The rapid collapse of the Starmer regime - inside two years - really blindsided the establishment centrist parts of the media, not least the BBC. Interesting how they are trying to finesse his departure. bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0qy…

Some humble suggestions for their in tray: National re-pointing service. Binding design codes for all new unitary authorities as a result of LGR, and new mayoral super authorities. A BAN on clothes recycling bins on high streets. REMOVE all unused telephone boxes. Conservation area lantern lighting maxing. A BAN on white upvc doors. ALL cleanliness and street maintenance brought back in house, and under the control of local authorities. A national state investment bank that only finances awnings for businesses. Benches that people can actually sit on. A WAR against tarmac in public space.

Spent 2 hours in a small public park in Barcelona. The adults/parents were eating and drinking (in a covered area before you mention the weather!) while the kids were running around a well kept pond and playing on a basketball court and football pitch. Dozens of kids. The social value generated by an ordinary space like this, over decades, is incalculable: social capital, better physical and mental health, biodiversity. With the occasional exception we don’t have this stuff in PFI-Serco-Capita Britain. Because of our model, dominant since around 1980, this would either be an empty landbanked shi*thole, or ‘student’ flats. We can do a lot better. Part of getting there is that the left needs to stop talking just about redistribution and more about how value is created - which includes *infrastructure* like this. Maximising broader social and economic value for a space like this - over a century - is a very different proposition to flogging everything to a highest bidder at any given moment.

This is Ghost Pitùr. An anonymous counter-cultural street artist in Brescia, Italy he….removes pointless tags and visual crap on otherwise attractive buildings. Otherwise known as cleaning up other people’s mess. Let a thousand Ghost Pitùrs bloom!

The Trump White House just made it plausible that the U.K. becomes the EV and microprocessor capital of Europe.

2 years ago this man let me try a 60 year old, aged balsamic vinegar. Some cultures put more forward planning into condiments than Britain does into public infrastructure.