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How to Make a Small UK Bathroom Feel Bigger and Brighter

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How to Make a Small UK Bathroom Feel Bigger and Brighter

In many British homes — whether it’s a Victorian terrace in Manchester, a new-build flat in Birmingham, or a compact London apartment — the bathroom is often the smallest room in the house. Yet it’s also one of the most used.

The challenge? Creating a space that feels light, open and modern without knocking down walls or embarking on a full-scale renovation.

The good news is that you don’t need extra square footage to make a bathroom feel bigger. What you need is smart design — particularly when it comes to lighting, layout and reflective surfaces.

Here’s how UK homeowners are transforming small bathrooms into brighter, more spacious-feeling rooms with a few well-chosen upgrades.

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1. Light First, Everything Else Second

If there’s one thing that makes a small bathroom feel cramped, it’s poor lighting. Many UK bathrooms suffer from limited natural light, especially in older terraces and internal new-build layouts.

A single ceiling pendant simply won’t do the job.

Layered lighting is key. That means combining:

  • Overhead ambient lighting
  • Task lighting around the basin
  • Soft backlighting for depth

This is where integrated mirror lighting has quietly become one of the smartest upgrades in modern bathroom design.

An illuminated mirror distributes light evenly across the face while also reflecting it back into the room. The result? Fewer shadows and a noticeably brighter space — without adding bulky wall fittings.

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More homeowners are turning to streamlined solutions like a LED bathroom mirror from LED Mirror World, which combines mirror and lighting into one clean, minimalist feature. It’s a subtle shift that makes a significant visual difference.

2. Go Bigger with Your Mirror (Even in a Small Room)

It sounds counterintuitive, but a larger mirror often works better in a compact bathroom.

A generous mirror:

  • Reflects more light
  • Creates depth
  • Visually doubles the wall space

In tight UK bathrooms where every centimetre counts, extending the mirror width across most of the vanity area can dramatically open up the room.

Round mirrors are particularly popular right now for softening sharp lines in modern interiors, while rectangular backlit designs suit more contemporary schemes. The key is proportion — the mirror should feel deliberate rather than squeezed in.

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3. Choose Floating Fixtures for Visual Space

Another clever way to make a small bathroom feel bigger is to lift elements off the floor.

Wall-mounted vanities and toilets create visible floor space underneath, which tricks the eye into perceiving a larger room. The more uninterrupted flooring you can see, the more spacious the room appears.

Pairing a floating vanity with an illuminated mirror enhances that effect. The gentle halo of light around a backlit mirror adds depth to the wall, subtly separating surfaces and reducing visual heaviness.

4. Tackle Condensation the Smart Way

Let’s be honest — condensation is a very British bathroom problem.

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Between chilly mornings and steamy showers, mirrors quickly fog up, especially in bathrooms without windows. Not only is this inconvenient, but over time excess moisture can contribute to mould issues.

Modern LED mirrors often come with built-in demister pads, which gently warm the glass to prevent fogging. It’s one of those small luxuries that feels surprisingly essential once you’ve experienced it.

Instead of wiping the mirror down after every shower, the surface remains clear and usable — particularly helpful during rushed weekday mornings.

5. Keep the Palette Light (But Not Clinical)

White has long been the go-to for small bathrooms, and for good reason. But that doesn’t mean the space needs to feel stark.

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Warm neutrals, soft greys, and muted greens work beautifully in UK homes, particularly when paired with natural textures like oak, stone or brushed brass.

Reflective surfaces also play a role. Gloss tiles, polished taps and illuminated mirrors all help bounce light around the room.

The goal isn’t to make the bathroom feel flashy — it’s about creating a gentle brightness that makes the room feel calm rather than cramped.

6. Energy Efficiency Matters More Than Ever

With ongoing concerns around UK energy costs, efficiency has become a genuine design consideration.

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LED lighting uses significantly less electricity than traditional halogen or incandescent bulbs, while also lasting much longer. Integrating LED lighting directly into the mirror eliminates the need for separate wall lights, reducing both energy consumption and visual clutter.

Brands such as LED Mirror World have leaned into this shift by designing mirrors that balance energy efficiency with everyday practicality — offering dimmable controls, colour temperature options and sleek frames that suit modern British interiors.

For homeowners looking to update their bathroom without increasing running costs, this kind of upgrade ticks several boxes at once.

7. Create a “Hotel Feel” Without the Hotel Budget

One of the most noticeable trends in UK bathroom design is the desire for a hotel-inspired aesthetic.

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Think:

  • Even lighting
  • Clean lines
  • Minimal visible fixtures
  • A sense of calm

An illuminated mirror is often the feature that pulls this look together. It frames the vanity area, creates symmetry and adds that soft glow associated with boutique bathrooms.

Importantly, this can be achieved without changing the entire layout. Swapping out a standard mirror for a well-designed LED alternative can refresh the room instantly — no tiles ripped out, no plumbing moved.

A Small Room, Reimagined

Small bathrooms aren’t going anywhere. In fact, as urban living continues to prioritise compact layouts, learning how to design them well has become more important than ever.

The secret isn’t about cramming in more features. It’s about choosing fewer, smarter ones.

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Better lighting. A well-proportioned mirror. Floating elements. Energy-efficient upgrades.

These aren’t dramatic renovations — they’re thoughtful refinements.

And often, it’s something as simple as upgrading to a quality LED mirror that shifts the entire feel of the space from cramped to considered.

In British homes where space is limited but style matters, that’s a change worth making.

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Energy bills slightly falling won’t be enough

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Energy bills slightly falling won't be enough

In April 2026, energy bills in the UK will apparently fall by 7%. But considering the massive rise in bills in recent years, this change will just be a drop in the ocean.

Uswitch reports that average households are paying about £1,758 per year for a dual bill including electricity and gas. The BBC says that the annual saving with the April fall will be about:

£117 for a household using a typical amount of energy.

Total energy prices, however, would still be higher than when Labour came into office in 2024, and still:

a third higher than before the war in Ukraine

Following privatisation in the UK, prices rose steadily through the 2000s before surging upwards after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. This surge meant the proportion of spending people had to dedicate to paying energy bills was at its highest since the 1980s, and possibly even the 50s.

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In October 2025, trade union Unite reported that average households were paying “£500 a year in energy profits” to the private companies running the system.

A much bigger change needs to come

Campaign group We Own It has called out the transfer of increasing amounts of money from ordinary people to big companies via privatisation. It says:

Shareholders around the world profit from our energy system and our outrageous bills.

Advocating for change, it asserts that:

Like Norway, the UK should introduce a permanent windfall tax on oil and gas companies like Shell and BP, at a rate of 56% (on top of corporation tax). Norway is paying 80% of people’s bills above a capped price. We should use the revenues to cut people’s bills, invest in renewable energy and pay for further nationalisation policies that will benefit the country.

It also calls for public ownership, insisting:

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Right now privatisation means we
– Waste money on shareholder profits
– Fail to invest enough in connecting renewable energy to the grid
– Miss opportunities to drive forward the green transition, both in terms of new renewable energy and insulating housing

Public ownership could mean
– More stability in the retail market not chaos
– Saving money on shareholder dividends
– Planning ahead and investing more in renewables

We agree. A fall in under £10 a month in energy bills isn’t going to make a big difference to most ordinary people. What would make a difference is if we stop private energy corporations leeching money off us once and for all, and actually invest in preparing our energy system in a stable way for the future.

Featured image via the Canary

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Wings Over Scotland | The Tactics Of Suicide

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Sorry, readers, we’ve been too busy boiling with rage at revolting, cretinous Americans for the last few days to trust ourselves with writing a full-length article, but we’ve just about calmed down enough in time for this month’s polling analysis.

Which is handy, because today is also the day of the Gorton and Denton by-election in Manchester (fun fact: a seat we’d very likely have lived in ourselves if not for Osama bin Laden, but that’s another story), and that throws up some interesting parallels.

But firstly let’s take a look at that Times story about a study which suggests that tactical voting from Labour supporters could give the SNP an outright majority at the Holyrood election in May.

The premise of the “global strategy and research” firm’s analysis is that Labour voters in Scotland hate Reform more than they hate the SNP. We’re a little sceptical of that, but it would be extremely revealing if it was true, because this site has been pointing out for some considerable time that there are in fact no meaningful areas of political dispute between Scottish Labour and the SNP.

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(There is of course one big ABSTRACT one over the constitution, but since the SNP has no actual intention of, or strategy for, achieving independence it’s a moot point.)

Labour hate the SNP not for any ideological reasons but simply because they still feel like the SNP have stolen their “birthright” of power in Scotland, that the Scottish Parliament was expressly designed to enshrine forever until Alex Salmond smashed the walls down. They’ve been out of office for so long now that they can hardly even remember what they want it for, other than the ministerial salaries.

Voters, of course, are rather more susceptible to changing sides than the professional political class. Labour’s former voters in Scotland have already deserted en masse to the SNP, while half a million of the SNP’s voters stayed home or switched to the Tories in 2017, and Labour voters south of the border are now defecting in huge numbers in both directions – to Reform and the Greens – to the extent that Labour now look all but certain to lose in May in Wales, a country where they’ve won every single election in more than 100 years.

We’re still pretty doubtful, though, that they’d want to achieve this on purpose:

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Stonehaven claim their figures show tactical votes from Scottish Labour supporters would condemn Labour to an abject third place, behind both the SNP and Reform.

SNP: 67 seats
Reform: 25
Labour: 15
Lib Dems: 8
Tories: 7
Greens: 7

(We quietly note in passing that obviously those 67 SNP seats in the projection are all constituency ones, with close to a million SNP list votes totally wasted. Who knew?)

And that doesn’t make a lot of sense. You don’t want BOTH of the parties you dislike the most miles in front of you, no matter which is worst. Now, that outcome might be unavoidable as the numbers stand, but in that case you also definitely don’t want one of them having an absolute majority, because if they don’t then you at least have a chance of SOME sort of political relevance and influence for the next five years.

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(Because if the SNP don’t have a majority, they’ll need support from at least one other party to pass any sort of legislation, and on a case-by-case basis there’s always a chance that that party could be you.)

There’s also no chance whatsoever of Reform being in charge at Holyrood. Even if they did better than any poll has ever suggested – let’s say 30 seats – that’s a million miles short of enough to form a government even with another party on board, and neither Labour nor the SNP would form a coalition (formal or informal) with them, so whatever happens they’ll be shut out of power. There’s no risk to consider there.

So there’s no point in Labour voters voting according to whether they want an SNP government or not, because unless the polling numbers change to a pretty spectacular degree in the next eight weeks they’re getting an SNP government no matter what.

What they’re faced with is a straightforward choice between a very weak SNP government with – by its OWN admission – no mandate for independence, and a very strong SNP government with at least a superficially arguable claim to a mandate for independence. And that IS something of a risk.

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(It would be an absurdly WEAK claim, and one that’d have no influence whatsoever on the UK government, but it’s a rhetorically strong one and at a minimum it would make Scottish Labour’s life even more of a misery than it currently is until 2031.)

Labour’s only hope of a sub-disastrous outcome for this election is that the SNP get (say) 50 seats and Labour get (say) 20, and become the only viable route to the SNP passing legislation (because none of the Greens, Lib Dems and Tories would have the numbers, and the SNP’s voters wouldn’t tolerate Reform support).

Reform, then, from Scottish Labour’s point of view, are a total irrelevance. It barely even matters how many MSPs Nigel Farage’s men get. The vital thing for Labour – their only hope of salvaging anything at all from their catastrophic polling – is to keep the SNP as far short of a majority as possible.

Now, voters don’t tend to think about things that way. They’re not playing seven-dimensional political chess, they just want someone reasonably close to a tolerable Parliamentary voice who might actually do something for them or their constituency.

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But if the party has even some tiny shredded fragments of a collective brain left it should be drumming that bigger picture into its own supporters at branch meetings and on the doorsteps every chance it gets – “if you want Labour to have any chance of any degree of power for the next five years, for God’s sake don’t give either of your votes to the SNP”.

As our analysis last month showed, their best hope is in fact to tactically vote AGAINST the SNP in constituencies other than Labour strongholds (whether that’s for Reform or Lib Dems or Tories or even Greens), but stay Labour on the list vote.

(Because we know that tactical list voting is close to impossible in a PR system, but it’s very possible indeed on the constituency vote.)

At the extreme that could produce a super-hung Parliament in which not even any TWO parties could form a majority, meaning that every party would have power and influence in every vote.

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From Labour’s perspective that’s a dream outcome from where they’re currently standing. It could even force a new election, something that would be beyond calamitous for the cash-strapped SNP but no problem for Labour with the UK party’s broad fiscal shoulders behind it.

So, give the SNP an absolute majority and a rhetorical battering ram, or reduce them to bit-part players in a 70%-Unionist chamber and maybe even nudge them over the cliff into bankruptcy before they can be bailed out by regaining loads of Westminster MPs in 2029? Even for the absolute dum-dums inhabiting Scottish Labour that ought to be a no-brainer.

But where does Gorton and Denton come in?

It comes in because it illustrates how difficult tactical voting can be to pull off. The anti-Reform, notionally left-wing vote in G&D is TWICE the Reform vote – 60% to 30%. There can be little doubt that most Labour voters would, if they can’t win themselves, prefer a Green MP to a Reform one, and definitely vice versa.

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But because it’s not clear which of Labour and Green is most likely to win, they’re both fighting each other for ownership of the anti-Reform vote, which might just be enough to let Reform sneak through the middle. (Though it would be arithmetically almost impossible, and therefore politically seismic in multiple ways if they did.)

There are no such dilemmas in Scotland, however. A tactical vote for the SNP is plainly and indisputably insane from the point of view of a Labour supporter, for the reasons noted above. They’re going to struggle to even come second in this election, but their options are two VERY different kinds of third place – one apocalyptically bad (possibly even fatal), or one beyond their wildest fantasies.

The overwhelming statistical likelihood, in reality, is that May will produce a damp squib of a result that changes nothing. Whether there is or isn’t a “pro-indy majority”, and whatever the exact numbers are, it’s all but certain that we’ve got five more years of the same incompetent, malignant stagnation coming, at best.

But right out at the far edges of what COULD happen on the current figures are two outcomes – both dependent on tactical voting – which would be at least somewhat more interesting, and would amount to either the crippling of the SNP or the effective final destruction of Labour.

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With very little else within their power to achieve, do Scottish Labour voters want an unstoppable, reinvigorated and bouyant SNP, or a weak and broken lame-duck version that spends the next half-decade being bullied from all sides? There are two months to go until we find out.

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Politics Home Article | What should we all do to build trust in advertising?

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What should we all do to build trust in advertising?
What should we all do to build trust in advertising?

James Best, CBE, Chair of Credos and CAP, and coauthor of Trusted Advertising

As new research and cross-industry initiatives show, maintaining trust in an AI-powered, online-dominated world is not just good ethics – it is smart economics, argues James Best, CBE, Chair of Credos and CAP.

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Trust in advertising matters. It matters to the public, who rely on honest and responsible ads to help them choose the products and services that fit their needs and pockets. It matters to the 3.5 million UK businesses, large and small, who invest in advertising to grow, innovate and reach customers. And it matters to politicians, because trusted advertising supports a healthy, competitive economy as well as funding our media and online ecosystem. When people can trust what they see, markets work more effectively, consumers can make informed, better decisions and public confidence in the economy is strengthened.

Encouragingly, the latest research from advertising think tank Credos shows that when advertising is engaging and enjoyable, people are significantly more likely to trust it. That trust, in turn, leads to more effective campaigns and stronger business results. This is a powerful reminder that the UK’s creative excellence is not just culturally valuable, it is an economic asset that contributes to business growth and national competitiveness.

At the same time, we know that the digital landscape has reshaped how people experience advertising. Trust is particularly important in the online environments that now account for over 80% of all UK advertising expenditure. While they offer consumers immense choice, the issues of scams, fraudulent advertising and AI deepfakes have contributed to public concerns. Credos’ work shows that people often judge online content in ‘a state of low-level vigilance’. Maintaining trust in this environment requires collective action, in partnership with Government and regulators and within industry itself.

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That is why the cross-industry and Government partnership through the Online Advertising Taskforce (OAT) is so important. This is a joint initiative with leading industry bodies including the Advertising Association, ISBA, the IPA and IAB UK, co-chaired by Rt Hon Ian Murray MP, Minister for the Creative Industries, and asbof Chair Mark Lund OBE. Its work includes support for industry initiatives around age verification, the responsibilities of creators, and tackling scams – through raising standards and information sharing.  

It also involves getting to grips with the responsibility of using emerging technologies such as AI. Practical outputs include a Best Practice Guide for the Responsible Use of AI in Advertising, published earlier this month under the auspices of the OAT. It has been shared widely to ensure ad practitioners can harness AI’s potential while maintaining consumer trust and ethical standards.

Our co- and self-regulatory system plays a critical role. The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) holds the front line in consumer protection, commands strong support from the industry and operates at no cost to the taxpayer. It is demonstrably effective in ensuring the vast majority of ads are ‘legal, decent, honest and truthful’. And members of the public who saw the ASA’s awareness campaign are more than twice as likely to trust the advertising industry than those who did not. But in the increasingly complex, online-dominated and AI-enabled advertising ecosystem, the ASA needs increased resources. The industry is actively discussing the new funding structure needed and success in securing it is critical to ensure future consumer confidence in ads.

Within the industry, we know that trust pays. Just last month, the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA) published an analysis of nearly a thousand case histories in their databank of effective campaigns, which showed that those that built trust were also much more successful than others in building business success, whether through greater market share, stronger customer retention, or cheaper customer acquisition.

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A good example of this is Tesco. Its emotionally rich, high quality creative advertising over a period of many years has worked hard to build consumer trust for the brand, translating into stronger customer loyalty and outstanding commercial success.

In a world of advertising shaped by technologies only imagined at the beginning of the century, the UK has to be clear on the importance of trust in ads. This translates into solid and vocal backing for the ASA, for the OAT’s initiatives and the industry’s own best practice in creativity and media. Trustworthy advertising protects consumers, strengthens businesses and reinforces the UK’s global reputation, goals shared by industry, regulators and Government alike.


Trusted Advertising: How to harness the power of trust in your brand, by Matt Bourn and James Best and published by Kogan Page is out now. Order your copy here.

Please get in touch with [email protected] if you would like to find out more about the Advertising Association’s work.

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Sewage scandal drama Dirty Business shows how horrific DWP PIP assessments are

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Dirty business documentary exposes DWP shortcomings

Dirty business documentary exposes DWP shortcomings

A Channel 4 docudrama about the sewage scandal has unexpectedly shown how horrific Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) Personal Independence Payment (PIP) assessments are.

Dirty business exposes heartache water companies caused

The three-part series Dirty Business lays bare how the water industry pumped raw sewage into Britain’s rivers and coastline. It’s an unflinching, stark look at how corporate greed led to the destruction of our ecosystem. Moreover, it led to avoidable deaths and life-changing disabilities.

There were many, many moments showing just how much these decisions by the rich destroyed the lives of those who were already struggling to survive under austerity. The scenes of a young girl who swam in infested water, becoming sicker and sicker until she dies of E. coli are heartbreaking.

Dirty Business also showed how much it made people sick. People who’d swum in polluted waters reported problems with their lungs and long-term illnesses. Furthermore, it even led to chronic and neurological conditions. In some cases, it can lead to illnesses which cause attacks of paralysis.

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DWP PIP, of course, had a part to play

One scene in particular shows not just how debilitating the sewage crisis has been, but how uncaring and vile DWP assessments are for anyone with a chronic condition.

Episode three opens with a man, Reuben Santer, surfing in the sea off the coast of Devon in 2022. As he surfs, his partner looks at a graphic on her phone about sewage levels in that area.

Later in the show, we see Santer having a PIP assessment in 2023. Santer explains that he regularly has “attacks” leaving him unable to move.  Despite this, he is asked the standard questions from the PIP playbook. These include whether he can prepare a meal for himself or get dressed

Santer replies:

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Yeah but again, not when I’m having an attack. Then I can’t move. I’ve been getting the attacks every few days for the past six months

Reuben has Meniere’s, a chronic condition which causes debilitating vertigo and can result in sudden loss of consciousness. Instead of having any understanding of fluctuating conditions and the impact these have on someone’s life, the assessor instead pushes him by saying:

But if you’re not having one of your attacks

When he tries to argue his case, she dismissively says:

Yes or no is fine.

This erases his experience of disability and asks him to only answer the assessment for days when his disabilities aren’t affecting him. He tries to reiterate throughout that he can do everything asked, unless he is having an attack. But this isn’t listened to.

Erasure of disabled people’s lived experience

There’s a tiny moment where Santer realises that his disability is being completely ignored and he’s being set up to fail. That no matter what he says or does now, he will not be listened to. So he gives up. It’s a feeling disabled people know very well. That when they are seeking support for their disability, those in power will do anything they can to minimise the issue.

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He keeps repeating throughout the assessment, “not when I’m having an attack”. He clearly became increasingly distressed by someone ignoring him and engaging in a tick-box exercise address the screen for than Santer. This, of course, means that the assessor scores him zero.

The assessor is seen rattling through his results and dismissing it because he can do all of the activities when he’s not having an attack

He attempts to stop her, upset with:

No, no, no that’s the thing with my condition that sometimes I can do these things and other times I can’t and when I can’t, I can’t do anything.

The assessor talks over him throughout. When she says that she can’t award him the benefit, he finally breaks down:

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I don’t know what to do.

As the assessor tells him that if he needs guidance on how to appeal, he can do so online, we see him later in his house. The man is clearly very unwell and collapses on the floor, having a seizure.

We later see Santer struggling to hold down a job and fighting to stop himself from having attacks, but collapsing anyway. Later in 2025, we see his partner walking in on him recovering from an attack with his baby daughter lying on the floor. He heartbreakingly admits:

I know I can’t be left alone with her.

DWP PIP assessments aren’t fit for purpose

This is the reality for so many disabled people who live with fluctuating conditions. When the DWP refuses to support us, we have no choice but to get on with our lives. No matter how detrimental to our health.

The PIP assessment scene in Dirt Business shows what disabled people have known for a long time. PIP assessments are too rigid to actually take someone’s daily life into account. If you’re chronically ill or have a fluctuating condition, the questions don’t have room for “well, sometimes”.

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They only work in absolutes. And the absolutes are never in our favour.

If someone told you, “some days I can carry on as usual, but others I have to spend hours on the floor,” the part you remembered wouldn’t be the days where they DON’T have debilitating attacks. And this is where the DWP is purposefully failing disabled people.

This isn’t something the DWP are doing by accident, they surely know by now that if they made the criteria more flexible, more people would apply. And that’s the opposite of what they want.

Thankfully, Reuben appealed his PIP assessment decision and won. But so many others won’t even get to that stage. If the DWP actually cared about reforming PIP, they would make it more compassionate, not harder to get.

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Featured image via the Canary

By Rachel Charlton-Dailey

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Hannah Campbell: AI, campaigning and how to win in the ‘Kemi Rap’ era

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Hannah Campbell: AI, campaigning and how to win in the ‘Kemi Rap’ era

Hannah Campbell specialises in data, and AI workforce transformation. She was Parliamentary candidate for Telford in 2024 and is currently the Regional Deputy Chairman (Political) for the West Midlands.

The 2024 general election was widely billed as the first “AI election”. It was not. Artificial intelligence appeared largely at the margins: modest productivity gains, a handful of deepfakes, and limited use by Reform to generate TikTok content. Yet to dismiss 2024 as overhyped would be a mistake. The cultural and technological shift is now unmistakable.

When an AI-assisted video of Kemi Badenoch “rapping” in response to the Budget went viral, it marked a turning point. The clip was satirical, quickly consumed, and widely shared. It demonstrated that political culture has already changed. AI is no longer experimental. It is becoming part of the core infrastructure of campaigns.

The next election will not be defined by whether AI appears, but by who uses it well. This transition will be visible in the May 2026 local elections and, by the next general election, AI will be embedded in the operations of every serious campaign.

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This is not optional. Campaigns are being asked to deliver more with fewer volunteers, tighter budgets, and an electorate whose attention has shifted decisively towards short-form video, satire and decentralised online creators. Those who use AI to scale operations, sharpen messaging and produce high-impact content will outperform those who do not. For the Conservative Party, failing to keep pace would be a strategic error.

How AI Has Already Entered UK Campaigning:

Despite the hype, AI’s most common uses in 2024 were practical rather than transformative. Campaigns used it to draft emails, leaflets and social media posts; generate multiple message variations in seconds; speed up rebuttal and opposition analysis; add subtitles and edit video; and improve back-office efficiency.

In effect, AI has already become a productivity engine. It allows local associations to match national-level production values and to respond at speed in a compressed media cycle.

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This matters in an environment where timing often determines reach.

Academic assessments also confirm that AI-enabled disinformation surfaced in 2024. The scale was limited, but the direction of travel is clear. The tools are improving, misuse is becoming cheaper, and voters are increasingly uncertain about what to trust. Future campaigns will operate in an environment shaped by synthetic content, rapid iteration and narratives created outside formal party structures.

The Opportunities AI Brings:

AI enables campaigns to do more with less. Volunteer numbers are falling, digital expectations are rising, and budgets remain constrained. AI can generate targeted messaging, graphics, canvassing routes, donor communications and briefing packs in minutes, freeing scarce human time for strategy and persuasion.

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It also sharpens political judgement. AI can analyse sentiment, test arguments, identify weak lines and surface emerging issues before a human team has convened. It does not replace political instinct, but it accelerates it.

Mobilisation and engagement can also improve. Chatbots and automated tools can help voters with registration, voter ID requirements and polling logistics, reducing friction and allowing campaign teams to focus on persuasion rather than administration.

Crucially, AI levels the playing field. Associations and candidates without professional creative teams can now produce high-quality content. Campaign capability is being democratised, but only if people are trained and confident enough to use the technology. That requires investment, support and leadership from the centre.

The most significant cultural shift, however, is the rise of AI-enabled video satire. Younger voters increasingly consume politics through humour, remix culture and short-form video rather than leaflets or long policy documents. AI is now the engine powering much of this ecosystem.

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Groups such as Crewkerne Gazette illustrate this vividly, producing parody songs and videos using AI-enhanced voices or imagery of political figures. These are not official communications, yet they shape perceptions, embed narratives and reach audiences that formal campaigns struggle to access.

Political satire is not new, but access has changed. You no longer need a production studio to reach millions. AI-powered satire spreads quickly and cheaply, often outside formal campaign rules, and the boundary between parody and misinformation is increasingly blurred.

Risks to Democratic Integrity:

The risks are real. Deepfakes and engineered deception are becoming easier to produce, and misuse will increase. Even a small number of convincing falsehoods can erode public trust. When voters assume any clip might be fake, democratic accountability weakens.

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Hyper-personalised persuasion also raises concerns. AI-driven interactions can be persuasive yet opaque, creating an uneven playing field. Microtargeted messages fragment public debate by delivering claims to audiences unseen by others, limiting scrutiny and challenge.

Independent creators may also cross ethical lines that political parties would avoid. Campaigns may benefit or suffer reputationally, but they cannot control the outcome.

Unlabelled synthetic content creates serious exposure. It can breach electoral law around imprints and misleading material, trigger defamation claims where individuals are falsely represented, and raise data protection issues where targeting lacks proper safeguards. Platforms may remove content at critical moments, and regulators may intervene. Most damaging of all, voters punish perceived manipulation. Once trust is lost, it is difficult to recover.

Using AI for Attacks – Legal Boundaries:

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AI-assisted attacks must sit within clear legal limits. It is lawful to analyse opponents’ records, highlight genuine inconsistencies, and produce parody or satire, provided it is clearly labelled and would not reasonably be understood as fact.

However, AI-generated audio, video or imagery that fabricates words, actions or behaviour risks breaching electoral law, particularly the prohibition on false statements about a candidate’s character or conduct under the Representation of the People Act. Outsourcing such material to “independent” creators does not remove exposure where campaigns encourage, coordinate or knowingly benefit. The test is whether voters are misled, not who created the content.

What Conservatives Should Do Now:

The Conservative Party operates within a framework overseen by the Electoral Commission and cannot dictate the direction of regulation. What it can do is ensure its own practices are robust, credible and defensible.

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That means setting clear internal standards now: no synthetic impersonation intended to mislead; consistent labelling of AI-generated content; and a presumption that campaign communications are traceable and attributable. These safeguards reflect existing law, public expectation and basic political common sense.

Regulation should remain targeted and proportionate, focused on deception, impersonation and covert interference rather than legitimate creativity or satire. Where work is already under way through regulators or Parliament, Conservatives should engage constructively. Shaping outcomes from within the system is more effective than objecting once rules are fixed.

Above all, the party should lead by example. If Conservatives use AI openly, responsibly and competently, that approach becomes the benchmark. In practice, regulators tend to codify behaviour that already works.

The Strategic Imperative:

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The 2024 election was the AI election that was not. The next will be the opposite. As volunteer numbers decline, budgets tighten and video dominates political communication, AI will sit at the heart of campaign success.

AI will shape how future elections are fought, whether parties prepare for it or not. Those that embed it early, train their people and use it responsibly will define the terms of political competition. The rest will spend their time reacting to a campaign environment they no longer control.

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Bring back the insane asylums

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Bring back the insane asylums

‘Perhaps [he] will end up killing someone.’ These were the prescient words of one psychiatrist involved in the treatment of Valdo Calocane, a paranoid schizophrenic who went on to murder Ian Coates, Grace O’Malley-Kumar and Barnaby Webber in an unprovoked attack in Nottingham on 13 June 2023. As the ongoing inquiry into these tragic events has revealed, the psychiatrist in question had good reason to make such a grave prediction. In the years leading up to the Nottingham incident, Calocane is alleged to have assaulted a police officer, attacked an emergency worker, assaulted two colleagues at a factory and frightened a neighbour so badly that she jumped from a first-floor window, seriously injuring her back.

Press coverage of the inquiry this week has focussed on revelations that Calocane was not sectioned under mental-health legislation because health staff were worried about the ‘over-representation of young black men in custody’. In other words, clinical professionals were more concerned about protecting themselves from allegations of racism than protecting the public from serious violence. This extraordinary disclosure is but the latest chapter in an ongoing saga of ‘protected-characteristic exceptionalism’. It is the same attitude that left grooming-gang victims ignored, allowed male rapists into women’s prisons and permitted adult male migrants to claim they are children.

Yet Valdo Calocane’s skin colour was not the primary reason that he was allowed to remain at large. Calocane was free to kill because Britain’s political and medical establishments have made the deliberate choice to allow dangerous psychiatric patients to live unsupervised.

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In the past, individuals with psychiatric disorders were detained, often indefinitely. Asylums were built from the Victorian era onwards, and by the 1950s there were around 150,000 secure mental-health beds across the country. Many of these institutions became overcrowded and, sadly, as happens in many residential establishments, abuse occurred. Nevertheless, the purpose of the insane-asylum system was to protect the public from violent crime.

From the early 1960s, everything changed. Treatment of psychiatric patients in Western countries moved away from incarceration and towards a policy of ‘care in the community’. The discovery and promotion of anti-psychotic drugs by a nascent pharmaceutical industry made such a revolution feasible. But it was the cultural climate that enabled this ‘deinstitutionalisation’, as concern for individual autonomy overtook the pursuit of the common good as the organising moral principle of Western liberal democracies.

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Left-liberals were not the only proponents of care in the community. Small-state conservatives welcomed the opportunity to close expensive taxpayer-funded institutions; Enoch Powell was a champion for the cause.

From our contemporary perspective, the idea of removing a sick person’s liberty – perhaps for life, and before he or she has even committed a crime – seems deeply distasteful, even barbaric. Yet if Calocane had been detained after his first psychotic episode in 2020, Coates, Webber and O’Malley-Kumar would still be alive.

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When it comes to the far-reaching consequences of deinstitutionalisation, Calocane’s crimes are just the tip of the iceberg. Between 2008 and 2018, an average of 69 people a year were murdered in the UK by patients under the care of mental-health services. Over the same time period, more than 4,000 people suffering from schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and living alone ‘in the community’ committed suicide.

In the late 1970s, Britain had around 400 psychiatric beds for every 100,000 people; in 2023, that number was just 22 beds per 100,000. As the number of mental-health inpatients has fallen, rough sleeping has risen. And over the past half a century, Britain’s per-capita prison population has nearly doubled. Identical trends can be seen in countries across the liberal West with the notable exception of Japan, which has 260 mental-health beds per 100,000 and the lowest rate of homelessness in the world.

Care in the community could be more accurately termed ‘neglect in isolation’. The reality is that many people with serious psychiatric disorders cannot be safely ‘managed’ without constant supervision and the capacity to use force if necessary to prevent them from doing harm – either to themselves or others. It is impossible to predict if, or when, a particular patient will turn violent.

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As the Nottingham inquiry continues, we will be told that ‘lessons must be learned’ by both the NHS and the police. The left will blame cuts and the right will blame DEI culture for the failure to section Calocane earlier. But until we admit that care in the community has failed, nothing substantial will change. Violent crimes will continue to be committed with diminished responsibility by people who are severely mentally unwell. If we truly want to prevent another tragedy like Nottingham, we must reverse decades of policy and begin the process of re-institutionalisation.

Unfortunately, in today’s political climate, it seems highly unlikely that we will see such a u-turn. Proposing that the state should routinely incarcerate innocent people is akin to heresy. All societies must find a balance between individual freedom and collective security, and liberal democracies like ours have typically allowed the pendulum to swing hard towards personal liberty. But as the case of Valdo Calocane shows us, when the pendulum swings too far, we all become less safe and less free.

Miriam Cates is a GB News presenter, senior fellow at the Centre for Social Justice and a former Conservative MP.

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Esther Ranstzen Calls For Abolition Of House Of Lords

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Esther Ranstzen Calls For Abolition Of House Of Lords

Esther Rantzen has called for the abolition of the House of Lords after it emerged a bill legalising assisted dying in England and Wales is set to run out of time.

The former TV presenter, who has terminal lung cancer, said it was “a disgrace” that unelected peers were able to effectively block the will of MPs.

The House of Commons voted 314-291 last June to allow the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill to proceed to third reading.

It is a private member’s bill brought forward by Labour MP Kim Leadbeater.

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However, it has become bogged down in the Lords as peers opposed to the legislation tabled more than 1,000 amendments to it.

Sky News reported that ministers are unwilling to allow more parliamentary time to be devoted to the bill, meaning it will not become law.

Rantzen, who persuaded Keir Starmer to back her calls for parliament to be given a fresh say on legalising assisted dying, told the broadcaster it was “absolute blatant sabotage” by the Lords.

She said: “A few peers, for their own reasons, have decided that they’re going to stop this going through parliament, and the only way to stop them would be to invoke the Parliament Act, which has happened before, or get rid of the House of Lords. They’re clearly not fit for purpose.”

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The Parliament Act allows the Commons to overrule the Lords, but it is rarely used.

Under the bill, terminally ill adults with less than six months left to live would be allowed to legally end their lives at at time when they choose instead of suffering though a prolonged illness.

The proposals stipulate that an individual must have the mental capacity to make the choice, make two separate declarations – witnessed and signed – about their desire to die, and have approval from two independent doctors that they are eligible.

A survey last year found 73% of Brits back the idea, while 72% support Leadbeater’s proposals.

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Rantzen said: “The general population wants the law to change. Every survey shows this. The majority of the public understand the cruelty and, ridiculous provisions of the current criminal law, which doesn’t criminalise suicide but does criminalise families who want to say goodbye to loved ones when life becomes unbearable and they want the choice of a quick, pain free death.

“This law would allow people like me not to shorten my life, but to shorten my death.”

The prime minister’s official spokesman said: “Our position is that it’s absolutely right that bills face the appropriate scrutiny, it’s what the parliamentary process is there for.”

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The House Opinion Article | Labour cannot afford a row with students

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Labour cannot afford a row with students
Labour cannot afford a row with students

(Credit: Haris Malekos)


4 min read

With the Greens and even the Tories ready to outflank them, Labour must take action on student loans to show it is still on the side of young people.

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Tuition fees are back on the political agenda for the first time since the increase to £9,000 during the coalition years. There were many lessons to be learnt from the impact of that rise in 2012. The change was near fatal to the Liberal Democrats at the next election and has continued to haunt them ever since, with the party still not trusted with young voters more than 15 years later.

The Labour Party now stands in a precarious position, at risk of making a similarly damaging mistake and losing support with a generation of young graduates who have become a key demographic.

While standing to be Labour leader, Keir Starmer described the need to end the “scandal of spiralling debt”. A month ago, however, Chancellor Rachel Reeves said the current system of Plan 2 loans is “fair”. Sticking with the latter position, and not reviving the former, would side Labour against a key group of voters, leaving the Greens and even the Conservatives with an opportunity to outflank them.

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Graduates and younger people were key to Labour’s success at the 2024 general election. YouGov polling suggested that 42 per cent of voters with a degree supported Labour, more than twice as many as who voted Conservative (18 per cent). Even smaller portions of this cohort voted for Reform (8 per cent) and the Greens (9 per cent).

This has changed dramatically since then, however.

The same pollster now has only 25 per cent of graduates voting Labour, closely followed by the Green Party on 21 per cent. This represents a near 15-point swing from Labour to the Greens. There is a similar trend amongst young people. At the last election, 41 per cent of 18-24 year olds supported Labour. This has now halved to just 21 per cent. Meanwhile, the Greens, who want to scrap tuition fees altogether, have jumped from 18 per cent to 37 per cent with the same age group and are also more popular than Labour with 25-29 year olds, overturning a 33 point deficit to lead by 7 points.

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Both these groups may be small parts of the electorate overall, but they will continue to grow in size and significance. There are already an estimated 5.8m adults who took out a student loan between 2012 and 2023. With almost half of graduates predicted to never pay back their loan in full, these concerns will remain with graduates as they enter their 30s, 40s and 50s, while, at the same time, more young people attend university and are burdened with debt.

The risk for Labour is that even delayed and reactive tweaks to the system, which reportedly could come as soon as next week, may struggle to win over young Green curious voters who are tempted by Zack Polanski’s bolder offer to scrap tuition fees altogether.

The electoral threat has been further complicated by Labour’s decision to allow 16 and 17-year-olds a vote at the next general election.

Our polling of teenagers aged 13-17 (who will all likely be eligible to vote at the next general election, depending on timings) highlights the impact of university fees on this cohort. Almost 3 in 4 (71 per cent) teenagers say that reducing tuition fees is a big priority which should be addressed urgently. This new electorate of 16-17-year-olds will only be one or two years away from aspiring to attend university when polling day next comes around, and tuition fees will be high on their personal agendas. If Labour is not seen as the party on their side on this issue, then the decision to extend the vote to this group risks backfiring on the party and boosting the electoral prospects of their rivals.

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It would be wrong to say that this is a narrow interest in terms of the population at large.

According to Ipsos research published this week, a majority of Brits (54 per cent) say that student loans should not be charged any interest, with just over three-quarters (76 per cent) of Brits concerned that students are ending up with too much debt from going to university. Dealing with student loans can reaffirm Labour’s support with their base, but also appeal to parents, employers and voters outside of it.

Being seen as failing to do so will only fuel Labour’s losses.

 

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Julian Gallie is Head of Research at Merlin Strategy

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Your Party internal election results annouced

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Your Party internal election results annouced

Your Party have announced the results of the elections for seats on the party’s Central Executive Committee (CEC). After months of endless controversy and bickering, the results are undoubtedly going to have an impact on the direction of travel for this new socialist party. As expected, both Zarah Sultana and Jeremy Corbyn have been elected as public office holders.

Corbyn posted a statement:

Sultana’s team also released a statement:

Grassroots Left congratulates all those elected in the Your Party leadership elections, and extends our thanks to every member who voted, organised and campaigned for us.

Having won collective leadership at the founding conference, we are delighted that eight women have been elected to the CEC who support our programme for Maximum Member Democracy.

A significant number of members have signalled their desire for a democratic, accountable and transparent party. We will now be in the room and ensure your voice is heard.

Our party is strongest when members have real power: over policy, finances, selections, and decision-making – through transparent, accountable structures. All Grassroots Left members will push for this on the CEC. We will push to make sure the branches are recognised immediately, fully supported and that members are put at the heart of the party.

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Your Party must now work together to become a party of and for the whole left – with no more witch-hunts or stitch-ups. All those who have been expelled should be reinstated. We now need a culture of mutual respect, open debate, and a shared focus on the real issues facing us: inequality, insecure work, crumbling public services, fascism, and a political establishment that keeps letting working people down.

Grassroots Left will work with all those elected who are committed to rebuilding trust by putting the members first and fighting with the branches for accountable, transparent and democratic structures and strong socialist policies in Your Party.

Your Party election results

The fledgling party saw two slates form sparking toxic debate among members: Grassroots Left and The Many. Refusing the factionality, many Independent candidates also stood.

The total number of votes received were 25,347, out of a possible 40,985 members. This represents an impressive 61.8% turnout. 43 postal ballots were received, of which 29 were accepted which represents 14 members returning two ballots and one member returning just one. Two ballots were removed due to having already voted online.

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The results for Public Office Holders: Zarah Sultana (GL), Jeremy Corbyn (TM), Laura Smith (TM) and Grace Lewis (GL).

Northwest: Sam Gorst (Ind), Dawn Aspinall (TM)

Northeast: Catherine Davis (TM) and Hannah Hawkins (TM)

Yorkshire and Humber: Monique Mosley (TM) and Sophie Wilson (GL)

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East of England: Jo Rust (TM) and Solma Ahmed (GL)

East Midlands: Louise Regan (TM) and Riaz Khan (TM)

West Midlands: Megan Clarke (GL) and Sue Moffat (TM)

Southeast: Naomi Wimbourne-Idrissi (Ind) and Cassandra Bellingham (TM)

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Southwest: Candi Williams (GL) and Jennifer Forbes (TM)

London: Mel Mullings (GL) and Noor Jahan Begum (TM)

Scotland: Niall Christy (Ind)

Wales: Maria Donnellan (TM)

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Results are in, now move forward

Now the results are in we can see there are fourteen for The Many, seven for Grassroots Left, and three Independents making up Your Party’s new CEC.

Let’s hope this at least allows the party to move forward from months of bickering and toxic briefing to a place where it can actually be effective from the grassroots.

After all, the far-right aren’t waiting around, neither should we.

Featured image via the Canary

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Republicans are freaking out over Texas Senate race

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Republicans are freaking out over Texas Senate race

With just days until Texas’ primary, Republicans in Washington are growing more alarmed that their increasingly vicious intraparty contest could cost them a must-win Senate seat.

Sen. John Cornyn appears to be headed to an expensive and nasty 10-week runoff against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, with a strong chance that Paxton wins the nomination even after national Republicans spent months airing his dirty laundry all over the Texas airwaves in an effort to boost Cornyn. 

“Honestly, if you look at the polling in a general election setting, I don’t think it’s outside the realm of possibility that the seat [flips], depending on who the Democrats nominate,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune, when asked about the possibility that Republicans could lose the race if Cornyn, who he endorsed, is not the party’s nominee.

If Cornyn loses the primary, Senate Republicans worry they could be forced to spend hundreds of millions of dollars that could otherwise go toward key battleground races in expensive states like North Carolina, Georgia or Michigan, complicating their path toward holding Senate control.

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Republicans have already spent nearly $100 million on TV advertising in the primary, which also includes Rep. Wesley Hunt (R-Texas), according to data from AdImpact. And Cornyn launched new ads this week, with support from the National Republican Senatorial Committee, that hammer Paxton in ways that could hurt him in the general election too: highlighting his messy ongoing divorce and accusations of corruption and calling Paxton a “wife-cheater and fraud.”

But those attacks haven’t stopped Paxton, a MAGA hero more aligned with the party base who has been bolstered by positive polling and a wave of grassroots enthusiasm.

“All signs indicate that Paxton probably finishes first,” a Washington GOP operative close to Cornyn told POLITICO granted anonymity to candidly discuss the race. “We’re just hoping the gap is close enough the narrative isn’t ‘Paxton kicked the crap out of Cornyn.’”

Paxton attended the president’s State of the Union address Tuesday night as a guest of Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Texas), who called warnings of an expensive general election a “scare tactic.”

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“What you’re doing now is you’re telling Texas you can’t elect Ken Paxton, not because you do a better job than me, but it’ll cost too much to win it,” said Nehls. “What a desperate attempt to convince voters to not vote for Ken Paxton because it could cost too much money in November. That’s ridiculous.”

Paxton is predicting a massive victory. Speaking with reporters after a campaign rally in the Houston suburbs last Friday, he suggested he may win the race outright and avoid a runoff.

Both Paxton and Cornyn allies have been running ads attacking Hunt in recent days, a sign either that they see a chance that Hunt could edge Cornyn for a spot in the runoff — or that Paxton could win outright.

If the race does extend until the end of May, Paxton said he doesn’t intend to change his strategy.

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“It’ll be grassroots, just like it always has been, and we’ll be out trying to compete,” Paxton said. “Obviously, [Cornyn] has got a lot of money, D.C. money. I don’t have that money. We’ll have our money from Texas.”

A spokesperson for Hunt said the congressman told NRSC chair Sen. Tim Scott last year before he got into the race that Cornyn was going to lose, but “Washington ignored it.” They also warned that Paxton could be vulnerable in the general election.

“If Senate Republicans lose the majority, it will be because the NRSC failed to plan for the future and chose to spend a record-breaking sum meddling in a Republican primary in Texas, of all places, where the GOP nominee is almost always favored to win,” the spokesperson said. “That’s malpractice.”

Republican Party officials and Senate GOP leaders think Cornyn has a far better chance than Paxton of staving off a Democratic challenger in the general election. When asked for comment on the race, the NRSC pointed to a memo it circulated to donors earlier this month that said that “John Cornyn is the only Republican candidate who reliably wins a general election matchup,” and warned “Paxton puts this seat at risk.”

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“We have to be prepared to spend there, and that’s a very different scenario if Cornyn’s the nominee,” Thune said. “He is by far, I think, the best candidate on the ballot in a general election, not only for the Senate, but also for down-ballot races in the House that could be impacted by the Senate race too.”

The polls bear that out. The NRSC released polling toplines showing Cornyn leading state Rep. James Talarico by 3 points and Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) by 7 points in general-election matchups. Paxton would trail Talarico by 3 points and lead Crockett by just 1 point. Nonpartisan public polls have found similar numbers.

A Democrat has not won a U.S. Senate election in Texas since 1988.

Rep. Monica De La Cruz (R-Texas), who hasn’t made an endorsement in the race, said she hopes the Republican primary avoids a runoff. “We’ve got to keep Texas red,” she said. “That is not a choice, and so the faster we can get someone in place, the better it is for all Texans.”

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During a Fox News appearance Monday, Cornyn said he anticipates he will face Paxton in a runoff and warned that a Paxton victory would give Democrats a boost in November.

“Unfortunately, the attorney general has got so much baggage and corruption in his wake that he will jeopardize our chances of keeping this seat red in November,” Cornyn said. “I believe that I can help President Trump in [the] end of his second term by not only winning this race, but bringing along some of these congressmen who are running in these five new congressional seats. Ken Paxton jeopardizes all of that.”

Paxton has led or been in a statistical tie with Cornyn in nearly every primary poll since launching his bid in April of last year, despite campaigning minimally and spending a small fraction compared with Cornyn’s war chest. It’s a testament to Paxton’s status as an aggressive MAGA figure in Texas, a reputation he has forged while serving as Texas’ top lawyer for a decade. Paxton used the power of his office to stoke the culture wars in court, like suing to overturn the 2020 election and defending the state’s strict abortion ban.

Dave Carney, an adviser to Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, predicted that Cornyn and Paxton will face off in a runoff, where he suggested Paxton would have the edge. The most conservative candidate tends to win because they often have the most driven supporters in low-turnout primary runoff elections.

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“They have to run real campaigns, both of them, they got to model their voters and turn them out,” said Carney.

To date, Trump has resisted making an endorsement in the primary. “I’m friendly with all of them,” he said earlier this month. “I like all of them, all three.”

Thune and other Senate Republicans for months privately lobbied to get Trump to endorse Cornyn, believing he would be the most formidable candidate in the general election. Thune has been careful not to predict what Trump will do in the future. Some top Trump political aides are working on Cornyn’s campaign — but the president has a longstanding relationship with Paxton. There is lingering skepticism in and outside of the Capitol that Trump would endorse Cornyn if the senator comes in second heading into the runoff.

Trump is scheduled to make an appearance in Corpus Christi on Friday to deliver a speech on the economy. A White House aide, granted anonymity to speak freely, said the president will not endorse at the event. The White House hasn’t announced if any of the GOP Senate candidates will join Trump on the trip.

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Top GOP donors, too, worry that the party is burning money — and that Paxton still has the upper hand in spite of the huge spending against him, with some concerned about an outright Paxton win.

“Nobody truly knows what is going to happen based on the polling,” said one GOP donor. “There is a scenario [where] Cornyn doesn’t make it into a runoff. But even if he does, a runoff with Paxton will be very tough because of [the] low number of voters who turn out — most of whom are very conservative and viewed as Paxton voters.”

The person added that there is “frustration from everyone that Trump lets this happen by not endorsing.”

Another GOP donor said there’s “not a lot of cautious optimism” among donors that Cornyn will even make it to a runoff. “It’s going down to the wire,” the donor lamented.

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Lisa Kashinsky contributed reporting. 

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