Jo Kibble (Political Animal)
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politicanimal.bsky.social
Jo Kibble (Political Animal)
@politicanimal.bsky.social
politic_animal from the Musk shop.
Local government policy adviser by day. Timetable wrangler/travel challenge story-teller by day and night. Once branded ‘Twitter’s answer to Phileas Fogg’
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@travelling_turtle?si=WGsuH_ffy0bqKr2
Pinned
I’m going to assume that the alleged breach of the FIFA ethics code is ‘The bribe accepted was far too low.’ www.nytimes.com/athletic/687...
Gianni Infantino accused of breaching FIFA’s ethics codes in relation to President Trump comments
Advocacy group FairSquare has also requested an investigation into President Trump being awarded the inaugural FIFA Peace Prize last Friday.
www.nytimes.com
December 9, 2025 at 8:00 PM
Reposted by Jo Kibble (Political Animal)
Might be worthwhile to expand here. So a cursory glance at a Westminster order paper will tell you that there are a /lot/ of votes at Parliament. That's part of why parties have research teams and whips offices, among other things they literally figure out how your MPs should vote on /everything/
It sounds stupid but it's actually extremely easy to do if you are an independent MP without a research team to preadvise you
December 9, 2025 at 5:43 PM
December 9, 2025 at 4:10 PM
Reposted by Jo Kibble (Political Animal)
Controversy as I don’t hate the new proposed GBR brand and livery.

I think it needs some tweaks (don’t think it works on the intermediate vehicles) but it’s not bad & will no doubt evolve over time and improve.

Happy #GBRDay everyone…

#GBR
December 9, 2025 at 7:56 AM
Look, the bit of Article 1(iv) of the British-Irish Agreement that says that birthright protections don’t apply if you’ve been fined £200 for being drunk and disorderly is in really, really small print. That’s why you haven’t seen it.
December 8, 2025 at 11:10 PM
Beautiful day in York to wander round the Minster, Treasurer’s House and the Walls.
Been a fabulous babymoon (that’s a thing now, apparently), a calm before the storm.

Tempered only very marginally by discovering Grand Central is the only train operator who won’t compensate you for a 37min delay.
December 8, 2025 at 9:16 PM
Weird how he has chosen to ignore the dark blue splodges on Clacton, Great Yarmouth and Grimsby.
The thing about Sam Ashworth-Hayes is he thinks it's fine and good for kids to go hungry and live in poverty provided they're brown.
December 7, 2025 at 5:32 PM
It’s beginning to look a bit like Christmas (at the Castle Museum).
December 7, 2025 at 4:57 PM
Can’t come to York and not pay a visit to Duchess of Hamilton, Evening Star and friends.
December 6, 2025 at 5:32 PM
Lovely to return to childhood honeypot of Knaresborough. While the town itself has sprawled in the last two decades, not much has changed in the Nidd Gorge during that time…
December 6, 2025 at 3:10 PM
Reposted by Jo Kibble (Political Animal)
Beloved franchises like Casablanca
December 6, 2025 at 5:29 AM
Our view for the weekend.
December 6, 2025 at 9:51 AM
Reposted by Jo Kibble (Political Animal)
I do feel that using the word ‘historic’ to describe posts made up to and including April 2025 is a bit of a generous stretch here.

Technically, my lunch yesterday was historic, but I probably wouldn’t describe it that way.
December 5, 2025 at 10:40 PM
Our LNER senior conductor this afternoon (jokingly) announced our arrival into Saint Evenage. Hopefully he will have convinced enough people to create another of these in a few year’s time.
When I moved to South London from Asia, I thought Stockwell was pronounced St Ockwell and celebrated a local saint from the European middle ages. I believed this for almost eight years.
December 5, 2025 at 10:26 PM
At last, someone prepared to speak the hard, unvarnished truth. Nothing but respect for my president.
5 minutes after FIFA gives him a fake medal Trump wants to rename American football.
December 5, 2025 at 8:55 PM
I’m disappointed, obviously, to be overlooked.
But I have it on good authority that I’m very much in line for the World Chess Federation Prize for Chemistry.
December 5, 2025 at 5:55 PM
It is very confusing, given the existence of a real North Pole Depot over at Old Oak Common, that this particular train is actually going to romantic Willesden (the Willesden Up & Down Relief Line, followed by the Willesden Railnet Reception Line, to be strictly accurate).
Platform signs at Euston. Please note the Polar Express is 1. not run by Avanti, so it might actually get there and 2. just next to the Chester train, thus proving Chester is in the north.

cc @jenwilliamsft.bsky.social
December 5, 2025 at 5:50 PM
The moment I have always dreaded just happened. My wife asked me, as we pull in, ‘What county is Peterborough in?’

Good practice in awkward questions for when our child asks ‘Where do babies come from?’
December 5, 2025 at 1:58 PM
Reposted by Jo Kibble (Political Animal)
This is unfair. On the House of Lords
Yep, the Supreme Court really is just a House of Lords—a purely political branch with bizarre veto power, wielded capriciously and without accountability. Time for massive reform.
December 5, 2025 at 2:03 AM
Some very confused Harry Potter-bound tourists on the train who had been informed by their AI of choice to take a Thameslink from Farringdon to Watford Junction.
December 5, 2025 at 12:53 PM
It is a fair criticism, though. Someone in mainland Britain who goes around openly considering Northern Ireland or the frameworks that underpin the peace process there is clearly never going to successfully integrate.
Novara Media - who claim to be left wing - seem to be happily retweeting Reform and agreeing with their racism.
December 5, 2025 at 12:18 PM
Reposted by Jo Kibble (Political Animal)
I've missed walking past a Jamie's Italian and saying "NO HE ISN'T!"
December 5, 2025 at 11:19 AM
There’s a lot in the Child Poverty Strategy which is really, really good, but as so often I am left reading it and trying to identify any substantive parts that couldn’t have been written while in opposition and therefore not, you know, with an 18-month delay on the most urgent of policy areas.
📉 This morning, the government published its full Child Poverty Strategy, setting out plans to reduce hardship for children growing up in the UK by the end of the parliament.

It's a crucial commitment to delivering on one of their central manifesto promises.
December 5, 2025 at 11:08 AM
A 10-minute doze.
December 5, 2025 at 9:49 AM