Matty

[Matty @matty8967]

@ArchRose90 @LucyTCWife Don’t think you get given bail once you plead guilty. whopper!

[Matty @matty8967]

@AdamsAVFC @jakesach1 Westham fan what do you expect?

[Dom Joly @domjoly]

@EricLDaugh Thisvis why we have a legal system and not trial by moron

[Matty @matty8967]

@stebrown_bcafc @Beacon_Digitals @TTWAR62 Fucking state of this cunt

[Matty @matty8967]

@The__Padrone @gingerrtom Playing the devils advocate here, but if you read between the lines he his correct. For every ‘Extra’ pound he makes.

[Rishi Sunak @RishiSunak]

I was a very fortunate kid. My dad's GP surgery sat between the Dell and Hampshire's County Ground, so at weekends I could go to a game and get a lift home afterwards. It left me with a passion for both sports and a belief that sport opens a window onto who we are.

When I was growing up, the Tebbit test was a matter of intense debate. Which side did you cheer for at the cricket? For all the criticism it received, it was a test anyone could pass. If you supported England because you saw it as home, you were part of the team regardless of the colour of your skin. Born in Southampton, 10 year old me passed it without even knowing about it.

Giving the @MCCOfficial's Cowdrey Lecture on Thursday made me think about cricket's place in our national life and the current arguments about identity.

In Britain we've built the world's most successful multi-faith, multi-ethnic democracy. I was a beneficiary of it. Whatever issues people had with me as PM (and there was no shortage) my race and religion weren't among them. I could read a lesson at the King's coronation or light Diwali diyas on Downing Street with my daughters without controversy. Foreign leaders assumed these must be huge symbolic moments. For most Brits, they just weren't that big a deal.

But Britain's democratic achievement is now under strain. Some of the challenges are ones I've written about before, like Islamism, and the failure of governments, including the one I led, to adequately control immigration. But something else is going on - a risk that we start equating skin colour with nationality.

After I left office, a debate kicked off here on @X about whether I was English at all, because I was a "brown Hindu". During the election campaign I'd been shocked when footage was broadcast of someone calling me a "Paki." It was shocking precisely because it was so unusual. That kind of abuse had simply not been a feature of my political life. But the Englishness argument was stranger still. Call it the reverse Tebbit test. If you're not white, it no longer matters who you support at the cricket, because you can never be English. It's a test no non-white person can ever pass.

I have no truck with people who offend our sense of fairness and come here illegally; I spent half my premiership trying to deport them to Rwanda. I think the bar for legal migration should be high. It is entirely possible to want a radical reduction in immigration and a far more robust approach to integration, and still totally reject the attempt to turn Britishness into a DNA test.

If you're born and brought up in England and view it as home, what are you other than English? Denying people their Englishness or their Britishness because of the colour of their skin is a recipe for alienation and a two-tier society. How are children who hear this meant to feel?

Sport can play a small but significant role here. Cricket is played by nearly every major ethnic group in this country. Ask what my largely white rural constituents in the Dales and the British-Asian kids in Bradford have in common, and the answer is cricket. If cricket can produce England teams in which every kid can see themselves, the impact reaches far beyond the boundary.

As I write in @thetimes today, we must all be on the same side, cheering for the same team.

We cannot allow race to be reintroduced into our politics. We cannot allow Briton to be set against Briton.

[James Pearce @JamesPearceLFC]

‘Wasn’t listening.’ He’s shameless

[Labour Press @labourpress]

What is the charge? Having a lunch? A succulent oyster champagne lunch?

[Global News Monitor @GlobalNewsMontr]

Do ignorant racists think bacon to muslims is the same as beef for Hindus?

They don’t worship the pigs you clowns🤣😭

[Andrew Neil @afneil]

I’ve watched this investigation carefully. It has Reform UK banged to rights in conspiring to accept illegal donations. Two of Nigel Farage’s most senior aides have already been shown the door.

[Dr Rosena @DrRosena]

Cowardice is running away from your seat in the North East (to which you said you were "bloody loyal") to a safe Tory seat in Essex, and you still only scraped in by 20 votes.

Pipe down, Richard.

[Matty @matty8967]

@AtTheRaces More comebacks than undertaker

[MrTARDIS @TrilbeeReviews]

It's collective insanity that 90% of Reform's Policies are "We will stop foreigners from accessing [thing they NEVER had access to]!" and it's met by cheers from their supporters and zero fact-checking from UK media.

[G.T @gingerrtom]

Watch Lucy White get absolutely cooked on Sky News after trying to use the war to push her racist ideology.

The stutter killed me. 🤣🤣🤣

[Matty @matty8967]

@plusEVbacker Remember tracking this horse being sold in the goffs million sale for €150,000 to E bethels yard and at one point finishing 3rd to Chaldean 🤡

[Nick Robinson @bbcnickrobinson]

@RupertLowe10 Happy to have you back on. Perhaps next time you come on @BBCr4today you’ll come ready to answer questions asking you to explain things that you’ve said.

[Simon 🇬🇧🌹 @AndyBurnhamFC]

Suella. Use your brain for five seconds and think why Andy might post this on January 6th 2021. Like, actually think

[Matty @matty8967]

@CapitalistClive @GBPolitcs God forbid a man has pint. Thought Reform were all for reinstating British values you weasel.

[Matty @matty8967]

@RealNatalieRowe What a prat!