Robert MacDonald

Social Scientist/ Professor. Tweets = bit of a mixed bag (sociology, dogs, birds, hills, punk, MCFC, novice archaeology, ‘left-wing flim-flam’ etc).

[Robert MacDonald @RFMacDonald]

👋🏽

[Rupert Read 🌍 🔥 @GreenRupertRead]

BREAKING!: Huge news: The Government has quietly published [link below] on its website, without any fanfare, the Joint Intelligence Committee / Defra report on
'GLOBAL BIODIVERSITY LOSS, ECOSYSTEM COLLAPSE AND NATIONAL SECURITY'
that it suppressed last October. It has presumably done this at this point (in the middle of an international crisis) to try to bury the story. <DON'T LET IT BE BURIED> ...this is a huge story. Just consider the report's title, for starters... the report warns of multiple likely ecosystem >collapses< that will have dire implications for our national security, and that require serious strategic adaptation at minimum. The report also sets out how these collapses if they are allowed to occur will significantly increase migration-pressure: "as development gains begin to reverse", a phrase that should make any human shudder in anguish. There is much more... But it doesn't end there: what they have published very much appears to be >only part of a larger piece of work<: there is no detail at all in what they have published on the geo-regional analyses; the connections from those regional analyses to the national security threats consequently facing Britain are not detailed; the "Key Judgements" of the report are not properly explained. It is fairly obvious what has happened here: in response to FOIs, they are trying to slip this report out, presumably because they feared it would otherwise get out anyway; but they have done so in a form that holds back much of the most disturbing content - the content that WE as citizens need to know if we are to know how to protect ourselves, what we are potentially going to have to adapt TO.
We must continue to press for the full report to be released...
But in the meantime there is much here to digest and reflect on, to put it mildly. Kudos to those who commissioned the report; do READ this version of it (it's only short!), and let's take it from there... Kudos too to those who pursued an (at least partly) successful battle to get the report released, via Freedom of Information requests...
>>Please share widely!
https://t.co/lMI3Nr5mPL

[Robert MacDonald @RFMacDonald]

My ‘top song of 2025’?
Absolutely.
🕺🏻💃🏾💕

https://t.co/UnkLMgGUAE

[J of Youth Studies @JofYS]

SAVE THE DATE!
Journal of Youth Studies Conference, University of Porto in May 4-6, 2027.

[Majority @Majority_uk]

📣TOMORROW📣

Stephen Yaxley-Lennon aka Tommy Robinson will be in the toon tomorrow with Nick Tenconi and his UKIP pals.

They seek to divide us and turn us against each other. But we won’t let them. Let’s turn out in force and show them who we are in the North East!

[Jamie Driscoll @JamieDriscollNE]

In December 2023 I wrote an article criticising Sir Keir Starmer for praising Margaret Thatcher in his Daily Telegraph article. The day after praising Thatcher his website took down his “ten pledges”, replaced by “404 – page not found”.

His praise for Thatcher, I said, was because Labour had no plan for government. Sadly, that prediction has come true. Everyone knew adult social care was a mess. What did Wes Streeting do? “Let’s talk about it for another three years.” A mental health crisis in schools? “Erm, we’ll, erm, tinker with academies.” Climate change breaking 1.5 degrees of heating last year? “Let’s expand the airports!”

Did you know that in opposition Labour got £7 million of public money every year to develop policy? It’s called Short Money, named after Newcastle MP Ted Short who introduced it in 1974.

Now the Starmer-Reeves government is emulating another Tory Leader. In October 2022 Liz Truss ranted against the “anti-growth coalition”. It was their fault, she said, that her genius scheme of doing sod all to fix Britain’s problems wasn’t working.

"I have three priorities for our economy: growth, growth and growth,” said Truss. “Time-wasting Nimbys and zealots” are holding us back, said Starmer in his Daily Mail article last week. The UK needs three things, said Starmer, "growth, growth, growth."

Growth, Keir, comes from fixing the Gateshead flyover. From paying the money we were promised for the Tyne Bridge repairs, so people aren’t stuck in traffic for an hour each day. The Leamside Line hasn’t been delayed by regulators, it’s government pulling the funding. Is it regulations holding up the Gateshead conference Centre? Was it nimbys who stopped Gateshead Town getting promoted because the stadium lacked investment?

It’s not the greenbelt stopping houses being built. Developers are sitting on land with planning permission already granted for over 1 million homes. They build when they can maximise profit. So why aren’t you funding councils, NeoLabour, to build affordable homes for rent?

And don’t say we can’t afford public ownership of water. Just enforce the regulations, make them pay for the clean up, and their share prices will tumble. Then the dividends can be invested in clean water instead of sucked out to tax havens.

Now, with the Heathrow expansion they’ve crossed the Rubicon into full Thatcherism. North East investment cancelled and channelled to the “Golden Triangle” of Oxford-Cambridge-London. It’s called levelling-down.

Truss promised an “iron grip” on public spending. Thatcher styled herself the “iron lady”. Rachel from accounts likes her metallic metaphors too.

The report she used to justify the Heathrow Project was funded by – yes, Heathrow airport, itself owned mostly by overseas governments. The Department for Transport previously rejected the report’s methodology as “not fit for purpose”, and the data was supplied by the airport itself!

In 1969 Elizabeth Kubler-Ross described five stages of loss. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.

Yet again a Thatcherite government is screwing over the North East. Many Labour members are coming out of denial. Like the German soldiers in the Mitchell and Webb sketch, thinking, “Are we the bad guys?”

There’s still a few, mostly on the payroll, who angrily bleat, “four legs good, two legs better.” “Any Labour government is better than any Tory government.” Tell that to your Gran who’s lost her winter fuel allowance. To the third child in poverty. To the people stuck in traffic on the Tyne Bridge. To the disabled people being bullied off benefits in Stamer’s Britain. Starmer and Reeves did listen to those poor non-doms, though.

Labour ministers sacked for corruption. MPs taking £££s in freebies. Most are in depression.

As Orwell said in Animal Farm, “The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.”

If you’ve reached acceptance, there’s an alternative. Along with hundreds of others, I’ve set up Majority. No whips. A commitment to high standards in public life. And deliberative democracy – directly involving the public in policy development. We’re standing candidates this May in Northumberland and Durham. In 2026, we’ll be running in all the Tyne and Wear elections. If you want a better politics, visit https://t.co/8SfAQK4dGU.

[Robert MacDonald @RFMacDonald]

10/10 💅🏼

[Illegitimate Scholar🧭 @ill_Scholar]

Can you pass the Test taken to be a History Teacher in the US?

These are 10 Questions from the Praxis Test for Social Studies

6/10 to Pass

1. Which of the following Rivers did NOT play an important role in the development of the earliest Civilizations?

[UCU @ucu]

⚠️ First they threatened jobs. Now they're policing conversations.

Sunderland Uni are hitting new lows, gagging our members while pushing redundancies.

Our members deserve better than this hostile management.

https://t.co/03rUtnSSzt

[Unrepentant Fenian bastard. @Budgie12438982]

KNEECAP LEADING THE WAY AND PISSING OFF THE DUP AT THE SAME TIME.

WELL DONE LADS 😂😂

[Centre for Youth Research & Dialogue @CentreDialogue]

All keynotes from our #UUStopTheClock Conference are now available #youth #youthstudies #youthwork https://t.co/NdNTxrhL3I @JofYS @CriticalVoiceNi @GailNeill @RFMacDonald @TracyShildrick @UlsterUniCYW

[Robert MacDonald @RFMacDonald]

@NewcastleBirder @BirderSouth @DurhamBirdClub @NorthWildlife I’m really tempted to go back asap!

[Robert MacDonald @RFMacDonald]

@BirderSouth @DurhamBirdClub @NorthWildlife

Hi!
I can find no local reports - and I thought they were confined to the SW - but I am 90% sure I saw a Chough today (Northumberland sea cliffs). My brother, walking separately, independently said he saw a pair.
Possible?

[Chris Packham @ChrisGPackham]

Emergency additional #FoxOfTheDay

[NabeelaAkh @NabeelaAkh]

The response of Panathinaikos fans to the call of Panthinaikos FC not to hang any political banners at today's game with Maccabi Tel Aviv.

[Robert MacDonald @RFMacDonald]

Hi friends

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT
I’m now (also) on blue sky 🦋
Please do follow
Same ‘handle’ as here

Love &amp; Peace 💙✌🏽

[Liberta Cherguia 🇪🇺 @MbarkCherguia]

The Queen, a Northern Cardinal, flew over to me on a cold and windy morning. 👑🐦 She landed by my boots while I grabbed some snacks for her. She goes with her usual combo, a peanut and a suet nugget. #birdwatching

🎥 Credit: @JocAPhotography ©️🇨🇦

[Helen Day @LBFlyawayhome]

“The shepherd is looking up at a large skein of whooper swans which has come from colder climes. Like geese, they fly in V-formation”

(What to look for in Autumn, 1960)
Artist: CF Tunnicliffe
Writer: EL Grant Watson

[Robert MacDonald @RFMacDonald]

#AfternoonDogWalk

Cranes
(South Shields, looking West)

[Robert MacDonald @RFMacDonald]

Another brilliant day out walking with @profcwebster &amp; Mabel
Roseberry Topping &amp; Captain Cook’s Monument
#NorthYorkMoors

[Adam Grant @AdamMGrant]

My new favorite word: sonder.

It's the profound awareness that every person you encounter has experienced a lifetime of hopes, fears, loves, and heartaches that you'll never know.

Each moment of sonder is a reminder to appreciate how little we truly grasp about others' lives.