What happens to our bodies when we kiss?

An exchange of good bacteria

Reduces blood pressure

Reduces headaches

Calms nervous bodies

Ben Habib, founder of Advance UK (an even more openly racist party than Reform UK) has announced that he aspires to ‘re-colonise’ the curriculum:

BREAKING RIGHT NOW: Ben Habib has just announced Advance UK will “re-colonise the curriculum” in the party’s first major policy event.
He vows to make schools hold Christian assemblies with the national anthem and teach how Christian thought moulded the UK.
Do you agree? pic.twitter.com/LL9B5e3bV1

— Dan Wootton (@danwootton) February 7, 2026

The party only officially launched in June 2025 and has already made some audacious statements regarding policy. Habib, claims to be driven by Christ, and wants Christian thought to be “moulded” into the UK and ‘western civilisation’.

Advance UK align with Christianity

Advance UK’s alignment with Christianity is no accident. In times of where there is a huge crisis of meaning, religion provides stability. It is much easier to justify power through the lens of divinity, than it is to take accountability over our humanity. Habib and his cohort know this well.

Their patriotic bravado is a purposeful choice. In order to have their warped sense of ‘home’ and ‘nation’ there must be an ‘outsider’ and ‘other.’

We don’t need to recolonise anything — least of all the curriculum. The British empire fucked so much shit up and its legacy still lives on today. The classroom is not a place where democracy is permitted. As Akala reminds us, “The curriculum is a political choice”. No matter how we try to pretend, the UK will never escape its shadow. Colonialism was and continues to be a travesty to humankind. Britain robbed countries of their wealth, health, and culture. It systematically ranked humans and portrayed neoliberal capitalism as some kind of ‘god.’

Colonial nostalgia

Advance UK’s attempt at colonial nostalgia is entwined with the same settler colonial ideology which not only drove the British empire but also powers the anti-immigrant rhetoric spewing forth from major political parties. We do not need to continue branding Britain as the pinnacle of civility and everyone else its subject. We need a curriculum that honestly confronts power and encourages diversity.

Decolonising the curriculum does not mean erasing Britain or replacing one orthodoxy with another. It means examining how knowledge was shaped by empire. It means recognising whose voices were centred and whose were marginalised. It means teaching Britain’s history in full — including the violence, resistance and global consequences — rather than presenting a sanitised national myth.

A decolonised curriculum will not weaken Britain. It would increase its maturity and thus forth credibility. As Priyamvada Gopal, a professor of Postcolonial studies at the University of Cambridge, argues:

Decolonising the curriculum is about expanding the scope of knowledge not narrowing it.

Expansion is not an attack on Britain. It is an investment in intellectual maturity.

Featured image via X

Lachlan Bruce is a Conservative councillor and a policy and public affairs manager at a British health charity.

The Home Secretary’s plan to “radically reduce” the number of police forces in England and Wales is being presented as bold and modern. We are told that 43 forces are inefficient, bureaucratic and ill-equipped to face modern threats, and that consolidation will save money while improving capability.

We have heard all this before.

In Scotland, the SNP forced through the merger of eight regional forces into a single national body: Police Scotland. It was sold as a reform that would cut duplication, strengthen serious and organised crime capability, and free up resources for frontline policing.

More than a decade on, the reality is stark. Centralisation has weakened local policing, not strengthened it. Communities feel less visible police presence, not more. Decision-making has moved further away from the streets and towns officers serve. Local commanders have less autonomy and communities have less influence. The promise that scale would deliver better neighbourhood policing has proved hollow and false.

What Scotland gained in administrative uniformity, it lost in local responsiveness.

Response times have risen. Public confidence has fallen. Officers themselves speak openly about morale and overstretch; many are leaving in their droves. Rural communities feel forgotten by a system geared around priorities in the big cities and metropolitan pressures. When everything is “national”, local problems struggle to compete.

Under the old model, chief constables were rooted in place and answerable to local police authorities. Today, decisions are taken in a national headquarters hundreds of miles from the communities affected. When policing goes wrong, it is far harder for local people to know who is responsible, let alone influence change.

A single force inevitably standardises practice. But Scotland is not uniform and neither are England or Wales. What works in Glasgow or London does not always work in Skye or Ynys Môn. What suits a city centre on a Saturday night is not what a rural village needs on a weekday afternoon. Centralised systems struggle with local nuance.

The clearest verdict on Scotland’s experiment in centralised policing does not come from ministers or management consultants it comes from the public. Fewer than half of adults in Scotland now believe the police in their local area are doing an “excellent” or “good” job. Just 45 per cent hold that view in 2023–24.

A decade earlier, before eight regional forces were swept into a single national body, that figure stood at 61 per cent.

That decline is not confined to satisfaction ratings. It reflects a system that has not delivered better policing.

The force has faced high-profile operational failings, from the M9 crash in which multiple reports of a crashed vehicle went unlogged, resulting in two deaths, to thousands of arrest warrants for serious crimes standing unexecuted. Instances of evidence mishandling in murder investigations and significant overtime pressures highlight a force struggling with core duties. Independent reviews have also flagged procedural shortcomings in how complaints and investigations are handled.

Whatever the theory behind centralisation, the lived experience is plain: people feel less well served by the police today than they did before the merger. That is not modernisation. It is decline.

Large-scale structural reform absorbs time, money and leadership bandwidth. Years are spent on uniforms, logos, IT systems, command chains and governance, while the everyday work of policing is put under strain. Communities do not experience “transformation”; they experience disruption.

Labour now proposes to repeat this experiment across England and Wales.

Labour ministers argue that smaller forces cannot handle terrorism, serious organised crime or major incidents. Yet those capabilities are already delivered through collaboration, regional units and national agencies. You do not need to abolish local forces to share intelligence, pool specialist skills or co-ordinate nationally. That work already happens.

What does depend on local structures is neighbourhood policing: the trust built by familiar faces, local knowledge and visible presence. British policing rests on consent – on familiarity, trust and presence. That tradition is fragile. It depends on people recognising their officers, not seeing them as remote agents of a distant system. Centralisation erodes that bond. That is precisely what is most at risk from sweeping structural reform.

The Home Secretary says she will create new “Local Policing Areas” in every town and city. But Scotland shows the flaw in this thinking. You can draw as many boxes on an organisational chart as you like; if power, budgets and priorities are set centrally, those “local” units become branding exercises, not real centres of authority.

Real neighbourhood policing is not created by White Papers. It depends on genuine local control, stable teams, and accountability to the communities they serve.

There is a deeper problem here. Labour’s instinct is always to centralise: fewer institutions, bigger systems, more control from the centre. We see it in health, in economic policy, and now in policing. The promise is always efficiency. The outcome is usually distance between decision-makers and the people affected by those decisions.

Scotland’s experience should be a warning, not a template.

Police reform should be driven by evidence of what improves safety, confidence and community trust, not by a Treasury-led hunt for savings or a managerial belief that “bigger is better”. The Police Federation is right: any change must strengthen frontline and neighbourhood policing, not weaken it.

England and Wales do not need a centralised policing model. They need more officers on the streets, stronger local accountability, a focus on the things that really impact the public and forces empowered to serve the communities that know them best.

Conservatives should offer a different vision: one rooted in local accountability, visible neighbourhood policing and respect for policing by consent. The answer to modern crime is not to abolish local forces, but to strengthen them backing collaboration where it works, investing in frontline officers, and giving communities real influence over the policing they receive. Reform should bring the police closer to the public, not place them further away.

We tried Labour’s idea north of the border. It did not deliver. Repeating it would be an expensive mistake.

Welp, looks like Donald Trump has been caught in yet another scandal. This time, he stands accused of laundering money with Russian oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev, as political analyst Brian Allen explained:

🚨 BREAKING — Epstein Files:

Donald Trump bought a Palm Beach mansion for $41M, financed by a loan tied to Russian oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev, then flipped it to the same oligarch for $95M.

Same buyer. Massive markup. No renovations. No logic.

That’s textbook money laundering.

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— Brian Allen (@allenanalysis) February 10, 2026

Trump accused of flipping properties for huge profit

This is all over quite a notorious Floridian property.

Trump acquired the Maison de l’Amitie estate in Florida in 2004. The six-acre property set him back a cool $41.35m.

This is the property where he outbid the paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, and the feud between the two supposedly began.

But that’s not the end of the story.

Just four years later, Trump sold the property to Rybolovlev in 2008 for a whopping £95m. Over double what he paid.

Trump claims he made some renovations, installing some of the gaudy gold fittings he loves. But surely he didn’t install enough of this bullshit to double the fucking property value?

Red flags galore

The issue with this comes down to the timing. This $95m sale occurred just as the US housing market was about to crash. And at the time Trump, was facing a $40m personal guarantee on a loan from Deutsche Bank, something he was struggling to pay.

One of the newly released emails from Jeffrey Epstein sheds more light on Donald Trump’s real estate model and gives as an example a mysterious figure referred to only as “R.”

“R” is almost certainly Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev.

Excerpt from the email… pic.twitter.com/wmKkRwT7n0

— Euan MacDonald (@Euan_MacDonald) February 9, 2026

Strange timing for a Russian billionaire to step in and buy the property, wasn’t it? And for double the cost. Especially when said billionaire’s ex-wife claimed he was using it to hide assets at the time.

Oh, and then he just tore the whole place down in 2016 anyway, having never lived in it.

Investigator Glenn Simpson testified to congress that the “extreme markup” on the property was suspicious.

Yes, it fucking is.

All coming out

Trump’s name is in the Epstein files thousands of times:

It should’ve been over when….. Can’t fit everything but what am I missing that’s a “must add”? pic.twitter.com/vorafakYSw

— Bri4Change2024 (formerly Bri4Change, Bri4Change1) (@Bri4Change2024) February 10, 2026

When this orange weasel has been through countless scandals, when is enough actually enough?

For more on the Epstein Files, please read our article on how the media circus around Trump is erasing the experience of victims and survivors.

Featured image via The Canary

The government has released its official response to the report, Time to Deliver, which the Autism Act Committee released at the end of 2025. It’s perhaps unsurprising to see that the response avoids accountability and refuses to place any care or timelines on the recommendations given across the report.

What is the Time to Deliver report, and why does it matter?

The Autism Act 2009 specifically mandated that there must be a national strategy around autism, and produced statutory guidance. The strategy should have been updated in 2019, which was delayed until 2021. And whilst it made significant commitments, it only accounted for a single year. At this point in time, the government said it was prioritising updating the statutory guidance.

The House of Lords Autism Act Committee was appointed to consider the impact of the Act, and recommend necessary changes. To many, the report is imperfect: it doesn’t acknowledge some of the true systemic natures of ableism and neuronormativity. And arguably it doesn’t go far enough. But it does include the views of many autistic people and their advocates. And it does make extensive recommendations for the future.

Time to Deliver argues that the government must begin to develop a new all-age, cross-government strategy which can replace the current version went it expires in July 2026. The authors argue this should be based on the six themes they use in the report. These themes formed the basis of the questions the public could respond to:

• Improving acceptance.
• Identification and assessment.
• Reducing health inequalities.
• Education and transitions.
• Employment.
• Criminal justice.

They also call for the involvement of autistic people at every stage, a costed plan for implementation of the new strategy, an accountable minister, and the strategy to set out how the government will give services the support they need. These elements are particularly crucial in this austerity version of society where there’s not enough funding reaching services. You can’t make recommendations when no one can afford to make them happen.

The House of Lords Autism Act Committee said:

The Committee recommends that the government must develop the new autism strategy now, so it is ready to launch when the current one expires in July 2026. The government must identify priority outcomes, produce a costed, deliverable plan to achieve them, and make clear who is responsible and accountable for delivery.

Too often, decisions about autistic people’s lives are made for them, not by them. This must change. Autistic people and those who support them must be meaningfully involved in every stage of the development and delivery of the new strategy.

The government response is feeble

Thousands of autistic people and those supporting them took part in this inquiry. It’s apparently a record number of written submissions for any House of Lords committee. This shows how significantly issues of support and care for autistic people are having an impact across the UK. And it’s extremely disappointing that the government has effectively dismissed this in its response.

In direct contrast to the careful recommendations of the committee, the government’s response lacks any real substance at all. It commits to almost nothing, apart from the existing 10 Year Health Plan for England, which does not mention autistic people once in its entirety, and to the existing commitments of work.

This notably includes the independent review into ‘prevalence and support’ for autism, ADHD and mental health conditions. This is of course the highly problematic review into the fallacy of ‘overdiagnosis’.

The response is flimsy, and says it welcomes the recommendations without any real intention to act upon them. There is seemingly no commitment to any timelines for a new national strategy. It would be a breach of statutory process if there is no follow-up action.

On the topic of meaningful engagement, the government response says:

We recognise that meaningful engagement will take time, so a balance will need to be struck as to what level of further engagement is required, and the current strategy will remain in force while we do this.

Co-production and engaging with the community cannot function as an excuse not to produce and act on a new strategy. Although engagement is important, action needs to happen effectively, efficiently and in a timely manner. Considering how much meaningful engagement the House of Lords Committee achieved in a relatively short time, it’s not impossible.

Autism charities are not happy with the response

A collection of the UK’s autism charities (National Autistic Society, Ambitious About Autism, Autistica, Autism Action and Autism Alliance UK) released a joint statement after the official release of the response, arguing that the response is unacceptable. They argue there is no evidence that the government intends to develop a new national strategy or:

do anything meaningful in compliance with the Autism Act.

Their statement says:

Vague commitments will do nothing to address the real barriers autistic people face… Once again, autism is lost in generic strategies, despite clear evidence of the distinct risks autistic people face and the need for specific, targeted, joined-up action. The House of Lords’ report articulates these risks powerfully…

Every day the Government delays meaningful action, autistic children, young people and adults will continue to face shorter life expectancy, higher risk of suicide, mental health crisis, exclusion from education, family breakdown, long-term confinement in mental health hospitals, and one of the lowest employment rates of any group in society. These outcomes are shameful.

The charities note that harm is happening right now, in every sector of society. Advocates, charities and autistic people are disappointed by the response, but more importantly, it allows for autistic lives to continue to be placed into danger across various sectors.

Delaying a new national strategy is not just about paperwork. Although we know that things like statutory guidance and strategies do not liberate us, they are a part of how action happens. And issues of harm in systems like healthcare or psychiatric care are ongoing for thousands of autistic people.

The damage our community faces is not going anywhere. This committee report could have been a moment to commit to real change. It’s unsurprising, but disappointing, that the response to a report full of genuine views and recommendations could fall so flat.

Featured image via the Canary

Kamran Balayev is an international legal and policy expert, business leader, and former London mayoral candidate.

London’s most profitable export is not a product. It is a place.

Each year, international businesses deliberately choose English law, London courts, and London-seated arbitration to resolve disputes that can run into the hundreds of millions, sometimes billions. This is forum shopping at its most sophisticated: parties comparing legal systems as if they were infrastructure, and paying a premium for the one they trust most. For the UK, that premium is both a source of revenue and a form of quiet national influence.

The scale of this choice is striking. The Commercial Court reports that around 75 per cent of its work is international, a proportion that has remained broadly stable. But “international” understates what is happening in practice. An independent review of 262 judgments delivered by the London Commercial Courts between April 2023 and March 2024 found that 68 per cent of litigants were non-UK parties, drawn from 84 different countries; the most internationally diverse year on record.

A national court serving litigants from 84 countries is not merely domestic. It is global legal infrastructure. That global pull rests on something unusually old, and unusually modern in function.

England’s courts have institutional continuity stretching back almost 900 years, to the royal courts that emerged in the late 12th century. English common law began to crystallise in the same period, developing incrementally through judicial reasoning rather than comprehensive codes. Over time, that method produced what commercial parties value most: predictability without rigidity, adaptability without arbitrariness, and judgments that explain not just what the law is, but why.

As Lord Mansfield famously observed in the 18th century: “The law of England is the law of merchants.” That insight remains true. English law became the governing law of choice for cross-border contracts even when neither party was British – and London became the natural venue for resolving disputes arising from them.

This is reflected in the work London attracts. The Commercial Court generally handles claims valued at £8 million and above, while the London Circuit Commercial Court typically deals with disputes in the £1-8 million range. Arbitration amplifies the effect. London remains the world’s leading arbitration seat: the 2025 Queen Mary / White & Case survey ranks it first globally, with 34 per cent preference, ahead of Singapore and Hong Kong. The LCIA alone registered 362 referrals in 2024, 95 per cent international, involving parties from over 100 jurisdictions.

One heavyweight arbitration can generate extraordinary economic activity. Specialist counsel, arbitrators, expert witnesses, disclosure providers, translators, hearing venues and weeks of accommodation quickly add up. Even where the dispute value runs into the hundreds of millions, the process itself can generate many millions of pounds in legal and professional services. Across hundreds of cases, the aggregate impact is substantial – one reason legal services contribute well over £35bn annually to UK gross value added and run a persistent trade surplus.

So why worry?

Because this is no longer a monopoly. It is a contest.

Other jurisdictions have grasped that dispute resolution is not merely a public service; it is an export industry and a source of influence. Dubai (DIFC), Abu Dhabi (ADGM), Singapore, Paris and New York have all invested heavily in specialist courts and arbitration centres. None replicates London’s history or depth. But they do not need to. They are competing at the margins where decisions are now made: speed, user experience, digital process, enforcement pathways and procedural efficiency.

And London is giving them an opening.

Concerns have been raised publicly that the median time to judgment in the Commercial Court approached 786 days in 2024. Comparisons with faster forums are not always like-for-like, but the signal is clear. Courts such as Singapore’s commercial courts explicitly market speed and active case management, with suitable cases capable of reaching trial within months, as part of a strategy to attract international disputes.

If English law remains admired while English dispute resolution becomes slow or cumbersome, sophisticated users will quietly re-price their loyalty. The risk is not collapse, but gradual diversion: fewer marginal cases, fewer hearings seated in London, fewer instructions, and reduced spillover into the wider economy.

Talent mobility reinforces the point. The Law Society reports that around 11,000 UK-qualified solicitors now practise overseas, particularly in the Gulf and Asia. This exports English law – a strength – but it also indicates where growth is perceived to lie. Judicial authority, too, has become portable. Retired senior UK judges increasingly sit in overseas commercial courts and arbitration centres, especially in the Gulf. Some of this strengthens the common-law brand; some of it strengthens London’s competitors.

London therefore faces a choice: treat its legal dominance as heritage – or treat it as strategy. If the aim is to protect and grow this export, the agenda is practical.

First, speed and user-friendliness must become explicit competitiveness targets. Delay is not a constitutional abstraction; it is a commercial deterrent. Judicial capacity for heavy commercial work must be protected and modern case management pursued relentlessly.

Second, the UK must promote its legal system with the same seriousness it promotes finance or trade. Competitors do this systematically. London has relied too heavily on reputation alone. Under the current government, there has been no sustained international strategy to champion English law as an economic asset, no visible ministerial ownership of the issue, and little sense of urgency despite intensifying global competition.

Third, London must remain the preferred venue for hearings, not merely the legal seat. Visas, facilities, digital infrastructure and logistics all matter. Where hearings take place determines where value is captured.

Finally, the integrity of common law must be preserved. Judicial independence, reasoned decision-making and predictability are non-negotiable. Any perception of politicisation or erosion of standards would do lasting damage.

This is not pessimism. The fact that London’s courts served litigants from 84 countries in a single year is evidence of extraordinary strength. But it is also a reminder: the world uses London because it chooses to.

Safeguarding that choice requires seriousness, confidence and stewardship – qualities traditionally associated with a Conservative Party understanding of institutions: valuing inheritance, while accepting responsibility for its renewal. London remains a global capital of justice. Whether it remains the global capital will depend on whether Britain once again treats the rule of law not just as a constitutional principle, but as a strategic national asset worth defending.

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Timothée Chalamet as Marty Mauser | Image by: LANDMARK MEDIA / Alamy

4 min read51 min

Oscar-nominated Marty Supreme is not the film I thought it was going to be.

I went in expecting a film with the gratifying arc of an athlete honing his craft, overcoming adversity and reaching the summit of his ambitions.

This assumption was reinforced by the presence of Timothée Chalamet himself. An actor who treats his profession much as you imagine Cristiano Ronaldo treats football: as a vocation demanding total commitment in pursuit of lasting greatness.

That spirit certainly animates Marty Supreme, but it feels less like a portrait of a sporting champion, and more the excoriating tale of an addict.

Marty Mauser, Chalamet’s character and the film’s namesake, is willing to do anything in pursuit of the stage. And it is a stage.

What ultimately makes the film work is Chalamet’s charm

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Mauser is a supremely talented table tennis player, but his drive is not the technicalities of a fast-paced sport. The film follows his escapades as he tries to fund his way to the World Championships in Tokyo. There is no training montage. He is not pursuing the title. He is pursuing the platform.

What drives the character is the performance of a championship match. The showboating; the cheers; the electricity of being watched.

As is so often the case with life’s entertainers, it is off stage that Mauser’s real character is revealed. 

He is willing to lie, con and steal to get his fix.

Josh Safdie, the film’s director, forces the audience to sit with this behaviour, offering no warning and little relief. The result is frequently painful to watch.

Early in the film Mauser enthusiastically encourages a fellow player to recount his experience in a Nazi concentration camp, setting up one of the film’s most memorable and disturbing scenes.

That same principle governs the dialogue. Grossly offensive jokes are fired off at the speed of a table-tennis serve and never allowed to land, the conversation moving on as relentlessly as a rally.

Odessa A’zion delivers a brilliant performance as the pregnant mother of Mauser’s child. A victim of her circumstance, she mirrors Mauser’s talent for manipulation and self-preservation. Their relationship is less a refuge than a collision.

All of this reinforces the grittiness of its setting – you feel like you are living in the dirty, criminal and enterprising city of 1950s New York.

In post-war America, as in Britain today, the distribution of opportunity is not equal. The film shows that inequality often isn’t loud or obvious. It’s not about cartoon villains, although there are a few here. It’s about how some people always get the benefit of the doubt, while others are expected to work twice as hard just to be taken seriously.

What ultimately makes the film work is Chalamet’s charm. Marty Mauser should not be a likeable character, and in many ways he simply isn’t. Yet he possesses the rare quality of charisma. You find yourself wanting him to succeed. He is, above all else, a born entertainer.

If you want to be entertained this winter, you could do worse than going to see the unsettling Marty Supreme.

Gordon McKee is Labour MP for Glasgow South

Marty Supreme

Directed by: Josh Safdie

Venue: General cinema release