Carol Corbett

[The Farmer's Dog @FamersDog]

An update and a message from Jeremy.

“Thank you so much for all the kind messages I've had but now, an announcement.”

[Nick Timothy MP @NJ_Timothy]

Labour's new adviser in the Ministry of Justice has extreme left-wing views.

She shouldn't be anywhere near our justice system.

Now I can reveal she is a close personal friend of the minister who appointed her.

My letter to the Ministry of Justice permanent secretary:

[Renée Hoenderkamp @DrHoenderkamp]

Hang on… a man so unwell that he literally threw a child to the crocodiles is now back amongst us on bail!?!
@CambridgeCops?

Man arrested after toddler ended up in crocodile enclosure 'not fit for interview' and released - Sky News https://t.co/qOSru3QJz3

[Jim Chimirie 🇬🇧 @JChimirie66677]

The Right Lost Big In Makerfield And Won Big In Aberdeen. The Difference Is Discipline.

Andy Burnham won Makerfield with 54.8% of the vote and a 9,231 majority. Reform finished 20 points behind. Every poll in the run up to Thursday had this as a close contest. Survation had Burnham at 43 and Kenyon at 40. The actual result was not close. It was a landslide.

The temptation is to explain this away with the vote split argument that has anchored analysis of this seat for weeks. Restore took 7%, almost double what senior Reform figures predicted on the night, taking real votes from Kenyon in a seat the right needed. That fracture is real and Farage himself called the result disappointing, urging Restore voters to think again. One in 15 Makerfield voters backed a party that did not exist a year ago. That is not a footnote. It is the central fact a divided right now has to reckon with.

But 20 points is too large a margin to be explained by a 7 point third party alone. Something else moved. The most plausible explanation is the one the smaller parties' vote share points toward. A consolidation of left of centre support behind Labour, motivated less by enthusiasm for Burnham than by a determination to keep Reform out, would explain a meaningful share of a swing this size. The same instinct that delivers tactical voting at general elections, where Green and Lib Dem voters routinely back Labour in marginal seats to stop the right, appears to have operated here at scale. Burnham's own personal standing is also a genuine factor. Farage compared him to Boris Johnson's personal popularity as London mayor, a fair comparison.

The same night told a very different story in Scotland. In Aberdeen South, contested simultaneously, the Conservatives gained the seat from the SNP with 49.5% of the vote, a 25.1 point swing. Reform finished a distant third on 8.6%. Labour collapsed to 5.4%. Where Makerfield saw the left consolidate around Labour, Aberdeen South saw the right consolidate almost entirely around the Conservatives.

The contrast is instructive. Aberdeen South suggests consolidation on the right is achievable when one party is clearly the dominant challenger and the contest is framed around a question, in this case the Union, that unites right of centre voters more naturally than immigration policy currently does. Makerfield suggests that where Reform and Restore are both viable options, the right of centre vote splits exactly as the arithmetic always predicted it would, while the left, faced with the same choice between Labour, the Lib Dems and the Greens, consolidates instinctively around whichever party can win.

What should worry the right is not which seat is more representative. It is that both outcomes point toward the same underlying truth. A divided right loses even where it should win. A unified right, as Aberdeen South shows, can still deliver landslide victories against a collapsing SNP and an even more collapsed Labour. The difference between the two results is not the public mood. It is discipline.

Burnham now returns to Westminster with a comfortable majority and a clear path toward a leadership challenge. Starmer has confirmed he will not walk away and will stand if a contest is triggered. The mayoral by-election to replace Burnham will now be fought under the supplementary vote system rushed through the Lords two days before this result, a system designed to allow exactly the kind of left consolidation that may have just delivered this landslide.

Restore took 7% in Makerfield and will not disappear. Aberdeen South proves the right can still win decisively when it is not competing against itself. The question facing Farage, Badenoch and Lowe is not whether the public wants change. Aberdeen South answers that emphatically. The question is whether they can stop handing seats like Makerfield to a party the country has already rejected.

"The Right Lost Big In Makerfield And Won Big In Aberdeen."

[Andrew Neil @afneil]

A welcoming present just out this morning for a Mr A Burnham to underline just how limited his latitude as PM will be:
The UK government borrowed £23.3 billion last month, 30 per cent or £5.4 billion higher than a year earlier.
It was also more than the £18.8 billion expected by most economists and the £17.7 billion forecast by the Office for Budget Responsibility, the UK’s independent fiscal watchdog.
 The interest payable on government debt rose to £11.7 billion, the highest ever recorded in any May.

[Earth @earthcurated]

194 YEARS OLD. 🤯 Jonathan the tortoise was born around 1832. He has literally lived through the invention of the lightbulb, both World Wars, and the entire internet era. An absolute legend. 🐢👑

[Toby Young @toadmeister]

According to Keir Starmer, a teenager doesn’t have the judgement to scroll through Instagram without state supervision, but does have the judgement to pick the next government. We are governed by idiots, says Clive Pinder. https://t.co/e7yEy87M7q

[Patrick Christys @PatrickChristys]

For me it’s the arrogance of the BBC to think the public wouldn’t notice they’d planted illegal immigrants in the audience and had them coached by an open border charity. It was blindingly obvious.

[Jim Chimirie 🇬🇧 @JChimirie66677]

When You Can't Beat Reform, Change The Rules. Labour Just Did.

There is a line in a democracy that, once crossed, changes everything. When those in power begin adjusting the rules of the game to determine its outcome, the game is no longer democracy. It is managed succession. That line was crossed again on Tuesday night.

Two days before the Makerfield by-election, Labour rushed a change to the mayoral voting system through the House of Lords. Regional mayors will now be elected using the supplementary vote system rather than first past the post. The change applies immediately. It will govern whoever replaces Andy Burnham as Mayor of Greater Manchester if he wins on Thursday and stands down.

The government's defence is that it is simply restoring the system used before Boris Johnson changed it in 2021. That argument requires the public to believe that a change Labour could have introduced at any point in two years of government became urgent on Tuesday evening, forty eight hours before the vote that triggers the election it is designed to affect.

Lord Hayward, a Conservative peer and experienced pollster, was precise in the Lords. There is no other justification for the haste, he said, other than that it solves the Labour Party's problems and prevents Reform winning a mayoralty. Not clumsy. Not rushed. Designed.

The mechanics explain why. Under first past the post, Reform could win the Greater Manchester mayoralty on a plurality of votes in a fragmented field, precisely as it won all eight council wards in May's local elections with around fifty percent of the vote. Under the supplementary vote system, voters express a first and second preference. Lib Dem and Green voters, given a second preference, will direct those votes to Labour overwhelmingly. The change does not affect Thursday's by-election. It affects the mayoral contest that follows it, constructing an anti-Reform coalition from the second preferences of smaller parties that Reform itself cannot access.

Lord Jackson identified the wider implication. This is potentially a strategy for a progressive alliance being rolled out ahead of a general election, he said, with the aim of locking out the Conservatives and Reform from power. Burnham's allies have already confirmed he would scrap first past the post nationally in favour of proportional representation. The supplementary vote is the local pilot for a national project. Pool second preferences, lock out the right, govern indefinitely on a minority of first preference votes.

This is not the first time. Earlier this year Labour delayed local elections after the Electoral Commission stated explicitly that the justification was not legitimate, that extending mandates damages public confidence and creates a conflict of interest by allowing those in power to decide how long they may remain there without consent. The Commission's objection was noted and ignored. Reform demolished Labour anyway.

Now the same instinct has been applied to a different mechanism. Not cancellation this time. Electoral system change, deployed with surgical precision forty eight hours before the vote that triggers the election it is designed to affect.

Governments confident in their mandate do not need to change the rules two days before the ballot. They face the electorate and take their chances. The timing of Tuesday night's Lords motion is not a coincidence. It is a confession.

The voters of Makerfield vote on Thursday. The question of who governs Greater Manchester after that, and under what rules, was settled in the Lords on Tuesday. Nobody voted for that.

"Burnham's allies have already confirmed he would scrap first past the post nationally in favour of proportional representation."

[ClarksonsFarm @ClarksonsFarm1]

Always worth a share🙌🏼

[Vinnie Sullivan @VinnieSull1van]

The fact that @JeremyClarkson's cancer announcement feels so personal and upsetting to me only shows how much he has touched our hearts over the span of his long career. We are with you Jeremy, and all you've done on cars, the farm, @FamersDog, and Great Britain itself.

[S A M M Y Woodhouse @officialsammyuk]

This morning, I appeared on Good Morning Britain in a live interview about the grooming gangs. Before I went on air, I was told not to mention the race of the perpetrators. I, of course, didn’t listen.

I have now received an apology from the editor.

My interview is below: 👇🏻

[Wimbledon @Wimbledon]

Back together, at Wimbledon 💚💜

Serena and Venus Williams will compete in the Ladies’ Doubles at The Championships 2026

[Paul Embery @PaulEmbery]

Labour MP Kim Leadbeater on Radio 4 this morning bemoaning the polarisation in Britain and arguing that the "forces" trying to "divide us" need to be "challenged more". I'd pay a bit more attention if she had spoken out a bit more forcefully against the extremist forces in her own constituency who hounded the Batley schoolteacher and sent him into hiding. Instead, she released a statement (a year later) which included the line: "The reason I am not discussing this matter publicly is that I have specifically been asked not to by the family involved." How brave.

[Janet Murray @jan_murray]

Dear Lush (cc Chelmsford City Council),

As a woman who had half a breast removed last year due to cancer, I am writing to raise my concerns about your “Proud of My Stripes” window display.

I am also, on behalf of other women who have experienced breast cancer, respectfully requesting its removal.

Because mastectomies are not a fashion statement, an identity marker or something to be celebrated.

They are something women undergo because they are ill, because they are frightened, because they are trying to stay alive.

Around 59,000 women are diagnosed with breast cancer in the UK every year. Many will undergo surgery - a mastectomy, lumpectomy or other procedure.

Others choose preventive mastectomies because they carry a high-risk BRCA gene mutation.

If a woman chooses to have her breasts removed to affirm a gender identity, that is her personal choice.

I honestly don’t know the number of women who have elective mastectomies for this reason.

What I do know is that it is a tiny number compared with those for whom breast surgery is medically necessary and not something to be celebrated.

I think I speak for many women who have experienced breast cancer - and for their families - when I say this:

Breast removal surgery is not something I regard as cute, playful or empowering.

Nor is it something I believe retailers should be celebrating.

For that reason, I am requesting that the display be removed and that @ChelmsCouncil apologise for promoting it on social media.

Yours sincerely,

Janet Murray

[Dr Sanjoy Kumar @drsanjoykumar]

A very very sad anniversary for us. Losing Grace leaves an enormous gap in my little family. we were 4 we are now 3.
James my son brings enormous comfort he misses his big sister Grace so much.@greatesthitsuk @BBCNews @ITVCentral @nottsinquiry

[Lee Patriot Hood @Mofoman360]

This is Barnaby Webber

Murdered on a street in Nottingham three years ago he was such a sweet soul

NEVER FORGET HIM!!!

[Lee Patriot Hood @Mofoman360]

This is Ian Coates

Murdered on a street in Nottingham three years ago

He had such a sweet soul

NEVER FORGET HIM!!!

[Lee Patriot Hood @Mofoman360]

This is Grace O’Malley-Kumar

Murdered on a street in Nottingham three years ago

She had a sweet soul

NEVER FORGET HER!!

[Cat a tac @cattatackk]

Shine bright forever beloved Barnaby. His family is fighting so hard for accountability 🙏🏻❤️ praying they get it