Yesterday’s Sunday Times made a passing reference to an unnamed “Lobby journalist” being “stripped of their parliamentary pass last week following reports about their raucous behaviour”.  The fearless Lobby cartel’s “rule of omerta” when it comes to their own is in play. Guido understands it was a Telegraph Lobby journalist who was stripped of their pass last week following a row in a bar. No one at The Telegraph is willing to comment…

This will reduce the number of Telegraph journalists with passes giving them access to Parliament from 23 to 22. They’ll just have to cope somehow…

UPDATE:  A Telegraph spokesman gets in touch “We are aware of an incident, we take the matter of parliamentary security seriously, and are dealing with the matter accordingly.”

Despite the SNP’s usual claims about Scotland’s ‘world-leading’ climate change efforts, a new report co-authored by Scottish government officials and Newcastle University has found the SNP have ignored more than a third of the recommendations put forward by their own ‘Climate Assembly’ on environmental policies. More broadly, the report says there is “no evidence” that the assembly’s work has influenced government policy. Somehow SNP Net Zero Secretary Michael Matheson says he’s still “exceedingly proud” of the work…

The Assembly published 81 recommendations to the Scottish government back in June, with Sturgeon claiming she was “delighted to support this package of recommendations” in the government’s response in December. Looking at those recommendations the report finds:

“A third of recommendations appear to broadly match existing or planned policy, with around a fifth being explored by government in some way albeit with no commitment to implementing… Over a third of recommendations include policy that will not be taken forward. Whilst 14 recommendations relate to UK Government reserved matters, the Scottish Government committed to contacting the UK Government about these, and has done so.”

“Member survey results indicate that between the end of the main assembly period and after receiving the government response, there was a decline in members’ confidence in the Scottish Government taking the assembly seriously.”

This isn’t the first time the SNP have paid lip service to environmentalism, only to then sit on their hands. Just last month, the Climate Change Committee accused them of “hollow rhetoric” and failing to deliver on policies. Now it’s happened again – from officials within their own government. If the SNP doesn’t actually believe in radical green policies, it should say so. Guido would be glad to listen. Instead, it looks like they’re happy to promise “transformational actions”, and then blame Westminster when they realise it’s impractical…

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has bought a $2.89 billion stake in Twitter, making him the largest outside shareholder in the social media firm, not long after criticising the company for failing to uphold the tenets of free speech.

Musk now owns 73,486,938 shares of Twitter, which represents a 9.2% passive stake in the company, according to the Securities and Exchange Commission filing released this morning. The stake is worth $2.89 billion, based on Twitter’s closing price on Friday. The stock has shot up some 25% in pre-market trading…

This comes less than two weeks after Musk criticised the company, polling people on Twitter about whether Twitter adheres to free speech principles. “Given that Twitter serves as the de facto public town square, failing to adhere to free speech principles fundamentally undermines democracy,” Musk tweeted. “What should be done?” Guido for one welcomes Musk’s intervention, if he can stop Twitter’s increasingly woke censorship tendency…

UPDATE:  This graphic taken from a Bloomberg article about his tweeting shows how active he is on the platform:

He’s a prolific tweeter!

One notable moment made it out of the Welsh Secretary’s morning media round. Asked about last night’s Partygate fines and whether the PM should resign if he receives one, Simon Hart told Kay Burley:

“We all make judgements which we have time to reflect on and wished we’d made differently, I think for me personally speaking the world has moved on… the idea that every politician – or indeed every journalist for that matter – who makes a misjudgement along the way should automatically be sacked is not something I subscribe to.”

Whoever could he be thinking of?

Grim reading for Number 11 in the latest ConservativeHome Cabinet poll, with the once popular Rishi’s net approval figures plummeting from +38.8 down to +7.9 following the Spring Statement. The Chancellor is now third from bottom, only ahead of Ben Elliot and Priti Patel, who’s now well into negative figures over bad headlines on Ukrainian refugees. Rishi’s precipitous drop shouldn’t be a surprise, given 58% of the membership said they either dissatisfied or very dissatisfied with the Statement in another ConservativeHome poll yesterday…

Defence Secretary Ben Wallace still holds a commanding lead at the top, while Nadhim, Trevelyan and Truss all jostle for the silver medal, with Zahawi just about pulling ahead this month. Truss has gained almost 3 points since the last poll, though she’s still making up for lost ground after her 10-point drop in February. 

Boris meanwhile is making a Lazarus-style comeback, shooting back up the rankings by 15.8% and finally leaving the negative ratings of the last three months. His handling of Ukraine has definitely helped, although having his most obvious successor and rival take all the flak for hiking taxes probably hasn’t hurt either…

President Zelenskyy’s address last night was his most damning in weeks, following the war crimes seen after Russians retreated from Bucha, near Kyiv. Speaking in Russia to the mothers of Putin’s troops, Zelenskyy asked:

“I want every mother of every Russian soldier to see the bodies of those who have been killed in Bucha, in Irpin, in Hostomel. What did they do? Why were they murdered? … Why were women strangled after their earrings were ripped out of their ears? How could women be raped and murdered in front of their children? Their bodies tortured even after their deaths?”

“Even if you raised looters, how did they also become butchers?”

Satellite images of the town show a 45 foot-long mass grave… 

Zelenskyy also used the opportunity to pour scorn on the leaders of Western Europe, inviting former German and French presidents Merkel and Sarkozy to Bucha to:

“see what the policy of concessions to Russia has led to in 14 years. To see with their own eyes the tortured Ukrainian men and women.”

Meanwhile Zelenskyy’s said the UK has “agreed on new defensive support for Ukraine. New package. Very, very tangible support,” adding “Thank you Boris for the leadership! Historical leadership. I’m sure of it”.