Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 12/05/2025If a new Govt tried to rule out compensation or dismantle these zones, it could face massive legal and financial challenges. ISDS is embedded in the CPTPP deals post-Brexit. x.com/EuropeanPowe...x.com 1117
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 12/05/2025As I’ve mentioned before, ISDS allows corporations to sue governments in secretive arbitration courts for billions if they believe their investments are harmed by policy changes. The LCIA, while more transparent, still prioritises contractual obligations. 1118
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 12/05/2025However, there are significant hurdles. The 25-year contracts tied to these zones are legally binding, and many likely include compensation clauses or dispute resolution mechanisms like Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) or London Court of International Arbitration (LCIA). 1128
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 12/05/2025This could be framed as a defense of sovereignty, workers’ rights, and environmental standards, especially given the involvement of firms like BlackRock, which I’ve previously criticised for their shareholder-first approach and financialisation of public assets (e.g., green spaces). 1125
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 12/05/2025A left-wing government could, in theory, rewrite the regulations governing Freeports and SEZs on moral grounds, arguing that they were established undemocratically and prioritise corporate profits over the public good. 1135
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 12/05/2025There absolutely is an undemocratic side of how Freeports and SEZs have been set up—clandestine deals between corporations and councils often bypass public scrutiny, and that’s a major issue. Secondary legislation is the main culprit here. 1127
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 12/05/2025I often get asked, could incoming Govt's rewrite the regulations on SEZs/Freeports and avoid aggressive lawsuits from corporation set up in UK free zones? Here's my answer Thread 23226
Reposted by KarenOtto English @ottoenglish.bsky.social · 05/05/2025Nationalism is always a shallow basket of ideas. It's invariably about flags and beige conformity, petty point scoring, and predictable pedantry. In being so it manages to pull off the remarkable trick of being simultaneously both mildly threatening and deeply fucking dull. 9552092
Reposted by KarenIt’s me, Claire 💚 @faultfinderuk.bsky.social · 06/05/2025A must read. This affects all of us, because if the truth goes unreported, our society is not free. 043
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 06/05/2025Since 2024, the government has spent £19.78 billion on 12 deregulated Freeports and 74 SEZs... 1110989
Reposted by KarenStéphanie Taberner 🔶 🇬🇧 🇪🇺 🇫🇷 @singlesfield.bsky.social · 19/03/2025Dictatorship Complete ✔️ 031
Reposted by KarenLarry the Cat @number10cat.bsky.social · 28/02/2025I can't stand bullies. President Zelensky is now trying to stand up against two of them. We should have his back. #SlavaUkraïni 988334875407
Reposted by KarenSylvia @sylvia-suffragette.bsky.social · 28/02/2025Starmer not looking the quite ‘Statesman’ now 63415
Reposted by KarenPeter Stefanovic @peterstefanovic.bsky.social · 17/02/2025You can support @anaesunited.bsky.social here www.crowdjustice.com/case/stop-mi...crowdjustice.comStop misleading patients - Physician Associates cannot replace doctorsWe are a group of anaesthetists (doctors trained in anaesthesia) that are unhappy with the way the medical establishment is selling patients and the profession short. 25632
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 16/02/2025What do you think happens when a company is allowed to 'self-regulate' inside a designated free zone? For every action there is and equal and opposite reaction. 25414
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 16/02/2025What do people think happens to public infrastructure when corporations don't pay their fair share in taxes? Your taxes will go up as corporate taxes go down. Look what happened with the water companies. Your bills will go up as you pay to clear up their mess. 1/2 316584
Reposted by KarenAdam Bienkov @adambienkov.bsky.social · 16/02/2025The gap in time in between the US administration attacking and undermining the UK, and the leader of His Majesty's supposedly opposition parroting their words wholesale, is getting shorter and shorter www.adambienkov.co.uk/p/the-collab... 67653171
Reposted by KarenPeter Stefanovic @peterstefanovic.bsky.social · 15/02/2025“The real “threat from within” comes from those fake British patriots loudly cheering on attacks on our own country by a hostile foreign power” @adambienkov.bsky.social 👏 www.adambienkov.co.uk/p/the-collab...adambienkov.co.ukThe CollaboratorsThe real “threat from within” comes from those fake British patriots loudly cheering on attacks on our own country by a hostile foreign power 792049538
Reposted by KarenClaire #FBPE ☘️ 🍉 🇺🇦 🇪🇺🐝 🦮🇮🇪🇧🇪 💙💚 @fbpech.bsky.social · 12/02/2025www.theguardian.com/money/2025/f...theguardian.comNationwide warns Reeves against cutting tax breaks on cash IsasCity wants more investment in stocks but move could reduce availability of mortgages for first-time buyers 087
Reposted by KarenSarah Murphy @13sarahmurphy.bsky.social · 12/02/2025Granting people refugee status but not allowing them citizenship. Come on Labour, make that make sense. Imagine doing this - harming people’s lives - to impress the bigot vote. But failing anyway. What a shameful abdication of responsibility and decency. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...theguardian.comUK to refuse citizenship to refugees who have ‘made a dangerous journey’Home Office accused of shutting out refugees, as new guidance says those applicants will ‘normally be refused’ 721199407
Reposted by KarenCatherine 🕊️🇪🇺💚 @demcath.bsky.social · 12/02/2025Starmer needs to go. I have no faith in him as leader of this country. He looks compromised. 3243
Reposted by KarenPrem Sikka @premnsikka.bsky.social · 12/02/2025A British Trump tribute act could snatch power in the UK. Unwritten constitution, corporates funding parties, weak parliament, billionaire controlled press won't obstruct right-wing coup. Boris Johnson illegally prorogued parliament, now judiciary weakened. Vote wisely. archive.ph/GxpN6prospectmagazine.co.ukA British Trump tribute act could snatch power in the UKWithout a constitution for protection, British politics is vulnerable to its own version of extremism 28488203
Reposted by KarenJosiah Mortimer @josiahmortimer.bsky.social · 12/02/2025This sort of stuff from MPs really does look corrupt. Via Private Eye: 2037590
Reposted by KarenHumanity Must Win @humanitymustwin.bsky.social · 30/01/2025Entrap, impoverish and enslave in a fully privatised corporatist hellscape. This is why they want to leave the ECHR. 18751
Reposted by KarenZoe Gardner @zoejardiniere.bsky.social · 12/02/2025The problem that Labour might be forgetting is… the Tories DIDNT win. I don’t think appeals to conscience will have impact, they haven’t done something this horrible by mistake. The question is only if they’ll win. If there really is only appetite for cruelty or more cruelty in politics. #r4today 1017935
Reposted by KarenZoe Gardner @zoejardiniere.bsky.social · 12/02/2025The political class has decided that that’s what you do to win. You punish refugees whose homelands are dangerous. You damage integration & weaken diverse communities. You trash the UK’s commitments under the Refugee Convention (which explicitly bans this). Labour’s fully joined the club. #r4today 414537
Reposted by KarenGuy Scantlebury @ifsguy.bsky.social · 12/02/2025Labour, wtf ! 🤦🏼♂️ #chartercities #SEZ 022
Reposted by KarenHumanity Must Win @humanitymustwin.bsky.social · 31/01/2025This is a fascist coup. Nobody is coming to save you. Only the people united and taking direct actions can stop this madness. 8200108
Reposted by KarenPeter Stefanovic @peterstefanovic.bsky.social · 11/02/2025Now on 99,250 signatures! By almost every economic and financial measure Brexit has been disastrous for the UK - lets get this petition to the 100,000 needed today and start an honest and open conversation about it 1313073
Reposted by KarenRevoltinghippie @revoltinghippie.bsky.social · 11/02/2025Outside the BBC today, Tuesday 11th February 2025. We will continue to protest every week until the BBC stops lying 33212
Reposted by KarenPrem Sikka @premnsikka.bsky.social · 11/02/202540% of the world's dirty money is laundered through London and UK Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. The govt can combat it with Unexplained Wealth Orders (UWO). Since 2017, only SEVEN UWOs have been issued. ZERO prosecutions and convictions. Contrast it with attacks on little people.questions-statements.parliament.ukWritten questions and answers - Written questions, answers and statements - UK ParliamentInformation from UK Parliament on written questions & answers, written statements and daily reports. 17567279
Reposted by KarenNobby Nobster @nobbyserenow.bsky.social · 11/02/2025How many multiple million pounds worth of tractors are there?!?! My family were farmers and I still believe it's right that they pay the same as all of us. They only have half to pay of what my children will. 45 years ago my father had to pay inheritance tax on his father's farm. 0191
Reposted by KarenKentish Fran #FBPE @kentishfran.bsky.social · 11/02/2025Farmers should do more about the pollution they are causing before they cause havoc about something that isn't going to affect most of them. www.bbc.co.uk/news/science...bbc.co.ukLivestock farming polluted rivers 300 times in one year - BBC NewsOnly six farms are prosecuted for pollution despite 300 river contaminations in one year. 15318
Reposted by KarenHenry Morris @mrhenrymorris.substack.com · 11/02/2025Lucky for the tractor drivers they weren't objecting to the continued burning of fossil fuels leading to environmental degradation, natural disasters, weather extremes, food insecurity, economic disruption, conflict, and terrorism. Still can't quite see how an ambulance would get through though. 671281468
Reposted by KarenNatalie Bennett @nataliegreenpeer.bsky.social · 11/02/2025A few rich men and their acolytes are tearing the US apart 19430
Reposted by KarenZack Polanski @zackpolanski.bsky.social · 11/02/2025Someone needs to tell Mandleson ethnic cleansing doesn't need to be "respected, understood and adjusted for." www.bbc.com/news/article...bbc.comUK must respect Trump's mandate, new ambassador to US Mandelson tells BBCIn his first day on the job, Lord Peter Mandelson says "we have to respect and understand what drives" the US president. 29432154
Reposted by KarenMike Galsworthy @mikegalsworthy.bsky.social · 11/02/2025Taking Britain out of the Erasmus+ programme was a huge mistake. Labour must rejoin and accept the EU’s offer of a youth mobility schemesussexbylines.co.ukBring back Erasmus+ and youth mobility in EuropeTaking Britain out of the Erasmus+ programme was a huge mistake. Labour must rejoin and accept the EU’s offer of a youth mobility scheme 281183300
Reposted by KarenFarrukh @implausibleblog.bsky.social · 11/02/2025Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall @hughfw.bsky.social takes on Nandos "Nandos make claims on their website that they're an environmentally responsible ethical brand" "They're buying huge amount of chicken from farms on the River Wye that are destroying life on the river" 26559224
Reposted by KarenParody Nigel Farage @parodypm.bsky.social · 11/02/2025Despite the fact that Reform MPs are always shouting about immigration, not one of them could be arsed to turn up for the debate on the Border Security Bill last night. Probably exhausted after a hard day cosplaying at being farmers. 411704456
Reposted by KarenFionna O’Leary @fascinatorfun.bsky.social · 11/02/2025This is very good “What I hear in the repeated insistence that “no one is doing anything” is the underlying belief that there is nothing that can be done. And this troubles me deeply.” 511253
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 08/02/2025The last hope for a solution to the UK's government-backed corporate coup is via grassroots activism. There needs to be a groundswell of public opposition to the selling off of entire regions to the likes of Blackrock, this must take place across the UK. SEZs are a threat to democracy. 13417
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 08/02/2025But don't assume that the UK duopoly's nationwide rollout of free zones is not using parallel systems of extraction, ruination, and evisceration of vital public infrastructure to achieve corporate hegemony and corporate sovereignty. 1135
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 08/02/2025Trump is doing the same in its most extreme form where human suffering and bombed-out wastelands are primed for US real estate, this is text book disaster capitalism. 183
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 08/02/2025Labour's deregulatory race to the bottom will reconfigure the UK's economy as something for the asset-classes to extract and exploit for decades to come. 314148
Reposted by KarenEuropeanPowell @europeanpowell.bsky.social · 08/02/2025Free zones are about as far from representative democracy as it gets. Who the fuck is Shanker Singham? open.substack.com/pub/european...open.substack.comFree zones are about as far from representative democracy as it gets.Who the fuck is Shanker Singham? 411479
Reposted by KarenRichard Murphy @richardjmurphy.bsky.social · 07/02/2025Drugs galore www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2025/02... In my opinion, big pharma really does not want to cure people. Managing them in their sickness is much more profitable for them.taxresearch.org.ukDrugs galoreAs if to reinforce the point in today's video, I noticed this in the FT yesterday: GSK launched a rare £2bn share buyback and raised its growth targets on the back of strong sales of speciality medici... 812139
Reposted by KarenRichard Murphy @richardjmurphy.bsky.social · 07/02/2025The UK average house price hits a record high as clear indication of the housing crisis we have www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2025/02... A record house price is the clearest possible indication of the fact that for many, having their own home is becoming an impossible dream.taxresearch.org.ukThe UK average house price hits a record high as clear indication of the housing crisis we haveThe Halifax (which is a trading division of the Bank of Scotland, which is, in turn, a subsidiary of Lloyds Banking Group) has reported this morning that: The UK housing market started the year on a p... 1113246
![RACING HANDICAP
"THE racing industry generates more than £4bn per year and employs more than 85,000 people," announced Jack Rankin, Tory MP for Windsor, in a Commons debate on 24 October last year. He warned the government "to tread carefully and acknowledge the unintended consequences of further regulation" of the gambling industry, especially given its potential financial impact on horseracing.
Rankin declared that "an increase in financial checks on customers" – commonly known as affordability checks, which are being introduced to help ensure punters are making bets they can afford – "risks pushing a lot of gambling underground", meaning "less money would be reinvested in the sport".
Coincidentally, the most recent register of MPs' interests reveals that just a couple of months later, in January, Rankin was generously gifted two tickets with hospitality to attend the Berkshire Winter Million horseracing event at the Royal Windsor Racecourse, worth £312. The MP received this freebie from the Arena Racing Corporation, a horseracing firm which has expressed "major concerns" over government plans for affordability checks, declaring them a "potentially disastrous" measure which "will deter punters from betting on British horse and greyhound racing". What are the odds?
TICKET COLLECTOR
ARSENAL-MAD Keir Starmer doesn't [rest of text cut off]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:6laekojw3whqu64tlaxopvgx/bafkreidbjj72svpapw7ha6zfsb7zzgfvxgmortl65fxry7n3rxjamgnz6q)
