Mike Murphy

[Maxi @AllForProgress_]

82 years ago this morning, a man of 31 from Middlesbrough waded onto Gold Beach in Normandy and, before the light went, did the thing that would make him the only man awarded a Victoria Cross for the actions of D-Day itself.

His name was Stanley Hollis. Before the war he had driven lorries and worked as a sandblaster. On 6 June 1944, a company sergeant-major in the Green Howards, he spotted a German pillbox his company had walked straight past. He went at it himself, up the open slope into the machine-gun fire, cleared it with a Sten and grenades, and took a second position and its occupants prisoner. Later that day, near a village called Crépon, two of his men lay pinned in the open under a German field gun and as good as dead. He went back out for them, into the fire, and brought them in. He had taken them in there, was his reasoning, so it fell to him to get them out.

That is more or less the whole of it. No speech, no pageant, no press release. A lorry driver from Teesside decided that other men's lives were his to answer for, and walked into the guns, twice, to make it good.

My dad was born in '61. We often sit and marvel at the fact that he is the full-way, and me half-way, through our fighting ages as men, and neither of us have ever been called up to war. We are the lucky few. But it is worth being honest, on this morning of all mornings, about what has thinned out between the country my dad and I have known, and Sgt. Major Hollis'.

Hollis did not wait to be told. He did not film the pillbox and tag the relevant authority. He saw what needed doing, judged it his to do, and did it. That mortal reflex - take responsibility, act, and expect no official to come and save you - was once an ordinary thing here, bred into ordinary men. Two generations of being managed and waited upon have quietly bred much of it not out but into deep dormancy.

The men of that generation did not cross the Channel in 1944 for a Britain that waits for permission to act, nor for one that watches its own dying boys handcuffed on the pavement. They did it for something they felt in their bones and would never have trusted to an institutional memorandum: a free people, fit to govern and defend itself, worth the dying for.

We owe them more than a poppy and a minute's silence. We owe them the vision of that country.

Stanley Hollis came home, kept a pub, and died in 1972. There are barely any of them left now, very old and very quiet. The decent thing would be to become a country of which they might be proud.

[Mike Murphy @mikemurff]

@Mishi_2210 980

[Just Jacob’s Dad @Dunkirk_1940]

Volunteer RNLI crews from Skegness, Bridlington, Mablethorpe and Cleethorpe along with Coastguard currently responding to a major incident in the North Sea. Remember that when politicians tell you not to donate to them😡
#NotAllHeroesWearCapes 🦸‍♂️

[Mike Murphy @mikemurff]

@ITV @GMB just switched tv off #piersmorgan

[Carol Vorderman @carolvorders]

Hmmmmmm

[Mike Murphy @mikemurff]

@[email protected] what is the truth about @ofgem incorrectly forecasting price cap as they assumed energy companies would pay higher borrowing costs than has been the case giving rise to higher net profit… #£bns @MartinSLewis #martinlewis

[Bill Madden @maddenifico]

Fuck yes! With Trump acting like a dejected toddler, Macron told the world that Russia should compensate Ukraine bcz it was Putin who started the war. This is a lesson for American politicians, as well as the press. Never cower to a fascist authoritarian.

[Mike Murphy @mikemurff]

@thecarfactoids @neilmbriscoe @t2stu @DarraghMcKenna @TopOfTheTower @StvCr @autocar @Rootes_Group @BMMuseum @avengerSunbeam @jertownsend @GeorgeCochrane1 @HagertyUK Morris Minor

[Haggis_UK 🇬🇧 🇪🇺 @Haggis_UK]

Jess Phillips: "I wrote a book about Sara Rowbotham(Rochdale whistleblower) 6 years ago... so the johnny-come-lately Justice Secretary(Robert Jenrick)... I look forward to reading that book he's writing on the subject."

[Barry Halverson @barry_halverson]

Kemi Badenoch has been an MP for 8 years, she has been children’s minister & women’s equality minister, not once did she call for a national enquiry, in fact she never even mentioned it in parliament. Her miraculous Damascene conversion happened immediately after Musks tweet.

[dave ❄️ 🥕 🧻 @mrdavemacleod]

“We should have got on to him early on”

Ian Hislop’s takedown of Elon Musk is a thing of beauty 👏

[Adam Bienkov @AdamBienkov]

Liz Truss threatens to sue Keir Starmer unless he "ceases and desists" from alleging she crashed the economy.

In other news, here's Liz Truss making the exact same allegation against Gordon Brown

[Allison Pearson @AllisonPearson]

Exclusive:
Liz Truss’s Cease and Desist letter to Keir Starmer.
Stop saying I crashed the economy!
1/4

[Liz Webster @LizWebsterSBF]

Brilliant 👏 take down of musk by Ian Hislop.

[Lyndy Mountain @LyndyMountain]

@implausibleblog What did they talk about in Cabinet meetings, parties, cakes, posh wine & champers, holiday homes, contracts with Russian mates, photo opportunities .......... 14 years of utter tory drivel, which did one thing - left our country to wreck & ruin. We shall never forget.

[PaoloThomas💙🇮🇹🦊😸🐶🐹🐻🦉🦡🦔🐑🐖🐂🦘🦒🐎🐇🦏 @PaoloThomas]

@implausibleblog Dorries appears to have forgotten what her great hero told her to think about inquiries into historic abuse.

[Farrukh @implausibleblog]

Wow! Must watch car crash interview with Nadine Dorries

Nadine Dorries, "I'm a victim of child sexual abuse as well, through the Church of England"

Victoria Derbyshire, "When did you realise you wanted another inquiry?"

ND, "When the call came for one"

VD, "From Elon Musk?"

ND, "I wasn't aware the problem was as widespread as it was... The inquiry was more further reaching than the grooming gangs.. A national inquiry on the grooming gangs and the people who knew"

VD, "So why didn't the Conservatives do that?"

ND, "That's a good question"

VD, "You were in government"

ND, "No, I was Culture Secretary, this didn't go anywhere near my desk"

VD, "You were sat around the cabinet table"

ND, "The entire time I was in cabinet this was never discussed"

VD, "Why?"

ND, "I.. I.."

VD, "Because there are a number of Conservatives who were in government who are calling for it now"

ND, "I can't answer the question.. A good person who can answer the question would be Suella Braverman and Priti Patel"

VD, "There's no record of you speaking in the parliamentary chamber about any of the local inquiries or ever calling for a national inquiry"

ND, "You don't have to stand up in the chamber and speak about something to support something.. I attended meetings in committee rooms"

VD, "Tomorrow the Conservatives are calling for another inquiry.. That's despite the Conservatives setting up that 7 year £200 million independent inquiry on child sexual abuse.. And then the Conservative government didn't implement any of the 20 recommendations.. Isn't calling for another one the very definition of political opportunism?"

ND, "Frequently inquiries take place and none of the recommendations are implemented"

VD, "The same people who didn't implement those recommendations calling for another inquiry, isn't that the definition of political opportunism?"

ND, "Its a definition of what we need to do to fix how government deals with inquiries"

VD, "You had 14 years to do that"

ND, "Dealing with recommendations made from people outside of Westminster, the people who put them in place are civil servants"

VD, "So it's the civil servants fault?"

ND, "No, what I'm saying your dealing with something outside of the normal processes so maybe it can't be delivered by government"

VD, "Well the Conservatives didn't deliver any of the 20 recommendations"

Narrator: Nadine Dorries blames the process for why the Conservatives didn't deliver, while Labour use the process to start delivering, make it make sense

[Natalie Bloomer @natalie_bloomer]

I once contacted @jessphillips out of the blue for advice about a woman I was trying to support who had fled domestic violence. I emailed her at 7pm on a Friday night not really expecting a response. 1/2

[Natalie Bloomer @natalie_bloomer]

At 11pm that night, she sent an urgent email to the head of the local council explaining all the ways they were failing in their duty to this woman and demanding to know how they would support her going forward. That’s somebody who cares about the safety of women and girls. 2/2

[Supertanskiii @supertanskiii]

This is Jess Philips.

Do you know who should really be ashamed? @RobertJenrick who was Home Office minister Oct 2022 to Dec 2023 and is capitalising on far right lies.

The Tories for allocating child sex abuse victims £40 each and Elon Musk for being a dangerous ignorant moron.