Dr_Aust_PhD
@draustphd.bsky.social
Grumpy old lab scientist (retd.), Uni teacher & centrist dad. Irked by trendy nonsense, own waistline, hair 📉 etc. NOT a medic - other ½ of NHS doctor. Long-ago 70s punk rock fan/ guitarist. 2 kids & now no dog (RIP). Personal views.
You forgot the domestic, and esp partner, violence which is so common that it's practically diagnostic for male far-right activists.
James O’Brien@mrjamesob.bsky.social · 2h agoBut they seemed like such nice, patriotic, community-minded chaps. (Except the ones currently facing murder, child abuse & assault charges, obviously.)
‘Tis a mystery. Every analysis suggests that money invested in unis pays for itself multiple times over in local and national economic activity alone. Then add it all the other stuff!
Dr_Aust_PhD@draustphd.bsky.social · 2h agoAin't that the truth. I can't work out why a UK Uni system educating lots of the world's brightest & best seems to cause such umbrage among UK politicians. A major 'export' earner. Buys global 'soft power' & influence by the bucket. Aids UK local economies. O/seas students subsidise UK ones. Etc.
What a repulsive man. I had eye problems. Everything from routine cataract surgery and laser work for retinopathy in both eyes, to a vitrectomy. Some of the surgeons and nurses didn't have flawless English. But as they were busy saving my eyesight, it would have seemed churlish to whine about it...
I recall we had a period of time where the response of Starmer and Cooper to concerns about these groups was ‘I like flags’
Oxford Clarion@oxfordclarion.bsky.social · yesterdayLeaders of flag-raising group Raise the Colours Oxfordshire placed trackers on highway workers’ cars to find out their home addresses, the High Court has heard. RTC then attempted to intimidate the highway staff into no longer removing flags by repeating their addresses to them.
Jason Arday resigns. Regardless of everything, hard not to feel like he has been repeatedly failed by serial institutions, which failed to instruct him or guide him into reputable academic work, and traded off his story without checking it.
Ain't that the truth. I can't work out why a UK Uni system educating lots of the world's brightest & best seems to cause such umbrage among UK politicians. A major 'export' earner. Buys global 'soft power' & influence by the bucket. Aids UK local economies. O/seas students subsidise UK ones. Etc.
Jim Woodgett@jwoodgett.bsky.social · 4h agoThe deprecation of the diverse UK (and further) university scene would be absolutely abhorrent to the visionaries who established the new and bolstered the older universities in the late 50's/early '60s. Utterly mindless destruction of national assets.
The United States Treasury: An ATM for the Rich and Powerful
The man who drove their name change, of course. If I were them, I'd be reverting to 'University of Bolton' double P.D.Q.
Times Higher Education (THE)@timeshighered.bsky.social · 5h agoThe University of Greater Manchester’s vice-chancellor George Holmes has left his position amid an ongoing police investigation into alleged financial irregularities at the institution. Tom Williams reports #highered #edusky https://ow.ly/C6HQ50ZwGPT
Pretending that the Navy taking back migrants would be a humanitarian mission and therefore legal, is a bit like pretending that a £5 million bribe is nothing to do with politics and therefore doesn't need to be declared.
Still, he has his yacht... so there is that.
Times Higher Education (THE)@timeshighered.bsky.social · 5h agoThe University of Greater Manchester’s vice-chancellor George Holmes has left his position amid an ongoing police investigation into alleged financial irregularities at the institution. Tom Williams reports #highered #edusky https://ow.ly/C6HQ50ZwGPT
Badenoch's two biggest flaws are that she's nowhere near as smart as she thinks she is and is incapable of admitting error. Both well illustrated by this fiasco.
Alex Partridge@alexpartridge87.bsky.social · 6h agoJoshua Bonehill-Paine steps back from being a Conservative council candidate following backlash
The Man Who Sold the Moon is a Heinlein novella about an amoral and ruthless entrepreneur who is obsessed with exploiting the moon.
Bela Lugosi's Dad 🏳️⚧️ 🇵🇸@belalugosisdad.bsky.social · 13h agoWe're literally just letting the richest man in the world commit vandalism on an extraplanetary scale.
Decision makers in federal, state, and local governments, along with the people charged with shepherding your retirement funds, cannot stop giving this guy as much money as they possibly can.
George Pearkes@peark.es · yesterdayElon is talking about using robots to build a mass accelerator on the moon in support of an economy 1000x to 1 million times the current earth economy. It's a bad sci fi novel not an earnings call.
A grim tale. How can Canterbury *not* sustain a University? Only opened in 1965 (so estate is newish) - now it's been taken over by Greenwich. Unless the mismanagement has been truly epic, this is scary for the entire sector, as it suggests that demographics & visa rules are killing the sector.
Glen O'Hara@gsoh31.bsky.social · 6h agoThe long, doleful story of how the University of Kent sank. Can't vouch for all the details, but apparently it took 7yrs, £29m in restructuring and £2m in consultancy to accept the inevitable: effective takeover. My view? You can delay, but not avoid, the inevitable. shepwayvox.org/2026/08/05/u...
I've lifted the paywall on this, but if you can pay to subscribe (from £4 a month), it helps me do more stories like this!
Laura Laker@lauralaker.bsky.social · yesterday“It’s perverse that people who want to walk and cycle are penalised because the motor traffic is too polluting". National Highways closes cycling and walking routes beside heavily polluted roads lauralaker.substack.com/p/national-h...
This is pure extraction of wealth from one group of people to another We urgently need: Windfall tax on oil giants Windfall tax on banks Both are creaming money off us during a cost of living crisis Even Thatcher had the balls to tax the banks Will you @andyburnham?
Quite. Reform are such obnoxious, ignorant arseholes. Sadly, joke/fake right-wing channel GB News is busy converting more & more of the UK public to the same aggressive ignorance. Like Fox News US, GB News allows people to live in an alternative 'hate-enabled' reality. And Ofcom is a joke.
Reform Party UK Exposed@reformexposed.bsky.social · 2d agoFrench forces held a fierce defensive perimeter around Dunkirk and lost 18,000 souls. 40,000 became POWs. Without their resolve we wouldn’t have our nation’s story. It’s estimated 20-60k French resistance fighters died during the war. You’re only diminishing yourself with comments like this.
Europe is burning + BP has just reported $5.7 billion profit in 1 single quarter [about $1.9 billion every month]. ONE COULD ALMOST THINK THEY ARE TAKING THE MIKEY!
I’m old enough to remember when lying about adultery was worthy of impeachment. Feels quaint at this point.
🎵 All things bright and beautiful, All creatures great and small, All things wise and wonderful, Are worth zero to capital 🎵
Simon Cox@simonfrcox.bsky.social · yesterdayChurch of England rejects proposal to rewild 30% of its land by 2030 claiming that will reduce capital value. Ugh. www.theguardian.com/world/2026/j...
Yup. Also wonder what 'non-white Commonwealth' Brits who voted for Brexsh*t think of this? 'Ever get the feeling you've been cheated?' etc. I remain (geddit?) astonished to see S Asian Brits in the ranks of Reform, given the basic appeal of Faragism is racism. Still, always exceptions for the rich..
Tiana’s other half 🐝🇵🇸🇬🇧🇮🇳@naveen39.bsky.social · 13h agoYes, the same people who argued pre Brexit that EU membership was discriminatory to non-EU immigration immediately switched to “there’s too many black and brown people” post Brexit. Worst of it is, they have absolutely no shame in the hypocrisy.
I'm shocked, shocked, I tell you, to hear that money laundering and grifting is going on here... what?... oh, just wire it to my Cayman Islands account, thanks. Or the Curaçao one. Or Panama.
Robin Bannks@robinbannks.com · yesterdayI'm shocked.
This is the same sort of sh*t (literally) that that clown Dr Oz used to trot out on his TV show...until Donnie Dumbf*ck put him in charge of Medicare/Medicaid. The US right loves this sCAM 'self-help MAHA fad diet' stuff, as it makes ill-health *the patient's fault*. And thus not the govt's problem.
Ben Collins@bencollins.bsky.social · yesterdayOh my god the dietician who is telling everyone in the White House to only eat steak and sauerkraut doesn't wipe his ass.
Good article but refusing formal rather than informal (family) care is hardly "taboo". I and my colleagues see people week in week out who quite openly do just this. I'd say the bigger taboo (in some cultures) is families admitting they can't/won't do it www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
What if older people refuse help outside the family? This is the taboo that could wreck care reform | Emily Kenway
Many fear losing their independence if they agree to care workers looking after them. Any social care review must take this on board, says Emily Kenway, a social policy doctoral researcher
theguardian.com
This seems like the beginnings of some robust government action if this results in convictions. If Palestine Action are a designated terrorist group, then what are these guys.
Oxford Clarion@oxfordclarion.bsky.social · yesterdayLeaders of flag-raising group Raise the Colours Oxfordshire placed trackers on highway workers’ cars to find out their home addresses, the High Court has heard. RTC then attempted to intimidate the highway staff into no longer removing flags by repeating their addresses to them.
Hadn't realised @officialuom.bsky.social had fully mothballed the famous (ex-UMIST) Grade 2-listed Sackville Street building. Saw one of those 'urban explorer' types posting photos online. Interior v. much of a piece w. M'cr Town Hall and the main original UoM buildings like the Whitworth Hall.
What has been powerfully reinforced of late is that to be a Reform activist you have to be intellectually lazy, ignorant, bent, socially unpleasant and riddled with irrational prejudices.
Daily Herald #FBPE #NAFO 🇬🇧🇺🇦🇬🇱@dailyherald.bsky.social · yesterdaySarah Pochin, who was born 24 years after the end of World War Two, might want to pick up a history book.
🎵🎵 Where have all the tankies gone? / Long time marching / Where have all the tankies gone? / Ochin khorosho / Where have all the tankies gone? / Joined the Greens now, every one / When will we ever learn / When will we ever learn 🎵🎵
James Austin@jamesdaustin.bsky.social · 2d agoA party that was actually anti-racist would be kicking this person out, not allowing them to run for the Governing Committee. There are many decent Greens who will be disgusted by this and I wish them all power fighting back against it. We know from experiance how hard that is.
