After everything that’s happened the last few years I didn’t think I could be surprised by any headlines any more… but “bird sniffing is not a crime” are a set of words I never expected to see out together in a sentence.

What an absolute crap-fest of a PM and a political party as a whole.

You can pick a message and sign one of the postcards here: https://findothers.com/tools/postcards-for-refugee-children

Voting is how things pass

You can combine that with other action if you are motivated - protesting, writing to your representatives, campaigning for whoever is closest to your views and so on…

yes the game is rigged.. the media is (mostly) bought and paid for, the impact of social media manipulation is awful…. But ultimately - not voting does nothing to help, worse than that.. not voting actively helps those people stay in power who stack the deck.

Voter apathy.. “they are all as bad as each other” is a ploy to stop us holding those in power to account.

Could you expand on that?

I mean… I get the frustration with Keir Starmer and how hard it is when you can’t find a party or person who properly represents those with left or more socialist view… but worse than the Tories? Really? I mean I just can’t see how that’s possible.

The only people who win when we don’t vote is the Tories… and we can all see what damage that has done.

It’s just so comically evil that a political party would be against Human Rights… at least it would be comical if there wasn’t a real chance that the tories could actually scrap it and that there are voters who have been tricked into agreeing with them.

The chance is very low, the Good Friday Agreement depends on the ECHR but after Brexit we know what level of destruction the Tories are willing to do to this country in order to cling on to power

with intent to destroy the life of a child capable of being born alive

These are extremely late self administered abortions. Absolutely tragic for all involved and the current laws may not be appropriate but although most people agree that a collection of cells or tiny foetus is not a person yet… when someone is at a point in the pregnancy where the baby can be born and survive then I don’t think it’s as simple.

Note: I’m assuming that’s what the line meant about being capable of being born alive (as the other recent case I was aware of was a really really late abortion and I think this is a similar case based on the posted link)

Again? When did that ever change?

It’s not theft unless the owner specified in the conditions of the rental that car’s couldn’t be charged at the property. (Even then “Theft” is a strong word!)

That being said - there is obviously a big difference in charging your phone and charging a car and really we are at a point where this should be clear in all holiday rental agreements one way or another.

I don’t think the owner would be happy if someone just turned on all the taps in the house and left them running for the entirety of their stay. There is a sort of “fair use” which is assumed (if not actually in writing)

Question comes if car charging should always be assumed “fair use” or is that above and beyond? Or is it a gray area that just “depends”.. Much better for everyone if all this is made as clear as possible in the agreement right at the beginning.

_From analysis of detention logs, during the previous six months, 1,257 children had been held at Manston, including 26 who were unaccompanied. The average recorded time of detention for children travelling in family groups was two days 11 hours although 232 children had been held for more than 96 hours and the longest time of detention for a child was more than 19 days. Unaccompanied children were held for an average of 21 hours 44 minutes.

Families with children were prioritised at Manston, but processing remained slow at busy times and we observed some families with very young children waiting for several hours to be progressed into the family marquee. The family marquee was in good condition and provided baby food, children's toys and changing facilities. However, at the time of our inspection there was no private area for women to breastfeed.

Some particularly vulnerable children were held for long periods. One case concerned a 17-year-old girl and her 10-month-old baby, who the girl said had been conceived after she was raped. They arrived in the KIU at 11:030am and were held until 10am the following day, when accommodation was made available._

https://www.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/hmiprisons/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2023/06/WJF-Manston-and-KIU-web-2023.pdf

———— Good thing that we spent £1,550 to get rid of those inappropriately friendly murals.. I guess the baby food, children’s toys and changing facilities will also be removed because there’s definitely no children arriving here.

I feel really reassured now that the 1,257 children in the report weren’t really children (and the 10 month old baby was obviously a teenager with an intense fear of bright, cheerful colours and disney characters).

Edit: @520 - I’m sorry my sarcasm wasn’t targeted at you exactly, your point about newspapers and the reported statements are both valid. It’s just a forked up situation for whatever insane reason the decision was made… I think malicious… but even if it was pure bloody incompetence it doesn’t make it better.

That’s a depressing thought - that Labour may agree with the basic principle of taking extremely vulnerable people and cramming them together on a bloody barge.

Good. What an absolutely ridiculous rule in the first place

Thank you for pointing this out, I totally agree.

Being able to afford food, water, shelter is not a bloody “benefit”. This is the absolute minimum we all need to survive.

That is assuming that by extracting it ourselves we are at least equally reducing how much is being extracted elsewhere…. Which obviously isn’t the case. This will take carbon that’s currently trapped under the ground and release it into the atmosphere.

They are killing us for profit & votes

Back to work after having a week off. Kind of dreading it as my calendar is already packed

That’s not the point and you know it. A child who already is likely to have experienced racism towards themselves not being comfortable with hearing casual racism being read out in class isn’t the same as wanting books restricted to “rainbows and unicorns”

I’m not saying that I agree with that of mice and men should be removed from the curriculum (honestly I don’t know what the right thing to do is) but I understand and empathise with the girls position.

What they are saying in the article that racism can and should be thought (and is!) but it’s entirely unnecessary and off putting for it to be part of English lit.

Part of English lit is encouraging a positive attitude to reading and literature. Yes it delves into the details but it should be encouraging young people about the joy of reading. That’s definitely not going to happen if you are choosing books that alienate your readers when there are plenty of alternatives that would be more suitable

This isn’t about “banning” of mice and men. It’s just about it not being the focus of the class where this hateful racist language and attitudes would be read out.

It’s a very understandable viewpoint