Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 12hMan City hid *£900 million*. The scale of this is extraordinary and they are guilty of all charges. Stripping all titles and a fine at least equal to the deceit would seem appropriate. 1121
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 28/09/2026Yes, if we truly think "AI is a new species" as Bill Gates appears to then I concede software is more intelligent than us. In fact, bricks and cheese are too. 2151
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026I've just looked at the bar chart for the second time today. I cannot make head nor tail of it. 381
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 20/09/2026If you are going to add £2bn to the national debt to make an "on your side" point, could I softly suggest doing so by reducing electricity bills that everyone pays and supports energy transition rather than petrol/diesel that impairs it? Whilst much of it goes to retailers anyhow.... 2244
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 19/09/2026At the heart of the argument is this graph which, more than any other, tells the story of manufacturing in the UK over the past decade and a half. Yet, it's as if it doesn't exist. Striking. 000
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 18/09/2026I'm going to put my neck out here and say there's more than one. 0120
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 13/09/2026This is excellent from Gordon Brown. Robert Putnam's The Upswing transplanted to the UK. Change comes from people leaning into civic life and active citizenship again. Manages to evade too much nostalgia and remain future facing. Idealistic but boy do we need some idealism. 0144
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 12/09/2026Thank goodness we have crypto billionaires to save us from "cartel" politics. They are truly the Bruce Waynes we need. 3230
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 14/08/2026Bravo. Now this needs to be a thread that runs through everything. We are shifting to clean energy because these terrible scenes in Stourbridge, Pershore, and Stoke will become ever more frequent if we - acting locally and globally - do not adapt and shift off fossil fuels- relentlessly. Win this. 0162
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 14/08/2026@hannahritchie.bsky.social has produced a nifty tool where you can track global production of major crops. Watching these two like a hawk (hops aren't on there). hannahritchie.github.io/world-agricu... 263
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 13/08/2026So my parents' town is on fire. Seems that Google is updating its maps so we can keep track. Which is great. For another day but the anti-net zero lot can hang their heads in shame. Of course, areas where Reform have made recent gains are on fire. 1225
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 13/08/2026Notable in today's growth figures is the jump in business investment. The "AI is supporting growth" thesis firming up given that it's strongly centred on technology. And the most significant growth sector amongst services (which are driving growth and exports) is ICT..... 140
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 11/08/2026Excellent stuff @johnthornhill.bsky.social. I love the way "and morally valuable" sneaked in there as if morality can be abstracted from humanity like code. 140
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 10/08/2026Some testimony on prison conditions in El Salvador. A civilised democracy doesn't send prisoners to where this treatment is commonplace. 1142
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 10/08/2026Luckily this "abroad" place doesn't have its own Government, politics, border or law. Can't believe we've missed this solution for so long. 158936210
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 01/08/2026Toured Munich and environs by bike today. 25 miles or so and only a few hundred metres on the main road carriageway. There the drivers were accommodating - because they all cycle too (lesson there on including cycling in driving test). Safe. Healthy. *And* reduced congestion. Win-win-win. 3260
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 28/07/2026Oh, classy touch this. Just in case you missed the corruption on the first pass- here it is with sirens and lights. 191
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 28/07/2026Yes, this is right. It will also need nurses, carers, business managers, customer relationship managers, teachers, public service administrators. In fact, the relational economy is where the big growth *and* volume of work will be. We need to be more comfortable in the skin of a service economy. 1458
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 25/07/2026And this from an excellent piece in the FT this am rather sums it up. Responsible media and public discourse does not assign AIs human motivation and characteristics. They are computer systems. Which is different on every level. And what is going on is the AI cos abdicating responsibility. 193
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 25/07/2026Oh, look, ChatGPT did it. No it did not. OpenAI did it. ChatGPT was *designed* to do it. "Without permission". Yet: "Two new versions of ChatGPT, designed to be master hackers, broke out of a supposedly secure test environment." Right, *designed* to be a hacker so it hacked! Duh. 281
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 25/07/2026Whoever designed this Times front page has a dark and wicked sense of ironic humour. Hyper-sensitivity to predictable technical challenges of energy transition. Meanwhile, Europe burns. 34410
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 24/07/2026How's reindustrialisation going in the US? The country pursuing a mercantilist policy of tariff and trade coercion in order to reindustrialise. Well, badly. Jobs declining in almost every manufacturing sub-sector. 24732
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 24/07/2026We're just at the end of your last ten year plan. Not gonna lie, the results ain't that great. 1422530536
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 21/07/2026Thank goodness for trees and hedgerows. This is Worcestershire! Could be a Spanish landscape without the tree/hedge preservation. 2100
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 19/07/2026Here is one micro AI UK start/scale up business with 10 employees. Spending $100k a month on US hyperscalers. The greater the adoption, the greater the offshoring of production (and jobs). Imagine this scaled across UK high value services, HE, manufacturing and digital sector... 351
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 17/07/2026If young people turn to AI rather than social media, the outcomes are unlikely to be great. We have to think about the psychological conditions of modern society. Not knee jerk policy: everything in the round. 100
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 16/07/2026A "public affairs" boss of a manufacturing firm referring dismissively to Miliband's "personal ambitions" re net zero. The ignorance and arrogance is off the scales. It's a global agreement and has been UK law for almost two decades- tightened by the Conservatives. Because it's damn serious. 1235
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 16/07/2026Perhaps it's about social media enabled bullying at school? That *seems* right. And yet, incidence of bullying hardly seems to have shifted. Perhaps it's something lower level? Who knows- we haven't really looked at it systematically. We just have narratives. 220
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 16/07/2026And then there's.... school. Something is going badly wrong at school. I don't necessarily buy into the popular narratives here- eg exam stress. And school is where peer issues also reside. Sleep affects it too (and social media may be driving deprivation). But a more serious look is needed. 161
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 16/07/2026And whilst we're on big factors. Covid just seems to be largely ignored in the policy debate. But clearly it's a massive factor (not necessarily the disease itself but the wider societal/institutional impacts). 151
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 16/07/2026By the way, prevalence of physical conditions (stomach ache, backache, dizziness etc) have also increased over the time period. Could they be linked somehow? Eg we know that childhood obesity has been creeping up (and this is also linked to deprivation) 110
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 16/07/2026By the way, prevalence of physical conditions (stomach ache, backache, dizziness etc) have also increased over the time period. Could they be linked somehow? Eg we know that childhood obesity has been creeping up (and this is also linked to deprivation) 000
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 16/07/2026Secondly, it shows that all psychological conditions have been rising for quarter of a century. There is an acceleration in the smartphone era- especially girls. It's clear though that there are other factors driving increases given the time series. And it's flatter if we exclude post Covid. 250
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 16/07/2026A few weeks ago an interim independent review into mental health was published. It hasn't yet concluded on causes of what is undoubtedly a mental health crisis. But it had interesting data. Firstly, this on self harm. Which shows we have been seeing a consistent and concerning increase since 2000. 252
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 13/07/2026Diane Abbott is absolutely right isn't she? Part of protecting democracy is protecting elected representatives. Social media is right at the heart of the corrosion of public life. And platforms that harm should be confronted. 22810
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 13/07/2026Glancing through the IS again two years later: 1. Successful development strategies have usually shielded developing domestic sectors while gaining access to others' markets. We are doing the opposite (esp in AI). 2. This feels completely inadequate: 100
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 05/07/2026Yes, I mean he doesn't even mention it in his list of achievements! He does say this though.... 000
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 02/07/2026And yet, there you are Terry, there you are. Posting. 1152
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 02/07/2026Admiring the heroic levels of cognitive dissonance of the 3200 who liked this - whilst merrily remaining on the "abuse and misinformation" platform... 1354
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 02/07/2026The biggest issue is not planning. Yet again. Quite remarkable that housing delivery is trailing the May, Johnson and on current delivery Sunak Governments. The private sector can't deliver what's needed. The state has to act at much greater scale. 2163
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 23/06/2026This would be a cracking appointment. James Purnell as Chief of Staff. Quite apart from his political experience, he's actually run things. 5252
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 23/06/2026We will need somewhere between an *additional* 600k to 1m care workers over the next decade due to retirement, increased demand and people leaving the sector. Are we sure targeting overseas care workers with new citizenship restrictions is sensible? And as for Home Office cost-benefit analysis... 13111
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 20/06/2026Yes, it is. It truly is. BBC firing on all political cylinders again. 2351
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 19/06/2026People don't want fascism. They want change. Labour has two years to show what real change looks like. This is it now. Last chance. 5389
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 17/06/2026London is scarred by Brexit but resilient. Industrial Britain, the manufacturing heartlands, the red wall, have been absolutely poleaxed. You think the politics align with that? Not a jot. 1222266
Anthony Painter @anthonypainter.bsky.social · 16/06/2026And here is your periodic reminder of the most common occupations in Labour's most marginal seats. (You can see the full analysis in my Substack linked in bio). Who are they speaking to/for? 022
