Imogen Sinclair

@Pharosofficial Fellow | @Reformparty_uk Adviser

[Mary Harrington @moveincircles]

“Many people get into car accidents having not taken out car insurance, giving them limited legal protections. Labour is consulting on ways to give them your money instead, because no one should be punished for refusing to manage their own life responsibly like a normal adult”

[Danny Kruger @danny__kruger]

Neither Labour nor the Tories has space for their patriotic, populist core - the ‘family, community, country’ tribe that once dominated both parties. They sometimes mouth the rhetoric, but the reality is sterile managerialism at the expense of these vital things, and a sneering contempt for the people who dare to believe in them. Reform UK now represents both wings of this tribe: the radical conservative tradition of left and right. Today’s results are the latest, but not the last, cry of revolt, and a call for a politics of home, neighbourhood and nation.

[Tim Stanley @timothy_stanley]

Thornberry has the right mix of authority and camp. It’s what made this country great.

[Danny Kruger @danny__kruger]

(for those interested, this is the pub that inspired Jez Butterworth's sublime play Jerusalem, about the battle between council planning officers and patriotic radical nonconformity)

[Sam Bowman @s8mb]

Has any other British politician highlighted the cybersecurity risks from new AI models like this? I am surprised (but pleased!) to see this from Reform before anyone else.

[Matthew J. Milliner @millinerd]

Excited for a surely forthcoming AI edition of this classic, re-entitled “I and It.”

[Imogen Sinclair @imogenasinclair]

@ItsTaz1989 It has metastasised

[Imogen Sinclair @imogenasinclair]

@duncanshrubsole We’ve not “gone” anywhere! A community must have its centre.

[Imogen Sinclair @imogenasinclair]

No. Next question.

[David Aaronovitch @DAaronovitch]

@NJ_Timothy @Iromg Would you say the same about a mass act of Christian worship? If not, why not?

[Imogen Sinclair @imogenasinclair]

Liberalism is “abused” when it’s deployed against its ancestor, Christianity. This is not what liberalism is for.

[Danny Kruger @danny__kruger]

Nick Timothy and Nigel Farage are right, and Sadiq Khan and Keir Starmer are wrong.

Small groups of people, of whatever religion, praying in public places is fine. And as a Christian country we should allow a special privilege for churches to lead services in our national spaces, like the Palm Sunday celebration that happens in Trafalgar Square.

What we don't want is mass ritual observances intended to claim the civic realm for another religion, or assert the domination of another culture over our own Christian traditions.

What happens in our national spaces is not neutral. People use Trafalgar Square, for celebrations and demonstrations, to make a point about the kind of country they want us to be. The Palm Sunday pageant reminds us of who we are - not as individuals (many or most of us don't identify as Christians at all) but as a national community, with the roots of our institutions in the ground of the Bible and our most solemn communal moments, from coronations to funerals, mediated through the liturgies of the Church.

A mass Adhan held there, or in any town square, is making a different point: that Britain is not a Christian country, and that - inshallah - one day it shall be Muslim. This is unacceptable to the British public and indeed incompatible with our constitution.

As ever with these debates, the issue is partly one of kind and partly one of degree. There is an issue with Islam itself as a religion which in most interpretations does not admit of pluralism or freedom of conscience, and therefore is inherently aggrandising, including over territory. But with a bit of confidence and a bit of toleration we could handle that - if it were not for the issue of degree.

It is the scale of Islam in Britain, and the ambition of its leaders for greater scale, that makes the problem. The numbers of people who assembled for the adhan in Trafalgar Square, clearly and openly claiming the territory for a faith with no connection (indeed, with strong doctrinal disagreement) with the model of Western liberal democracy that Britain has developed and exported to the world - that is the problem. The numbers, whether everyone there understood it this way or not (and I suspect many did), convey an explicit threat to the foundations of our country.

Being relaxed about other people's religion is a good thing, a very British thing. I don't mind modern druids dancing around Stonehenge in my constituency (arguably, though the historicity is tenuous, they have a claim to the place). I don't mind small groups of Hindus or Buddhists or Muslims demonstrating the reality of Britain's religious toleration by worshiping in Trafalgar Square.

But let's not kid ourselves about this adhan, or pretend that we're just seeing another harmless expression of Britain's religious diversity. We are seeing an abuse of liberalism, led by people who are not themselves liberal; or - let us imagine they are acting in good faith - who are themselves deceived about what they are doing.

It should not happen again. And it would be good to hear the Church of England say so.

[Imogen Sinclair @imogenasinclair]

Yes! Absurdly, the whip is only ever suspended on the most important of issues: life and death.

[Miriam Cates @miriam_cates]

“Free votes” should be abolished. They allow party leaders to absolve themselves of responsibility on important issues of life and death. MPs can break the whip if they want to, but political parties should take a position so that the public know what they’re voting for.

[Imogen Sinclair @imogenasinclair]

Viability was always, more or less, arbitrary anyway.

[Tim Stanley @timothy_stanley]

The logic of abortion: if at 3 months, why not at 9? If a matter of choice, why should it ever be criminal?

Watch this: it's what will happen with assisted suicide.

[Rajiv Shah @RajivShah90]

The Scottish Parliament is over 70% left/liberal/progressive

It has just conclusively rejected euthanasia

It's not a progressive cause

[Imogen Sinclair @imogenasinclair]

Simpler times

[Spice Girls @spicegirls]

Happy #MothersDay to all the mums, mother figures and families celebrating across the UK today! 💐

[Imogen Sinclair @imogenasinclair]

@DuncanHegan1 Is the supposed (?) uptick in Church attendance mirrored in other social infrastructure settings too?

[Rhys Laverty @RDLaverty]

He jokes, but working out "acceptable relationships with paedophiles" is a decent description of much of this government's approach to asylum hotels, grooming gangs, and trans issues.

[Tamara Leigh @tamaraleighcfc]

Diapers every time. Next question.

[James Orr @jtworr]

Hardly needs saying that the hamfisted critiques of Danny Kruger’s thought in both The TImes and The Guardian this week unwittingly underline that it is his ideas and influence - not Finkelstein’s or Malik’s - that are in the ascendant.

[Phillip Blond @Phillip_Blond]

The vandalism of the State continues