Carers: System 'not fit for purpose' in Northern Ireland.

Joanne McKee: 'It just never stops, there's no down time, no sick days, no holidays - it's just constant 24/7.'

A lot of pain for £81.90 a week.

bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northe…

Luna wants me to stop photographing the fire & get on with sitting by it so she can sleep on my feet.

Yes, it’s nearly May, but it’s FREEZING so we’re having a fire anyway!

Great work by Patrick Butler highlighting this carers allowance scandal. The Trussell Trust response: Carers rewarded for their critical work by being forced into hardship, hunger and debt. A system that's neither compassionate nor just. It shames us all. twitter.com/Helen_Barnard/…

“Things are going quite badly wrong:' influential chair of commons welfare committee tells ministers to fix the failing carer's allowance benefit as concerns grow at treatment of unpaid carers theguardian.com/society/2024/a… by Josh Halliday and me

People often leave public messages on a local stable website asking about lesson availability etc. I’m totally up for a night out with the woman who had the confidence to post “Is there a weight limit for adult lessons?”. Own it, work it, girlfriend!

Scottish political bods: if Scottish Labour’s binding no confidence motion in the government passes, does that trigger Holyrood elections immediately? (Given no other party/parties could form a new government).

“Most importantly, disabled people and people with health conditions must listen while our political leaders avoid or misrepresent the harsh realities they face.” Excellent piece by ⁦Sumi Rabindrakumar⁩ ⁦The Trussell Trust⁩ for ⁦Big Issue⁩ bigissue.com/opinion/dwp-di…

‘Currently, government policy does not provide enough money for people to live healthily.’

Consequently ‘the UK is sicker because we’re poorer.

‘… We [do] have the policies to turn it around. [But] making disabled people even poorer isn't one of them.’

Someone I completely trust has said the rumours are nonsense ⬇️

This is interesting and good to see. bbc.co.uk/news/articles/…

We've tried before in our recruitment, but more recently have shared the themes that questions cover rather than the qn itself (unless someone requests when we ask about reasonable adjustments).

Interested in views...

We do integration so much better than mainland Europe - it's one of our big success stories and yet so much of our politics is built around denying it.

A typically forensic Jennifer Williams piece on levelling up programme failings.

It didn’t:
- compensate for #localgov ££ cuts
- allocate promised funds (below)
- target ££ to deprivation

It did:
- add to funding complexity
- waste scarce bidding capacity
ft.com/content/45c12c…

My rant against the dodgy government presentation of its defence numbers. we should not have to rely on Ben Chu Ben Zaranko to decode the figures for us. Come on HM Treasury - get a grip.

*sighs wearily*

A reminder, if election were announced Monday, you’ve still got a week or more of washup of Parliamentary business

We looked at post 2 May announcement with Parliament dissolved two weeks later.

Election is 25 working days from dissolution, not announcement