CitizenSanchez

#Healthy Streets, #Walking, #Sustainability, #Behaviour Change, #LCWIPs, #Active Travel. Bristolian-Bolivian Mix. Mezcla BoliBristoliense 🇬🇧 🇧🇴

[Emma @MrsEmmaWebber]

Barnaby Philip John Webber
11/01/2004-13/06/2023 💔

If you can, share these images of the beautiful soul stolen from us by the worst of humanity.

Let his face today burn bright.
Barney, I promise you there will be accountability 💛💚

For You. For Grace. For Ian.

[Feargal Sharkey @Feargal_Sharkey]

"Thames Water should be nationalised, says Andy Burnham."

And he's right. Thames Water should have been renationalised years ago.

Bravo @AndyBurnhamGM 👏👏👏👏

https://t.co/w5QQPFcYMX

[Blue Labour @blue_labour]

The long shadow of Tony Blair has once again cast itself over the Labour party.

Jonathan Rutherford writes the definitive response.

"What Labour politicians called progress, was experienced by many as the destruction of their way of life and of their country."

[Darren Jones MP @darrenpjones]

Proud to share the best of the South West with @AmbJapanUK

And slightly embarrassed that the Japanese Ambassador can say “gert lush” in a better Bristolian accent than I can!

🇬🇧 🤝 🇯🇵

[Despotic Inroad @DespoticInroad]

Again, an awful lot of gaslighting re: "neoliberalism", denying the existence of a ~50yr policy/governance agenda on the basis of "the state spends a lot of money".

Public spending as %-of-GDP isn't high because we've had a period of Leftwing hegemony. (Outside of the arts, the academy & the social/cultural policy sphere, that's obvious nonsense). Rather, it's high because:
👉Demographic pressures have pushed up the 2 massive spending outlays, health & pensions – a problem common to the vast majority of Western democracies
👉UK growth/productivity has been stagnant for ~18yrs, since The City of London collapsed under the weight of its own poor investments, while spending pressures have continued to grow apace
👉We have a growing (& expensive) debt pile as a result of the taxpayer twice being forced to bail out the private sector to the tune of several hundred £BN – 1st during GFC, 2nd during Covid lockdown
👉We have huge revenue pressures from "sticking plaster" subsidies covering up the underlying issue of chronic low investment, e.g. housing benefits ballooning while municipal capex on housebuilding shrinks; or tax credits/UC top-ups disguising stagnant real wages; or increasing day-to-day NHS spending after years of squeezed capital budgets/social care sector collapse

Neoliberalism is defined by privatisation, the embrace of globalisation/free trade, monetarist central banking, the emasculation of the labour movement, & the transformation of the state from a prime actor in national production/investment into a post-hoc fiscal distributor. It has been consciously driven by market-liberal true believers (some even self-identifying as "neoliberals") – on the Right by Hayekian/Friedmanite think tanks, business groups & various Conservative ideologues, and on the Left by Third Way modernisers (see Blair) and their intellectual forebears in Marxism Today's revisionism, the Democratic Left etc. etc.

Pretending none of this happened (because 'muh the state still spends £££') is pure sophistry. They want us to believe they didn't sell off airlines, steelmakers, coal mines, energy generators, water companies, car manufacturers, banks, bus/train contracts & millions of council houses. That they didn't deregulate financial services to get their 'Big Bang'. That they didn't abolish rent controls, or capital/exchange controls, or wage boards, or price commissions. That they didn't outsource core services and state capacity to corporate providers. That they didn't impose some of the most draconian/restrictive trade union laws in the democratic West. That they didn't cede monetary policy to an independent central bank, or cede trade/migration policy to an unelected, supranational, continental bureaucracy. That they didn't squeeze public investment or prioritise tax cuts over infrastructure spending. That they didn't eschew industrial policy and take a lax approach to deindustrialisation because the future was services & the "knowledge economy".

This isn't simpy an accumulation of random policy titbits, but is the outcome of a coherent intellectual project that has consistently rebalanced the labour/capital relationship in the latter's favour. These people are conning you.

[Sienna Rodgers @siennamarla]

Here, @DanCardenMP sets out a Blue Labour response to Tony Blair's essay. 👇

“The citizen is absent. Treated as a recipient of services, a unit of human capital, a problem on a welfare roll – never as someone with a contribution to make.” https://t.co/0rnAX6L6Ci

[Dan Carden @DanCardenMP]

Labour is losing today because we are a party that won’t say Britain is broken - when it is, won’t challenge the rules of globalisation, and we are now a party defined only through tax, spend and welfare — and with no answer for working class voters who’ve been left behind. The question isn’t how to win them back. It’s whether Labour wants to represents them at all.

[Richard Parker @RichParkerLab]

This election is a clear choice - serious leadership that unites, or division that holds our region back.

My first proper @Substack piece, on why this election is so important to our region.

https://t.co/Nji4x9YktT

[Lilian Greenwood @LilianGreenwood]

Every woman and girl deserves to feel safe walking in their own neighbourhood.

New guidance for councils will help redesign our streets – with better lighting, safer crossings and smarter planning – so safety is built in, not an afterthought.

https://t.co/uZ2Aw48IKV

[People & Cities @GeorgeFergusonx]

Bristol’s planning officers are busy twisting the arms of our democratically elected councillors to support this dreadful application after being asked to write up reasons for refusal! The report could have been written by the developers. Disgraceful https://t.co/JHXge4943n

[Restoration @leftrestoration]

Finally wider Britain is waking up to regional inequality being the biggest factor in a person's life after years of identity politics' con job.

Want to help us End The Two Englands?

https://t.co/oA2C0qclZX

[Despotic Inroad @DespoticInroad]

A Left-Right consensus has emerged on the need for “reindustrialisation”. Geopolitical fragmentation & deglobalisation won’t reward countries with a narrow focus on financial/legal services + the bullshit sector.

Reform/Labour are split on net 0, the former interpreting it as a blockage & the latter as a catalyst for industrial growth. But NEITHER have a real plan for a “new political economy”, which would involve a radical rupture with decades of failed consensus.

A shift towards manufacturing will require more than a switch in our energy policy to full (de/re)carbonisation — it will mean we have to learn the lessons of East Asian developmentalism:
👉High public/private sector investment in R&D, infrastructure, plant, machinery, fixed assets etc. (and yes, at the expense of day-to-day public/private consumption)
👉Agile states with empowered executives
👉Strong economic nationalism & Britain-First industrial policy, inc. targeted tariffs, restrictions on capital mobility, financial repression etc.
👉A domestication of footloose internationalised capital, restoration of a coherent NATIONAL capitalism

Link to full piece below 👇

https://t.co/YJpYPaKwx9

[Jonathan Hinder MP @Jonathan_Hinder]

“Puberty blockers should NEVER be given to under 18s, even as part of a clinical trial”

LABOUR voters:

Agree 61%
Disagree 15%

Don’t know 24%

- Polling by @WStoneInsight

[Brendan May @bmay]

People on the centre/centre left fuming about Labour getting tough on the immigration issue don't seem to understand that if Labour doesn't deal with it firmly and fairly Reform will sweep the board at the next election. It's nonsensical to pretend the issue isn't real - it is.

[Paul Embery @PaulEmbery]

The predicted howls of anguish from Labour backbenchers are emerging. Mahmood must face them down. This is a seminal moment for this government. If it doesn't get a grip on the immigration crisis, it is done for. Only the ideologically blind refuse to acknowledge the depth of public concern over this issue. There can be no rowing back. Mahmood has to win this battle.

[Shabana Mahmood MP @ShabanaMahmood]

The St George's Cross and the Union Jack belong to us all. They are symbols of unity, a kingdom united, and they must never be used to divide us.

[Jonathan Hinder MP @Jonathan_Hinder]

If a house worth 260k is charged £2,500 a year in council tax…

How much should a house worth £1million+ be charged?

[Richard Parker @RichParkerLab]

Delighted to welcome the Prime Minister to the West Midlands today as he set out plans to fix the foundations and build a better future for Britain.

This region is already working hard to deliver the change our residents want to see.

[Rachel Reeves @RachelReevesMP]

Stability is change. Vote for it today.🌹

[The Labour Party @UKLabour]

Change will only happen if you vote for it tomorrow.