My surname, Gill, has been recorded in England since the 13th century. Same with my mother’s maiden name, Hill, which appears in records in the 12th century. It’s insane to say that someone who has arrived in England a few decades ago is as English as me. Stop with this nonsense!

You have no idea how much I resent AI for completely ruining a perfectly good sentence structure: "It's not just x – it's y." You cannot write that anymore. Everyone will assume it's AI or get derailed wondering if it's AI. We've been robbed of an entire sentence form.

Restore Britain will ease fees and rules around spouse visas. If a British man or woman wants to raise a family in Britain with their foreign spouse, we will support that. We will make it easier, quicker, cheaper. Foreign wives and husbands will not be treated like fraudsters and criminals by the Home Office - we will save that for the genuine foreign miscreants. There will be a Red List of countries, through which this liberalisation will definitely NOT apply. Pakistan, Albania, Bangladesh, Somalia, Afghanistan and many, many more. This list will be decided on facts, it will be decided on evidence. We will crush fraud, it will not be tolerated. Cousin marriages will be outlawed, so don’t even try and bring your wifecousin in from Pakistan. Not happening. But if a British man wants to bring his American wife to Britain in order to build a life together, then we will encourage and enable that. Because the current system is expensive, slow, intrusive and disrespectful. It’s easier to jump on a sodding dingy than get a legitimate law-abiding French wife or Australian husband into Britain. Restore Britain will change that. We will restore fairness, decency and competence to the spouse visa system.

Burnham will not rest until everyone is paid above-average wages

I'm increasingly convinced that burnout doesn't come from working long hours or weekends. Burnout comes from working on things that drain your energy with people that do the same.

Farage blaming ‘work from home' for Britain’s troubles is just so lazy, whilst attacking the idea of youngsters seeking a work-life balance. It is predictable and it is boring. For young men and women in modern Britain, finding their way in life is incredibly difficult. No use people of my age telling them that if they stopped buying cappuccinos, they’d all be able to afford a home within a few years. It’s just not true. Wages are stagnant. House prices are high. Interest is excruciating, on mortgages and student loans. Everything costs SO much. Rent bleeds them dry, how on earth are they supposed to save 20k for a deposit, if not far more? What, to buy the leasehold on a dingy flat? They don’t even own it, then get done by service charges and whatever else. Raising a family in Britain is brutally difficult. Childcare is extortionate, so yes - working from home does make that more possible. Good. If British men and women want to have more children, we should be making that as easy as possible. A lawful relationship between an employee and a private employer is none of our businesses. If they decide working from home is workable, then good for them. If not, that’s fine too. From my experience in business, happy workers are good workers. They care. They want the business to succeed. That benefits everyone. A healthy work-life balance is essential. Absolutely essential. Anyone who has run a successful business will tell you that. Politicians of my age are so far away from what young men and women are dealing with. Of course there are many who take the piss, and we should brutally crack down on them. But the good majority of British men and women want to work hard, contribute to society and build a prosperous life for their family. If they do that from their desk at home, or one in the office, I really don’t care.