This used to be the case, but has changed recently - now driven much more by fewer couples rather than fewer children per woman. www.ft.com/content/43e2...
Current affairs, politics, education and miscellany. All views my own. Substack at edrith.co.uk
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This used to be the case, but has changed recently - now driven much more by fewer couples rather than fewer children per woman. www.ft.com/content/43e2...
Nick Gibb! Nick Gibb! Nick Gibb! Buy the book here: (Essential reading for all who are interested in how effective ministers can deliver reform, not just educationalists). www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B0F4...
Agree it's bad. One thing would be more broad-based movements that strongly opposed racist abuse, 'Sunak isn't English', etc - where there's strong consensus - without also advocating for 'decolonisation' or BME-only internships. Football seemed to do it well. I've seen few equivalents elsewhere.
And read a personal tribute to him here: www.edrith.co.uk/p/the-lanter...
Listen to him speak tonight, livestreamed at 6pm: (Sorry, no more in person places) policyexchange.org.uk/events/refor...
Nick Gibb! Nick Gibb! Nick Gibb! Buy the book here: (Essential reading for all who are interested in how effective ministers can deliver reform, not just educationalists). www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B0F4...
The counterexample here is that Air Chief Marshal Sir Hugh Dowding, who commanded the RAF during the Battle of Britain, believed in fairies. 'People have wacky views in one area but are perfectly rational in others' is surprisingly common. www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article...
Two things that give me hope for this country are that we've managed not to polarise on either vaccines or Ukraine.
My latest: on the BBC's weird NIMBY campaign against the Universal theme park.
Very good point on James - fully agree. And yes, wigs fine for Weasleys.
Having filed, now is actually a perfect time for my thoughts on the latest engagingly silly bit of HBO Harry Potter news.
Who are your six? Snape, Dudley, Dumbledore, Fleur, arguably Neville (though I think he could be scrawny as easily as fat and it would work). I do feel the Weasleys must have red hair.
Great piece on the perverse reporting about the new Universal Theme Park in Bedfordshire. By @mjrobbins.com. (As a Hertfordshire resident, I'm a huge fan of it). open.substack.com/pub/martinro...
Council tax is terrible. I don’t like this exact proposal but am in general in support of replacing stamp duty and council tax with a property tax. Bizarre to have any proposal for a property tax that doesn’t remove stamp duty, the worst of all taxes. However, this doesn’t really cover how bad CT is
Any time anything escapes my immediate followers I get repeated F*wits, C*s, etc, also being told I am a moron, stupid, etc. I usually block these immediately, which is why I suspect they don't show up on my timeline.
There's a good bunch of interesting people posting good stuff here. And as someone on the right I expect to take some stick. But the sheer level of vitriol, swearing and personal insults that seems to be the mainstream culture here means it is definitely not a 'kinder, pleasanter' place.
The appointment of @tombennett71.bsky.social and Jane Lowe will make some progressive educationalists very cross - and hundreds of thousands of children's lives better. Not often I praise Phillipson, but credit where credit's due - this is a good call.
Casino Royale is fantastic - one of the the top 5 films, maybe top 3. Others are mixed from decent to poor. Agree with you on the no classic villains point.
Oliver Johnson has done some good quick and dirty analysis on this here: bristoliver.substack.com/p/bad-bbc-st...
A consolidated post of the 'August Archives' - 15 of the best posts from my 2017-19 era that are still worth reading. Early 'culture war' writings, book reviews, leaving the civil service - and some timeless rants. www.edrith.co.uk/p/august-arc...
Australia.
And you see disclaimers such as 'it's really about poverty/culture' much more on WWC commentary than on issues such as black exclusion or attainment gaps. Challenging this for WWC is correct. But ethnicity is often accepted uncritically as a framing on the left for the gaps for non-whites.
I'm not saying you haven't. I wouldn't say discussion of WWC is 'taboo'. But it is embedded much than consideration of other 'ethnicity gaps' - and the uni example was a specific example of that.
I also agree you make about it being more about multigenerational disadvantage (or family structures)), than about ethnicity. But this is true elsewhere - e.g. Black African vs Black Caribbean. And yet it is only with WWC where many progressives feel the need to say 'it's not primarily ethnicity'.
In 2019 the OfS found only 11 access and participation targets referred to white working class, whereas every uni was required to have one for BME. I'm not actually a fan of the WWC narrative - you don't fight identity politics with identity politics. But that's a specific example of discrepancies.
The 21 schools chosen as Behaviour and Attendance hubs are also an inspiring list of schools that achieve great results, often with very challenging intakes. schoolsweek.co.uk/government-n...
The appointment of @tombennett71.bsky.social and Jane Lowe will make some progressive educationalists very cross - and hundreds of thousands of children's lives better. Not often I praise Phillipson, but credit where credit's due - this is a good call.
A consolidated post of the 'August Archives' - 15 of the best posts from my 2017-19 era that are still worth reading. Early 'culture war' writings, book reviews, leaving the civil service - and some timeless rants. www.edrith.co.uk/p/august-arc...
This is all bad stuff and completely unjustified. We should be better than this as a country.
August Archives 15: Votes at 16 Our final 'archive' is one that's hardly dated at all - and, indeed, has only become more relevant! www.edrith.co.uk/p/votes-at-1...
August Archives 15: Votes at 16 Our final 'archive' is one that's hardly dated at all - and, indeed, has only become more relevant! www.edrith.co.uk/p/votes-at-1...
These are really terrifying numbers in terms of the partisan split on vaccine hesitancy in the US... via @today.yougov.com
I pin lots of things on the off-chance I might want to come back to them!
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Good piece by @joxley.jmoxley.co.uk. I'd add: 'won't work' can only work for a party in gov't people think that gov't's own approaching IS working. Which they don't. Similar to how Sunak's attacks on Starmer for 'not having a plan' failed to land. www.joxleywrites.jmoxley.co.uk/p/it-wont-wo...
I've read some of it! We also wrote a report on it yesterday, in which Hunt did a foreword where he also called for the need for a rethink. Lots on EHCP reform you may agree with (including more children in mainstream schools).
This is the most important point, regardless of how it is met.
I agree on those two specifics, but think there are many other areas that should be cut: growth in welfare claimants, SEND, uni numbers, UIFSM, etc. I guess that's (a reason) why I'm on the right and you're on the left. Politically, after the u-turns, I agree it's hard to see this Gov doing them.
An *actual Parliamentary candidate* messaged me the morning it came out to say 'Boomer Bingo'. I was away with friends at the time, 7 out of 8 of us had voted Tory in 2019 and 6 out of 8 for Brexit, and for at least a couple it crystallised their decision they weren't doing it again that year.
I guess I meant 'what is your marker for a more generous level'? A certain proportion of median income? Or something else?
I think politically you're probably right about that, but from a policy perspective I favour it much more, because it reduces the deficit by cutting spending, without cutting public services; raising income tax/VAT do so by increasing tax. (Still. both probably preferable to 'borrow more').
We (rightly!) don't protect the state pension from tax if it goes over the personal allowance. I know this was in the last Tory manifesto, but I don't think (tell me if I'm wrong) this Government has suggested that.
I'm curious: why would you ideally have one more term before switching? (Agree with your second point on potential political realities).
The triple lock is always there!
August Archives 14: In which I make the case for Herman Wouk as the 'greatest novellist of the last 100 years. www.edrith.co.uk/p/herman-wou...
Full report here, setting out how poor incentives have driven overdiagnosis of mental ill health and neurodivergence in young people, stretching key public services to breaking point - and proposing major reforms. policyexchange.org.uk/publication/...
Always good when a report gets covered well in both the Times and Guardian (+ others). Our new paper on how the rise in mental health diagnoses has pushed the SEND, health and welfare systems to breaking point. Guardian: www.theguardian.com/education/20... Times: www.thetimes.com/article/e4b4...
The possibility of a Reform Government and a Lib Dem Official Opposition are underrated. *By which I mean 'still not all that likely, but a lot likelier than we'd have thought 18 months ago.'
I guess I would defend 'useful' as 'useful in helping someone understand history', even if it has no day to day tangible benefit for that person to do so.
Moreover, my understanding is there is a 'change and continuity' school, which is mainstream (maybe even the orthodoxy) which says there wasn't much decline, which falls much more in the place of an academic discipline pursuing falsehoods over truth.
This, and the odd level of opposition to the term (beyond eg to 'classical' music), for whatever reason, says something interesting and concerning about modern academia and the extent it functions effectively, which has implications for all kinds of other, more directly impactful, issues.
Moreover, my understanding is that this isn't just definitional, because there is a 'change and continuity' school that argues there wasn't much decline at all, which is mainstream or even orthodox. This feels much more in the area of a discipline (or sig. part of it) pursuing falsehood over truth.
So to discuss it more temperately on my part, it seems clearly useful to me, as the decline is the most significant and unusual element of the period. Arguing otherwise feels a bit of intellectual jujitsu, like saying WW2 isn't a useful term because things happened then that weren't war.
August Archives 13: Why are young progressives so eager for authorities to impose censorship, fire people and otherwise determine the limits of free speech? It's because they can't imagine living somewhere where the authorities don't share their values. www.edrith.co.uk/p/dont-know-...
I'll accept it was an escalation (and I don't think you're like an anti-vaxer). I do find the insistence it's not a useful term (in non-specialist circles) extremely weird.
Sure - professional historians use specialist terms, just as professional musicians use 'Baroque', 'Romantic' etc. - but most people still group it all as 'Classical' music. The insistence by many that the commonly used and understood term Dark Ages is 'wrong' is at best snobbish and confusing.
Based on some of the denialists, some appear to think it 'racist' or 'Eurocentric' because, unsurprisingly, other parts of the world were progressing at this time. The fact that a term used to describe a period in European history only applies to Europe is not a flaw!
Ultimately, in W. Europe after the fall of the Western Roman Empire, on most measures - state capacity, population, cities abandoned, army size, literacy, trade, living standards - things got worse. That's what ordinary people call the Dark Ages, and it happened, no matter what games you play.
Ultimately, much of arts / social science academia is no longer concerned with the pursuit of truth, but with intellectual one-upmanship. The more outlandish a claim you can argue is true, the stronger your intellectual kudos. If you can link it to a social justice issue, even better!
It shouldn't surprise me, but it's fascinating to see how much this site embraces Dark Ages denialism. 'It was only in Western Europe' - yes, lots of things only refer to one geographic area. 'Not everything got worse' - yes, but state capacity, population, literacy rates and more all dropped.
Everyone likes to talk about the Small Boats as the cause of Labour's Polling malaise. But food price inflation and rising energy bills may be just as much to blame. With tax increases and the rising coat of debt waiting in the wings...
Fertility rate drops to record low of 1.41 - and falling. A rate that means the population of England amd Wales will halve every two generations. One of the most serious global challenges - yet one where the least is being done. Read more here: ⬇️ www.edrith.co.uk/p/we-too-are...
'It's more complex than Petrarch / Victorian dudes thought' is one thing (and true). But to say the Dark Ages didn't happen is nonsense.
There was a major fall in population, state capacity, literacy, and army size, over several centuries. Entire cities were abandoned or greatly diminished. Pretending this didn't happen is reality denial on a level with anti-vax, phlogiston theory or the moon landings were faked.
The fact that some historians insist the Dark Ages didn't actually exist - and this is considered legitimate within the professional community - is a big reason why History doesn't deserve the same respect as, say, medicine or physics. It's as if lots of medical academics held anti-vax views.
Lord Ashcroft's mega-polls are always a fascinating read. conservativehome.com/2025/08/26/l...
Everyone likes to talk about the Small Boats as the cause of Labour's Polling malaise. But food price inflation and rising energy bills may be just as much to blame. With tax increases and the rising coat of debt waiting in the wings...
I came of age in the ‘Little Golden Age’, a period where one could be confident things were getting better: economically, socially and geopolitically. But modern society is no longer making people happy, more connected or more fulfilled. www.edrith.co.uk/p/we-too-are...
Birthrates the world over are plummeting. Where will it end? And what can we do about it? www.edrith.co.uk/p/we-too-are...
I agree extinction is unlikely, due to Amish if nothing else. But long term societal upheaval and negative consequence seems larger than anything other than climate change. And unlike the latter, where there's a lot of effort, it's one that is largely ignored.
I'm sceptical that eg cheaper houses will cause societies to 'pull out of it' when population drops, if having 0 or 1 child has become the norm. And in democracies, the response may be to shaft the young even more as their relative voting power declines (certainly what has happened in UK).
Dependency ratios are already causing difficulties in health, social care, pensions and labour force - those will be turbo-charged. More 'left behind' areas. Potential (at 80% drop over 2 gens) to enter a vicious cycle of high tax, low innovation, increasing decline.
Birthrates the world over are plummeting. Where will it end? And what can we do about it? www.edrith.co.uk/p/we-too-are...
Most men don't want five children either!
Shrinking gradually is v. different from losing 80% over 50-60 years. Plus as children become denormed this appears to set in (culturally and institutionally/structurally). It's not obvious how societies pull out of this. It's the xkcd comic, but going down!! www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.p...
Yes - and if we were bimbling along at 1.7-1.8 I wouldn't worry. But some East Asian nations will lose 80% over two generations. And in the last decade the TFR trends in much of Europe, S America and elsewhere have dropped sharply and look to be heading to the same place.
Modern society is failing on its own terms - people are unhappier, lonelier, report worse mental health and are increasingly putting off relationships and even sex. Can we grasp the nettle of falling birthrates before it is too late? www.edrith.co.uk/p/we-too-are...
Global societal collapse?
Modern society is failing on its own terms - people are unhappier, lonelier, report worse mental health and are increasingly putting off relationships and even sex. Can we grasp the nettle of falling birthrates before it is too late? www.edrith.co.uk/p/we-too-are...
Postcode Address File?
I got three from Springsteen in there - the trouble is there are too many good Sprinsteens!
Americana playlist: music.youtube.com/playlist?lis...
Brilliant and thought-provoking piece by @daisychristo.bsky.social. open.substack.com/pub/daisychr...
Fair - more Celts needed!
August Archives 12: My Perfect KS3 History Curriculum With the benefits of 7 years of hindsight, this is ridiculously too long and ambitious a list. Maybe an aspirational curriculum for the top set! www.edrith.co.uk/p/a-better-s...
The minister who 'evicted' her tenants was a hypocrisy argument given Labour are bringing in rules to make what she did much harder. Same as the Guardian attacking a 'family values' Tory for having an affair or being gay. Or indeed anti-lockdown papers attacking Boris for partying during COVID.
August Archives 12: My Perfect KS3 History Curriculum With the benefits of 7 years of hindsight, this is ridiculously too long and ambitious a list. Maybe an aspirational curriculum for the top set! www.edrith.co.uk/p/a-better-s...
If it's not (and I agree there are some tests where time isn't relevant) we should let anyone who wants to have extra time.
If a test is timed, the ability to do a test in that time is part of what is being assessed. The purpose of tests is to measure differences in ability - not conceal them. The English system, where close to 1 in 3 get extra time, is becoming a perversion of fair assessment.
It is all part of the same phenomenon where interest rate rises are 'horror for mortgage-holders' and interest rate falls are 'horror for savers', sadly. Media loves a negative spin/headline because it sells. (Not saying you're wrong to call them out on it).
Not sure the 'convicted murderers and rapists' I referred to can be called 'entirely innocent.'
Plenty of refugees from Iran who arrived at Stansted airport who have managed it.
That's not our problem.
When we signed that convention we also had capital punishment and laws that criminalised homosexuality. Not sure the idea that all laws or conventions that we followed in 1951 are sacrosanct holds water!
If we sort these elements out, we could have a functioning asylum regime. Taking a number of those in genuine need per year (the number set by Parliament). But we cannot be taken advantage of by convicted criminals and those entering from safe countries.
If someone is a convicted murderer, rapist or paedophile, I don't care what danger they may be in if deported. We should not be obliged to harbour such criminals or endanger our citizens. Refuge and hospitality is something we choose to offer, not to be abused in this way.
The other fallacy was that the UK had a continued duty of refuge to those convicted of murder, rape or other serious crimes. Not a UK citizen and commit those crimes? You should be deported after sentence served. No matter where you're from - or what 'ties' you've put down.
The idea Channel-crossers deserve the same rights as someone who escapes from Iran and Afghanistan on a plane is peculiar. The first are entering from a safe country in search of a better life. Economic migrants. I don't blame them - but they're not fleeing persecution.
All integrity on the asylum-seeker debate was lost at the point people said those entering irregularly from a safe country - France - could claim asylum. People are not being persecuted, murdered or tortured in France.
S&S?