Graham Whitham

CEO & founder of Resolve Poverty. @ResolvePoverty @GMLivingWage. UK @Acumen Fellowship 2024. Working locally to end poverty nationally.

[Graham Whitham @GrahamWhitham]

This, this, this.

It’s time to level the playing field between the small local businesses that keep our communities alive and the online tech giants who extract and hoard wealth with little consideration of what this means for our lives.

[Politics UK @PolitlcsUK]

🚨 NEW: Andy Burnham has pledged to scrap business rates for shops, cafes and hairdressers - and reduce them by 20% for pubs

It would be funded by increasing taxes on online tech giants and their British warehouses

[@Telegraph]

[(((Dan Hodges))) @DPJHodges]

Has a single senior member of Reform condemned last night’s violence against the police.

[Anthony Scaramucci @Scaramucci]

Britain has gotten poorer over the last decade. Brexit didn't work.

Disposable income has fallen more than in other European countries and certainly more than in the US.

They cut their nose off despite their economic face, a populist, nationalist, emotional decision, and now they're stuck because you can't get the same deal with the EU you once had.

People are done with both parties and they want to throw the bums out.

Now Farage is rising. I've met him and think he’s a con.

Go read his economic proposals — some of them are hate-based, some are tribally based.

Farage's broader economic proposals are populist noise that will make the country weaker and hurt the very people supporting him.

[Graham Whitham @GrahamWhitham]

Hmm

‘this type of gutter politics has no place in the UK’

but it’s ok for your lot to cheer on a fella who was verbally abusing the Chancellor?

Either you want decency in politics or you don’t.

[Lee Anderson MP @LeeAndersonMP_]

Let me put the record straight in plain English.

We had no plans at all to visit this venue. Rob was taking us on a tour of the constituency to places which meant something to him. He took us to an old factory site next to the canal to start the tour. This was a factory where Rob used to work ( if you're not familiar with the term 'work' it's something working class people do day in day out and it involves getting your hands dirty).

As we drove around he decided to take us to a fishing lake where he has fished. Once there we saw a cafe and decided to have a cuppa and use the toilet.

I am confused as to why the lady sent the letter as she sat with us talking to us all about the cafe and the challenges it faces. She then asked for a selfie with Rob and Nigel and thanked us for the visit. We then left.

On entering the car park I came across a very shaken looking @christiancalgie who I believe had been subject to a torrent of verbal abuse, some of it by yourself. We know there is a lot of pressure on yourself to become Labour leader but this type of gutter politics has no place in the UK.

The cafe is a great place doing great work and as a supporter of these types of establishments I know full well about the financial challenges they face and the conversations these establishments have with politicians to secure funding. It now makes me wonder why this letter has been sent and I just hope this cafe is not being taken advantage for political gain.

[Graham Whitham @GrahamWhitham]

This is bang on. Pitch invasions can’t be allowed to end football matches. It sets a worrying precedent.

[Heart of Midlothian FC @JamTarts]

📝 Club Statement: https://t.co/5Z5zjKKtmK

[Graham Whitham @GrahamWhitham]

Tinpot journalism.

[Alex Wickham @alexwickham]

EXCLUSIVE: Andy Burnham won’t commit to keeping Labour’s manifesto promises on tax and has opened the door to new tax rises if he becomes PM.

His decision to back the current fiscal rules wins him a reprieve from markets, but it limits his options to fund policies like council house-building. It raises the prospect of tax hikes.

Asked by Bloomberg if he is committed to Labour’s election manifesto pledges not to raise income tax, national insurance, VAT or corporation tax, his campaign declined to say so.

They also didn’t rule out new taxes on wealth.

Burnham’s spokesperson says he doesn’t want talk about tax policy during this by-election:

“Andy is fully focused on working hard for every vote in Makerfield so he can represent them in Parliament. Andy is not standing on a national manifesto at this election; he is standing to make a difference for the people of Makerfield and to bring the change he has delivered in Greater Manchester to the national stage.”

Burnham has recently called for the top rate of tax to be hiked to 50p and a council tax reevaluation to target the wealthy. “We have overtaxed labour and undertaxed wealth,” he said last year.

But former Jeremy Hunt SpAd Adam Smith says wealth taxes don’t raise sufficient revenue and it is inevitable Burnham will have to look at the big taxes if he is going to implement bolder policies.

[Paul Lewis @paullewismoney]

The stories unravel.

[Graham Whitham @GrahamWhitham]

This is what funny looks like @tompeck

[Omid Djalili @omid9]

Comedy palate cleanser. Robert Jenrick about to grandstand but reminded of his defection from one party to another this year is gold. The timing. First line great. Second line superb but crowd not recovered from the first to fully appreciate it 😊

[Graham Whitham @GrahamWhitham]

@jtworr How do you know they didn’t?

[Graham Whitham @GrahamWhitham]

What an odd post. 1) We vote for MPs not for prime ministers 2) Are we saying PMs have to cling onto power until they lose a GE? 3) it was clear to everyone in 2005 that Blair would hand over to Brown at some point during that parliament. A surprise to no one when it happened.

[Jon Sopel @jonsopel]

Think voters have a right to feel pissed off that this is what happens:
Vote Blair get Brown
Vote Cameron get May
Vote May get Johnson
Vote Johnson get Truss(!), get Sunak
Vote Starmer get ?

[Graham Whitham @GrahamWhitham]

What a load of nonsense this is. People want him to be held to account and to held to the same standards as others.

[Trevor Phillips @TrevorPTweets]

@AndrewMarr9 is utterly peerless. 👇🏾 “many on the left believe that if only voters can be persuaded to think more about the £5m donation Farage too, or his connections to crypto or what he said at school, Britain will turn on him and his movement will collapse. They are deluded.

[Graham Whitham @GrahamWhitham]

Just arrived in Euston, in case any Telegraph or Guardian journos need some content for their live blogs 😉

@AndyBurnhamGM

[Resolution Foundation @resfoundation]

Core benefit rates for young people have fallen considerably compared to wages since 2013-14. work incentives have actually increased for young people in receipt of benefits in recent years.

So, UC rates are unlikely to be incentivising more young people to remain out of work.

➡️ https://t.co/Rbke4Eviwb

[Graham Whitham @GrahamWhitham]

@IanTowler Not the only one, but it’s the line Labour politicians should be putting out.

[Graham Whitham @GrahamWhitham]

‘Vote green, get reform’ is all we should be hearing from Labour politicians following the locals. Not heard it from a single one yet.

A big part of the government’s problem is that they haven’t had a coherent communications strategy since coming to power.

[Resolution Foundation @resfoundation]

The Health and Disability Green paper will deliver tiny income gains at the cost of major losses for those with health problems or a disability.

Plans to save £5 billion by restricting PIP qualification would mean between 800,000 & 1.2 million people losing support of between £4,200 & £6,300 per year by 2029-30.

[NEF @NEF]

Cuts to benefits announced today have clearly been motivated by a desire to make short-term savings to meet arbitrary fiscal rules. They're not going to help ill and disabled people, they're only going to create more problems.

@PollardTom reacts to Liz Kendall's speech

[Katie Schmuecker @KatieSchmuecker]

Cuts that rob disabled people of a dignified life are not a moral choice. These would be unprecedented disability benefit cuts that drive up hardship.

A govt that vowed to end the moral scar of food bank use should not be leaving disabled people at greater risk of needing one.

[Katie Schmuecker @KatieSchmuecker]

📢New @jrf_uk analysis

There is no way to cut £5bn from PIP without affecting people with problems feeding and clothing themselves or getting around everyday

A govt that vowed to end the 'moral scar' of foodbank use shouldn't leave disabled people at greater risk of needing one

[Z2K (Zacchaeus 2000 Trust) @Z2K_trust]

Steve, one of our experts by experience, spoke to @BBCNews about the cruel and short-termist disability benefit cuts expected to be proposed today.

"My life is already at below minimal quality - that will reduce further and health will suffer first".

https://t.co/TCAofyCocq