that he has accepted at least one fixed penalty notice.

He *cannot* claim this now without freshly misleading Parliament. While I am not an expert on parliamentary rules, I would suggest that misleading Parliament while claiming you didn’t mislead Parliament is probably a bad idea.