jimbocrx

Married with three beautiful children, and committed to inclusion and participation for all.

[Farrukh @implausibleblog]

There are ~200 berths at Lee Valley Marina

Over 35 years, with normal turnover, that’s around 1,000 boats

Dan Neidle revealed: only 1 ever registered for council tax

Zack Polanski was one of the 999 who didn’t realise the rules applied. The council never chased anyone there. He’s now contacting them to sort any shortfall

What was sold as “Zack Polanski dodging council tax” is actually a story about hundreds of boaters not understanding the rules, not paying, and a council not enforcing them

A genuine mistake that’s being fixed

So why has the media turned this into a full scandal suggesting he’s a tax avoider?

This isn’t journalism — it’s a coordinated effort to tarnish Polanski over an error that 998 others at the same marina over 35 years also made

Meanwhile, barely a peep about Nigel Farage’s £5m from his foreign crypto billionaire backer

Double standards much?

[Sam @SamCKx]

Nigel Farage has committed prosecutable election offences with this video under the Representation of the People Act 1983.

The Act prohibits inducing voters through the threat of “temporal injury”, which includes material disadvantage such as the targeted imposition of government burdens.

Threatening to specifically house illegal migrants in a constituency if it does not vote Reform is coercive and constitutes a criminal offence.

[The Fraud @StarmertheFraud]

So let's get this straight... two sitting black councillors are deselected in Croydon. The Party's bureaucrats enforce a mandatory shortlist... and the result is KEIR STARMER'S MID-20s NIECE gets picked to stand for the 2nd safest ward?

She might be very smart and capable, and might eventually be a credit to the role, but this sort of mad top-down management invites scepticism. If I was a local resident, I'd be pretty miffed.

https://t.co/mbyoJDji11

[Dale Vince @DaleVince]

An amazing collection this, of hope over reason. Britain just invested £600m into Rolls Royce’s ‘mini nuke’ program - that was always coming. But here we see it’s being done in the hope that these things can be built faster than the big versions that are famously slow and always late. Hope. 

This sentiment get’s worse when we hear that this mini nuke investment is intended as an answer to the middle east inspired - second fossil fuel crisis of this decade so far. The ‘hope’ is to have the first three up and running by 2035, nine whole years from now. This crisis will be over by then and the ones that will follow. How on earth can anyone think that something coming in ten years is an answer to a crisis we’re in right now? 

And that’s not all. Rachael Reeves is right to flag the importance of making our own energy here, to protect us from future crises - but she overlooks the elephant in the room (no not Trump) - we don't set the price of electricity made here, whether from the wind, sun or nuclear. Global fossil markets do. So these nukes could appear tomorrow, could even make affordable energy - but it won't affect our electricity bills at all - because all of the stuff we make here is priced somewhere else.

Why won't Labour grasp this nettle - we need to break the link between the price of fossil gas and the price of all other forms of electricity made here. That (and only that) can bring bills down immediately. And protect us for the future. Legislation to do it exists - only the will seems missing. We can find £600m for tech that might help us in ten years (big bold announcement) - but not the courage to take on this foolish market mechanism.

Shame.

https://t.co/mXYwnP6EtD

[jimbocrx @jimbocrx]

@BenJCallow @austinfatutor Amazing achievement Ben!

[Daniel Lismore @daniellismore]

Reform figures are now openly talking on television about private healthcare. This is exactly what many of us warned about. When healthcare depends on money people fall through the cracks. Serious illness stops being a medical issue and becomes a financial crisis. This is not theory. We have seen it happen elsewhere.

Private healthcare does not protect ordinary people. It pushes those who get sick into debt insecurity and desperation. When public healthcare is weakened homelessness rises. People lose work. Bills pile up. Support disappears. The consequences do not stay neatly contained to someone else.

This is the part Reform never explain. These policies do not only hurt the people you are told to blame. They come for everyone eventually. When public protection is stripped away no flag no slogan and no vote shields you from the outcome.

If you support Reform you should start asking your councillors some serious questions. What happens when healthcare costs explode. What happens when illness turns into debt. What happens when people lose their homes because treatment depends on what they can afford.

Because these policies do not just affect others.
They affect you too.

🇬🇧🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿☕️🫖⛺️

[Dan Price @DanPriceSeattle]

It’s been 10 years since I took a million dollar pay cut to pay all staff at Gravity Payments a $70,000 minimum wage. People have wondered: How did it go?

We conducted a comprehensive study of everything that has happened since our 2015 announcement.

We are proof that paying living wages is good for both employees and businesses.

Since raising wages, our revenue and profits have soared, employees have started families while continuing to provide excellent customer service, and clients have become happier and stayed longer.

It worked so well that we raised the minimum to $80,000 and added an employee profit-sharing program.

Yet outside our company, it made no impact: no businesses followed suit, and the pay gap between workers and CEOs remains massive.

[Trees for Streets @TreesforStreets]

You may not have known that today is World Soil Day, but we want to celebrate how vital soil and green patches are to local communities.

Without soil on and near our roads, we would be much more susceptible to flooding in the winter, as urban soil does an incredible job of collecting rainwater runoff 💧

[Farrukh @implausibleblog]

Susanna Reid, "What did Nigel Farage say to you when you were both at Dulwich college together?"

Peter Ettedgui, "He regularly would come up to me and say Hitler was right, and he's also come up to me and go, gas them"

Susanna Reid, "Are you Jewish?"

Peter Ettedgui, "Yes"

Susanna Reid, "So he was specifically targeting you because you were Jewish, with the most hurtful comment?"

Peter Ettedgui, "Yeah, absolutely"

"My German Jewish grandparents had escaped Nazi Germany in 1937, so I kind of grew up knowing about the Holocaust and everything that had happened"

"This was the first time I had ever been targeted for antisemitic abuse in my life"

"I have to say it was also the last time. I have since never remotely had anyone say anything like that to me"

Susanna Reid, "How old were you at the time?"

Peter Ettedgui, "Between the ages of 13 and 14"

"When I was first approached to talk about this back in 2013, I felt that it was an unfair thing to do. And it was only after Nigel Farage denied it, that I had to say something, because there's no way he couldn't remember"

"I was really worried that it was one person's word against another, but what has come up in the more recent reporting there's a large number of people who not only corroborate my experience but have their own experience"

Ed Balls, "Nigel Farage has at times said this is untrue. At other times said it's playground banter. That it was a long time ago. That there was no intent to cause harm"

*GMB play the clip of Farage denying antisemitism"

Ed Balls, "He's never directly racially abused anybody"

Jean-Pierre Lihou, "That's not true"

"Peter and I were good friends at school, and I've heard it live"

Susanna Reid, "So you weren't the target of Nigel Farage's comments but you witnessed them. Were there any others?"

Jean-Pierre Lihou, "Yeah, anybody who wasn't white would likely to have a comment"

"That was for many years. We're talking 13-14, all the way up to senior school"

Susanna Reid, "So what else did you witness?"

Jean-Pierre Lihou, "Anybody who was not white, Nigel Farage would go up to and say useless, or, send them home"

"Nigel Farage used to draw NF (National Front) all over his schoolbooks, with pride"

"When I came over from Belgium at the time as a ten year old, my father was in the military, my mother was from Germany"

"While I had no conflicts with Nigel Farage, it was odd to come to this big school in London and to have such an obvious thing"

Ed Balls, "Playground banter. We all grew up in the 1970s. It was harsh then. People said things on television about disability which you wouldn't say now"

"But, the Nazi's were right and the hissing of the gas chamber"

Jean-Pierre Lihou, "When you think about it its crazy"

"When I used to be called, because I'm from Germany, the K word, but you say, things you couldn't imagine saying now"

"That's the point. When you look online, those things are starting to come out again, and that's the dangerous thing"

Susanna Reid, "Was this a one off?"

Peter Ettedgui, "No. We were in the same class. Neighbouring desks because we were seated in alphabetical order"

"This was, whenever he saw me. It was almost a kind of gut reflex when he saw me"

"I was very struck by an interview a classmate gave to The Guardian the other day, where he said, I don't understand why Peter took it, why he didn't react"

"I think learnt to throw a protective cloak over myself and ignore him"

"I found my own tribe at school, and it wasn't all bad"

"So I kind of got on with my life"

"That experience marked me"

"Antisemitism is often called the oldest hatred, and when I think of the oldest hatred, it's Nigel Farage's face that I see in front of me"

"I'd like to pick up on this thing about it being the 1970s, it was a different time, you're absolutely right"

"But words like, the K word, the Y word, the Jews, the P word, those were being thrown around"

"Nigel Farage was of a completely different order"

"The regularity, the intention with which he did this, to so many pupils of different races"

Jean-Pierre Lihou, "The singing of the song: gas them all"

"He used to regularly sing that at school"

"It's horrendous. I don't want to sing it on TV"

Peter Ettedgui, "Another story has come out from another Jewish pupil, younger than me, who remembers Farage and his pals waiting outside Jewish assembly, waiting to taunt the kids coming out"

Ed Balls, "Nigel Farage says he didn't ay any of these things with intent"

"But standing outside the Jewish assembly at Dulwich college to say things about the Nazis, feels like it has some intent"

Peter Ettedgui, "A great deal of intent"

Jean-Pierre Lihou, "Regular"

Peter Ettedgui, "Yeah, and the targeting of other students of ethnic minorities waiting at the school gates"

Ed Balls, "Last night Nigel Farage told us that the stories they are telling about him from 50 years ago are not true"

Jean-Pierre Lihou, "It said these things also when he was 14, 15, 16, 17, when the issue of the prefect of the nomination came up, it wasn't just 50 years ago when he was 11"

Ed Balls, "He says the two of you are politically motivated"

Jean-Pierre Lihou, "I don't have any political affiliations at all"

Peter Ettedgui, "And neither do I"

"There isn't a political, but a deeply personal motivation"

"I do not want to see a school bully become my prime minister"

"That probably goes for all 20+ people who have spoken out about his behaviour at school"

[ALASTAIR CAMPBELL @campbellclaret]

Another Reform story that will be ignored by most of the telly radio and right wing papers to add to Nathan Gill, Farage tax arrangements, non declarations of earnings, Russian interference in Brexit and anything else that stops them being able to say their phrase of the moment “the rise of Reform”

[David Mullings 🇯🇲 @davidmullings]

Woke up to this message in one of our diaspora hurricane relief groups and everyone agreed:

“Good morning can i make a suggestion, humbly? Before we begin purchasing and shipping items from abroad, I’m asking us to think strategically. Jamaica may have businesses that already sell many of these same products. Instead of bypassing them, can we identify and buy directly from local suppliers. That approach strengthens the economy, creates jobs, and accelerates recovery from within.

This isn’t just relief. It’s rebuilding with dignity and strategy.”

#HurricaneMelissa

[Carole Cadwalladr @carolecadwalla]

My colleagues & I have taken a huge gamble to set up @thenerve_news. We’re trying to build a new independent publication from the ground up. Social media is our only distribution for now.

Sharing this article in your networks would make a huge difference. Thank you! 🙏🙏🙏

[Carole Cadwalladr @carolecadwalla]

NEW: The British politician, his Russian intelligence handler & a Kremlin plot against the US & Ukraine.

My new piece about Nathan Gill and Nigel Farage for @thenerve_news in which we ask:

Why, even now, is no-one asking questions?

[Arnaud Bertrand @RnaudBertrand]

Here's a question I know many are wondering about: why did China wait until now to use rare earths as leverage against the US? Why not in the first Trump administration when the US started the trade hostilities? Or when the Biden administration unleashed the chips export controls 3 years ago?

I just watched a fascinating explanation by a Chinese analyst and, unexpectedly, a big part of the explanation is... helium.

I had no idea but as he explains (source here: https://t.co/eUbbU5QIHW), all the way until 2022 China imported 95% of its helium and most of it was controlled by the US. Of the world's ten largest helium producers, four were American companies, and the remaining six all used American technology.

Helium isn't just a party balloons gas: it has plenty of industrial applications for things such as quantum computing, rocket technology, MRI machines, as a coolant for chip lithography equipment, etc.

In a nutshell what he's explaining is that with helium the US had an even stronger card to play if China ever used the rare earths card.

This raised huge alarm bells inside China. In an article published in late 2022 in the journal Frontiers in Environmental Science (https://t.co/eZhyv438LK), several researchers from PetroChina’s Beijing-based Research Institute of Petroleum Exploration and Development stressed that China would be greatly affected if the US imposed a “stranglehold” blockade on helium exports.

So over the past few years there were gigantic efforts in China to break the "helium shackles," with seven helium extraction facilities going into production, and China also switching imports from the US in favor of imports from friendly countries like Russia.

China's research ecosystem also went into overdrive to find solutions to the helium dependency issues, with China's Academy of Sciences awarding its annual 2024 "Outstanding Science and Technology Achievement Prize" to a new helium extraction technology project (https://t.co/eWs163mfaO) because "these scientific and engineering achievements broke the long-standing monopoly of the US and ensured the security of China's helium resources" (https://t.co/d7YquWKFGS)

The result: by the end of 2024 China had cut its helium dependence on the US to less than 5% (https://t.co/wOxm8VRZJj). The "helium shackles" were broken.

That's what most people don't realize: power isn't about intentions or rhetoric - it's about what you can actually do. Many wonder why countries almost never retaliate when the US imposes sanctions or export controls. The answer is simple: they can't. They lack the alternatives, the technology, the supply chains.

China is the first country that systematically worked to eliminate every single pressure point, with humongous efforts. It's not just helium: it's chips, energy, telecommunication, pharmaceuticals, etc.

That's why the rare earth card can finally be played now. Not because China suddenly became aggressive, but because they have developed the capabilities to say "no."

Last word: as a European, this is both depressing and inspiring. Depressing because it highlights the immense magnitude of the task at hand to become genuinely sovereign and develop our own capabilities to say "no." Inspiring because China demonstrated that it can actually be done, and relatively fast if we execute competently. Although with the current crop of folks at the helm in Europe, that last part is admittedly a very, very big "if"...

[Dr. Ezzideen @ezzingaza]

Since early morning, my family and I have been living in a state of total psychological collapse.
Today we learned that our homes, our land, and our entire neighborhood, every house belonging to our family and our neighbors, have been completely erased. Bulldozed. Flattened into a barren stretch of yellow dust.

From the first light of day, we have been living the full meaning of defeat.
We have lost more than seventy members of our family. We have lost our land.
We now have no home to return to, no walls to protect us, no place left to call our own.

And then, one of Hamas’s leaders appears on television declaring that “the people have not been defeated,” that “Gaza has stood firm and fought a historic war.”

So let history record this:
I, Dr. Ezzideen Shehab, from Gaza, together with my family, my friends, and their families, did not fight any war.
We were the victims of an annihilation ignited by Hamas from within our homes, only for the Israeli army to descend upon us and unleash its full cruelty on the civilians of Gaza, while Hamas’s fighters vanished into their tunnels.

Let history record the truth: we were defeated, utterly, painfully, and completely defeated.
And it is we, the people of Gaza, who have the right to say whether we were defeated or not, not those who sit comfortably in Qatar or Turkey.

We were crushed, humiliated, and broken after our city was destroyed, occupied, and erased from existence.
We were displaced, stripped of everything we had built, left to wander through the ruins of our own lives.

And somewhere amid all this, I understood something simple and terrible:
My mother’s tears are holier than the homeland itself, and my father’s brokenness matters more to me than any flag.
Because what meaning does a homeland hold when it devours the ones you love, when it glorifies death but forgets the living?

We were not steadfast. We were held hostage in our own land.
We could not leave. We could not change those who claimed to rule us.
We were trapped between a merciless occupier and rulers who feed on our suffering.

And if there is one moment in my life when I must speak the truth, without fear, without hesitation, then this is that moment.

Let it be written clearly:
We were not soldiers in a war.
We were the bodies buried beneath it.

#GazaGenocide

[Parody Nigel Farage @Parody_PM]

Nigel Farage is desperate to convince everyone that he never met Nathan Gill, the traitor who took bribes from Russia, so please don't share these.

[Ragged Trousered Philanderer @RaggedTP]

First words from Tadhg Hickey as he returns home to Ireland after being kidnapped and illegally detained by the occupying forces. We pray for the release of all Palestinian Men, Women and Children being illegally detained.

[Carole Cadwalladr @carolecadwalla]

One month before Russia invaded Ukraine, I stood trial at the High Court. And now I wait, in purgatory, to be judged.

But I believe this trial and the silence around it - & all the Kremlin's men - has revealed something profoundly rotten at the heart of the British state.
1/

[dave lawrence 🐟🐟🐠 @dave43law]

Farage is far from happy about this

Feel free to share #Farage