SubscriptionsColumn / Investigation: Crypto Politics
Dark money, lobbying, regulatory capture, state institutions hollowed by donor factions, foreign interference, and the financialisation of political power.
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North Loses Out as Government Replaces EU ‘Shared Prosperity Fund’
Sam Bright and Tom Robinson calculate the reductions in UK regional development spending, compared to the equivalent EU scheme
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Young People As Prime Targets: Student Loan Hike is the Latest Frontier of the Conservative ‘Culture War’
By allowing student loan debt to soar, the Government is seeking yet more division between young and old, says Maheen Behrana
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Post-Brexit Britain: A Rotting, Corrupted State
Chris Grey explores why the UK’s departure from the EU cannot be separated from other challenging political and public developments in Britain today
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Resigning Matters: By Failing to Step Down, Johnson has Put Democracy on Standby
Prime Minister Boris Johnson in March 2022. Photo: Alberto Pezzali/PA/Alamy
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The ‘Big Power Off’ and the Importance of Fact-Checking
Katherine Denkinson explores the genesis of the protest against rising fuel costs and the media’s unwitting part in promoting untruths
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Conservatives’ ‘Partygate’ Impunity for Johnson Shows the Entire British Constitution is Now At Stake
If the governing party proves that those in power can get away with anything, the essential contract between leaders and their people will be ruptured for good, says Jonathan Lis
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Parts of the Media Are Waging Psychological Warfare Against the Public
Sections of the newspaper industry, aided by broadcasters, are engaged in a ‘hyperdistortion’ effort to conceal the crimes of those in power, says Sam Bright
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Political Parties Must Not Pave the Way for Perpetrators in Power
Parties must not turn a blind eye to protecting the public from perpetrators, says Jenn Selby
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The Broken Brexit Promises Leaving Loved Ones In Limbo
Sian Norris reports on how delays to family permits for spouses, parents and children of EU nationals and British citizens in the UK are causing families untold emotional distress
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Above and Beyond the Law: ‘Partygate’ has Fatally Exposed Britain’s Political System
In a succession of scandals, Boris Johnson has opened the floodgates to wrongdoing and impunity by politicians like never before – aided by his lawless friends in the British press and a sclerotic constitution
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Private Schools Attended by Cabinet Ministers Increase Assets by £300 Million in Six Years
Sam Bright and Sascha Lavin report on the burgeoning wealth of Britain’s elite, fee-paying institutions, and the character of the politicians they have created
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Wage Stagnation and the Conservative Party’s Ideological War on Workers
The current cost of living crisis can be placed firmly in the context of the Conservative Party’s antipathy to the strife of the working class, says Thomas Perrett
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Voters Don’t Trust Johnson to Tell the Truth After ‘Partygate’
An exclusive poll for Byline Times suggests the Prime Minister may still pay the price for lockdown-breaking parties on his watch
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‘Another Shocking Example of Waste’: UK Spends At Least £23.4 Million to Dispose of Unused PPE
The Government has spent billions on PPE from the private sector, and is now spending tens of millions recycling the equipment it doesn’t need, Sam Bright and John Lubbock report
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How an Influential Pro-Russian Business Network Worked Silently Within Westminster for Decades
TJ Cole explores how the Russo-British Chamber of Commerce has attempted to shape UK politics and trade for more than a century
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How Hungary’s LGBT Activists Took on the State and Won
In an exclusive UK interview with Sian Norris, Hungarian LGBTIQ activists tell how a campaign filled with hope and collaboration stopped Orbán from winning an ugly referendum
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The Non-Dom Conservative Oligarchy
Playboys and plutocrats are now the natural constituency of Boris Johnson’s party, argues Sam Bright
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Rishi Sunak’s Family Tax Affairs Raise Questions He Can’t Avoid
We need to know how the Chancellor can defend raising taxes for ordinary Britons while his own family avoids paying large sums in taxes, argues Adam Bienkov
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Has Austerity Made it Harder to Find Dirty Money?
Sian Norris asks if cuts to the criminal justice system, and wealthy oligarchs spending big bucks on the best lawyers to protect their riches, have impacted efforts to go after financial crime
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Levelling Down: Government Energy Inaction Will Hit the Poorest People and Regions
Spiralling household costs will undermine Boris Johnson’s promises to ‘Red Wall’ voters, reports Thomas Perrett
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How Johnson’s Government is Using Oligarchs in its Attempt to Rebuild the ‘Red Wall’
Sam Bright and Sascha Lavin explore how the Government is inviting questionable regimes into Britain’s former industrial heartlands
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All the Conservative Manifesto Promises Boris Johnson has Broken
The Prime Minister’s promise not to raise National Insurance is the latest in a growing list of ripped up pledges from his 2019 manifesto, reports Adam Bienkov
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Backwards Britain: Having Rejected a European Future, We Can Only Hark Back to an Imperial Past
Hardeep Matharu explores how the Russian invasion of Ukraine has exposed the UK’s perilous retreat – at a time when collaboration and a new vision of itself is required to navigate the dangerous realities of a changing world
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How the French Far-Right Is Copying the Digital Campaigning Tricks of Brexit
A new report into Eric Zemmour’s social media in the run-up to the French elections shows how Britain’s Leave campaigns during the EU referendum created a controversial template
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‘De-Nazification’ and Putin’s Disinformation War
Using an example of local vigilante violence in Ukraine and its exploitation by Putin’s propaganda machine, Max Colbert explores Russian disinformation techniques
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Selling Smoke: The Forgotten Child Victims of Taliban Rule
A cruel new era of Taliban rule is turning the clock back in Afghanistan. Angelo Calianno reports from Bamiyan, where more than the world-famous giant Buddhas were destroyed
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Equality and Human Rights Commission Should Be Defending Our Rights – Instead it Sits on its Hands
Brian Cathcart explores the abject failure of our official watchdog to challenge the Government’s onslaught on human rights
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Boris Johnson Told to ‘Come Clean’ after Hinting he will Ignore Vote to Release Lebedev Security Papers
Exclusive: Labour tells Byline Times that Johnson will be in contempt of Parliament if he hides security service advice he received about the son of a former KGB agent, reports Adam Bienkov
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Boris Johnson Could Block Release of Security Advice on Evgeny Lebedev
The Prime Minister’s spokesman said release of security advice about Lebedev may not be ‘in the public interest’, reports Adam Bienkov
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Putin’s Gulag-Based Empire of Abduction, Deportation, and Modern Slavery
Brad Blitz and Alexandra Lewis explain how Russia’s mass deportation of Ukrainians is not an accident, but central to the ‘Ru.Lag’ – the Kremlin’s new form of political and economic control
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Sanctioned Russian Firms Allowed to Flaunt Human Rights, Anti-Corruption Credentials by UN
Have Kremlin-backed companies used the international peace system to launder their reputations? Dimitris Dimitriadis explores
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Sunak’s Russia Spin Shows He’s No Different to Johnson
The Chancellor is debasing public standards and ethics in exactly the same way as his boss, argues Rachel Morris
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Very Inefficient Process: Watchdog Exposes Government’s PPE Failures
The National Audit Office has produced more shocking statistics on the £13 billion of contracts awarded to personal protective equipment suppliers, reports Sam Bright
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Chancellor Rishi Sunak in New Financial Connection to Russia
Sam Bright explores the links between a firm owned by Sunak’s wife and a Russian billionaire
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Boris Johnson’s Partygate Lies Have Brought Disgrace to his Office
The Prime Minister repeatedly lied to Parliament and the public about the lawbreaking that took place in his own house, reports Adam Bienkov
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Ukraine Changes Everything: The Collapse of Boris Johnson’s Brexit World Order
Professor Chris Painter sees Putin’s invasion of his neighbour as a major turning point in history, with the values of multilateralism and an activist state set to break the spell of Johnsonian politics
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‘Government Risks Damaging Democracy for Generations to Come’, Warns New Report on Citizenship Education
Citizenship should be redefined to promote a more positive form of it and should not be linked with opposing extremism, according to peers
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‘Close to Useless in Every Way’: The Government is Pursuing Economic and Climate Disaster
Thomas Perrett reviews Rishi Sunak’s Spring Statement and how it affects the UK’s climate change commitments
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The Flawed Logic of Extreme Australia Free Trade Deal Optimism
Ben Ramanauskas critiques the outlandish ideas of influential Brexit economist Professor Patrick Minford Several weeks ago, Professor Patrick Minford of Cardiff University – one of the most influential economists in pro-Brexit circles – claimed that the UK’s free trade deal with Australia would be worth £69 billion to the UK economy, the equivalent of 3% of GDP.…
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28 Days: 28 Pictures – Documenting the War in Ukraine
Tom Mutch has spent the first month of Russia’s war against Ukraine depicting the lives of ordinary people facing Vladimir Putin’s onslaught, and it is a portrait of both horror and hope
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‘Profiting from Putin’s Russia’: Quarter of Council Pension Funds Invested in Russian Firms
Sascha Lavin reviews the extent to which UK councils have propped up the companies linked to Putin’s war effort
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Conservative MP Takes £22,000 Second Job For American Group Linked to Anti-Abortion Campaigns
The backlash over the secondary employment of MPs rolls on, as Sam Bright and Sian Norris reveal the lucrative role of one backbench Conservative
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All the Bad News Rishi Sunak Buried in his Spring Statement
Finer details in the Chancellor’s budget statement reveal that taxes will rise, incomes will fall, and the young and poor will pay the price
