Hellequin

@EdwardJDavey So binary. Politicians love a good binary argument that ignores all the implications that go beyond. Let's say you do that and Israel / US cut off intelligence to the UK. Do you believe there are no threats being stopped? We'd find out quick enough... All for some posturing...

After Trump's latest shocking threats, Keir Starmer faces a choice. Withdraw US access now to UK air bases, or risk letting British soil be used to commit war crimes.

@ccurts2 @denali16 @julianHjessop @ZoeJardiniere I can't find an estimate on how much it would bring in, and it won't be up and running tomorrow, but for context the British Industrial Competitiveness Scheme is budgeted for ~£500m a year. Even an increase of 10% in budget could bring many more businesses into scope

@Hellequintalks @denali16 @julianHjessop @ZoeJardiniere Agreed on policy. The extra revenue will be welcome, but not transformative

It is blowing my mind how many people don’t seem able to grasp that oil & gas in the North Sea is not “ours” but was sold off to private companies who will trade it on the international market like any other fuel. We don’t get any kind of privileged access to this fuel.

@ccurts2 @denali16 @julianHjessop @ZoeJardiniere I think the policy point here, and why the concession to licence has been made, is the extra revenue can be used to fund market interventions to reduce bills. Whether that'll target households or businesses I don't know

@denali16 @julianHjessop @ZoeJardiniere I'm all for local production. All for it. But to repeat myself, loosening the restrictions in the NS won't affect my gas bill.

Remember: Iranian schoolgirls were poisoned for removing forced hijab. Their mothers demanded answers and were beaten. At the same time, European officials went to Tehran, complied with hijab, and legitimized the same system.

@Londonboylab @alexwickham Bro... C'mon.. If it isn't a free election, one where you don't need to worry about persecution because of your beliefs, it's not an election. I'm looking forward to a free Iran in the near future, after the IRGC has been wiped from the face of this earth. Back to 70s Iran vibes

@Hellequintalks @alexwickham You realise Iran literally had a democratic election in 2024 right?

NEW: Bloomberg Easter weekend read Labour MPs think Iran has given Keir Starmer a reprieve that could put off a May leadership challenge. That might mean Angela Rayner misses her window to make it to No10. — MPs and aides say while Starmer still faces danger if Labour takes massive losses on May 7, his chances of surviving the local elections have increased. — Polymarket now sees just a 27% chance of Starmer going by June 30. That’s down from 45% a week ago and well below the 67% likelihood seen at the height of the Mandelson scandal in February. — The prediction platform still puts the chance of him leaving by the end of the year at 59%, though that too is down from 67% a week ago and 77% in Feb. — Bets are shifting in favour of Starmer’s survival. That sentiment reflects the views of Labour MPs. One suggests the war means a challenge may be delayed to later this year or next year. — They put that down to two factors. It is harder for Starmer’s opponents to criticise him and make their case to replace him while he grapples with an international crisis. And the PM has won plaudits from even some of his critics for resisting extreme pressure from Trump. — Another Labour official said Starmer’s rivals would be much more likely to be able persuade MPs to oust him if things had still not improved by the halfway point to the next election, which comes around the end of this year. They argue Labour conference could be a decisive moment for Starmer and his would-be successors. — Some Labour MPs said the danger to Starmer was over-stated, doubting whether any contender would be able to amass the 80 MP signatures needed for a challenge. One said a common view among backbenchers, especially among new Labour MPs first elected in 2024, is that the chaos and leadership changes under the last Conservative government crashed their electoral appeal, and Labour shouldn’t make the same mistake. — MPs also reported they hadn’t seen evidence of the kind of support-gathering and coordination by the likes of Rayner that would be needed to force a leadership vote. — Rayner’s chances are complicated by this narrative shift. She had been presented with a window after the local elections where she would have been the clear front-runner, with Wes Streeting falling back and Andy Burnham blocked. — But if a challenge is delayed, that increases the chances of Burnham becoming a contender, MPs say. He would likely try again to run for parliament and it would be much harder for Starmer to prevent him from doing so next time round, they argue, given Labour’s defeat in Gorton and the PM’s vow to be more “inclusive” with his party. — Burnham making it to parliament might see him supplant Rayner as the favourite. As one MP put it, a deferred challenge could see Rayner miss her window. That could provide an incentive for her to move sooner, and some MPs on the soft-left may be less squeamish about a move against the PM during a global crisis. It leaves Rayner with a difficult political calculation to contemplate over the coming weeks. With @Joe_Mayes >> bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

@Londonboylab @alexwickham I guess I do give more leniency to a democracy that has the power to vote its leaders out. Democracies tend to have legal systems that lead to consequences for these things too, which seems to be happening in the US. I don't give leniency to fundamental dictatorships

@Hellequintalks @alexwickham Gotcha. Western leaders can kill their own people as long its not many. Thanks for clarifying But also targeting women like states in the US do with proposed death penalty for abortions? But again......western leaders get a pass

@Londonboylab @alexwickham You can't put ICE in the same bracket as the IRGC... While their actions can both be bad, there are levels to this... 30,000 of its own citizens. Not total, just in the last few months. Volume matters, so does the torture before killing, the targeting of women etc..

@Hellequintalks @alexwickham 2 things can be bad at the same time? But im also curious if its the amount of people that were killed or the fact that anyone was killed because of protests. Because ICE literally killed people for protesting but apparently Iran is the cohntry that needs dealing with?

@Londonboylab @alexwickham They did, which seems to have been because of bad intelligence. It's appalling that Trump hasn't even given an apology for it. Yet to the point you're making, Iran has killed 30,000 of its citizens since the protests that sparked the US intervention. But they're ok?

@Hellequintalks @alexwickham "The west" literally bombed a primary school killing 160+ children......

@John_Karalis Just sub him in for 30 seconds in a game and call a timeout to take him back out. Silly rules require silly workarounds

Luka has now played in 64 games ... Imagine if the technical foul suspension is the reason why he doesn't qualify for postseason awards

@IainDale Or if you want to keep the triple lock, be honest about the need to make it means tested in some way. These benefits need to return to their core purpose, which was to give dignity in retirement. It was not meant as a handout to the already wealthy. Make it affordable again

One day, a politician will have the bollocks to say in public what they're quite happy to say when the microphone is off, and that is this. The Triple lock is unaffordable and must go. We all know it. And I say that as someone who in four years would benefit from it.

@ZoeJardiniere @lewisayres Or start having more kids again. A lot of scaremongering about overpopulation amongst the young these days that is having significant damage. Have younger cousins upset they won't be able to have kids because of "ecological devastation". Yet migration is not challenged...

@lewisayres It’s not. We need to reverse the plummeting net migration numbers if we want to keep paying pensions & providing public services.

Fun fact

@tomhfh If the US was on the table I'd agree Tom, but it's fairly clear the only relationship available there is one of complete subservience and that's not an economic surety in the slightest

Partnering with the zero growth museum continent. For what? Their cheap abundant energy? Their dominant defence sector? Their trillion dollar tech companies? Oh wait.

@DaveKeating I don't think diplomacy has ever been described as being abrasive

I'm sure 🇪🇺President von der Leyen again had a rebuke for the EU foreign policy chief as a result of this. Kallas is punished any time she stands up for Europe.

@henrywinter The lines are so blurred. We've regularly seen owners be the face of a club and openly support political parties e.g. Sir Alan Sugar. Politicians regularly get free tickets through betting companies to see matches, that's within a clubs control. We can't pick and choose

The issue here is that no politician, whatever their party, should be allowed the opportunity to use a football club as a platform to promote themselves.

1. NPR’s @EmilyZFeng has been interviewing Iranians who’ve recently fled to Turkey. She reports that “most people told us they supported the strikes.” npr.org/2026/03/24/nx-…

@ObamaWellington @Sam_Dumitriu That's true but the point is that when they would normally charge it, we tend to have the option to transmit the electricity to the South East where it's needed. It all comes down to minimising constraint costs. They can cost us a lot, though we don't see that shown on our bill

@Hellequintalks @Sam_Dumitriu And actually if they do change their usage significantly it'll cost a lot too because they won't be paying to charge up their EV or home battery later in the week for example.

This is a good idea, but we're doing it in the most Soviet way possible. DESNZ ruled out using locational price signals, but are now reverse-engineering market outcomes via adminstrative diktat. It's like when the Soviets tried to deal with the fact their factories were extremely inefficient by introducing a complex system of bonuses to replicate how factories behaved in a market economy. Better than nothing, but strictly worse than actually letting markets work.

@ObamaWellington @Sam_Dumitriu It will make it cheaper for those living in over generated areas but not at our expense because there is already a cost being incurred. I think the discount will probably end up tied to usage, ie the more you use the bigger the % discount so that it isn't just a giveaway

@Hellequintalks @Sam_Dumitriu Doesn't feel fair though & the biggest winners will presumably be the wealthy with EVs & home batteries. Also unless a lot of people change their usage significantly it will just cost money because we'll be giving people electricity for free that they'd have used anyway.

@ObamaWellington @Sam_Dumitriu The wind farms get their strike price anyway, whether their generation makes it onto the network or not. So the scheme won't cost extra, it'll just test whether zonal pricing moves demand to where the generation is

@Sam_Dumitriu Presumably the wind farms will still be getting their strike price, while the users will be getting free power... meaning everyone else will be paying their bills to subsidise people who happen to live in the right area 🙃

@Steven_Swinford Tbf, that is exactly what happens when your phone gets nicked in London, so it is plausible. I'd be angry if he'd got preferential treatment because of who he is when the average person gets jack all from the Met.

Exclusive: Police did not investigate the theft of Morgan McSweeney’s phone because officers were “too busy”, despite the sensitivity of his messages and contacts Sir Keir Starmer’s former chief of staff told the Metropolitan police that his phone was stolen as he returned home from a restaurant in central London on October 20 last year The theft of the work device means that McSweeney’s WhatsApp messages and texts to Lord Mandelson, the former ambassador to the US, cannot be retrieved. It has led critics to question whether the phone was stolen The State of It, the political podcast from The Times and The Sunday Times, can disclose that McSweeney told police the phone was taken by a man wearing a balaclava on an electric bike. The man grabbed it out of his hand as McSweeney was responding to text messages and cycled off. McSweeney gave chase but was unable to keep up Scotland Yard has a record of the incident but did not carry out any formal investigation. Officers did not speak to McSweeney directly because they were too busy. He was given a crime reference number and the case was closed McSweeney reported the theft of his phone to No 10 and the device was shut off remotely. He was given a new device with the same number the next day. The theft of the phone was first reported by The Sun on Sunday thetimes.com/uk/politics/ar…