Unwelcome donations

Good morning, you glorious beasts.

Poundland is set to be sold "for a pound."

Frontrunners for the takeover have already earmarked 200 stores to close, likely axing thousands of jobs.

They need a £100 million cash injection after their model floundered under ballooning shoplifting, a cost-of-living crisis, and Rachel Reeves’ existence.

WESTMINSTER
Everyone’s miserable and hates the government

According to a recent poll, Brits feel worse than they did when we were locked inside our homes and not allowed to attend our relatives’ funerals. Half of 2024 Labour voters don’t like the government and, like Bonnie Blue after a hard day’s work, the average Reform voter has absolutely no regrets.

Spill the beans

• Net optimism among the public is -39 (the worst since 2019)

• People are more optimistic about their local area than the UK as a whole

• 77% of 2024 Labour voters are considering switching parties… 

Hold my feta, excusez-moi?

The recent council elections say it all: the two party system is dead or dying or just having a bad day. 

• Half of Tory voters might vote Reform

• Half of Labour voters might vote for the Greens or Lib Dems

• But one quarter of Labour voters would vote for Reform

Reform is winning by a mile and their supporters are feverishly drunk on their choices, with 97% expressing no regrets about voting for Reform in 2024. Everyone else, meanwhile, is full of doubt. 

The survey found something interesting

The more likely a 2024 Labour voter liked Reform, the less likely they’d ever vote for Labour again. 

• 15% of 2024 Labour voters said there was “no chance” they’d ever support the party again

• That number climbs to 36% if they like Reform. 

So why the animosity?

Reform-inclined 2024 Labour voters don’t care about economic change unless it

1. Improves their household finances

2. Improves their local area. 

Which is understandable. Reform performed best in working class wards, and worst in middle class ones.

What can Starmer learn from this? 

Starmer's tough talk on decreasing net migration isn’t playing well with the people who might actually vote for him. 

The Labour Left said as much. Now the data shows it. 

Why bother, sir?

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HEALTH
Sperm shortage sees rogue donors run amok

There’s been a plague of unregulated sperm “donors” exploiting poor and vulnerable women trying to conceive. 

Why? 

Regulated treatment is:

• Expensive (costing in the tens of thousands)

• Time-consuming (long waiting lists)

• Plus, there’s a “national donor shortage”.

Not everyone can be a sperm donor: you must be rather rigidly screened for STIs, genetic defects, and mental problems. 

Plus, sperm donors can only donate to 10 families to reduce the risk of accidental inbreeding. 

What’s the problem with unregulated sperm donors?

These aren’t strapping six-foot warriors leading Fortune 500 companies - they’re a wet sock-load of weirdos who (mainly) just want to have sex with women or harbour obsessive fantasies about fathering as many children as is humanly possible. 

Think Elon Musk, but with less money. 

One American man

• Claimed to have fathered 180 children worldwide - from South America to Australia

• Flew to the UK the day he was first contacted just to “donate” sperm 

• Did it all for free

• “Donated” to a woman with an IQ of 75

• Tried to win custody of 4 different children

• Has a goatee. 

Nay, nay we do not desire the semen of such men to be sown into the fabric of Britain’s genetic tapestry.

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TECH
The rural village getting bullied by big tech

The British government overruled a local council to allow the building of a massive data centre on the outskirts of Abbot Langley, a tiny village on the Green Belt. 

What’s the problem? 

The local council didn’t want the data centre to be built because it would spoil the view and local heritage sites. 

And it’s easy to see why, wunderkinds. 

The data centre will be

• 900,000 sq ft

• comprise two buildings, some offices and storage facilities for all the generators and equipment

• capable of delivering 96 MW. 

And it isn’t the first of its kind in this part of Hertfordshire, with approval recently granted for a mega facility just 10 miles from the village. Some think it’ll be the largest cloud and AI data centre in Europe. 

How could the government do it? 

Data centres are now designated as ‘critical national infrastructure’ (CNI), which means they’re not subject to the usual draconian planning restrictions. 

It’s easier to override objections, basically. 

What happens now? 

The developer, Greystoke, is offering local residents little treats to make them feel better:

• £12 million set aside for local education and training

• A country park the size of 25 football pitches on nearby private land.

But local residents don’t really care about treats.

Councillor Giles-Medhurst said, “There is little gain for the village apart from an extra country park and some low-level employment.” 

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NEWS BITES
This just in…

• 💧 🚨 1.3 million East Anglians drank plastic-filled water for 6 months in 2021, and now the company responsible - Anglian Water - has to pay a £1.42 million fine. The investigation found that poor staff training and scant oversight did it. But really, it was the fact that they knowingly coated pipes with unapproved plastic coating, wasn’t it, friends?

• 🍓 📈 This year’s crop of strawberries is 20% bigger thanks to the endless sunshine we’ve been enjoying. Apparently they’ve got more sugar, taste better, and some of them are so big you can’t even fit them in your mouth. Cheeky little things that they are.

• 💻️ 🙃 Remote working is not reducing regional inequality, largely because most remote workers actually work hybrid. Because they commute to the office a few times a week, they live within reach of big employment hubs. 

• 💷 🙅 Supermarkets don’t offer deals and discounts on minimally processed food because fast food lobbyists worked tirelessly until the government dropped their plans. Though the Food and Drink Federation (FDF) lauded their success on their website, they have since removed it for some reason. 

• 🍃 🔼 Demand for green jobs is soaring in London and far outpacing other sectors. In fact, green jobs account for 5% of all job adverts in our dirty great capital. The trouble is we don’t have the people to fill them. 27% of green companies report skills shortages. 

• 🪖 🏠️ The government wants to establish a Home Guard to defend our nuclear plants and airports, similar to schemes in Norway, Denmark, and Sweden. And, of course, our much-heralded “Dad’s Army” of WWII.