Philip Murphy
@philipvmurphy
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Hull-born academic & author of 'The Empire's New Clothes: the Myth of the Commonwealth'. Interested in that sort of thing. Director of @historypolicy
London, England
Joined May 2015
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I have a letter in The Times this morning about an old hobby horse of mine (by which I mean archives rather than The Crown).
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In the latest breach of Cabinet discipline, Alok Sharma say Charles should go to COP27: “Of course, he is head of state in the United Kingdom but he is also head of state in other countries, some of which are very much on the front line of climate change."
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In the Sunday Telegraph today, Micheal Gove talks about British businesses having ‘access to the new opportunities being an independent nation will bring’. Meanwhile, in the real world...
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Rather depressing to see David Lammy claiming he wants Britain to be “outside of the EU but a leader in Europe once again”. It’s all too reminiscent of the UK’s self-deluded rhetoric about Europe in the early postwar years.
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I want to make it clear that I played no part in writing yesterday's speech by Prince William in Jamaica.
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Excellent documentary on
@BBCRadio4
right now about the activities of the right-wing pressure groups operating out of 55 Tufton Street, including links between the Tax Payers’ Alliance and Vote Leave in the Brexit referendum.
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This is a VERY interesting angle on Charles’s non-attendance at COP27. Were the governments of the other Realms consulted?
The British PM stopped our head of state attending the COP 27 conference to speak about the importance of stronger action to combat climate change. We need a head of state that represents the aspirations of the Australian people, not the wishes of the British government.
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It’s now clear that William and Kate’s ill-fated Caribbean tour last month wasn’t an outlier caused by poor planning. This is now likely to be the pattern for royal visits to the region & I expect they’ll peter out. 2022 looks like being a pivotal year.
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My wife, the writer and scholar, Dr Christina Britzolakis, died on 10 December after a long illness which she faced with immense courage. Christina loved children. If you would like to honour her memory, please give a donation to
@savechildrenuk
via
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The Times demonstrates today how the placing of an apostrophe can make the difference between Corbynite rejoicing and rural traditionalist despair.
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The Telegraph spells out the stark, awful truth of the cost-of-living crisis.
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Speaking on the ‘Reporting Royalty’ panel
@CityUniLondon
Omid Scobie,
@scobie
co-author of the Harry & Meghan biography ‘Finding Freedom’ describes royal reporting as a ‘delicate dance’. Not delicate enough for one Palace official who told him “You ended up on the other side”.
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An obituary of my wife, Dr Christina Britzolakis, has been published in the print edition of the Guardian this morning. The digital version is available here:
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A good day to remind ourselves that there are still historical files in the National Archives from the 1950s and ‘60s that remain closed on the basis that they might embarrass the royal family.
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The sentence went on “and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong.” It strikes me as rather silly to censor such a well known passage. It’s the sort of thing right wing culture warriors are always accusing the left of doing.
'I declare before you all that my whole life whether it be long or short shall be devoted to your service'
Princess Elizabeth delivered a radio address on her 21st birthday, recorded in the garden of Government House in Cape Town.
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Personally, I think he should start by opening the archives.
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William’s comment in the Bahamas about respecting ‘your decisions about your future’. This has always been the Palace’s line. Indeed, his grandfather, Prince Philip, set it out more bluntly during a press conference in Canada in 1969 (below, from my Monarchy & the End of Empire).
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The Palace should be careful about briefing in this way. It isn’t Charles’s role to make his own foreign policy. The future of the Commonwealth and the relations of the Realms to Britain are matters for the governments concerned, not the royal family.
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Why Harry and Meghan are right about the Commonwealth. My opinion piece in
@Independent
has just been published
@ICwS_SAS
@SASNews
@UoLondon
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I have a letter in The Times this morning. To be clear, this isn’t about whether one supports republicanism or the monarchy. It’s simply that the other Commonwealth Realms are entirely independent, and it’s not up to the Palace or the UK to determine their constitutional future.
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Stopped off in York on the way up to Hull today. An abiding image of Easter from my childhood is the sight of daffodils beside the city walls.
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Historians of
#decolonization
- did you know that the digitized volumes of the British Documents on the End of Empire series are available on the
@ICwS_SAS
website? Thousands of key documents plus substantial introductions by leading scholars in the field:
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I love these rather despairing entries from Harold Nicolson’s diaries on the challenges of royal biography. I’m not sure QE2 was intrinsically a much more interesting character, but at least she was kept busy from a relatively early age.
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An obituary in The Times today for Yvonne Blenkinsop, the last surviving member of the 4 ‘headscarf revolutionaries’ who in the 1960s fought vested interests to improve safety on the Hull trawlers.
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Interesting review of the Amirandes Hotel in Crete posted on tripadvisor today…
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The British Documents on the End of Empire project, the volumes on which are free to download on our website, is a reminder of how
@ICwS_SAS
@SASNews
has been supporting research on
#Decolonization
for decades & continues to do so.
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I suspect professional historians are more relaxed about these sorts of things than journalists. A good rule of thumb for them is 'When did you last cite a drama series as a source in your footnotes for a refereed article?'
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To date, I make that 3 Home Secretaries and 0 asylum seekers.
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I have a letter in The Times this morning about the government’s plans to send refugees to Rwanda
@HistoryPolicy
@ihr_history
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The Guardian has just published this obituary of my wife, Dr Christina Britzolakis, who died on 10 December. Her funeral takes place on 4 January. To make a contribution to
@savechildrenuk
in her memory, please visit:
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An important letter from
@AnthonySeldon
in
@thetimes
today arguing that we need to see the current crisis of integrity in government as a structural issue, and not merely a failure by individual civil servants confronted by the ‘recent ethical flexibility’.
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Out of power, the parallels between Johnson and Trump continue to mount. Believing they’ve done nothing wrong in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary becomes a sort of shibboleth for their followers, a mental exercise that marks out the truly orthodox cult members.
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Given the current debate about the future of the statue of Winston Churchill in Parliament Square, it’s interesting to revisit this piece I published in
@ConversationUK
in 2015 on the 50th anniversary of his death.
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What do you get if you cross Nineteen Eighty-Four with A Matter of Life and Death?
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Very pleased to announce that History and Policy is returning to its original home
@IHR_history
@SASNews
and I will be taking over as H&P’s new director (in conjunction with my work
@ICwS_SAS
). Great to be involved in this unique network.
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More specifically, according to a recent House of Lords report, “[The] UK’s visa policies are damaging its reputation and the ability of international departments to build and strengthen relationships across Africa".
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Historians will worry (rightly I think) that the behaviour of the Palace over recent news footage doesn’t bode well for its approach to written records. A little thread. It achieved sweeping exemptions from the 2000 Freedom of Information Act reinforced[1]
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Highly significant. Lord Evans is not just chair of the Ctee on Standards in Public Life but a former DG of MI5. He describes yesterday’s vote as ‘a very serious and damaging moment for Parliament and for public standards in this country.’
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Since Rosalynn Carter’s death last week, much has been written about the low-key style of the Carter presidency. This nice little anecdote from the diaries of Trevor Beeson, then Canon of Westminster Abbey, certainly bears that out.
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This story hasn’t aged particularly well.
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Loved the Greek psalms sung by the Byzantine Chant Ensemble as Charles was presented with the Sword of State. Can I suggest the next Coronation is conducted entirely in Greek? It just sounds so… right.
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The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History is currently offering free access to this excellent article by
@redhistorian
. An essential read for the weekend. Don't miss the chance to download it!
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This is such a bizarre article, it could almost be a wind-up. It's couched as a folksy human interest story. But what historians will notice about Mr Whybrew isn't his height but the fact that he is not a trained archivist [Thread 1]
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Did a dry run this morning for the ‘Spy Walk’ I’m going to be leading next week as part of the
@ihr_history
summer school: some inconspicuous London buildings with fascinating histories linked to the British intelligence community. I’ll explain everything on Monday!
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Probably an underestimate of the full cost to the taxpayer of this legal battle against
@andrewlownie
. As Lownie notes, “Prince Harry can leak intimate family secrets from a year ago but historians cannot see files which are a hundred years old.”
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#PeopesVoteMarch
today. 700,000 people, or as
@Channel4News
put it just now, ‘the largest protest march in British history not to be attended by Jeremy Corbyn.’
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If you’re interested in learning more about the secret colonial archives mentioned by
@GeorgeMonbiot
in
@guardian
register for our special online event
@ICwS_SAS
on Friday at which leading historians will talk about what they reveal. Go to:
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Might have been worth going back to the thesaurus on this one.
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PM of St Vincent, Ralph Gonsalves said the response of David Cameron’s govt was that, “‘Look, we're not doing apologies. Let's look forward, let us learn. Let's not look to the past'. There's only one problem with that. The present is the past”.
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‘The revolution in the British economy promised by Leave campaigners six years ago finally seemed to go the way of all revolutionary movements this week: it ended up eating itself.’
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Christina’s funeral was on a particularly bleak, overcast early-January day. This morning there’s at least a bit of colour as the bulbs around her grave start to flower. The sight of the natural world waking up offers some comfort.
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A little historical footnote from my book ‘Monarchy and the End of Empire’ on the fun Whitehall had in 1949 translating ‘Head of the Commonwealth’ into Latin so it could be included in the monarch’s titles.
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If you care about the work that we do PLEASE make your views known to the leadership of the School of Advanced Study and the University of London. If they are serious about the current ‘consultation’ there maybe a chance of reversing this decision.
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There’s something genuinely sinister about the way in which
@ColonialCountr1
is being attacked in the right-wing press. It’s one thing to critique the project. But what the Daily Mail and others seem to be doing is putting targets on the backs of academic colleagues.
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@RevRichardColes
@michaelgove
From long experience of commuting, I’m slightly surprised that anything short of an escaped, man eating tiger rampaging down the aisles would persuade train managers to violate the sanctity of the First Class compartment.
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UK THREATENED BY NEW STRAIN OF OLD ETONIAN. A members of SAGE commented, “We’re used to Old Etonians getting everywhere in Britain and we’ve come to think of them as relatively harmless. But this new variant is shameless, callous and completely incompetent.”
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Delighted to be quoted alongside Norman Baker MP in this important new piece by
@pmillerinfo
in
@declassifiedUK
on the retention of files relating to the royal family. Historians have a duty to push back against this.
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Just finished reading the intensely moving and beautifully written account by
@RevRichardColes
of his recent bereavement. Many passages will stay with me, but here’s just one that has lodged in my consciousness. I imagine it will resonate with believers and unbelievers alike.
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Delighted to announce a new series of online seminars on hosted by
@HistoryPolicy
@ihr_history
in partnership with
@FCDOHistorians
. Over the course of 2024 we'll bring together those who've written, studied and used official history to discuss its value.
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A ‘free trade agreement with Australia would be worth an additional 0.01-0.02 per cent of GDP over 15 years.. “Basically we’re talking about signing off the slow death of British farming so Liz Truss can score a quick political point,” said one insider..’
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'Sorry, Brexiters. Banking on the Commonwealth is a joke' An excerpt from my new book, 'The Empire's New Clothes: the Myth of the Commonwealth' in
@guardian
this morning
@HurstPublishers
@SASNews
@ICwS_SAS
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‘The cabinet secretary raised concerns about Rishi Sunak’s decision to reappoint Suella Braverman as home secretary days after she quit the job for breaking the ministerial code.’ So internal Tory Party politics still trumps proper standards & procedures.
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Delighted to announce that Professor Ludmilla Jordanova
@durham_uni
will be delivering the
@ihr_history
@SASNews
'Historical Research' annual lecture (online) on 'The Accountability of Historians' on Weds 14 July. Book now via the link below:
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I have a letter in The Times this morning following on from the excellent article yesterday by
@AnthonySeldon
on the importance of history in policy-making. The national network of historians in
@HistoryPolicy
@ihr_history
stands ready to help!
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So the Tory ‘Common Sense’ group rides to the defence of the Pogues’ ‘Fairytale of New York’ suggesting that the BBC’s decision to censor it is an attack on British traditions. There is, of course a delicious irony here. [thread]
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The 1988 album on which the track appeared also contained a song about the Birmingham Six, which was banned under the Thatcher government’s 1981 Broadcasting Act for claiming they’d been ‘tortured and framed’ which, err, they had. Will the ‘Common Sense’ Group apologise for this?
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Nice that Penny Mordaunt’s leadership pitch is set to a melody by Gustav Holst - an English-born composer of Latvian, Swedish and German descent. An important reminder of how the UK has been constantly enriched by its links with continental Europe.
Our leadership has to change. It needs to become a little less about the leader and a lot more about the ship.
#pm4pm
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Completely wrong. We need:
1. Candlelight
2. Incense (lots)
3. Byzantine Chant
4. More creepy hooded figures in the background
5. Filming solely in grainy back & white
6. Revival of the King’s Champion (to be formally challenged by
@GrahamSmith_
)
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If the definition of extremism is to include seeking to “overturn or undermine the UK’s democracy, its institutions and values”, then unlawfully advising the Queen the prorogue parliament would surely fall within its remit?
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If I were Sunak, I’d sack Braverman before the Sunday papers go to print.
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Worth saying that if the UK has a narrowly blinkered approach to its history which excludes Empire, closing the Institute of Commonwealth Studies
@ICwS_SAS
a major focus for the study of imperialism & Decolonization isn’t going to help.
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Makes sense of one of the strangest ministerial resignation letters of recent times. And it reflects incredibly badly on Braverman in terms of both a) the leak itself & b) her vindictive response to being sacked. Casts further doubt on Sunak’s judgement.
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"If you want a vision of the future after Brexit, Winston, imagine sitting in the dark, hopeless cavern of a Wetherspoons pub on a sunny day - forever."
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A fine bit of detective work. Worth reading the original correspondence linked to the article. The official, Mr Drukker, comes across as a bit of a hero, refusing to fold in the face of pressure from an overbearing Palace emissary.
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Almost every pub in England seems to have its own Lee Anderson, propping up the bar and boring for Britain. That’s why they invented jukeboxes.
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Striking to hear Lord Evans, outgoing chair of the Committee on Standards in Public Life & former head of MI5, speaking at
@instituteforgov
this afternoon, expressing concern about lack of action on foreign funding of political parties (where "standards meet national security").
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Another reason to love Dorothy Parker: when she died in 1967 she left her money to Martin Luther King. On his death, it passed to the NAACP as did her ashes which were buried in the grounds of its HQ in Baltimore. Now they’re moving & she might come too.
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Extraordinary moment this morning (8.23) when Nick Robinson tells Suella Braverman, “…you’ve attacked the homeless, you’ve attacked migrants as being part of an invasion. Isn’t the truth that you’re a headline grabber who does it by spreading poison even within your own party?”
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Alberto Costa begins his questioning of Johnson with elaborate courtesy. A sure sign of someone about to go in for the kill.
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@ihr_history
Count yourself lucky. This is a photo of what the floor of the director's office
@ICwS_SAS
currently looks like.
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An important and worrying story this morning from
@NatashaLgstone
.
@andrewlownie
and I are quoted expressing concern at the news that a number of files on the royal family that had previously been released to the National Archives have been closed again.
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Warmest congratulations to
@andrewlownie
on this tremendous victory. All contemporary historians owe him a huge debt of gratitude. Thanks too to all who supported him including Julian Lewis MP for raising the matter in the Commons.
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Quite extraordinary image. Gary Powers as Icarus/Lucifer descending between the shining white angels of Soviet science and the heavenly armies defending the Motherland.
On this day in 1960: The U-2 spy plane of American pilot Gary Powers was shot down near Sverdlovsk (now called Yekaterinburg) during a mission in Soviet airspace
This mural is in the city's railway station
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An important new article from
@HistoryPolicy
@ihr_history
by Dr Alison McClean
@BristolUni
. Thousands of previously declassified files have been closed at the National Archives in a process that is both opaque and contrary to the spirit of FOI legislation.
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I start a new year with the haunting Greek Orthodox funeral prayers still echoing in my mind: “To the soul of Your servant, Christina, give rest in a place of light, in a place of green pasture, in a place of refreshment, from where pain and sorrow and mourning are fled away”.
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Hull Minster’s splendid medieval font, carved in the 1380s, in which William Wilberforce was baptised in 1759.
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Looking at some files on the immigration policies of the first Blair government. Interesting that there was initially a sceptical response in Downing Street to what was to become the ‘Life in the UK’ test.
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The National Council of St Vincent and the Grenadines said “We as a community feel that the royal family and Buckingham Palace must rethink the future of royal tours following previous visits, given their involvement in the treatment of people of colour.”
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We know that the family has a history of actually destroying material it finds embarrassing. And it maintains that the royal archives are a 'private' rather than a state collection. So we need some assurances that "Tall Paul" will follow the highest professional standards.
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Here’s one to remember if anyone ever asks you for an example of a sentence that would mean the opposite if it didn’t include a colon.
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@redhistorian
There’s also a perverse hope that because Johnson shares some of Churchill’s faults - he’s irresponsible, erratic, self-indulgent, & disloyal - some magic will turn these characteristics into those of a great leader. But the wand’s been waved & the pumpkin’s still a pumpkin.
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