Police gag order against union activist overturned in free speech case

A Free Speech Union (FSU) member was arrested in an early-morning raid after criticising his former employer in a private Facebook group, then placed

A Free Speech Union (FSU) member was arrested in an early-morning raid after criticising his former employer in a private Facebook group, then placed under “Orwellian” bail conditions barring him from even revealing the arrest. Following legal intervention supported by the FSU, the extraordinary “gagging clause” has now been overturned at a special court hearing. […] In 2023, an employment tribunal ruled he had been unfairly dismissed on grounds of capability. Since then, he has continued to advise firefighters in a private Facebook group, occasionally posting critical remarks about the service’s management. Speaking to the Telegraph, he said his comments – which have been reviewed by the paper as well as by the FSU’s casework and legal teams – were “anodyne” and “certainly not criminal”. Nevertheless, these remarks drew police attention. Earlier this summer, Staffordshire Police carried out a 7am raid on Moss’s home in Newcastle-under-Lyme, seizing his phones, iPad and computer, before arresting him on suspicion of an offence under section 1 of the Malicious Communications Act 1988. Moss said the officers were “heavy-handed” and left him feeling “like a criminal.”

BBC News

Labour councillor Ricky Jones cleared of encouraging violent behaviour

Ricky Jones denied encouraging violent disorder after comments at a counter-protest last year.

A Labour councillor who called for far-right protesters' throats to be cut at an anti-racism rally has been found not guilty of encouraging violent disorder. Ricky Jones, 58, has been on trial at Snaresbrook Crown Court after he called demonstrators "disgusting Nazi fascists" and said "we need to get rid of them all" while addressing a crowd in Walthamstow on 7 August last year.

Long but interesting.

The Daily Sceptic

The Land That Forgot About Wolves – The Daily Sceptic

In a world where fairy tales once warned of deadly wolves, David McGrogan reveals how modern tales now tackle these predators with kindness, reflec...

The image of the fairy tale wolf no doubt has lots of semiotic resonances but the most obvious (beyond the literal danger of wolves themselves, I suppose) is that of the sexually predatory male. The message of these tales is that although there are good people in the world (your grandmother, the woodcutter, the little pig who made his house out of bricks), it is also inhabited by dangerous actors who want to do bad things to you. And since these actors will often come in disguises, pretending to be nice – and particularly when your mother and/or father has gone out or is otherwise not present – be on your guard. Learn to discern the benevolent from the malign. He goes on to analyse some recent BBC versions of Little Red Riding Hood and The Three Pigs: In Little Red Riding Hood, we see “Little Red” going to visit her grandmother with a basket of treats, as in the original. And, sure enough, we discover that there is a wolf lurking in the forest. But he is curiously un-wolf-like. With bunny-like ears and a fluffy tail he looks more like a fox, and his behaviour is flighty, cowardly, almost effete. And we quickly find out that he has no interest in eating “Little Red” or her grandmother or anybody else.

The Spectator

Do the Palestine Action protestors really care about Palestine?

There have been some interesting takes on Saturday’s protest in London by supporters of Palestine Action. The police arrested 522 people for expr...

The focus of the protest, Palestine Action, is almost incidental as a cause, because those arrested, and the rest of those who attended, were there not because they identify in any specific sense with the cause of Palestine Action but rather because they identify with every cause. Support for Palestine Action is merely the latest example of what has been dubbed the ‘omnicause’. Whether they’re demonstrating for Palestine, trans rights or the environment, it’s essentially the same people doing the same thing, but under supposedly different labels. If you drew a Venn diagram of Palestine, eco and trans activists, you would draw a simple circle, because they are basically the same people. They aren’t protestors with a focus; they protest about everything, everywhere. Palestine Action is itself an offshoot of a green group. https://archive.ph/YiKvm

Peculiar day, barely a breath of wind (which is not normal up here!) but that at least meant the clouds were so slow moving that the sun only came out for the downhill part of our walk!

Nearly done, unless I decide to extend it: It’s expensive, but that “Very Velvet” thread is pretty. It’s the darker shade in the alternating squares, and it really does sew up like velvet.

The Spectator

The nauseating hypocrisy of Kneecap

You truly could not make it up. Kneecap, who spent the past three months whingeing and complaining about their gigs being cancelled because of thei...

It is worth recalling their noble sentiments when Kneecap was feeling the heat: ‘As artists, we feel the need to register our opposition to any political repression of artistic freedom… The question of not agreeing with Kneecap’s political views is irrelevant: It is in the key interests of every artist that all creative expression be protected in a society that values culture, and that this interference campaign is condemned and ridiculed.’ Consider the letter Kneecap and the same artists signed demanding the cancellation of Mise Eire: ‘If it is permitted to go ahead, we believe the far-right “Mise Éire Festival” will tarnish the proud history of the Mayflower as a venue that has served to bring people together from all backgrounds and as a safe and inclusive cultural space. We artists and musicians thus call on the committee of the Mayflower Community Centre to cancel this divisive event.’ So, there you have it. The festival was declared far right and divisive. It had to go. https://archive.ph/KRmdY

At Pilates, thinking “Why am I so stinky? Not really done much physical activity today…” then I realised that the Gorilla was over at the other side of the room. Bleh.

On the plus side, the wind means the showers aren’t staying around for very long.

The Spectator

Jess Phillips: ‘I’m being controlled by aggression and violence’

Jess Phillips spoke to Iain Dale at the Edinburgh Fringe festival about Gaza, voter intimidation and her return to Labour’s front bench.

[Jess Phillips] says that her opponent, ‘the independent [muslim] candidate,’ brought in external canvassers. ‘From London,’ she believes. ‘We couldn’t advertise where we were going. They were haranguing voters. There were fireworks thrown, tyres slashed and constituents threatened at polling stations. And I have to say they were almost exclusively men.’ She told her sons, aged 16 and 20, to keep away from the count. ‘I thought, I’m being controlled by aggression and violence.’ She won by 693 votes but her opponent asked for a recount. The returning officer refused. ‘She was incredibly professional,’ says Phillips. ‘And absolutely tiny. About five-foot nothing. And she was encircled by men, shouting at her. It made me fucking furious.’ After the count, Phillips exchanged a handshake with each of her defeated opponents. ‘The independent candidate refused to shake my hand. Petty little idiot.’ Jonathan Ashworth had a similar experience in Leicester South where he narrowly lost to the independent, Shockat Adam. Phillips now regrets her decision not to publicise her opponent’s tactics for fear of tarnishing the image of her constituency. ‘Lots of journalists came and I kept them away. I didn’t want the people who live there to look bad.’ https://archive.ph/iJ8vf

Record number of over-60s are referred to anti-terrorism scheme amid overall explosion in 'extreme right wing' views | Daily Mail Online

Home Office figures show 127 adults in their 60s or beyond were put on Prevent

Record numbers of over-60s are being referred to the Government's troubled anti-terrorism scheme, the Daily Mail can reveal today. […] Even the 1955 epic war film The Dam Busters and The Complete Works Of William Shakespeare were flagged as possible red flags of extremism by Prevent's Research Information and Communications Unit. […] While 'extreme right wing' referrals have been stable since records began in 2016, the reports for over 60s in all categories has more than doubled - rising from 59 in 2016, to 127 in 2023. Over the same period, the overall number of referrals under the Islamist umbrella has plunged by 75 per cent, from 3,706 to 913 - or 13 per cent of the total.

I normally go walking in bog standard cotton/poly socks, never have any issues with them but I don’t normally walk very long distances. Did some research and the jury definitely says to wear two layers. I’m not at all keen on those thick wooly hiking socks, so I looked into mad high tech ones and bought a couple of pairs of double layer ones that are only slightly thicker than my usual ones. Tried them out walking the dog today, and I had a slight sore spot on the pad (weirdly) of my heel after about forty minutes. I just took them off to have a look and there’s no damage or redness, but I do have a bit of a callus there, so maybe that’s the problem? I’ll crack on with them and see.

No, Sydney Sweeney is not a genocidal goose-stepper

Woke TikTokers have mistaken her American Eagle jeans ad for Nazi propaganda.

Way back in the mists of time, before TikTok, before Bluesky, before pussy hats and the #Resistance, there used to be this thing whereby large companies would hire beautiful young women with bodies you could bounce pennies off and for large sums of money, said women would prance about showing off whatever products the company was selling – plus their own natural assets. […] The funniest thing about this non-story is that, by eighties and nineties standards, Sweeney is not a traffic-stopper. She’s obviously lovely in her own way, but compared with the glamazons who sold us stuff back in my youth, she’s practically homely. She’s a normal looking young woman with a fantastic rack and a very expensive make-up artist. And yet she’s provoking thinly veiled jealous rage all over the internet. That is how far the culture has shifted in just a few years.

The Spectator

The Online Safety Act is plumbing new depths of stupidity

As anyone who has endured a pointless argument on the internet probably knows, there’s a decidedly useful rule for such situations. It’s called...

The result? Not a safer internet, but a smaller, duller, more paranoid one. A place where freedom shrinks, innovation flees, and everything begins to sound eerily and deadeningly pre-approved, like Russian poetry under Stalin. It is already noticeable that the OSA is not being used to shut down Pornhub or xHamster for adolescents, but to silence discussion – or even basic news – about those topics most awkward for the world’s worst government: Pakistani rape gangs, illegal immigration, protests about asylum hotels, and all that dreadful jazz that soundtracks Britain’s decline. What’s more, the OSA threatens to destroy Britain’s AI industry – one of the few areas where we might actually be exploiting our post-Brexit freedoms. […] For example, next year the OSA will allow Ofcom to require companies to hand over any information about their algorithms as well as internal documents, data and software source code as part of its ‘regulatory functions’. https://archive.ph/uZO58

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2025/07/26/elite-police-unit-to-monitor-online-critics-of-migrants/ An elite team of police officers is to monitor social media for anti-migrant sentiment amid fears of summer riots. Detectives will be drawn from forces across the country to take part in a new investigations unit that will flag up early signs of potential civil unrest. […] Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, said: “Two-tier Keir can’t police the streets, so he’s trying to police opinions instead. They’re setting up a central team to monitor what you post, what you share, what you think, because deep down they know the public don’t buy what they’re selling. “Labour have stopped pretending to fix Britain and started trying to mute it. This is a Prime Minister who’s happy to turn Britain into a surveillance state, but won’t deport foreign criminals, won’t patrol high streets, won’t fund frontline policing. “Labour are scared of the public, Labour don’t trust the public, Labour don’t even know the public.” https://archive.ph/lgkq1

the Guardian

Russia’s Aeroflot cancels flights after pro-Ukraine hackers claim cyber-attack

More than 50 flights axed and 10 delayed as Silent Crow hacking group apparently claims responsibility

The Russian airline Aeroflot was forced to cancel dozens of flights on Monday after a pro-Ukraine hacking group with a track record of claiming responsibility for hacking targets in Russia said it had carried out a cyber-attack. Aeroflot did not provide further details about the cause of the problem or how long it would take to resolve, but departure boards at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport turned red as flights were cancelled at a time when many Russians take their holidays.

The Spectator

Sadiq Khan will wear his Trump insult as a badge of honour

The Trump Golf Course at Turnberry in Scotland looks like a middle-ranking complex for assisted living. It is all plastic double glazing, unfashion...

As soon as the Prime Minister and his wife arrived, Mr Trump turned his attention to Mrs Starmer, over whom he practically slobbered. ‘She’s a respected person over all the United States’, the President said, in one of his trademark mad reveries. This conjured the image of the Prime Minister’s wife being afforded that same respect across the United States. All Hollywood is a-chatter with tales of Sir Keir’s Missus. New York cab drivers affix a miniature of Lady Starmer on the wing mirrors. Drifters across the great truck routes of Appalachia tell tales of her beneath the stars. On the remaining reservations of the Rosebud Sioux in South Dakota when they rise to beard the new dawn, they do so by saluting Victoria, the Lady Starmer. https://archive.ph/uxAWy

I weeded the drive half an hour or so ago, and foolishly didn’t bother to go back and get my big leather anti-nettle gloves rather than my normal gardening ones. I’m not sure what’s caused this to suddenly come up, but I’ve had a thorough scrub and an antihistamine….