As we speak, 4.3 million children in the UK are living in relative poverty. Over 350,000 people are homeless in England.
Millions are worried about the cost of heating their home, braced for yet another hike in energy bills. Meanwhile, billionaires are richer than ever.
So what is the government doing?
They could lift children out of poverty, if they wanted to, by scrapping the two-child benefit cap.
Keir Starmer says that a changing world means we have to increase defence spending (Picture: Ministry of Defence)
They could help pensioners with energy bills, if they wanted to, by restoring universal winter fuel allowance.
They could ensure nobody had to sleep rough on the streets, if they wanted to, by launching a massive council-house-building programme.
Instead, they have signed off on a 13.4 billion increase in military spending. With that money, the government could scrap the two-child benefit cap 10 times over.
Now, today, we’re told the government is preparing to cut billions from welfare budgets.
…
Even David Lammy admits Gaza is in ‘rubble’ (Picture: Getty Images)
Put simply: there is never any money for the poor, but always enough money for war. I just wish the government was honest about that.
Keir Starmer says pensioners can freeze to death and poor children can starve and be condemned to failure and misery all their lives.Keir Starmer justifies why he has to travel abroad so much
U.S. President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy meet in the Oval Office of the White House on February 28, 2025. (Photo: Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images)
“An utter embarrassment for America. This whole sad scene,” wrote U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy.
A White House meeting on Friday between U.S. President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy rapidly devolved into chaos as the two American leaders took turns berating Zelenskyy with television cameras rolling and the global public looking on.
Both Trump and Vance bizarrely demanded that Zelenskyy show more gratitude for the military aid the U.S. has provided Ukraine since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022 and pressured him to accept an as-yet-undefined deal to end the war.
Vance told Zelenskyy he must “say thank you” and chided him for “trying to fight it out in the American media when you’re wrong,” but Trump intervened to say, “I think it’s good for the American people to see what’s going on here… that’s why I kept this going so long.”
“You have to be thankful,” Trump told the Ukrainian president, who has repeatedly thanked the American public for the U.S. government’s military assistance.
“You don’t have the cards,” Trump continued as Zelenskyy tried in vain to interject. “You’re buried there, your people are dying, you’re running low on soldiers.”
"You've gotta be more thankful" — remarkable scenes out of the White House as Trump and JD Vance team up to do Putin's bidding and demean Zelenskyy pic.twitter.com/wjp8UfqN0G
Insisting that Russian President Vladimir Putin can’t be trusted to uphold a bilateral cease-fire, Zelenskyy is demanding security guarantees against a future Russian attack in any agreement to end the conflict—a demand that Trump has thus far rejected.
“Your country is in big trouble,” Trump, who falsely suggested last week that Ukraine started the war, told Zelenskyy during the Oval Office meeting, which was meant to kick off talks regarding U.S. access Ukraine’s rare earth minerals.
Zelenskyy left the White House on Friday without signing a minerals deal.
“You’re either going to make a deal or we’re out,” Trump told Zelenskyy during Friday’s meeting, a clear threat to withdraw U.S. support for Ukraine. “And if we’re out, you’ll fight it out and I don’t think it’s going to be pretty.”
Trump to Zelensky: "Your country is in big trouble. No, no, you've done a lot of talking. Your country is in big trouble. You're not winning this." pic.twitter.com/SDmKGXMgNl
Observers were aghast at Trump and Vance’s conduct during Friday’s meeting, which was likened to an ambush. At one point, as Trump responded dismissively to Zelenskyy’s call for security guarantees as part of any cease-fire deal, Ukraine’s ambassador to the United States was seen with her head in her hands.
“Wow. Just wow,” said CNN‘s Dana Bash following the meeting.
Zeteo‘s Mehdi Hasan wrote on social media that it is “insane that this just happened.”
“We are governed by children,” he added.
Watch the full exchange:
WATCH: Full Heated Exchange between President Trump, Vice President Vance and Ukrainian President Zelenskyy in the Oval Office. pic.twitter.com/oMJUGPqbSU
U.S. lawmakers also voiced disgust over Trump and Vance’s behavior, with Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) writing that the meeting was “an utter embarrassment for America.”
Shortly after the meeting concluded, Trump took to his social media platform to accuse Zelenskyy of disrespecting the U.S. “in its cherished Oval Office.”
“He can come back when he is ready for peace,” Trump added as backlash over his treatment of Zelenskyy continued to pour in.
“Trump berates Zelensky, the leader of a democratic country courageously fighting Russian imperialism, while he allies himself with Putin, a dictator who started the bloodiest European war in 80 years,” U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) wrote on social media.
“Sorry, President Trump,” Sanders added. “We believe in democracy, not authoritarianism.”
People take part in a pro-Palestine march in central London organised by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, July 6, 2024
THE BBC has been urged not to give in to “cynical” attacks on a documentary on the Israeli invasion of Gaza, which it has pulled from iPlayer after criticism of its child narrator’s father being a Hamas official.
Gaza: How To Survive A War Zone is narrated by 13-year-old Abdullah, whose father is deputy minister of agriculture in Gaza’s Hamas government.
Last week Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy said she would raise this with the BBC’s director-general and chairman, “particularly around the way in which they sourced the people who were featured in the programme.”
A petition signed by socialist Jews including film-maker Mike Leigh, comedian and writer Alexei Sayle and actor Miriam Margolyes calls on the BBC to resist “censorship.”
A protester holds a placard outside of the Pennsylvania Capitol during a #50501 protest on Wednesday, February 5, 2025. (Photo by Paul Weaver/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
If anyone celebrating this attack against transgender people were to spend time with the parents, children, and doctors affected, their feelings might change.
President Donald Trump’s executive order prohibiting any hospital that receives federal funds from practicing gender-affirming care callously disregards the needs of children who are both gender and neurodiverse, putting them and their families at risk. If anyone celebrating this order were to spend time with the parents, children, and doctors affected, their feelings might change. They should meet Pearl who before receiving treatment was failing out of high school, contemplating suicide, and rarely left the house, and is now attending community college, teaching herself another language, and has developed deep friendships. Or the mathematically-gifted Ellen who after two deep depressive episodes in the last three years, finds safety, companionship, and stability in her gender support group. Or Jacob, a role model to all that meet him, who is attending college out of state and just performed in a concert on campus.
For three years my husband and I have been part of a support group with the parents of these children, who range in age from 14 to 25. Many are now scrambling for information to determine how far the order extends; where one can continue to receive care; what care, if any, the doctors they’ve trusted, relied on, and put faith in for years can still provide. Parents are counting prescription refills, checking if pharmacies will still honor them, searching for providers not impacted by the order, and compiling a list of states they could afford to travel to if other options don’t materialize. Some fear the order will destroy their children’s delicate mental health. Others fear it is a death sentence.
Our “community” includes some of the most thoughtful and loving caregivers I have ever known. Our children, who all have autism spectrum disorder (ASD), see and experience the world through a different yet remarkable lens. While some focus on their deficits, we see their creativity, honesty, strong sense of justice, loyalty, and enhanced focus as superpowers. But none of us deny that what makes them unique also presents challenges, including struggling with social interactions, poor executive functioning skills, or developmental delays. One challenge they all share is dealing with their gender diversity.
These are parents not boogeymen. These children are lovingly cared for and listened to, not abused.
Those with ASD are three to six times more likely than the general population to be gender diverse1—the umbrella term that includes non-binary and transgender. On top of their social, developmental, or communication issues, the added stress of feeling uncomfortable in their own bodies deeply impacts their well-being. We often talk about their “dark periods” when they’ve experienced debilitating depression, suicidal ideation, and elevated anxiety. Like any good parent, we sought advice from trusted medical professionals who provide the standard of care supported by leading medical organizations, including the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Our children see a multidisciplinary team of fully licensed, board-certified, highly trained pediatric specialists at a world-renowned hospital. These neuropsychologists, psychiatrists, gynecologists, and social workers coordinate care plans tailored to each child, considering their unique developmental, mental, and emotional health needs. Every child is evaluated regularly over extended periods of time. The medical care they receive may include mental health treatment, executive functioning courses, and in-person or online groups where they play games like D&D and socialize with like-minded youth. Some children who are past puberty receive hormone therapy after an extensive evaluation process. No child under the age of 18 is provided with gender-affirming surgery.
Parents in our group run the gamut. Some struggled to accept their child’s gender diversity or ASD diagnosis. Some oppose using hormone therapy, despite their child’s repeated demands, because they believe their child couldn’t handle the responsibility. Some have once needed to hospitalize their suicidal children, but have watched them flourish since starting them on hormone therapy. All struggling and questioning. But no care decisions are made without extensive consultation with their doctors, whose paramount concern is that our children are happy, healthy, productive, and thriving.
My child does not receive hormone therapy or other treatments outlined in the order. I do not, cannot, fully understand the magnitude of their pain. All I can do is stand witness to this action’s cruelty. These are parents not boogeymen. These children are lovingly cared for and listened to, not abused. These doctors have dedicated their lives to improving the mental and physical health of some of the most vulnerable among us. They are saving them, not experimenting on them. We are all good, intelligent, informed, and, now, scared people, whose greatest concern is the welfare of our children.
Editor’s Note: To protect privacy all names and identifying details of those mentioned in this piece have been changed.
Donald Trump decrees forbidden terms denying sexual diversityElon Musk urges you to be a Fascist like him, says that you can ignore facts and reality then.
dizzy: I have somehow managed to post this to the non-current version of this site. There are 2 versions atm because I have changed my web host and DNS needs to propogate so that it all points to my new web host.
RACHEL REEVES’S decision to protect fat cat bankers has lost the public £15 billion — money that could have saved freezing pensioners and hundreds of thousands of children from going hungry, a damning new report found today.
Campaigners for a windfall tax on banking profits slammed the Chancellor after it emerged that Britain’s four biggest banks made a record £45.9bn in profits for 2024.
Positive Money found that the policy, called for by unions and left MPs, would have brought in an additional £14.7bn for the Exchequer this year after Lloyds Bank became the last of the so-called Big Four to announce its £6bn pre-tax profits for last year.
The group calculated that increasing the existing surcharge on bank profits from 3 to 35 per cent, in line with the government’s windfall tax on energy companies, could have raised this sum from Lloyds, HSBC, Barclays and NatWest alone.
This would be enough to cover the cost of scrapping the two-child benefit cap — fives times over.
Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves wear the uniform of the rich and powerful. They have all had clothes bought for them by multi-millionaire Labour donor Lord Alli. CORRECTION: It appears that Rachel Reeves clothing was provided by Juliet Rosenfeld.Keir Starmer says pensioners can freeze to death and poor children can starve and be condemned to failure and misery all their lives.
