The byelection victory for Lindsay Whittle is a huge boost for Plaid, which believes it can win next year’s Senedd elections, ending a century of Labour dominance in Wales. Photograph: Matthew Horwood/Getty Images
Rhun ap Iorwerth’s party seizes Senedd seat after Reform UK challenge
Rhun ap Iorwerth’s party, which wants Wales to become independent, seized the Senedd (Welsh parliament) constituency from Labour and resisted a fierce challenge from Reform UK.
Plaid candidate Lindsay Whittle received 15,961 votes, while Reform UK’s Llyr Powell won 12,113. Labour’s vote collapsed in what had been a stronghold, with its candidate Richard Tunnicliffe polling only 3,713 votes.
Plaid emerged with a majority of 3,848 votes, and a swing of almost 27% from Labour.
In his acceptance speech, Whittle … said: “There is deep, deep disillusionment with Labour, both on a UK level and at a Welsh government level, and the people are looking for new leadership. A Plaid Cymru win here tonight is the clearest evidence yet of who is in the driving seat to lead [Welsh] government for next year. I don’t think Reform have shown they are particularly interested in Wales. It’s all about getting [Reform leader] Nigel Farage to Downing Street.”
Fossil Free London protesters on Westminster Bridge, London, demonstrate against drilling at the UK’s largest untapped oilfield, 16 July 2025. Photograph: Leon Neal/Getty Images
…
The excuse most often provided for turning away from green measures, for expanding fossil fuel production, for ignoring the science, is pragmatism. The idea being that, yes, the climate emergency is serious, but we have to be practical – we have to consider other things too, inevitably ensuring business as usual, protecting the bottom line and keeping consumer capitalism in the fast lane. The fact is that this is dangerous drivel. Pragmatism is only possible when feasible alternatives are available. Where climate breakdown is concerned, there is no alternative. The climate doesn’t recognise pragmatism. We either slash emissions now or we are in deep, deep trouble.
In 2024, the temperature of the planet topped the 1.5C temperature-rise threshold for the first time (since preindustrial times), and according to the UK Met Office, there is a 70% chance that the average temperature rise over the next five years will be above this. A recent report by the UK Institute and Faculty of Actuaries and Exeter University forecasts that a 2C global temperature hike by 2050 would see a 25% collapse in the global economy and 2 billion people dead. This is what the end game of a “pragmatic” climate strategy looks like.
We can no longer pretend that we are sleepwalking into climate catastrophe. We are doing it consciously, with our eyes wide open, and hang the consequences. The truth is that on a rapidly heating planet, a pragmatic approach means that we are playing Russian roulette with all six barrels loaded. The only question is just how big a mess we will make when we pull the trigger.
Bill McGuire is professor emeritus of geophysical and climate hazards at UCL and author of Hothouse Earth: an Inhabitant’s Guide
Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.Donald Trump urges you to be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.Orcas comment on killer apes destroying the planet by continuing to burn fossil fuels.
Sir Keir Starmer has called the current benefits system unsustainable, indefensible and unfair, and said the government could not “shrug its shoulders and look away”.
Addressing Labour MPs on Monday evening, the prime minister said the current welfare system was “the worst of all worlds”, discouraging people from working while producing a “spiralling bill”.
The comments come as Work and Pensions Secretary Liz Kendall prepares to set out changes to the welfare system and cut the benefits bill in the coming weeks.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves has earmarked several billion pounds in draft spending cuts to welfare and other government departments ahead of the Spring Statement.
There is unease over the plans within the party, with Labour MP Rachael Maskell warning against “draconian cuts” that risk “pushing disabled people into poverty”.
Maskell told the BBC she had picked up “deep, deep concern” among Labour MPs.
Keir Starmer confirms that he’s proud to be a red Tory continuing austerity and targeting poor and disabled scum.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.
Activists gathered outside the Norwegian parliament in Oslo during a vote to approve deep-sea mining on January 9, 2024. (Photo: Will Rose/Greenpeace)
“This decision is an irrevocable black mark on Norway’s reputation as a responsible ocean state,” said one critic, warning of environmental impacts.
The Norwegian government came under fire from environmentalists and scientists worldwide on Tuesday after moving to become the first country to enable destructive commercial deep-sea mining.
Stortinget, Norway’s parliament, overwhelmingly voted in favor of allowing exploration of the seabed under the country’s Arctic waters for minerals—an outcome widely expected after center-left parties that control the government struck a deal with right-wing parties last month.
“This decision is an irrevocable black mark on Norway’s reputation as a responsible ocean state,” declared Steve Trent, CEO and founder of the U.K.-based Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF), in a statement Tuesday. “Deep-sea mining is a pursuit of minerals we don’t need, with environmental damage that we can’t afford.”
“We can upgrade our economies and get to zero carbon without wrecking the deep ocean in the process.”
“We know so little about the deep ocean, but we know enough to be sure that mining it will wipe out unique wildlife, disturb the world’s largest carbon store, and do nothing to speed the transition to clean economies,” he stressed. “Recent scientific studies in Norwegian waters demonstrate that there will be severe impacts on ocean wildlife if this mining goes ahead.”
Trent continued:
Instead of being the answer to boosting renewable energy, deep-sea mining would be just another form of harmful resource extraction, with steep and needless costs we cannot and should not pay. As the Norwegian government decides to push forward with deep-sea mining, EJF’s latest report reveals that we can upgrade our economies and get to zero carbon without wrecking the deep ocean in the process. New battery technologies are taking off, and there is a ready supply of minerals available now if we improve existing recycling rates. The argument for destroying the deep sea for cobalt and nickel does not withstand scrutiny and Norwegian lawmakers must recognize this.
Chloé Mikolajczak of Europe’s Fossil Free Politics campaign said on social media that “exploration, while different from exploitation, already comes with significant environmental damage. Today, Norway failed the world and failed to protect our future. But the fight can not stop and we’re mobilizing a community of thousands to #StopDeepSeaMining.”
Amanda Louise Helle, who was among the Greenpeace Norway activists protesting outside Stortinget on Tuesday, was similarly determined to continue the battle against deep-sea mining.
“Today our parliament is getting ready to vote in favor of a criminal fate for one of the last safe havens for Arctic marine life,” Helle said ahead of the vote. “Promising to protect the oceans one day and proposing deep-sea mining the next, is next-level hypocrisy. Not only does it risk vulnerable ecosystems in the Arctic, but also Norway’s international reputation.”
“If our politicians are ready to give the Arctic away to greedy companies, then we are more than ready to chase them wherever they plan to deploy their destructive machines,” the campaigner pledged.
#BREAKING: Norway sparks global outrage by approving #DeepSeaMining in the Arctic, endangering the last haven for marine life.
The deep sea is the world's largest carbon reservoir with unique wildlife and important habitats that do not exist anywhere else on Earth. pic.twitter.com/ypA1eO6KB9
Norway’s plan applies to 108,000 square miles of its national waters—”an area bigger than the size of the U.K.,” as the BBC reported Tuesday. “The Norwegian government will not immediately allow companies to start drilling. They will have to submit proposals, including environmental assessments, for a licence which will then be approved on a case-by-case basis by parliament.”
Hundreds of scientists, countries including the U.K., and the European Union have called for a moratorium on deep-sea mining due to environmental concerns. The United Nations-affiliated International Seabed Authority is set to meet later this year to try to finalize global rules about the controversial practice.
I’m not talking about representative democracy here:
What I’m talking about is self-determination. How is that different to democracy?
A huge problem with the West’s idea of democracy is that it’s so-called representative democracy and the representatives are not accountable or held to account.
Discuss.
Edit: And why is self-determination so different to democracy? Should it be so different?
I suggest that the idea of self-determination is very close to the idea of democracy except that contemporary democracy is perverted and divorced and opposed to the interests of those that are subjected to this so-called democracy.
It’s not that difficult really, is it? Those that claim to be democrats …
Later edit: The role of lobbyists is so pervasive in (yet another edit: and is so perverse in) UK politics .
