Politics
The House Article | Too much information
6 min read
It’s a statistic that haunts me: one in 40.
It’s a statistic that haunts me: one in 40. That’s the chance that my daughter will, like me, develop multiple sclerosis. For my son, the risk is lower, but these figures are the wrong side of negligible.
I might find them easier to push away if researchers were not making such rapid progress in being able to diagnose serious diseases early – sometimes up to a decade before the first symptoms appear. Would my children want to be tested, when they are old enough to decide? How would they cope with the prospect of a disease whose effects they have seen first hand?
These are questions that many more people will soon have to answer. AI-assisted research increasingly gives us the ability to identify the first, invisible signs of a disease. Scientists at the UK Biobank have access to half a million blood samples with which they can build metabolic profiles. Analysing data about the donors shows them which markers make a person likely to develop conditions such as dementia, cancer, diabetes and heart disease. Last year, a group of European researchers identified a test that traced how the body’s immune reaction to Epstein-Barr – a virus that infects nine in 10 of us – predicts whether it will lead to MS.
These breakthroughs are usually hailed as positive. In the case of a condition like diabetes, or certain cancers, they can prompt someone to improve their diet and activity to lower their risk. But diseases like dementia cannot be prevented with the drugs and interventions that are currently available. Where does that leave the future patient? Thanks to the internet, they can find out everything about what awaits them. Every memory lapse induces panic. Every twinge in the wrong place makes them fear that the end is beginning. It would take a sanguine personality to deal with an advance diagnosis of Alzheimer’s. According to polling for Alzheimer’s Research UK, half of Britons say it is the disease they fear most.
It is important to point out that widespread advance testing on the NHS is some way off, and the service cannot always deal promptly with patients who already have symptoms. “A third of people with dementia right now don’t actually have a diagnosis,” says David Thomas, head of policy at Alzheimer’s Research. “It is quite a big postcode lottery in terms of how long people have to wait.”
But private scans are readily available to those who can afford them. “Anyone can go for a private MRI scan of your brain, and you can get it yourself in the same way people at risk of Alzheimer’s can get a scan independent of the healthcare profession,” says Professor Gavin Giovannoni, chair of neurology at the Blizard Institute at Bart’s. “I don’t support that. I think unfiltered information that’s given in the wrong context is not helpful.” Thomas agrees: “We certainly wouldn’t be supportive of a healthy person receiving the blood tests at the moment. That’s a big challenge.”
The NHS already offers bowel and breast cancer testing to all over-50s. But last November, the National Screening Committee recommended against offering a blood test for prostate cancer. They found that although two lives would be saved out of every 1,000 men tested, up to 20 men would be overdiagnosed and undergo surgery, radiotherapy or treatment they did not need.
The difficulty is that not everyone with a biomarker will go on to develop a disease, or it may progress so slowly that they end up dying of something else. “We can see [the biological changes] 10 to 20 years before symptoms develop, but just because you’ve got those changes doesn’t mean you will go to develop Alzheimer’s disease,” says Thomas.
And treatments for Alzheimer’s are not good enough to justify giving them to people before they develop symptoms. “There are two treatments approved by the regulator, but not funded by the NHS, that have been shown to slow the progress. The benefit’s very modest.”
For MS, where treatments have advanced a great deal in the past two decades, there might be real advantages to preventative treatment. But the evidence is not yet available. Two tablets have been trialled on asymptomatic patients, but they have tough side effects and women must not get pregnant while taking them.
Still, even without treatment, says Kieran Winterburn, head of national influencing at the Alzheimer’s Society, there are advantages to early diagnosis. “For many people, not knowing is much worse than knowing. When diagnosis is done right, it actually reduces anxiety. It needs to be accompanied by a personal care plan, with people given the ability to monitor their health regularly and ensuring their carers and loved ones are able to access support.” They have the chance to put their financial affairs in order and talk to their families about what they want – although for some, these conversations will be extremely difficult.
Those who are willing to be tested will probably play a part in trials that save lives later on. We are at a “tipping point”, says Winterburn. “New treatments are coming down the line. Getting this right, seizing this opportunity we have right now, will hopefully lead us to a cure for dementia.”
Right now, I can see few advantages in encouraging my children to find out whether they are likely to develop MS. Catching the disease early would save money in the longer term because it postpones disability. “But unfortunately, NHS managers don’t think long-term,” says Giovannioni. “They work on an annual cycle.” So, the decision to implement a prevention programme is a political one. Health secretaries will base that decision on the data they have: the NHS might run a screening programme in half the country, treat cases with a worse prognosis and compare the outcomes with the other half. As patients would be part of a trial, they would not know whether they were at higher risk, and some would be given a placebo.
Thomas and Winterburn both talk about the “stigma” of an Alzheimer’s diagnosis. They hope that is changing. But as the controversy over assisted dying shows, western societies have only just begun to adapt to a world in which people will know much more about how and when they will die. In a culture where self-improvement and “wellness” is so important, dealing with that reality will be very hard.
Scream 7 actor Anna Camp has apologised for resharing a post about the film’s release that she said did not “reflect” her “personal beliefs”.
Shortly after this, the film’s director parted ways with the project, as did Melissa’s co-star Jenna Ortega.
After the film hit cinemas, and it was reported to have made around $100 million in its opening weekend, cast member Anna reshared a post from X on her Instagram page, which read: “The boycott didn’t work, the critics’ hate didn’t work, the pathetic leaks didn’t work.
“What worked was audiences coming out and making the film a success.”
She accompanied this with a blast of Taylor Swift’s Karma.
However, after facing backlash, Anna removed the post and shared an apology.
“It has come to my attention that I reposted someone else’s story that does not reflect my personal beliefs,” the Pitch Perfect star told her X followers. “I have since deleted the repost because I absolutely meant no harm.”
Anna added: “I’m sorry to anyone who was affected.”
Around 250 people gathered outside Belfast’s City Hall on Monday March 2 to voice their disgust at the illegal aggression launched against Iran by US/Zionist terrorists. They were met by a much smaller crowd of around 30 people voicing their support for Reza Pahlavi. The man they are backing is the son of the Shah of Iran deposed in 1979 during the Iranian revolution.
He has bravely been willing to fight to the last drop of someone else’s blood from his home in the United States. Earlier this year he encouraged desperate young people to their death in protests met with brutal force by the theocrats in Tehran. Now he’s happy for his own people to be butchered again by the thugs in Washington and Tel Aviv. All this so he can regain the 1,648,195 km2 of Iran he sees as his personal property, along with the 90 million people within it.
Monarchists back alternate form of tyranny
Supporters of Pahlavi at times waded into the crowd of anti-war demonstrators to try and instigate confrontation. Some of the former group brandished ‘Israeli’ flags and were met with shouts of “Zionist scum, off our streets”.
A slightly larger group of monarchists gathered at the same location on Sunday after the murder of Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei. Many held the flag of the Zionist entity on that occasion too, indicating they are also happy for ordinary Iranian people to be treated as expendable in the name of installing the self-appointed “Shah II”.
Gerry Carroll, West Belfast MLA for People Before Profit was the first speaker, successfully able to drown out interruptions from the monarchists. He started by denouncing the massacre of school children carried out by Zionist savages.
I don’t know anybody who claims they’re for freedom and democracy and human rights, but then cheer a school in Iran being blown to bits and at least 160 children being killed. In my eyes, in most people’s eyes across the world, that is not democracy, human rights and dignity. And we’re here to stand against that quite clearly and loudly.
He also called out the hypocrisy of the US demanding an end to Iran’s nuclear program:
The International Atomic Energy Authority…have said…that Iran is compliant when it comes to nuclear weapons. Now, I don’t think there should be any nuclear weapons across the world, but [we] must remind ourselves: who is the country, the only country in the world that has used nuclear weapons? I’ll give you a clue. This, the United States government, they have used it on the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Never trust Zionists
Palestinian Mohammad Samana told the Pahlavi supporters backing so-called ‘Israel’ to beware, based on the bitter experience of his people:
For our friends, there protesting: nobody experienced ‘Israel’ as much as the Palestinians. They came to our land claiming being the victims. We welcomed them. And they took our land and created their apartheid state.
‘Israel’ told the world in 1993, that there will be a Palestinian state by 1998. But they used the agreement to steal more Palestinian land and ensured that they prevented the creation of a Palestinian state and colonised the West Bank and destroyed Gaza.
Crucially, Iranian Azedeh Sobout spoke too, saying:
I stand before you as an Iranian woman, one who opposes the men who rule my country now and the men who ruled it before. The current theocratic regime that massacred thousands of protesters in January and the monarchists backed up by U.S. standing at the other side. There is a space for people like me, [though] very little, in this current geopolitical script because we are constantly told that we must choose. Choose between a dictator and a bombing campaign. Choose between repression and destruction. Choose between submission and annihilation.
We reject that choice. This binary is false. It is coercive and it erases our political agency. It assumes that Iranians cannot imagine or build a future beyond the options imposed on us by empires and dictators. That logic is colonial. Their logic is colonial. That’s why they can only ally with the US, Israel and British colonial systems.
Regime change starts at home
She concluded:
Align your solidarity with our revolutionary philosophy: Jin, Jîyan, Azadî; woman, life, freedom. A vision rooted in Kurdish feminist struggle. A struggle [which] the monarchists are terrified of…because it’s based on feminist, working class resistance and democratic dignity.
And if you believe in regime change, begin it at home. Thank you.
Her last words are an essential message. We’re limited in the direct effect we can have on events thousands of miles away. What we can effect is that which happens right where we stand, in our own communities, town halls and parliaments. That means sweeping away any politician that shows the merest hint of sympathy towards the terrorist forces of the United States and so-called ‘Israel’.
Featured image via the Canary
A new YouGov poll has put the Green Party in second place, just two points behind Reform. This comes just after the Greens announced they have more than 200,000 members. And with Labour lagging five points behind Zack Polanski’s party, it seems voters now see the Greens as the main opposition to Reform.
Pollsters think the “seismic” Green by-election win on 27 February 2026, along with the public exposure surrounding it, has had a big influence on voter perceptions. In particular, it has shown the Green Party is a viable electoral choice which is fully capable of winning elections.
Our latest voting intention (1-2 March 2026) has the Greens on their highest figure ever recorded by YouGov, significantly ahead of Labour, who are on their lowest figure to date
Reform UK: 23% (-1 from 22-23 Feb)
Greens: 21% (+4)
Conservatives: 16% (-2)
Labour: 16% (-2)
Lib… pic.twitter.com/C7tL21tzBv— YouGov (@YouGov) March 3, 2026
The result is the Greens’ highest with YouGov, and Labour’s lowest.
Despite Labour plummeting into the dustbin of history, however, Polanski has noted that Labour leader Keir Starmer is just doubling down on his failing strategy (which has already seen 25% of 2024 Labour voters go Green). And his tactics are continuing to backfire:
On Sunday I announced on the BBC that Green Party membership is 200,000.
Keir Starmer continues to keep trying to smear us – calling us extremists.
The result? We’ve had thousands and thousands of new members in the past 48 hours alone.https://t.co/0qbagSvIYp https://t.co/gk2iB7ThOT
— Zack Polanski (@ZackPolanski) March 2, 2026
Times are changing, and the old order is dying
Sky News clarified that:
The Greens are now the most popular party in all age categories under 50.
Let’s emphasise that point again. *Every generation under the age of 50 prefers the Greens to any other party.* That includes almost 50% of 18-to-24-year-olds and 27% of people between the ages of 25 and 49.
Sky also reported that Greens are boosting their support levels in working-class communities, saying:
Those classified as doing “routine” jobs also vote Green in significant numbers.
The Green Party is now a mass party, not a niche one. And current polling already makes the potential electoral map look slightly more hopeful than it seemed a few months ago:
It’s just 1 poll (for now) – but here’s how it plays out in the Nowcast Model:
RFM: 227 (+222)
GRN: 135 (+131)
LDM: 92 (+20)
CON: 59 (-62)
SNP: 48 (+39)
LAB: 40 (-371)
PLC: 20 (+16)
Others: 10 (+5) https://t.co/C6e7Abw34H pic.twitter.com/49xhYWsezR— Election Maps UK (@ElectionMapsUK) March 3, 2026
According to that projection, a far-right coalition of Reform and Tories would still win. But a centre-left coalition of the Greens, SNP, and Plaid Cymru would be hot on their heels. And if the centre-right Liberal Democrats preferred to back a Green-led coalition to stop the far right, the Reform-led coalition would lose.
As Polanski has emphasised, there is a massive section of society that clearly wants hope. These people want to stop the far right, get investment in their communities and public services, have lower bills, and protect the planet from the billionaire warmongers intent on destroying it:
It’s becoming increasingly clear every single day that the way to stop the rise of the right in this country is to join the Green Party.
It’s also the way to invest in our communities, lower our bills and protect our planet.https://t.co/0qbagSvIYp https://t.co/uaKZd8pgB2
— Zack Polanski (@ZackPolanski) March 3, 2026
Turns out lowering bills, protecting the NHS and rebuilding our public services is really popular.
This is just the beginning – people are seeing through the attacks and demanding something better.
And we’re making hope normal again – together.https://t.co/0QUCQbH19l https://t.co/bLXPb0v7Z1
— Zack Polanski (@ZackPolanski) March 3, 2026
The old order is rapidly fading away. Times are changing. And the Greens have placed themselves at the forefront of that struggle for a better country and a better world. There’s no hiding from that fact now, and Reform’s elitist hatemongers must be shaking in their jackboots.
Featured image via the Canary
This month’s gardening checklist includes pruning roses, which can help to ensure a bright and bountiful bloom come summer.
In fact, according to gardening guru Monty Don, “The first half of March is the best time to prune any shrubs and climbers that will flower on new growth”.
That can include roses and buddleia. Some shrubs, like willow and cornus, can benefit from pruning right now, too.
It can be a little nerve-wracking to hack back plants you’ve spent ages growing. But the expert is here to help: “I know that pruning can be the cause of some anxiety but there is only one rule to follow,” Don continued.
“Always cut back to something”
The gardener said that when pruning, you should “always cut back to something, be it a side shoot or leaf bud.
“Other than that, do not worry unduly about outward-facing buds or any such finessing.”
This is in line with the Royal Horticultural Society’s (RHS) advice.
When pruning roses, they warn you not to prune more than 5mm away from a bud.
And Gardener’s World said that you should always prune just above a bud – neither so close that it damages it, nor so far away that water can gather on the stump when it rains and lead to rot.
“As a general rule, cut above the bud at a distance of about a quarter of the thickness of the stem,” they wrote.
Why should you prune back to a side shoot or bud?
Gardener’s World said these spots of growth form “nodes” on the plant.
And when you cut too far away from a period of plant growth, it might not have enough energy to regrow quickly enough. Then, you risk “dieback” and disease.
“Also, by cutting above a node, you can manipulate new stems, leaves or flowers to form in a desired direction, as nodes form on different sides of a stem,” the publication said.
They added that no matter what, you should avoid cutting more than 1cm above a node.
Richard Osman has announced that he is stepping down from his BBC game show House Of Games after almost a decade at the helm.
On Tuesday morning, the former Pointless host confirmed that the current season of House Of Games would be his last.
However, fans of the format needn’t worry, as he’s confirmed that it will continue to air with a new host.
Announcing the news on his podcast The Rest Is Entertainment, he confirmed: “I am leaving House Of Games. It will no longer be Richard Osman’s House Of Games – it will be somebody else’s House Of Games. I gladly hand over the keys.”
“Thank you for all your kind words as I step down from House Of Games after nine amazing years,” he later wrote on X.
“It is honestly the most fun show to work on, with the most wonderful team, but, after 800 episodes it’s time to hand over the keys to a new host.”
Richard continued: “There are plenty of new episodes still to air though, and I’ll even be filming one final handover week later in the year! It really has been a treat from start to finish.”
House Of Games sees Richard welcoming four celebrities into his studio for a week of shows which pits them against each other in a series of weird and wonderful challenges.
Launching in 2017, the show has garnered a loyal following over the years, and in 2025, spawned its first international spin-off for Australian audiences, with comedian Claire Hooper at the helm.
It is also notably where he met his now-wife, Ingrid Oliver, after she appeared as a celebrity participant back in 2021.
Outside of his TV work, Richard has become synonymous with his hugely successful Thursday Murder Club book series, the latest instalment of which hit the shelves towards the end of last year.
In 2025, the first Thursday Murder Club novel was also adapted for Netflix, with Dame Helen Mirren, Celia Imrie, Pierce Brosnan and Sir Ben Kingsley leading an all-star cast in the streaming movie.
As Bridgerton fans know, the Netflix series frequently takes creative license with the Julia Quinn source novels that inspired it.
For an understandable reason, one heartbreaking moment from the book When He Was Wicked was cut from season four of the show.
During the recent season, Francesca (played by Hannah Dodd) suspected that she was pregnant with her husband John’s child after he died in his sleep as the result of a sudden cerebral aneurysm.
After undergoing an exam, the character found out that she wasn’t pregnant, while in the original book, she actually discovers that she is pregnant, and later suffers a miscarriage, which shapes Francesca’s grief and fertility throughout the story.
Speaking to Swooon, showrunner Jess Brownell explained that she and the Bridgerton writers decided to cut Francesca’s miscarriage storyline because they felt it would have made the tone of season four “too morbid”.
“Ultimately, I think John’s death and the funeral are already in so many ways such a departure from the tone of the show,” she explained.
“I think episode seven has hints of lightness, but it is a much darker version of Bridgerton in a way that I think is really interesting, and especially in the way we get to watch the family come together.”
Despite not wanting to adapt the darker miscarriage storyline from the source novels, Jess still intends to explore Francesca’s fertility journey in future seasons.
“We’re still very interested in honouring the fertility storyline… and we will continue honouring [it] in her future season,” she said.
This isn’t the only major change to Francesca’s storylines on the show, though.
Her love interest in the books, Michael Stirling, has been gender-swapped in the show, meaning Francesca’s future love story – and, indeed, fertility story – could unfold very differently on screen.
All four seasons of Bridgerton are available to stream on Netflix.
Politics
Andrew Gilligan: Northern Powerhouse Rail won’t help the North, or power better transport. The Tories have got this wrong
Andrew Gilligan is a writer and former No10 adviser.
Kemi Badenoch’s Conservative Party likes to see itself as the hard-headed teller of difficult truths, the fearless critic of bad ideas and the maker of tough decisions. That’s exactly what it should be, what the country needs it to be, and what it sometimes actually is.
Not always, though. The Tory front bench’s first response to several seismically bad Labour ideas has been either fence-sitting (for instance, on digital ID) or feeble acquiescence (on the “Hillsborough law,” which risks making Whitehall ungovernable.)
The periodic woolly-mindedness of our time in government lingers. As we did then, we’re still backing some stupid policies because they “look good,” because some lobby group or celebrity wants them, or because opposing them might make us “look bad.”
The frontbench toughened up on rejecting digital ID – helping cause a swift government U-turn – but it now seems to be embracing a new stupid policy, a new politicians’ magic answer: “Northern Powerhouse Rail” (NPR). This project achieves the difficult feat of making HS2 seem quite sensible. It will be a high-speed line, from Liverpool to Manchester and possibly Leeds, on which trains can never reach high speeds, because the stations are too close together.
The Liverpool-Manchester stretch – Labour’s priority – will cost at least £17bn, almost certainly closer to £30bn, but journeys between the two cities will actually take longer than the existing service. That’s because it runs via Manchester Airport – sort of. The “airport” station will actually be a mile from the airport; you’d have to transfer by bus.
Yet in last month’s Commons debate on carrying over the bill to build NPR – or part of it, at least – Jerome Mayhew, the shadow rail minister, criticised the Government for the “lack of progress” it was making on the scheme and asked accusingly: “What cuts will [the Transport Secretary] be forced to make, and are they to the high-speed section?”
Maybe we’re worried that opposing NPR would look anti-North. But NPR – though understandably beloved of the profit-scenting construction lobby, and the Labour mayors it has captured – is in fact a huge obstacle to giving the North the better transport it badly needs.
Public transport is a network. Creating better public transport does not mean grafting one new high-speed line, serving a handful of places, onto an otherwise still decrepit system. It means creating a better network, through hundreds of small and medium improvements as well as some large ones: bus, tram and local rail, not just inter-city.
The North’s main rail capacity problem is not on links – lines between cities – but at nodes: places where the trains converge, above all central Manchester. NPR would do little to fix this.
Most importantly, NPR is a fantasy: there will never be enough money, perhaps £70-100bn, to build the whole thing (Labour has just cancelled the northern half of the Midland Main Line electrification to save £1bn). It is described as “unachievable” by the Government’s own infrastructure watchdog. Every pound and every month wasted on a scheme that will never happen is time and money not spent on the things that will help more passengers, in more places, more quickly – and that have a chance of actually coming to pass.
Yes, I know – Boris Johnson, the PM I worked for, supported NPR. His view was that we could do that and all the other things as well. I opposed it, then and since, because I knew that at high-speed prices, you simply can’t. You have to choose, or at least to sequence – which is, in fact, what France and Germany did do, fixing their urban services before turning to the comparative luxury item of high-speed rail. On our current path, we’ll end up with neither.
And yes, I know – my other PM employer, Rishi Sunak, though he cancelled the northern section of HS2, said he would fund a new Liverpool-Manchester line and let the metro mayors decide the route. That was intended to give them scope to choose something better – such as a Manchester version of the “Elizabeth Line” to fix the city’s rail congestion – but they went for the lobbyist option instead.
Reform has come out against NPR. Maybe that’s another reason (an equally bad one) why the Tories appear for it. But if you think it’s a votewinner, you’re mistaken. The North has never wanted high-speed rail. It is transport for the few, not the many. As Richard Tice has said, the political elites’ obsession with high-speed schemes – rather than the services that most people actually use – is another symbol of how mainstream British politics became estranged, in so many ways, from ordinary voters’ real wishes and needs.
There’s still time for the party to get this right – and for Northern England to get more than a Labour press release.
The government of Cyprus has slammed the UK for failing to respect its humanitarian commitments. Iran – or one of its allies – allegedly hit RAF Akrotiri with a drone on 2 March 2026.
There no casualties. Yet the UK is clearly being pulled deeper into the illegal US-Israeli war against Iran – and Cyprus with it.
Government spokesperson Konstantinos Letymbiotis said on 3 March:
Despite the assurances given in yesterday’s address by the prime minister of the United Kingdom, there was no clear clarification that the British bases in Cyprus would not under any circumstances be used for any reason other than humanitarian.
Adding:
The information we had, through many communications and at various levels, was clear, that the British bases would have a strictly humanitarian role.
Cyprus shows Britain is at war
UK PM Keir Starmer effectively announced to parliament on 2 March that the UK would be a party to the war. He tried to insist the UK’s role would be defensive – but said the US would use British bases to hit Iran.
The UK has two bases in Cyprus at Akrotiri and Dhekelia. Britain has used the bases to launch hundreds of spy flights over Gaza over the course of Israel’s genocide against the Palestinians.
Letymbiotis said the UK had failed to take into account Cyprus’s wish to be a humanitarian hub. He added that the UK had communicated poorly:
The message we send in every direction, not only rhetorically but through our actions over decades, is that the Republic of Cyprus is a humanitarian hub.
There was no timely information residing in the areas adjacent to the bases.
Middle East Eye reported:
Letymbiotis refused to rule out Cyprus requesting a renegotiation of the status and operating conditions of British bases.
Meanwhile, a former UK ambassador to Iran has said the UK has made itself a legitimate target.
Legitimate targets
Sir Richard Dalton told Declassified UK that British assets in the region were now legitimate targets of Iran.
The regional power:
will not distinguish [between] attacks to its missiles and other wider attacks on its political, military and economic institutions and leaders.
They will say that these are attacks facilitated by Britain on Iran as part of the United States campaign to destroy the Islamic Republic.
You can watch the full interview here:
The UK is pulling itself deeper into the mire of a Middle East war. And in doing so its colonial relationship with Cyprus – already badly shaken by the UK’s role in Israel genocide – has become even more precarious. As the war intensifies across the region, things are likely to get even worse for the eternally flip-flopping UK PM.
Featured image via the Canary
British journalist Isabel Oakeshott, who is famous for her hateful content against migrants and refugees, has been documenting her life in Dubai amid Iran’s retaliatory strikes on the UAE , and people have little sympathy.
Oakeshott shared a bilingual emergency alert from Dubai during the strikes. It was in Arabic first, then English, telling residents to take shelter. The internet immediately laughed at her for enjoying the kind of accommodation she’d never offer migrants.
Outrageous that Dubai has to send these out in a foreign language because immigrants won’t learn Arabic. https://t.co/i9VIx8duFc
— Lord Protector Will Wartsandall (@LewensWill) March 1, 2026
Influencers were getting roasted for suddenly caring about British embassies after spending years clout-chasing in a country with zero tax and infinite irony.
Me when people who’ve spent years boasting about not paying any UK taxes say they want the British embassy to help evacuate them from Dubai. pic.twitter.com/6hie1D8U1D
— Brendan May (@bmay) February 28, 2026
Some of those Brits in Dubai might want to try coming back in a small boat, I’ve heard it’s well easy
— Jasinya 💞 (@bougieluxebabe) March 1, 2026
Should Dubai tax-dodgers get tax help?
Even mainstream British media wasn’t holding back. Susanna Reid straight-up asked: if Brits move to Dubai to avoid paying tax, then need rescuing, shouldn’t they pay for it themselves?
Susanna Reid: “Brits have moved to places like Dubai, potentially.. to avoid paying tax.. if they need rescuing.. should they pay for their own evacuation, because if they’re avoiding paying tax then they’re avoiding paying into public services, like the govt coming to get you” pic.twitter.com/5Z0Qkf8N19
— Saul Staniforth (@SaulStaniforth) March 3, 2026
Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey rightly pointed this out in the Parliament on Monday. He called out “tax exiles and washed-up old footballers” in Dubai who “mock ordinary Brits” but now expect the UK military to rescue them. He said:
Oakeshott’s fiancé and “patriotic” Reform MP Richard Tice is definitely not keen on this frankly patriotic measure. He criticised Davey for being “obsessed” with Oakeshott for this suggestion.
Dear old @EdwardJDavey
Back off my fiancée …. !
You seem obsessed with her….! https://t.co/F2P6M7wXmD
— Richard Tice MP 🇬🇧 (@TiceRichard) March 2, 2026
Imagine fleeing the UK to avoid taxes, then asking your MP fiancé to cover for your tax-dodging behaviour, Embarrassing, really.
Featured image via the Canary
On Jan. 6, 2021, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton declared to a raucous crowd of President Donald Trump’s supporters, many of whom were moments away from storming the U.S. Capitol: “We will not quit fighting.”
Five years later, Paxton’s fighting spirit has him poised to unseat a 24-year incumbent.
It’s been a steady journey. As Texas’ top lawyer, Paxton became a hero of the far right by using rapid-fire lawsuits to spearhead their most important causes, from expanding religious influence in schools to attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election. He presented himself as a foil to the Obama and Biden administrations, filing more than 100 lawsuits over issues like immigration and environmental regulations. And he continues to steer the power of his office toward investigating alleged election irregularities, particularly in Democratic-led cities like Houston.
On Tuesday, the MAGA grassroots that fueled his rise will reach its apex of influence so far: Paxton is well-positioned to finish first against John Cornyn in the GOP primary for his Senate seat, despite being saddled with tons of political baggage and targeted by millions of dollars in attack ads.
The bare-knuckle Senate primary is likely headed to a runoff, dragging out the party’s own angst over generational change.
For the far-right in Texas, Paxton’s arc shows the ascendent strength of their movement, which has pushed Republican leaders toward adopting increasingly conservative positions. For Cornyn, it means the potential end of his long career in the Senate, and the near-extinction of establishment Republicans within the party.
“Ken Paxton is more than just an attorney general that’s been MAGA. He is a symbol of the heart of the grassroots MAGA movement,” said Steve Bannon, the former senior adviser to Trump and War Room host who has been broadcasting his popular show from a rented ranch in North Texas in the days leading up to the election.
“He’s resilient because folks here know he has fought the good fight for years and years and years,” Bannon said. “He has resilience because people know where his heart is, and he’s a fighter.”
Cornyn is in serious trouble
The MAGA movement is tenacious in protecting its own and knifing its Republican rivals. Paxton has survived an impeachment by the GOP-controlled state House, a federal securities fraud investigation and slew of ethics complaints. Three months after beginning his Senate campaign last year, Paxton’s wife filed for divorce, alleging an extramarital affair. His competitors — including Cornyn, who has said Paxton is too unethical to serve in public office — have hammered his trail of scandals.
And still he’s the front-runner.
Paxton has continued to lead in polling — from even before he launched — despite a concerted effort by Republicans in Washington to boost Cornyn.
“Ideally you want a saint to be your elected leader, and that is something we all hope and pray for one of these days,” said Bo French, former chair of the Tarrant County Republican party, who is running for a seat on the Texas Railroad Commission. “But until that happens, we need people who are going to be warriors for the cause. And he is seen and beloved among Republican primary voters in Texas as a warrior.”
Cornyn knows the strong headwinds he’s facing, conceding that the composition of primary voters doesn’t reflect his usual base of support. Many Texas Republicans remain angry with the senator for voting in favor of a bipartisan gun control package after the Uvalde school shooting that left 19 children and two teachers dead. Cornyn was famously booed onstage at the Texas GOP convention in 2022.
“If only the most radical people show up in the primary … then I think that’s going to be a challenge,” Cornyn said in an interview Saturday with CBS. His other primary opponent, Rep. Wesley Hunt, who is also running a campaign appealing to the far right, said on X that Cornyn’s comments show he has “lost touch with the people you’re supposed to represent” and “your contempt for the voters of Texas is exactly why your career is coming to an end.”
Trump has not endorsed in the race, throwing a wrench into any MAGA pickup Cornyn could get — or that could put Paxton over the line. At an event in Corpus Christi last week, Trump said he had “pretty much” decided who to support, but did not reveal that pick.
Democrats believe Paxton’s baggage makes him beatable in the general election, a view shared by many national Republicans, including Senate Majority Leader John Thune, who is working to keep Cornyn in the GOP caucus.
Kendall Scudder, chair of the Texas Democratic Party, said Paxton jeopardizes Republicans at every level of the ticket. “Every one of these top-tier Republicans in the state is wildly unpopular, and they’ll be led by Ken Paxton,” he said. “That’s what puts a lot of these different seats in interesting hands.”
The MAGA vs. establishment fight has been years in the making
Paxton has endured years of legal and personal scrutiny. He also kept winning.
Texas Republicans have repeatedly reelected both Cornyn to the Senate and Paxton as attorney general, backing the leaders of both wings of the party. But recent elections have shown the growing strength of the MAGA faction.
Paxton’s reelections have been aided by the deep coffers of Texas megadonors like Tim Dunn and the Wilks brothers in addition to his hyper-conservative supporters. In 2022, he was challenged by Land Commissioner George P. Bush — the relativegrandson of former Presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush.
Bush tried to sell conservative voters on his vision to restore integrity to the attorney general’s office at a time when Paxton was facing years of securities fraud investigations and bribery allegations. It’s a playbook Paxton allies say Cornyn is reusing.
Voters seemed to prefer Paxton’s combative style. Paxton thumped Bush by a two-to-one margin in that year’s run-off, the clearest sign yet that voters were siding with the MAGA wing and rejecting the old-school establishment.
In 2022, Paxton agreed to pay restitution and perform community service to settle the securities fraud case, which was brought over allegations that he duped investors in a tech startup. The Justice Department, in the final weeks of the Biden administration, decided not to prosecute Paxton over the remaining bribery charges. That eventually led the GOP-heavy Texas House to impeach him before the Senate voted to acquit.
As scrutiny over Paxton intensified within the Texas Republican Party, he cast himself as a martyr, a victim of spurious probes that not only threatened him, but also the integrity of the MAGA base. For the far-right, Paxton’s impeachment acquittal only further strengthened his parallels to Trump.
The onslaught energized his supporters. State Rep. Gary Gates, a Republican, learned that firsthand when he publicly recanted his vote to impeach Paxton after dealing with blowback from the base.
“There was a certain faction of those that support him that were rather upset,” said Gates, who represents a suburban district outside of Houston. “You have to deal with that political reality.”
Paxton often brags that he was one of the few Republicans to attend Trump’s campaign launch at Mar-A-Lago in 2022, when many in the party had abandoned him following the violent insurrection in the U.S. Capitol.
“When you try to take out somebody like those two guys who have fought for our values, and the whole world is weaponized against them, the people are ride-or-die,” said Aaron Reitz, a former deputy in Paxton’s office who, with his backing, is running to succeed him.
“I hope that the establishment wing of the GOP would learn a similar lesson when they have tried to take out Trump, which is they are not in control of this party,” Reitz said. “The grassroots, the people, are in control of the party, and they have to stop spending their millions.”
How Paxton got here
Paxton’s deep base of support is built in part from his lawsuits against frequent targets of the right — high-profile cases that were splashed on the front pages of local newspapers from Beaumont to Amarillo. Throughout his decade as Texas’ top lawyer, Paxton oversaw the Lone Star State’s transformation into an incubator for ultra conservatives issues, from defending abortion restrictions to warning that Muslims will attempt to introduce Islamic law in Texas.
At a recent campaign event in the Houston suburbs as early voting was underway, Paxton ticked off his courtroom successes to a group gathered at a “safari ranch” in Richmond with roaming peacocks, zebras and goats.
Paxton, speaking to the crowd of about 75 supporters, recounted the beginning of his career, starting with when he decided to run for attorney general during his first term in the state legislature because he viewed former President Barack Obama as “a really epic threat” who relied excessively on executive orders to bypass Congress.
In his first AG race, Paxton rode the wave of the Tea Party insurgency to topple an establishment Republican backed by former President George W. Bush. Paxton told the audience, to chuckles, that he sued Obama 27 times in the 22 months they overlapped.
After Obama left office and Trump took his place, Paxton turned his sights away from the White House and toward Silicon Valley. He sued Google (“who was doing really bad things”), Facebook (“we got a lot of money from them”), Twitter (“before Elon”) and Pfizer (“they lied about the vaccine”).
Then Paxton became fixated on probing voter fraud allegations, making him an instrumental figure in Trump’s unsuccessful efforts to overthrow the results of the 2020 election. He even filed a case directly with the Supreme Court seeking to invalidate election results in Pennsylvania and other battleground states — though the justices rejected his attempt, ruling Texas did not have standing.
When Joe Biden was sworn in, Paxton picked back up his onslaught against the federal government. Then Trump was reelected in 2024, Paxton said, and he “felt like I didn’t have a mission. I’d done my three different missions. I felt like 12 years was enough.”
“And I looked around,” Paxton told the crowd, “and I saw a guy: John Cornyn.”
Adam Wren contributed reporting.
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