How would you finish this sentence? “The current system isn’t working, so we should…”

1. “…deport immigrants.”
2. “…tax the rich.”

For millions, this sums up current British politics. There are quite a few who would choose both A and B.

Radical listening

On Thursday, I was one of the Majority team running our Radical Listening, Radical Persuasion session. Too much politics is “load, fire, aim”. People just shouting slogans or posting offensive memes without making the effort to understand where someone is coming from. It’s counterproductive – almost every neutral observer thinks worse of someone who is shouty, compared to someone who can articulate their point and back it up with evidence.

Part of listening is finding out what is behind the words used. Does “too much immigration” mean “I don’t like dark-skinned people”? Or does it mean, “I’m worried the public services have no money”? You have to get past the different use of terminology. No-one likes having their speech policed. Then, nine times out of ten, you can find some common ground.

Of course, some people think the system is fine. It just needs better managers. The reason our energy bills are too high is because of too much government interference. Either that or it’s because of people with blue hair eating avocado on toast.

The failures of managerialism

Belief in managerialism is declining. For obvious reasons. The Johnson, Truss and Sunak governments didn’t exactly cover themselves in glory. Nor the May and Cameron-Clegg governments before them. Even Labour MPs think the Starmer government is incompetent. U-turn after screeching U-turn.

Managerialism is driven much less by evidence than by the desire to be an insider. They use phrases like “grown-ups”, then jostle for ambassadorships or set up political consultancies, monetising their connections.

Paul Holden, author of The Fraud, explained it neatly in a podcast last week. He said that Starmer’s Labour faction:

present themselves as hyper-competent, ‘We can chair meetings’, ‘We can meet business leaders’, and actually, at a deep and fundamental level, they are threatened by competence. Really genuinely competent people are not allowed to be part of this political project because they are too threatening. The key examples for me are Faiza Shaheen and Jamie Driscoll.

Tax the rich

I’m an advocate of column B, tax the rich.

Those three words comprise a complete economic strategy. You need to blend tax with wider monetary policy. Any government with a sovereign currency can earn, borrow, tax or create money. Even then, money is only part of the equation. You need the real resources too. Skilled, healthy people. Transport and energy infrastructure. But “tax the rich” is three words that encapsulate the idea that wealth extraction is the root cause of people’s daily hardships.

I also think there should be some controls on borders and immigration. In a globally connected world, it is not unreasonable to want to know who is and isn’t in the country. Tax and law enforcement requires that information. Epidemic control and stopping people trafficking needs that infrastructure too.

But the UK and Ireland has had free movement for a century, and it works fine. I look at how 29 European countries work together within the Schengen area. Trade is higher and administration costs are lower. That seems like a workable system to me. You can retain your central bank and monetary sovereignty. You can still have a full English breakfast. In fact, the bacon is probably Dutch or Danish anyway.

Pressing the reset button

Radical Listening, Radical Persuasion isn’t just academic training. Those exact issues come up when we’re out canvassing in Newcastle.

“I’m thinking of voting Reform,” one bloke said after I’d introduced myself. He was maybe in his 50s. His small front garden was neat. He lives in an area of high deprivation. The media would label him “white working class”.

I asked him what he wanted Reform – or any government – to do. It came down to lower bills, cleaner streets, and reversing a general sense of decline. He basically wanted to press the reset button.

Did he want public ownership of water, I asked. Yep. Did he think we should invest in better skills training for young people? Yep. Did he think we should close tax loopholes for the rich? Damn right. Had Reform been round to talk to him? No. Who did he think would get stuff done? “You will,” he said. He’s voting Green.

By Jamie Driscoll

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Campaigners staged a mock state visit on 27 April, with people in giant masks of Charles and Donald Trump. Standing in front of the Buckingham Palace gates, they held a giant prop missile with the word ‘COMPLICIT’ on it.

Demanding an end to US use of UK military bases to conduct strikes in Iran, the Stop Trump Coalition is also calling on the government to stop cosying up to Trump. It cites the cost to ordinary UK citizens. And it points out that back-to-back state visits are emboldening the rogue president when what he needs most is accountability.

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Jake Atkinson, spokesperson for the Stop Trump Coalition, said:

Keir Starmer sending the king to wine and dine with the warmonger-in-chief signals we are happy to green-light Trump’s illegal actions around the world, no matter how much chaos they cause.

Ordinary people across the UK are struggling more and more with the cost of living whilst Trump’s war on Iran has driven up prices. Honouring Trump like this is a slap in the face to so many who are struggling, and suggests to the president he can continue violating international law and be rewarded with more pageantry.

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Being joined at the hip to Trump’s US is not just making us complicit in war crimes, but hurting the British people. From teaming up with Big Pharma to hike our medicine prices to pressuring us to drop our Digital Services Tax on the biggest tech companies, Donald Trump wants to extract as much as he can from us for the benefit of the super rich and mega-corporations in the US.

The King’s refusal to meet with Epstein victims further reinforces that this visit is not to the benefit of anyone but Trump and the political elites. It should never have gone ahead.

Featured image via Stop Trump Coalition

By The Canary

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Transport workers from across rail, bus and the ferry sector will take part in a day of action against assaults across the country on Tuesday 28 April.

RMT activists will leaflet train stations, bus depots and ports. They’ll be highlighting the union’s national campaign demands to curb the rise in assaults and abuse and to make public transport a safer place.

The demands include safe staffing levels and an end to lone working. The union also wants to see proper funding for British Transport Police and an increased presence of officers. And it’s calling for legislation to make it a specific offence to assault a transport worker. The campaign also wants an end to outsourcing of security and enforcement staff.

In Scotland, the union has secured manifesto commitments from the SNP, Labour and Scottish Greens, to legislate to protect public transport workers.

This stands in stark contrast to the continued failure of the Westminster government to introduce a standalone offence for assaults on transport workers. This is despite repeated calls from RMT and the wider industry.

RMT general secretary Eddie Dempsey who will be joining activists in Glasgow, said:

Our day of action against assaults is a major part of our campaign to put pressure on employers and politicians across the UK, to take concrete steps to deliver for transport workers on this vital issue.

Our members will be calling on the public to support them in this campaign as there is a shared interest to see assaults, abuse and harassment curbed, so we can have a safer environment for travel on public transport.

The action on Tuesday will be a launchpad for further political and industrial campaigning until we secure improvements for our members.

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By The Canary

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The following public letter to the Green Party comes from two Jewish anti-Zionist organisations. Jewish Network for Palestine and International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network have written the letter in response to the suspension of Tony Greenstein from the party.

We reproduce the letter in full:

We are writing to the Green Party as members of two Jewish Anti-Zionist organisation operating in Britain – Jewish Network for Palestine (JNP) and International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN), and representing many thousands of members and followers – protesting against the recent Green Party’s shameful decision to suspend the membership of Tony Greenstein, claiming a “history of antisemitism including court decisions” as the foundation for this action.

Tony Greenstein, a pro-Palestinian activist and Jewish Anti-Zionist Green Party Member has been active against Israeli racism, ethnic cleansing, Apartheid and genocide for many decades; he is a member of Jewish Network for Palestine and on its Steering Committee. He has been a fearless campaigner against Zionism and for the rights of the Palestinian people and the rule of international law. He has been given no information other than spurious claims without evidence or proof for this offensive claim. We are deeply concerned this could be part of a broader smear campaign against pro-Palestinians within the Green Party, along the lines of the Hasbara campaign against the Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn.

We were offered no information about the source of such accusations but believe the Party has been bullied into taking action without any basis in fact. No court decision anywhere has decreed Tony Greenstein is an antisemite, so there is no substance to this accusation, and the Party should have checked this before signing up to an accusation which itself is antisemitic. The claim that Tony has “a history of anti-Semitism” is false and especially infuriating as Tony is the author of a most detailed recent book about the links between Zionism and the Nazis during the period 1933-45, and is an authority about antisemitism himself; much more so than the people who accused him anonymously.

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Like so many Jews, Tony comes from a family which suffered losses during the Holocaust, and the accusation, as well as the suspension from the Party, are hurtful, offensive and unjustified antisemitic acts by the Green Party.

So, we have some questions for Zack Polanski, for which we should have simple and truthful replies:

1. Is the Green Party now taking on the mantle of accusing Jews with antisemitism if they criticise Israel for its crimes – crimes the whole world is aware of and for which it is now under inquiry by the ICC and ICJ – the highest courts of humanity?

2. Has the party become an instrument of Israeli Hasbara? By acting like an inquisitorial court driven by Zionist accusations, without providing details to the accused, any pretence of justice seems to have been abandoned. Do you find this an acceptable way to treat your members, and are you committed to continue using this flawed approach?

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3. Who has put such accusations against Tony Greenstein, and what is the evidential foundation of such scurrilous claims? Is it the practice of the Party to accept accusations and keep the identity of the accuser a secret, and not expose them to a simple procedure of a proper inquiry and cross-questioning?

4. What kind of process is being used by the party, in which no proof is necessary, no evidence is presented, no procedure is followed, and no justice can be seen, let alone done? Is the GP now open to any accusation of antisemitism against anti-Zionist Jews and others, not upholding an evidential procedure, requiring proof from named persons, and allowing the accused a process of self-defence, not to mention some information about the basis for the inquiry?

5. Does the Party believe it has the expertise, procedures, information and the moral authority to dictate to Jews, as well as non-Jews, committed to international law and the struggle against Israeli racist crimes and crimes against humanity – that they must support Zionism, in defying not only of their personal moral code, but that of the international legal authorities?

6. Will the Green Party act against those Jews, and others, who have supported, and continue to support the crimes of the Zionist state? Is the Party committed to ending the Racist Zionist Apartheid in Palestine? If so, will supporters of the Zionist crimes be ousted by the Party as opponents of both international Law and the Green Party positions?

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Given that there were no clear or truthful grounds for the decision taken by the Committee, and no proper process followed, and hardly any information supplied by the deciding body, we call on the Green Party to immediately apologise to Tony Greenstein and annul the incorrect and shameful decision.

We also call upon the Party to clarify its rules, make then compatible with local and international law, and overhaul its faulty procedures so such decisions cannot be taken in such manner in the future.

We are convinced that the Green Party owes such clarity to its members, to the law-abiding Jewish community, and the Palestinians under the Zionist genocidal jackboot.

Signed for JNP and IJAN, David Cannon, Chair of JNP

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By The Canary

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Rich Drake, CEO of Anduril, boasted to the British military’s in-house media about his firm’s role in enhancing troop lethality. Anduril, also used by the US, has ties with Israeli arms maker Rafael.

Drake told Forces New — the UK military’s own propaganda channel — that his products would streamline ‘kill chains.’ A kill chain is process by which targets are identified, prioritised, and hit, which you can read all about here.

In a brazen puff piece for the military firm, Forces News said:

The British Army wants to double its lethality by 2027 and triple it by 2030 – and one way it’s hoping to achieve this is by using something called Lattice.

This system joins up and integrates all the sensors and effectors the Army currently uses.

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They further said:

In other words, all the assets available to it, whether that be loitering munitions, attack drones or F-35s providing close air support, can all be monitored and tasked from one screen.

Drake told the outlet, which announced a new 10yr deal with the UK military on 24 April, that:

In the past, maybe two different companies had two different systems and you would have to transfer data from one to the other by writing it down, swivelling your chair across and typing it into another system.

And the beauty of software like Lattice means we can integrate those natively and speeding up decision cycles in what we call kill chains, again, to help the Army become more lethal.

Never have the words “beauty” and “lethality” sat so uncomfortably in a single sentence.

Fully autonomous options

Drake continued:

If we think of how Lattice is used, an operator may be looking for a Russian air defence system and have assets in the air, sensors in the air, such as radars or cameras to find it.

When those cameras find the air defence system, what Lattice can do is make the connection between the sensor to the effector, which may be a fighter in the air or a one-way drone ready to make that attack.

Adding:

Lattice then makes that connection and creates a kill chain – and creates that kill chain at machine speed – computer machine speed rather than at human speed.

Truly “beautiful”…

Drakes stressed that while the killing could be carried out “fully autonomously”:

Right now, there is a rule of law around warfare and we completely support that at Anduril.

We support any rule of law or any way the military wish to use it… the human will always be involved.

Forces News said training on the systems would take place at a re-purposed RAF base in Wales.

Anduril’s dark reality

In 2024, Anduril partnered with Israel arms firm Rafael and AI firm Oracle to:

pair various command and control, sensor-to-shooter, intelligence operations, and expeditionary C4 platforms with the company’s cloud infrastructure.

And the US military signed a $20bn deal with Anduril in March 2026. The US has used Anduril technology in its illegal, unprovoked war with Iran. Anduril US chief Matthew Steckman confirmed this on 24 March 2026:

We’re heavy participants in the current conflict in the Middle East, mainly on the defensive side.

Adding:

So if you’ve read about the Shahed drone, as an example, we’re one of the principal systems to defend against that threat in the Middle East.

The British military finds itself in dubious company once again. Relying on Anduril’s technology ties the UK deeper into the US-Israeli colonial security framework. The firm claims it isn’t using fully autonomous killing systems yet, but has made clear that capacity exists. These rapid developments are outstripping international law’s ability to catch up — with dangerous implications for everyone.

Featured image via Anduril Industries/X/Twitter

By Joe Glenton

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Demonstrating he has the thinnest skin of any politician, Donald Trump once again lost it at a journalist, while citing excerpts from the White House dinner shooter’s manifesto:

TRUMP LOST IT ON CBS REPORTER AFTER SHE READ SHOOTER MANIFESTO

"I am NOT a pedophile. You read that crap from some SICK person."

"Your friends on the other side of the plate are the ones who were involved with Epstein."

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"You shouldn't be reading that on 60 Minutes. You are a… pic.twitter.com/M2dtKSCLGQ

— Sulaiman Ahmed (@ShaykhSulaiman) April 26, 2026

Attempt #3

As we reported, an alleged gunman charged through security at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Trump initially used the event to promote his plans for a White House ballroom:

If I was a conspiracy theorist I would be certain that Trump staged all of this just to get people on board for him to build his illegal White House Ballroom, and save his floundering, all-time-low approval ratings. pic.twitter.com/b1oYCMcG4V

— Brian Krassenstein (@krassenstein) April 26, 2026

Trump actually spoke about the ballroom in the immediate aftermath of the shooting:

Donald Trump is trying to make the case for his ballroom after the incident at the White House Correspondents' Dinner.

You've got to be kidding me. pic.twitter.com/O7Kofd9yq7

— Art Candee (@ArtCandee) April 26, 2026

Trump’s Department of Justice is now using the shooting to try to ensure there are no more legal delays preventing the ballroom from being built:

DOJ sends letter urging dismissal of lawsuit against Trump’s White House ballroom, citing last night’s events. pic.twitter.com/3iyfH1As8j

— Molly Ploofkins (@Mollyploofkins) April 26, 2026

“I’m not a paedophile”

In the clip at the top, the interviewer notes that the gunman’s:

so-called manifesto is a stunning thing to read, Mr. President. He appears to reference a motive in it. He writes… ‘administration officials, they are targets’. And he also wrote this: ‘I’m no longer willing to permit a paedophile, rapist, and traitor to coat my hands with his crimes’. What’s your reaction?

Trump responded:

Well, I was waiting for you to read that because I knew you would, because you’re horrible people, horrible people. Yeah, he did write that. I’m not a rapist. I didn’t rape anybody.

The interviewer then said:

Oh, you think he was referring to you?

We think she was protesting a little too much here; clearly the alleged gunman meant Trump (if the manifesto is genuine).

Trump continued:

I’m not a paedophile. You read that crap from some sick person. I got associated with stuff that has nothing to do with me. I was totally exonerated. Your friends on the other side of the plate are the ones that were involved with, let’s say, Epstein or other things. But I said to myself, you know, I’ll do this interview and they’ll probably… I read the manifesto. You know, he’s a sick person. But… You should be ashamed of yourself reading that because I’m not any of those things.

Contrary to Trump’s complaints, the Epstein Files did reveal what one congressperson described as “credible FBI receipts”:

CRAZY: Congressman Goldman showed 'credible FBI receipts' that Trump "unzipped his pants, forced a 13-year-old’s head down, and when she bit his p*nis, he punched her and called her a b*tch!"

"AG Pam Bondi lied under oath about this." pic.twitter.com/eZ4XEI3QeM

— Coinvo (@Coinvo) March 28, 2026

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Inexplicability

It’s since come out that the White House may have been unusually lax with its security at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner:

Surprise! https://t.co/aGFe6FQfL2

— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) April 26, 2026

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This is feeding into the conspiracy theory that the authorities knew about the alleged gunman, and that they opted to make things as easy as possible for him.

It would obviously be bizarre if Trump allowed all this to happen for the sake of a ballroom. At the same time, the Strait of Hormuz is currently blocked because Trump saw some mysterious benefit to attacking Iran, so who knows with this guy?

Featured image via the Canary

By Willem Moore

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