This platform is a cesspit for fascists & racists. I'm here just to annoy them. Scary times folks. Love and Unity ❤️
Swansea
Joined March 2009
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Basementjack retweeted
I've been leaked the shortlist to be next leader of Reform in Wales:
Jack the Ripper
Nasty Nick from Big Brother
Joffrey Baratheon
The Demon Headmaster
The woman who put a cat in a wheelie bin
Basementjack retweeted
‼️ Watching Sir Robin Knox-Johnston defend the @RNLI on @BBCNewsnight is deeply personal for me.
I grew up in Porthcawl, the South Wales town whose seafront is shown whenever a great storm crashes into Britain. My mother chaired the local RNLI fundraising committee, fundraising for this cause is central to seaside communities. Many of our friends served volunteered as lifeguards and risked their lives regularly.
Those of us who grow up beside the sea know its power. We know that when someone is in danger, you do not first ask where they were born, how they arrived or whether saving them is politically convenient. You launch the lifeboat.
RNLI volunteers risk their own lives to save strangers. They do not make immigration policy and they do not control our borders. They answer distress calls and uphold the ancient law of the sea: a life in danger must be saved.
For @SuellaBraverman to call this an “RNLI taxi service”, and for Reform and parts of the Conservative Party to turn lifeboat crews into political punchbags, is utterly disgraceful.
Britain is an island nation shaped by the sea. For centuries, people arrived here and departed from here by boat. Courage, seamanship and going to the aid of those in peril are woven into our national character.
Scapegoating lifeboat volunteers for saving drowning people is not patriotism.
It is the absolute antithesis of being British.
No words...independent.co.uk/news/uk/po…
Basementjack retweeted
"The government have actively avoided looking for evidence Russia interfered."
This is arguably the greatest scandal of modern British politics. The Intelligence & Security Committee's Stewart Hosie said the government didn't investigate alleged Russian interference in the Brexit vote, and no one wanted to touch this "with a ten-foot pole".
Successive British governments including Starmer's have covered up the extent of Russian interference in the most important vote in modern British history.
Please repost to demand that Andy Burnham shows the courage to put an end to this cover-up and allows an inquiry to expose the truth about Russian interference in the Brexit referendum. – at Brighton, England
Are library closures misogynistic? They certainly impact women more than men. Have a listen 17 mins in. bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002zr…
Basementjack retweeted
WHISTLEBLOWER CAUGHT THE FRAUD, THE NHS CAUGHT AMNESIA
Sharmila Chowdhury @sharmilaxx gave the NHS 30 years of clean service. Not one blemish. Then she did something apparently unforgivable.
She noticed two consultant radiologists at Ealing Hospital, run by London North West University Healthcare NHS Trust @LNWH_NHS, billing the NHS for shifts they were actually spending at a private hospital down the road.
Getting paid twice for the same hours is fraud everywhere on earth.
Everywhere except, apparently, inside an NHS complaints process.
She reported it.
To her line manager.
To the Medical Director.
To the HR Director.
To Counter Fraud.
To the Chief Executive.
To Number 10.
To the Treasury.
She built a paper trail so solid that ITV @itvnews later sent an undercover team into the same hospital years on and filmed the same consultants still taking cash from patients for private ultrasounds on NHS premises.
The Trust's response to all that diligence was to sack her, based on counter allegations later shown to be fabricated.
The man behind those allegations reportedly signed off an email too crude to print here.
He picked up a Top Mentor award from the Trust that same year. Nobody writes comedy this good on purpose.
Sharmila took it to tribunal and won. Won the appeal too.
A judge ordered the Trust to reinstate her. The Trust said no. She was then quietly blacklisted across the NHS.
One job offer was withdrawn the moment they worked out who she was. Legal costs hit £130,000.
Somewhere in the middle of it she developed breast and lung cancer, which her doctors link to years of sustained stress.
The two consultants kept their jobs.
George Osborne could not get involved.
Andrew Lansley could not get involved.
David Cameron could not get involved.
Every one of them filed it under employment matter, Whitehall for we would rather not know.
A proven fraud case, covered by ITV @itvnews, the Guardian, Daily Mail @DailyMail, Channel 4 News @Channel4News, the Independent @Independent, BBC News @BBCNews, the Times @thetimes and the Daily Mirror @DailyMirror.
The official position of Her Majesty's Government was still not our problem.
This is the reward system.
Report fraud, lose your career, lose your health, and watch the people you reported get promoted.
Basementjack retweeted
The Royal Family are the epitome of inequality in Britain.
Taxpayers are funding two new helicopters for one family, while air ambulance charities have to ask the public to donate just to keep lifesaving helicopters in the sky.
One serves a privileged few. The other serves millions.
There’s something fundamentally wrong with those priorities. #AbolishTheMonarchy
Why do white working class boys do worse in terms of educational attainment? Thoughtful and nuanced piece...
Nigel Farage knows nothing about the real causes of white English working class boys underperforming. Unlike Farage, I was one. I left school at 16 with one 'O' Level, in Art. Farage attended one of the most expensive schools on earth.
The best expert evidence says white working-class boys in England tend to do worse at school mainly because poverty, gender and place combine in a particularly damaging way.
The biggest driver by far is socio-economic disadvantage: boys from low-income white families are much more likely to fall behind than better-off white pupils, and they often do worse than disadvantaged pupils from several other ethnic groups too.
A big part of the problem starts early. Many disadvantaged white boys are already behind in language, reading and writing by primary school, and those early literacy gaps then affect performance across most subjects. Boys also tend to do worse than girls in English, which pulls down overall results. Experts repeatedly point to weak literacy as one of the clearest and most important reasons for later low attainment.
Place matters as well. White disadvantaged boys are heavily concentrated in some coastal, ex-industrial and isolated areas where schools may struggle more, transport and enrichment opportunities are weaker, and there are fewer obvious routes into professional jobs.
This helps explain why the issue is not the same everywhere: some schools and areas with very similar intakes do much better than others, which shows the outcomes are not inevitable.
Family background matters too, but the evidence is often misunderstood. Researchers do find that parental engagement and educational capital are important, but that does not mean parents do not care. It usually means poorer families may have less time, confidence, money or familiarity with the education system, and may be less able to help children navigate school, university or career routes.
Studies also suggest many low-income parents start with high hopes for their children, but become less confident over time as barriers mount.
Another theme is that many white working-class boys see weaker returns from academic routes. University can look expensive, unfamiliar and uncertain, especially in places where good jobs do not obviously follow from qualifications. Some boys are more likely to enter lower-level vocational routes, but less likely to use them as a springboard into higher apprenticeships or degree-level study. That means the problem is not only low attainment at 16, but also weaker progression afterwards.
There is also growing evidence that masculine norms, peer pressure, mental health, stereotypes and low expectations from adults can make things worse. But this part of the evidence is less settled than the evidence on poverty, literacy and geography.
There is no strong evidence that the Equality Act has harmed white working-class boys' educational performance. That claim appears often in politics and commentary, but the serious evidence points elsewhere.
The main causes identified by researchers are still poverty, low early literacy, weaker school engagement, exclusion and absence, place, and limited progression routes. Some expert submissions go further and argue that stronger equality duties would help, not hurt, because class disadvantage, race, gender and school practices interact and need to be tackled together. The Act has NOT been shown to be a cause of the problem.
Some question the gap between disadvantaged white boys and disadvantaged non-white boys, which is real, but it is often described far too crudely, especially by populists who strategically use the white working class to set up a polarising 'Us' vs 'Them' narrative.
A lot of public debate uses "working class" when the data are really about a narrower group, usually pupils eligible for free school meals. Within that disadvantaged group, white boys often do worse than several minority ethnic groups, but not all, and the difference is not well explained by simple claims about effort or values.
The best explanations are that poverty seems to hit White British pupils especially hard, and that many disadvantaged white boys are concentrated in places with fewer opportunities, such as some coastal, rural and ex-industrial areas. These places may have weaker labour markets, fewer strong educational networks, and less visible payoff from academic success.
White disadvantaged boys also tend to have very weak early literacy outcomes and very high rates of persistent absence, suspension and exclusion, which then feed back into lower attainment.
Precisely why some disadvantaged non-white groups do better is harder to pin down, but the evidence usually points to different social settings rather than preferential treatment.
Some minority families are more concentrated in urban areas with stronger schools and closer access to universities and transport. Some groups may also have stronger study expectations, tighter peer norms around school, or what researchers call migration selection effects - meaning families who migrated may be unusually motivated or education-focused compared with the average population. That does not mean minority pupils face fewer barriers overall; many still face racism and other disadvantages. It means that class disadvantage does not operate in exactly the same way in every community.
Overall, the most reliable conclusion is that white working-class boys underperform not because of one cultural flaw, and certainly not because of the Equality Act, but because material disadvantage, early literacy problems, local opportunity gaps and weaker progression routes reinforce each other over time.
Great debunking from @Care2much18
Challenging disinformation is a duty we must not avoid nation.cymru/opinion/challen…
Basementjack retweeted
WATCH: Asked Nigel Farage last night abt his £5m gift from Christopher Harborne. Why did he not just declare? Does he regret that? What’s his response to those who argue it looks dodgy?
He said my Qs were a “waste of space" & was clearly annoyed in what became a tense exchange
Nigel Farage told Sky's @BethRigby that he took a £5 million gift from crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne in early 2024, before he announced he would stand for parliament, for 'protection'
Basementjack retweeted
1/
Laure Ferrari has refused to confirm how she paid £885,000 cash for a house in Nigel Farage's constituency.
In an interview with Le Monde today, she said: "There's more than one way to pay for a house."
Here's what we know.
2/
Land Registry, Title EX38068.
Orchard House, Turpins Lane, Kirby Cross, Frinton-on-Sea CO13 0PB.
Registered solely to Laure Ferrari. Cash purchase. No mortgage. No charge of any kind.
Date: 11 November 2024. Four months after Farage was elected MP for Clacton.
3/
Farage originally told Sky News and LBC he had "bought a house in Clacton."
He later said he "misspoked."
Then he said she came from "a very successful French family and can afford it."
4/
BBC Verify investigated the family wealth claim in September 2025.
They found no evidence of substantial family wealth or property sales.
Her father's haulage business in Strasbourg was liquidated in 2020, with more debts than assets.
5/
Today Ferrari offered a new explanation to Le Monde.
"Yes and no, that would be a very large inheritance… There's more than one way to pay for a house."
"I can't say how much my grandmother gave, that's my business."
6/
So the explanation has now shifted from:
❌ "Farage bought it"
❌ "Very successful French family"
❌ "Grandmother's inheritance, but I can't say how much"
Each explanation raises more questions than it answers.
7/
What we do know: Had Farage been named as co-purchaser, the additional dwelling surcharge would have applied, he owns investment property through Thorn In The Side Ltd.
Estimated stamp duty saving by registering solely in Ferrari's name: ~£43,500.
8/
Last week Farage failed to declare a £5 million personal gift from crypto-billionaire Christopher Harborne upon entering Parliament.
This week his partner won't confirm how she funded an £885,000 cash house purchase.
The leader of a party that campaigned on transparency.
Basementjack retweeted
Reform UK’s billionaire-funded propaganda channel, GB News, exists to protect the interests of the rich.
Its key propaganda strategy is to blame and scapegoat minorities and other vulnerable groups, including those who need assistance in the form of welfare.
The inflammatory claims in the article below are based on a highly partisan analysis released on 4 May 2026 by the Conservative Party, using Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) administrative data on actual benefit payments.
In 2024–25, approximately 625,000 households (down slightly from 668,000 in 2023/24 when the Conservatives were in power, but double the 2019–20 figure) received more than £32,000 in total welfare payouts.
This threshold roughly matches the average post-tax earnings of a full-time worker (median full-time gross pay was about £39,000 in 2025, with take-home pay around £31–32k after tax and NI).
About 16,000 households received over £60,000, and the Conservatives highlighted that the number of working-age households on high payments (>£30k) has risen.
While these claims appear to be broadly accurate, I will now show how they are misleading, decontextualised, lack nuance, and, like almost all GB News and other right-wing news media content, appear to be framed to provoke maximum outrage, anger, and polarisation, and to deflect blame away from the ultrarichrich and the failed deregulatory free-market ideology of successive governments, rather than to objectively report, inform, and educate.
A reminder that while it has the word ‘news’ in the title, it is clearly not a news channel.
The article frames the data against a ‘£155 BILLION benefits budget’ that is ‘ballooning’ and will soon ‘dwarf defence spending’. The presentation is deliberately provocative, inflammatory, selective, and misleading.
Headlines like “Welfare pays more than work” and phrases such as “critics slam”, “abuse the system”, and “golden ticket” imply widespread laziness or fraud among recipients, strongly and falsely implying that large numbers of able-bodied people are simply choosing benefits over jobs.
This rhetoric ignores the legal and policy reality: most very high awards go to households with severe disabilities or caring responsibilities, where benefits (especially Personal Independence Payment, or PIP) are exempt from the household benefit cap precisely to protect the most vulnerable.
Would they prefer we turn the most vulnerable in British society into beggars? Bring back work houses? Should we ‘deport’ them to somewhere more affordable?
I’m reminded of the time privately educated multimillionaire Richard Tice’s Dubai-based privately educated multimillionaire partner, Isabel Oakeshott, referred to people claiming disability support as “parasites” on another right-wing propaganda channel, TalkTV, which is funded by another divisive billionaire, Rupert Murdoch.
While, outside of the inflammatory headlines, the analysis itself notes that these payments are the “highest needs” cases, the framing downplays that context in favour of outrage.
Key contextual information that audiences need to make sense of the article is deliberately concealed or downplayed, including the composition of the overall UK welfare budget.
The £155bn figure cited appears to refer primarily to working-age and children’s benefits (official forecasts for 2025–26 put this at around £145bn). However, the full UK social security system is forecast at £323bn (Great Britain) or £334bn (UK-wide) in 2025–26.
Around 55% of that total (£178bn) goes to pensioners, including £146bn on the state pension alone. Pensions are the single largest item and have grown due to the triple lock and an ageing population.
The 625,000 high-payment households represent roughly 2% of the UK’s 29 million households and are a tiny fraction of overall spending; the vast majority of welfare goes to retirees who have contributed through National Insurance over decades, not to “work-shy” working-age claimants.
Despite the strong impression given by the article, by populist politicians, and by swathes of Britain’s print and broadcast news media, Britain’s welfare costs are NOT unusually high when benchmarked against culturally similar countries. Nor are levels of taxation.
Britain is categorically NOT a “high tax, high welfare” country. This is one of the most widely circulating lies pushed by media and political discourse in the UK for several decades, and should be robustly challenged at every opportunity.
Using the standard OECD measure of public social expenditure (which covers pensions, health-related benefits, family support, unemployment, housing, etc.):
OECD average: ~21–22%
Finland: 31.4%
France: 30.6%
Germany: 27.9%
Italy: ~27.6%
UK: 23.0% of GDP
Australia: 22.9% (net)
While the US is just 19.8%, it has much higher private spending and much worse outcomes across many key quality-of-life measures, including lower life expectancy, more poverty, more public debt, fewer worker holidays and protections, and a far higher homicide rate.
The UK sits comfortably in the middle of the pack among developed Western democracies, lower than most continental European peers with similar living standards and higher than the US or some Anglosphere nations.
Working-age disability and incapacity spending, while rising post-pandemic, remains close to or below the OECD average as a share of GDP.
The welfare model that Reform UK wants to impose is far closer to the US model than our European neighbours.
Is that really what GB News audiences and Reform UK voters want? Or have they been fed a diet of divisive, misleading propaganda which seeks to promise them everything and actually make their lives far worse should Reform ever get anywhere near the levers of power?
Claims of an “out-of-control” or uniquely bloated welfare system simply do not hold up against comparable countries.
GB News, owned by Evangelical “Christian” billionaire hedge fund founder Paul Marshall (alongside other right-leaning investors), has a clear editorial incentive to present the story this way.
Sensational framing of “benefits Britain” drives engagement among its core audience, who are often older, taxpayer-focused, and receptive to narratives of waste, dependency, and government failure.
Highlighting the figures now, under a Labour government, serves to attack current Government policy while glossing over the fact that the benefit-cap loopholes and post-pandemic rises occurred across governments and administrations.
It also keeps pressure on Labour to pursue tougher reforms, aligning with the channel’s broader populist-right, small-state, low-tax, anti-union, anti-regulation, and anti-immigrant #TuftonStreet-aligned leanings.
Billionaire ownership of media may not be inherently sinister, but it does shape coverage priorities: stories that resonate with anti-Left sentiment and boost ratings are prioritised over dry, balanced, informative fiscal analysis.
We see this pattern repeated daily right across the massive media empires owned by Marshall (GB News, UnHerd, Spectator), Murdoch (Sun, Times, TalkTV/Radio), and Jonathan Harmsworth (Mail, METRO, i newspaper), with many non-billionaire-owned news media (Express, London Standard, Telegraph) also adopting this framing.
The choice of a non-expert guest from Spiked magazine is also significant for similar ideological reasons.
Spiked (originally the Revolutionary Communist Party’s Living Marxism) is a small but vocal, opaquely funded outlet that specialises in contrarian, divisive, anti-welfare-state, anti-migrant, anti-Islam, anti-feminist, anti-tax, free-speech-focused culture-war commentary from a libertarian-right perspective.
Its contributors frequently argue that generous benefits create dependency and cultural decay rather than addressing structural issues.
Selecting such a guest, rather than, say, a neutral economist, DWP statistician, or disability-sector expert, allows the segment to amplify an emotive, “common-sense” critique without the inconvenient caveats (disability exemptions, pension dominance, OECD comparisons) that a data-focused expert would introduce.
It lends an intellectual veneer to an elite populist narrative while staying firmly inside the channel’s ideological comfort zone. This is a classic media tactic: pair selective facts with aligned commentators to reinforce the desired framing rather than test it.
@Ofcom have absolutely failed to reign in this clearly ideological approach, making GB News effectively Britain's Fox News.
Maybe at the next general election we can look forward to its partisan presenters claiming that the election was fraudulent or “stolen”, should Reform UK do worse than current opinion polls suggest.
In short, the raw numbers are real and worth debating: welfare reform, work incentives, and disability assessment are of course legitimate policy questions. As are taxation of the ultrarich, rising inequality, regulation of the financial institutions and crypto, worker’s rights, environmental protections, politicians receiving gifts of £5 million from old men with two names living in Thailand, politicians lying to voters about buying a house in their constituency, and the concentration of media ownership in the hands aof a few right-wing billionaires. But he GB News presentation strips away essential context to manufacture a culture-war-style scandal.
The reality about welfare is far more nuanced than GB News claims: the UK spends a middling amount on social protection by international standards, raised by middling levels of taxation, with the bulk going to pensioners, and with the high awards highlighted overwhelmingly going to support people with severe needs who cannot reasonably be expected to “choose work.”
