James Oakley

@Gasman2O @GuidoFawkes Now there's an intriguing thought

@GuidoFawkes @GuidoFawkes Do you think there is a chance that 83 rebel labour Mp’s use the vote at the end of the Kings address tomorrow to vote against it ?? Triggering a vote of no confidence and forcing him to resign or call a General Election👀

STARMER LOYALIST LETTER IMPLODES: MPs complain they have been added without their consent. Rupa Huq: “Surprised to see my name on this list when I haven’t either signed any letter supporting the PM or called for the PM to go?? Not very courteous of colleagues to put names down without their approval”

@johnpauldickson @JaneCaro So atheism is a religion, or at the very least can't claim to be the one neutral and beneficent worldview that is outside of what Jane describes

It’s a cute line, Jane (credited to Steven Weinberg) and you can even buy the T-shirt. But it’s too easy. Stalin, an atheist, killed more people each week than the Spanish Inquisition did in three centuries. Most pro-slavery arguments, ancient and modern, were secular, not religious. The real issue isn’t religion versus irreligion, but the human capacity to justify anything when our convictions go unchecked by a clear ethical framework.

Yes, there are some decent people if faith, many of them, in fact, but I completely agree with the view that the only force on earth who can get decent people to do terrible things is religion.

A recent report says that voice notes are huge across the world… apart from in Britain. Here’s my two cents (or pennies) on why I dislike voice notes: 1. I don’t want to have to put in earphones or find a quiet place when out and about, just for you to tell me “yes” or “no” about whether you’re free for a cup of tea next Wednesday. 2. While I’m watching telly, I want to be able to glance down at my phone and get the information I need in text form. I don’t want to have to turn the telly off and listen to your private podcast that’s just for me. 3. I don’t want to wade through three minutes of waffle and chit-chat I never asked for when a thumbs-up emoji will do. 4. It makes me feel like you expect a voice note back - and I’m not doing that. 5. I have no interest in tangents about how you’ve just seen an interesting pigeon on the pavement. I asked if you could give me a lift to the station, and 12 minutes in you’re talking about a pigeon and I’ve missed my train. 6. The convenience is all yours. It’s quick to send a voice note, but much slower for me to consume it. It’s bad manners. I think that about covers it. Of course, if voice notes are a more accessible option for the sender (due to difficulty typing, vision impairment, language barriers, etc.), that’s completely understandable - a different kettle of fish! But if you just like waffling, I’d rather not be the waffle sounding board. (Really I think I’m just jealous of people who are able to talk coherently for minutes at a time).

A couple of hours later, and it's back up. Guess it was a blip that you've fixed.

Hey @todoist, when I try to log in to my account I just get an unformatted error message: Cannot GET /auth/login Is something down your end?

Loved the @BBC podcast "How did we get here?" by @JonnyDymond, but wanted to push back on some of the claims in episode 1 about the Bible not being historical. The guests then were Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones and @simonmontefiore. Other than that, recommended oakleys.org.uk/blog/2026/03/r…

#ConsumerRightsAct #Currys #KnowYourRights A rant for @currys, who are currently breaking the law. Normally I'd let it go, but your customer service is a shitshow and your desire to wash your hands of the faulty items you sell is illegal. On 10 October 2025, I walked into your Exeter shop and bought a PCSpecialist computer. This was the birthday present for my 12-year-old. A present they'd been dropping hints about for months with the subtlety of a child who remains terrible at poker. They'd saved their own pocket money towards it. I topped it up. It was, genuinely, a lovely moment. For four months, it was perfect. Homework. Games. The full experience of being 12 in 2025. On 22 February 2026, four months and 12 days after purchase, it stopped working. No final farewell. It just… stopped. My child sat there pressing the power button with increasing desperation, and nothing happened. The machine that had cost a significant amount of adult money, and a not-insignificant amount of 12-year-old pocket money, was dead. Fine, I thought. This is what a receipt is for. I'll call Currys (the shop I bought it from, with my money, as a birthday present for my child) and they'll sort it. Your staff told me that my contract wasn't with Currys, and that I should contact the manufacturer. They also told me to go in-store with the machine to have it looked at. I went in-store. The in-store staff told me to call the number I had just called. I called again. I was given the phone number for PCSpecialist. Phone → store → same phone → manufacturer. A perfect circle of not helping. A masterpiece of redirection. If it weren't happening to me, I'd almost admire it. Now let's talk about the law, because I think someone at Currys may have forgotten it exists. The Consumer Rights Act 2015 is not a suggestion. It is extremely clear on this point: when you buy something from a retailer, your legal contract is with that retailer. Not the brand on the box. Not the manufacturer. Not some third party you've never met. The shop. The one that took your money and handed you a receipt. Within the first six months of purchase, the law presumes the fault existed at the point of sale. I don't have to prove the computer was faulty when I bought it. Currys has to prove it wasn't. The burden of proof sits entirely with them. During this window, I am legally entitled to a repair or a replacement, and if either of those fails, a full refund. We are currently inside that six-month window. I bought it on 10 October 2025. I complained on 22 February 2026. I am four and a half months in. The law is not ambiguous about what happens here. What makes this particularly spectacular is that Currys' own published policy acknowledges the six-month framework. It is written down on their website. They know the rules. They have typed them up and put them on the internet. They are simply hoping that their customers are too tired from the runaround to actually enforce them. PCSpecialist are entirely blameless in this story. They manufactured a machine. Currys sold that machine to me. My dispute is with Currys. Directing me to PCSpecialist is the retail equivalent of Tesco selling you a gone-off chicken, and when you try to return it, handing you the farmer's phone number. The farmer didn't sell you the chicken. You don't have to knock on the farmer's door. You go back to the supermarket. This is not a controversial legal position. It is just how shops work. My 12-year-old has been without their birthday present for a few days now. They have been, I have to say, considerably more gracious about this than I have. They haven't complained. They've been patient. They are, in this situation, the bigger person — which is a sentence I never expected to write about a primary school leaver, but here we are. They shouldn't have to be patient. They should just have a working computer. So this is where we are, @currys. I know my rights under the Consumer Rights Act 2015. But before I go down the small claims court route, and start contacting every journalist in my network on a slow news day, I am giving you the opportunity to do the right thing, in the hope that public accountability is more efficient than your customer service helpline. A child saved their pocket money for this. Sort it out.

@johnpauldickson It's also not an entirely accurate headline. Blessing ceremonies that take place as part of Sunday worship are still allowed. Stand-alone ceremonies are abandoned for now, while another process is set up to find the way “forward”.

Well, that's surprising! bbc.com/news/articles/…

Fixed

Confirmed. The #Drupal website is redirecting to install.php, which (thankfully) us mere mortals are blocked from running @drupal @drupal_infra #Drupal

Anyone else finding that #Twitter no longer shows you all tweets in date order, even on "Following" view (as opposed to "For you" which we all know doesn't do this)

Hmm, @AdGuard doing their very best to send me emails that reassure me that I can trust my IT security needs with their suite of products.

@LS_trader1 @TheBabylonBee That's exclusive. "A Bee" or just "Bee"

@TheBabylonBee Babylon has oppressive undertones and it's probably racist Please rename to simply "The Bee" 🐝

Announcement: The Bee Is Excited To Unveil Our New Logo buff.ly/moZ73Qg

So after making America's showers great again, @realDonaldTrump has decided his next project is to make America's @CocaCola great again. How does he find the time to address issues such as this? bbc.co.uk/news/articles/…

@doit4thetwins Their maths is interesting too. £0.02 is a 74.25% discount of 0.775p Presume they meant £0.002

“This represents a discount of 74.2%” #CRTM

A bit more of a rant than my thread just now, but Tops does one good rant when he gets going. What he says 👇

I understand platform like @IGcom let you buy without an issue. @ii_couk need to get on top of this or they’ll lose customers. People coming across from @JarvisInvest won’be happy to arrive at a platform that arbitrarily restricts what you can buy. [8/7] #CannotCount 😆🤦‍♂️

(c) It disrupts an orderly market. One of largest retail platforms allows sells but adds friction to buy. (d) There’s no need. With issues like #CostDisclosure or #FCA #ConsumerDuty, they had regulatory reason to restrict certain instruments. There is no restriction here. [7/7]

Time for me add my voice to the others objecting to @ii_couk preventing people buying #TIR @tigerinvests online. I rarely post on stocks, but this is more a post about platforms. This is not good as they prepare to welcome clients of @JarvisInvest to them. 🧵 [1/7]