Dear @Keir_Starmer Starmer & @RachelReevesMP , Firstly, sorry for the hand which you have been dealt. After 14 years of @Conservatives government our beloved country has never been in a worse state. I wish you both strength, courage and resolve as you endeavour to get our once great nation back on track. Our national debt, which has skyrocketed from 25% of our GDP to 100% and is crippling our nation. Unless we can reduce the debt, then our debilitating interest payments means we are stuck in a vicious cycle of paying ever increasing amounts of taxes for ever diminishing quality of services. As difficult as the hand which you and your government have been dealt is, it would be remiss of me not to point out 2 fundamental things: 1)        Recategorization Of Debt The fact that the government are discussing how to recategorise of our debt, in order to borrow more, is astounding. It is not how our debt is categorised which is crippling our country, but the interest we have to pay on it. More debt (however you choose to categorise it) means more interest, which means less of our tax money gets spent on things which actually matter and that we will have no option but to further raise taxes in the future to service this debt. This recategorization proposal is governmental equivalent of a smart 6-year-old putting the family clock in the kitchen back an hour to postpone bedtime. A neat sleight of hand, but the whole family know that they will pay the price for having a tired and grumpy child in the house the next day. It is almost incomprehensible that anyone could think that the solution the UK needs is to make a technical change to how our debt is calculated to allow us to borrow more. 2)        Removal Of Incentives Hiking up capital gains tax will destroy entrepreneurial spirit in the UK and in turn severely damage our economy. Most of the brilliant business minds that I know, the people who drive our economic growth and create our jobs, will simply leave the UK to build businesses and create jobs elsewhere. If we lose our brightest and best entrepreneurs, which we undoubtedly will if we significantly increase capital gains tax, we deal a hammer blow to the UK economy and the overall prosperity of every single UK family. Increasing capital gains tax will do far more damage to our economy than any gains we may experience from increasing this tax. Perhaps this letter is futile. And perhaps the seeds of our democracy’s demise are hardwired into our political system. Sadly, every government is incentivized to increase the debt (so as to avoid unpopular austerity) which not only kicks the problem down the road, but massively increases the ferocity of the wolf at our door. But if is not your door in 5 or 10 years’ time then who cares about the wolf? Tragically, it is the people of the UK who lose out, because our politicians are more concerned about short-term optics than the long-term health of our country.

Must watch first speech in parliament by Keir Starmer in which he tears into 14 years of Conservative failure and outlines how Labour will do better - long watch but refreshing Keir Starmer, "Whilst I respect the tone of leader of the opposition Rishi Sunak's contribution, I can't stop my mind wandering to 9 months ago when he was at this dispatch box" "His political hero Nigel Lawson said: to govern is to chose, and everyday serving the people of this country is a chance to make a difference for them" "Yet Mr Speaker, the last King's speech was the day the veil of Rishi Sunak's choices slipped.. And we all saw a party, his party, content to let our countries problems fester.. Content to push aside the national interest.. As they focused almost entirely on trying to save their own skins" "No more wedge issues.. No more gimmicks.. No more party political strategies masquerading as politics.. This is an agenda focused entirely on delivering for the people of this country.. Legislation for the national interest.. To make people better off.. Solve problems not exploit them" "With each day that passes, my government is finding new and unexpected marks of their corruption.. Scars of the last 14 years where politics was put above the national interest.. Decline deep in the marrow of our institutions" "We've seen it in our prisons.. In our rivers and seas.. It's even worse than we thought.. We see it in our councils, not even able to deliver services for children with special educational needs" "The work of change has begun"

It seems to me that the portrayal of the Labour win as shallow because of the vote share is misleading. This was a ‘get the tories out’ election. For different people that generally meant voting Labour, Lib Dem, Green or Reform. But in doing so they all knew they’d get a Labour government and did it deliberately. In reality even Reform voters actually voted for Keir Starmer to be PM.

The thing is — everyone else can tell the kind of person this tracks well with. And wants them nowhere near the running of the country.

Tories think 'protected family time' is an attack line Tories have zero respect for the family it seems Tories have no time for their children - work comes first Do yourself a favour Never be a Tory

Bad debate nights happen. Trust me, I know. But this election is still a choice between someone who has fought for ordinary folks his entire life and someone who only cares about himself. Between someone who tells the truth; who knows right from wrong and will give it to the American people straight — and someone who lies through his teeth for his own benefit. Last night didn’t change that, and it’s why so much is at stake in November. joebiden.com

ABTA and Seasonal Businesses in Travel (SBiT) welcome today’s announcement from the European Commission that they are recommending to the Council that negotiations be opened with the United Kingdom on a youth mobility agreement. Read more here: abta.com/news/abta-and-seaso…

SBiT and ABTA welcome European Commission announcement that they are recommending to the Council that negotiations be opened with the United Kingdom on a youth mobility agreement, a move both organisations have been lobbying for in Brussels and Westminster. 1/n

@Charles_Owen , MD of SBiT said. “A reciprocal youth mobility scheme is a win-win for both Europe and the UK, and in particular for UK travel businesses operating in the EU." 6/n

“Momentum is building to get this deal done and we implore the Prime Minister to engage in conversations with the outbound industry to prepare for the upcoming negotiations appropriately. This is a serious economic and cultural issue”. 7/END

Thank you. @SBIT_UK together with @ABTAtravel has been calling on the UK and EU to agree a Youth Mobility scheme since the UK left the EU single market. We call on @RishiSunak and UK Govt to prepare by engaging with industry and reading our report sbit.org.uk/s/SBiT-Unlocking…

🚨NEW🚨 "They've got a test that they're already failing and they're raising the pass mark." @Femi_Sorry brilliantly exposes Sunak's attempt to hide Tory failure in building new hospitals. Watch the latest #PMQs Fact Check here 👇

...The quickest way to help ease inflation is to improve trading arrangements with our largest partners in the EU, and that should start with committing to regulatory alignment where beneficial and negotiating reciprocal youth mobility visas.”

Must be doing something right...my words about anti-foodbank MP & his wages being twisted by the Tories today into trying to label me an education 'snob''....what a joke...🙄 They can't think of anything else to have a go at.... HOWEVER, I'll let my record in education do the talking inc helping 500,000 children with their maths during lockdown...giving bursaries for young people and schools with disadvantaged backgrounds like mine....helping Blunkett introduce the Numeracy Hour....governor of inner city school......education books for decades.....recognised STEM Ambassador....I could go on. Always a believer in encouraging young people to achieve their best, in whichever way that comes around, to be strong and happy and confident. Anything else being espoused is offensive, targeted, predictable Right Wing nonsense. PS Tories....this attack won't work. It just makes us more determined. PPS thanks for all your support...we'll beat them in the end ❤️❤️ Please RT

Please like and retweet!!

A new @SBIT_UK and @ABTAtravel report says a 69% drop in UK travel staff working in the is EU set to impact travel businesses’ growth. They are calling for improved UK-EU employee mobility arrangements and outline simple and sensible policy solutions. sbit.org.uk/s/SBiT-Unlocking…

Dear 🇬🇧, 225,000 people have died in this country from COVID-19 and millions continue to suffer from its long term effects. We lost family, friends, patients, co-workers, and it caused disruption to our lives and livelihoods on a scale never before seen in our lifetimes. If we don't learn the lessons from this pandemic, from the reasons why we were so terribly ill-prepared in the first place, to failures of politicians to recognise the nature of the threat, to mitigation efforts to contain the disease, to best practices for management of the disease, to government communications with the public — to hundreds of other lessons yet to be learned — then we will be doomed to repeat these mistakes in the very near term. In an interconnected world of 8 billion people, in a country that is a transportation hub to the world, it's laughable to think that COVID-19 will be the last pandemic we'll see for 100 years. The next one is likely around the corner and we must be better prepared. So I can't stress this enough: We must demand nothing but full and complete transparency with this #CovidInquiry. If Boris Johnson ran government communications via WhatsApp then the Covid Inquiry must receive all *unredacted* communications and the Cabinet Office must comply and release all of this information immediately. If they do not urgently release this information and comply with the order, then we must march in the streets to support the families of @CovidJusticeUK. 225,000 people are dead. We cannot allow the most corrupt government in our lifetimes to deny justice to them, to us, and to future generations. Release all information now. #SOSNHS

Mail, Express and Telegraph get taken on a taxpayer funded Braverman trip to Rwanda. Each paper dutifully splashes their Sunday edition with the headline she's asked for. Client journalism as it's most blatant and we're paying for it.

Tweet of the week …