Tim Ashton

@holland_tom 100 per cent

There can be only one

For some reason, today I've been drawn back to these words, of HM Queen Elizabeth II: (Feb 2012, speech at Lambeth Palace)

#AsYouLikeIt is coming home to @SoultonHall, home of Old Sir Rowland, location of the source text Though Rowland is dead in the play, his spirit lives in its heroes; after nearly 500 years, his spirit returns to the place where the ancient closing dance of harmony is recorded

This beautiful 7th-century Anglo-Saxon gold and garnet pectoral cross was found in St Cuthbert's coffin when is was opened in 1827. It is now on display @durhamcathedral ❤️

The Consumer Duty Champion needs to resign.

Serious Qs are being raised in Parliament regarding the conduct of @nfum ​By preventing policyholders from attending AGMs, #NFUMutual is forcea evwn more matters into a public forum A sad use of Parliamentary time to have to step in and protect people from board-level abuse.

Today is the feast day of our Patron Saint, St Cuthbert. Durham Cathedral exists as the final resting place of one of the North’s greatest saints: the man who lived a humble and prayerful life and who inspired many to follow in the footsteps of Christ.

@ArturNadol7566 @financialombuds The evidence highlighted a pattern of disability discrimination at @NFUM designed to obstruct accountability. As the High Court class action approaches in November, questions remain about the SLT’s tactics and the exploitation of vulnerable policyholders and abuse of staff

@ArturNadol7566 @financialombuds Ive given APPG evidence recently in this area.

Financial Ombudsman Service @financialombuds was already operating on something close to a zero trust score. What happened this week did not just confirm that. It made it worse. On 16 March, at the APPG summit, serious voices raised serious concerns. Systemic failure. Weak accountability. A redress system that no longer commands public confidence. Those warnings were on record. That same day, @hmtreasury announced the most significant overhaul of FOS since the service was created. The language was reassuring. Faster. More predictable. More closely aligned with the @TheFCA Read that last part again. More closely aligned with the regulator. Not with consumers. With the regulator that already failed them. Then came 18 March. FOS leadership appeared before the @CommonsTreasury Committee. Under direct questioning from MPs, they confirmed it. Some complaints that would previously have been taken forward will now be dismissed. Not investigated. Not heard. Dismissed. Screened out before the consumer ever gets a fair shot at redress. Think about what that means in practice. Someone has already been failed by their bank, their lender, their insurer. They have already fought for months to get to FOS. They arrive at the last door available to them. Under these reforms, that door gets narrower. For some people, it will be shut. This is deliberate. They defended a reform package that trades consumer access for institutional convenience. They did it in public. On the record. FOS was created as an independent check on financial services power. What is being built now is something else entirely. An institution pulled closer to the FCA, stripped of the friction that made it useful to ordinary people, and restructured in a way that benefits the firms it was supposed to hold to account. The people who will never know their complaint was screened out will not be writing about it. They will not appear before a committee. They will not get a letter explaining what they lost. They will simply be gone from the system. Quietly. Without record. This is why Gary Smith's @G8GWS judicial review work is critical. This is why it has to be supported. What is happening here is not reform. It is the managed removal of consumer access to redress. The warnings were heard on 16 March. The reforms were announced on 16 March. The defence of those reforms came on 18 March. Three days. Start to finish. This has to be stopped.

In rather more pleasant news, an excellent picture of His Majesty opening the coastal path that bears his name.

The "In Hoc Signo" sculptures by @ByrgaGeniht in collaboation with @jacobchandler are now on display at @magdalenealumni These gilded bronze works explore 16th-century geometry and the "New Learning" of the 1550s ​ ​Blog: soultonhall.co.uk/2026/in-hoc-si…

Thank you @BBCShropshire for your hospitality today. An interview should be out on Friday about #asyoulikeit coming home.

@fathergarlick @2D0XPS ....something something books in the running brooks, toungs in trees, sermons in stones and good in everything...

@2D0XPS My Lent vow is to try and be kinder. But with this utter nonsense it is not always easy.

Even your most iconoclastic Protestant does not consider the scissor arch to be a “theological obscenity”. I'm all for a bit of polemic, but can we agree to stop lying about each other?

Our world is richer because we all think, learn, and experience things differently. Neurodiversity Celebration Week shines a light on the unique strengths that neurodiverse minds bring. #NeurodiversityCelebrationWeek

@AnneEBailey1 shropshirestar.com/your-world/202…

On the trail of a forgotten saint in York Minster #Echobox=1773554793" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2026/…

Historic Tudor site formally recognised in government papers ift.tt/WenfwmI

Shropshire Manor’s Role as ‘Nation’s Safe Box’ reaches Parliament trib.al/4Vsishc

New chapter for Soulton Hall as committee findings enter Hansard trib.al/rI4kMU5

Happy #PiDay... Celebrate with a maths puzzel in stones set in the 1550s...