New post: Young people are increasingly unhappy. It's a real phenomenon + nothing to do with "snowflakes". There are lots of standard culprits - social media, school, economy - but none can explain the long-term trend. So what is going on? (£/free trial) samf.substack.com/p/the-agency...

The Agency Gap

Why are young people increasingly unhappy?

samf.substack.com

Hoots, hollas, and high fives welcome from anyone watching the Great North Run today. Keep an eye out for me cantering round.

A good source told me yesterday that the Tories are convinced there's going to be a summer 2027 election and are working to that timetable...

Survation.@survation.bsky.social · 3d ago

NEW: Westminster Voting Intention LAB 28% (+1) RFM 23% (-1) CON 21% (+2) LD 10% (+1) GRN 8% (-2) SNP 2% (=) PC 2% (+1) RB 2% (-1) OTH 4% (=) F/w 9-10 September 2026. Changes vs 28/08/2026

It's hard to think of anything less British than the morons doing this to the heroic RNLI

By the end of next year, the projection for the average British household is a reduced income of about two and a half thousand pounds *just as a direct result of the Iran war*. It’s truly insane what this guy has done to the world.

"Less than one in three believed London was a net contributor to public finances, even though it pays more tax than it receives back — one of only two UK regions to run a fiscal surplus." Fascinating polling here on how the rest of the country views London www.thetimes.com/uk/london/ar...

Sadiq Khan hits out at ‘plastic patriots’ doing London down

Mayor says groups are spreading disinformation that is leading the public to overestimate the level of crime in the capital

thetimes.com

Unsolicited writing advice, no. 128: To write, you need to read - widely and with passion and curiosity. Doing one without the other is like expecting a cook not to be interested in eating.

Job done - the project can finish now! I've added an entry on the Tyne Bridge - no explanation really needed. Link below.

I am sorry, I may have said this before, but there really are moments when British politics are astonishingly naive, and I really think this may have something to do with the fact that the British have not experienced occupation, tyranny, displacemen within living memory.

John Oxley@joxley.jmoxley.co.uk · 6d ago

WTF - first BBC question to Pat McFadden "Are you focusing too much on the protestors, and not on the issue that millions care about: small boats?"

The Times. Explicitly and deliberately, as a matter of editorial policy, promoting violent racist thugs.

The Times and Sunday Times@thetimes.com · 6d ago

Activists who brought Dover to a halt on Saturday refused to remove their balaclavas but were ‘very polite’, say fellow travellers

As gangs of masked men block Dover port, I will just leave this here www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Five Just Stop Oil activists receive record sentences for planning to block M25

Campaigners receive longest ever sentences for non-violent protest after being convicted of conspiracy to cause public nuisance

theguardian.com

“I propose that I use what's left of the treasury to move to a more prosperous party and run for leader. And, once elected, I will send for the rest of you.”

Financial Times@financialtimes.com · last wk.

Nigel Farage is set to address Reform’s UK annual conference just hours after two of his key advisers stepped down following an undercover sting that alleged the rightwing populist party knowingly sought illegal funding from overseas. Follow for more: ft.trib.al/BYU7LF9

8yo: how much will you get paid to write your book Me: uh, I don't know. Authors are paid in royalties so each time someone buys the book they get like $2 8yo: that seems like a bad deal Me: I dunno, what if my book sells a million copies? How much would I make? 8yo: well that's not gonna happen

Zia Yusuf has tweeted this about the leader of Camden Council, Sagal Abdi-Wali, who has lived in Camden for over 35 years, after arriving as a child refugee in the early 1990s. (Nadhim Zahawi, born in Baghdad to an Iraqi Kurdish family, came to the UK as an 11 year old:should be asked about this)

Keir Starmer (11 years, 2015-26) will have shortest MP career of any 20th century PM: 4 months as backbencher, 5 years on frontbench + 4 years as Leader of Opposition + 2 years PM https://www.camdennewjournal.co.uk%2Farticle%2Fexclusive-sir-keir-starmer-to-step-down-as-mp-for-holborn-and-st-pancras

Agree and reading Starmer's statement it's infuriating how his sense of moral superiority has stayed intact despite everything.

a rare photo of sean connery signed by roger moore@steamedhamms.bsky.social · 2w ago

i do think it reveals something (bad) about ex-PMs characters when they can’t countenance being in parliament without the big job

"I want your children's lungs to be smaller and less functional" is a bold electoral strategy.

“Dutch people cycle an average of 2.6km each per day. If this pattern was replicated worldwide, annual carbon emissions would drop by 686 million tonnes. This mammoth figure exceeds the entire carbon footprint of most countries, including the UK, Canada, Saudi Arabia and Australia.” @euronews.com

Cycling like the Dutch would slash the world’s carbon footprint

If everybody cycled like the Dutch, we could offset the UK or Australia’s entire carbon footprint.

euronews.com

This is manifestly untrue

@jonnygf.bsky.social · last mo.

Nigel Farage says he 'didn't want to resign as MP' but was 'forced' - Metro apple.news/A_e4Hfb8ZTO-...

The Narrative™️, though. It cannot fail. It can only be failed.

Dan Silverman@dmsilverman.bsky.social · last mo.

New study shows that — contra widely accepted narratives — there is NO EVIDENCE that professors change their students’ politics and make them more liberal through their teaching

If you ever doubt we’re in the banter timeline, remember that “a strong Binface vote” really appeared in a newspaper

#20sPlenty "There is a six to eight per cent reduction in casualties for every 1mph reduction in speed. Anything that brings down speed is a positive.” #PublicHealth www.thetimes.com/uk/transport...

How the 20mph speed limit is taking over British cities

With a third of roads now having the limit, driving offences are up while deaths have continued to fall. Plus: seven tips to make sticking to the rules easier

thetimes.com

Many of the benefits of fiscal devolution that are held out in the recent spate of proposals are questionable, argues @marksandford.bsky.social There are two stronger alternative rationales for fiscal devolution. politicalquarterly.org.uk/blog/what-pe...

Once, for amusement, pasted a chunk of Orwell’s ‘Politics and the English Language’ into docs, and was told it was full of errors and needed re-writing.

The standard explanation for Britain’s declining graduate wage premium is that higher education expanded too fast and too far. But similar expansions elsewhere have not produced the same outcome, writes John Burn-Murdoch. ft.trib.al/smljhw9

This comes courtesy of the Soho Society, a resident group established in 1972 aimed at “preserving the character of Soho”. Which they want to do by banning the centuries-old concept of the pub, and not (you'll be shocked to hear) the historically accurate option of increasing street prostitution

NEW How the BBC turned the litigation table on Trump The president now faces a dilemma about revealing his business records By me at @prospectmagazine.co.uk www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/ideas/law/th...

Behind the bewildering transformation of British universities, are management consultants being paid millions Really proud to have this vital piece on our unis are being gutted from the inside by @jheathershaw.bsky.social on Democracy for Sale. Do read democracyforsale.substack.com/p/inside-bri...

Inside Britain's university crisis

As teaching staff face job loss, their bosses have netted pay rises and bought advice from a “vampiric” management consultancy, writes Prof. John Heathershaw of the University of Exeter

democracyforsale.substack.com

The most brilliant piece of academic plagiarism I ever cam across was now many decades ago. A doctoral candidate lifted his thesis from two long articles in the Juridical Review from more than 50 years earler. Why is that clever? /1