We've now made six podcasts featuring artists, writers, and makers who feature in our current Radical Rural galleries trail.
Hear from @maninthewoods.co.uk, @katrinanavickas.bsky.social, @lisaschneidau.bsky.social, and Ruth Webb on our website!
merl.reading.ac.uk/whats-on/rad...
It's also a bit insulting they're making communities enter competitive bids for even these small beer initiatives (the final national forest and the future eight river walks).
What's that got to do with ending postcode lotteries? Why wouldn't they at least target the areas of greatest deprivation?
The government must know this line is nonsense. Yet still keep repeating it.
Nine river walks & three forests won't change the postcode lottery on access to nature. Even where these initiatives are happening they're so far only upgrading the existing infrastructure, not creating new access at all.
FT comments section this morning - saying what everyone else is thinking, right?
"I would do anything for my grandchildren"
Absolute Units returns tomorrow!
We're back with Ruth Webb and @lisaschneidau.bsky.social, picking up where we left off last time and continuing the story of Old Crockern and the fight for wild camping on Dartmoor.
Listen wherever you get your podcasts.
merl.reading.ac.uk/explore/abso...
interesting how we were able to get rid of leaseholds in scotland and it didnt cause some sort of apocalyptic end of days housing crisis or something. almost seems to suggest that siding against landlords is a good idea actually
If Labour HQ were smart they'd spend more time listening to MPs like Chris who know the nature space - and how it polls - far better than they do. Rather than treating him like a pesky rebel... and finding out the hard way down the track.
There’s a nature-loving majority in this country.
Those in power must listen and stop trashing our environment.
There are far more of us than there are developer lobbyists.
They have the millionaires. We are the millions.
We need a bold campaign to get our nature back.
It's a common refrain for ministers to note Nigel Farage's absence from the Commons, but the stats do seem to back it up. So far this year he has spoken five times and voted seven times. As a very rough, smaller-party comparison, Ellie Chowns of the Greens has spoken 46 times and voted 24 times.
I know the Telegraph is basically a meme now but...
I've always said it. Buy a man, eat fish he day.
I am immensely disappointed that the Government has today scrapped permanent refugee status. Refugees will now face reviews every 30 months and be forced to return if their country is deemed 'safe'.
We know that countries listed as 'safe' aren't safe for everybody, particularly LGBTQ+ refugees.
What is the true significance of Labour’s by-election loss in Gorton and Denton? I got into an argument with Tom Watson about whether Labour can assume support for the “minor party” will collapse at a general election and this is the result... williamcullernebown.substack.com/p/arguing-wi...
If not it's not implausible a chunk of that 25% of progressive & incremental activists look more closely at the Greens. Especially as first past the post no longer a factor in Senedd elections.
SNP (partially) navigated this historically via a focus on land reform. Could Plaid follow suit?
Will be interesting to see how this plays out in the environmental space.
It's a running meme in Wales that their environmental policy is written by the farming unions. As they become a more progressive party with a younger base & enter into rainbow coalitions, can the contradictions be reconciled?
"The Iranian regime must understand that it now has no other option but to engage in good-faith negotiations"
Yes, the US and Israel are now famous for their good-faith approach to negotiations.
Honestly, what is this statement? Did a Starmer write this?
www.theguardian.com/world/2026/f...
Well, no, they’re not just as wrong. The bigger error is not seeing that “trying to win over voters from a party on the opposite end of the spectrum, whose values your core voters oppose” is not same as “chasing voters from party on same side ideologically whose values your core voters like.”
Very clear that for Starmer, 'sectarian voting' is when British Muslims don't vote Labour, and for many others, it is just when British Muslims vote.
Presumably that will also be much strengthened now, as people become confident insurgent parties can win.
By contrast it seems Reform vote is, so far, quite accurately dialled.
Also interesting to see if YouGov et al start adjusting their models.
Sure, some contingent circumstances in Gorton & Denton (not least a superb candidate) but even so, anti-Labour left vote seems underpriced. See also: Caerphilly by election (which had Plaid five points lower a week before).
I think it fails to understand the coalition of voters that just voted Green, and why. And as usual you won’t get very far by implicitly slagging off the voters. The Green voter coalition was your coalition five minutes ago.
It does feel like a robot programmed with one mode: kick the left. No matter the circumstances. I guess this is what happens when your politics becomes more obsessed by factionalism than analysis & proposition.
There are/were some good Labour MPs & advisers. They just don't get promoted, or leave.
I’m afraid this letter shows why so many Labour MPs think Starmer needs to go. His political antenna is non-existent. If you have just been humbled in a by-election it might not be the best idea to slag off the choices of the voters who deserted you in their droves.
What stands out in this is the gulf between the Prime Minister & Labour HQ and its MPs.
MPs were spelling out in private how mind-bogglingly disastrous the official attack lines were. Yet no one with power within the party was capable of perceiving the obvious.
www.theguardian.com/politics/202...
Yeah but that's quite a different thing to be able to handle a pulpit in the midst of a national media scrum after you've probably slept about six hours in six days. People think 'I could do that'. But they can't.
Quite funny that Hannah Spencer was chilling as a plumbing influencer about a month ago.
Now it seems she's already better at politics, speech writing, and public speaking than the Prime Minister and most of his team.
And she could sort your pipes and walls out. Impressive.
I'm a rural bloke and I don't forgive Labour for promising right to roam and then bottling it. They are in the pockets of the rich and powerful. They have wasted the generational chance to improve society for the majority and have lost this lifelong voter for good. Going Green.
make u think
