It's real!! Very excited to hold in my hands a hardback copy of my new book, THE LIE OF THE LAND - an expose of what the 'custodians of the countryside' have done to nature in Britain. Published 12th September - pre-order yours here: lnkfi.re/dsHR7n

wait til you find out which party initiated legislation to ban smoking for *everyone* under a certain age

A reminder that the official portrait of every former PM - even Johnson and Truss - is hung on the staircase leading from the Cabinet room to the State rooms. Being a Labour PM and not wanting a huge painting of Margaret Thatcher staring at you as you work strikes me as

Now Starmer's gone too far; he's removed Liz Truss' portrait.

It’s a tradition for Secretaries of State in the department

Things that fail to provoke my outrage 1/ what painting the Prime Minister does or doesn’t want in his office 2/ how Angela Rayner spends her holiday 3/ the price of Oasis tickets.

Apparently, only one of the dancing politicians demeans their office 🤷‍♂️

REVEALED: Landowners in England have been paid £9billion in 'stewardship' payments over past 30yrs - yet nature continues to decline Large landowners should be required to publish reports showing how they are stewarding land for nature and carbon 1/ theguardian.com/environment/ar…

2/ For decades, the public has paid billions of pounds to landowners to be good stewards of nature. In some cases it’s worked – but too often, they've failed to deliver, leaving habitats and wildlife in near-terminal decline.

It’s time we made the 1% of the population who own half of England – and who often claim to be ‘custodians of the countryside’ – accountable to the public. Much more on this in my new book The Lie of the Land, out 12th Sept: lnkfi.re/dsHR7n

Oh this is a fun game. Debt: 70% of GDP vs 100% of GDP NHS waiting lists: 2.5 million vs 7.6 million Kids in temporary accomodation: 38k vs 150k Foodbanks: 35 vs 3000 (approx) Shall we keep going?

It’s not just how the Tories behaved in power, Labour will be sustained in government by what this lot do in opposition. theguardian.com/politics/artic…

Elon Musk

Disappointing and extreme statement by the chief rabbi.

The Chief Rabbi (an absurd post in itself given the structure of UK synagogues) should ration his interventions in British politics. Fears of British jews at home are a reasonable topic. Arms licences and foreign policy not so much.

Indeed. British Jews are pretty united on the issue of antisemitism here but are not when it comes to the behaviour of the Israeli government. On that topic the Chief Rabbi certaintly does not speak for many of us.

well this is awkward

I interviewed Michel Barnier about the Brexit negotiations for my book on Keir Starmer. It would be fair to say the new French PM is an admirer of the (slightly less) new British PM.

Much as I admire BBC News (UK), I do sometimes despair of it when the lead item on the 10pm news is a long report about prison overcrowding - but fails to mention either the ridiculous sentencing policy or the failure to build new jails in previous 14 years.

All we got by way of reasons for the problem were vague references to how it had got worse because of Covid and locking up criminals involved in recent riots. That is not a full or even partial explanation and I suspect those responsible for the editorial decisions know it.