Why?
She hates us all and thinks we're racist. And he wants to be paid for doing nothing. Oh wait?
bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c62ey0โฆ
The couple's children, Prince Archie, 7, and Princess Lilibet, 5, are enrolled to start at a school in September.Daniela Relph (BBC News)
Morning All
I declare today: Happy Gingerbread Day!
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Remember, children. This is where it starts: #Labour Spend, spend, spend until the money runs out. Wait, I thought it had run out? What happened to this ยฃ22 billion black hole?
#Politics
bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cjwx5vโฆ
The change, which has been welcomed by campaign groups, will come into effect in England from April.Beth Rose (BBC News)
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That free bus pass isn't free, you know. The government reimburses transport companies for free passes. I would put money on transport operators applying peak-fare prices to their reimbursement.
(if I ever get around to applying) but I don't need to travel at peak hours because I don't work. This isn't an extra cost. It's to remove a barrier to disabled people working and paying tax.
.
Downing Street has declined to comment on the security breach, first reported by Politico.Jennifer McKiernan (BBC News)
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All joking aside, and it is funny. What the hell is Clacton going to do if he wins?
More importantly, what will he do if he wins?
#Politics #CountBinFace
independent.co.uk/news/uk/poliโฆ
Some 20 per cent of Clacton voters to back Count Binface in Nigel Farageโs constituencyAthena Stavrou (The Independent)
He's already said he's not Sinn Fรฉin and would take the seat.
I expect he'd just get on with case-work and probably be one of the best local MPs in the country because there's no shuffling for position in the party or taking up ministerial roles or campaigning for the future to worry about.
Opposite of Farage really, who is only in Clacton at all for party and national reasons.
He is doing it for the national lols.
In interview he does appear to be saying that in the unlikely event he won he'd take the job seriously and do his best for Clacton.
He certainly won't be lining up ministerial positions or flying to America to make deals with foreign parties or thinking about campaigning for the next election.
He could of course either be lying or just be shit at it or even just decide after a month that he can't be bothered and quit. But from what he's saying in interview, his plan would just be to try and be a good independent MP.
A month or so ago, I was asked to quote on installing an agent on 18 machines. I sent the price, and I could tell they weren't happy. A couple of weeks later, I got a new request to install it on 6 machines. I sent over a revised price and silence for another week or so. I then got an angry email demanding to know how I justified the price for a "six-minute job!" I explained how we have highly skilled technicians with a wealth of knowledge and experience and that our resources, too, come at a cost.
I then received yet another request for 2 laptops. My first thought was:
๐ง "Don't tell me, there's a problem with these, isn't there?"
Lo and behold, nobody can install because the laptops' firewall is enabled and we can't give the user the admin password. We sorted it in the end, but this demonstrates why IT services come at a premium.
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And another bottomless pit of failure being propped up by taxpayer money.
bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5y680โฆ
The Scunthorpe steelworks has been officially nationalised under new government powers passed this week.Harry Sekulich (BBC News)
So I've extensively played with #ChatGPT, #Copilot, and, most recently, everyone's wet dream, #Claude. I have to say, they're all pretty much the same. I think the reason everyone is cooing over Claude is that it shows you what it's doing as it cogitates, and it integrates well with SharePoint.
What I don't like is that, for freebie accounts, ChatGPT and Claude are very stingy about how much interaction you can have. Waiting one or two days to complete a task is pretty annoying. Copilot seems slightly more generous IMO.
#AI
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I don't believe weather forecasters, I honestly don't.
This morning I asked Google what the weather would be where I live, and it told me it would be cooler than yesterday, at 26 degrees. The radio said within two minutes that the weather would be hot in Birmingham and 29 degrees!
My computer says it is 26C for my current location, while Chrome says it's 27C
2026, and they still can't get it right.
#ukweather #MetOffice
Many of Wednesday's papers lead on the fallout from the Defence Investment Plan released yesterday.BBC News
I can't see large-scale conventional wars happening again. Troops will be used to guard and police occupied territory. There will always be small-scale actions, but the Russian experience should have taught us that massed tanks and infantry are a thing of the past.
The reason we need bombers is that if Europe is overrun, fighter-bombers can't reach Moscow. That is, if Moscow still exists, if we're brave enough to push the button?
Disorder erupted in Southampton on Tuesday near where 18-year-old Henry Nowak was fatally stabbed.BBC News
I think "I've been stabbed" takes precedence over anything. My original knee-jerk reaction to the video was "WTF!" After speaking with a number of people, I've changed my opinion to: "It certainly looks like arresting him for a race crime seemed to be the main objective." I mean, think about it. There's a bloke on the floor who's only crime at that stage was supposedly racially abusing someone, and the course of action is to cuff them? When you get stopped for speeding, etc., do they slap the bracelets on? No, they sit you in the back of the car and have a chat.
There are lots of questions, and we're not going to get the answers. Henry Nowak is going to have died for nothing, and nobody apart from his family cares because the world we live in is more worried about upsetting people's feelings than telling it like it is. ๐คทโโ๏ธ
The prime minister's position has hardened since Andy Burnham said he would seek to enter any potential Labour contest.Ben Wright (BBC News)
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British politics has stagnated. Nobody wants to do anything, stand out or rock the boat. Other than prices going up, which has nothing to do with the UK government or Brexit, for that matter, I've not seen this government achieve anything. The problem with that is there has been nothing as such where the electorate stands up and says, "This government must go!"
I think these local election wins for ReformUK will not translate to votes in a general election.
Serious clashes between Unite the Kingdom and pro-Palestinian protesters were avoided on Saturday.Daniel Sandford (BBC News)
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This demonstrates how ineffectual our so-called PM is. He's doing nothing while his party colleagues are literally setting in motion actions that could potentially lead to his downfall, in full view of everyone, including Starmer himself. He'll go down in history as the Prime Minister who did nothing!
#Politics #UselessLabour
politico.eu/article/uk-leadersโฆ
Follow along for the latest as Britainโs prime minister tries to ride out dire election results while his own Labour colleagues circle.POLITICO
Potentially, there's only Reeves, and she's not had the best of starts. I know I've been joking about Raynor and Abbott, but my worry is that factions may well think that Raynor is a viable option. Don't forget, there is still a powerful lobby within the Labour party who think it's still 1970.
Raynor would have been in her element during the 70s and mid 80s. She would drag us back to those times if she could.
I think Reeves would be a useless as Starmer.
At least Raynor actually stands for something and can communicate that.
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The PMโs battle with Whitehall is a delayed reckoningEthan Croft (New Statesman)
Guardian investigation uncovers decision by UK security officials to deny clearance before Mandelson took up role as US ambassadorPaul Lewis (The Guardian)
I did a bit of digging last night.
Canonical can get some idea of usage, just not in the way people seem to think.
Mirror & telemetry data (aggregate, not per-user)
They can see things like:
IPs hitting mirrors
Package download volumes
Which releases are being pulled
Useful for trends and capacity planning, but itโs not tied to individuals or licences.
Optional telemetry (since 18.04)
Thereโs a one-off system report:
Hardware profile
Installed packages (high level)
Basic system config
You can opt out, and plenty do.
Ubuntu Pro (formerly Advantage)
This is the only place it gets closer to โcountingโ:
Machines are attached to a subscription
So yes, they can see numbers there
But thatโs about support entitlement, not policing updates.
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Rachel Reeves is set to urge coordinated action to tackle the global economic shock caused by the war at a Washington summit.irishnews.com
Yeah, the futures market reacts on what it expects to happen. Makes it volatile.
Fuel coming out of the pumps today in the UK shouldn't be much affected for a month or more, but they are coz the forecourts use that futures price I guess.
And this is another reason I don't trust news outlets!
A news story about Corridoor Beds had a reporter who said: "We've just come out of the worst winter on record for the #NHS." Umm? Did you forget COVID?
Everything is always "On record", and yet when I cast my mind back, I'm like "Well, you must have been in a different country? Especially when it comes to the weather, "Warmest on record!" Aye? I had my heating on all day!
#BBC News
The prime minister says a "historic deal" is on offer from the government to resident doctors, and the decision to reject it will damage the NHS.Sky News
THE Peopleโs Postcode ยญLottery has sparked fury after raising the price of tickets yet again โ with players branding it an โabsolute waste of moneyโ. Tickets have gone up to ยฃ12.50 per month, a 25 โฆTara Evans (The Sun)
As of March 2026, the #Labour government is significantly off track to meet its manifesto target of building 1.5 million new homes in England by the end of this Parliament (estimated August 2029). To hit 1.5 million homes over five years, the government needs to deliver an average of 300,000 homes per year (approximately 811 per day).
Total Delivered: Approximately 309,600 net additional homes were delivered between the start of the Parliament (9 July 2024) and 11 January 2026.
Shortfall to Date: By early November 2025, the government should have built roughly 396,000 homes to stay on track, representing a deficit of over 120,000 homes just in the first 16 months.
Daily Rate: The current delivery rate is roughly 564 homes per day, well below the required 811. GOV.UK
#politics
It's like the General Belgrano all over again.
๐๐ฆ๐จ๐ด๐ฆ๐ต๐ฉ ๐ต๐ฐ๐ญ๐ฅ ๐ข ๐ฏ๐ฆ๐ธ๐ด ๐ค๐ฐ๐ฏ๐ง๐ฆ๐ณ๐ฆ๐ฏ๐ค๐ฆ ๐ฐ๐ฏ ๐๐ฆ๐ฅ๐ฏ๐ฆ๐ด๐ฅ๐ข๐บ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ข๐ต ๐ข ๐๐ ๐ด๐ถ๐ฃ๐ฎ๐ข๐ณ๐ช๐ฏ๐ฆ ๐ฉ๐ข๐ฅ ๐ด๐ถ๐ฏ๐ฌ ๐ข๐ฏ ๐๐ณ๐ข๐ฏ๐ช๐ข๐ฏ ๐ธ๐ข๐ณ๐ด๐ฉ๐ช๐ฑ "๐ต๐ฉ๐ข๐ต ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฐ๐ถ๐จ๐ฉ๐ต ๐ช๐ต ๐ธ๐ข๐ด ๐ด๐ข๐ง๐ฆ ๐ช๐ฏ ๐ช๐ฏ๐ต๐ฆ๐ณ๐ฏ๐ข๐ต๐ช๐ฐ๐ฏ๐ข๐ญ ๐ธ๐ข๐ต๐ฆ๐ณ๐ด".
bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0e55gโฆ
Sri Lanka's navy says around 140 people are feared missing after a military vessel went down off its southern coast.Yogita Limaye (BBC News)
HMS Dragon is being loaded with ammunition in Portsmouth having just recently come out of maintenance.Jonathan Beale (BBC News)
Hey, look, I'm a dumbass, what would I know? But I find it interesting that all the news outlets, and especially the BBC, are ramming it down our throats that while Donald Trump spoke for two hours, TWO HOURS! According to them, he said nothing of value? I even read a BBC fact-checker that debunked much of what he said about fuel prices, etc.
The thing is, I watched a lot of it LIVE, and I watched both sides of the Senate stand and applaud him and not just once either! So that tells this dumbass that a lot of what he said struck a chord with senators across the political spectrum and not just his party faithful.
We need to be careful what the press, TV and social media tell us. Remember, folks, they, too, have their own agenda, and we've seen numerous court cases where it turns out that maybe journalists and editors are not your guardians with your best interests at heart after all.
Right Reverend Stephen Conway has also been suspended by the Church of England.Aleem Maqbool (BBC News)
The report comes as police widen investigations into former prince, including questioning his close protection teams.David D. Lee (Al Jazeera)
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