Simon Thomas @SimonGThomas

@GoldRobin_11 @GenghisTebbit @afneil You want to cover British farmland with Chinese solar panels to mitigate crop failures! Genius!

@seanzjay @afneil Because this time socialism will work, right? It’s destroyed everywhere else that’s tried it, but your ideology is more important than actual evidence based reality

Andy Burnham increased the debt of the Greater Manchester Combined Authority by 28.8% (£300m) during his tenure in office, leaving it with the highest debt of any combined authority in England. If he expands this track record to the whole of the UK, that would mean an equivalent national debt increase of about £860 billion, taking UK debt towards £3.85 trillion. The debt-to-GDP ratio would rise from 95.1% to 122.5% & at an average interest cost of 5% we'd pay an additional £43bn in interest costs each year. High spending Andy could be a very expensive choice for Britain.

@UxbEconomist07 @RollingHedge Yes, I don’t understand that yet. Maybe he’ll do a follow up, acknowledging he’s been wrong all along! Or maybe not!

'A Britain that dumped GDP-destroying climate policies, put prosperity first, slashed its energy costs and started to put on a point or two of extra GDP growth would be an example to be emulated.' briefingsforbritain.co.uk/brexit-net-zer…

Robert Farle hat gerade live im Bundestag die Klima-Religion mit einem Taschenrechner hingerichtet.♥️👏 78 % Stickstoff. 21 % Sauerstoff. 0,04 % CO₂. Davon produziert die Natur selbst 96 %. Von den restlichen 4 % menschgemachtem CO₂ kommt Deutschland auf lächerliche 1,76 %. Hochgerechnet ergibt das einen deutschen Einfluss auf den weltweiten CO₂-Gehalt von 0,000028 %. 0,000028 %!!!! Und für diese Zahl soll Deutschland weiter seine Industrie zerstören, seine Strompreise explodieren lassen, seine Arbeitsplätze ins Ausland treiben und den Wohlstand der arbeitenden Bevölkerung opfern? Die Regierung, die Grünen, die Medien und alle, die diesem Wahnsinn immer noch applaudieren, tun so, als würde ohne die deutsche Energiewende die Welt untergehen. Während China und Indien jeden Monat neue Kohlekraftwerke hochziehen. Während der Rest der Welt einfach weitermacht. Und wir? Wir zahlen. Wir frieren. Wir verlieren unsere Fabriken. Farle hat nur eine Frage gestellt: „Wie blöd halten Sie eigentlich die Menschen?“ Die ehrliche Antwort lautet: Offensichtlich so blöd, dass sie immer noch glauben, Deutschland könne das Weltklima retten, während der Rest der Welt das Gegenteil an den Tag legt😂 Das ist kein Klimaschutz mehr. Das ist ideologischer Selbstmord auf Kosten der eigenen Bevölkerung. #KlimaSchwindel #EnergiewendeFail #Deindustrialisierung #RobertFarle #CO2Lüge #KlimaHysterie #WohlstandVernichten #GrünePolitik #Bundestag #RealTalk #DeutschlandVerliert

The Manchester Model. What It Actually Looks Like Up Close. Andy Burnham is asking the country to trust him with Downing Street on the strength of what he calls the Manchester Model. Eight years of integrated public services and progressive governance that he says Britain should adopt nationally. Before the country decides, it should know what that model actually produced. Start with the money. £578 million in public money was lent by Burnham's Greater Manchester Combined Authority to a single developer, Daren Whitaker of Renaker. A tribunal found that GMCA failed to obtain a statement of assets and liabilities from Whitaker before lending, exposing taxpayers to a risk the tribunal described as potentially wiping out the public funds. A meeting between a senior GMCA officer and Whitaker at which loan terms appear to have been agreed produced no minutes or notes. Court papers allege Renaker presented high profit figures to the GMCA when seeking loans and low profit figures to Manchester City Council when seeking exemption from affordable homes requirements. The Court of Appeal is considering judgment on whether the loans were lawful. Out of 11,000 homes built with that public money, 503 are classed as affordable. Less than five percent. Whitaker's personal fortune grew from £140 million to £698 million during Burnham's mayoralty. The luxury towers were marketed to Chinese buy to let investors through Hong Kong estate agents. Hundreds of flats have been sold to Asian investors according to Telegraph analysis of Companies House filings. Now the transparency. In April 2026 the Information Commissioner issued a practice recommendation to the GMCA for failing to publish Freedom of Information compliance statistics. Greater Manchester Police, under Burnham's authority as Police and Crime Commissioner, was separately issued with an ICO enforcement notice for 850 overdue FOI requests, more than 800 over six months old. The oldest had been waiting two and a half years. Now the transport flagship. The Bee Network has absorbed a £30 council tax precept increase in two years to subsidise its operation. The £115 million Clean Air Zone was scrapped after £211 million in public funds was received and only £22.5 million returned. Burnham's own transport commissioner acknowledged the network remains twenty two years behind London. The board of Be.EV, the company holding the Bee Network's public EV charging contract, includes Burnham's wife, who joined the company six years into his mayoralty and was appointed to the board as his Westminster ambitions became increasingly visible. Now the promises. Burnham pledged to end rough sleeping by 2020. Rough sleeping rose. Today 18,000 people across Greater Manchester have no permanent address. He promised Platt Bridge a flood solution by 2018. The area flooded in 2015, 2021 and on New Year's Day 2025. The projected solution is now 2028. When asked on Question Time why he would not apologise, he said it was before his time. He became Mayor in 2017. The promise was made in 2018. Now the politics. Labour's candidate to replace Burnham as Mayor is Bev Craig, leader of Manchester City Council, the body that accepted Renaker's low profit figures and granted the affordable homes exemption. The mayoral by-election on 30 July will be fought under the supplementary vote system rushed through the Lords two days before Burnham's Makerfield victory, designed to consolidate left of centre second preferences and lock out Reform. 108 Labour councillors lost their seats in Greater Manchester in May's local elections. The region Burnham governed for eight years delivered the most devastating local election result in Labour's history. This is the Manchester Model. These are its documented facts. The country is being asked to implement it nationally. It should read the small print first. Bev Craig. Labour's candidate to replace Burnham. Leader of the council that granted Renaker's affordable homes exemption.

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@carryonkeith @dyrvfm686b Wow! The strength of your argument is overwhelming! 🙄

@ccfcwills @matthewsyed We’ve all been paying “a bit more tax” for decades, to the point where we’re at record levels of taxation - higher than our own historical levels and higher than comparable nations. At what point do you realise that more tax isn’t the answer?

@7_Sages_Wotcm @dorfman_p Tax?

This is simply not true. When you frame wealth as a result of value added, it becomes much more reasonable. Musk’s wealth results from the value he creates - goods and services that people willingly buy, and the resulting jobs and taxes he generates. Nobody got poorer because of his actions - plenty got richer, and even more benefited. Do you want him to stop creating value?

I get the frustration — no one wants prime farmland turned into industrial estates, or households subsidising hyperscalers’ power & water while bills rise. Local campaigns have valid points on landscapes. But data centres aren’t optional luxuries. They’re the new electricity grid, ports & motorways for the 21st century economy. UK already gets ~£4.7bn GVA/year from them, with potential +£44bn by 2035 + tens of thousands of jobs. Without domestic compute, we offshore sovereignty, AI innovation & security to US/China clouds. Better path: • Prioritise brownfield/industrial sites & AI Growth Zones (e.g. Culham with nuclear pairing via SMRs). nucnet.org • Force efficiency (advanced cooling, waste heat reuse, full cost recovery on grid). • Pair with new nuclear/renewables so it’s not robbing Peter (households) to pay Paul (AI). Stagnation isn’t sovereignty — it’s managed decline. Compete smartly, or fall behind while still using the tech. Power for the people includes building the infrastructure that keeps Britain competitive. What alternative do you see for UK data sovereignty & growth?

@zarahussain999 Does it not treat women differently? Are you offended that someone has pointed it out, but not that it is true?

@CurtisDaly_ That’s not debunking anything - it’s ignorance about the implications of multiple economic policies

Earth's Temperature History For Dummies! @WillieSoon8 @HeartlandInst @CO2Coalition

@NoFarmsNoFoods It would also further damage the population’s health! The CCC works against the interests of the British people in many ways - they are what needs decimating

@AutismCapital @Simon_Breezer I go in a lot of houses and can generalise as follows: people who want shoes off are uptight and have no joy in their lives; people who don’t mind shoes are well adjusted, happy, and possibly have a dog.

@CutMyTaxUK 3 years is going to be a very long time, in terms of what will be achieved and how far we’ll be left behind

Whether you are from the left or the right, watch this. @LiamHalligan is brilliant and entirely right. If you are not for a massive slashing of the state, you should be nowhere near politics because you are for the economic destruction of our country.

Academy of Ideas @acadofideas

4 months ago

"The 6th biggest economy in the world is run by infantile fantasists with no understanding of financial markets.... There's nothing progressive about driving the economy of a cliff"📉⛰️ @LiamHalligan @ #BattleFest 2025 "From steel to railways: can the state revitalise British

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