English
Mark Hodgkinson
2.5K posts
Mark Hodgkinson
@shefmarkh
Particle Physicist for a living, hiker, squash player and film addict.
เข้าร่วม Nisan 2012
431 กำลังติดตาม384 ผู้ติดตาม
I wrote this at 7am this morning.
Since then, Richard Tice has appeared on the BBC News, Radio 4 and now LBC [that I know of].
I would really like some answers from the media as to why.
This is not balanced in any fashion. It's ludicrous.
@BBCWorld | @BBCr4today | @LBC
Don McGowan@donmcgowan
As we've just come out of the most recent Richard Tice week on our UK media channels, something struck me. Aside from the obvious, latent snobbery and condescension toward everyone he talks to, the guy is a virtual assistant — nothing more. Watch him on TV. What he's good at is applying any one of fifteen preset answers, to any question asked of him. The skill Tice holds is a learned one. He's effectively a walking automaton. Richard Tice is an anthropomorphised website chatbot. Listen to him and you'll see. He's learned a script and has his algorithmically programmed set of answers. Each answer has a subset of shaky data that often contains the deeper lie that Reform want to push out. But there is a limit to his responses, like all algorithms … they can only output the data they were programmed with. Tice is the same. You cannot tempt him off-topic, he always returns to the same answers. More often than not, Net-Zero. If you think about it, it starts to make sense. His, almost ubiquitous, appearances in the UK media, mirror our modern age of being unable to contact humans when we have a problem. Reform are sending out the equivalent of 'please press one for Net-Zero stupid, two for leaving the ECHR'. They can wind him up and send him onto 'talk' to Trevor Philips, knowing that whatever question he is asked, he will not deviate from the party lines. Unlike the loose cannon that is Lee Anderson and the monumentally dull McMurdock, Tice has a posh voice and can easily mimic human behaviour … to the point that his appearances sway Reform subscribers into believing his shtick. Trump utilises JD Vance in the very same way. Farage has no patience for debate and is very easily pulled apart under questioning; he is often to be found shouting “BORING” at interviewers and petulantly stomping away. Tice has no complications like this. Farage can set his programming to whichever of the day's 'policies' are required to be lied about, and bingo … Reform's chatbot will do the work. There in lies the reason, I contend, for Tice's removal as party leader. Farage realised that he was much more useful as a human/robot shield that could be deployed to spread unadulterated hot nonsense, without being dragged off subject. So next time you see/hear Tice on the media — probably today, going by their current coverage — listen to his answers. You'll see what I mean. ROBOT! I really didn't mean for this to go so long, but thanks for attending my Monday TED Talk.
English
@NautilieC @TheGriftReport @Keir_Starmer People also forget they can’t leave. Even with a tv etc being locked in a room for years on end isn’t going to be much fun.
English
@TheGriftReport @Keir_Starmer My cousin is an officer for one of Britain’s worst prisons. The cells might be nice, but he still finds men on the verge of death weekly. Just because it’s nice, doesn’t mean it’s “nice”. It’s prison mate. It’s fucking horrible, let them watch BGT before they get stabbed to death
English
@garygilligan @Ryanleigh1231 Not necessarily. They may have thought they would not win a lot of these seats, so it wouldn’t matter. The voters aren’t going to be happy about this.
English
@Ryanleigh1231 Looks like multiple failures of their vetting process.
English
Another Reform Councillor in Nwark has resigned, a week after being elected.
There will have to be a by-election and more expense. A shambles from Reform.
English
@sylwiamk @dearaunty @BriefcaseMike In France my tax forms only had a French option. Not sure about the health system. In pharmacies they would switch to English if I struggled, but unsure if that was official policy.
English
@dearaunty @BriefcaseMike Translators are used in hospitals in Spain, Poland, and the Netherlands, for example. Due to the large number of Ukrainian refugees and immigrants in Poland, two languages are used in public transport and other public spaces.
English
@Thomas_L_Scott @JonathanBrash They are doing the same in reverse. The scheme relevant to me was in France. This is a similar scheme with India.
English
@Thomas_L_Scott @JonathanBrash There is tax and social security (NI). They pay tax here but not NI. The reason I paid tax but not social security overseas was because I paid NI here AND had to have private medical insurance overseas so I would not cost their government anything if I got ill.
English
Total nonsense from this grifter. The NI rules only apply to Indian companies in India, who send temporary workers to the UK for Indian Businesses, and not Indians on Work Visas being hired by UK businesses.
Reform UK@reformparty_uk
Two Tier Keir betrays British workers. It is now 20% cheaper to hire Indians than British people. He has cut taxes for Indian workers and hiked them British workers.
English
@Thomas_L_Scott @JonathanBrash They pay the NI in their home country. Just like I paid NI here when I worked overseas. This is a very common arrangement between countries.
English
@JonathanBrash If you work In the uk you should pay the same income/employment taxes as everyone else.
I feel like uk businesses need a trade deal!
English
@AlexandriaMEast @antoiney0117 @mirts88 @JonathanBrash @John9191toe @RajabGhandour It’s in line with what I paid for private medical insurance when I worked overseas.
English
@antoiney0117 @mirts88 @JonathanBrash @John9191toe @RajabGhandour £1035 would not cover a broken arm
English
@PhilJC2 @CptHastings1916 Don’t forget you can get a large fraction refunded when the train is inevitably late or cancelled!
English
@CptHastings1916 And travel costs too. I would go to the office more if it didn’t cost me a small fortune to get in each time
English
I don't think you can reasonably discuss WFH w/o also discussing housing costs. One reason ppl w families whose jobs are London based like hybrid working is that they can buy a decent family house in the Home Counties, not some tiny 2-bed in Zone 35 with a drug dealer next door.
The Telegraph@Telegraph
✍️ 'Sorry civil servants, your WFH dream is over: the public purse demands accountability' | Writes @WilliamSitwell telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/05/0…
English
@KingBill @TallyCat8 Because no private investors would touch it with a barge pole.
English
@TallyCat8 Why did they have invest money to have their airport back? They were in power when they lost their airport!
English
Labour: here you go Doncaster, we've invested £Ms so you can have your airport back and the jobs and economy boost which goes with that.
Doncaster: fuck off, we want Reform who will make council workers redundant and spend our money on strike action and lawsuits.
English
@AlexUribarri @basedlayer Apple Pay doesn’t need internet to work, at least not on your phone. I thought the vendor did need internet though for it to work.
English
@basedlayer I was even able to pay with Apple Pay in Mercadona. Given the scale of disruption, I would say everything went surprisingly orderly. The recovery was also smooth.
English
I was there yesterday when Spain went dark.
It took less than an hour for panic to set in.
Cash became, surprisingly, worthless.
Here’s what actually happens when the systems break: 🧵
English
@djbshearer @DavidDavisMP @Philosophy_the There are no transcripts. That’s why it will cost serious money to get them for a big trial,
English
@DavidDavisMP @Philosophy_the Surely all transcripts are maintained online and accessible? If it’s not the case at present then it should be!
English
Transcripts of court trials should be freely available.
For a recent major trial, I was initially quoted £100,000 for the transcript!
This is a travesty of justice.
It must be put right.
My question to the Justice Secretary 👇🏻
English
@TheBTCViking @CaldronPool I bet peoples gardens aren’t full of cat poo though.
English
@CaldronPool WTF, Australia has rules that prohibit your cats from "roaming". Sounds like some police state bullshit to me.
English
A council worker in Queensland has been caught on camera luring a cat into the street so she could slap the owners with a $280 “roaming” fine.
English
@scott_edinburgh @theiaincameron Maps can also be bought laminated nowadays.
English
Mercifully, this piece doesn’t quote anyone from Mountain Rescue arguing for walkers to carry a compass (a doomed request). It *does* however mention carrying a paper map (which is also a doomed request).
Because…
1/3
English
@herdyshepherd1 @ChairmanMao2121 They can import their meat. What is stopping them upgrading their production to our standards?
English
@ChairmanMao2121 Yes
Well spotted
I’d actually like to protect our health and food standards and our ability to improve our environment
I’m not even hiding it
If there was nothing to protect I’d be cool with it all
English
I hope I am wrong… but the signs are that we are about to be sold down the river… I wrote this…
unherd.com/2025/04/keep-a…
English
@rageinhisfeet @TJiMTS If they wanted to annoy the motorist wouldn’t the cheap option have been to not build a tunnel?
English
There's NO way in 2024/5 they built a brand new tunnel, and thought 2 lanes was sufficient? and made 1 of them a bus lane?
The UK actually has incompetent people making decisions.
TfL@TfL
The Silvertown Tunnel is open! 🎉 This tunnel marks a major milestone for London’s transport network, improving cross-river travel. Take a tour and see the tunnel from a whole new perspective. 🛣️
English
@SpeedySticks007 @ChimeWhistle @philatrail @GreaterAngliaPR @transportgovuk This problem us not solved on Greater Anglia though? Still very large and steep gaps between trains and platforms.
English
@ChimeWhistle @philatrail Get the trains, then worry about the platforms. That’s what @GreaterAngliaPR did. But it was an @transportgovuk experiment order.
English
DfT is making £5m available to ‘first of a kind’ innovations for, among other things, level boarding. I welcome this focus but the answer is simple - buy trains with floors that match Network Rail’s standard height platforms. And fund alterations to platforms that don’t comply.
English
@railnigel Maybe they knew. This would have generated more clicks and revenue.
English
That illustrates my point orrfectly: WTF we’re news editors doing?!
“If someone tells a reporter it’s raining it’s not his job to just repeat it. It’s their job to go to the ******* window and LOOK and check.”
🐰🐣 David Wilding 🐣🐰@DavidWilding271
@railnigel Looks like they just blindly reported on from Reuters, where the error seems to have originated…the Guardian made the same mistake 🤦🏼♂️
English
@PositivFuturist @ClaudetteGGibs1 Fair enough. But if she is willing and able to leave why the need to imprison her? Just let her go back home and ban from reentry for violating visa conditions?
English
This is fascism…this is Becky Burke she was on a back packing tour of North America and crashed into Trumps immigration pogroms.
Her father writes
“Our daughter Becky, a 28-year-old British tourist, has been caught up in the recent immigration crackdown in the US. What was meant to be a life-changing four-month backpacking trip across North America has turned into a nightmare.
Despite being a tourist with no criminal record, she was handcuffed and taken to a detention facility in Tacoma, Washington.
Becky’s current conditions are deeply concerning. She is sharing a cell, surviving on a diet of cold rice, potatoes, and beans (she is vegan), and has limited access to phone calls. Visitors are restricted to speaking through a glass screen via telephone.
All her possessions have been confiscated, and she feels isolated and desperate to come home.
We are doing everything we can. We are in touch with the British Consulate in London and San Francisco. An American friend is helping by sending funds to her inmate account so she can buy basic necessities like tea. But progress has been slow, and we urgently need more support.
We are asking for your help. Please share Becky’s story widely through your networks. We hope to connect with experts, legal professionals, or anyone who can offer advice or assistance. Becky is a kind, adventurous young woman who simply wants to return home to her family.”
English
Mark Hodgkinson รีทวีตแล้ว
More evidence of a budget squeeze for STFC emerges.
STFC plans voluntary exit scheme as budget fears loom researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-res…
English