Philip Patrick

This is what @Keir_Starmer is afraid of.

Many conservatives have foolishly begun to yearn for proportional representation, as it would get them more seats. It would also exclude them from office forever, and weaken parliament. I defend first-past-the post here on the Hitchens-Vine blog open.spotify.com/episode/0A0nGV… podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/ala…

Ambition Before Accountability. The Pattern Burnham Hopes You've Forgotten Andy Burnham is positioning himself as the man who will change Labour for the better. The outsider who understands working people. The mayor who got things done. Before Westminster accepts that narrative it should examine the one thing Burnham has been consistent about throughout his career. When institutional failure has required a reckoning, he has commissioned a review, expressed anger and moved on. The reckoning never comes. Start with Mid Staffordshire. As Health Secretary from 2009 to 2010 Burnham personally recommended the trust for Foundation Trust status on the basis of four lines of information. Between 400 and 1,200 more patients died at Stafford Hospital than would have been expected. He and his predecessor Alan Johnson rejected 81 requests for a full public inquiry sitting in public across their combined tenures. The Francis Inquiry, which Burnham resisted, found systematic failures. David Nicholson, the NHS chief, told that inquiry that the level of detail Burnham required before recommending Foundation Trust status was surprising because usually ministers would expect much more. The HuffPost analysis published at the time concluded that looking at the witness statements it was difficult not to reach the conclusion that Burnham was guilty at best of incompetence, at worst of gross negligence. Burnham's response was to stand before Parliament and accuse the government of failing to respond adequately to the Francis Report. The report he never wanted. About the trust he had recommended. Then comes the Augusta inquiry. Operation Augusta was a Greater Manchester Police investigation into a grooming gang of up to 100 members who abused at least 57 children, some as young as 12. It was closed before Burnham's mayoralty. But when MPs wrote to him challenging him on the failures documented in the subsequent review, his response was described in Hansard as supine. He accepted the lack of resources argument without challenge despite Greater Manchester Police having gained over 1,000 additional officers in the years the operation ran. There was, in the words of MPs who examined his reply, no sense of injustice. The minutes from the GMP meeting where the decision to close Augusta was taken had disappeared. The minutes from Manchester City Council had disappeared at the same time. The IOPC subsequently concluded it could not determine who took the decision or why because records were missing and former employees were unwilling to cooperate. The Rochdale review he commissioned identified 96 men still deemed a potential risk to children who remained at large. Nobody has answered the question of what his mayoralty did to locate and prosecute them. Not Burnham. Not any of the MPs now championing him for Downing Street. The pattern is not accidental. Mid Staffordshire. Augusta. Rochdale. In every case the same structure. Institutional failure. Review commissioned. Parliamentary challenge answered inadequately. Unanswered questions buried under the next announcement. The man presenting himself as the antidote to institutional evasion has spent his entire career practicing it. Now he seeks to represent Makerfield. Reform is ahead in polling for the seat by 46 to 35 percent. Labour lost 20 councillors in Wigan last Thursday while Reform gained 23. The seat being handed to him is no longer the safe Labour fortress it once was. If he loses it his leadership bid ends before it begins. If he wins it the questions above will follow him to Westminster. The political class preparing to crown him has not required him to answer those questions once. It will not start now. Changing the leader without changing the culture of institutional evasion reproduces the problem with a more popular face attached. Britain has been here before. It knows how it ends.

@WingsScotland @CraigMurrayOrg Brilliant riposte.

Firstly, he isn’t a Dr. Secondly, he isn’t “non-binary”, because nobody is. Thirdly, people haven’t called for him to be deported for getting elected or for being trans or brown or whatever, but merely observed the simple material fact that people who breach their visa terms have no right to remain. Amusingly, it turned out that our legislaters created a loophole whereby being an MSP is not classed as work, despite paying almost £80,000 a year of public money, so in fact he does have the right to remain for now, subject to being granted a graduate visa, which will extend that by three years. It is highly UNlikely he’ll qualify for any other visa after that, and will not be able to legally complete his term, a farcical,position which people have rightly highlighted. Those are the facts of the matter. You have chosen to swerve all around them in order to launch a bitter smear attack on some women who have fought for years at considerable personal cost to clarify and uphold the law of the land and the rights of women. Ironically, as someone who has fought similar battles, also at considerable personal cost, you appear unable or unwilling to empathise with them. People can only speculate as to why you’re so hostile to the idea of women protecting their rights.

Dr Manivannan - The furore around the election of Dr Manivannan to the Scottish Parliament is deeply troubling. There is no argument whatsoever that they were eligible to stand for election. The law was changed specifically in order for those on temporary craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2026/…

@GoodwinMJ 100%

“We’ve had free speech in the UK for a very very long time”. That’s what Keir Starmer said to President Trump. But now look at what just happened in the UK in the last 48 hours alone. ➡️ Starmer’s government is pushing ahead with plans to scrap jury trials that will trash our ancient traditions, despite these never appearing in the Labour manifesto. ➡️Starmer’s government is pushing ahead with plans to impose Digital ID - a naked power grab - despite this also never appearing in the Labour manifesto. ➡️Starmer’s government is pushing ahead with plans to impose EU single market rules and laws which will cost the people billions of pounds while stripping us of our sovereignty, going against the democratic Brexit vote, and leaving us unable to influence EU decisions. ➡️ And Starmer’s government just BANNED conservatives from entering Britain on the grounds they are “not conducive to the public good” while allowing Islamist sympathisers & anti-Semites to stream across our border every day. Are they “conducive to the public good?” As I explain in my newsletter below, contrary to what Keir Starmer tells you this is all happening. We face a sustained attack on our freedoms. And so the quicker not just Keir Starmer but this authoritarian Labour government is removed from power the better. They’ve never understood the British people. They’ve never understood our ancient traditions. And they’ve never understood our country.

I do get tired of the claims that the campaigners for justice in the Letby case have coarse and selfish motives.

Shocked silence has greeted the official junking of the IPCC's climate doomsday RCP8.5 scenario. The mainstream media don’t seem to want to report that their Net Zero fearmongering lies in tatters, says Chris Morrison. dailysceptic.org/2026/05/14/sho…

@ClarkeMicah Beautiful. Thank you.

Why I am relinquishing my column for ‘The Lamp’ thelampmagazine.com/blog/bind-and-…

As an MP, I will not comply with Digital ID. I just won't do it, and I hope many millions of British men and women will join me. Send a message to Starmer - share this graphic absolutely everywhere. I will not comply with Digital ID.

Here are 4 things that happened to the UK in the last 24 hours: 1. The Labour government confirmed it will remove the right to a jury trial. Cases will be tried by a judge alone. 2. The Labour gvt confirmed it will impose Digital ID despite it never being included in Labour's manifesto and nearly 3 million Brits signing a petition against it. 3. The Labour gvt confirmed we will "align" with the European Union, directly going against the 2016 democratic vote for Brexit & forcing the British people to pay billions for laws they'll never be able to influence. 4. The Labour gvt confirmed that while Islamist sympathisers & antisemites are free to march on the streets of our capital city, & while it welcomes former allies of al-Qaeda into Downing Street, it has banned conservative activists from joining a peaceful protest against mass immigration in London. Put all these things together and you get a sense - just a sense - of how hideously authoritarian and illiberal this Labour government really is.

@AlexBerenson @jlawrencenc Fantastic result Mr Berenson and hugely important. This should be leading the news.

This is a groundbreaking settlement - @jlawrencenc, my (very able) lawyer, and I think it's the first time any individual American has received a cash payment to resolve a lawsuit over government coercion of social media companies. Will the mainstream media cover it? HAHAHAHAHA

@EvaVlaar Shameful, all true Brits are with you Eva.

I would be very interested to see their formal response. Since there was no avenue to appeal the travel ban, my lawyer tried to get a response at the British embassy but was immediately denied entry when he said he represented me.

Many of the onshore wind farms along the coasts of the UK and Denmark are falling apart after only 10 years. A study reveals that energy contributions from wind farms begin to fall sharply after only 10 to 15 years, leaving the skeletons of steel and plastic blowing in the wind. The economic analysis reveals the lifespan of an onshore turbine is not 20 to 25 years, as stated by the wind industry itself, supported by the UK Government. This peer reviewed British study reveals that the energy production of onshore wind farms falls substantially as they get older, due to wear and tear. Energy and environmental economist, Professor Gordon Hughes (University of Edinburgh), carried out the statistical analysis of wind farm performance data in the UK and Denmark. He concluded that load factors, like electricity generated as a percentage of capacity, declined a lot faster than expected, suggesting a baseline 10 to 15 year lifespan. This is when the technical life of most turbines crunch to halt, and become unprofitable to continue. Rising maintenance costs makes them uneconomical. The study found the average UK wind farm's ability to meet electricity demand had fallen by a third after around 10 years, leading to a conclusion that many are fully uneconomic to run after only 12 years. While the wind industry generally forecasts a 25-year lifespan, the data reveals a different reality about the viability of keeping them spinning so long. Many companies now 'repower' (replace old turbines with new ones) long before the 25-year target to maximise subsidies and output. This often ends the lifespan of the original hardware much sooner. The wind farm study is published by the 'Renewable Energy Foundation on the Performance of Wind Farms in the United Kingdom and Denmark, 2012'.

Of course.

'It's the most disgusting thing I've ever seen.' Father Ted co-creator Graham Linehan has started a petition against RTE’s Eurovision night programming, after it was announced they would be airing My Lovely Horse, the Eurovision themed episode of the sitcom. He debates RTE's decision not to broadcast the Eurovision, and for Ireland to not compete, with Shane Coleman on The Hard Shoulder.

@WingsScotland Absolutely. Craig Murray is a lost cause.

Q Manivannan has no legal right to be in the UK. His gender is of no relevance whatsoever. He is a foreign national who has breached the terms of his visa. Unless Craig is saying trans people should not be subject to the law like everyone else, there's no "bigotry" here.

Jess Philips resigns add to Keir Starmer’s woes. If the Minister for Silly Walks goes next, he really will be in trouble.