South Western Railway will become the first train operator to be nationalised under Labour, effective from 2 a.m. on Sunday. Unsurprisingly, the grand moment has already gone off track…
The first train under the new regime, scheduled to leave Woking at 5.36 a.m. for London Waterloo, will see passengers having to switch to a rail replacement bus beyond Surbiton due to engineering works near Raynes Park. A bus-ted flush…
Transport secretary Heidi Alexander will be celebrating the occasion by getting on board the 6:14 a.m. service from Waterloo to Shepperton – a train which will have to be diverted around the disruption. Off the rails…
Pretty much every Friday there is a round of rumours that Tory MPs will go public with discontent over Kemi Badenoch’s leadership. The Sunday papers are traditionally the place for that kind of thing – for now, at least, they continue to drop without incident…
After a humiliating battering at the locals, MPs kept their counsel. Many continue to complain in private, but not a single one of the 120 (one currently has lost the whip, so not 121) raised their head above the parapet. They gripe behind closed doors about pretty much everything – from policy to PMQs – there’s a long list of complaints. Eyebrows were raised at a particularly testy argument this morning between Badenoch and BBC Breakfast presenter Charlie Stayt about her performance against Starmer on Wednesday…
The positioning in Badenoch’s shadow cabinet is transparent – Guido hardly needs to explain. Jenrick’s sheer work ethic and honed communication skill is now reliably driving the right wing media narrative. Chris Philp is considered a solid performer on crime and immigration, and is catching the eye of donors. Mel Stride has been advised by Tory old hands to help turn the party’s national campaign towards the economy, amid concerns that on that issue, they have not yet really set out their stall. But immigration is the most salient issue in every poll, and that is benefitting Reform…
Some senior Tories snipe that Badenoch did not put in enough campaigning effort during the local elections and took a step back for periods, which generated unhappiness at ground level. Her team pushes back strongly on this, and continues to see her as the answer – just that she hasn’t had enough time. But outside Tory circles, there is widespread media and public apathy about the Conservatives in general, and Tory MPs are busy plotting how to get out of politics themselves, rather than take out another leader…
Sometimes individual savings identified by UK DOGE number in the billions. Others reveal the rot in Whitehall’s attitude towards taxpayer cash…
The Government Property Agency was asked this month by Richard Holden what flags it had purchased since the general election. There are two. One is a Ukrainian flag purchased to “show solidarity” for £104.60 – all good. The GPA managed to spend almost seven times that figure, though, on one Pride flag “purchased for flying during events.“ Total price tag: £674.17…
Seeing as you can buy a massive eight foot “Intersex Progress Pride” flag on Amazon for £25 – and that’s on the expensive side – Guido is not quite sure how the government managed to get the bill to 27 times that amount. There is no bottom to Labour’s capacity to spaff the cash…
Stateside journalists at Politico are up in arms over the company’s new AI-powered tool that delivers live news summaries during major political events. The tech was rolled out last March, with Politico executive Rachel Loeffler hailing it as “seamlessly integrating generative AI with our unmatched policy expertise.” The hacks are having none of it…
Now backed by the PEN Guild union – Politico being one of the first US newsrooms to bag a union contract – the journos claim the AI tool violates their agreement by being introduced without the required 60 days’ notice. Union reps argue the technology “materially and substantively impacts bargaining unit job duties” and that “this isn’t just a contract dispute, it’s a test of whether journalists have a say in how AI is used in our work.” The union’s vice chair Arianna Skibell, who pens Politico’s energy newsletter, lamented:
“We’re not against AI, but it should be held to the same ethical and style standards as our political journalists. We do remain hopeful that we can come to some kind of agreement. But we’re also ready for a fight.”
Meanwhile, less hysterical journalists are actually putting AI to good use. Two Pulitzer Prize winners revealed they used the technology to help uncover systemic failures in the Chicago Police Department’s investigations last year. Guido can think of a few morning emails that would benefit from AI summarisation…
Entries in the comments…
Co-conspirators may remember that back in 2022 James Harding’s Tortoise Media launched a judicial review against the Tory Party for its refusal to reveal membership figures in the Truss/Sunak leadership contest. Fought all the way to the Court of Appeal and the latest judgement is now in…
“The Court of Appeal Civil Division has today dismissed a claim for judicial review brought by Tortoise Media Limited (“Tortoise”) against the Conservative and Unionist Party.”
The key point here is that the Tory party was not “exercising a public function when it conducted the process for election of its leader in 2022” and so cannot be JRd for its refusal to supply what Tortoise thought was enough information about the process. It was always barmy to threaten a private organisation with Judicial Review…
A Tory source tells Guido:
“This deranged legal action was always doomed to fail. but not before Tortoise’s James Harding had burned plenty of his reader’s hard earned cash in a giant egotistical bonfire. Now loon Tortoise has joined the ranks of Jolyon, the Good Law Project and other campaigners who gum up the legal system with nonsense attempts at lawfare. No wonder their ‘journalists’ are getting ratty about the whole thing and many are asking whether they should run The Observer.”
UPDATE: A Conservative Party spokesman said:
“Once again, this publicity stunt has been a waste of time and ultimately a waste of Tortoise’s, and now the Observer’s, subscribers’ money. It is clear that the courts should not be used to conduct gesture politics and Tortoise’s ongoing failure with this claim is the latest in a line of welcome judgments against half-baked attempts at activism made by campaigners.”
Oops…
Read the full judgement below:
Red Wall Labour backbencher Jonathan Brash told GB News that Starmer should resign:
“I’m completely fed up about it, and I think it’s got to the point now where I genuinely think that, as far as the Prime Minister is concerned, it’s not a case of if, it’s when.”
