There is a not particularly funny joke that is sometimes told in legal circles about why a law student failed to finish his coursework – because he had no conviction. With rare exceptions lawyers aren’t renowned for their sense of humour but I can’t help thinking someone, at the highest levels of our justice system, is having a right laugh at my expense and those who have loyally supported me over the past six years.

I’m talking about the Lord Advocate, Dorothy Bain KC – a sitting member of the Scottish Government’s cabinet who was nominated by Nicola Sturgeon to that post in 2021, five months after I was acquitted.

For those unfamiliar with my case, I offer this brief summary. In March 2020 I made a short video on my mobile phone that was two minutes and thirty eight seconds in length. I hadn’t planned to make the video when I went out for a walk in a field near my home. But I was annoyed and wanted to articulate that annoyance, although at the time I recorded it I wasn’t intending for it to go much further.

Later that night, just before turning in, I uploaded it to my YouTube channel on a closed, unlisted link and then posted that link to my Twitter account that, at the time, had a modest 1000 or so followers. I then forgot about it.

Little did I know that short mobile phone video would result in me facing initially a criminal trial, then a five year legal battle in the highest civil court in Scotland and now, most likely, an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

In that very short video, I expressed my disdain for the complainers and conspirators, male and female, who were still trying to destroy the reputation of Alex Salmond, despite the fact he had been fully acquitted at the High Court just a few days before I made that video.

So what did I say? What possible criminal offence could I have uttered in less than three minutes that would result in the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, then led by Ms Bain’s predecessor James Wolffe, despatching five Edinburgh detectives to raid my home, confiscate all of my tech and then bring me to trial where I potentially faced a year’s imprisonment if found guilty.

The video simply highlighted my opinion that if the complainers continued with their efforts against the former First Minister, ignoring the judgement of the High Court that had acquitted Alex, and they persisted in this campaign behind a veil of anonymity, then eventually, one way or another their identities would become widely known.

In evidence produced at the High Court the complainers themselves made plain that they could undertake this politically motivated campaign by exploiting the legal protections that rightly exist to protect actual victims of sexual assault. Their cynical and stated exploitation of this important protection not only continued to damage Alex’s reputation but also undermined wider confidence in those actual victims of such assault whose identities to deserve to be protected from the wider public.

That aspect is one of the more egregious and nefarious undertaken by the complainers and those who coordinated them in what has become the Alex Salmond saga.

As Sheriff Patterson concluded at Jedburgh Sheriff Court, “I do not accept [the comments made in the video] would cause a reasonable person fear and alarm. The video contained an opinion, nothing more.” He accepted my defence team’s motion of “no case to answer” and the prosecution case was dismissed and I was fully acquitted.

But such is the lunacy of Scotland’s once-revered independent legal system that my only hope of a subsequent remedy for this wrongful prosecution would have come if I had been jailed in January 2021. Only then would I have a legal route to seek compensation.

As Fergus Ewing MSP, former Scottish Government Cabinet Secretary and Minister noted in Holyrood just last week (see from 17.08), that situation is plainly “absurd”.

After my acquittal I instructed Solicitor Advocate Gordon Dangerfield – easily the most tenacious and dogged lawyer I have ever come across – and Andrew Smith KC to act on my behalf and in May 2025 we finally secured two full days of legal debate with the aim, on our side, of moving to the “proof stage”. That would potentially have enabled “certain facts”, as Alex Salmond put it following his acquittal, to see the light of day.

After these hearings we waited for Lord Lake’s considered written judgement, which was finally published on 5th February 2026. It is 31 pages in length and narrates, for the most part, all the legal issues around my case in some considerable detail before coming to a conclusion on whether I could proceed to the proof stage and what would have been the “juicy parts”.

Myself and my legal team were confident we could prove that there was clear malicious intent behind the decision to prosecute me in 2021. However, as Lord Lake makes plain in his conclusions, my case cannot proceed because of legislation passed by the UK Parliament.

The Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995, section 170 provides that prosecutors are immune from liability for malicious prosecution in summary proceedings like mine, where the person suing was not imprisoned.

In his written submissions to the court, my solicitor advocate posed these questions about that provision: “On what rational basis is a prosecutor liable for malicious prosecution only if imprisonment has been imposed on the person suing? … Is it compatible with Article 6 for there to be no remedy for a person seeking to sue and caught by the terms of section 170?”

Our answers to those questions had already been given almost four years earlier in our letter before action to the Lord Advocate, lodged as a production with the court. Section 170 was, we said, “incompatible with Article 6 of the European Convention in that it fails to provide a remedy when a wrong is committed”.

Lord Lake has now agreed. In a formal declaration in his judgment he has found section 170 to be “inconsistent with the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, Article 6 (right to a fair hearing), as it is an unjustifiable restriction on a pursuer’s right to have a determination of the merits of his claim that he was the subject of a malicious prosecution”.

That is an incredible statement in its own right, but Lord Lake continued: “Nothing has been brought to my attention to indicate why, notwithstanding the submission of no case to answer being upheld, it could be said that there was a case fit to try. It therefore appears that in the circumstances, the decision of the sheriff to sustain a submission of no case to answer indicates that there was no objective reasonable and probable cause [for bringing a prosecution].”

He then conducted his own analysis of the evidence and concluded: “Whether on the basis of the view taken by the sheriff at the trial or an examination of the evidence available in relation to the requirements of section 38 [the statutory breach of the peace provision under which I was prosecuted], viewed objectively there was no reasonable and probable cause to commence the prosecution – no case fit to be put before a court.”

In other words, Lord Lake is saying that if it was not malice that lay behind the decision to prosecute me, then what was it? In effect, he is laying out the basis of my claim and that it has clear merit. Indeed, he concludes in terms that “the requirements for a case of malicious prosecution against the Lord Advocate … are admitted, established, or the subject of relevant averments” in my pleadings before the court, and that I should be able to go to proof on them.

However, my claim cannot continue because the law stands at present is inconsistent with ECHR and my rights to a fair trial.

Now you might think that conclusion would have been a welcome one for our Lord Advocate because it effectively brings an end to my legal claim against her.

But on Monday 16th February 2026 the Lord Advocate took the decision to appeal Lord Lake’s decision to the Inner House of the Court of Session, the highest civil law court in Scotland. It is a fair assumption that the Lord Advocate is not best pleased by the ruling, not least because it leaves the door wide open for us to proceed with an application to the European Court of Human Rights.

Given Lord Lake’s very strong judgement substantively in my favour, albeit having been forced to dismiss my claim, we are confident of getting a very sympathetic hearing in Europe.

However, one consequence (intended or otherwise is hard to say) of this decision is that we now face unexpected additional court costs.

From the start, it has been clear that the Crown Office, led by the Lord Advocate, has sought to grind us down and price me out of this important legal case. Through the sheer generosity of my supporters in both my initial criminal trial and later in this civil case, we have kept up the fight.

Some have argued that it might have been easier for me to have simply walked away after my acquittal in 2021. They have misjudged me.

For simply offering an opinion in a 158-second video that initially hardly anyone viewed, I had my home raided, my mobile and laptop taken and all of my digital fingerprint forensically scrutinised in what was evidently a fishing expedition. Even after this, so weak was their case they had to amend my initial charge and hope they could jail me under a catch-all breach of the peace.

The publicity, generated by the complainers who didn’t even wait for the initial police report to be actioned, was relentless and highly critical of me personally, causing huge reputational damage that ultimately saw me lose contracts amounting to tens of thousands of pounds. As so often in modern Scotland the process was the punishment, but if they had succeeded I would also have been in prison for a year, for uttering a short opinion on legal proceedings that had been concluded and were of huge public interest.

Senior Counsel for the Lord Advocate during his pleadings at last May’s Court Of Session hearings before Lord Lake made no effort to hide the real agenda; to send a chilling effect across all those who had criticised the complainers.

This is not how actual justice systems are meant to function or how a state prosecutor should be conducting public affairs. Their actions are, as many within the criminal justice system have already noted, brought the entire system into disrepute, but still they continue.

This week I have reluctantly relaunched my financial appeal to get us over this next hurdle. We are genuinely optimistic about our chances but we cannot do that without support.

It has already become a landmark and historic case but we need one big final push. Hopefully then, the joke and the last laugh will be on Scotland’s malicious state prosecutor.

Cllr Steve Harden is the Shadow Cabinet Member for Environmental Services on Rushmoor Borough Council.

Where should councils draw the line between education and enforcement in our communities? Education has an important role to play, but without enforcement it is failing to protect the cleanliness of our country.

I have noticed a worrying decline over the last couple of years in the cleanliness of our nation’s streets. Most back alleys or local fields have some kind of fly-tip, or you find yourself walking through the woods and seeing a bag of dog mess that someone has flung into a bush. I really don’t understand why people make the effort to pick it up, bag it and then throw it into the closest bush when a perfectly good bin is waiting nearby. Everywhere you look, litter seems to fill our streets.

Since being elected as a councillor, I have carried out multiple litter picks with colleagues and local residents, but there are only so many times volunteers can pick up the same litter that magically appears a couple of days later in the exact same spot.

In a council meeting last year, I reviewed our local plan, which seemed to be littered with ways to get more volunteers involved, asking them to pick up the where Labour is failing. While across the county we support volunteers and are grateful for the work they do, how can it be fair that more services are cut while more is expected of people constantly cleaning up their area?

Of course, like many, I believe people should carry out social responsibility, helping to keep their area clean and reporting offenders. When it becomes a part-time job, we know we have an issue.

Nowhere can this be seen more than in my own borough, Rushmoor, where litter-pick teams are going across the borough cleaning up other people’s mess. However, a recent council meeting made me wonder: where do we draw the line between education and enforcement?

In Rushmoor, if you drop litter, you can be certain you will not receive a fine if spotted. Why? Because our Labour council has decided the focus should be on educating people, not enforcing. This isn’t a hidden policy at Rushmoor; at just our last council meeting, Labour councillors were proud to announce that no fines had been issued to offenders.

Now you may think that perhaps there aren’t the resources to enforce, but Rushmoor, alongside many councils in the country, has a dedicated enforcement team patrolling areas looking for offenders. While they “educate” litterers, more and more volunteers are called into action to pick up the slack. Enforcement is not anti-community; it supports the dedicated volunteers going out every day and the law-abiding majority. Let me be clear: this is not a criticism of volunteers, whose time, effort and commitment are invaluable, but of councils using goodwill as a substitute for proper enforcement.

Fly-tipping across the county is another major issue. Fly-tipping incidents in England are now at their highest recorded levels. I was pleased to see that the Conservatives are calling for legislation to come forward to increase the maximum fine, currently £1,000 for those caught. This would make a huge difference in our area, helping to reduce this fly-tipping plague.

Despite many councils needing to reduce cleanliness services in this year’s budget due to inflation, National Insurance rises and, in some cases, the “fair funding review”, Labour-run councils like ours seem to be focusing on schemes that give the illusion things are improving when reality says something different. Labour here in Rushmoor created a pilot scheme called Walk This Waste.

The idea was that a van would drive around Rushmoor asking people to carry their fridge freezer or oven to the van for removal. This scheme cost thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money. Worse still, the scheme failed to reduce fly-tipping and, in some instances, increased it. I suppose it was slightly better than their reported idea of placing skips on major roads through the borough.

I, for one, agree with educating people on keeping the borough clean, putting waste in the bin and not falling to the temptation to fling a poo bag into a bush (however strong that may be…). However, it must be done in conjunction with enforcement. I myself have worked with local schools and taken part in local litter picks with all ages, which does bring a great community spirit. However, if Labour continues to forget enforcement, sadly people will often take the easy option.

If we believe in pride in our country, then we must also believe in caring for it – and that is why Conservatives should be leading the call to clean up Britain.

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Just when you thought Keir Starmer couldn’t get any lower, he’s now using the death of his brother as a justification for cutting benefits.

Starmer puff piece in the Mirror

Writing exclusively for the Daily Mirror, Starmer shares that the “system failed” his brother. Starmer says that Nick, who died on Boxing Day 2024:

had difficulties learning when he was growing up. He spent much of his life drifting from job to job in real hardship.

The system didn’t work for him. There are millions in the same boat. Held back by a system that doesn’t work for them.

So you’d think, with this in mind, that Starmer would be pledging to do more for disabled people who struggle to keep a job or can’t work at all.

Instead, he pushes out a fluff piece totalling just 364 words that. Like most things that come out of Starmer’s mouth, it has absolutely no substance.

There’s also the fact that the Mirror gave the Prime Minister the space to publish this absolutely nothing article, just bigging himself up, when for the past week he’s been clinging onto Number 10 by his nails. It’s a highly suspect move for a supposedly working-class paper.

Using his dead disabled brother for sympathy

Despite his brother being a disabled man who, apparently, lived in poverty, Starmer’s little PR piece doesn’t mention disabled poor people at all.

Obviously, he has time to swipe at Reform, even though the Labour-run DWP is already implementing nearly all the things Reform proposed for benefits in their economic plan.

He also found space to brag about lifting the two-child cap, which he and ministers could’ve lifted a year and a half ago but instead chose party politics.

However, as the Canary has previously reported, lifting the two-child cap can’t be all the government does. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that if the government only relies on the child cap lifting and does little else, poverty will only fall by 1% by 2029.

It’s a bit rich that the prime minister is using his dead, poor disabled brother to gain support at a time when Labour threatens to leave millions more in the same position. Under Starmer’s Labour, the DWP plan to half Universal Credit “health” element for new claimants.

There are also longterm plans to move it over to PIP, despite the fact that PIP has nothing to do with being unemployed.

The government is also hell-bent on getting disabled people back into work, whether or not they actually can. And whilst they’re doing that, they’re gutting support for disabled people in work.

Why did his brother die poor when Starmer’s rich?

So it’s absolutely vile that Starmer is using his brother’s death to rehabilitate himself, whilst if he weren’t related to him, he’d sooner spit on him than help him.

But that’s what I can’t get my head around, because it makes no sense that his brother did die in “virtual poverty”. Starmer’s a millionaire for fucks sakes. Nick died at the end of 2024, but in the tax year leading up to April 2024 alone, Starmer made £152,225.

I know family can be stubborn and proud, but something isn’t adding up here. I’m not doubting that Starmer is grieving for his loved one, but if this is true, Starmer’s basically admitting he let his brother die poor.

But that says it all about the way Labour and Starmer see disabled people. Why should disabled people expect real, life-changing support, when they obviously just aren’t trying hard enough with the bare minimum. In Starmer’s world even his own family don’t deserve to live if they can’t jump through every hoop the DWP throws at them.

Featured image via the Canary

If former royal, and mate of serial child-rapist Jeffrey Epstein, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was hoping for any public sympathy after his arrest this morning – on his birthday – he’s going to be sorely disappointed.

The family of Virginia Giuffre, Andrew’s most well-known victim, welcomed the arrest as a sign that no one is above the law:

At last, today, our broken hearts have been lifted at the news that no one is above the law, not even royalty,” Giuffre’s family said in the statement given to CBS News.

However, Windsor was arrested on suspicion of ‘misconduct in a public office’. Knowing the British state, this was more likely linked to his leaking of secrets to Epstein than his abuse of trafficked and potentially under-age girls. But the offence carries a potential life sentence, so there’s that.

Andrew gets birthday wishes

If sympathy is in short supply, mockery isn’t – and many were wishing Andy a delighted “happy birthday” – while also pointing out the vileness of him being arrested for passing info to the rapist instead of for his crimes against the victims:

Happy 66th birthday, Andrew.

Trafficking and sexual abuse allegations against Andrew — no arrest.

Alleged misconduct in public office? Arrest.

No wonder women don’t trust the police. pic.twitter.com/rUFSRLAmie

— Dr Charlotte Proudman (@DrProudman) February 19, 2026

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Happy Birthday Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor pic.twitter.com/9R1Ixm0kIb

— Manxy (@Manxy) February 19, 2026

Happy Birthday Andrew you crock of shit! 🤣

— Mark Hopkins (@Hopperz1980) February 19, 2026

Just to wish Andrew a Happy 66th Birthday………. 👀 pic.twitter.com/BFLIaueIp1

— Peter Hulbert (@Peterhulbert195) February 19, 2026

Happy 66th birthday Andrew! May you rot in prison for what you did to those kids! Evil bastard! pic.twitter.com/cli4SSFhSc

— 👑LMJ👑 (@Jonsey_8) February 19, 2026

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Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor has been arrested after a complaint about sharing confidential material with Epstein.

Here. We. Go.

If Britain can arrest a Royal, the US should get it together and arrest Trump and every other person involved with Epstein’s child trafficking ring pic.twitter.com/e7XCiSvF2c

— Kelly (@broadwaybabyto) February 19, 2026

And of course, it didn’t take long before AI was eagerly used to imagine the scene:

Happy birthday ex Prince Andrew 🥳🎈🥳 pic.twitter.com/hwldcaN8jI

— Jackson2244 (@PatriotWoman22) February 19, 2026

Happy Birthday to the jailed prince $Andrew #PrinceAndrew #EpsteinFiles @realDonaldTrump @elonmusk
ASDvJ3koPUMqx8e4mdYi7r5mhBPZbJe4GEtfNaRVpump pic.twitter.com/BKWxoxAqJM

— george hacker (@GHacker98613) February 19, 2026

Sources say the Police sang Happy Birthday to Andrew once they booted the door in 😂 pic.twitter.com/99cIyzDMp0

— *LittleChic ❤️❤️❤️ (@_Littlechic_) February 19, 2026

Happy 66th Birthday to Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor! 🎉
Gift from the police: Arrested for misconduct in public office over Epstein secrets.
Cake, candles, and cuffs what a royal party. 🥳👮‍♂️
Sweating yet?

#PrinceAndrew #Epstein pic.twitter.com/5tdqlo5NFY

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— Sarah White (@advancesarah) February 19, 2026

No accountability

More seriously, others pointed out how little accountability there has been so far for anyone implicated in Epstein’s crimes:

🚨 BREAKING: Prince Andrew taken into custody

We will post the full arrest counter and all verified updates shortly.#PrinceAndrew #Breaking pic.twitter.com/XzMW63ku1R

— Index Stats (@indexstatshq) February 19, 2026

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And if Windsor was hoping the fam might be a bit more supportive, those hopes were quickly dashed. Brother Chuck fell over himself in his haste to distance himself – but still no word for the victims:

King Charles issued the following statement regarding the arrest of his brother Andrew.

Extraordinary and unprecedented! pic.twitter.com/VHHZWrag9N

— Lori Spencer (@RealLoriSpencer) February 19, 2026

Maybe Charles is hoping his ‘hot potato’ act will make us forget he funded his brother’s out-of-court payment to Giuffre. But the British state and its corporate media enablers will certainly do their best – and no doubt focus on ‘Randy’s secret-leaking as a handy distraction from the establishment’s involvement in the rape, murder, and trafficking of children and young women.

For more on the the Epstein Files, please read the Canary’s article on way that the media circus around Epstein is erasing the experiences of victims and survivors.

Featured image via the Canary

The Green Party in south-west Wales has been in touch to voice its continuing opposition to the DARC radar project. The installation would use the same site that campaigners originally defended successfully in the 1990s. Back then the group of locals took the name Pembrokeshire Against the Radar Campaign. Now a lively and interactive website declares:

Well now for the great news. PARC is back, baby. We’re here with a new generation, a new purpose, and a fight we are ready to win.

Under the name PARC Against DARC, the group has the backing of Plaid Cymru as well as the Greens and some members of the Liberal Democrats and Labour and an array of pressure groups. However, it remains strictly non-partisan.

Ceredigion Penfro Green Party statement on DARC

To a lot of people it appears that the world has reached a point where lots of things need fixing. The Green Party has always advocated co-operation and diplomacy over fighting.

It is therefore angry at plans by the US to build 27 giant radar dishes on Pembrokeshire’s St David’s Peninsula. The sole aim of this development is for the US to have total control over space.

Amy Nicholass, Ceredigion Penfro number one candidate for the Senedd Elections, is in outright opposition to this development. She says:

The DARC proposals are a disgrace. It benefits no one except the government of the US. When the US tells us to jump, the Westminster government simply asks how high.

We need to put all our efforts into creating lasting peace, not allowing anyone to recreate Cold War tactics where none of us feel safe.

Peace is at the heart of Welsh culture. The US and Westminster should come and learn from us.

There are other, more immediate dangers associated with DARC, the purpose of which is to track and destroy enemy satellites. Should any of these satellites be destroyed, it will leave behind a lot of space debris. That can make it more dangerous for other satellites, such as for weather forecasting or telecommunications, to continue their orbits.

It is vitally important that local people have a say on matters such as this large development. A local campaign group called PARC Against DARC is very concerned about the effect it would have on the tourism industry in Pembrokeshire.

These campaigners describe St David’s Peninsula as a:

true jewel-in-the-crown natural wonder and headline Welsh tourism industry attraction.

Nicholass agrees. She argues for more local power to determine large planning considerations. Nicholass also says:

We in the Green Party understand how precarious the world feels to a lot of people. We can feel grateful to live in a part of the world that is peaceful but this plan brings world disorder very close to us.

We all share this one planet and we need to be part of the conversation on how to stand up for each other in a peaceful way.

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Featured image (artist’s impression) via PARC Against DARC

Amid the furore over the soon-upcoming Gorton and Denton by-election, you’ll probably have noticed mentions of the fact that the constituency was only created in 2023.

With this electoral boundary redraw came the fourth highest index of change — i.e. upheaval in voting makeup — in the entire northwest.

This article provides a brief overview of the ways in which that electoral makeup has (been) changed in Gorton and Denton. Beyond that, it’s also a reminder that our democracy is never as simple as ‘one individual, one vote’. Where that vote comes from carries enormous weight — and that ‘where’ is always a fluid quantity.

The newly minted constituency

The Parliamentary Constituency for England redrew the electoral boundaries in 2023, including those of Gorton and Denton.

The new constituency was first contested in the 2024 general elections, with Labour’s Andrew Gwynne taking the seat. Gwynne took a comfortable 18,000 votes, that’s 13,000 ahead of both Reform and the Greens.

Before that point, the area included portions of the former Manchester Gorton and Denton & Reddish seats. Oh, and Burnage Ward — previously of Manchester Withington — thrown in to boot.

The constituency is now made up of two distinct lobes, connected in the middle by Reddish Bridge. The westward half, nearest Manchester itself, includes Gorton, Belle Vue, Levenshulme, and Burnage. Meanwhile, the eastward Tameside portion comprises Denton and Haughton Green.

Demographic makeup

There’s also an unequal split between the number of voters in Gorton and Denton respectively. In 2024, the Manchester wards boasted 55,000 registered electors to the Tameside’s 26,000.

As such, roughly two in every three voters in the constituency fall on the more urban-liberal Manchester side. Of these, 42% of voters have a university background, 42% are white, and 40% are Muslim.

Meanwhile, the Tameside section has a far higher white and UK-born population, at 83% and 86% respectively. A further 30% of the Tameside voters hold typically working-class semi/routine jobs, far higher than the national 23.5% average. 

As such, we might expect the Denton populace to be more open to Reform’s populist anti-migrant messaging. By contrast, Gorton may see more of a shift to the Greens. This is especially true given that the Workers Party of Britain and Your Party – otherwise potential pulls for the Muslim vote – have stood down.

Electoral history

For what it’s worth, the electoral history of Gorton and Denton’s tributary constituencies is about as red as they come. However, given the collapse in support for Labour under Starmer, that doesn’t necessarily mean a great deal.

Manchester Gorton, for its part, has remained stoically Labour-led from 1935 to its abolition in 2024. The Lib Dems managed to grab a third of the vote in 2005 and 2010, campaigning against the Iraq war, but fell off again in 2015.

Meanwhile, Denton and Reddish was itself created in 1983. Whilst it has also remained a Labour safe-seat since its inception, the Parliamentary Labour Party has typically enjoyed a much smaller margin of the vote. It has consistently averaged just above 50% of the share, rising above 60% in just three elections.

By contrast, UKIP took took third place in 2015, with 18.7%, and the Greens never made it over 4%.

Finally, Bunrage ward voters previously belonging to Manchester Withington make up around 16% of what is now Gorton and Denton. In stark contrast to much of the Northwest, Withington once tended weakly Conservative.

After swinging more strongly to Labour in the 1980s, Withington then flipped Lib Dem. Again, at the time, a large number of Muslim voters turned their backs on Labour due to Blair’s warmongering in Iraq.

The shadows of war

The fact that it’s anti-war sentiment among the Muslim electorate that has previously threatened Labour’s hold on the Gorton and Denton area is significant. Labour has once again haemorrhaged support among Muslims in recent years due to its enthusiastic support of Israel’s genocide of Palestinians.

As such, and quite unsurprisingly, campaign group The Muslim Vote has now thrown its weight behind the Greens in Gorton and Denton, stating:

Muslim voters, alongside many others in the constituency, will play a decisive role in this by-election. This moment must result in the defeat of both Labour and Reform through unity behind a single, credible candidate.

On this occasion, we believe the Green Party offers the strongest opportunity to win, and we urge them to work swiftly with local communities, while calling on all other progressive and independent alternatives to stand aside to give the best chance of delivering a clear break from politics as usual and putting the community first.

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With the two halves of Gorton and Denton breaking down into more uni-educated urbanites and strong Muslim representation in one half, and a higher proportion of the white working class in the other, the by-election could prove a study in the shifting allegiances of the groups Labour previously took for granted.

As such, what would once have been a Labour by-election shoe-in is proving a testing ground for the UK’s polarised politics — and a more multi-party system as a whole.

Featured image via the Canary

Tunisian filmmaker of The Voice Of Hind Rajab, Kaouther Ben Hania, has refused to accept an award from Berlin’s so-called ‘Peace Gala’ over its ‘perfuming’ of Israel’s genocide. Ben Hania’s film won the award for “Most Valuable Film” at the ‘Cinema for Peace’ festival on 16 February.

The ceremony’s organisers invited warmongering former US secretary of state Hillary Clinton and gave an award to former Israeli general Noam Tibon. Tibon is an advocate of military expansion in his “beloved state of Israel” and oversaw murders of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.

Ben Hania gave a speech after her award was announced, but said she was not taking the trophy because the event was providing “political cover” for genocide and acting as a “perfume sprayed over violence so power can feel refined”, “denigrating protesters” and “reframing mass civilian killing as self-defence”:

She continued:

The Israeli army killed Hind Rajab; killed her family; killed the two paramedics who came to save her, with the complicity of the world’s most powerful governments and institutions…I refuse to let their deaths become a backdrop for a polite speech about peace.

Hania said she would accept the award for The Voice of Hind Rajab “with joy” only when peace is “rooted in accountability for genocide.”

Featured image via the Canary

Aaron Jacob is a solicitor, and former district councillor. He was the Conservative candidate for Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough in 2024.

Home ownership in the UK is the dream that is slipping through the fingers of millions.

I have previously shared my thoughts on declining home ownership on this site, outlining in detail how there has been such a dramatic shift in the course of one generation. Recent survey data shows that the average age of first-time buyers overall and in the rest of England (excluding London) was 34 in 2024-25, compared to the pre-pandemic years in 2019-20 when it was 32.

Obviously, this is gravely concerning for younger generations. But on present trends, this shift will be equally consequential for older generational cohorts in both the medium and long-term, as well as for the size of the state.

Home ownership is implicit in many retirement saving models. The Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association’s (PLSA) Retirement Living Standards, for example, assume that retirees will be living in their own home and have no mortgage or rent. This assumption is now colliding with reality. The proportion of privately rented homes headed by someone aged 55-64 increased from 6.3 per cent in 2010-11 to 11.3 per cent in 2020-21. The OBR estimates that the likely projected rise in the pensioner renter population will be from around 6 per cent today to 17 per cent by the 2040s. The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) estimate that this alone would result in a £2 billion (in today’s terms) increase in housing benefit spending.

Retirement savings models will clearly need to adjust to these facts. Indeed, Standard Life has estimated that pensioners who rent in retirement could need almost £400,000 more in retirement savings than those with no housing costs. The corollary of reduced home ownership is a larger role for the state: as renters age, either government spending on housing support will rise, or pensioners’ living standards will fall. As many as 400,000 more households could become dependent upon income-related pensioner benefits.

A twentieth-century retirement model is rapidly, but quietly, being eroded before our eyes, with this barely registering on the policy Richter scale. Instead of seeking to address either side of the home ownership-retirement savings equation, Rachel Reeves has opted for the short-term expedient of capping at £2,000 per year the amount that can be shielded from employer and employee NI contributions by using salary sacrifice from 2029.

Reduced rates of home ownership in later life have wider and often underappreciated consequences beyond the public finances. Housing security is itself a determinant of wellbeing in old age. Older renters are more exposed to rent inflation, possible eviction, and forced moves at a time when they cannot adjust their income. All of these factors can lead to poorer physical and mental health outcomes.

Home ownership, by contrast, is correlated with residential stability and the ability to adapt housing to changing mobility or care needs. A growing cohort of older renters therefore implies not just higher fiscal pressure, but a population ageing with less security and less autonomy. These costs ultimately reappear in the taxpayer-funded NHS and welfare system.

The Labour government’s decision to establish an independent commission on adult social care reform, chaired by Baroness Casey, signals that ministers are at least alert to the scale of the challenge. The NHS website currently states: “You will not be entitled to help with the cost of care from your local council if you have savings worth more than £23,250 and you own your own property (this only applies if you’re moving into a care home).”

Whilst I am no expert in adult social care, this framework is clearly relevant to any serious discussion of housing policy and home ownership. Put simply, however the system is designed, the funding model must fall into one of three broad categories, or a combination thereof: greater state provision, greater individual or family responsibility, or some form of insurance-based solution.

If the funding model for adult social care is fully socialised, as with the NHS, this implies a much-expanded role for the state and, given demographic pressures, higher general taxation. Alternatively, there could be an insurance solution, whether universal or targeted at those not eligible for state support. There could also be a largely privatised model.

What matters here is not an argument for the use of housing wealth to fund care, but the recognition of a constraint: lower rates of home ownership narrow the range of feasible policy options. As the literature notes, “providing household support for old-age costs was a core goal in early policies for housing wealth in most countries”.

This is not an endorsement of using housing equity as the preferred means of paying for care. Rather, it states the obvious: when fewer people own homes, policymakers have fewer levers at their disposal and face a starker choice between higher taxation and lower provision. Whatever the eventual settlement for adult social care, declining home ownership increases fiscal rigidity and pushes more responsibility onto the state.

For too long, the housing debate in the UK has had a narrow and crude focus on the inter-generational inequality in housing wealth. The decline in home ownership is having, and will have, consequences across the generations. The growth of pensioner renters is a slow-burning political and social issue whose scale is inversely related to the government attention it receives. Assumptions that underpinned twentieth-century housing, welfare, and retirement policy no longer hold. There is an urgent need to confront what can be done to reverse declining rates of home ownership; not only for the young, but for the security and dignity of pensioners. Let this article sound the alarm bells.