So, this was the week that Boris Johnson finally admitted his oven ready Brexit deal was nothing of the sort. Except he didn’t. He was probably too busy celebrating the news that the Metropolitan Police aren't taking any further action against him for his law breaking covid parties. Instead, he sent future leadership contender and Foreign Secretary Liz Truss to tell us that the wholly foreseeable issues caused by the Northern Ireland protocol would justify the UK unilaterally rewriting it. Perhaps he thinks he will get off as lightly with this as he has with his covid law breaking. I doubt it. All the signs are that the international community will be less forgiving than the Met.

It is hard to identify the lowlight of the debate on the Queen’s Speech in parliament this week. From the sycophantic speeches by Tory backbenchers proposing and seconding the speech to the nauseating hypocrisy of Tory glee at Keir Starmer’s discomfort over beergate, its been hard to sit through. But on Wednesday we hit a nadir when we had to listen to a short lecture from a red wall Tory on why people need food banks. Apparently, it’s because they don’t know how to cook or budget. 

Westminster is currently prorogued (legally this time) as we await the start of a new parliamentary session next week. On Monday I spent the day walking around my constituency with council candidates and our local organiser speaking to voters. We had a list of former SNP voters who had not bothered to vote at the Scottish elections last year and we wanted to find out why and to see if we could persuade them to vote this time round.

Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter has prompted renewed debate about free speech and how Twitter moderates its content. Musk has described himself as a “free speech absolutist” leading to concerns that Twitter could become a forum used by criminals, bots and others for nefarious purposes and to incite hatred and violence. This would not be desirable. However, unfortunately, Twitter already allows some users to incite hate and violence without sanction and paedophiles to hide in plain sight while algorithms steer them towards the accounts of young children.