I think there really is an issue with social media - indeed with the web itself. Partly because children are growing up with a fast changing media environment that their parents are also learning. The challenge isn't met with bans - the primary duty rests with parents - but with harm reduction strategies. Also, in the same way we socialised kids going to bed at seven or eight pm, we need to develop social tools - supported by good safety advice - that allow parents to control their children's use of the web. What's clear is that growing up in the years since the mid 2000s has been a bit of a wild west. Parents didn't appreciate how troubling some of the content out there had become - the job now is to give parents the tools and information necessary to allow them some degree of peace of mind. I'm not sure simple bans and curfews - each requiring adults to ID themselves before using sites - are the solution. Not just because de facto forcing adults into a digital ID is wrong but because this doesn't mean children can't and won't breach the walls you build. Finally smoking kills something like 70,000 people in Britain every year. There are a handful of tragic cases related to social media and some contested evidence about harm to mental health (although lockdown did vastly more damage to children's mental health than social media can even imagine). Calling social media "as bad as smoking" is simply another moral panic, a piece of ghastly nannying fussbucketry designed to scare people rather than help people. Anyone making this claim is a reprehensible shyster.

‘The term misinformation has been weaponised.’ Independent Peer Baroness Claire Fox slams Labour’s social media crackdown following the ‘distressing’ disorder in Northern Ireland, arguing that they are ‘missing the point’. ‘We have to keep speaking truth to power loudly.’

Our schizophrenic government is giving the vote to people it doesn’t trust to be on social media in the evening.

Love this idea that you can avoid scrutiny by posting a free Substack. As opposed to what? Publishing behind a paywall at the Spectator or the Times? It's great that politicians are committing to direct, long form writing. An upgrade over the "podcast election," surely

Brilliant @DebatingMatters final here in Berlin on 'Protecting free speech more important than preventing hate'. Tho I stand with the free speech side, worth saying both teams of young debaters made great speeches & are fighting hard. The future is bright if this is the standard

John Healey may have just resigned over government unwillingness to protect us from new threats, but we've been talking about desperately needed reforms since 2024... Check out - "How defence is changing for the West" @ #BattleFest 2024 W/ @tonygilland, Dr Tim Black, @Sherelle_E_J, Sir Simon Mayall & @TimScottUK 👇

Hockney was peerless. Almost in the mold of the renaissance masters, his life and art were somehow fused into one riotous celebration of freedom. He was daring in a more conservative society, and then almost conservative in contemporary society. I will never forget the works which defined his later life, nor the title of the book “Spring Cannot Be Cancelled” which was both a middle finger to Covid lockdowns and a spiritual demonstration of the faith that life will always be reborn. It is remarkable that he is, so far as I can tell, the only person to have made a genuine and non-cynical contribution to visual art in a digital medium. Perhaps this is less a sign of his willingness to innovate than an indication that the joie de vivre which defined his art would flower in any medium. It ought to be a source of enormous shame to us that he felt forced to live abroad to find the freedom to live and create, and yet I still feel proud of being British to think that we can call such a master one of our sons.

From imposing lifestyle changes to shutting down debate on climate policy, how much of a say has the public had on Net Zero? In the GWPF's latest podcast, we ask @Fox_Claire whether Britain's Net Zero agenda has a democratic mandate. Watch Claire Fox: Is Net Zero Democratic? below👇

We've lost one of the greats. Not only as an iconic artist of huge originality, but also a public figure with the courage to be a dissident. I once had the honour of chairing David Hockney on a panel. Yes, it was about the excessive Nanny statism about smoking. He made an eloquent case for choice & liberty. I was excessively star-struck. He was excessively modest. Ahh. Such a loss.

Vapaan sanan käytäntöä ja juhlaa.

Senior Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue bosses have cautioned firefighters who support Reform UK. Fire chiefs sent an email to staff stating that firefighters who support — or have stood as candidates for — Reform UK had been spoken to about their views. The email, sent by Mr Petch and Ms Ahmed, also appeared to encourage staff to report colleagues they believe support Reform UK. The General Secretary of the Free Speech Union, Lord Young, has written to Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham, who is responsible for the governance of the region’s fire and rescue service and is widely regarded as our next Prime Minister. In his letter, Lord Young wrote: “Staff are further invited to report colleagues who support any groups that go against the service’s values, which effectively amounts to an instruction to inform on colleagues for their political beliefs.” He added: “The practical effect is that a public fire and rescue service governed by you is treating the lawful political activity of your electoral opponents as a reputational risk to their employer. “Regardless of whether this reflects your instruction, it reflects your governance; and a public office-holder who permits his institution to demonise or chill the speech and political activity of those who support his principal electoral rival cannot claim to be discharging that office with the impartiality it demands.” Read more from FSU Campaigns Officer @MaxHThompson 👇

The Justice Committee has given its verdict on Labour’s plans to restrict our ancient right to a jury trial. It’s utterly damning. It says there is NO evidence for David Lammy’s claim that judge only trials will take 20% less time than jury trials. 🧵

Huge thanks @Suomalaisuus for all hard graft creating #BattleFest #Helsinki @acadofideas. Fabulous day ahead in October. Debates on #sovereignty #populism #freespeech #AI #languagewars #GenZfuture #media #misinformation Bookmark 31 October. And spread the word. Details soon...

Von der Leyen is coming for Europe’s wallet The Multiannual Financial Framework. Even for a body as jargon-prone as the European Union, the phrase feels almost bewilderingly dull. Perhaps that’s the point. For hidden amid the technical language of the EU’s new budget is a kind of technocratic coup — one that promises more power for the Commission, less for member states, and which would ultimately make Brussels even less accountable than it already is today. Over the past decade, the EU’s institutional balance has already tilted heavily towards the Commission, which has extended its reach into areas once considered the preserve of national governments — from fiscal policy and public health to foreign affairs and defence. The mechanism has been consistent: each crisis — the sovereign debt crisis, Brexit, the Covid-19 pandemic, the Ukraine war — has served as a pretext for the Commission to assume more authority, make “emergency” decisions and lock in permanent changes to the exercise of EU power. None of this has required formal treaty changes. It has occurred surreptitiously, outside the arena of democratic debate, through what scholars have called “integration by stealth”. The result has been a creeping “Commissionisation” and supranationalisation of European decision-making, with a corresponding erosion of national sovereignty and democratic accountability. Now the Commission is using negotiations over the EU’s next seven-year budget — the aforementioned Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) for 2028-2034 — to push this process further still. And precisely for this reason it is keen to wrap up a deal by the end of the year. Brussels insiders are acutely aware that the French presidential election of April 2027 could produce a government led by Jordan Bardella of the National Rally — a party hostile to the integrationist agenda underpinning the new MFF. Since the framework requires unanimous approval in the Council, a Eurosceptic France could strangle the budget at birth. The unstated but operative goal is to seal the deal before that risk appears. That this is never said openly only underscores the contempt for democratic deliberation that now pervades the process. Read my article on the EU’s latest power grab here: unherd.com/2026/06/von-der-l…

Friedrich Merz hat in seiner Zeit als Unionsfraktionschef ein Unternehmen beauftragt, das Netz zu durchforsten und hunderte Bürger mit Anzeigen wegen angeblicher Beleidigung zu überziehen. Ausgerechnet dieser Merz stellt sich nun hin und preist den Zustand der Meinungsfreiheit in Deutschland. Wie verlogen ist das denn? Ist der Kanzler schon einmal auf die Idee gekommen, dass es eine einschüchternde Wirkung haben könnte, wenn Bürger wegen teils harmloser Kritik an Politikern mit Geldstrafen überzogen werden oder plötzlich die Polizei zur Hausdurchsuchung vor der Tür steht? Schluss damit! Diese Regierung sollte schnellstmöglich der Vergangenheit angehören. Wir starten unsere „Weg mit Merz“-Kampagne: Samstag, 13. Juni, um 16 Uhr auf dem Willy-Brandt-Platz in Magdeburg. Kommt alle vorbei!

Oxford University is facing serious questions over its handling of repeated disruption of public talks by Dr Michael Foran, an associate professor of law and tutorial fellow at Keble College, after trans activists interrupted two events linked to his recent work on sex, gender identity and the legal tensions that have emerged between them. thecritic.co.uk/the-screamin…

My opening remarks at the Battle of Ideas 2025 debate "From Harvard to Sussex: should the state punish universities?" I argued that institutional autonomy can be interfered with, but any such intervention must comply with four key principles. youtube.com/watch?v=xRB8UdHq…

Voyager 1 is 24 billion kilometers from Earth. It communicates with us using a 23-watt transmitter. Less than a refrigerator light bulb. The signal takes 22 hours to reach us, traveling at the speed of light. By the time it arrives, it's 20 billion times weaker than the power of a digital watch battery. NASA's Deep Space Network picks it up using 70-meter dish antennas cooled to near absolute zero to reduce electronic noise. The engineering required to hear a 23-watt signal from 24 billion km away is arguably more impressive than the spacecraft itself. Launched 1977. Still transmitting. Still being heard. We built something that works perfectly, 47 years later, in conditions no one has ever tested in. That's what engineering for the long term looks like.